Editor’s Note: The following article was adapted directly and edited from a letter published in the “Army and Navy Journal,” Oct. 15, 1870, page 139. It was forwarded by Bookshelf Editor Peter A. Frandsen who summarized and/or added the material in brackets.
Sir: A remark made some time since by an old officer of the Army, upon visiting the library and museum of the Artillery School [Fort Monroe, Virginia], to the effect that he had previously no idea their extent and value was so great, has induced me to give your readers a brief history and description of them, in the hope that it will not be uninteresting both to those who may visit the school of practice and to those who look forward to a tour of duty at this post, as showing some of the valuable aids in mental progress and proficiency that are to be found here.
On the 28th day of July, 1824 Major [Christopher] van de Venter of the Quartermaster’s Department transmitted to Lt. Col. [Abraham] Eustis, First Artillery, temporarily in command at Old Point Comfort, a catalog of books which had been receipted for by Col. [John Rogers] Fenwick, Fourth Artillery, the commanding officer of the school of practice. This seems to have been the nucleus of the original library.
On the 1st of April, 1826, James Barbour, Secretary of War, writes to the commanding officer at Fort Monroe as follows:
Department of War, April 1, 1826.
Sir: Colonel S.B. Archer, late Inspector-General in the Army of the United States, directed in his will that “his military books and instruments” contained in the enclosed copy of a catalog prepared by himself, should be presented to the United States, for the use of the Artillery School at Old Point Comfort.
The books have been delivered by his widow, Mrs. Archer, and have been forwarded to the school. You will take charges of these books and instruments, and devise regulations for their preservation, as the legacy of an able, useful, and justly lamented officer.
I have the honor to be your obedient servant,
James Barbour
Colonel Archer, before his appointment as Inspector General, was a major of artillery. He was an officer of great talent, cultivation, and research, had traveled extensively abroad, and had collected from various sources this library, probably at the time the best of its kind in the country; and it was strong proof of his professional pride and his own worth, that at his death he wished his professional library to be located where the younger officers, without his opportunities of travel and study, might have access to it. He died December 11, 1825.
Some time in 1835-36, General [Walker] K. Armisted, Colonel, Third Artillery, then in command, caused these books and instruments to be distributed among the companies then serving at the post, and thus the greater part of this valuable collection was forever lost to the Artillery School. Attempts have been made to find some trace of the missing portions, without success.
In March, 1858, a box of books was sent to the school from the United States Military Academy at West Point, and in April valuable books and instruments were furnished upon requisition of Major, now General Harvey Brown, [Second Artillery,] who made further addition by the purchase of the library of Colonel I. L. Smith, of the United States Corps of Engineers, consisting of several hundred volumes, including valuable, and in many cases rare, foreign military works.
Additions were also made from time to time by purchases under the superintendence of a committee of officers stationed at the post. Upon General [William F.] Barry’s, [Second Artillery,] assuming command [after the Civil War] of the present Artillery School [which had been closed during the war], it was deemed advisable by him that the library should be rearranged and re-cataloged.
It was found to contain many books of light character, and entirely unsuited for the requirements for such a library as this should be. All such books were transferred to the post library for the use of the enlisted men, and to the number retained additions have constantly been made, amounting in all to more than 200 volumes, so that now it contains 1,969 volumes, strict regard being had in the selection to obtain such books as should make a library of reference, containing those works which are either too rare or too costly to be in the possession of any officer.
It occupies half of a large and comfortable room in Carroll Hall and the administration is so conducted as to furnish the greatest facilities to the greatest number of those persons wishing to use them, and at the same time best guard against loss or damage to the books. The general regulations do not differ essentially from those of public libraries through the country.
[The professional books were divided into ten numbered categories of which engineering was first and artillery was second.] Under these heads may be found, with many others on engineering, the works of Allent, Belidor, Bousmard, Carnot, Cormontaigne, and Vauban of earlier times, and those of Dufour, Duparcq, Barnard, Gilmore, Elphinstone, Jebb, Jones, Mahan, Neil, and Pasley, of modern times.
In artillery, the works of Belidor, Didion, Lallemand, Jacobi, Mouze, Piobert, Taubert, and Thiroux of former times; and those of Borman, Boxer, Benton, Dahlgren, Rodman, Holly, Fave, Louis Napoleon, Sir Howard Douglas, and Lynal Thomas, of the present day. In the department of artillery tactics and instruction the library possesses the earliest works ever published or used during the eighteenth century, and in this country dating from colonial times.
Among these are rare copies of the works of Kosciusko, [Maneuvers of Horse Artillery (1800),] De Scheel, [A Treatise of Artillery (1800),] Tousard, [American Artillerist’s Companion (1809),] and Stevens, [A System for the Discipline of the Artillery of the United States (1797)].
In the art of war, etc., the works of the Arch Duke Charles, Jomini, Napoleon Bonaparte, Marmont, and Rogniant, of the last century and beginning of the present, and those of Dufour, Duparcq, Halleck, and Hamley, of modern times.
In military history, or at least that department of it which comprises narratives, official reports, and detailed histories of battles, campaigns, and sieges of the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries, the library is enriched with rare works, many of which are accompanied by maps, plans, and drawings of great pecuniary as well as scientific value, among which are Russian, French, and English official reports of the sieges of Sebastopol and Bomarsund, with plans, drawings, etc. [There follows a description of the post library, being the other half of the room and presumably containing the books of “light character.”]
The museum is wholly the creation of the present Artillery School. It occupies the room adjoining, and the same size as that containing the libraries; and its object is to furnish the illustration of all the theory of the course in ordnance and gunnery taught here.
It contains over 800 different articles, embracing the whole range of material, implements, and equipments used by the artillerist; the list comprising models of exact proportions of all the field and siege carriages in use now or before the present system; of mortars of all calibers, from the Coehorn to the 13-inch, with their beds, platforms, and implements, besides specimens of all the shot, shell, case, and canister used, from the 6-pounder smooth-bore gun to the 15-inch, and from the 3-inch to the 12-inch rifled;
Of hand grenades and carcasses; of cartridge bags of all calibers; all patterns and styles of fuses; all the implements required in the service of the piece and those for laboratory use; all the instruments used in inspecting shot, shell, and cannon; all kinds of powder, and the materials used in its fabrication, besides miscellaneous articles, among which are Confederate projectiles, specimens of metal castings, both in iron and bronze, and models of the different purchases, with block and tackle. [There follows a description of the small arms in the museum.]
Here as was designed, the artillery student can see at a glance what no author can make as clear — the points of difference between the new and old systems and the reasons for the change; can see the practical manner of laying platforms of all kinds; can compare for himself the different methods by which projectiles are made to take the grooves in rifled pieces, by the studs, by Whitworth’s methods, by compression, and by expansion; can study the vexing question of the different forms and manner of attaching the sabot and the materials composing it;
Can trace the process of making gunpowder from the willow reed to charcoal; from crude to refined nitre, through the mealed, rifle, mortar, cannon, mammoth, Rodman oake powder, and Doremus’s patent cartridge; can follow the gradual improvements from the linstock and slowmatch through the various styles of priming tubes to the recent metallic priming cartridge and the electric primer; in short, can see practical illustrations of whatever he may read.
In view of all these facilities for improvement presented by the library and museum, those who expect sooner or later to spend a year at the Artillery School, and who desire to advance in knowledge of their profession, may congratulate themselves, for nowhere, except at the Military Academy at West Point, can equal advantages be found, and in some respects those at the Artillery School are superior. [There follows the order opening the facilities.]
How entertaining and instructive they have been is proven by the fact that in the four months following the reopening of these rooms they have been visited by nearly four thousand persons, during one month of which there were but two companies serving at the post.