Prior to the commencement of the Mexican-American War, the United
States regular military establishment suffered from a popularly accepted
image of low-class individuals being fed and clothed at the public's expense.
Unless these troops were actually engaged in military operations, the public
found no useful purpose for these "loafers".
US Infantryman
In his memoirs, Ulysses B. Grant related a story concerning his return home from the Military Academy at West Point in August, 1843. As a young first lieutenant, he was proudly strutting down the street in his new wool uniform when he was confronted by a stableman who mockingly shouted, "Soldier will you work? No sir-ee, I'll sell my shirt first! Oh, ain't I a big Injun!".
It is said that this incident established Grant's distaste for military polish and pageantry which he later apparently lived by. This scene also, however, reveals the open distaste that the public had for the regular army and their "easy living lifestyle".
Actually, the military life of the time was anything but a free meal and a lounging lifestyle. From the soldier's perspective, there were post assignments more desirable than others. Posts in the populated east were most desirable due to their proximity to civilized society. However, both the frontier posts and the eastern posts shared the responsibility of providing the needed manpower for the various civil projects such as road building, bridge construction and the construction and maintenance of various local and governmental buildings. Even those troops stationed in the more remote and possibly more hazardous posts suffered from boredom and fatigue due to overwork on civil projects. Alcohol and gambling occupied what little free time was available and consequently alcoholism, ill health and poverty were the norm for the period.
The living conditions of the common soldier were far from ideal and because of the low pay afforded to the ordinary rankers, there was little chance for them to marry and support a family on what they earned. Quartering in the billets usually required that two men shared a bunk approximately six feet long and four feet wide. These beds were constructed in bunk bed fashion and were more often than not padded with straw which would be periodically changed.
Some soldiers did take "wives" which in common with many of the armies of the day, acted as the company laundresses. Frequently these "wives" were not legally married to the soldier and should her husband die during the course of the "marriage" she would soon find another soldier of the same company to take the first husband's place. Often these "wives" did not wait for the demise of their husbands but changed partners as they saw fit.
The educational level of the enlisted man was less than impressive. Itwas often acknowledged that anyone who could do anything, would stay out ofth military at all costs. This opinion holds true when the high percentage of foreigners and British Army deserters who were in the ranks of the American Army is considered. These individuals had little chance to acquire employment in U.S. civilian life.
Added to this collection were the poor southern whites who had few opportunities provided in life other than farming on a small plot of landf or the local plantation owner. To these plot farmers, the military appeared to offer a step up. In the north, where industrialization presented greater financial opportunities, enlistment into the U.S. military was far below that of the southern states. This is one reason often cited for the apparent greater military tradition in the south than in the north.
Officers
If the condition of life was poor for the enlisted man, it was little better for the officers. Expected to maintain a certain standard of living which exceeded that which they were actually paid, army officers were frequently heavily in debt unless they came from wealthy families. Advancement was slow as well and offered the peacetime officer little hope for promotion.
Educational levels of the officers varied considerably. Officers in the regular army ranged in educational levels from self-taught to college educated. The problem, however, in keeping the college educated officers in the service was the already mentioned lack of advancement. Potential West Point graduates often remained in the military only long enough to fulfill their military obligation and then resigned to private life where their education could be put to greater financial advantage.
The older, often less educated, officers were frequently allowed to remain in the service long after the time that they should have retired. Near senile officers were sometimes kept in the service because of the woefully inadequate retirement afforded to those in the military. It was felt that these long serving officers deserved better than a poverty level retirement pension, so they were allowed to collect full pay in the service. This lack of turnover resulted in a dearth of promotions for younger officers and their eventual separation from the service.
Companies of the regular regiments of the American military establishment frequently served in small posts isolated from the remainder of the regiment. This dispersing of companies to man military posts was a definite detriment to the organization of the regular army. Company officers, although becoming familiar with small unit tactics and tactics required for Indian confrontations, did not gain experience in coordinated actions with other companies in formation. Regimental officers, many who had never seen more than three to four companies of their regiment in one place at a time, lacked the needed experience to maneuver their regiments as a unit. General Zachary Taylor, aware of this shortcoming, established a training ground for his troops in New Orleans during the assembly of the Army of Occupation. It was Taylor's intention that regimental commanders could take the needed time to become accustomed to regimental tactics.
These drill sessions were often the first time that long service officers had seen their entire regimental organization. The story is told that Colonel Vose, regimental commander of the Fourth U.S. Infantry, who was quite advanced in years, forced himself onto the parade grounds to drill his entire regiment. The story continues that Vose was unable to take the pressure of the exercise, gave two or three orders, grew faint, turned around and fell dead."
The common soldiers of the Fourth believed that the shock of seeing the entire regiment together was more than the old man could handle. This story illustrates, however, the infirmed condition and advanced age of many of the higher ranking military officers and the inability to drill large bodies of troops by these same officers.
Leader Quality
The quality of leaders in the military prior to 1846 was varied. The establishment of West Point in 1812 had ensured that there was a professional military training academy for the U.S. officers. However, due to the aforementioned governmental policy of allowing older officers to remain in the service, these older commanding officers had no formal military training.
Generals Zachary Taylor and Winfield Scott, both commanding U.S. armies in Mexico, were veterans of the War of 1812, had been in the service prior to that war, and had become self-taught in the "Art of War" by their experiences in leading relatively small forces in mainly Indian engagements. These two officers were not the exception though. The majority of officers in the regular army were not formally educated in military matters.
It was in the junior officer corps that the regular army shared a common thread Of uniformity in education. Many younger officers were graduates of the Academy at West Point. A unique feature of the Mexican-American War is the extent to which these junior officers played important and pivotal roles in the conflict. Many of these junior officers gained valuable experience in Mexico which Would later provide them with the needed experience for the American Civil War.
Whereas the differences in educational background in the regulars varied from self-taught to academy instruction, the gamut of abilities in the volunteer units were at times, bordering on the bizarre. On one extreme, there were West Point graduates who had served out their military obligations and had retired to the private sector where their education could be used to greater economic advantage. Because of this education and experience, these men generally became leaders within the community and were often selected for higher grade regimental officer positions than they would have been able to attain in the regular army had they spent a lifetime in the service. If not politically appointed to the rank because of their experience, these retired officers were often elected to officer positions by their constituents when the volunteer regiments were raised.
Electing of officers by the rank and file was one thing that those of the regular army found so distasteful about the volunteer forces raised for the war. It is this sense of volunteer republicanism run amok, that elections for officers often became popularity contests. For this reason, totally inexperienced and ill-prepared individuals were elected to command positions. Samuel Chamberlain relates an election that took place in Illinois which illustrates the strange process of officer elections.
Chamberlain indicates that one individual, in vying for the position of Captain of the Alton Guards, made the following speech: "Fellow citizens! I am Peter Goff, the butcher of Middletown! I am! I am the man that shot that sneaking, white livered Yankee abolutionist son of a bitch, Lovejoy! I did! I want to be your Captain, I do; and I will serve the yellow bellied Mexicans the same. I will! I have treated you to fifty dollars of whiskey, I have, and when elected Captain I will spend fifty more, I will!". Peter Goff was promptly elected Captain of the Alton Guards. It is unknown if he kept his promise.
"Political plum" appointments to command positions also accounted for inappropriate individuals being placed in posts of authority. This practice, however, was not limited only to the volunteers; the regular army also suffered under misguided hands, placed there by self-motivated politicians, looking for future political favors or paying back past debts.
The contemporary views of military affairs were tainted and skewed by the mythical image of the "citizen soldier". This popular image embraced ideal of the peaceful citizen-farmer laying aside his plow for his musket in order to defend the nation's honor. This concept was so accepted that it accounted for the vast majority of problems that the regular army faced such as low authorized strengths, low actual musters, isolated garrison poses with little or no support, low pay and low public esteem.
The public's view of the military was shared by the volunteer soldiers. Volunteers maintained a strong distaste for what they viewed as senseless military customs such as saluting, maintaining the condition of their weapons and uniforms and placing latrines downstream from bivouac locations. Volunteers thought the regular military to be a de-humanizing institution and made every effort to insure that they would not become a "musket toting machine". One Indiana volunteer, when he discovered that he would have to wear a regular U.S. Army uniform rather than his volunteer uniform which had worn out, exclaimed, "I'll be blowed if they make a regular out of me."
Additionally, a factor that may also have accounted for some of the prejudicial views of the regular army would be the high percentage (about 42%) of foreign born soldiers. Men from Germany, France, Ireland, England, Italy, etc., made up a large portion of the regular military rank and file. It was difficult fot he American public to view these soldiers with anything but contempt when national chauvinism made it difficult to accept anyone that could not speak English or spoke with an accent as many regular troops did.
If the volunteers lacked respect for the regulars, it was a two-way proposition. The regulars found the volunteers ill disciplined, slovenly and lacking in the very basic characteristics required of military personnel. Regulars frequently complained of the camp conditions of the volunteers. They stated the volunteers had not even the most rudimentary knowledge of camp sanitation and diet. Based on the high percentage of serving volunteers during the Mexican-American War who died of sickness and disease this accusation may be accurate.
By far, the single most objectionable practice of the volunteers was their election of officers. This cut across the very heart of regular military tradition. The regulars felt that the volunteer's propensity for looting, murder, rape and othe rcrimes committed on the local Mexican population, was a direct result of this election practice. How, they argued, could an officer control men, who by a single vote, could remove the officer's rank? Indeed, the Mexican population preferred the arrival of U.S. regulars over volunteers, primarily because of the manner in which they were illtreated by the volunteers.
If, at this time, a most controversial topic concerning the military had to be selected, it would be the advisability of maintaining the military academy at West Point. Since the establishment of the academy, it had been the subject of frequent debates over governmental maintenance of an institution of higher learning that appeared to promote the formation and continuation of an elitist military officer class.
This image of highly educated military men was contrary to the ideals of the average American who still held tightly to the myth of the "citizen soldier". Although West Point had been open for thirty-four years at the start of the Mexican-American War, there had been little opportunity for the graduates of the Academy to show the skills they had learned. Because the operations of the military had been against Indians, government officials succumbed to the notion expressed by their constituents that the Academy was a waste of tax dollars that provided nothing towards the betterment of the nation.
US Army During the Mexican-American War
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