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Maryland State Archives Adam Goodheart Collection MSA SC 5826 msa_sc5826_3_1-0023 Enlarge and print image (823K) |
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Maryland State Archives Adam Goodheart Collection MSA SC 5826 msa_sc5826_3_1-0023 Enlarge and print image (823K) |
| msa_sc5826_3_1-0023 ©Maryland State Archives - 23 - the elite of the young men of the Army. He was the very antipodes of Col. Thayer in every respect, both, no doubt, equally useful in their way, and the faults of one seemed to be compensated by the merits of the other. Together, they certainly produced the beat result at the Military Academy. The one was cold, austere, and penurious, but just, the other was impulsive, chivalrous, liberal to a fault, and the beau ideal of the gallant soldier, he proved himself to be on the field. It was fortunate for me that my first year came to a close without meeting with greater misfortunes, for I was but a child wholly unfit to undergo the hardships and temptations of a military school planned for adults. The second year found me better prepared and better located, I was very properly put back one year altho' I was in the first or second section of Mathematics, and I started in a new Class with a fixed determination to adhere in every thing to the regulations, I was allowed to choose my own room-mates and associates. Luckily, among both, I found persons whose excellence of character has grown brighter in proportion as they have been subjected to the vicissitudes of life, and whose friendship has grown stronger, in proportion as our interests differed, and our paths of duty separated us. At that time, and for several years after my leaving the Academy, horses were not furnished, and the field artillery was maneuvred by hand, and there was no practical instruction in Cavalry, The Junior Cadets were furnished with long ropes and were hitched by two's to the Timber of the Field-pieces which they dragged about the plain on field days with great rapidity, while the Cadets of the 1st Class acted as gunners and chiefs of sections. On one of these occasions, being leading horse, while descending at full speed the hill near Wood's monument, my foot slipped and I was thrown with |