Only when the three hundred odd new cadets have been transferred to camp and joined the Battalion, do they begin to feel that they are members of the Corps. They are, however, ill-formed, crude, ungainly members, and from the moment they pass the hedge that screens the camp from the visitors’ seats, the Tactical gardeners begin the work of bending these natural twigs, so recently transplanted from the individualistic soil of civilian life to the orthodox ground of military training.
Realizing how difficult it is for a young man to adapt himself to the changed conditions that he meets at West Point, the authorities require the new cadet to report in June, just as the academic year has closed, in order that he may receive the benefit of the summer-camp training before taking up his studies. The physical fatigue that the new plebe experiences is really so great, that he would not be able to plunge into the academic course before his body has become accustomed to the demands made upon it. The aching muscles, the 128 drooping eyes, that awful heaviness of fatigue must all be given time to pass away so that the mind may be free to pursue its development. To this end, he goes into camp after his first few weeks in “Beast Barracks.”
The camp is prettily situated in the northeast corner of the Plain along the bluff overlooking the Hudson. In form it is rectangular, laid out for six companies whose streets are centrally cut by an avenue known as the general parade. The streets are parallel to the parade ground proper, from which they are separated and screened by a hedge.
Nor is the cadet camp lacking in the features that make every permanent camp comfortable and convenient for the soldier. For these creature comforts, the cadets have been at times criticised on the ground that soldiers in the field should be content with the bare necessities of life. The cadet camp, however, is intended as a camp of instruction only. In military life there are two kinds of camps, the permanent camp and the temporary camp. In the latter, soldiers live close to nature dispensing with the hundred and one little conveniences that all of us today consider necessary to our physical well-being, but in the former, such as the cadet encampment, the soldier is provided with a maximum of comfort—and why not? The illustrated magazines that help to bring us closer to the Great War in Europe give visual proof that when men remain for any length of time in one place, even in the zone of danger, 129 they build and adorn abodes. It may be that an enemy shell will destroy these shelters the next moment, but the domestic instinct remains unimpaired. Some of the bomb-proof dugouts on the western front are miniature triumphs of architecture and comfort. The occupation year after year of the cadet camp has had the same effect. We therefore see today a camp with graveled company streets that are illuminated at night by electricity. The tents, instead of being pegged, are supported by galvanized iron rails. The dim candle of olden times is replaced by the brilliant electric bulb, and the cadet, instead of reposing his weary bones on the hard wooden floor, slumbers luxuriously on a Gold Medal cot.
A large central tent, like a mother hen watching over her brood, is reserved for the Commandant of Cadets. The tents of the cadet officers are on the opposite edge of the space in front of the Tactical officers’ tents, the next indication of hierarchical authority. Then come the tents of the non-commissioned officers and the privates.
To have a neat-looking camp, strict regulations govern the arrangement of the tents. Twice a day they are aligned. Due to changes in the temperature, the supporting cords lengthen or shorten, so that the front tent-pole gets out of alignment. Then an authoritative voice rings out:
“Turn out, ‘B’ company, and straighten your tent-poles!” Whereupon cadets in all conditions of dress and undress tumble out of the little brown 130 canvas homes. When it rains the cords must be loosened at the first pitter-patter of the raindrops on the tent-fly. The new plebe sitting in his underwear in his tent, probably polishing his breastplate for the twenty-fifth time that day, does not realize that this duty must be performed until a dozen or more yearlings command from the recesses of the canvas bungalows:
“Turn out, you plebes, and loosen those tent-cords!” Out they jump into the “catacombs” (the space between the tents), bumping their heads against the rails, and at once commence tugging at the obstinate, water-soaked tent-cords, while the summer downpour soaks them to the skin.
To each tent two cadets are assigned, one of whom performs for a week at a time the duty of tent orderly. Whenever the cadet detailed for orderly is absent on account of duty or sickness, his tent-mate becomes responsible. In order that the Tactical officer in charge of any company may know which cadet is responsible, there is fastened on the front tent-pole, a revolving octagonal disk of wood, about three inches in diameter. Both cadets’ names, as well as the words “Guard” “Sick,” are printed on the face of the disk, along one of the sides, and the disk revolved to indicate the name of the orderly, or the cause of the occupant’s absence. The orderly is also supposed to keep the water bucket filled, but the occupants of each tent usually have some private treaty 131 whose provisions prescribe which one shall “drag” the water from the hydrant.
Generally speaking the orderly is responsible for the cleanliness and police of the tent, and of the ground adjacent and in front, as far as the middle of the company street where the rubbish is swept into a pile to be removed by the policemen. These men are civilian employees, many of whom have been at the Academy so long that they are intimately identified with the Corps. In time, some of them will fade into legendary characters much the same as Benny Havens. Promptly at police call at five o’clock, the wheelbarrow squad commanded by “Mike,” “Frank,” or “Tony,” moves ceremoniously down the street collecting the sweepings. At this hour the camp presents an animated scene. Cadets are busily dragging the ground around their tents with a broom to give it a “spoony” appearance for inspection, and every few minutes some one man will dart out to the center of the street with a stray match or piece of paper and throw it in the passing wheelbarrow.
The interior of the tent contains a wooden clothes-press and usually a canvas stretcher suspended from the ridge pole. Each cadet has a certain section for his clothes. All articles, belts, gloves, socks must be folded and arranged in a prescribed manner. The cots are folded and kept out of sight during the day. Gray, painted wooden lockers for storing cleaning material and clothing border one side of the tent floor. Many cadets, however, 132 secrete food, known as “Boodle” in these convenient places, and I am sure that an unexpected inspection would reveal many tins of saltines, bottles of olives, and jars of peanut butter. During my cadet days, the officer in charge of my company never, for some reason, looked into the lockers. My tent-mate and I therefore grew more and more bold about filling them with vast supplies of “Boodle,” and we began to think that the “Tac” was inspired by a sort of noblesse oblige where the lockers were concerned, a sort of sympathetic remembrance of his own cadet-gnawing appetite. One Saturday, however, just as he was leaving and I was offering a silent prayer of thanksgiving, he ordered the lockers opened. A gallon jar in which some fifty olives lay submerged and a slovenly looking pineapple cheese met my humiliated gaze. A reprimand that as a cadet officer I should set an example to the rest of the company, and five demerits, were awarded to me forthwith.
When the tents are not prepared for inspection, however, cadets may make down the cots and rest. How wonderfully refreshing it is to rest! to throw oneself down on the blankets and forget the heat, the weary march, the grime, the dust, and abandon oneself to the delights of the imagination, dreaming of the sweetness of the past or building vast plans for the future! How precious to the cadet is each moment of repose snatched from the busy day! But it is in the morning that the real longing for sleep becomes most acute. 133
Every morning at 5:20, the solitary boom of the reveille gun is echoed throughout the hills, rudely dissipating the fog of unconsciousness that envelops the sleeping cadets. Little by little the deathlike slumber of the camp is broken. Indistinct sounds, a sigh, a yawn, float gently out upon the air; drugged forms twist and roll uncertainly beneath the mosquito bars, as if struggling in a bewildered sort of way to preserve the pleasing heaviness that charms their bodies.
Suddenly the air is torn by the shrill garrulous fifes and the lusty rub-a-dub-dub of the drums. The reveille march has begun. Around the camp the “Hell Cats” march, up one street, down another like demons possessed. The shrieking sounds of the fifes and the deep rolling noise of the drums brusquely rout the stillness of the dawn, while the semi-conscious forms toy with danger, beguiling themselves that there is plenty of time until the assembly. Presently from near the general parade the familiar warning notes of Yankee Doodle change the camp to a place of intense animation. Up go mosquito bars and in a twinkling, almost as if by magic, tents disgorge their sleepy occupants, hastily and feverishly buttoning their uniforms as they run to their places in ranks to the fading rolls of the drum corps.
After reveille it takes but a few minutes to police the tents and perform the necessary ablutions before breakfast. The drills commence within a half-hour after the morning meal and 134 continue until noon. They are of various kinds, the majority of which will be described in the chapter entitled “Lessons from Mars,” but I will speak of the plebe’s work in his first camp, since it is somewhat different.
The physical exercises given to the new cadet in “Beast Barracks” are continued in camp. In addition, he is sent to the Gymnasium for swimming, where a professional instructor is present to see that no one drowns, and to teach the various strokes. As many of the cadets are adept swimmers upon entrance, they are tested, and those found qualified are excused from further attendance. The men who cannot swim, the real “land lubbers,” attend daily until they are proficient.
The most diverting instruction, however, in plebe camp is the dancing lesson. A civilian professor spends the summer at West Point to instruct the fourth classmen in the Terpsichorean art. Every morning at hour intervals, squads of cadets carrying their pumps march across the parade to Cullum Hall. Here they remove their coats, put on their pumps, and line themselves along the wall. The waltz step is first taught as the basis of all dancing, then later the two-step, and, since the new dances have come upon us, the fox-trot and one-step are rehearsed toward the end of the course. The dancing lesson is not open to visitors. Once upon a time it was, but long cadets, short cadets, fat cadets, lean cadets, awkward and graceful ones, all tiptoeing, “one- and two- and threeing” 135 around the room like a lot of coy young hippopotami with compass bearings lost, became a famous sight for tourists, who wanted to enjoy a good laugh. How could anyone learn to dance in the presence of a giggling crowd! But the crowd wasn’t to blame! Here in one corner was a little slender chap delicate as a reed, perspiring in his efforts to steer his six-foot partner, a regular steam roller, through the mazes of Professor Vesay’s old-fashioned waltz. Again, all over the room, self-conscious boys in white shirt-sleeves were in a bewildered state trying to execute the Professor’s directions:
“Right foot in second position—glide and cut!” Nowadays an officer excludes all sightseers during the lesson.
The instruction of the plebe in infantry drill continues uninterruptedly, for it is essential that he should not spoil the appearance of the rest of the battalion. Together with swimming, dancing, and infantry drill, his morning is completely occupied. After the midday dinner, he is assembled in squad for instruction in hygiene and guard duty, or he may be required to spend his time working upon his equipment, his brasses, his bayonet, and rifle.
Very little social diversion is permitted to the plebe, because he is usually awkward in appearance and unfamiliar with military customs and deportment. Consequently he considers that his life is excessively hard, to him unnecessarily so; but 136 as I have observed cadets for thirteen years I am convinced of the wisdom of holding them in a distinct class for one year. Then they emerge from the cocoon of plebedom as dazzling yearling butterflies.
To afford instruction in guard duty the camp is surrounded by sentinels. A quota of cadets from each company marches on guard immediately after parade in the evening. There are three reliefs for each of the ten posts: three corporals, a sergeant, and two officers of the guard, and an officer of the day. The guard is under the control and supervision of the officer in charge, who is one of the Tactical officers. Each sentinel walks two hours and rests four, so that during the twenty-four hours the cadet walks eight hours. The effect of this duty upon the cadet is lasting, for it teaches him the fatigue a sentinel experiences and prevents him, when an officer, from demanding too much of his men. The borders of the camp are divided into posts, numbered from 1 to 10.
The first important duty demanded of the plebe is guard. With what quivering sensations this youthful soldier approaches his first real test! Before he goes on guard he is instructed in his orders, both general and special, but few feel as if they knew them well enough to stand the ordeal of an inspection by a yearling corporal. No opportunity is lost, therefore, before the hour to march on post to perfect his knowledge, so that after supper little groups of excited and nervous 137 plebes study diligently these orders under the pale and insect-infested lamp-posts near the guard tent. In the obscure light these slim gray forms, some seated and some standing, seem shadowy and motionless except for their gloves, little dabs of white that move restlessly to and fro, attacking the ubiquitous mosquitoes.
The nearby guard tents under the elms are dark except the main one where sit the officers of the guard, who keep the record of a stream of gay upper-classmen, signing out for the hops and concerts. How far off they are to the plebe! It seems to each one, as he watches them from the shadows, that there is an impassable gulf between them, and he wonders as he listens to their hurried voices calling, “Ducrot, hop with,” or “Dumbguard, hop with, extended” if ever his year of plebedom will roll by. What are those unintelligible remarks? It is some time before he understands that the above expressions mean that Cadet Ducrot is taking a young lady to the hop, and that Cadet Dumbguard also, except that the latter’s girl lives at some distance so that he is allowed ten minutes more after the conclusion of the dance to escort the young lady to her home. Today, as I stroll by the camp in the evening and see the same scenes re?nacted, I re-live the first impressions of my own plebe days.
Often while I was waiting my turn to go on post, I sat fascinated as I watched the scene at the guard tents in the twilight of the summer evenings. 138 From the obscurity of the camp, stalwart figures were constantly coming. Their gray coats and the evening mists merged into one so completely, it seemed as if only animated pairs of white trousers were flitting across the parade, all converging toward Post No. 1. Little by little, as they approached the light of the guard tent, the rays that were stabbing the darkness illumined the bell buttons of the gray coats, and for a brief moment gleaming forms with happy laughing faces filled the picture and then into the darkness of the Plain quickly disappeared.
Such reveries, however, are usually interrupted by a sharp voice calling:
“Turn out the second relief!” “Hurry up, you plebes,” and away the novitiates scamper to perform their first guard tour. As the relief marches around the graveled paths under the command of a very military corporal, the plebe has, in spite of his feeling of uncertainty, a sensation of pride in being entrusted with the guard of a part of the camp. Each time that the corporal commands “Relief Halt No. 2!” and the rifles hit the ground in unison, a pleasurable thrill pervades his being, a consciousness of a certain importance. Before very much pride can swell his breast, he is brought back to reality by the stern corporal exclaiming, “Wake up, Mr. Dumbguard, and come to port arms!” or “Drag in your chin!” In goes the chin, and the shoulders instinctively draw to the rear. Glory was brief; humiliation reigns anew. 139
Then commences in earnest the lonely two hours of marching up and down, back and forth, at the end of which time the nine pounds of the rifle has tripled at least. The arms ache, and legs feel as if they would bore holes in the body.
The early part of the tour is filled with interest. The animation in some company streets in contrast to the silence in others, the occasional tinkling of mandolins, the cries from one tent to another, the laughter over a surreptitious bucket of lemonade, the Y. M. C. A. phonograph, the confusion over the wash lists, scampering cadets noisily returning from hops and concerts—all keep a sentinel from thinking of himself. It is not until the three taps of the drum, when the camp is magically plunged into obscurity and silence, that the plebe begins to feel the monotony of his duty and, while walking mechanically back and forth on his post, to become introspective.
The stillness of the camp only accentuates his slow nonchalant step on the path. In his imagination the air seems to be filled with invisible spirits—the spirits of the night that have come forth. First he is conscious of only a few timid ones here and there, but as the hours wear on they seem to grow bolder and bolder, filling the surrounding atmosphere and whispering in his ear their ghostly messages. Each nerve becomes more alert as he listens for the crunch, crunch, crunch of some official step on the gravel. How vivid and eerie seem his surroundings! The lonesome hours of 140 the night strike a sympathetic chord in his sensitive nature and the balmy stillness calls forth his starry fancies. At this hour when his comrades lie in their tents bewitched by sleep, the most beguiling of enchantments, he is conscious that another mysterious world is awakening all around him in the solitude and silence. The air is filled with fairies holding their imperceptible revels. He hears the rustling of the leaves, the intermittent chattering of the crickets, the soughing of the breeze in the branches, as if the trees in great distress were calling mournfully to each other. Should this be the first time that he is alone at night on post, he is a little afraid, and starts at the faintest sound. It seems that when man reposes, the Things come forth to their daily tasks, performed in a world unknown to us.
Never will he forget, however, the ineffable beauty of the scene, so beautiful that he is filled with a little sadness. The buildings across the Plain, stern and melancholy even in the darkness, seemed to be companion sentinels ever watchful over their traditions, and guarding the sleeping hills dimly discernible through their misty blankets. Occasionally a graceful river steamer, like some huge Jack-o’-Lantern ruffling the smooth waters of the Hudson, glides softly by under the cliff, her throbbing engines seeming to send forth a certain warmth that dispels the chill of the early morning.
It is at this hour especially that his thoughts 141 wander to his “ain Folk” and reveal to his senses the full aroma of his days at home.
The clanking of a sword in the darkness calls him back to earth and to the realization that the dreaded inspection is at hand.
“Halt! Who goes there?” he quickly challenges.
“Corporal of the Guard,” answers a sepulchral voice from the shadows.
“Advance, Corporal of the Guard, with the countersign,” uncertainly commands the plebe. When within whispering distance, the corporal faintly breathes the countersign, “Saratoga,” or “Burgoyne” (or maybe Tannh?user or Dumbguard, to test the sentinel), whereupon the corporal is allowed to pass by the sentinel’s order:
“Advance, Corporal of the Guard.”
In the eyes of the yearling corporal, a plebe is habitually wrong, so that for a few trying minutes the benighted sentinel endeavors to “take charge of his post and all government property in view,” while his preceptor picks him to pieces, his bearing, his accoutrements, his knowledge, admonishing him at intervals, to “Drag in his chin—way in.” But soon, the solitude of the night begins to work even upon the yearling corporal constraining him to indulge in a partial intimacy with the plebe, adding in softened tones:
“Mister, where are you from?”
“South Carolina, sir,” proudly responds the sentinel, touched by the upper-classman’s near-cordiality.
With a gruff “Pretty fine State, mister,” the 142 corporal virtuously departs to interrogate his next victim.
How welcome now is the first faint tread of the relief as it makes its bi-hourly round to take the sleepy sentinel back to the guard tent where a bed of camp stools awaits his aching muscles.
The tour of guard of a new cadet is sometimes made uncomfortable by the pranks of the upper-classmen, although since the abolition of hazing at West Point, this form of diversion has greatly diminished. The regulations against hazing have been made so stringent that few cadets indulge in the practice. As a matter of fact hazing no longer exists at the Military Academy. A few heedless chaps from time to time, forgetful of the future, unconscious of the heartburns that they will suffer later on, indulge in hazing the plebes, but they pay the price for their fun. Formerly, hazing was tolerated among the cadets because some of its features were not harmful or objectionable, but, as in all cases where a little liberty is granted to lads of immature judgment, license followed. The practice was carried too far and moderation ceased to exist. In 1901, at the instance of a former cadet’s parents, Congress ordered an investigation of hazing conditions, with the result that the Superintendent was directed to abolish all semblance of mistreatment of plebes by upper-classmen.
The more vicious practices disappeared at once, 143 but from time to time investigation revealed isolated cases of the innocent kind. In the days of hazing, the favorite and most injurious punishment meted out to a plebe, if he were at all fresh, or “B. J.” as the cadets say, was a series of exercises known as “eagles.” The new man would be taken in a tent, stripped to the waist, and compelled to execute a setting-up exercise, “Full bend knees.” The knees are separated and bent as much as possible; point of knees forced forward and downward, heels together; trunk and head erect; but instead of placing the hands on the hips, he was required to raise the arms laterally. It is not the exercise itself that was injurious, but the duration of the punishment. Some men were required to “eagle” 100 or 150 times without a rest, and if they had committed a particularly heinous offense, this physical rebuke was administered under the broiling sun in the “catacombs.” Another form of punishment consisted in making plebes, stripped to the waist, hold pieces of matches or tissue paper, between their shoulder blades for half an hour or more, while their tormentors stood around insisting that they flatten their chins to their necks.
But this punishment was not viewed by the plebes with as much dismay as was the servitude to “Tabasco Sauce.” The prowling yearlings would descend into the Fourth Class sink, line up the plebes, and order them to stick out their tongues, upon which they dashed a flop or two of the burning liquid and fled. Sometimes, at the Mess Hall, as 144 much as half a teaspoonful was meted out for some unconscious transgression by the plebe of the upper-classmen’s wishes. Fortunately the above practices have long since disappeared.
On the other hand, the greater part of the hazing consisted of what is known at college as “fagging,” such as dragging water, sweeping tents, making beds, cleaning brasses and rifles, making lemonade, running errands, sewing buttons on white trousers, etc. Each upper-classman selected a plebe for his “special duty man” to perform the aforementioned tasks. Most of the plebes did the duty cheerfully, buoyed up by the thought that next year their turn to have a plebe would arrive. A large part of the hazing, moreover, was the so-called “deviling” the plebes, a generic term applied to all kinds of humorous and mischievous pranks. Any cadet, for example, who possessed any peculiarity of size, appearance, or temperament was given a “tech” or technical name, to be used always in lieu of his own. One of my classmates, whose tent was in a part of the camp called “Paradise Alley,” was given in consequence of his auburn hair the following “tech” with strict instructions to use it no matter who asked him his name. In reply, therefore, to the same inquiry, “Who are you?” many times daily, he scrupulously replied:
“I am a too-loo-loo bird, sir! Peep-y-ty-peep, sir! Poop-y-ty-poop! Ah! ..............