REMINISCENCES OF MEN AND EVENTS OF THE CIVIL WAR.
By Charles A. Dana,
Assistant Secretary of War from 1863 to 1865.
ILLUSTRATED WITH PORTRAITS FROM THE WAR DEPARTMENT COLLECTION OF CIVIL WAR PHOTOGRAPHS.
I.
FROM THE "TRIBUNE" TO THE WAR DEPARTMENT
HAD been associated with Horace Greeley on the New York "Tribune" for about fifteen years when, one morning early in April, 1862, Mr. Sinclair, the advertising manager of the paper, came to me saying that Mr. Greeley would be glad to have me resign. I asked one of my associates to find from Mr. Greeley if it was really his wish. In a few hours he came to me saying that I had better go. I stayed the day out, in order to make up the paper and give them an opportunity to find a successor, but I never went into the office after that. I think I owned a fifth of the paper—twenty shares—at that time; this stock my colleagues bought.
Mr. Greeley never gave a reason for dismissing me, nor did I ever ask for one. I know, though, that the real explanation was that while he was for peace I was for war, and that as long as I staid on the "Tribune" there was a spirit there which was not his spirit—that he did not like.
My retirement from the "Tribune" was talked of in the newspapers for a day or two,[1] and brought me a letter from the Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton, saying he would like to employ me in the War Department. I had already met Mr. Lincoln, and had carried on a brief correspondence with Mr. Stanton. My meeting with Mr. Lincoln was shortly after his inauguration. He had appointed Mr. Seward to be his Secretary of State, and some of the Republican leaders of New York who had been instrumental in preventing Mr. Seward's nomination to the Presidency and in securing that of Mr. Lincoln, had begun to fear that they would be left out in the cold in the distribution of the offices. General James S. Wadsworth, George Opdyke, Lucius Robinson, T. B. Carroll, and Henry B. Stanton were among the number of these gentlemen. Their apprehensions were somewhat mitigated by the fact that Mr. Chase, to whom we were all friendly, was Secretary of the Treasury. But, notwithstanding, they were afraid that the superior tact and pertinacity of Mr. Seward and of Mr. Thurlow Weed, Seward's close friend and the political manager of the Republican party, would get the upper hand, and that the power of the Federal administration would
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AN EDITORIAL CHANGE.
It seems to be generally understood, and we believe it is true, that Charles A. Dana, Esq., who has been for the last fifteen years managing editor of the "Tribune," has withdrawn from that position, and dissolved his connection with that journal.
The reasons of this step are not known to us, nor are they proper subjects of public comment.
We presume, however, that Mr. Dana intends to withdraw from journalism altogether and devote himself to the more congenial pursuits of literature. He is one of the ablest and most accomplished gentlemen connected with the newspaper press. The ranks of the profession are not sufficiently crowded with such members to render his departure from it a matter of indifference.
The "Albion" makes the following just and merited notice of this incident:
"The daily press of this city has sustained—for a time at least—a serious loss in the discontinuance of Mr. Charles A. Dana's editorial connection with the 'Tribune.' Differing as we almost invariably have done with the policy and the tenets of that paper, and having been drawn at intervals into controversy with it, we should nevertheless omit both a pleasure and a duty if we failed to put on record our grateful sense of many professional courtesies experienced at Mr. Dana's hands.
"Remembering also that during the palmy days of the New York Press Club, no member of that association was more personally popular than this our genial and scholarly friend, we do but unite, we are sure, with all our brethren in hoping that he will not long absent himself from the ranks. Should he, however, hold aloof from a difficult and thankless office, his taste and abilities are certain to bring him most honorably before the public in some other department of letters. Such as he cannot hide their light under a bushel."—"The Times," New York, April 6, 1862.
