New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1883-08-15
The Army Defaulters,

Recent events in connection with Off
GERS of the army have made these Off
GERS laughing stock for the whole coun-
try. Officers who had nothing to back
them but the fact that they were gen
tlemen,n have gone wrong by becom-
ing defaulters, selling their pay three or
four times. over to get money to play
poker, and skipping out in a disgrace
full manner. The attention of the whole
country has been called to the frequency
with which ssan officer and a gentleman
becomes guilty of conduct unbecoming
an officer and gentleman and the
country is sick of it. The trouble is
easily accounted for. Young men have,
in times past, been appointed to West
Point because their parents were rich,
or stood high in society or politics, or
because the young men We're wild and
needed tanning down. The appearance
of a young man at West Point was
sure Indication that he was q member
of good society, and a splendid dancer,
and smart at flirting. Eastern society
petted the young cadets, and adored
them when they became officers, and
the fighting that they learned to do,
mixed with the dancing they could ac-
complish, made people forget the bad
habits, the gambling and drinking, and
West Pointers have been looked upon
as assistant gods. until they got into ac-
tive service and didn't amount to any
thing. Late years competitive examine
nations have been held in congressional
districts, and the boy who stood the best
examination, whether democrat, repub-
lican, or anything else, got the place,
and in this way the rich young men
who are dudes nsociety, and ''dawnce''
divinely, are left out, and the son of
blacksmith or hotel porter, or q farm
er, may 90 to West Point and become
an officer. This is a great blow to the
society of the East. which has been
but it will be better for the army. The
son of blacksmith may not mash the
daughter of an old family on the Hud-
son, and he may not ''dawnce" so di-
vincly, drink benzine SO gracefully, or
play poker SO nonchalantly, but he will
make soldier who will fight when fight
| ing is the thing to do, and who will not
be SO apt.to steal government funds to
play poker with. These examinations
by competent boards, to pick out the
| most level headed and intelligent boy to
make soldier of, regardless Of birth,
politics, or terpsichorean accomplish
ments, may seem hard blow to those
at the East, who have always looked up
on West Point ASA hot house to train
| up husbands for silk stockinged fresh
young women from Vassar college, but
the country will gain by the change.
There is no sense in the government
taking rich mems sons that are going
wrong, to reform them, and make bean
poles of them for green female bean
stalks to cling to on commencement day.
Let the country have few generations
of army officers appointed from the peo-
pie, on their merits, without regard to
the fact that their fathers were rich and
acquainted with presidents, or a power
on the stump for congressman, and the
officers of the army will always be true
to their trusts. The best officers in the
army to-day, are those who were APP
pointed on account of being poor, but
honest, and the worst are those APP
pointed because they belonged to good
families that wanted to get rid of them.
|-Peck's Saln.