Winning a Cause: World War Stories

by John G. Thompson; Inez Bigwood

Camp Devens, Massachusetts; Camp Upton, New York; Camp Dix, New Jersey; Camp Meade, Maryland; Camp Lee, Virginia; Camp Jackson, South Carolina; Camp Gordon, Georgia; Camp Sherman, Ohio; Camp Taylor, Kentucky; Camp Custer, Michigan; Camp Grant, Illinois; Camp Pike, Arkansas; Camp Dodge, Iowa; Camp Funston, Kansas; Camp Travis, Texas; Camp Lewis, Washington.

These great cities were built in less than four months. If all the buildings of the sixteen cantonments were placed end to end, they would make a continuous structure reaching from Washington to Detroit. Each one of these camps housed between 35,000 and 47,000 men. The sixteen cantonments were capable of providing for a number equal to the combined population of Arizona and New Mexico. The hospitals of these camps were able to take care of as many sick and wounded as are to be found in all the hospitals west of the Mississippi in normal times. Each camp covered many square miles of land which had to be cleared of trees and brush before buildings and roads were completed.

[Illustration: This picture shows the standardized style of building used in every army cantonment in the United States. The tar-paper structures in the foreground were used for storehouses and general out-buildings. In the background are the well-built barracks. The company "streets" run between them. Camp Devens, Mass.]

To keep these cantonments clean and fit to live in, large numbers of sanitary engineers, medical officers, and scientific experts were kept busy planning and installing the most modern sanitation systems. To command this great army, the government built officers' camps where men best fitted were trained to be officers, and were then sent to the cantonments to help in changing the American citizen into a soldier. War was declared in April, and by the hot weather of summer America was sending troops by the tens of thousands to Europe. The wonderful way in which American shipbuilders had made it possible to transport these soldiers is told later. But before leaving the subject of raising an army, let us first see by means of figures just what the United States had accomplished in this work. In August, 1918, the overseas force alone was seven times as large as the entire United States army sixteen months before, at the declaration of war. In this time she had transported a million and a half troops overseas and had the same number on this side, with the numbers always increasing. In September, 1918, she had another draft and registration, calling men between the ages of 18 and 45. This gave thirteen million more men.

The colleges of the country had suffered a great deal because of the two draft laws, as practically all men of college age were liable to military service. To overcome this difficulty, the government established in the fall of 1918, the Student Army Training Corps. This plan allowed all students of military age, who were physically fit, to enlist in the army and receive military training, and at the same time obtain a college education. From these men the government planned to choose future officer material. Although the war came to a close before the plan could be fully carried out, it gave every promise of being a success.

It must be evident that perhaps even a greater problem than raising the army was how it was to be transported to Europe. At the beginning of the war, the United States had no ships to use for her necessary task of transporting men and supplies. The ships that were sailing from her ports were all doing their capacity work and could not be used for the new demands. The Shipping Board immediately looked around for yards to place orders for new ships; but there were no yards to fill the orders, as the few the United States had were all overburdened with work. The only remaining solution of the problem was to build new yards. America did it.

The United States went into the war with something like thirty steel and twenty-four wood shipyards, employing less than eighty thousand men. In a little over a year's time, there were one hundred and fifty-five yards turning out ships and employing over three hundred and eighty-six thousand men. These men turned out more tonnage every month than the United States had ever turned out in any entire year before the war. Of the new yards, the greatest was the famous Hog Island yard. On what was once a swamp on the Delaware River, just below Philadelphia, the United States built this yard which is the largest in the world. The demand for speed in building resulted in the plan of fabricating the steel before sending it to the yards. By this method the steel is cut and punched before going to the yard where it is then assembled. Thus steel mills at long distances from the shipyards could be doing a very considerable part of building the ships. Perhaps the great increase in shipping can be best stated by a few figures. In the month of January, 1918, America produced 88,507 tons. Six months later in July she produced 631,944 tons. Before the war the official estimate of America's annual shipping production was 200,000 tons. The estimated production for 1919 was 7,500,000 tons.

The United States navy at the time of the declaration of war was unprepared for the task ahead of it. It was efficient but not nearly large enough for the tremendous amount of work it was called upon to perform. The troop and supply transports needed convoys. There were hundreds of miles of coast to be patrolled. Merchant ships must be armed with men and guns. All this had to be done, besides the work of aiding the Allied fleets in European waters. The government was not long in seeing the need of a great increase in the naval force and was soon making plans to bring this about. New yards were constructed immediately for the building of warships, and the capacity of the old yards was increased. These yards were soon busy turning out destroyers and battleships at a remarkable speed. The special work of patrolling the coasts for submarines called for a great many small and speedy submarine chasers. Motor boat manufacturers all over the country immediately began to make these swift little craft which were popularly called the "mosquito fleet." Even the great factories of Henry Ford, although already busy turning out thousands of motor cars, found room to build these chasers at their inland factories. They were built on specially constructed flat cars, which were then drawn to the coast, where the ships were launched.