John Harrison Wilson, The life of Charles Henry Dana

[305] soon as one paper was disposed of, he took another in hand, and thus without losing a minute from hour to hour kept at his task till it was completed. Untiring, methodical, and possessed of an infallible memory, I have never met a man in any walk of life who concentrated himself more completely upon his work, or got through it with less friction or greater rapidity than he did. In this respect he was the admiration of the department. As he was uniformly self-contained and courteous, never impatient nor violent, every one, civilian and soldier alike, having business with any of the bureaus, took it by preference to him, and never by any chance to the secretary, if he could be avoided. Thus it will be seen that Dana was at once the breakwater and the channel to that imperious official; but with all Dana's suavity and skill, it will be readily perceived that his position was by no means an enviable one.

It was to this five months tour of duty in the War Department, during the winter of 1863-64, that Dana was indebted for his intimate acquaintance with Stanton. Previously their meetings were casual, but now official business brought them daily and sometimes hourly in contact with each other. As the assistant secretary was always master over his own temper, and never overawed or confused by the furious outbursts which at times so sadly marred the secretary's behavior, these frequent meetings gave Dana an opportunity to study the character and idiosyncrasies of his chief under conditions which were open to but few others. Judged by his work, and the success which crowned it, it must be admitted that Stanton was one of the strongest and greatest men of his time, but Dana, not only that winter but afterwards, admitted that had the secretary known how to control his temper, and to act with common courtesy, he would have been a still greater man, and might well have been called upon