"The Honorable Alphonso Hart, congressman of the Twelfth District of Ohio, nominated Charles Young for a Cadet from the Twelfth District of Ohio on April 29, 1884. Young was officially accepted on May 17, 1884, appointed May 20, 1884, and instructed to report June 10, 1884. The official appointment certificate was presented to Young in 1885. The document stated that the President was pleased to appoint Charles Young a cadet of the Military Academy and that his rank was retroactive to June 15, 1884. The seal of the War Department was dated February 7, 1885, and the document was signed by Robert Lincoln, Secretary of War."

In May of 1929, The Washington Post published a lengthy article about some – then – unrevealed facts about the life of Charles Young at West Point. The author of the article, E.H. Lawson, wrote:

“Greatest discipline he (Young) received at the Academy was academic silence, the man without a country. He only spoke at times to professors at the Academy and often wrote songs and music. When some act had been performed by his fellow cadets calculated to gall him to the marrow, he wrote him a ballad in English or in French.”