Ulysses S. Grant's real name is Hiram Ulysses Grant

In his younger years, he wouldn't have known who you were talking about if you called him Ulysses S. Grant. Hannah Simpson Grant and tanner Jesse Root Grant welcomed Hiram Ulysses Grant into the world on April 27, 1822, in Point Pleasant, Ohio. This is an interesting fact about Ulysses S. Grant. As a young lad, the young Ulysses did go by his middle name, but the name that is remembered in history books was given to him after he was selected by Ohio congressman Thomas Hamer to attend West Point.

In 1839, Ulysses S. Grant's name was accidentally entered as "Ulysses S. Grant," with the "S" standing for Grant's mother's maiden name, Simpson. This happened because Grant's father, an old friend of Grant's father, did Ulysses a favor by nominating him for enrollment at the prestigious military academy.

The name Grant stayed because the young Grant accepted the clerical error despite his low social background. Even as a nickname, his peers referred to him as "Sam." Later, in a letter to his future wife Julia in 1844, he made fun of the fact that he had an "S" in his name and didn't know what it stood for. He quipped, "Find some name beginning with "S" for me." Grant is not the first president with a peculiar middle name, by the way. The middle initial of Harry S. Truman was similarly a simple "S."