Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1882-01-27
WASHINGTON.
Senator Plumb Proposes
to Knock a Nest of
Soft Place PlumbS
in the Army.
A Bill that Threatens Sad
Havoc Among Quasi
Military Dress Pa
rade Aids.
The Soldiers and Sailors
League Looking Up the
Subject of Depart
ment Nepotism.
The Way Speaker Keifer Sat
Down on the Crank Oscar
Wilde---Sorted Social
Paragraphs.
Soft place brigade.


WASHINGTON, Jan. 24.-Bsth houses
and nearly all of the departments have
been greatly excited to-day over the
rumored great damage that Senator
Piumb's army bill will cause if passed.
As a matter of fact it will scarcely af-
feet the military service proper, but it
will cause an unprecedented upheaval
in the Soft-Place brigade-an annex of
the army which has received the atten-
ton of the Herald on several occasions.
Should the bill in its present shape sur
mount the quiet but determined oppo-
sition In store for it, and find place in
the StatuteS-at-L Large, several estimable
gentlemen who have never served a
day with troops since they received
their commissions as officers of the
United States army, will actually find
themselves in command of companies
of veterans, and even of independent
posts and garrisons. Altogether thirty
eight officers will be relieved from cler-
ical, civil, and quasi-military duties.
Ten of these officers have been on de-
tached service from three to five years,
ten from five to ten years, eleven from
ten to fourteen years, and seven up
ward of fourteen years. Among the
latter are four who have never joined
any command since they were appoint
ed III the army, and several of the otk-
els have never served with the regi-
ments upon whose rolls they are borne.
These facts suggest very pertinent
question, namely: If regiment can
get along ten or fifteen years with two
or three officers less than its legal COM
plement, are not those officers practi-
cally supernumerary, or at any rate
supertiuous?
HAVOC AMONG THE AIDS.
From the roster given below it will
be seen that, under tho proposed law,
the military families of all the general
officers except the junior brigadier
or partially broken up and dispersed.
The General of the Army will lose the
services Of the two captains of cavalry
who have shared his fortunes these
dozen years or more with the rank and
pay of colonels of cavalry One of
these captains will have to place him.
self at the head of a troop of colored
cavalrymen in New Mexico, and the
other take command of his white troops
at the School Of Application, Fort
Leavenworth, Kansas. Tie heuten-
ant-generars military secretary who
has been absent from his regiment
nearly fourteen years, will have to re-
join it at Fort A. Lincoln, Dakota. The
two senior aides of General Han
cock will have to bid farewell
to the pleasant retirement of Cover
nor's Island and the attractions of New
York and betake themselves to Texas
Generals Schoville, Mcdowell, Terry,
and Augur will have to select new sets
of aids, all their young gentlemen
coming within the proposed statue of
limitations. General Pope's senior aide,
who has been eleven years captain of
artillery, but has never done duty in
that arm of the service, will have to
take command OF lis battery at Little
Rock, Ark. The two senior aids of
General Howard will nave to migrate
from West Point to Wyoming and
Washington Territories, and one of
General Crooks aids, on leave of alb
sence since November, 1879, will be re-
legated to his regiment, in other di-
rections there will be few important
changes calling for special notice, but
the officers concerned are not on mil
itary duty.