Robert C. Richardson

When at last the colonies found themselves free, and realized that they were in no immediate danger from any foe, the thoughts of the people, so long occupied with war, eagerly turned toward the establishment of their new government. It was only natural that the Army, weary of the long struggle for independence, should gladly welcome their release from service, and resume once again the peaceful pursuits of civil life. For seven long years their days had been filled with arduous marches through heat and through snow, with tedious vigils on outposts, or with bloody encounters with the British, and the great mass of the people joyfully hailed the piping times of peace, and without ado they turned their battle-axes into billhooks, and their helmets into beehives.

It could not be expected that during the reaction that followed the Revolution much attention would be given to the subject of military education. As a matter of fact, for seven years this question was allowed to sleep; but Washington, ever on the alert for the welfare of the new country, suggested in his annual message of 1790 to the Congress the establishment of a National Military Academy. In spite of the great prestige that he enjoyed both as President and as the man who had successfully waged the Revolution, his words were not heeded by Congress until some years afterwards.

The Congress of those days apparently was like our own and needed to have a matter brought to its attention many times before any definite action was taken. Washington undoubtedly appreciated this condition for we find that on numerous occasions he spoke of his plan, telling Congress that “it is an inquiry that cannot be too strongly pursued.” His efforts were not without reward, for in 1794 the grade of Cadet was created, and a military school was established at West Point. This school was composed of the cadets who were by law attached to the Engineer and Artillery Corps of the garrison. In each company there were two of these young men styled “cadets of the Service,” whom the Government aimed to train to become commissioned officers of the Army. There was, however, no organization to the school, nor scientific system of instruction, so that the cadets did about as they pleased, pursuing their studies in a desultory manner.

It was not until the 16th of March, 1802, that the United States Military Academy was definitely established by law. Congress then authorized the President to organize the Corps of Engineers whose cadre contained, in addition to the officers, ten cadets. West Point was designated as the station of the Corps which was to constitute the Military Academy. The next year forty cadets, to be appointed from the artillery troops of the Army, were added and in 1808, 156 additional men.

During the first ten years of its existence the Military Academy was in a most chaotic condition. It was in reality “a foundling barely existing among the mountains, out of sight of, and almost unknown to, its legitimate parents.” It is greatly to be wondered at that the Academy ever survived the terrible throes of its birth. Almost no provisions for its existence were made by Congress. The cadets were lodged in an old barrack of the Revolution, called the “Long Barrack,” that occupied the site of the present hotel, and their instruction was given in a wooden building called the “Academy” that stood on the spot of the present Superintendent’s quarters. They were allowed to board around promiscuously, really living from hand to mouth. Among the student body there was very little discipline, but a great deal of idleness and dissipation.

In 1812, a new law placed the school on a firm basis and furnished the principles upon which the institution has been conducted to this moment. Two hundred and fifty cadets were authorized and the respectable sum of twenty-five thousand dollars appropriated for buildings. To offset this good fortune, the Academy had to fight against the hostility of Madison’s Secretary of War, Eustis, who tried his utmost to strangle the new-born institution. But happily the exigencies of the War of 1812 frustrated his hostile designs.

Despite insuperable difficulties, the Academy began to grow, not scientifically, but in a muddling sort of way. Where the Superintendent had heretofore been a rover up and down the Hudson Posts, he now became permanently located at West Point. The professors began to work together with more harmony, going so far as to recommend a broadly planned course that included most of the subjects studied today. By the Regulations of 1815, the cadets were required to mess at a common table, instead of boarding at private houses, their age limit was fixed at fourteen to twenty, and their uniform was definitely prescribed. A little order was being brought out of chaos. Annual vacations were granted, to commence immediately after the examination in July and to end on the first day of August. Notwithstanding the excellence of the above features, the general condition of this infant school was far from satisfactory. A picture of its inner life is revealed in a letter written in 1815 by Andrew Ellicott, the Professor of Mathematics, to the Secretary of War, in which he states:

Until I came here the Academy was abandoned by the Professors and a great part of the students from the first of December until, the first of April following every year. This practice I immediately put a stop to, and kept the Academy open two winters, not even excluding Sundays, without the aid of any other Professor or regular assistant. The winter before last, I kept together more than twenty students, 16 of whom were commissioned last July, and last winter more than 80, some of whom would do credit to any country or nation, and will be found among our future rulers. These extra services are not ideal—they are substantial.

Although Professor Ellicott rather emphasizes his assiduity in his application for extra compensation we must be grateful, at least, for the glimpse he gives us of the state of affairs in 1815.

Better days, however, were in store for West Point. That the War Department was not entirely insensible to the handicap under which those at West Point were working, is proven by the circumstance that at this particular time there was in Europe an officer, Major Sylvanus Thayer, who had been sent abroad “to prosecute inquiries and examinations calculated for his improvement in the military art.” He was given five thousand dollars for the collection of books, maps, and instruments for the Military Academy. Shortly after his return, he was made Superintendent, relieving Captain Alden Partridge whose administration had not been popular nor very successful. Although Captain Partridge was much criticized by the professors and cadets his farewell address to the “Gentlemen Cadets of the Military Academy” was so high-minded that I am tempted to quote it in full:

Before I take my leave of you, gentlemen, permit me to impress anew upon your minds some precepts to which I have frequently before this called your attention. Be attentive to your studies, and correct and gentlemanly in your deportment. Pursue with undeviating course the paths of virtue and true honor; and rest assured that although the vicious and the vain may affect to ridicule and despise, they will inwardly respect you, and that you will thereby ensure the applause of the good and the great, and, which is of more importance, the approbation of your consciences and of your God.

With the advent of Major Thayer began the golden age of the Academy. This officer was a veteran of the War of 1812 in which he had served with great distinction; he had studied the military schools of France, and had profited by his unusual opportunities to acquire a profound knowledge concerning the conduct of an institution such as the military school over which he was chief.

The great talents that Major Thayer possessed were well employed. For sixteen years he shaped the destiny of the Academy, and with such wisdom and foresight that the broad fundamental principles which he laid down for the school’s guidance, govern the institution today.

Major Sylvanus Thayer
“The Father of the Military Academy”

From the Painting by Thomas Sully, Library U.S.M.A.

To him, more than to any one man, is due the elevation of the Military Academy to its high rank among schools of learning both in this country and abroad.

Upon taking over the command, he immediately drew upon his genius for organization, with the result that the cadets were organized into a battalion of two companies, a “Commandant of Cadets” was created, the classes were for study purposes divided into sections, transfers were made between sections, and weekly reports, showing daily progress in studies, were rendered. Moreover, the system and scale of daily marks, the publication of the Annual Register, the introduction of the Board of Visitors, the check-book system, the preponderating influence of the blackboard, and the essential part of the modern Regulations are proofs of his untiring efforts as an executive. The above changes that he effected, and the reforms that he introduced, are a part of the modern organization of West Point. Perhaps no one method has so much influenced the quality of the instruction of the cadets as the blackboard recitations. Major Thayer insisted on this form, although old records show that it was introduced at West Point by Mr. George Baron, a civilian teacher, who in the autumn of 1801 gave to Cadet Swift “a specimen of his mode of teaching at the blackboard.” Today it is the prominent feature in Academic instruction.

Major Thayer’s success in giving West Point an upward impetus had attracted general attention and observation throughout the country so that appointments were now sought after with avidity. The politicians rejoiced at the Academy’s increased importance and the consequent patronage that the appointments offered. Although the present law did not obtain, whereby Congressmen appointed cadets, still it had been the custom for the President to appoint men to West Point upon the recommendation of a Representative. In 1843, a law was passed that allowed one cadet for each congressional district. Major Thayer was at his own request relieved as Superintendent, after a brilliant administration whose results were so beneficial to the institution as to gain for him from posterity the title of “Father of the Military Academy.”

Could Major Thayer have only peered into the future he would have seen Fame, years later, crowning three of his raw young cadets. One of the lads at West Point under Major Thayer was Edgar Allan Poe, America’s foremost literary genius. He entered West Point July 1, 1830, but after a troublous stay of a little over eight months was dismissed for repeated misconduct. Not a great deal is known of his brief cadet days, but his classmates have stated that he was irritable and morose, and addicted to excessive drinking. He would steal out of barracks sometimes, long after taps, and “run it out” to “Old Benny Havens,” a tavern kept by Benny Havens on the banks of the Hudson about a mile below West Point. Benny Havens’ name is preserved in song and story at West Point, and tales that surrounded the cadet reunions in ye olden days at “Benny’s” are flavored with all the romance of a mythical legend. Old Benny died in 1877 at the ripe age of eighty-nine years, but his name survives in a stirring West Point song that I quote in part:

Poe, however, was only one of many who disobeyed the regulations, but he did not care for military life and made no effort to conceal his offenses. Finally he was tried by court-martial. For two weeks prior to his trial he neglected almost all of his studies as a cadet. Two of the specifications against him were for absences from parades and roll calls and two for disobedience of orders, but at the trial, he deliberately pleaded guilty to the latter and not guilty to the former, the most patent and obvious of his offenses. Whether or not he did this from a sense of humor, is not known, but his action was not calculated to help him in the eyes of his superiors. He was dismissed March 6, 1831. Four days later he wrote Major Thayer the following letter:

Letter of Edgar Allan Poe, Lately Cadet, U. S. M. A., to the Superintendent: 1831.
(Original in the library U. S. M. A.)

New York,
Mar. 10, 1831.

Sir:

Having no longer any ties to bind me to my country—no prospects—nor friends—I intend by the first opportunity to proceed to Paris with the view of obtaining through the interest of the Marquis De La Fayette, an appointment (if possible) in the Polish Army. In the event of the interference of France in behalf of Poland this may easily be effected—in all events it will be my only feasible plan of procedure.

The object of this letter is respectfully to request that you will give me such assistance as may be in your power in the furtherance of my views.

A certificate of standing in my class is all that I may have a right to expect.

Anything further—a letter to a friend in Paris—or to the Marquis—would be a kindness which I would never forget.

Most respectfully,
Yr. obt. st.
Edgar Allan Poe.

Poe, however, abandoned the plan and little more was heard of his whereabouts by his friends at West Point.

The two other cadets under Major Thayer, were Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee, but their history is too well known to bear repetition here. Suffice to say that Jefferson Davis was mischievous and human enough as a cadet to be court-martialed for an escapade.

The prosperity of the Academy continued in spite of its opponents in Congress who, just prior to the Mexican War, came near accomplishing its overthrow, but the brilliant achievements of its graduates in that conflict silenced for a while their mutterings. Many young officers who served with distinction in this war were later to win greater fame in the titanic Civil War. Grant (class of ’43); Sherman (’40); Hancock (’44); Thomas (’40); Meade (’35); Hooker (’30); Sedgwick (’37) participated in the campaigns against the Mexicans.

The nation was given ample proof of the wisdom of Washington, Hamilton, and Knox in their efforts to establish a Military Academy wherein officers might be educated and trained to organize and discipline citizen soldiers, and lead them to victory. At West Point today there are bronze cannon, tattered flags, and mutilated flagstaffs, trophies of the Mexican War that were presented to the Academy by General Winfield Scott, the Commanding General of the Army, who stated, “as under Providence it is mainly to the Military Academy that the United States became indebted for those brilliant achievements and other memorable victories in the same war, I have a lively pleasuring in tendering the seven trophies (semi-national) to the mother of so many accomplished soldiers and patriots.”

The close of the Mexican War found the Military Academy the pet and idol of the National Legislature. All of its requirements were solicitously studied and plenty of funds were forthcoming to supply its wants. As time went on, however, and no foe appeared at our door, the usual indifference on the part of some toward military affairs, and the open hostilities of others, were manifested. As before in its history, the Academy became the object of numerous attacks, but it ignored them, continuing unobtrusively the preparation of her cadets for their future work, little realizing how important this work was soon to be.

In 1852, Brevet-Colonel R. E. Lee, Corps of Engineers, class of 1829, was appointed Superintendent. Under his administration the course was extended to include five years, embracing more English studies and Military Law. A new riding hall was completed in 1855 which greatly increased the opportunity for cavalry exercises. Colonel Lee, having transferred to the Cavalry arm of the Service, was relieved as Superintendent, April, 1855, because according to law at that time, only Engineer officers could serve as Superintendent.

The year before Lee’s administration began, there entered West Point in July, 1851, a cadet, James Abbott McNeill Whistler, aged sixteen years and eleven months, destined to become one of America’s greatest artists. Whistler remained three years at West Point when he was discharged for deficiency in chemistry. In speaking in after years of his experiences with this study, he said, “Had silicon been a gas, I would have been a Major-General.” He was called up for examination in the subject of chemistry, which also covered the studies of mineralogy and geology, and given silicon to discuss. When called upon to recite, he stated: “I am required to discuss the subject of silicon. Silicon is a gas.” “That will do, Mr. Whistler,” said the Professor, and the artist soldier retired quickly to private life.

Another story was told of him in an examination in history. “What!” said an officer who was his instructor, “you do not know the date of the Battle of Buena Vista? Suppose you were to go out to dinner and the company began to talk of the Mexican War, and you, a West Point man, were asked the date of the battle. What would you do?”

“Do,” said Whistler, “why, I should refuse to associate with people who would talk of such things at dinner.”

Although Whistler was not a success in defining silicon or remembering dates, he excelled in drawing, standing at the head of his class. The Professor of Drawing at the time was Robert W. Weir, an artist of no mean ability himself and of generally recognized standing. For Whistler, Professor Weir always had a high esteem on account of the unusual talent he displayed in the drawing classes. Specimens of his work as a cadet are still preserved at West Point.

In 1860, the rumblings of trouble over the slave question began to be heard even in the secluded Highlands of the Hudson. At first the Southern and Northern cadets ardently advocated the views of their respective States, arguing with all of the warmth and enthusiasm of their young natures but without any particular bitterness. Soon, however, the gathering of the war clouds and the noise of the storm that was brewing brought the Southern cadets face to face with a problem that of its nature was most difficult to solve. Each one had sworn allegiance to the Government and taken an oath to defend it against all enemies. What should they do? To remain and support the Federal Government meant to fight against their own flesh and blood, yet to resign was to break one’s sworn word. As a Southerner myself, I have often reflected upon the mental suffering that those fellow cadets of “the long grey line” must have experienced, trying to decide upon their duty. General Schaff, in The Spirit of Old West Point, gives us a vivid picture of those days at the Academy. So much has been written about the cadets who left West Point to fight with the Southern forces that the following data may prove interesting.

At the outbreak of the Civil War there were from the Southern States eighty-six cadets. Of this number sixty-three resigned, from various causes connected with the war, leaving twenty-one who remained loyal to the Government. In the Army, it is a remarkable fact that of the officers of Southern blood appointed from civil life, one half went with the Confederacy, whereas only one fifth of the West Pointers went South. One hundred and sixty-two Southern graduates withstood the terrible strain of fighting their own people, and remained true to the flag.

Although up to the time of the Civil War no graduates of West Point had been appointed to the rank of general officer, the war had not been in progress a year before the country eagerly turned to men from the Academy to lead its armies. In September, 1861, six of the eleven generals in the Regular Army were graduates. At the conclusion of the war sixteen of the seventeen Regular general officers of the line were graduates. Sixty-six graduates rose during the war to the grade of major-general and 112 to that of brigadier-general of volunteers, which means that more than one third of the graduates engaged in the war rose to the grade of general officer. Nine received the thanks of Congress for conspicuous gallantry.

Turning to the Confederate forces, we find a similar state of affairs. Of the West Pointers in the Confederate service, eighteen were made full generals, fifteen lieutenant-generals, forty major-generals, and eighty-eight brigadier-generals. In command of all was Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederacy, and a West Pointer.

The most famous West Pointer on the Union side was Ulysses S. Grant, class of 1843, but scarcely less noted were Sheridan (’53), and Sherman (’45). Other graduates whose services were most conspicuous follow: George H. Thomas (’40), Meade (’35), Hooker (’35), Sedgwick (’37), McClellan (’46), Halleck (’39), McPherson (’53), Rosecrans (’42), Warren (’50), Pleasanton (’44), and Gregg (’55).

On the Confederate side we find Lee (’29), Early (’37), Jackson (’46), A. S. Johnston (’26), A. P. Hill (’47), Daniel H. Hill (’42), and Longstreet (’42), Ewell (’40), and Stuart (’54).

At the conclusion of the Civil War, a struggle between three million combatants, all of the armies in the field on both sides were commanded by graduates; nearly all of the corps; a large majority of the divisions; the staff corps or organization of supply of both forces, and many of the brigades. Every important battle of the war was commanded on one or both sides by a graduate—generally both. This was the verdict of the end of the great conflict after a test to which no other institution of learning has ever been put.

After the Civil War the Academy began to drop out of public notice because the people were more interested in the commercial development of the country. Apathy on the part of the public has never, however, affected West Point’s attitude toward its duty, so that year after year graduates were sent forth to fight the Indians upon the Plains where they underwent great hardships of which the country was ignorant.

Then came the Spanish War to test again the product of the Academy, but the work of the graduates in Cuba and the Philippines gave ample proof that the metal was still good and well stamped.

With the advent of Colonel A. L. Mills as Superintendent, the Academy received a fresh impetus and many important changes were effected. The Corps in 1900 was increased by one hundred cadets, hazing in all of its forms was practically abolished after a long bitter fight, and elaborate plans were inaugurated for the enlargement and rebuilding of West Point. In this connection the late Colonel Charles W. Larned, Professor of Drawing, distinguished himself. It is largely due to his indefatigable efforts and to the foresight and ability of the late General Mills, and to the Secretary of War, Elihu Root, that West Point has its magnificent new buildings. Their construction extended over a long period, from 1904 to 1911, during which time the courses were expanded and improved to meet the needs of our new Army.

Once again the country is at war, this time with the most powerful and resourceful enemy that our citizens have been called upon to face.

The graduates of West Point will prove as true to their traditions in this struggle as they have in the past, and West Point knows that they will return in triumph to their Alma Mater who ever stands ready to press the cup of greeting to the lips of all honorable and loyal sons.