Throughout the troubled period preceding the actual outbreak of war, President Tappan was circumspect in his public utterances, and was considered conservative on the slavery question though he presided at the Wendell Phillips meeting. The professorial radical of those days was the young Andrew D. White. He was in closer touch with the students than his colleagues, and his personal influence and brilliant lectures on modern history swept his students on into bold opinions and resolute action.
When Sumter was fired upon the University was aflame at once. Although it was Sunday when the news of the surrender came, there was no thought of services. A platform of boxes and planks was raised on the Court House Square and Dr. Tappan was sent for. Upon his arrival, Bible in hand, he found a large and a serious gathering awaiting him. Heretofore President Tappan had permitted himself to say little, though his students were thrilled occasionally by some remark which showed how keenly alive he was to the great issues of the time. Now he could speak. After reading some heroic passages from the Old Testament, he spoke, in the words of Gen. W.H.H. Beadle, '61,--
With mind and heart and soul in heroic agony, as if long-formed opinions and long silenced feelings now burst into utterance.... In all Michigan's history this was the great historic occasion.
The contemporaries of Dr. Tappan are unanimous in their judgment of his extraordinary ability as a speaker, to which a majestic figure and magnificent voice no less than his logic and apt illustrations contributed. But on this day he made the effort of his career. From that time the University was whole-heartedly for the Union and the war.
[Illustration: THE CAPTAINS OF THE THREE STUDENT COMPANIES IN 1861 Charles Kendall Adams, '61. Captain of the University Guards Isaac H. Elliott, '61. Captain of the Chancellor Greys Albert Nye, '62. Captain of the Ellsworth Zouaves]
Student companies were organized at once; and the Tappan Guards under Charles Kendall Adams, '61, the Chancellor Greys, under Isaac H. Elliot, '62, and the Ellsworth Zouaves, under Albert Nye, '62, who died at Murfreesboro in 1862, formed a University Battalion which enrolled practically every student in the University. This was not the first effort of the sort, however, for five years before Professor W.P. Trowbridge, a graduate of West Point, had organized the first University Battalion, with uniforms and arms furnished by the Government, and had managed to have a small building erected as an armory, which was later to become the first gymnasium. This experiment was short-lived and came to an end when Professor Trowbridge resigned the following year. With the organization of the new battalion the duty of drill master fell upon Joseph H. Vance, the steward of the University, who was also assistant librarian. The President set apart a room at the south end of the south College, and there the students, in sections of fifty, drilled for an hour each day. The old muskets had been called in by the Government some time before, and sticks were perforce the ordinary armament. This drill continued for the rest of the year and for most of 1862. The men who thus received their preliminary training were to be found later in practically every corps and division of the Union Army.