Military discipline and exercises are by no means an untried experiment in the annals of American education; some of our best private schools and institutes having long since adopted it, and with a good degree of success as it will be our endeavor now to show.
To the admirable regulations of our National Military and Naval Academies, we need not refer; the systematic course pursued by them for the development of health, for discipline of mind and body, being well known to the majority of our readers.
One instance which came under the writer’s personal observation, will sufficiently illustrate the dependence which can be placed upon well-drilled boys in case of emergency.
In April last, when Washington was defenceless, Baltimore in riot, and all Maryland in a state of revolt, communication being cut off at Annapolis, there was great fear of attack upon that important strategetic point. The pupils were prepared for any exigency, and slept with their loaded rifles over their cots. At an alarm of a night attack, there was no hesitation among those gallant little fellows. They were up directly; fell in their ranks and off at a double-quick for the point of danger, in an almost incredible short space of time. The elder boys dragged their howitzer with them. Had an attack taken place, those pupils would have given a good account of themselves and have stood their ground with courage and steadiness. The secret of this is the discipline, for which they are indebted to the assiduity of their brave and experienced superintendent, Captain Blake of the Navy.
Let us read the opinion of this able officer in respect to the applying of this discipline to public schools:
“My experience at this institution long since impressed me with the importance of this subject, and I intended to have given my views publicly, but you have left nothing more to be said upon it, and I can only hope that those who have the control of our public schools will view the subject as we do. We have received about a hundred and forty acting midshipmen this year, some of them very young, and although they have not been here two months, they present a beautiful example of such results as the system would produce all over the country.”
It must be acknowledged that the States now in rebellion have devoted much more attention to military instruction in special schools, than we have, many of them pursuing the European plan of State Academies devoted to military science. Thus while we have been obliged to create officers from the small nucleus afforded us from West Point, they have had the students from State Colleges to officer their regiments.
For a long time back Virginia has annually expended upon her Military Institute nearly $50,000; South Carolina, $30,000; Kentucky and other States have likewise institutions, founded in whole or part, upon a military basis.
Although several attempts have been made to obtain legislative action for similar institutes in the Northern States, they have not, up to the present time, been successful, owing, we think, to the groundless opinion that it would prove a heavy tax, without a corresponding advantage. We shall endeavor to prove in this article how economically an academy could be supported. It is, therefore, to private enterprise, we are indebted for any experiments which have been made in this respect.