[34] Lord Byron and his Contemporaries, Vol. II. p. 258.
REGULAR AND VOLUNTEER OFFICERS.
It is pleasant to see how much the present war has done towards effacing the traditional jealousy between regular officers and volunteers. The two classes have been so thoroughly intermingled, on staff-duties and in the field,—so many regular officers now hold in the volunteer service a rank higher than their permanent standing,—the whole previous military experience of most regulars was so trifling, compared with that which they and the volunteers have now shared in common,—and so many young men have lately been appointed to commissions, in both branches, not only without a West-Point education, but with almost none at all,—that it really cannot be said that there is much feeling of conscious separation left. For treating the two as antagonistic the time has clearly gone by. For judiciously weighing their respective services in the field the epoch has not come, since the reign of history begins only when that of telegrams and special correspondents has ended. It is better, therefore, to limit the comparison, as yet, to that minor routine of military duty upon which the daily existence of an army depends, and of which the great deeds of daring are merely exciting episodes.
At the beginning of the war, and before the distinction was thus partially effaced, the comparison involved very different elements. In our general military inexperience, the majority were not disposed to underrate the value of specific professional training. Education holds in this country much of the prestige held by hereditary rank in Europe, modified only by the condition that the possessor shall take no undue airs upon himself. Even then the penalty consists only in a few outbreaks of superficial jealousy, and the substantial respect for any real acquirements remains the same. So there was a time when the faintest aroma of West Point lent a charm to the most unattractive candidate for a commission. Any Governor felt a certain relief in intrusting a regiment to any man who had ever eaten clandestine oysters at Benny Haven's, or had once heard the whiz of an Indian arrow on the frontier, however mediocre might have been all his other claims to confidence. If he failed, the regular army might bear the shame; if he succeeded, to the State-House be the glory.
Yet there was always another party of critics, not less intelligent, who urged the value of general preparations for any duty, as compared with special,—who held that it was always easier for a man of brains to acquire technical skill than for a person of mere technicality to superadd brains, and that the antecedents of a frontier lieutenant were, on the whole, a poorer training for large responsibilities than those of many a civilian, who had lived in the midst of men, though out of uniform. Let us have a fair statement of this position, for it was very sincere and had much temporary influence. The main thing, it was argued, was the knowledge of human nature and the habit of dealing with mankind in masses,—the very thing from which the younger regular officers at least had been rigidly excluded. From a monastic life at West Point they had usually been transferred to a yet more isolated condition, in some obscure outpost,—or if otherwise, then they had seen no service at all, and were mere clerks in shoulder-straps. But a lawyer who could manœuvre fifty witnesses as if they were one,—a teacher used to governing young men by the hundred,—an orator trained to sway thousands,—a master-mechanic,—a railway-superintendent,—a factory-agent,—a broker who could harness Wall Street and drive it,—a financier who could rule a sovereign State with a rod of (railway) iron,—such men as these, it was plausibly reasoned, could give an average army-officer all the advantage of his special training, at the start, and yet beat him at his own trade in a year.
These theories were naturally strengthened, moreover, by occasional instances of conspicuous failure, when volunteer troops were intrusted to regular officers. These disappointments could usually be traced to very plain causes. The men selected were sometimes men whose West-Point career would hardly bear minute investigation,—or who had in civil pursuits forgotten all they had learned at the Academy, except self-esteem,—or who had been confined to the duties of some special department, as quartermasters or paymasters, and were really fitted for nothing else,—or who had served their country by resigning their commissions, if not by holding them,—or who had contrived, first or last, to lose hopelessly their tempers or their digestions, or their faith, hope, and charity. Beyond all this lay the trouble, that the best regular officer from the very fact of his superior training was puzzled to know how much to demand of volunteer troops, or what standard to enforce upon them. It was a problem in the Differential Calculus, with the Army Regulations for a constant, and a raw volunteer regiment for a variable, and not a formula in Davies which suited the purpose. Unfortunately, these perplexities were quite as apt to end in relaxation as in rigor, so that the regiments thus commanded sometimes slid into a looseness of which a resolute volunteer officer would have been ashamed.
These were among the earlier results. Against them was to be set the fact, that, on the whole, no regiments in the field made progress so rapid, or held their own so well, as those placed under regular officers. And now that three years have abolished many surmises, and turned many others into established facts, it must be owned that the total value of the professional training has proved far greater, and that of the general preparation far less, than many intelligent observers predicted. The relation between officer and soldier is something so different in kind from anything which civil life has to offer, that it has proved almost impossible to transfer methods or maxims from the one to the other. If a regiment is merely a caucus, and the colonel the chairman,—or merely a fire-company, and the colonel the foreman,—or merely a prayer-meeting, and the colonel the moderator,—or merely a bar-room, and the colonel the landlord,—then the failure of the whole thing is a foregone conclusion. War is not the highest of human pursuits, certainly; but an army comes very near to being the completest of human organizations, and he alone succeeds in it who readily accepts its inevitable laws, and applies them. An army is an aristocracy, on a three-years' lease, supposing that the period of enlistment. No mortal skill can make military power effective on democratic principles. A democratic people can perhaps carry on a war longer and better than any other; because no other can so well comprehend the object, raise the means, or bear the sacrifices. But these sacrifices include the surrender, for the time being, of the essential principle of the government. Personal independence in the soldier, like personal liberty in the civilian, must be waived for the preservation of the nation. With shipwreck staring men in the face, the choice lies between despotism and anarchy, trusting to the common sense of those concerned, when the danger is over, to revert to the old safeguards. It is precisely because democracy is an advanced stage in human society, that war, which belongs to a less advanced stage, is peculiarly inconsistent with its habits. Thus the undemocratic character, so often lamented in West Point and Annapolis, is in reality their strong point. Granted that they are no more appropriate to our stage of society than are revolvers and bowie-knives, that is precisely what makes them all serviceable in time of war. War being exceptional, the institutions which train its officers must be exceptional likewise.
The first essential for military authority lies in the power of command,—a power which it is useless to analyze, for it is felt instinctively, and it is seen in its results. It is hardly too much to say, that, in military service, if one has this power, all else becomes secondary; and it is perfectly safe to say that without it all other gifts are useless. Now for the exercise of power there is no preparation like power, and nowhere is this preparation to be found, in this community, except in regular army-training. Nothing but great personal qualities can give a man by nature what is easily acquired by young men of very average ability who are systematically trained to command.