America's Munitions 1917-1918

by Benedict Crowell; United States. War Department

BINDING DEPARTMENT OF THE PRINTING PLANT OF THE SOCIÉTÉ PUBLICATIONS PERIODIQUES.

The new pay books were manufactured at this plant and were turned out at the rate of 100,000 a day, using 36 tons of print paper, 16 tons of parchment cover, 15 tons of paper for envelopes, 6 tons of paste, 10,000 rolls of moleskin. Paris, France.

The road-building regiments in the zone of the armies built and maintained the roads immediately behind the front. Equipped with modern road-building machinery and motor trucks, these regiments maintained the roads in shape to handle the abnormally dense and heavy traffic incidental to operations at the front. The Army road troops were recruited from among men accustomed in civil life to road building, quarrying, and construction operations. They usually worked well within sound of the enemy guns, and frequently under their direct fire. During the advances made from the stabilized line of June, 1918, these regiments improved and perfected the hasty roads thrown across No Man's Land by the sapper regiments of the fighting divisions, so that transport of supplies and troops could be maintained to the advancing armies. To furnish materials for this construction many quarries were opened or taken over from the French road service. A total of 42,000 cubic meters of rock was quarried and prepared for use in quarries operated exclusively by American engineers, while in quarries jointly operated with French forces 75,000 cubic meters were produced.

MAP MAKING AND PRINTING.

A vitally important part of the work of Engineer troops was the making and reproduction of the many maps required for the conduct of tactical and strategic operations by the American Expeditionary Forces. A highly specialized regiment was organized to conduct the topographic surveying operations, map reproduction, and printing work in France. Many of the officers of this regiment had been formerly connected with the American Coast and Geodetic Survey and the Geological Survey, and they were well qualified for the work of war-map making. At Chateau Thierry a portion of this organization rapidly mapped to a large scale the new region in which the theater of operations suddenly found itself, thus supplementing the excellent small-scale map which was in existence for the whole of France, but which was not sufficiently precise for the conduct of our artillery fire. This work was done under pressure, but it contributed its share to the later American successes in that locality. These troops also were charged with furnishing to the Artillery the mathematical azimuths and coordinates, on the basis of which artillery indirect fire was executed.

The maps in use even on stabilized fronts were in a constant process of revision and change. The data and information on which these changes and revisions were based were constantly pouring in from the photographic branch of the air service, from the intelligence service, the Artillery, and from the sapper regiments at the front. Consequently new maps had to be prepared continually and furnished to all the organizations and officers concerned with their use. Then, too, an Army as large as ours required an impressive amount of field printing in order to distribute its orders and information.

As soon as our forces reached France it was apparent that the French map-production plant could not take care of our needs. The Chief of Engineers in the United States thereupon ordered the purchase of equipment for a base printing plant large enough to take care of all the map printing for an army of 1,000,000 men. The special machinery ordered in the United States for this plant did not arrive in France during 1917, and so the American Expeditionary Forces purchased abroad five large rotary lithographic presses, several type presses, and a number of linotype machines and other printing equipment.

The base printing plant was established at Langres, France. In the spring of 1918 the American equipment arrived, and thereafter the base printing plant was able to print not only the current maps required but also the base maps which the French had been supplying. In addition, during the heavy fighting in July and August, 1918, our printing plant supplied to the Seventh and Eighth French Armies the base maps of their fronts.