Jay Stone (c. 1851–1932) was the 'Chief of the Correspondence Division' in the

United States War Department The United States Department of War, also called the War Department (and occasionally War Office in the early years), was the United States Cabinet department originally responsible for the operation and maintenance of the United States Army, als ...

in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In a period without 'Assistant Secretaries', this was the second highest-ranking civil service position in this cabinet-level department, under the Chief Clerk (who sometimes served as Acting Secretary of War). Stone retired in 1928 as the department's longest-serving civilian employee (50 years). Born in

Bangor, Maine Bangor ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Penobscot County, Maine, United States. The city proper has a population of 31,753, making it the state's List of municipalities in Maine, third-most populous city, behind Portland, Maine, Portland ...

, Stone enlisted in the cavalry at 18 and went west. In 1877, he was chosen as "phonographic reporter and Indian interpreter" to Gen. Alfred H. Terry's Commission sent to negotiate with Sioux chief

Sitting Bull Sitting Bull ( ; December 15, 1890) was a Hunkpapa Lakota people, Lakota leader who led his people during years of resistance against Federal government of the United States, United States government policies. Sitting Bull was killed by Indian ...

, who had fled to Canada after winning the

Battle of the Little Big Horn The Battle of the Little Bighorn, known to the Lakota and other Plains Indians as the Battle of the Greasy Grass, and commonly referred to as Custer's Last Stand, was an armed engagement between combined forces of the Lakota Sioux, Northern C ...

. Stone had learned the new skill of

stenography Shorthand is an abbreviated symbolic writing method that increases speed and brevity of writing as compared to longhand, a more common method of writing a language. The process of writing in shorthand is called stenography, from the Greek ''s ...

(then called phonography), and, according to a newspaper report, was the first stenographer ever employed by the War Department. He continued for some time to work at Terry's headquarters, but by 1881 was listed as the 'private secretary' to Secretary of War

Robert Todd Lincoln Robert Todd Lincoln (August 1, 1843 – July 26, 1926) was an American lawyer and businessman. The eldest son of President Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln, he was the only one of their four children to survive past the teenage years ...

(the President's son) in the administration of

James Garfield James Abram Garfield (November 19, 1831 – September 19, 1881) was the 20th president of the United States, serving from March 1881 until Assassination of James A. Garfield, his death in September that year after being shot two months ea ...

. Stone was on Garfield's funeral train after his assassination that same year. Secretary of War Lincoln stayed on in the administration of

Chester Arthur Chester Alan Arthur (October 5, 1829 – November 18, 1886) was the 21st president of the United States, serving from 1881 to 1885. He was a Republican from New York who previously served as the 20th vice president under President James A. ...

, and Stone was promoted to 'Chief of the Correspondence Division'. In 1882 he became Acting Chief Clerk during a leave of absence of Chief Clerk John Tweedale. Stone would take dictation for three Secretaries of War before being sent to New York to serve as Chief Clerk of the

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers The United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is the military engineering branch of the United States Army. A direct reporting unit (DRU), it has three primary mission areas: Engineer Regiment, military construction, and civil wor ...

, the post from which he retired.Gastonia (NC) Daily Gazette, Mar. 26, 1928, p. 5

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stone, Jay 1850s births 1932 deaths People from Bangor, Maine United States Department of War officials