It\u2019s the story of James Pelosi, a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army. While a cadet at West Point, Pelosi endured 19 months of a now-outlawed punishment called \u201csilence,\u201d in which he was completely shunned and ignored by his fellow cadets \u2013 a treatment he was still being subjected to even after graduating West Point.<\/p>\n Pelosi had been convicted of cheating at West Point \u2013 but then \u201cthe charge was dismissed by the West Point superintendent on grounds that a staff officer had prejudiced the case.\u201d<\/p>\n Not satisfied with this outcome, Pelosi\u2019s \u201cclassmates voted to invoke the silence\u201d treatment, \u201ca rarely used punishment exacted by cadets who believe a classmate has escaped just punishment on a legal technicality.\u201d<\/p>\n The punishment lasted 19 months, right up to the time Pelosi graduated from West Point.<\/p>\n \u201cPelosi became a nonentity to his classmates. They did not talk to him or associate with him. He was forced to live and dine alone. He could not take part in class activities.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Since it was \u201cWest Point tradition that silence lasts forever,\u201d Pelosi was still being punished by fellow graduates as they attended Ranger school with him at Ft. Benning.<\/p>\n The article does report two positive development, however. One is that:<\/p>\n \u201cLast week West Point\u2019s cadet honor committee, a target of criticism over the Pelosi incident, abolished the tradition of silence.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The other positive outcome was:<\/p>\n \u201c[Pelosi] said he has been emotionally bolstered by hundreds of letters from people applauding his behavior at West Point.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cOne was from Mrs. Benjamin Davis, the wife of a general who was silenced as a cadet in the 1930s because he was black.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Wikipedia says this of General Benjamin O. Davis Jr. (1912-2002):<\/p>\n \u201cAfter attending the University of Chicago, he entered the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, in 1932. He was sponsored by Representative Oscar De Priest (R-IL) of Chicago, at the time, the only black member of Congress. During the four years of his Academy term, Davis was racially isolated by his White classmates, few of whom spoke to him outside the line of duty. He never had a roommate. He ate by himself. His classmates hoped that this would drive him out of the Academy.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n In her letter, Davis\u2019 wife Agatha gave advice to 2nd Lt. Pelosi:<\/p>\n \u201cYou will forgive but never forget what your classmates did. Don\u2019t resent them. Feel sorry for them\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The article concludes:<\/p>\n \u201c\u2019I\u2019ve taken her advice,\u2019 Pelosi said.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In this article, Thomas Jay Kemp writes about 2nd Lt. James Pelosi and the punishment of the \u201csilent treatment\u201d he received at West Point.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48477,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12235],"tags":[6713,2020,40867,3534],"class_list":["post-48455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history","tag-american-history","tag-newspaper-archives","tag-united-states-military-academy","tag-west-point"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/photo-0305-2019-featured-graphic-west-point.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48455"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48455\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"An](\"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/durham-morning-herald-newspaper-0921-1973-james-pelosi.png\")
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