CHAPTER V

IN TIME OF PEACE PREPARE FOR WAR-GILHAM AND

JACKSON

THE faculty of the Institute now consisted of Colonel Smith, Majors Preston, Williamson, Gilham, and Jackson, and several young Assistant Professors with tactical duties. Captain Rodes resigned soon after Jackson's appointment.

It is frequently assumed by those ignorant of the facts, that Jackson was the military genius of the Institute during his association with the School. Nothing could be more erroneous than such a belief. His sole connection with the military affairs of the School was as Instructor of Ordnance and Artillery Tactics and Commander of the Cadet battery which President Taylor had presented the Corps the year before Jackson's appointment.

As a member of the faculty Jackson did undoubtedly exert his own peculiar influence upon the Corps of Cadets and the community in which he dwelt; but his was not a commanding influence, nor did he in any way shape the course of events at the Institute, or its character as a School of Arms. I believe it is not too much to say that Jackson was influenced more by the Institute than it was by him. Even had he possessed the personality to be a leader of thought, he did not occupy a sufficiently prominent position as a mere professor, without executive duties of any kind, to exercise a positive control.

In the writer's opinion, the impression of Jackson which a late popular novelist has sought to create is not a correct one. That impression harmonizes too well with the Boer-like figure portrayed in the frontispiece of the "Long Roll." Jackson was undoubtedly eccentric

as we shall see, but he was not a bore; he was peculiar but not rough. He was not handsome, but in his appearance there was nothing partaking of the repulsive; he was rather unhandsome than ugly; unpolished than coarse in grain.

The writer did not, of course, know Jackson, but he has been at particular pains to gain a correct impression of the man as he appeared while a professor at the Virginia Military Institute. Jackson may have appeared otherwise to those who knew him elsewhere; but to his personal acquaintances, his brother-officers, his business associates, his official superiors, his military subordinates, his social equals, his servants, his superiors and his inferiors, in Lexington, he presented the features so carefully and vividly portrayed by his military biographer, John Esten Cooke. That likeness has been verified in detail by the author. It bears the flesh tints from the brush of an artist who painted from life, and, as it can not be improved upon in the writer's opinion, it is herein incorporated:

"Well-meaning persons have drawn a wholly incorrect likeness of Jackson at this period of his life. Misled by admiration, and yielding to the temptation to eulogy, they have bestowed upon Professor Jackson every moral and physical grace, and even his eccentricities have been toned down into winning ways, original and characteristic, which only made their possessor more charming than before. We are sorry to say this is all fancy. Jackson was the farthest possible removed from anything graceful; and as the first merit of any biography is accuracy, we shall endeavor to lay before the reader a truthful sketch of the real form seen moving to and fro, on the streets of Lexington, between the years 1851 and 1861.

"It was the figure of a tall, gaunt, awkward individual, wearing a gray uniform, and apparently moving by separate and distinct acts of volition. This stiff and unbending figure passed over the ground with a sort of stride, as though measuring the distance from one

given point to another; and those who followed its curious movements saw it pause at times, apparently from having reached the point desired. The eyes of the individual at such moments were fixed intently upon the ground; his lips moved in soliloquy; the absent and preoccupied gaze and general expression of the features plainly showed a profound unconsciousness of 'place and time.' It was perfectly obvious that the mind of the military-looking personage in the gray coat was busy upon some problem entirely disconnected from his actual surroundings. The fact of his presence at Lexington, in the commonwealth of Virginia, had evidently disappeared from his consciousness; the figures moving around him were mere plantasmagoria; he had travelled in search of some principle of philosophy, or some truth in theology, quite out of the real, work-a-day world, and deep in the land of dreams. If you spoke to him at such times, he awoke as if it were from sleep, and looked into your face with an air of simplicity and inquiry, which sufficiently proved the sudden transition which he had made from the world of thoughts to that of reality.

"In lecturing to his class, his manner was grave, earnest, full of military brevity, and destitute of all the graces of the speaker. Business-like, systematic, somewhat stern, with an air of rigid rule, as though the matter at issue were of the utmost importance, and he was entrusted with the responsibility of seeing that due attention was paid to it-he did not make a very favorable impression upon the volatile youths, who sat at the feet of this military Gamaliel. They listened decorously to the grave Professor, but, once dismissed from his presence, took revenge by a thousand jests upon his peculiarities of mind and demeanor. oddities were the subject of incessant jokes; his eccentric ways were dwelt upon with all the eloquence and sarcastic gusto which characterize the gay conversation of young men discussing an unpopular teacher. idiosyncrasy of the Professor was lost sight of. His stiff, angular figure; the awkward movement of his

His

No

body; his absent and 'grum' demeanor; his exaggerated and apparently absurd devotion to military regularity; his wearisome exactions of a similar observance on their part;—that general oddity, eccentricity, and singularity in moving, talking, thinking, and acting peculiar to himself-all these were described on a thousand occasions, and furnished unfailing food for laughter. They called him ‘Old Tom Jackson'; and pointing significantly to their foreheads, said he was 'not quite right there.' Some inclined to the belief that he was only a great eccentric; but others declared him 'crazy.' Those who had experienced the full weight of his professorial baton -who had been reprimanded before the class, or 'reported' to the Superintendent for punishment or dismissal called him 'Fool Tom Jackson.'

"These details are not very heroic, and detract considerably from that dignified outline which eulogistic writers upon Jackson have drawn. But they are true. Nothing is better established than the fact that the man to whom General Lee wrote, 'Could I have directed events, I should have chosen for the good of the country to have been disabled in your stead,' and of whom the London Times said, "That mixture of daring and judgment, which is the mark of "Heaven born" Generals, distinguished him beyond any man of his time'-nothing is more certain, we say, than that this man was sneered at as a fool, and on many occasions stigmatized as insane.

"It is doubtless true, however, that some of the youths, of more generous disposition or penetrating judgment, did not share in this general opinion.* They saw in the young professor originality rather than eccentricity of mind. They could acknowledge the peculiarities of his views and opinions, and the singularity of some of his habits, without sharing the popular impression that some wheel or crank of his mental machinery was out of order. Upon one point, however,

*Among whom may be mentioned Col. R. Preston Chew, '61, who, in his address at the Institute on the occasion of the unveiling of Ezekiel's Jackson Statue denied much that has been written about Jackson's appearance and eccentricities.

there seems to have been a general concurrence: the young teacher's possession of an indomitable fearlessness and integrity in the discharge of every duty. His worst enemies never ventured to say that he did not walk the straight path of right, and administer his official duties without fear, favor, or affection. They were forced to recognize the fact that this stiff military machine measured out justice to all alike, irrespective of persons, and could not be turned aside from the direct course by any influences around him. The cadets laughed at him, but they were afraid of him. They agreed, by common consent, that it was time thrown away to write excuses for a 'report' made by Major Jackson. The faculty had come, from long experience, to understand that when Major Jackson reported a cadet he deserved punishment, and the consequence was that, although the young men derided his peculiarities, and laughed in private at his odd ways, they felt that he was their master, and yielded full obedience to his orders.

"Such was the ex-artillerist turned professor. From his functions of professor in the schoolroom, he would pass to those of instructor of artillery on the parade ground. Here he was more in his element. He was called upon to teach the mysteries of that arm of the service which he loved above all others; and the proficiency of the cadets in drill and all the evolutions of the battery was soon a subject of remark. Jackson took great interest in those drills, especially when blank cartridges were used. 'An Ex-Cadet,' in his interesting account of this portion of Jackson's life, says: 'As soon as the sound of the guns would fall upon his ears, a change would seem to come over Major Jackson. He would grow more erect; the grasp upon his sabre would tighten; the quiet eyes would flash; the large nostrils would dilate, and the calm, grave face would glow with the proud spirit of the warrior. I have been frequently struck with this, and have often called the attention of others to it.'