 He was orphaned young and raised by his guardian, a man named McAleer.He attended both public and private schools, spent two years at Manhattan College, another year studying in Germany, and two more at Columbia Law School.Though the earliest data, including the United States census of 1860 and 1870 and Grant's 1878 passport application, establish his birth year as 1858, early in his political career he began to present himself as born several years earlier in 1852 or 1853, perhaps to avoid calling attention to his youth.