Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant; April 27, 1822 - July 23, 1885) was the 18th President of the United States (1869-1877) following his highly successful role as a war general in the second half of the Civil War. Under Grant, the Union Army defeated the Confederate military; the war, and secession, ended with the surrender of Robert E. Lee's army at Appomattox. As president he led the Radical Republicans in their effort to eliminate all vestiges of Confederate nationalism and slavery. Upset over uncontrolled violence in the South and wanting to protect African American citizenship, President Grant effectively destroyed the Ku Klux Klan in 1871. Grant was the first President to establish Civil Service reform, creating a two-year federally funded Civil Service Commission in 1871