By far the greater number of America's distinguished generals and soldiers since the War of Independence have been graduates of West Point. These include U. S. Grant, Philip Henry Sheridan, William Sherman, George P. McClellan, Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson (Confederate), Robert E. Lee (Confederate) and Richard Henry Anderson (Confederate). Grant was appointed to West Point in 1839; he was a good horseman and good in mathematics, but graduated in 21t place in a class of 39. Sherman, on the other hand, stood near the head of his class when he graduated in 1839. Lee was commissioned in the engineering corps upon his graduation in 1829. The most notable commanding officers in the American army during the World War, including, of course, Gen. Pershing, were West Point graduates; the most conspicuous exception, perhaps, was Maj.-Gen. Leonard Wood, who began his career as a surgeon. [Illustration: West Point and the Highlands, 1868 This picture, published shortly after the Civil War, gives a good idea of the dress and uniform of the period, as well as a typical battery. Note the lady's hoop skirt and the bearded officer to whom she is speaking. The gun is one of the old muzzle-loaders, and there is a mortar in the foreground.] Above the cliff and towards the north and east of the plain is Fort Clinton; on its east front stands a monument erected in 1828 by the Corps of Cadets to Kosciusko, while "Flirtation Walk," on the river side of the academy, leads to Kosciusko Garden, so named because it was much frequented by the Polish hero. On the parade ground is Victory Monument (78 ft. high), erected in 1874 as a Civil War memorial. The library--one of the finest military libraries in existence--contains interesting memorials by Saint Gaudens to J. McNeil Whistler and Edgar Allan Poe, both of whom were cadets at the academy and both of whom were virtually expelled.