I am not quite sure that I should not say “The Model Colonel,” since
every one knows men and horses are much alike when they have first
passed under the eye of the recruiting officer and the remount board,
and every one knows that colonels are very unlike, so that a model
squadron or a model troop is certain to owe its superiority to its
commander; but as we are observing the product in this instance, let
the title stand as above stated.
The model squadron aforesaid is quartered across the Potomac from
Washington in Fort Meyer, which is the only purely cavalry post in the
country. Everywhere else the troops are mixed, and the commandant may
be of any arm of the service. Here they are all cavalry, with cavalry
officers and cavalry ideas, and are not hindered by dismounted
theories, or pick-and-shovel work, or any of the hundreds of things
which hamper equally good “yellow legs” in other posts. There are many
passable misdemeanors in this post, but only one crime, and that is
bad riding. There is little dismounted work, and any soldier can have
his horse out on a pass, so long as he does not abuse the privilege;
and when he does, it’s plenty of walking falls to his lot.
There is a large brick riding-hall of approved pattern, which enables
the men to do their work in all weathers. The four troops now
quartered there are from the First, Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth
regiments, which creates a good-natured rivalry, very conducive to
thorough work. It is the opinion of General Henry that one old troop
should always be left at this post as a pace-setter for the newly
transferred ones, which seems reasonable.
[Illustration: GENERAL GUY V. HENRY, SEVENTH UNITED STATES CAVALRY]
Now to tell what the preparatory discipline is to the magnificent
riding which can be seen any morning by spectators who are “game for a
journey” to the fort by ten o’clock, I must say that General Guy V.
Henry is a flaming fire of cavalry enthusiasm. He has one idea--a
great broad expanse of principle--ever so simple in itself, but it is
basic, and nothing can become so complicated that he cannot revert to
his simple idea and by it regulate the whole. It is the individual
training of the horse and rider. One bad rider or one unbroken horse
can disarrange the whole troop movement, and “woe to him” who is not
up to concert pitch! “Who is the scoundrel, the lummux, humph?” and
the colonel, who is a brevet-brigadier-general, strides up and down,
and fire comes from his nostrils. “Prefer charges against him,
captain!” and the worst befalls. The unfortunate trooper has committed
the highest crime which the commandant of Fort Meyer knows--he cannot
ride.
A soldier becomes a rider by being bucketed about on a bareback horse,
or he dies. The process is simple, the tanbark soft, and none have
died up to date, but all have attained the other alternative. This is
unimportant; but the horse--it is to his education that the oceans of
patience and the mountains of intelligence are brought to bear. It is
all in the books if any one cares to go into it. It is the gathering
of the horse; it is the legs carried to the rear of the girths; it is
the perfect hand and the instant compliance of the horse with the
signs as indicated by the rider; it is the backing, the passaging, the
leading with either foot, and the pivoting on the front legs; it is
the throwing of horses, the acquisition of gaits, and the nice
bitting; it is one hundred little struggles with the brute until he
comes to understand and to know that he must do his duty. It all looks
beautifully simple, but in practice we know that while it is not
difficult to teach a horse, it is quite another matter to unteach him,
so in these horses at least no mistakes have been made. After all
this, one fine sunny Friday morning the people drove out from
Washington in their traps and filed into the galleries and sat
down--fair women and brave men; of the former we are sure, and of the
latter we trust. The colonel blew a whistle--ye gods, what a sacrilege
against all the traditions of this dear old United States army!--and
in rode Captain Bomus’s troop of the First Plungers, which I cannot
but love, since I am an honorary member of their officers’ mess, and
fondly remember the fellows who are now sniffing alkali dust down in
Arizona. They were riding with blankets and surcingles, and did their
part of a drill, the sequence of which I have forgotten, since it was
divided with the three other troops--Captain Bell’s, of the Seventh,
Captain Hughes’s, of the Ninth, and Captain Fountain’s, of the Eighth.
I felt a strong personal interest in some of these men, for memory
took me back to a night’s ride in Dakota with a patrol of the Ninth,
when they were all wrapped in buffalo-skin overcoats, with white frost
on their lapels; the horses’ noses wore icicles, and the dry snow
creaked under the tread of the hoofs as we rode over the starlit plain
and through the black shadows of the _coulees_. I had pounded along
also through the dust in the wake of this troop of the Eighth when it
wasn’t so cold, but was equally uncomfortable.
[Illustration: RIDING SITTING ON LEGS]
[Illustration: OVER THE HURDLE BACK TO BACK]
The sharp commands of the captain soon put the troop in motion, and
they trotted along with a cadenced tread, every man a part of his
horse; they broke into fours and wheeled to the right about, then into
line and wound themselves up in the “spiral,” and unwound again, and
soon brought order out of a mess, and the regular canter was ever the
same. Then low hurdles were strung across the hall, and by column of
fours the troop went over, never breaking the formation; to the rear
they turned and back again; finally they took the obstacle in line,
and every horse rose as though impelled by the same mechanism. As if
this was not enough, every second man was dismounted and put on double
with a comrade, not with his breast to his comrade’s back, but back to
back, and then in line the odd cavalcade charged the hurdles, and took
them every one. It was not an individual bucketing of one horse after
another, but all in line and all together. After this what could there
be more to test the “glue” in these troopers’ seats? There was more,
however, and in this wise: The saddles were put on, but without any
girths, and all the movements were gone through with again, ending up
with a charge down the hall, and bringing up against the wall of the
spectators’ stand at a sharp “halt,” which would have unseated a
monkey from a trick-mule.
The horses were all thrown by pulling their heads about, and one
cavalryman amused himself by jumping over his prostrate mount. They
rode “at will,” and stood upon their knees on their horses’ backs. One
big animal resented carrying double, and did something which in Texas
would be called “pitching,” but it was scarcely a genuine sample,
since the grinning soldiers made little of it.
The troop of the Ninth executed a “left backward turn” with beautiful
precision, and this difficult undertaking will serve to give one an
idea of the training of the mounts.
Gymnastics of all sorts were indulged in, even to the extent of
turning summersaults over four horses from a spring-board. A citizen
near me, whose mind had probably wandered back to Barnum and Bailey,
said:
[Illustration: THROWING A HORSE]
“But what’s this got to do with soldiers; is it not highly flavored
with circus?”
I could offer no excuse except the tradition that cavalrymen are
supposed to ride well. All the men were young and in first-rate
physical fix, and seemed to enjoy the thing--all except one old first
sergeant, who had been time-expired these half-dozen times, whose skin
was so full of bullet-holes that it wouldn’t hold blood, and who had
entered this new régime with many protests:
“O’me nau circus ape; I can’t be leppin’ around afther the likes av
thim!” whereat the powers arranged it so that the old veteran got a
job looking after plug tobacco, tomato-cans, tinned beef, and other
“commissaries,” upon which he viewed the situation more cheerfully.
The drill was tremendously entertaining to the ladies and gentlemen in
the gallery, and they clapped their hands and went bustling into their
traps and off down the road to the general’s house, where Madam the
General gave a breakfast, and the women no doubt asked the second
lieutenants deliciously foolish questions about their art. The
gentlemen, some of whom are Congressmen and other exalted governmental
functionaries, felt proud of the cavalry, and went home with a
determination to combat any one hostile to cavalry legislation, if a
bold front and firm purpose could stay the desecrating hand.
But all this work is primary and elementary. The second degree is
administered in field-work, comprising experimental marches, and those
who know General Henry by reputation will not forget his hundred-mile
march with the Ninth Cavalry at Pine Ridge, and those who know him
personally will become acquainted with his theory that a cavalry
command in good condition, with proper feeds, should make fifty miles
a day, with a maximum on the road of ten hours a day, moving at the
rate of five miles an hour in cavalry halts, the gaits being walk,
trot, and leading, with a day’s rest each week, to be continued
indefinitely. And knowing all this, they will be sure that the model
squadron wears out a good many horseshoes in a season.
[Illustration: OVER THE HURDLES IN LINE]
The “Cossack outposts” are another feature much insisted on, and,
strange to say, this arrangement was first invented in America,
despite its name (see Wagner’s _Outposts_), and is an improvement on
picket posts in a ratio of 240 to 324. Another movement is the “form
square,” which is an adaptation of the “Indian circle,” it being a
movement from a centre to a circle, and useful when escorting wagons
or when surprised. The non-commissioned officers are sent on
reconnoissance, on patrols, and are required to make maps, which are
submitted to an inspector.
Another scheme which I have never seen was the linking of a troop of
horses, formed in a circle, to one another, by hooking the regular
cavalry links from one horse’s bridle to the next one’s halter ring,
and then leaving them in charge of one man. I also saw the new cavalry
bit for the first time. It is commended by all who use it, and I saw
no horses boring on it or in the least uppish about going against it,
and I never remember a horse who would not do either the one or the
other to the old trap which was formerly worn.
Two other curious movements indulged in by this squadron are the
firing over horses while they are lying down; and, riding double--the
man faced to the rear draws his pistol, and while moving to the rear
keeps shooting. It might be useful during a slow retreat, and could be
done with the carbine equally well.
This whole enterprise at Fort Meyer is vastly encouraging. As one
officer said, “We take no credit for it, since others could do the
same if they had riding-halls and cavalry officers in command.” But
there are cavalry officers and there are cavalry officers, and it is
not every day one is born. For thirty-five years has the old general
sat in a McClellan saddle, and the tremendous enthusiasm of newly
joined “sub” still remains. The very thought of a wagon arouses his
indignation, and every day the mules are brought into the riding-hall,
and the men initiated into the intricacies of the “diamond hitch.” It
takes a past-master to pack a mule in twenty-two seconds, however, and
I saw that feat accomplished in General Henry’s command.
It is a grand thing for the young men to have this practical training
by these old veterans of the civil war and the alkali plains before
they go on the retired list. It is well for a young man to know enough
not to unsaddle a sweating troop of horses in a broiling sun, and to
learn that it makes sore backs; and it is quite important if men can
cook rations, and not go up to the sky-line of a hill when scouting,
and rival the statue of “Liberty Enlightening the World,” when it is
clearly their business to throw what light they have behind them and
not before. It takes experience to put the sole of a boot back on the
upper, when it has fetched loose, with four horseshoe nails, and it is
not every man that knows that the place to intrench is on the edge of
a cut bank, near water, if one expects ever to get out of a round-up.
No one can figure that a recruit will know how many people passed over
the road before him, or which way they were going, and it takes a long
head and good nerves not to pull a trigger unless the sight is dark on
the object when the fight may last all day and probably all night; but
all these things are not taught in school. If a horse under him is
weakening on a long march in an enemy’s country, it is an ignorant
fool who uses a spur instead of good sense. That’s the time to unload
a few dollars’ worth of government property. But who can understand
the value of a rubber blanket, fifty rounds of ammunition, and a
pocket full of grub, with a feed of grain in the bag, but one who has
tried it? There are lots of dead soldiers who would have learned these
lessons if they had been older. In my opinion, the tremendous box of
tricks which Uncle Sam’s horses are supposed to carry has put more men
afoot than will ever be admitted; but at least the old boot has gone,
though there is yet room for an intelligent hand with a jack-plane to
shave off that cavalry pack. I am inclined to take what every one
tells me is a “cranky” view on this subject, but let it stand until
the next hard campaign, and I hope to be able to be more lucid. Horses
are horses, and horses are not made of wood, iron, or by rule of
thumb.
To revert to Fort Meyer: it is altogether refreshing; it is worth any
one’s while to go there and see four troops of cavalry which cannot be
beaten, and it is positively exhilarating to meet their creator, a
thoroughly typical United States cavalry officer, and I’m bound to say
his successor in command has had a hard pace set for him.