Carolina Military Institute of Charlotte
By Matthew M. Peek, Military Collection Archivist, State Archives of North Carolina
Editor’s note: A lot of the information in this piece was taken directly from period sources, or from official information created by the N.C. Office of Archives and History.
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 Charlotte Observer 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.
Resources
Carolina Military Institute Materials, MMP 14, Miscellaneous Military Papers, Military Collection, State Archives of North Carolina, Raleigh, N.C.
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, viewed online at http://www.ncmarkers.com/Markers.aspx?MarkerId=L-80.
North Carolina Journal of Education, Vol. 1, No. 6, February 1875.
“North Carolina Military Institute,” by Rod Andrew Jr., 2006 NCPedia article, viewed online at https://www.ncpedia.org/north-carolina-military-institute.
Michael C. Hardy, “North Carolina Military Institute,” June 14, 2010, Looking for the Confederate War blog, viewed online at http://michaelchardy.blogspot.com/2010/06/north-carolina-military-institute.html.
