Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 12.djvu/15

Rh that when that State seceded, she withdrew her army and navy officers. It was, indeed, rather a matter of surprise to the better classes, even at the North, when a Southern officer failed to resign and join his friends and relatives at home. This action on the part of the naval officers who resigned must, and eventually will, stand forth as one of the most sublime instances in history of abnegation and devotion to principle.

In spite of all the censures in the Northern papers at that time and since, such as the talk of "bad faith, ingratitude, and treason," the fact remains that these officers educated by their States, not at a royal or imperial academy, but at a United States academy recognizing the right of a State to secede, heroically threw up their commissions, and offered their services to the States that claimed them. This sacrifice on the part of the Southern naval officers has never been properly appreciated. While at the close of the war the statesman returned to the Senate, the lawyer to his briefs, the doctor to his practice, the merchant to his desk, and the laborer to his vocation, the naval officer was utterly cast adrift. He had lost his profession, which was that of arms. The army officer was in the same category. Here it may be as well to explain to the general reader (too apt to confound the naval officer with the mere seaman) that the profession of a naval officer is precisely that of an army officer. They are both military men. So far as the profession goes, there is no difference between a lieutenant in the navy and a lieutenant of dragoons. One maneuvers and fights on shipboard, the other on horseback.

But there was this difference : The Southern officers of the United States army who came South were raised to high rank; young lieutenants, and even cadets, attained the rank of major or brigadier-general, and the close of the war left them with a national reputation. Far otherwise was it with the Southern naval officers. Men who,