Military tenure

“ As they receive no pay, and as the officers are their fellow-citizens, it cannot be imagined that these troops will perform the manual exercise and military evolutions, with the exactness of soldiers who have no other occupation, and who are under all the rigour of military discipline. ”

“ But to train the recruits, and to command such an army when fashioned, would have required a very great corps of professional officers of high military education, many times as large as we had actually raised. ”

“ You can, therefore, appreciate the importance, the necessity, of every officer and noncommissioned officer doing everything that he possibly can during times of peace to qualify himself for his duties and responsibilities during times of war.
If we are going to have a good army we must have good regiments; to have good regiments we must have good battalions; to have good battalions we must have good companies—but to have good companies we must have efficient company officers and noncommissioned officers.
As stated before, everything in the life of the soldier leads to the field of battle. ”

“ To be raised at once from a position so subordinate and anomalous, so unrecognised and so fraught with useless peril as that of a gentleman volunteer, from the ranks as it were of that army whose dreadful sufferings he shared and whose many dangers he risked—to be raised to the rank of an officer in a regiment so distinguished as the Royal Fusiliers, and to be at once, temporarily though it were, placed on the general's staff, and beyond the reach of Cosmo's coldness, pique, and hauteur, was indeed to be independent, and to taste of happiness supreme! ”

“ I would then style them, and cause them to act as chiefs of engineers or artillery, and which rank they should hold for the same number of years as lieut.-colonels commanding regiments, when, like them, they should become major-generals; and enabling them also to take advantage of the retirement from the country, and of the system to be proposed for the military fund, these accomplished officers, if they thought fit to remain upon the effective list, could become available for staff or any other appointments the same as other generals, and at the same period of life. ”

“ By all means take advantage of the present disturbances to get into the army, where you will at once put yourself in a high position for life. I know that promotion and every facility for advancement will be cordially extended by the authorities. You are a favorite in the army and have great strength in political circles. I urge you to avail yourself of these favorable circumstances to secure your position for life; for, after all, your present employment is of uncertain tenure in these stirring times. ”

“ It was the duty of the lord-lieutenant in times of peace to see that the musters of the trained bands were regularly held, that the militia- men had their arms, and that men of higher rank who owed military service to the crown were prepared to perform it; in time of war to levy, muster, and train soldiers, fix the quotas of the hundreds and townships, see to the payment of troops, the collection of horses, and equipment generally, until the recruits were actually handed over to their officers. ”

“ I.I. Stevens.
He urged the elevating of the personnel of the army by—
“enlisting none but intelligent, respectable men, a fair representation of our people, attracted by increase of pay, and by opportunity of promotion to the grade of commissioned officer; that by care in selecting men, by schools, by libraries, and by camps of instruction, we can actually make of the common soldier a pretty good military man, so that going into civil life he may do good service in the militia, and in time of war be an important element in rapidly organizing armies. ”

“ Even the regular officers, who have some idea of military efficiency, rather derived from education and foreign travels than from actual experience, bristle up and talk proudly of the patriotism of the army, and challenge the world to show such another, although in their hearts, and more, with their lips, they own they do not depend on them. ”

“ A great and very important advance has already been made in bringing the regular army into close relations with the National Guard of the several States, and in the employment of regular officers in disseminating military education, both theoretical and practical, throughout the country. ”

“ For while the demands which modern war makes have increased in every direction, the term of service has been shortened in order to make enlistment in very great numbers possible. Thus the full consummation of military training cannot be attained unless recruits enter the army well equipped physically and mentally, and bringing with them patriotic sentiments worthy of the honourable profession of arms. ”

“ Always a close student of the higher branches of his profession, and belonging to an élite corps which at that time had no part in the command of troops, he became a proficient in military organization, administration and logistics, and also in strategy and grand-tactics, as taught in the text books, long before the outbreak of the war for the Union, but it is to be observed that he never claimed to have become specially skilled in minor tactics, or in the daily routine of company or regimental service. ”

“ As regards the immediate manpower requirements, the Royal Navy, the Army and the Air Force are in the fortunate position of having almost as many men as they can conveniently handle at this moment. There are, however, certain categories of service in which men are immediately required, both for Military and Civil Defense. ”

“ For the corps of matured officers, required to train recruits and to command them in war when organized in their units, would have had to consist of soldiers, themselves highly trained in military organization, who had devoted their lives to this work as a profession. It takes many years in peace time to train such officers. Because they must be professional, they can only be recruited under a voluntary system. ”

“ The argument brought forward for the maintenance of a standing army usually refers only to expediency in the case of unexpected war, whereas, one of the chief reasons for the maintenance of an army is the advantage of the military system as a method of education. ”

“ The military service near his person, that which takes place in time of war, and, in general, all the jobs or escorts, are performed by the subjects at their own expence, and they are obliged to execute his orders, and follow him wherever he chooses to lead them. ”

“ These are the men that form the backbone of the company, and are the best material on which to work in order to raise the general standard of courage in Battle. From a purely military point of view, it is absolutely necessary for an [Pg 253] officer, noncommissioned officer, or private to possess some marked military qualifications in order to gain respect from others. ”

“ The Corps of Engineers, the Supply and Transport Corps, and the Ordnance and the Army Medical Service, are recruited from those classes who exercise in civil life the functions which they are required to discharge in war. ”

“ To bow in meek submission to the uneducated authority of the civilian, or to the soldier whose record was such as not to command the respect of his fellows, was the lot of thousands of intelligent and brave soldiers, the superiors in all respects, save that of military rank alone, of these self-same officers ”

“ Let him also consider the analogy of the military mark, which, though it can both be retained, as by deserters, and also be received by those who are not in the army, yet ought not to be either received or retained outside its ranks; and, at the same time, it is not changed or renewed when a man is enlisted or brought back to his service. ”

“ And as the major, in the discharge of this honourable and important duty, would be afforded numerous opportunities of bringing his military acquirements under the eyes of his superiors, it is obvious that he could not be appointed to a situation better calculated to bring him into notice in that quarter, towards which the eyes of all those who look forward to rank, and honours are continually bent. ”

“ By method and discipline are to be understood the marshaling of the army in its proper subdivisions, the graduations of rank among the officers, the maintenance of roads by which supplies may reach the army, and the control of military expenditure. ”

“ Cadre Force, consisting of the General and Instructional Staff, a regiment of Artillery, small detachments of Engineers, Army Service Corps, Ordnance Corps, and of Army Medical Corps, for partially garrisoning the naval strategical bases, for technical duties, for maintenance of valuable stores and equipment, and, above all, for the instruction of the Militia and Volunteer forces during peace and for stiffening them in times of war. ”

“ The existing militia oath, which strictly limits obedience to the defence of the realm, covered the whole military duty of our ancestors; and it was only the innovation of the military contract that prepared the way for our modern idea of the soldier’s duty as unqualified and unlimited with regard to cause and place and time. The very word soldier meant originally stipendiary, his pay or solde (from the Latin solidum) coming to constitute his chief characteristic. ”

“ On the whole, it must be admitted that, while the war developed not a few volunteer officers of great merit, the class of professional soldiers who had graduated at our great military school furnished by far the largest number and the most efficient of the superior commanders in the field. ”

“ The private soldier’s vocation has risen, in many branches of the military service, from a trade to a profession, and now, more than ever before, is extensive training and a high order of intellect necessary for the command of armies. Wars have become shorter, sharper, more decisive and more terrible ”

“ With an army in the field, certain persons, not soldiers, are also subject to the provisions of "Military Law," such as civilians serving with the force in an official capacity; persons accompanying the troops with special leave, such as newspaper correspondents and contractors; persons employed with the troops, such as transport drivers; other persons known as followers who accompany the troops either as sutlers or on business or pleasure with the permission of the commander. ”

“ It may be possible that this facility of transfer from the military to the civil service would be rather injurious than favorable to a high military spirit, and that to encourage this spirit it would be expedient to place the profession of the soldier above all others. ”

“ To this purpose, my lords, it is indispensably necessary, that the military subordination be inviolably preserved, and that discipline be discreetly exercised without any partial indulgence, or malicious severities; that every man be promoted according to his desert, and that military merit alone give any pretensions to military preferment. ”

“ In our armies there is a regular gradation of rank; and every officer feels that he holds his commission by a tenure as high in origin, as secure in possession, and as independent in its exercise, as that of the general who commands; and the soldiers all know and feel that the places of those officers, who are killed or disabled in action, will be immediately filled by those next in rank, who are equally trained to command, and whose authority none will dispute. ”

“ Two thousand officers, among whom undoubtedly are a number of the best educated soldiers in the world, constitute nearly all of our military force upon whom we could confidently rely in case of trouble. The enlisted man, taking him as an average character, is practically worthless at a time when the enlargement of the army may suddenly become necessary. In France or Germany officers may at any time be selected from the ranks. ”

“ The duties and responsibilities of the officers were always put upon a high plane. They had, during all military service with troops, to dress like the men, to live among them in the trenches, to share their hardships and privations, and to be responsible for their welfare. ”

“ They necessarily had to learn pretty thoroughly the army regulations, with the methods and forms of making returns and conducting business with the adjutant-general's office, with the ordnance office, the quartermaster's and subsistence departments, etc. In this ready knowledge of the army organization and its methods their advantage over the new volunteer officers was more marked, as it seemed to me, than in any and all other things. The routine of army business and the routine of drill had to be learned by every army officer. ”

“ The efficiency and discipline of a company depend to such an extent on the noncommissioned officers that the greatest care and judgment should be exercised in their selection. They should be men possessing such soldierly qualities as a high sense of duty, cheerful obedience to orders, force of character, honesty, sobriety and steadiness, together with an intelligent knowledge of drills, regulations, and orders. ”

“ But I cannot understand a master of military administration such as he was, a soldier equipped with exceptional knowledge of organization and with wide experience of the requirements of a British army in the field, sending a considerable body of troops off oversea to a theatre of operations, where fighting might be expected almost as soon as they landed, without making provision for their base and communications. ”

“ It is true that many public employments demand a special course of study; but cannot the soldier, in the abundant leisure of peace, prepare himself for the career he would prefer after having fulfilled his debt to his country in the profession of arms? If these administrative offices were conferred upon officers retired from the army in a grade not lower than that of captain, would it not be a stimulant for officers to attain that rank, and would it not lead them, when in garrisons, to find their recreations elsewhere than in the theaters and public clubs? ”