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Collection Reference Number GLC03015
From Archive Folder Documents Relating to 1858 
Title Richard Delafield to Charles James Faulkner regarding Faulkner's recent address delivered to the House of Representatives
Date 23 March 1858
Author Delafield, Richard (1798-1873)  
Document Type Correspondence
Content Description Delafield, Superintendent of the United States Military Academy, writes to Faulkner, a United States Representative from Virginia. Recently received an address delivered by Faulkner to the House of Representatives "on the true policy of our Country in its application of Volunteers, the Militia, and the regular army." Requests another copy. Writes, "If we take enthusiastic inexperienced citizens, we must either have a very large proportion of experienced officers to lead and take care of them in the field; much time to instruct and discipline them, or the consequences, sickness, disease, delays, and immense number to compensate therefor- A body of inexperienced men marching across our Continent with army transportation and supplies would be just as helpless as the same inexperience in a factory... yet humanity alone forbids calling upon, and inducing the enthusiastic young men of the Country to enter upon a Service which by the facts you have presented clearly shows they must suffer greatly beyond the necessity of the Case, and that the only corrective, is to instruct them before they move into the field..."
Subjects Military History  Militia  Congress  Government and Civics  Military Supplies  Transportation  Health and Medical  Disease  Education  West Point (US Military Academy)  
People Delafield, Richard (1798-1873)  Faulkner, Charles James (1806-1884)  
Place written West Point, New York
Theme Government & Politics; Health & Medicine; Education
Sub-collection The Gilder Lehrman Collection, 1493-1859
Copyright The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History
Module Settlement, Commerce, Revolution and Reform: 1493-1859