Diary of Gideon Welles, Monday, August 6, 1866

Am beset by disappointed naval officers who think they have not had due promotion. This may be the case with some, but the more I examine the whole ground the better satisfied I am with the action taken. One of the most afflicted is Commodore Hitchcock, an old schoolboy friend, a good officer in peaceable times and an exemplary man in every respect, who has well performed ordnance duty, but who has no war record, no ambition but to live at ease and in style, proud and gentlemanly. He has taken such excellent care of himself during the War—done so little in the heroic line—that he is dissatisfied with the result when heroes are to be rewarded.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 2: April 1, 1864 — December 31, 1866, pp. 571-2