"'The feeling of ostracism is so strong that a white boy who dared to recognize a colored cadet would be himself ostracized by the other white cubs, even of radical extraction.'
"We copy the above from the Atlanta Herald of last week, for the purpose of remarking that among colored men we know of none more honorable or more deserving than Flipper, the father of the colored West Point student of that name. Flipper lived for many years in Thomasville as the servant of Mr. E.
G. Ponder--was the best bootmaker we ever knew, and his character and deportment were ever those of a sensible, unassuming, gentlemanly white man. Flipper possessed the confidence and respect of his master and all who knew him. His wife, the mother of young Flipper, was Isabella, a servant in the family of Rev. R. H. Lucky, of Thomasville, and bore a character equal to that of her husband. Young Flipper was baptized in his infancy by the venerable Bishop Early.
From these antecedents we should as soon expect young Flipper to make his mark as any other colored youth in the country."(From the Louisville Ledger.)"It is just possible that some of our readers may not know who Flipper is. For their benefit we make haste to explain that Flipper is the solitary colored cadet now at West Point. He is in the third class, and stands forty-six in the class, which numbers eighty- five members. This is a very fair standing, and Flipper's friends declare that he is getting along finely in his studies, and that he is quite up to the standard of the average West Point student. Nevertheless they intimate that he will never graduate. Flipper, they say, may get as far as the first class, but there he will be 'slaughtered.'
"A correspondent of the New York Times takes issue with this opinion. He says there are many 'old heads' who believe Flipper will graduate with honor, and he thinks so too. The grounds for his belief, as he gives them, are that the officers are gentlemen, and so are the professors; that they believe merit should be rewarded wherever found;and that they all speak well of Flipper, who is a hard student, as his position in his class proves.
From this correspondent we learn that Flipper is from Georgia; that he has a light, coffee-colored complexion, and that he 'minds his business and does not intrude his company upon the other cadets,'
though why this should be put down in the list of his merits it is not easy to understand, since, if he graduates, as this writer believes he will, he will have the right to associate on terms of perfect equality with the other cadets, and may in time come to command some of them. We are afraid there is some little muddle of inconsistency in the brain of the Times' correspondent.
"The Chicago Tribune seems to find it difficult to come to any conclusion concerning Flipper's chances for graduating. It says: 'It is freely asserted that Flipper will never be allowed to graduate; that the prejudice of the regular army instructors against the colored race is insurmountable, and that they will drive away from the Academy by persecution of some petty sort any colored boy who may obtain admittance there. The story does not seem to have any substantial basis; still, it possesses considerable vitality.'
"We don't profess to understand exactly what sort of a story that is which has 'considerable vitality'
without any substantial basis, and can only conclude that the darkness of the subject has engendered a little confusion in the mind of the Tribune as well as in that of the writer of the Times. But the Tribune acquires more confidence as it warms in the discussion, and it assures us finally that 'there is, of course, no doubt that some colored boys are capable of receiving a military education; and eventually the presence of colored officers in the regular army must be an accepted fact.' Well, we don't know about that 'accepted fact.' The white man is mighty uncertain, and the nigger won't do to trust to, in view of which truths it would be unwise to bet too high on the 'colored officers,' for some years to come at least.
"But let not Flipper wring his flippers in despair, notwithstanding. Let him think of Smith, and take heart of hope. Smith was another colored cadet who was sent to West Point from South Carolina. Smith mastered readin', 'ritin', and 'rithmetic, but chemistry mastered Smith.* They gave him three trials, but it was to no purpose ; so they had to change his base and send him back to South Carolina. But what of that? They've just made him inspector of militia in South Carolina, with the rank of brigadier-general.
How long might he have remained in the army before he would have become 'General Smith?' Why, even Fred Grant's only a lieutenant-colonel. Smith evidently has reason to congratulate himself upon being 'plucked;' and so the young gentleman from Georgia, with the 'light, coffee-colored complexion,' if he meets with a similar misfortune, may console himself with the hope that to him also in his extremity will be extended from some source a helping flipper."*Cadet Smith failed in Natural and Experimental Philosophy. In Chemistry he was up to the average.
He was never appointed Inspector-General of South Carolina. He was Commandant of Cadets in the South Carolina Agricultural Institute at Orangeburg, S. C., Which position he held till his death November 29th, 1876.
