[248] among the officers of higher rank. Hon. Charles A. Dana, who as Assistant-Secretary of War was with the army during the early days at Petersburg, in one of his reports to Secretary Stanton, made the following vigorous statements concerning General Meade's faults of temper:
A change in the commander of the Army of the Potomac now seems probable.
Grant has great confidence in Meade, and is much attached to him personally, but the almost universal dislike of Meade which prevails among the officers of every rank who come in contact with him, and the difficulty of doing business with him felt by every one except Grant himself, so greatly impair his capacities for usefulness and render success under his command so doubtful that Grant seems to be coming to the conviction that he must be relieved. * * I have long known Meade to be a man of the worst possible temper, especially toward his subordinates.
I do not think he has a friend in the whole army.
No man, no matter what his business or his service, approaches him without being insulted in one way or another, and his own staff-officers do not dare to speak to him unless first spoken to, for fear of either sneers or curses.
The latter, however, I have never heard him indulge in very violently, but he is said to apply them often without occasion and without reason. * * *
Toward the end there is a discernible modification of the better feeling against Meade; nevertheless, it is certain that he never became a popular commander, either with the officers or men of his army, though his military capacity was recognized and respected by all.
While Mr. Dana's characterization of General Meade's dictatorial manners undoubtedly conveyed the truth to the Secretary of War, and accurately diagnosed the feeling toward him in the army, it yet appears that in carrying forward his military operations this hotheaded commander, so quick at trigger in personal matters, never acted upon impulse, and never lost his equipoise; every movement in important or dangerous crisis seems to have been dictated only by the most cool and dispassionate judgment.
So tenacious and clear of purpose was he that no amount of pressure or nagging from his superiors could sway General Meade to act against his judgment of the necessities of a given military situation.
