The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-07-31
AN OLD MEMS WAR.
Few Commanding Officers of the Pres
ent Strife Are Youthful.

New York Journal of Commerce.
This is an old mems war, so far as tho
army is concerned When the civil war
broke out, Lee, the two Johnsons, Cooper
and perhaps one or two other men of years
ana rank Joined the Confederacy, for most
OF these officers were from the Southern
States; few elderly officers went into serv-
Ice IN the national armies, but with rare
exceptions 1t was the captains and lieuten-
ants of the regular army who became the
generals of the civil war, and the civil
lans who were appointed to military COM
mand were usually young men. Most of
the general and field officers of what is
known as the old army were deemed ply
sically unavailable, and their names are not
known 10 generation that remembers well
the names of scores of military command
ers who in 1861 were company officers, or,
II In civil life at the time, were Just begin
hlng tnelr business or professional careers.
IN 1851 the patriarchs of the United States
army were Sumner aged sixty-four, and
Mansneld, aged hfty-eight. The latter was
killed at Antetam; the former, soon after
Fredericksburg, was relieved from service
in the field at his own request Ormsby
Mcknight Mitchell was fifty-two when the
war began, Hooker forty-Seven, Meade for
Iy-si4, Thomas forty-tye. Mcdowell. Ord
and Buell. forty-three, Sherman forty-one.
Aufur forty, Grant and Pope thirty-nine
Hancock and Burnside thirty-seven, Logan
ana Mcclellan thirty-five, Mcpherson thir-
ty and Merritt twenty-five
MOST OF the general officers of the present
army were the generals and colonies of the
regular army; Few Of these are under sixty
years or age. The four original major gem
erals OF volunteers appointed from civil life
aGmeved nigh rank in the civil war. A man
VINO was only tWenty-seven when that war
closed would now be sixty, so that these
commanders are over that age, for the
youngest OF them. General Wheeler was
tWenty-eight at the end of the war. General
Sewall declined his appointment preferring
70 remain in the Senate, and the President
added to this list Butler, of South Carolina
and keifer, of Ohio, both sixty-two; these
men were not thirty years of age when the
civil war closed, and both of them had dis
tngulShed themselves in that struggle.
Dandolo took Constantinople at eighty or
over and Won Moltke was over seventy at
the time CT the Franco-German war. Sew
eral other German officers were we'll over
sixty, but these must be regarded as excep-
t1onal cases. Napoleon and Wellington were
about forty-five at Waterloo, and most of
Napoleon generals were young men. Our
officers in the revolution were generally
young men, but so were the leaders of civil
life; the active period of life seemed then
TO begin and close earlier than now. Scott
and Taylor were past middle life in the war
with Mexico. After forty-five a man is LA
bic to develop physical weaknesses that in
terfere with campaigning, and man of fif-
ty does not generally take the chances that
a man of thirty does, and in war many
chances must be taken. If General Shafter
is to be criticised at all, however, it is for
being too aggressive and not for being too
cautious. We do not criticse the general,
but IL he were to be criticised it would be
for fault of youth and not for fault of
age But he is over sixty. weighs over three
hundred pounds, and on account of trouble
with his legs is unable for days at a time to
stand. General Wheeler is sixty-two, and
was carried forward to the fighting before
Santiago on a litter, but, against the pro-
tests of the surgeons, he insisted on mount
ing his horse when he reached the front.
General Young, also over sixty, has been in
valided home because he cannot stand the
climate of Cuba. Men between thirty and
forty the age of most of the generals Of the
civil war, are at present subalterns. Colonel
Roosevelt. who is one of the boys of this
war; must be forty or a little over.