Carolina Military Institute Materials, MMP 14

[Item name or title], [Folder Number], Carolina Military Institute Materials, MMP 14, Miscellaneous Military Papers, Military Collection, State Archives of North Carolina, Raleigh, N.C.

There is no particular arrangement for this collection.

The Carolina Military Institute (originally called the North Carolina Military Institute or North Carolina Military Academy) was a state-supported military school opened in Charlotte, N.C., in 1859. North Carolina by that time had established itself as a leader in private military education, a means of education which became popular throughout the South prior to the U.S. Civil War. After Virginia, South Carolina, and other southern states experimented with publicly supported military schools, North Carolina followed suit. Due to the efforts of later Confederate general Daniel H. Hill, the cornerstone for the North Carolina Military Institute was laid in 1858. The school received a charter from the North Carolina legislature in 1859, and opened its doors in the fall of 1959 with 40 cadets. The first instructors of the school were Daniel Hill, who was at the time a professor at Davidson College and became the superintendent of the institute; General James H. Lane; and Charles C. Lee. There were also several other instructors that served at the school.

Within a year, the school had more than 100 cadets. It was reported in an 1889 issue of the newspaper that the first year of the school lasted without intermission throughout the year; in August and September cadets spent time campaigning in the mountains of North Carolina. By April 1861, the school had grown to include 150 cadets. With the coming of the Civil War, the institute closed in 1861. North Carolina Governor John W. Ellis ordered the entire corps of cadets to duty as drillmasters in Raleigh, N.C. Many of these cadets later served in the 1st North Carolina Infantry, Confederate Army, under Gen. Daniel H. Hill. All of the staff officers of this regiment were former faculty members of the Institute. When the regiment was formed, North Carolina Adjutant General Robert F. Hoke stipulated that the cadets could join the regiment with the consent of their parents and guardians (since many were underage at the time). Once most of the students and all of the leading faculty members had gone off to war, the school was used as a Confederate military hospital between 1861 and 1865.

After the end of the Civil War, several efforts were made to revive the institution; but none succeeded, mainly because of the unsettled and impoverished condition of the country following the war. The buildings remained unoccupied and unused most of the time, though the main building was used as a girls' school or academy at some point between 1865 and 1873.

The school was revived in the fall of 1873 as the "Carolina Military Institute" by Col. John P. Thomas of South Carolina, who later became superintendent of The Citadel in Charlestown, S.C. After a few years, it functioned as a graded school only. Thomas had thought of the project of founding a school which would embrace within the scope of its aims and influence the youth of both North and South Carolina, and the school formerly run as only a North Carolina institution was designated to serve students from both the Carolinas. Col. Thomas met with many difficulties in the beginning of reopening the school. This was largely, as it was reported at the time of the 1870s, because educational opportunities or institutions met with little public support as Southern states were attempting to recover following the Civil War financially and otherwise.

The first academic year for the reborn institute began on October 1, 1873, and ended October 1, 1874, with 102 cadets. During the start of the second year of the institute, 104 cadets were now matriculated at the institution. The primary object of the Carolina Military Institute was to educate the cadet-mentally, morally, and physically. Its aim was to develop the body as well as the mind, and to train and cultivate the moral as well as the intellectual faculties. The institute remained opened through 1882, before it was closed.

After the close of the military school, the building was used by the Charlotte public school system from 1883 until 1950. Construction of an extension of Independence Boulevard in Charlotte in 1954 led to the destruction of the former institute's brick school building.

[Information for this historical note was taken from the following sources: U.S. Bureau of Education Circular of Information No. 1, 1888, United States Bureau of Education, Volume 8, Part 1; North Carolina Military Institute, N.C. Highway Historical Marker L-80, N.C. Office of Archives and History; North Carolina Journal of Education, Vol. 1, No. 6, February 1875; and "North Carolina Military Institute," by Rod Andrew Jr., 2006 NCPedia article].

Collection Contents

The materials in the collection were received by the Military Collection of the State Archives of North Carolina from Richard M. Williard of Rolesville, N.C., in July 2019. The donation was completed in August 2019.

The materials were received by a collector who had purchased the materials with the intent of eventually donating them to a cultural heritage institution. The materials appear to have been removed from a scrapbook by a previous owner, as they have pieces of celluloid office tape on the corners or portions of the materials. It appears the tape was to keep the materials stuck to page, or for basic document repairs in some spots. However, the tape is too strong to be able to safely remove from the documents. The tape's acidic adhesive has already discolored places of the materials or torn off pieces of paper from the materials. Some part of the documents or ephemera seem to have been removed from the items over time.

In order to provide individual descriptions on the materials, each item was assigned an item number within a numbered archival folder. The item numbers were note written on the original materials-only labeled as such in the finding aid for description. The items were numbered as follows: "MMP 14.F1.1" should be interpreted as "Miscellaneous Military Papers 14 collection, Folder 1, Item 1." Two of the materials were stored in archival plastic photograph sleeves to keep the materials stabilized, and safe during handling by researchers.