Sylvanus Thayer

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Colonel and Brevet Brigadier General Sylvanus Thayer (June 9, 1785 – September 7, 1872) also known as "the Father of West Point" was an early superintendent of the United States Military Academy at West Point and an early advocate of engineering education in the United States.

Sylvanus Thayer
Sylvanus Thayer, painting by Robert Weir
Nickname(s)"Father of West Point"
Born(1785-06-09)June 9, 1785
Braintree, Massachusetts
DiedSeptember 7, 1872(1872-09-07) (aged 87)
Braintree, Massachusetts
Resting Place
West Point Cemetery, Highland Falls, NY[1]
AllegianceUnited States of America
Service / branchUnited States Army
Union Army
Years of service1808 – 1863
Rank Colonel
Brevet Brigadier General
CommandsSuperintendent of the United States Military Academy
Battles / warsWar of 1812

Early life and education

Sylvanus Thayer (9 June 1785-7 Sept. 1872) was born in Braintree, Massachusetts, the son of farmer Nathaniel Thayer and his wife Dorcas Faxon.[2] In 1793, at the age of 8, Thayer was sent to live with his uncle Azariah Faxon and attend school in Washington, New Hampshire. There he met General Benjamin Pierce, who, like Faxon, was a veteran of the Revolutionary War. In 1803 Thayer matriculated at Dartmouth College, graduating in 1807 as valedictorian of his class.

Thayer, however, never gave the valedictory address at Dartmouth, having been granted an appointment to West Point by President Thomas Jefferson at the behest of General Pierce. Thayer graduated from the United States Military Academy after a single year, and received his commission as a second lieutenant in 1808. His first assignment was supervising the construction of Fort Warren (later renamed Fort Winthrop) in Boston Harbor, foreshadowing the bulk of his later career.[3]

During the War of 1812, Thayer directed the fortification and defense of Norfolk, Virginia, and was promoted to major. In 1815, Thayer was provided $5,000 to travel to Europe, where he studied for two years at the French École Polytechnique. While traveling in Europe he amassed a collection of science and especially mathematics texts that now form a valuable collection for historians of mathematics.[4]

Superintendent of West Point

In 1817, President James Monroe ordered Thayer to West Point to become superintendent of the Military Academy following the resignation of Captain Alden Partridge. Under his stewardship, the Academy became the nation's first college of engineering.

While at West Point Thayer established numerous traditions and policies which are still in use at West Point. These include the values of honor and responsibility, strict mental and physical discipline, the demerit system, summer encampment, high academic standards and the requirement that cadets maintain outstanding military bearing and appearance at all times.

Many of the cadets who attended West Point during Thayer's tenure, held key leadership positions during the Mexican War and American Civil War.

 
Statue and Memorial to Sylvanus Thayer

Later career

Colonel Thayer's time at West Point ended with his resignation in 1833, after a disagreement with President Andrew Jackson. He was elected an Associate Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1834.[5]

Thayer returned to duty with the Army Corps of Engineers. Thayer spent the great majority of the next 30 years as the chief engineer for the Boston area. During this time he oversaw the construction of both Fort Warren and Fort Independence to defend Boston Harbor. Thayer's great engineering ability can be observed in both of the above-mentioned forts.

In August 1861, Fort Thayer, an earthwork fort part of the Civil War Defenses of Washington, DC is built and named in his honor.[6]

Thayer retired from the Army on June 1, 1863 with the rank of colonel in the Corps of Engineers.

Death and legacy

টঘখহছইঢ়ঠ১ত৪ে৫ওঢ়

Philosophical and/or political views

Works

Thayer's papers and manuscripts are divided between the U.S. Military Academy Library, West Point, New York, and the Dartmouth College Library, Hanover, New Hampshire.[2]

Honours, decorations, awards and distinctions

In 1852 herpetologists Spencer Fullerton Baird and Charles Frédéric Girard of the Smithsonian Institution named a species of lizard in honor of Thayer, Sceloporus thayeri, which was later placed in the synonymy of Sceloporus undulatus hyacinthinus.[7]

On April 21, 1864, President Abraham Lincoln nominated Thayer for the award of the honorary grade of brevet brigadier general, United States Army (Regular Army), to rank from May 31, 1863, the day before he retired,[8] for long and faithful service.[9] The U.S. Senate confirmed the award on April 27, 1864.[8]

To honor his achievements, in 1958, the Sylvanus Thayer Award was created by the United States Military Academy. He has been honored by the United States Postal Service with a 9¢ Great Americans series postage stamp.

Thayer Street, in the Inwood, Manhattan section of New York City, is named after him.[10]

Bibliography [2]

  • Stephen E. Ambrose, Duty, Honor, Country: A History of West Point (1966)
  • Thomas J. Fleming, West Point: The Men and Times of the United States Military Academy (1969)
  • James L. Morrison, Jr., "The Best School in the World": West Point, the Pre-Civil War Years, 1833-1866 (1986)
  • George S. Pappas, To the Point: The United States Military Academy, 1802-1902 (1993).

See also

Notes

  1. ^ "Sylvanus Thayer". Find a Grave. Retrieved October 17, 2010.
  2. ^ a b c Herman Hattaway, Michael D. Smith. "Thayer, Sylvanus"; American National Biography Online Feb. 2000, accessed [1]; American Council of Learned Societies. Published by Oxford University Press.
  3. ^ Fort Winthrop at FortWiki.com
  4. ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2004-11-24. Retrieved 2006-05-24. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  5. ^ "Book of Members, 1780-2010: Chapter T" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 22 April 2011.
  6. ^ 1862 Commission to Study the Defenses Report - Letter to the Secretary of War - Washington, December 24, 1862 - http://www.npshistory.com/publications/cwdw/hrs/appc.htm
  7. ^ Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, xiii + 296 pp. ISBN 978-1-4214-0135-5. ("Thayer", p. 264).
  8. ^ a b Eicher, John H., and Eicher, David J., Civil War High Commands, p. 737. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001. ISBN 0-8047-3641-3
  9. ^ Hunt, Roger D. and Brown, Jack R. Brevet Brigadier Generals in Blue, p. 608. Gaithersburg, MD: Olde Soldier Books, Inc., 1990. ISBN 1-56013-002-4
  10. ^ http://myinwood.net/inwood-street-names/

References

  • Eiche, John H., and Eicher, David J., Civil War High Commands. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001. ISBN 0-8047-3641-3.
  • Hunt, Roger D. and Brown, Jack R. Brevet Brigadier Generals in Blue. Gaithersburg, MD: Olde Soldier Books, Inc., 1990. ISBN 1-56013-002-4.
  • Kershner, James William, Sylvanus Thayer – A Biography, Arno Press, New York, 1982, p. 329.
  • Eliot, Major George Fielding, Sylvanus Thayer of West Point, Messner, 1959
  • Lathem, Edward Connery, editor, The Beginnings of the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College. The Thayer School of Engineering, Hanover, NH, 1964
Military offices
Preceded by Superintendents of the United States Military Academy
1817–1833
Succeeded by