Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1905-06-10
Quickly Made Good Soldiers.

-Blackwood's Magazine
Quickly Made Good Soldiers.
81 was surprised" said the doctor,
that the newspapers didn't give more
attention to Field Marshal Oyama's
characterization of the modern Japan
csc army. After explaining that I'M
der the old rule military service was
limited to the hereditary fighting or
soldier class, the general pointed to
the result of breaking away from the
old rule and calling men of all classes
into the army. He insisted that an
army including all classes had a finer
national spirit and fought better than
the old army made up exclusively OF
professional fighters.
This interested me greatly, be-
cause it called to mind experiences
in the Union army of the civil war
which illustrated the processes by
which the average man of patriotic
impulse was transformed into sol
der. 1t is impossible for the pres
ent generation to understand how ut
terly ignorant the men of 1861 were of
the simplest details of military ser
vice. There were then very few mill
tary companies outside the large cities
and the members of the few carried
themselves as superior beings.
when Fort Sumter was fired on the
members of the military companies
in the county towns constituted sort
of fighting caste, and they became the
drill masters of the thousands of
patriotic young men, not one of whom
could come to an about face. 1t re-
member well when hundred of our
best young men organized military
company. They sent to Capt. Branch
in the nearest city, asking him to send
one of his crack company out to drill
us. A private in the company dOnned
a lieutenant's uniform and came out
to act as instructor at SIS an hour. and
he lorded it over hundred as earnest
and intelligent men as ever lived
so anxious were we to learn, and
SO much respect had we for a man who
knew military things that we bore
with the autocratic impertinences of
the drill master and conceded all he
demanded in the way of Difference to
himself. He seemed to us graf man,
although we discovered later that he
taught us very little. We went for
ward rapidly, however, after he left
u.s. and were soon at the front, where
we learned in a few months more than
any crack holiday soldier could teach
us. After several campaigns we were
with Buel's advance to Shiloh, and as
we climbed the bank of the river,
where thousands of stragglers were
gathered, / heard a voice that
knew.
'tThe men of the company had been
in service nearly a year. They consti-
tuted the crack company of a fight
ing regiment. They were going up
the river bank into battle, and they
were ready and eager to meet the enc
my. Imagine their surprise when they
saw their pompOus little drill master
of the previous April standing among
the stragglers declaiming to the new
corners about the glory, and death,
that awaited them in front.
1.-The captain. who had been among
the humblest of the learners, in April,
1861, and was in April. 1862, one of the
most resourceful officers in the regi-
ment, looked at the declaimer in won
der. The orderly, who had been
roundly abused because he could not
hold his hands still. said quietly to
the shouting straggler: If you want
| to go to the front and glory fall in
at the rear of the company Then
came the marching men, whose swing
into line and soldierly bearing 81
fenced the man who had lorded it
over them for SIS an hour less than
year before. They had become fight
ing soldiers, while he had stood still
at $13 a month. Chicago Inter
Ocean.
There had been surprises and dis
appointments in the company of
course. In the first forced march Eve
| of the strongest and finest looking
| men fell by the way, and three of
| them did not recover their health for
several years. Slender young fellows,
given three months to break down,
stood that march and all others well.
Men of refinement and education had
come into close fellowship with men
who could not write their names, and
| the hodcarrier had become the COM
rade of his ole employer, but the thin
ming out and the leveling processes
| had made dependable soldiers of ALL"
Chicago Inter Ocean
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