try, not, to my judgment, sufficiently cared for in the bill. This principle is, to make the army, in all its rights, privileges, means of support, as much as practicable the creation of law, and as little as practicable the creation of contingencies.

Under existing civilization, armies appear to be an essential component part of all governments, and no government, which pretends to an equality with the nations of the world, can do without them. Therefore, in a government like ours, true policy is to relieve so necessary an institution from unkind prejudices, and from jealousy; and I know of no mode so well adapted to produce such results as that of making our army as much as practicable dependent upon law, and as little as practicable upon contingencies.

Such a course will turn the feeling of the army to the law; will make it the creature of the law; and will relieve it, to a great extent, from the prejudices and the mistrust now extended towards it.

I think it is to be demonstrated that the present bill will be a much more costly arrangement than the proposed increase of numbers and pay, with existing staff organization.

I have not suggested remedies to the defects of the proposed bill, because under the impression that such a course was not expected. But, finding other officers under different impressions, I will respectfully suggest a few general considerations for a bill of this kind.

1st. Immediate necessities call for an increase of the numbers and pay of the army; therefore, a bill involving these considerations has a strong necessity in its favor.

2d. It would be idle to say that existing staff arrangements cannot be improved; but these are not of such pressing necessity. The staff arrangements which now exist are the results of much investigation, of many reports, and of long trial, and will be found to pervade in rights, duties, obligations, &c., &c., may laws (See Hetzel's edition of Cross's Military Laws.) Properly to modify and to improve existing staff arrangements will require time and a careful examination of existing laws.

3d. The retired-list matter is a new measure, hitherto unknown to our military system. It is, without doubt, a necessary and proper measure, but need not be made to embarrass the more necessary wants of No. 1, preceding.

The bill is silent in the regular organization of the higher ranks. According to our system, (copied from the systems of other nations,) nine brigadier generals call for not less than four major generals, and over the whole there should be one "commanding general." There is an evident reluctance to giving to our army a rank higher than that of major general. But while we have such institutions, (institutions essential to all governments,) it is not, I think, offensive to propriety or to patriotism that such institutions should be adequately organized. On this account, the commission of "commanding genral" is brought to consideration.

With me the question is very simple. Either we must cease to consider ourselves among the leading nations of the world, or we must meet the required concomitants of that consideration. Among

these concomitants is a regular army of some size; which being admitted, its proper organization is a mere consequence.

Respectfully submitted:

J. J. ABERT,

Colonel Corps Topographical Engineers.

Hon. CHARLES JAMES FAULKNER,

Chairman Military Committee, Ho. of Reps.

WASHINGTON ARSENAL,
January 22, 1855.

SIR: Agreeably to the request of the Committee on Military Affairs, of the 19th instant, I proceed to state, as briefly as possible, my views relative to the bill reported by the Committee on Military Affairs of House of Representatives, for the "increase and better organization of the army."

In doing this, I shall consider the provisions of this bill in connexion with those of a similar bill reported by the Senate Committee on Military Affairs, which I have also before me.

The increase of force proposed in the first section of the bill is of too pressing and obvious necessity to require any comment; but the manner of effecting this increase which is proposed in the Senate bill, (first and second sections,) appears to me preferable to the other. Whoever has visited an artillery garrison, or seen a considerable body of our artillery in the field, must have remarked that the greater part of them are distinguished from infantry only by their uniform. Their habitual drill and service is that of infantry; and even at the artillery school of practice which existed for several years at Fort Monroe, infantry exercises occupied the principal share of attention. This anomaly results in great measure from the organization of the artillery. It is arranged in regiments like infantry, and the force is too great a proportion of the whole army to be spared from the active duties of frontier and other service; but as they cannot all serve there in their appropriate arm, they are employed as infantry, and hence the necessity of having them all instructed so as to take turns in this service. If the corps of artillery were reduced to a strength which could be spared from the duties above referred to, the officers and men might be confined to the practice of their own arm, and be constantly employed and exercised in the use of artillery, either field or garrison-a service requiring much greater and much more difficult instruction than that of foot troops. The corps of artillery would not then, in time of war, be subject to the mortifications which they experienced in the late war with Mexico, of seeing volunteer artillery serving a field battery, whilst the regular artillery marched with muskets.

The increase of officers proposed in the second section of the House bill appears to me ill arranged. In expressing the object of the appointment of supernumerary captains and lieutenants of artillery, infantry and cavalry, "to furnish details for staff duties," the proposition would seem to confine these details to those corps, at least by

implication. But there may be a great advantage and propriety, under some circumstances, in the selection of an engineer or ordnance officer for appointment on the staff. A greater objection appears to the addition of four supernumerary captains to each regiment. This would give seventy-six (76) supernumerary captains in the army to furnish details for staff duties, (besides the seventy-six lieutenants,) whilst all the staff officers required by the act to be taken from regiments or corps amount to only twenty-four, (24.) Supposing all those to be taken from the captains of regiments, (which would not be the case,) what will be the position of the remaining thirty-two captains having no companies? If the addition to provide for these details, or rather staff appointments, were made, as in the Senate bill, to the list of lieutenants, no such inconvenience would occur, as the lieutenants would be all attached to companies; and it is well known that at present there are rarely more than two officers present with a company on service. When captains are taken for staff duties, their separation from their companies would probably be of considerable duration, and the lieutenant succeeding to the command would have the same interest as a captain in the welfare of his company. The excellent act of 1799 "for reorganizing the troops," proposed that in such a case as the above, the officer next in grade to the one appointed on the staff should be actually promoted to the vacancy; but in case of the staff officer being replaced in his regiment, this arrangement would lead to the inconvenience of supernumerary majors, captains, &c.

The organization of companies in the 2d section of the House bill seems to me too indefinite; and, although I speak with great diffidence on this subject, I should doubt the necessity of increasing so much the number of non-commissioned officers for a company of not more than one hundred privates.

In arranging a new organization for the army, one of the great principles to be attended to, as much as possible, seems to me to be that of simplifying the administration of the army, and reducing that service to the fewest heads. This principle might undoubtedly be applied more extensively than in either of the bills under consideration, without embarrassment, and probably with benefit, to the public service. Why should services of a like kind be performed by different sets of officers? At the same post, or in the same market, why should one officer be employed to purchase flour and other provisions for men, and another to procure oats and other food for horses, with all the complication of a separate set of accounts and vouchers for each of these objects, when a few additional lines and columns in a voucher or an abstract would effect the purpose? In practice, at nearly all the military posts, these services, as regards receiving and issuing supplies to the troops, are actually performed by the same individual, although he is subject to a double accountability to two different heads of departments.

In the scientific and constructing departments of the army this subdivision of administration and of duties has also been carried too far, and it is under this impression that I approve of the consolidation of the services of the corps of topographical engineers with the corps of

engineers, proposed in the 3d section of the bill. Their military duties are entirely similar, and should be conducted under the same general direction, as is well argued in the annual report of the Secretary of War.

The organization of the ordnance department, proposed in the 4th section of the bill, is that which, in its general features, I have always considered the best for our service, and I was accordingly opposed to that provision of the bill of 1838 by which lieutenants were attached permanently to the corps. The higher and important duties of the ordnance department demand continued study and reflection, aided by careful and laborious experiments, which require the attention of officers devoted to these investigations, and pursuing them through a long time, without danger of interruption by duties unconnected with them, or by transfer to posts where the necessary facilities do not exist, &c. Although I was one of the officers originally appointed in the ordnance corps, when it was reconstituted in 1832, I do not fear contradiction, or the imputation of improper motives, when I say that the very great improvements introduced into the armament and military supplies of the troops since that time have fully justified that measure, and shown the utility of a special corps of. officers for this service. But the inferior and routine duties of the ordnance department require nothing more than ordinary intelligence, care, and honesty, and the more important duties to which I have referred cannot generally employ a large number of officers. consider it better, therefore, that the junior officers for this service should be taken from the regiments. The knowledge which regimental service would impart to them, with regard not only to military practice and administration, but with regard to the practical working and effects of arms and military equipments in the field, will be of great value in the performance of the special duties of the ordnance department; and the knowledge and experience in the construction and use of artillery, arms, and ammunition, which they may acquire in the performance of ordnance duties, will be of still greater value to them in the execution of their regimental duties; furnishing, in some measure-what the scattered condition of our troops now prevents their enjoying the opportunity of practice which would be given by regimental or other schools of practice.

I

The only question in this connexion is as to the grade of the lowest permanent officers of ordnance. As their number is small and their duties alike, I think the proposition of having none lower than majors a good one. Officers appointed to these places will have had greater experience in command of troops, to qualify them for taking such command when it may fall to them, by virtue of the provisions of section 9.

The first lines of section 5 probably do not express what was intended, as they would have the effect of legislating out of office the general of engineers authorized by section three. If the wording of the corresponding section of the Senate bill be insufficient or objectionable, this section 5 may be made to read thus: "In addition to the number of brigadier generals now authorized by law, and the

brigadier general of engineers, there shall be seven brigadier generals, one of the brigadier generals to be Adjutant General," &c.

The provisions of this section simplify, in some degree, the organization of the army, by reducing the number of officers devoted permanently to special duties. It is certainly true that the usual, and especially the routine, duties of any department, will be more readily performed, like any other business, by those long practised in the execution of them; but it appears to me that intelligence, a good professional education, and respectable business capacity, are sufficient, with moderate experience in details, for the performance of the administrative duties of the general staff, and that it is not necessary in this case to incur the inconvenience of complicating the system, and of separating a large number of officers entirely from service with troops.

Whilst there appears, therefore, to be no necessity for the organization of separate permanent corps for performing the duties of the several departments of the general staff, it is highly desirable to avoid the evils which are almost inseparable from this permanent organization. This is, I think, well accomplished by the arrangements proposed in section 5, which would not only offer all the present facilities of selecting competent officers for staff duties, but would afford the means of correcting errors of selection by replacing in the regiments officers who, whilst they may be well qualified for regimental duty, shall have been found deficient in administrative ability, or otherwise unsuited to their positions on the staff.

It may be said that the objections to special organization apply also to the corps of engineers, so far as relates to their succession to command. This is true to some extent; but their duties absolutely require training and constant practice, and the evil cannot be avoided in this case without incurring a greater one. All that can be done is to limit its extent as much as possible.

The provisions of sections 4, 5, and 6 are intimately connected with those of section 9, regulating rank and command; and the latter I consider among the most important sections of the bill, in promoting the harmony of the service, and preventing the scandalous and even hazardous quarrels (hazardous to the success of military operations) which have frequently occurred in our army.

Perhaps it may be said that these regulations for rank and command could be adopted without a reorganization of the army; but the consequence would be, that a young officer entering the ordnance corps at its foot, or appointed in the general staff, may attain the rank of major, lieutenant colonel, or colonel, without any experience or knowledge derived from active command of troops, and may by right of his rank be placed in a position to command a detachment, or even an army in the field. This would lead to practical inconveniences which ought to be avoided, if possible. The evil consequences of a wellestablished and indisputable rule on the subject of rank and command are too frequently felt in the service to require further remark, and it is of the greatest importance that some definite rule on this subject shall be adopted. The simple principle that an officer shall have the right to command all those of inferior rank who are on duty with him