20 February 2008
Von Steuben and the Model Company
Posted by Terrie Soberg under: Judaeo-Christian Values Under Attack .
This is a comment from Chuck C. worthy of its own post:
It’s funny, but this morning I picked up a book I have not read in a long time. It is called “500 Little Known Stories from American History” published by Christian Crusade in 1964. I was reading the very first paragraph of the introduction as Joy’s blog was coming up on my screen. Let me share two paragraphs with you:
“1. Action, The Effect of Daring. The Declaration of Independence in 1776 hadn’t solved the problems of the American colonies, but rather had intensified them. Washington’s army had been forced to retreat before superior numbers, Tories were everywhere, Continental troops were in a mood to desert, and it looked as if the American cause was going to be short lived. Washington knew that unless a brilliant blow was struck before the end of the year, it would be all over. Crossing the Delaware in the bitter cold of Christmas night, his troops fell on the unsuspecting Hessians at Trenton and won a signal victory, taking a thousand prisoners.
The uplifting effect on the morale of the country was immediate. Philadelphia was saved, Congress returned after having fled the city, a large force of Pennsylvania militia joined Washington’s camp, and by promising a bounty of ten dollars, the Continental troops which were ready to desert, agreed to stay. Washington’s bold venture had proved to be the turning point in the history of the nation.”
I had chills run down my spine when, after reading this, the very next thing I read was Joy’s blog. Have the sunshine patriots gone home? I’d like to think not. They are gathering strength, fortifying themselves, looking for a rallying point. We may be in our Valley Forge, needing a leader to show us what to do. Think about what happened there.
Friedrich Wilhelm Ludolf Gerhard Augustin von Steuben (September 17, 1730 – November 28, 1794) was a German-Prussian army officer who served as inspector general of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. He is credited with teaching the Continental Army the essentials of military drill and discipline, helping to guide it to victory. He wrote the book that became the standard United States drill manual until the War of 1812, and served essentially as General George Washington’s chief of staff in the final years of the war.
On September 26, 1777, he reached Portsmouth, New Hampshire and by December 1, was being extravagantly entertained in Boston. Congress was in York, Pennsylvania, after being ousted from Philadelphia for the winter and on February 5, 1778, Steuben was with them. They accepted his offer to volunteer, without pay for the time, and on the 23rd of the same month, Steuben was reporting for duty to Washington at Valley Forge. Steuben did not speak English, but his French was such that he could communicate with some of the officers. Alexander Hamilton and Nathanael Greene were of great help in this area. The two men assisted Steuben in drafting a training program for the soldiers which found approval with Washington in March.
Steuben’s training technique was to create a “model company”, a group of 120 chosen men who in turn successively worked outward into each brigade. Steuben’s eclectic personality greatly enhanced his mystique. He trained the soldiers, who at this point were greatly lacking in proper clothing themselves, in full military dress uniform, swearing and yelling at them up and down in German and French. When that was no longer successful, he recruited Captain Benjamin Walker, his French speaking aide, to curse at them for him in English. To correct the existing policy of placing recruits in a unit before they had received training, Steuben introduced a system of progressive training, beginning with the school of the soldier, with and without arms, and going through the school of the regiment. Each company commander was made responsible for the training of new men, but actually instruction was done by selected sergeants, the best obtainable.
The first results of the army training were in evidence by May 20, 1778 at Barren Hill and then again at Monmouth (ending June 28). Washington recommended an appointment for Steuben as Inspector General on April 30; Congress approved it on May 5. It was Steuben serving in Washington’s headquarters in the summer of 1778 who was the first to report the enemy was heading for Monmouth. During the winter of 1778-1779, Steuben prepared Regulations for the Order and Discipline of the Troops of the United States, commonly known as the “Blue Book.” Its basis was the plan he devised at Valley Forge. (source: Wikipedia)
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We can thank people like Joy for inspiring us. Now we need to take courage from people like her and retrench a bit. We also need a von Steuben type who can help us to develop a plan of progressive training. We don’t have all the answers, but we should not be discouraged.
I once had a very old man give me some wonderful advice. He said, “look for the bright and uplifting things of life. Avoid that which is dark and shady and destroys the testimony of your soul.” We may begin to feel that we are in a dark period and become discouraged. But we will be lifted up in our spirits by knowing that we are not alone.
17 Comments so far...
E.E. Says:
20 February 2008 at 10:22 am.
Okay, so what is our training. What do we do to stop thinking about frostbite?
Jesse Says:
20 February 2008 at 10:30 am.
The problem is, we need a von Steuben but we can’t agree on who that is. McCain isn’t in the running. Would Mitt Romney get involved in the conservative movement? I would like Ron Paul but I am afraid either man would focus so much on the war issue that they wouldn’t be able to just lead out in basic constitutional principles to try and unite the various factions. Neither of them have any patience with the other side on the issue of the war. It blinds almost everyone to other things.
Wikipedia » Von Steuben and the Model Company Says:
20 February 2008 at 10:45 am.
[…] In God We Trust wrote an interesting post today on Von Steuben and the Model CompanyHere’s a quick excerptThis is a comment from Chuck C. worthy of its own post: It’s funny, but this morning I pick […]
T. Fan Says:
20 February 2008 at 11:01 am.
Joy’s blog about not circling around a man made sense to me. We don’t need a king or big government to tell us what to do and how to think. We circle around the constitution. We can do this ourselves. We discussed and formed the mission statement and 3 purposes. We make sure we get educated and we spread the word and we work to support people for congress that we feel will help the country.
Chuck C Says:
20 February 2008 at 11:23 am.
I have been thinking of a plan. Let me know what you think… I have downloaded from the US Senate website the voting records for one vote of all the senators and have sorted it by party. I then color coded the votes into Green for Yeah, Yellow for Not Voting and Red for Nay votes. It is then easy to see at a glance who voted with or against their “party” vote.
If we do this same thing for all “bell weather” votes, it would be easy to see who is representing their constituency or just voting the party line. We need to do this for the House as well.
Once we have the data, we need to look at all Blue states especially and target which seat would be most likely to be converted from liberal to conservative. If we see a democrat voting for conservative values, then let that person know he/she can expect support for supporting those values (including support for constitutionalist judges).
If, for example, the democratic representative from Utah is determined by a quick look down the color chart to be voting lock step with the democratic leadership, then this specific information needs to be disseminated to everybody in his district - using the media, internet and foot soldiers. In this way we can vote intelligently by looking at how a person votes, not the promises the speech writers know will resonate. We are too easily fooled by the handlers running the elections. They know what sells, but we can cut through that.
This can be duplicated in each area of interest. It will be a lot of work, but it can be done. We need leaders, organizers, foot soldiers, intellectuals, writers…
Is anybody game?
Cavetrollhead Says:
20 February 2008 at 12:25 pm.
Chuck,
Are you suggesting that we help you create these charts or just disseminate them?
Chuck C Says:
20 February 2008 at 12:48 pm.
The first help I would like is to get a committee to determine which votes are worth plotting on the charts — votes that tend to show liberal vs conservative values. After I know which votes to chart, I can do the charting initially. Because the data is not parsed on the government sites, I put it into a database for parsing and sorting.
I can then create PDFs or other data formats, but what would be better is if we had a programmer to present the data interactively so anyone can select a congressional district and see at a glance (by the color code) how that representative voted on major issues compared to the two groups.
Then we need help to organize and disseminate. Does this make sense?
Sharon Anderson Says:
20 February 2008 at 1:05 pm.
Wow, Chuck, You have a lot more time and energy than I do. I’m impressed that you are willing make a difference. I believe there are websites out there that have basically done what you are suggesting and could save “reinventing the wheel.” Here, for example is a link to one with the voting record of Ron Paul http://www.votesmart.org/voting_category.php?can_id=296. You can check the voting records for others here too. There are also organizations that have already done alot of research in areas that are of particular concern to them, for example Eagle Forum has good insights on family issues, judges, and education. Thanks for encouraging us to stay involved on the state and local levels (not just national). That is so important.
Terrie Soberg Says:
20 February 2008 at 1:17 pm.
Chuck C.,
Your idea sounds wonderful, but whew! You are talking about a LOT of work. What you are talking about would need an entire website and grassroots organization. I checked to see what other sites are out there, and I found these:
http://projects.washingtonpost.com/congress
I have my hands full with this blog and my other projects. Realistically, I don’t believe I would have the time to upload and maintain the information, let alone work on collecting it and disseminating it to the individual politicians. I especially do not have any programming experience.
Your idea fits very well with one component of our mission statement, but for the Blog to take on what you are suggesting would overwhelm us and take us too far off track. My calling is too make sure we stay focused on our mission. My goal for the people here is that they educate themselves to the eternal principles we teach and then share that message with as many other people as possible. It’s a difficult enough task reaching out to new people. Before they can really understand why what you are doing is important, they must have an understanding of the principles upon which the Constitution was framed. That’s my assignment. It’s exciting now that we have some Serbs here, because the principles apply to any people or government. I hope our message will grow to other parts of the world as well.
Your idea is great, and I encourage you to go forward with it. I will be happy to link with your site when you put it together.
Chuck C Says:
20 February 2008 at 1:17 pm.
Sharon, the data on the site you mentioned is a great start, but I can’t look down the list of votes and determine which votes were with the right, left or middle. There would be too much homework to be done by each individual to do so and to come up with a trend for that congressman.
So, data from this site, or one like it, is a a good place to start. The US Senate site has votes for each member listed for each vote, so working with the group data might be easier.
No, I don’t have that much time or energy. I do this in between printing catalogs, telephone calls, etc. I need help. If this is already done in an efficient manner somewhere else, then let’s disseminate the info, otherwise, we roll up our sleeves. Thanks for the link.
Jesse Says:
20 February 2008 at 1:58 pm.
Like T. Fan said, we had a long discussion awhile back about what the blog should be about. Some people wanted us to get involved in a grassroots level on issues. We decided that what we wanted to do was more over arching than one component like Terrie says. It is very important to get informed and involved and I think your idea is a great one Chuck. But we should not get unbalanced in the goals we set. We want to identify the areas of agreement about principles and try and unify conservatives with knowledge about what constitutes political freedom, what works against that, and work hard to get the word out. I am studying harder than ever now so I can understand what is most important. I have been talking to people and emailing some of my favorite blogs to try and get more people to come here. It might not seem that this accomplishes anything but changing attitudes is hard work and takes planning and discussion. I search every day for information that helps us. I don’t have time to take on a major project in addition to this.
Don’t get me wrong. I love Terrie’s idea that you have a website for this. Hopefully there are others here who would have time to want to do that in addition to what we are doing here. What worries me is that you might think this is a chat room where we just talk. You made a comment a few days ago about not just blogging but doing something. This is totally different than a chat room. It is a school and a microphone to actively spread the information we need to help people understand exactly why we need to uphold the constitution. What you are suggesting could be a good branch under the bigger canopy of what we are trying to do. I hope this doesn’t offend you.
Chuck C Says:
20 February 2008 at 2:00 pm.
Terrie,
I appreciate your feedback. I looked at all the links and they have good information, just not presented in a way to make informed decisions without hours of study. The Washington Post has some great information on “Members Voting with their Parties”, but again, not in a way to see how they voted on “bell weather” legislation compared to the flock.
Maybe I am up in the night, but I would like a better presentation to help as many people as possible make informed decisions and pass the “picture” on to others. If I had some help to determine which votes over the last two years were “bell weather”, it would be a big help.
Chuck C Says:
20 February 2008 at 2:03 pm.
Jesse, no offense at all. Love your comments.
Joy Bischoff Says:
20 February 2008 at 2:32 pm.
I think it is a great idea. If I wasn’t so behind on my other website and a bit overwhelmed with this site I would help.
Chuck C Says:
20 February 2008 at 3:42 pm.
I’ll send Joy a sample one of these days and you all can decide if it is impactful enough to bother with. If not, I won’t make busy work for myself. I also appreciate that you are working on constitutionally sound principals to educate and inform as many people as possible.
Jan W. Says:
20 February 2008 at 4:43 pm.
Chuck is right that if we sit around winter quarters on our fat donkeys then we will get discouraged. We don’t have time to waste. We can say we have our plan but we really need to work it. I would really appreciate it if someone could suggest some good reading material. What I have learned from here is that the founding fathers did a lot of studying and thinking. I want to read more about them but I am nervous about getting biographies that have revisionist history. I’m not sure how to get the right books. I was also wondering when the next part of Joy’s Dialogue of Freedom is coming out.
Roy Bischoff Says:
20 February 2008 at 6:06 pm.
A good source for some reading material can be found at http://www.gwc.edu and look at the titles in their bookstore under history or politics. They also have a list of classic books that is good. I am not saying you need to buy their books you can probably find most of them at a library. GWC is just a very conservative college that emphasizes a classical education like most of the founding fathers had.
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