Diary of Gideon Welles: Saturday, October 1, 1864

The President yesterday made inquiry of me as to the disposition made of Farragut. Informed me that General Canby wanted him to remain at Mobile, and that F. preferred doing so to coming to Wilmington. I told him Farragut was relieved of the latter duty, and he could remain as long as he pleased in the Gulf. This morning the President called at the Navy Department and made further inquiry. Said that Halleck and Sherman had some movements on hand, and the War Department also, and would like to know if F. could remain. I told him he could.

Shortly after he left, two dispatches from Admiral Farragut came on to my table, received by this morning's mail, in which he expressed decided aversion to taking command at Wilmington.

These dispatches inform me that General Canby has an expedition on foot for the capture of Mobile, that he is getting troops for this purpose, etc., all of which has been studiously kept from the Navy Department, and now when ready to move, they are embarrassed. I immediately went over to the War Department and the President was there. He was, I soon saw, but slightly informed of the proposed army movement, but Stanton and Halleck, finding they had refined too much, had communicated hastily with him, in order that he should see me.

All this is bad administration. There will be want of unity and concert under such management. It is not because the President has any want of confidence in his Cabinet, but Seward and Stanton both endeavor to avoid Cabinet consultations on questions of their own Departments. It has been so from the beginning on the part of the Secretary of State, who spends more or less of every day with the President and worms from him all the information he possesses and can be induced to impart. A disposition to constantly intermeddle with other Departments, to pry into them and often to control and sometimes counteract them, has manifested itself throughout, often involving himself and others in difficulty. Chase for some time was annoyed that things were so but at length went into competition for the President's ear and company. He did not succeed, however, as against Seward, though adopting his policy of constant attendance. Stanton has been for the departmental system always. Pressing, assuming, violent, and impatient, intriguing, harsh, and arbitrary, he is often exceedingly offensive in his manners, deportment, and many of his acts.

A majority of the friends of the Administration in the last Congress was opposed to the President, but his opponents were the cronies and intimates of Stanton, or Chase, who, however, were not cordial towards one another or in anything but in their hostility to the President. Stanton kept on more intimate terms with the President, while his friends were the most violent in their enmity. Wade, Winter Davis, and men of that description were Stanton's particular favorites and in constant consultation with him.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, p. 165-6