I recently re-watched the HBO series Deadwood (takes place in the 1870s in the Dakota territory). There is an episode where U.S. Army General Crook brings his cavalry unit into town to rest after battling the Sioux. The show had a pretty negative portrayal of the enlisted soldiers (from a fighting readiness standpoint). They appeared to be very poorly disciplined. Some of them were trading in their equipment for alcohol, clothing, or in some cases as payment to prostitutes. Others appeared to be looking for the first opportunity to desert. Crook and his officers seemed to be having a lot of trouble holding the unit together.
My question is, how accurate is this portrayal? With the size of the postwar army cut down severely, shouldn't the Army be able to be more selective about recruiting quality volunteers?
Followup question:
How did the US army at this point compare to European ones. One of the things that I was taught in US history is that a main reason for Napoleon the 3rd getting out of Mexico is that the US army was already mobilized and strong. Was this true?
With the size of the postwar army cut down severely, shouldn't the Army be able to be more selective about recruiting quality volunteers?
Remember this is pre GI Bill, pre Tricare, pre BAH, pre organized dependent support and relocation assistance, pre Vet discounts, and with only the most basic retirement or pension possibilities or post service care. You can only pick the best if you have sufficient numbers of good men who want to serve to begin with.
In short before many of the things that draw many recruits today to enlist. Meaning many who might have had other career prospects would often do all that could be done to avoid resorting to enlistment in the Navy or Army. Particularly when it meant likely being sent with a few dozen or maybe 100 other dregs to a fort in the middle of nowhere to look out at nowhere all day and monitor the settlers that came by. Hoping you dont freeze in winter, burn in the summer, catch a disease , have your pay or supplies stolen, and perhaps once every few years actually fire your weapon in anger in a few terrifying confused minutes against an Indian band, some bandits you had been asked to help round up, or other malcontents.
To be clear not ever post and every battalion was falling apart and full of drunks, there were always good men and good officers in good units to be found. But morale was always an issue, and alcoholism damn near pervasive(not that things are all together that much better in the 2017 'peacetime' military!) and the places the Army was tasked often to operate was not helpful to fixing things.
Officers had it somewhat better, but the peacetime career of soldiering was certainly not a glamorous one, and the quality of recruiting reflected that by and large. You can overcome some of that with better pay and bonus offerings, but the post war budget cuts, and drawdowns limited that.
And the Army didnt even suffer as much as the Navy! The Army at least had sympathetic leadership in the White House for part of the post war years with Grant, and most of his successors as veterans(if as volunteers and state officers not Regulars), but the Navy had little of that. It went from the largest(if very much not the most powerful), to smaller even then that of Brazil in about 20 years with a staggering loss in capabilities even for coastal defense work.