The 1826 West Point Egg Nog Riot

Podcast Transcript

The United States Military Academy in West Point, New York, is one of the most prestigious academic and military institutions in the United States.

Their motto of “Duty, Honor, Country” is something every cadet that attends the academy aspires to.

However, things haven’t always been that way. There was a period when West Point was downright rowdy and rambunctious.

Learn more about the 1826 West Point Egg Nog Riot and how the military academy completely went out of control one Christmas on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

The United States Military Academy in West Point, New York, has a long and distinguished history. Almost every significant American army leader you can think of over the last 225 years has graduated from West Point.

That includes many generals who fought against the United States during the Civil War.

As the place where future military officers are trained, West Point has a tradition of high standards and a very strict honor code.

However, that wasn’t always the case.

I’ve never had the chance to talk about West Point before, so I should briefly explain how the Academy got to where it was in 1826.

The idea of a military academy for the new country had its origins in the beginnings of the United States.

During his first presidential term, George Washington felt that the country should have an institute to train qualified military officers. To be fair, while the United States managed to beat the British in the Revolutionary War, it wasn’t because they had great officers.

Washington was a great leader and a statesman, but he wasn’t really a great military tactician or strategist. He was good, but the best thing he did was avoid any major engagements that would have been catastrophic for the Continental Army.

As much as Washington wanted a military academy, he found resistance, particularly from his secretary of state, Thomas Jefferson.

Jefferson wasn’t necessarily against the idea of an academy per se, but there was nothing in the Constitution that allowed the country to create a military academy, so Jefferson was against it.

Others in Congress felt that creating a military academy was too European and aristocratic and were against it for those reasons.

Nonetheless, in 1794, Congress authorized a corps of engineers to be based in West Point, which had been a military outpost since the Revolution.

In 1802, during the presidency of Thomas Jefferson, Congress passed authorization to create a military academy at West Point, and Jefferson approved it.

Jefferson changed his mind for a host of reasons. He felt that the engineers who came out of the academy could be used for civilian projects and that the United States needed protection from threats from European countries.

Also, there were many Americans going to Europe for military training, and he felt it would be better if they were trained at home.

West Point initially only offered courses in engineering, science, mathematics, and military science.

The early years of the academy were a mess. There were almost no criteria for admission, and there was little in the way of academic standards.

There were cadets as young as 10 years old and some as old as 37. Some studied there for 6 months, and some for 6 years.

By the War of 1812, things were so bad that Congress considered disbanding it all together. They had only graduated 89 officers in ten years by the outbreak of war.

To solve these problems, Colonel Sylvanus Thayer was appointed academy superintendent in 1817.

Thayer completely overhauled West Point. For this reason, he is considered the “Father of the United States Military Academy.”

Thayer introduced advanced teaching methods, including a structured, sequential curriculum, regular written exams, and the use of textbooks, particularly in mathematics and engineering.

Thayer upgraded the academy’s facilities, including classrooms, barracks, and libraries, to provide a better learning environment.

His reforms established West Point as a model for military academies worldwide.

Part of his reforms was instilling strict discipline and a strong honor code, which remains a cornerstone of West Point to this day.

One element of that was banning alcohol on campus. He didn’t just ban alcohol. He also banned tobacco, playing cards, and novels.

He did make a few exceptions.

In a rare display of leniency, “The Father of West Point” permitted alcohol consumption during the Fourth of July and Christmas celebrations.

However, this policy changed after a particularly unruly Fourth of July in 1825, when cadets staged a “snake dance” and carried the commandant, William Worth, on their shoulders back to the barracks.

So, going into 1826, the campus was completely dry, and there were no exceptions. After the dry Independence Day, a group of Cadets vowed that they were going to get booze for their annual Christmas celebration, which had been the tradition up until recently.

Despite the prohibition, cadets traditionally celebrated Christmas with festive eggnog, which was made alcoholic by smuggling in spirits from nearby taverns or off-campus suppliers.

For those of you in countries that don’t have egg nog, let me briefly explain what it is.

Eggnog is a rich, creamy beverage traditionally made from milk, cream, sugar, whipped egg yolks, and whipped egg whites. It is often spiced with nutmeg, cinnamon, or vanilla. During the Christmas holidays, eggnog is frequently mixed with alcohol, such as rum, brandy, or bourbon.

The drink’s origins are traced back to medieval Britain, where it evolved from a warm, ale-based beverage called “posset,” which was flavored with eggs and milk. Over time, due to the cost of eggs, dairy, and spices, it became a drink of the wealthy. When the recipe reached the American colonies, where these ingredients were more abundant, eggnog became a popular holiday staple, often with locally produced rum as the spirit of choice.

Egg nog is still consumed today around Christmas, although it isn’t as popular as it used to be.

A group of cadets, led by Jefferson Davis and others, plotted to procure alcohol for their Christmas eggnog. The cadets smuggled large quantities of whiskey and rum from local taverns, specifically Benny Havens Tavern, to prepare their illicit drink.

…and just in case you are wondering, the Jefferson Davis in question is, in fact, THAT Jefferson Davis, who later became the president of the Confederate States of America.

The cadets didn’t just sneak in a couple of bottles of alcohol. They managed to sneak in gallons of the stuff, even taking a rowboat across the Hudson River to procure booze in secret.

The celebration started innocently enough on Christmas Eve in the North Barracks. It began in one room but soon expanded into other rooms as more cadets joined and became intoxicated.

As the night progressed, the party turned into chaos, with drunken cadets shouting, fighting, and causing extensive property damage.

By 4 am, now Christmas Day, the party had gotten so loud that it woke up Captain Ethan Allen Hitchcock, an academy staff member who looked after the north barrack.

Captain Hitchcock began wandering the halls to see what was going on. The cadets got wind that something was up, and Jefferson Davis shouted, “Put away the grog, Captain Hitchcock is coming!”

Hitchcock chewed out the partiers, ordered Davis back to his room, and reminded everyone that any gathering of 12 or more cadets was considered an unlawful assembly.

Until this point, what the cadets had done wasn’t a big deal. Sure, they might get in trouble, but this really wasn’t anything more than what you would find on any college campus. I’ve been involved in several dorm room celebrations just like this myself.

If everyone had gone back to their rooms, I wouldn’t be doing an episode on this almost 200 years later.

However, most of them didn’t do that. Jefferson Davis was one of the few cadets who returned to his room.

Instead, the cadets decided to exact revenge on the perceived party spoiler.

One cadet shouted, “Get your dirks and bayonets…and pistols if you have them. Before this night is over, Hitchcock will be dead!“

They hurled sticks of wood at Hitchcock’s door and shattered his windows with rocks. Dozens of cadets rampaged through the halls armed with swords, muskets, and bayonets, with one even firing a pistol as Hitchcock attempted to force open a door. During the chaos, two superior officers were assaulted.

The disturbance spread, with nearly one-third of the cadet corps, around 70 cadets, involved in the melee.

Windows were broken, furniture destroyed, and the academy’s discipline entirely collapsed during the riot.

The unruly behavior only subsided when the school’s commandant, William Worth, arrived to restore order.

When reveille sounded at 6:05 A.M. on Christmas morning, the sober cadets in the South Barracks rose with their usual military discipline. The North Barracks, however, told a very different story. The dormitory was in shambles, with broken windows, smashed furniture, torn banisters, and shattered plates, dishes, and cups scattered about.

The cadets who had taken part in what would later be called the “Egg Nog Riot” looked just as disheveled as the wreckage around them as the first light of day revealed the aftermath.

The Egg Nog Riot put the academy in a very tricky position.

According to the academy’s code, a third of the entire cadet corps should have been expelled. However, that would have gutted the academy and would have severely hamstrung the future of the United States Army.

I should note that many of the cadets at this point, although not necessarily part of the riot, went on to have stellar careers in the Merican-American War and the Civil War.

On December 26, a faculty meeting took place, and Colonel Thayer notified the staff that an investigation was going to take place in January while the cadets were undergoing their final examinations.

That day, 22 cadets, who were the most egregious offenders, were placed on house arrest.

Over the next several months, nineteen cadets and one soldier were court-martialed. The court-martials lasted until mid-March and were widely publicized in newspapers across the country.

What should have been a public relations disaster for West Point ended up being a positive for them as the court-martials showed that they were to be tough on discipline.

The solder who was court-martialed, Private John Dougan, was sentenced to a month of hard labor and had his whiskey ration revoked for a month as well.

The nineteen cadets were all found guilty. Seventeen were expelled from the academy, and some of them were offered clemency. Two were reduced in rank. One cadet was allowed to resign so he wouldn’t be expelled.

Two notable cadets were not court-martialed.

The first was Jefferson Davis. Although he helped organize the party, he didn’t take part in the riot. He went on to become the US Secretary of War and later, as I mentioned, the President of the Confederacy.

The other cadet who was involved but not court-martialled was John Archibald Campbell. He is notable because, in 1853, he went on to become an Associate Justice on the US Supreme Court for eight years.

One of the expelled cadets was Benjamin G. Humphreys, who served as a general for the Confederacy during the Civil War.

As for the institution of the United States Military Academy, it came through relatively unscathed.

The riot reinforced Thayer’s resolve to maintain strict discipline and further cemented West Point’s reputation as an institution committed to rigorous standards.

It also highlighted the challenges of managing young military cadets and set a precedent for future responses to insubordination.

The Eggnog Riot remains a quirky yet significant episode in U.S. military history, illustrating the tension between youthful rebellion and institutional discipline.

It has since been recounted as a cautionary tale and an example of the sometimes unexpected consequences of enforcing strict regulations, as well as what happened when you take away alcohol at Christmas.