Virginia Military Institute

Early History

The first years of the institution were marked by frequent upheaval, as had been the case at other academies such as those at West Point and Annapolis. As the federal government had done at those academies, the Commonwealth of Virginia had laid a basic framework of what it expected from the Virginia Military Institute: a four-year curriculum split more or less evenly between military training and a technical education. But it was often vague in defining the details of what that program should specifically entail. As such, early cadets attended classes, participated in infantry drill, and were largely restricted to their barracks, with little coordination among their activities or training. However, just as Sylvanus Thayer had done with the Military Academy or George Bancroft with the Naval Academy, the Virginia Military Institute grew owing to the work and vision of several key figures who expected more out of the institution.

Col. Claudius Crozet was appointed as the first president of the institute's Board of Visitors. Crozet was a Frenchman who had served under Napoleon and later became a professor of engineering at West Point after moving to the United States. In 1839, he was the chief engineer of Virginia, working on several key construction projects for the state. With many graduates not pursuing permanent military careers, Crozet believed the curriculum should be technically focused, but in ways geared towards civilian applications, such as civil engineering or transportation. Based on his experiences with mass conscription in Napoleon's France, he also knew that military training needed to be an important component of the program to prepare cadets to step into officer roles in the event of an emergency.

The institute's first superintendent, Gen. Francis Smith, was also crucial to its development. Smith graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1833 and came to the Virginia Military Institute from Hampden-Sydney College, where he had been a professor of mathematics. Smith held his position at the institute for more than 50 years, an extraordinarily long time for an academy superintendent; most officers rotated out of such positions every four or five years. Smith's tenure was especially important in establishing the institute's professional traditions, many of which resembled those at West Point. The institutional culture valued discipline above all else, a priority demonstrated through the institute's insistence on an unquestioning obedience to orders. Cadets also learned to equate their personal honor with that of the institution and their classmates, and the cadet who brought shame to either one stood to be severely punished. Most of the institute's traditions were instilled during the cadets' rat (freshman) year.

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