The daily gazette., 1878-07-01
Our Skeleton Army and Other
Cries.

tions of "Our Skeleton Army" and the
"Defenceless Condition of thessTerritor-
ies.". The scream Will be loud, and prob
ably it will last the summer through. The
Delegate from Montana pitched the Key
note when he shouted on the floor of the
House his protest against allowing the
army "to remain in skeleton condition
dangling from the scaffold of economy
and bleaching in the wind OF starvation 3
The variations will be sung to the score
of the orator who argued in the last extra
session of Congress as follows:
"When Gen. Gibbon struck the Nez
Perces, if he had only had hundred
more men he could have ended that war
then and there. He came upon them in
the night with six companies of infantry,
numbering in all one hundred and twen-
ty men, and aided by thirty volunteer
citizens. Suppose those six companies
numbered SIX hundred men instead of
one hundred and twenty. Suppose this
former Maior-General of the United
States army, the author OF standard
work on military science, one OF the most
gallant and accomplished gentleman i'll
our army, or in any army, who went into
-
his rifle on his shoulder, and fought the
savage foe like bushwhacker-suppos
he had the command of Lieutenant
Colonel only. He could have wiped out
the whole of the Nez Perces, and ended
the war at once"
This outcry is thoroughly dishonest and
hollow. While Gibbon was fighting those
Indians with one hundred and fifty men,
there were two full regiments in Wash
ington. They had no business there
They were not wanted there. There are
no hostile Indians in the District of Col
umbia. And at that moment, too, there
were in Washington 376 general SER
vice" soldiers in the War Department,
495 in the Signal Service, and 17S doing
doing various work for the cadets at West
Point. In all there were were on "gene-
/, raj service" as it is called, in Washing
| ton and in the various departmental and
| division headq uarters throughout the
| country, doing clerical or menial labor
. 1874 enlisted soldiers.
AT the moment Gibbon was fighting
this bemoaned battle, there were lyiug
idle, principally in the pleasant on The
Atlantic coast, 1881 artillerymen. If al
that Gibbon needed to crush the Nez
Perces war in the bud was one hundred
| more men, why were not these idler.
forwarded to Idaho and NJ, mana? The,
were of no use here. They had all beef
drilled as infantry. They were perfectly
available.
AT the moment the Rev. De Golyel
Garfield was exhorting on the floor o
the House for the increase of tour poor
| unpaid starving army, doomed to many
days of further starvation, while theii
numbers are reduced by sickness ant
| Indian warfare" the printed evidenc,
was before Congress that the whole o.
the Thirteenth Regiment of Infantr.
was in Pennsylvania, where it was M
more wanted than it was in a Connec
ticut Sunday sci ool; that the Twelttl
Regiment was in California and Nevad
where it was not at all needed; that til
Fourteenth was principally in Salt LAX
City, where IL was no more require
than it was III New Haven that tn
Sixteenth We're mostly quartered in tn
midst of the wheat and corn farms {
4 Kansas, idle as tortoises that the Eigh
I eenth was in Indiana New York, Penn
sylvauia, and Tennessee that the Twel
I ty-second was in PENNSYLVANIA excel
r two companies in Michigan, and ii
Twenty third was mostly In the CITY
} Leavenworth, Kansas, where soldie
5 are precisely as much required as the
are in Milwaukee.
AT the moment Gibbon made his wea
c handed fight, and when our "skeleton
V an army was dangling from the scafio
OF economy and bleaching in the wind
IL Starvatlon," there We're available
t. crush the Nez Perces over ten thousaI
"A 1men lying idle in different parts of Il
Z" country. Why We're they not used? f
II | tl,4 fhDf thatr
ra used now. AT these the enlisted IN,
serve for commands for officers who
e. home, whose family residences, a
* these Military quarters. An officer wit
out soldiers to command is absurd
IL officers family without soldier seryaI
sh lis uncomfortable. That principally
why Gibbon was short handed And
W Howard or any other General is sh,
ly handed now, in Oregon or Idaho, that
hn the reason, and there is no other r,
:, son.
lie There an overabundance of soldi
90 for every real military need but
zee army officers will not let them be us
For example, the headquarters OF
'ie First Artillery is Fort Adams, IN Rho
to Island. This regiment is as much
part of the fashionable watering place
Newport as it, Old Mill and Spout
IN NUN dic' uo lOIl, lD6 IeglinCI
or band, the evening parade, the uniform
=, officers, constil ue peculiar and dura
IL pleasure in this summer home of
eat idle rich of many cities. Correspond
nd ly, summer Newport opens her dc
;cb wide to the officers of the garris
Nothing sholt of an act of Cong
t" could move that regiment, armed as
by fantry, out to Oregon to fight the L
BILE mock Indians. And ten to one an aC
iza Congress ordering the regiment Il
would be evaded by the War Der
Vi ment. What piercing little sore
ef- would vibrate the old china in
the parlors of Newport at the mention
lie. the First Artillery's fighting Indians
ir, anything else save the flavorless W,
ness of the summer rehash near
toh Adams of Fifth avenues winter
de- A thousand to one that regiment could
is be moved And the inability will
taInly be used in the next session
ihls Congress as an argument for Ii
mo ally filling out our skeleton of an al
Gus IF Gibbon had had only one hum
,ate more soldiers" and so on, and so on
tbe REDUCE THE ARMY To TEN THoUs
in MEN