Cadet Corps

For other uses, see Cadet Corps (disambiguation).

A corps of cadets, or cadet corps, is a kind of military school for boys. Initially such schools admitted only sons of the nobility or gentry, but in time many of the schools were opened also to members of other social classes.

The original, French Corps of Cadets was established by King Louis XIII for younger sons of Gascon gentry (in the Gascon language, capdets—"little chiefs"). This idea of a school for boys who would later become gentlemen volunteers in the army to offset their lack of patrimony, soon spread, with similar schools being established in other European countries.

Notable cadet-corps schools were created by Frederick William I, Elector of Brandenburg, in Kolberg, Liegnitz (1730), Berlin, and Magdeburg. Similar schools were established in 1725 in Dresden, Saxony; in the Russian Empire (1732); and in Warsaw, Poland (1765).

The students at the United States Military Academy at West Point—a four-year military college that was established by President Thomas Jefferson in 1802—are referred to as "cadets", and collectively as the "United States Corps of Cadets".

Upper Canada College, in Toronto, Ontario, maintained a cadet corps from 1832 to 1976.

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 8/24/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.