Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1886-09-09
NAVAL SNOBBERY.

The recent appointing of an army Off
Ger, who had risen from the ranks, to the
position OF Adjutant-G General at Washing
ton, with the rank of Major, as recogni-
ton of thirtY-seven years of efficient SER
vice in war and peace, has set the east
ern press on to the fact that such thing
could not be in the navy as it is now or
ganized, and the Boston Daily AdUertiser,
the organ of the bean-eating blue bloods
OF that wondrous place, thus discourses
on the subject:
st is worth while to remark that, while
men from the ranks are every year pro-
NOTED to be officers in the army, there is no
road to a commission in the navy save
! through the academy at Annapolis. It is
the boast of naval officers that, while oom-
mon people may secure military commits
sions, they are not eligible to rank in the
line of the navy. This is not American and
not profitable, for if the boys on our naval
training ships could look forward to a
chance for promotion to be officers, the class
of sailors would be materially better and
the standard of the officers themselves might
be improved
This is in part true, and shameful be-
cause it is true. Men who enlist in the
naval service cannot rise above the rank
OF warrant officer, which includes Boat
swains, Gunners, Sailmakers, Carpenters
and Masters Mates. No matter how
long they serve, nor how competent they
might become if the way was open to
them, their horizon of glory is bounded
by the gueTdon of a warrant, to be the
butt of beardless boys, and the common
enemy of all below them in standing.
Bad as is the case with warrant officers,
it is still more humiliating with gentle
men who served nobly during the war as
volunteer officers, and who were admit
ted into the regular service in reduced
rank, by what was termed competitive
examinations. Some of these gentlemen.
notably Lieutenant-Co Commander Cor
ringe, and few others, though they
have proven themselves a thousand
times better than men who are jun ped
over them, have never gone above the
rank of Lieutenant-C Commander, and
never will, for the reason that an exam
lining board composed of officers above
that rank, and all of whom are graduates
OF the Academy, have to pass upon their
merits and abilities, and the fact that
they are not graduates, keeps them from
advancement beyond that grade. So
strict is the line drawn between the off,
Ger who was volunteer, and the regular
graduates, that Lieutenant Commander
who has been in the volunteer service is
never appointed to an executive position
over regular officers, even of less rank,
and with those who are but Lieutenants,
they are always so assigned that they be-
come the junior of the deck officers, or
those who control the ship watch and
watch at sea or in port. An assumed
superiority by the graduates has caused
more heart-burnings and unhappiness in
the service than any cause known, and
by it, good men are subjected to all man
ner of sights from which they have no
appeal or means of redress Even in the
location of a room or seat at the table or
place in formation, these petty tyrannies
are practiced, and man of feeling who
is sensitive, simply suffers through for
eign cruise, looking longingly ahead to
the time when he shall return to shore
duty, as relief from the worse than prison
life he led on the cruise. If men who
have proved themselves superior to grad
yates of their own rank cannot attain an
equal rank in the naval service, it can
not be expected that an enlisted man
can. The quarters furnished to warrant |
officers in naval vessels are so poor and |
the service so demeaning, by reason OF
The cringing servility, mis-called respect,
9xacted from them by even midshimen,
hat it is seldom it is held long,
except it be by that class of
men who could not live away from the
navy, and who have that cringing spirit
veil developed. The navy has great
DAD OF wrong 10 bear, but no one item is
greater than this snobbery perpetrated
~ the graduates ON the volunteers, and
he common disdain in which the former
lold the enlisted man. 1t is a crying
vii and will yet break out at Washing
on, and when it does, the country will
'e electrified at the disclosures of petty
antics and childish conceits which it
will arnnSn