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3.RegularsMilitiaandVolunteers1800-1860.pptREGULARS, MILITIA, AND VOLUNTEERS, 1800-1860
JOHN ADAMS EXPANDS THE MILITARY
(Below) President John Adams. In 1798, the Adams Administration gave America a frigate navy (upper right) and a marine corps (lower right).
A NEW PRESIDENT WARY OF HIS MILITARY
(Left) Thomas Jefferson painted in 1796, four years before his election to the White House. (Right) Captain John Pratt, 1st U.S. Infantry Regiment, exuding the aristocratic aura that Jefferson found so disturbing in the Federalist officer corps he inherited.
JEFFERSONIAN DEFENSE POLICY: A LAND AND SEA MILITIA AND COASTAL FORTS
(Upper right) A gunboat of 1800. (Lower right) Fort McHenry, the guardian of Baltimore Maryland. (Below) An unknown officer of the New York City Legion, circa 1795.
JEFFERSON ESTABLISHES WEST POINT TO PRODUCE EDUCATED, REPUBLICAN OFFICERS
(Left) A cadet from the U.S. Military Academy, circa 1805. (Below) A view of the Hudson River from West Point painted later in the 19th century.
JEFFERSON USES THE REGULAR ARMY FOR SCIENTIFIC AND COMMERCIAL PURPOSES
Two U.S. Army officers led the Lewis and Clark Expedition and many of their men were soldiers. (Lower right) Captain Meriwether Lewis in the frontier dress he wore on the trail.
AN AGGRESSIVE USE OF THE NAVY
(Upper left) Commodore Edward Preble’s squadron of American frigates and gunboats bombards Tripoli on August 3, 1804. (Below) Philadelphia’s own Stephen Decatur became one of America’s first naval history thanks to his exploits at Tripoli. (Lower left) Decatur and his sailors seize a Tripolitan gunboat in a fierce hand-to-hand melee.
JEFFERSON’S AGGRESSIVE USE OF THE ARMY
(Left) Major General James Wilkinson, the senior officer in the U.S. Army, who would have commanded an attack on New Orleans. (Right) Captain Zebulon Pike, 2nd U.S. Infantry, who dared Spanish wrath by exploring present Oklahoma , Colorado, and New Mexico in 1806.
THE ROYAL NAVY BULLIES A VULNERABLE UNITED STATES
With the resumption of the Napoleonic Wars in 1803, Britain’s Royal Navy made a habit of stopping American merchant ships to confiscate cargoes meant for French ports and also to refill the crews on its warships by impressing or kidnapping American sailors. Seen here are various views of British press gangs at work.
JEFFERSON’S MIXED LEGACY
Thomas Jefferson increased the size of the U.S. Army and U.S. Navy before leaving office in 1809, but the army’s leadership and the quality of its rank and file did not augur well for the future. (Right) A private of the 4th U.S. Infantry Regiment, circa 1811.
AMERICA GOES TO WAR WITH BRITAIN, 1812
(Left) James Madison, Thomas Jefferson’s successor as fourth President of the United States. (Right) A private of the 4th U.S. Infantry, a captain of the 13th U.S. Infantry, and a drummer of the 22nd U.S. Infantry in front of Fort Niagara, circa 1812.
AMERICA’S REGULAR ARMY: LARGER BUT NOT NECESSARILY BETTER
(Left) A contemporary cartoon depicting the typical U.S. Army officer as a well dressed dandy incapable of hard military service. (Lower left) An unknown U.S. Infantry officer, circa 1812. (Lower right) An officer of the tiny U.S. Marine Corps in 1812.
AMERICA’S SHAKY MILITIA
Poorly trained and poorly led, American militia proved unsteady on campaign and in battle, especially when confronted by Britain’s Indian allies in the Old Northwest.
U.S. VOLUNTEERS – A MIXED RECORD
Some volunteer units did not perform well, like the Kentucky infantrymen (left) who were roundly defeated by a mixed force of Redcoats and Indians on the River Raisin on January 22, 1813. Yet Colonel Richard M. Johnson’s Kentucky Mounted Volunteers (right) would rout the same foes at the Battle of the Thames ten months later.
AN ARMY CRIPPLED BY ELDERLY GENERALS
Born in 1751, Henry Dearborn trained to become a doctor, but abandoned his medical studies to fight in the American Revolution. He saw action at Bunker Hill and the failed American attempt to capture Quebec in 1775. He also participated in the Saratoga, Monmouth Court House, and Yorktown Campaigns. Named America’s senior major general in January 1812, his slow-moving maneuvers during the War of 1812 earned him the nickname “Granny Dearborn.” He was removed from active command in July 1813 and retired from the army in 1815.
1812:
YEAR OF SHAME FOR THE U.S. ARMY
(Left) A timid Brigadier General William Hull surrendered Fort Detroit (above) to an inferior force of Redcoats and Indians. (Below) The ignominious American defeat at Queenston Heights.
MAJOR GENERAL WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON: SAVIOR OF THE OLD NORTHWEST
(Left) General Harrison in his ornate, gold-embroidered uniform. (Upper right) Harrison’s mounted Kentucky volunteers overrun the British at the Battle of the Thames, October 5, 1813. (Lower right) Some of Harrison’s infantry stand watch at Fort Meigs, Ohio.
MAJOR GENERAL ANDREW JACKSON: “OLD HICKORY”
(Above) Jackson crushed the Creek Indians at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend on March 27, 1814. (Below) He then defeated a numerically superior British army at New Orleans on January 8, 1815.
BRIGADIER GENERAL WINFIELD SCOTT TURNS AMERICANS INTO SOLDIERS
(Lower left) A terra cotta bust of Brigadier General Winfield Scott, circa 1815. (Center, lower right, and upper right) A shortage of blue cloth forced Scott’s regulars to wear gray coatees, normally the uniform worn by poorly trained militia.
SCOTT’S METHODS VINDICATED AT THE BATTLE OF CHIPPEWA, JULY 5, 1814
WINFIELD SCOTT MOLDS THE REGULAR ARMY
(Left) Brevet Major General Winfield Scott, circa 1820. (Right) One of the men who met Scott’s standard, Captain Stephen Watts Kearny, 13th Infantry, who survived a wound and capture while fighting beside Scott at Queenston Heights.
WEST POINT GROWS UP
(Below) Major Sylvanus Thayer, Superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy, 1817-1833. (Right) West Point cadets, 1816-17.
EXCLUDING AMATEURS
(Lower left) Henry Dodge, a political appointee who was the first colonel of the 1st U.S. Regiment of Dragoons, 1834. (Lower right) A West Pointer in the full dress uniform of Dodge’s regiment. (Upper left) A West Point cadet on sentry duty. (Upper right) An officer of the U.S. Artillery, circa 1840.
MILITARY GENIUS VERSUS PROFESSIONALISM
To many Americans in the 1820s and 1830s, the ideal soldier was Andrew Jackson, who became a general and won stirring victories without the benefit of military schooling and years of sustained military experience.
LAMPOONING THE MILITARY ARISTOCRACY
A cartoon from the 1830s showing regular army officers loafing in their tents instead of fighting Indians.
ABOLISH WEST POINT!
Congressman David Crockett of Tennessee (below) called for abolishing the U.S. Military Academy. He later proved his natural military genius by getting himself trapped and killed at the Alamo, March 6, 1836.
THE AMERICAN SOLDIER’S LOT: ISOLATION, DISCIPLINE, HARD WORK, LOW PAY, POOR FOOD, AND OTHER HARDSHIPS
THE DANGER OF INDIAN OUTBREAKS
Scenes from the Second Seminole War in Florida, a frustrating conflict that occupied most of the U.S. Army from 1835 to 1842.
THE U.S. NAVY: ABLE OFFICERS AND BRAVE VICTORIES
(Upper left) Captain Isaac Hull commanded the USS Constitution, “Old Ironsides,” when it bested HMS Guerriere on August 19, 1812 (below). (Lower left) A young American officer who also served on the Constitution.
AMERICAN NAVAL SUPREMACY ON THE GREAT LAKES
(Upper right) Master Commandant Oliver Hazard Perry secured American control of Lake Erie in a hard-fought action at Put-in-Bay on September 10, 1813. This victory allowed Major General William Henry Harrison to invade Canada.
THE CREATION OF THE NAVAL ACADEMY
The U.S. Navy standardized the training of its future officers with the establishment of the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland, in 1845. Franklin Buchanan, pictured here, served as the Naval Academy’s first superintendent. (Left) Buchanan as a lieutenant in 1828. (Right) Buchanan as a captain commanding the Washington Navy Yard in 1859-61.
THE CREATION OF THE NAVAL ACADEMY
(Left) A midshipman, circa 1847. (Right) Midshipman Charles W. Flusser, USNA Class of 1853. Flusser would be killed during the Civil War in 1864.
THE MEXICAN WAR, 1846-47
American regulars advance quickly under fire to engage their Mexican opponents outside Mexico City, September 1847.
PRESIDENT POLK PROVOKES A WAR
(Upper right) Brigadier General Zachary Taylor led half the U.S. Army, 3,922 men, into a disputed area along the Texas frontier between the Nueces River and Rio Grande. (Below) American troops on the march.
WINFIELD SCOTT WANTS TO FIGHT THE WAR WITH REGULARS
(Right) Major General Winfield Scott. (Left) Uniforms worn by regular infantry officers and men in the Mexican War.
PRESIDENT POLK PREFERS AN ARMY OF CITIZEN SOLDIERS
(Upper left) President James Knox Polk, a hard-headed partisan Democrat from Tennessee. (Lower left) An unknown militia officer. (Below) An early photograph of New Hampshire Volunteer Militia, the kind of men with whom Polk wanted to fight the war.
RAISING A VOLUNTEER ARMY
(Upper left and right) Two of Polk’s politician generals, Gideon Pillow of Tennessee and Franklin Pierce of New Hampshire. (Lower left) The regimental colors of the 4th Illinois Volunteers. (Lower right) A recruiting poster distributed through New Hampshire.
SOUND LEADERSHIP AND COURAGE: AMERICAN VOLUNTEERS IN COMBAT
Colonel Jefferson Davis, a West Point graduate turned planter and politician, leads his 1st Mississippi Volunteers at the Battle of Buena Vista in February 1847.
U.S. VOLUNTEERS – A CHRONIC DISCIPLINARY PROBLEM
Rampaging American volunteers murder the occupants of a Mexican hacienda.
ZACHARY TAYLOR CHECKS THE MEXICANS IN THE NORTH
(Below) A portrait of General Taylor. (Upper and lower right) Scenes from Taylor’s early victories at Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma.
“TO THE HALLS OF THE MONTEZUMAS”
American regulars and volunteers under Major General Winfield Scott fight their way past Chapultepec, a castle guarding the approaches to Mexico City, September 13, 1847. Scott’s troops took both Chapultepec and clawed their way inside Mexico City though opposed by an enemy that outnumbered them three to one.
A NEW AMERICAN TRADITION OF VICTORY
(Below) American infantry overruns a fortified Mexican position at Churubusco. (Upper right) General Scott and his staff enter the main plaza in Mexico City, September 14, 1847. (Lower right) Scott reviews his victorious troops.
AMERICA DOWNSIZES THE ARMY OF THE MEXICAN WAR
(Left) American civilians thrill to news of more victories during the Mexican War. (Right) Discharged volunteers from the Mormon battalion reunited with their families after the war.
THE REGULAR ARMY RETURNS TO THE FRONTIER
(Upper left) U.S. Dragoon uniforms of the late 1840s. (Lower right) Infantry uniforms of the early to mid 1850s.
THE PERMANENT INDIAN FRONTIER, 1830-48
(Left) A map of the area in question. (Upper right) Troops removing Indians from the Old Southwest to Indian Territory. (Lower right) U.S. Dragoons parley with Comanche Indians on the Central Plains.
THE U.S. ARMY INTO THE WEST
(Upper right) U.S. Dragoons attacking a Comanche camp. (Lower right) U.S. Cavalry and Dragoon uniforms in the late 1850s. (Below) Lieutenant Colonel Philip St. George Cooke, 2nd U.S. Dragoons, on duty in Utah Territory, 1858.
