The foregoing facts are stated for the purpose of illustrating and confirming the correctness of the opinion I have so often advanced in my lectures on education, relative to the practicability, and even facility, of combining the full development and perfection of the physical powers of youth, with a due cultivation and improvement of the mental faculties. Whether a young man, who enters on the grand theater of active life, with a mind and body equally vigorous and improved, who, while he has a head to conceive, possesses also an arm to execute, will or will not possess advantages in the discharge of the various duties he may be called upon to perform, over one, who has grown to the age of manhood, puny and debilitated, destitute of physical energy, and incapable of bodily exertion, I shall leave to the sound discretion of the American people to decide.
As it respects the effect of the system on the morals of youth, I would observe, that I feel confident no one has left the institution worse than he joined it, and that I flatter myself, several have, in this respect, been improved. Next after the influence of religion, I consider habits of industry and economy as constituting the surest basis of morals amongst youth. To instill these into the minds of my pupils, ever has, and ever will be, a leading object; and I consequently shall imperatively require the strictest adherence to ail the regulations bearing on those points, by all concerned. I would therefore beg leave to assure the parents, guardians, and relatives of my pupils, that the regulations prohibiting the cadets being furnished with money, otherwise than by the superintendent, or by his express permission, is to be taken in its literal meaning, (without exception,) and must be adhered to under all circumstances; and that any deviation from it will be followed by immediate dismission. I would much prefer that the great body of my pupils should enter young, and grow up under my system. The mind and body are then more susceptible of improvement, than at a more advanced period. Few, if any, vicious habits have then been formed, and the morals, under a strict and regular discipline, may easily be preserved. It is my fixed determination not, knowingly, to admit any young man of confirmed vicious or dissipated habits into the institution. I would accordingly recommend to parents and guardians not to send me any of this description; for if they should gain admission, and did not immediately reform, (which seldom occurs when the habits are confirmed,) it would only eventuate in their dismission, and consequent disgrace. It is much easier to prevent a youth from acquiring bad habits, than to correct them after they are acquired. If parents and guardians will send me their sons and wards free from habits of dissipation, immorality, and vice, I will guarantee, as far as human agency will authorize, that they shall be preserved free from such habits, while they remain under my care. Every requisite means will be used to correct the foibles and faults incidental to youth—to accomplish this object no pains will be spared. With their foibles I will bear as much as any person, but with their vices I will make no compromise. For the purpose of enabling me the more readily and the more certainly to accomplish this important object, I must request parents and guardians, if their sons or wards have foibles or faults, frankly to state them to me. On this subject there should be no reserve; as, with such information, I should know much better what course to pursue with them.
The favorable view taken of the aims, progress, and results of the scientific and military training provided by Capt. Partridge in his Academy at Norwich, was amply justified by the success of his pupils at Middletown, as practical men in various departments of business and public life.
On account of the condition on which he held a portion of his property at Norwich, Capt. Partridge was obliged to maintain there a literary institution, after his removal to Middletown. When he discontinued his labors at the latter place, and not succeeding in his plans for establishing a scientific and military school in the neighborhood of New York, he returned to Norwich, and in 1832, made preparation to reëstablish his Academy on its old basis, and with enlarged premises. With this view he erected the building known as the North Barracks, which were occupied for two years by Rev. Amasa Buck, for the purposes of a Methodist school, known as the Franklin Seminary.
NORWICH UNIVERSITY.
In the spring of 1834, a number of gentlemen associated to establish at Norwich, not an academic, but a collegiate institution, after Capt. Partridge’s views, and in the autumn of that year, obtained from the Legislature of Vermont, a charter by which the petitioners were constituted a Board of Trustees of an institution by the name of the Norwich University. The charter further provides “that the said Board shall be required to furnish at said institution constantly a course of Military instruction, both theoretical and practical, and also in Civil Engineering, and the practical sciences generally; and the President of said institution, with the consent of the Trustees, shall have power to give and confer all such diplomas, degrees, honors, or licenses, as are usually given or conferred in Colleges or Universities, at their discretion; provided, however, that in so doing they shall have respect to the morals and merits of the candidate alone.”
This act of incorporation named fourteen gentlemen, and provided for the election of eleven others, which twenty-five should constitute the Board of Trustees of Norwich University. The first meeting of the Trustees was held at Norwich, Vt., January, 1835. The vacancies in the Board were then filled, and the first members of the Faculty were elected, viz.:—Alden Partridge, “President and Professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy, History, Science of Government, Political Economy, and Military Science and Tactics;” Truman B. Ransom, Vice-President, and Professor of Natural and Experimental Philosophy, Mathematics, Theoretical and Practical, and Civil Engineering; M. Noras, Professor of Ancient and Modern Languages; and Franklin Marsh and I. M. Horr, assistants in the English Department. These gentlemen were authorized to form a course of study and laws for the government of the institution.
In May, 1835, the University was opened under the auspices and in the buildings owned by Capt. Partridge, with a full course of literary, scientific, and military studies. Among those enumerated in the first prospectus were Military Law, Military Drawing, Civil and Military Engineering. “Military Science being considered an important appendage to the education of every American youth is taught theoretically in all departments of the University. The military exercises are attended at those hours of the day which are generally passed by students in idleness or devoted to useless amusements, for which they will be made a pleasing and healthful substitute.” “The discipline will be strict, but correct; in principle, military. It will be a great and leading object to instill into the minds of students liberality of sentiment and principles of honorable integrity and attachment to our republican institutions. Everything of a sectarian character in religion will be entirely excluded and all literary honors will be conferred in accordance with scholarship and moral worth alone.”
At the close of the academic year, 1835-6, (August 18, 1836,) the first Annual Commencement took place, and the class of 1836 then graduated, consisted of one person, Alonzo Jackman, now Brigadier-General in Vermont, and Professor of Mathematics, Military Science, etc., at the University. Professor Ransom, entered the United States Navy about this time, and Mr. Jackman was appointed to fill the vacant Professorship. Soon after this, Rev. Zerah Colburn, succeeded Professor Noras. August 17, 1837, the second Annual Commencement was held, and Hon. George McDuffie, of South Carolina, delivered the address; the next year Robert Rantoul, Jr., of Massachusetts, was the orator; in 1839, John Wentworth, of Illinois, and Thomas H. Seymour, of Connecticut, were speakers; and in 1840, Benjamin F. Hallett, of Boston. The catalogues of each of these years show that the number of students, or cadets, averaged a little less than a hundred, and in all the catalogues, the regulations for the Police of the Cadets’ Quarters were given in full. They provided for all the military duties of the students, for the wearing of uniform, etc., etc.