Situation Desperate:

U.S. Army Engineer 

Disaster Relief Operations, 

Origins to 1950

Leland R. Johnson

Situation Desperate: U.S. Army Engineer Disaster Relief Operations, Origins to 1950  •  Leland R. Johnson

EP 870-1-70

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ISBN 978-0-16-086109-3
Situation Desperate

U.S. Army Engineer Disaster Relief Operations

Origins to 1950

•

Leland R. Johnson

Office of History

Headquarters, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

Alexandria, Va.

2011

EP 870-1-70
This is the Official U.S. Government edition of this publication and is herein 

identified to certify its authenticity. Use of ISBN 978-0-16-086109-3 is for 

U.S. Government Printing Office Official Editions only. The Superintendent 

of Documents of the U.S. Government Printing Office requests that any 

reprinted edition clearly be labeled as a copy of the authentic work with a 

new ISBN.

It is prohibited to use the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers seal, as it appears on the cover, on any republication of 

this material without the express, written permission of the Office of History, Headquarters, U.S. Army Corps 

of Engineers. Any person using official seals and logos in a manner inconsistent with the Federal Regulations 

Act is subject to penalty.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Johnson, Leland R.

 Situation desperate : U.S. Army engineer disaster relief operations, origins to 1950 / Leland R. Johnson.

 p. cm.

 Includes bibliographical references and index.

 ISBN 978-0-16-086109-3

1. United States. Army. Corps of Engineers—History. 2. United States. Army. Corps of Engineers—

Civil functions—History. 3. Disaster relief—United States—History. 4. Civil engineering—United States—

History. 5. Military engineering—United States History. I. Title. 

 UG23.J64 2010

 363.34'80973—dc22

 2010030957
Table of Contents ■ iii

Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . x

1. Federal Assistance: Constitutional Questions . . . . . 1

The French Refugee Bill , 1794 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Library of Congress List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Venezuela Earthquake , 1812 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Alexandria Fire , 1827 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Ships for Disaster Relief , 1847 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Chapter 1 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

2. Disaster Relief Origins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Portland Fire , 1866 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Federal Disaster Measures During Reconstruction . . . . . . . . 17

Humanitarian Services by Individuals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

First Official Engineer Disaster Mission , 1882 . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Levees and Work Relief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

The 1884 Flood on the Ohio and Mississippi . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

North Carolina Storm , 1884 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Charleston Earthquake , 1886 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Chapter 2 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Table of Contents

The New Madrid earthquakes of 1811–12 

created huge waves on the Mississippi River.

State Historical Society of Missouri

The Chicago fire of 1871 destroyed much of 

the city’s business district.

National Archives, 59-HB-1
iv Situation Desperate

3. The Corps Builds A Tradition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Johnstown Flood , 1889 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

The 1890 Mississippi River Flood Fight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Discretionary Disaster Authority , 1896 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Flood Fight Operations , 1897 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Executive Initiative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Shawneetown Emergency , 1898 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Brazos River & New Bern Floods , 1899 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Chapter 3 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

4. Disaster Mission Expansion, 1900–10 . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Galveston Hurricane, 1900 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Bridging the Kansas River , 1903 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Baltimore Fire , 1904 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

San Francisco Earthquake , 1906 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Recovery Work at San Francisco . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Operational Challenges , 1907 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Chapter 4 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81

5. The Flood Fights of 1912 and 1913 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Lower Mississippi River Flood , 1912 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Rescue and Relief in the 1912 Flood . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

Dayton Flood , 1913 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Mississippi River Flood , 1913 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

Chapter 5 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

The hurricane that hit Galveston in 1900 also 

destroyed Corps facilities and killed Corps 

employees.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-78468

The Johnstown flood of 1889 caused over 

2,200 fatalities. Office of History

The floods of 1913 inundated Riverside Park in 

Indianapolis. National Archives, 27-ND-8
Table of Contents ■ v

6. The Corps Initiates Work Relief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

Louisiana Hurricane , 1915 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

No Work, No Rations in February Floods , 1916 . . . . . . . . . 109

Work Relief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113

Southern States Floods , 1916 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116

Work Relief Administration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122

Special Regulation No. 67 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

Chapter 6 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130

7. Roaring Floods of the Twenties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

Arkansas River Flood at Pueblo , 1921 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

Mississippi River Flood , 1922 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

Five Minutes of Hell on Earth, Lorain Tornado . . . . . . . . . 143

Georgia Rivers Flood , 1925 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144

Mississippi River Flood , 1927 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147

The 1927 Flood Relief Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156

Chapter 7 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158

8. Emergency Service and Military Training . . . . . . 161

Vermont Flood , 1927 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Managua Earthquake , 1931 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164

Floods of 1936 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

Superflood on the Ohio , 1937 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171

Mississippi River Flood , 1937 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181

Chapter 8 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182

Torrential rains in 1916 caused damage to 

Asheville, North Carolina.

Schandler Family Collection, 

Special Collections, D.H. Ramsey Library, 

University of North Carolina at Asheville

National Guard engineers rushed to Lorain, 

Ohio, after a tornado hit in 1924.

Lorain Public Library System

In 1937 both the Ohio and Mississippi river 

valleys experienced massive flooding.

Office of History
vi Situation Desperate

9. Emergency Planning and Mobilization . . . . . . . . . 185

Los Angeles Flood , 1938 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185

New England Hurricane , 1938 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188

Engineer Readiness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191

Reorganization and Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195

The 1943 Floods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196

The 1945 Floods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205

Chapter 9 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206

10. Postwar Emergencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209

Texas City Disaster , 1947 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209

The Aiken Act . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213

Rutland Flood , 1947 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214

Missouri and Mississippi River Floods , 1947 . . . . . . . . . . . 215

Vanport Debacle , 1948 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217

Other 1948 Floods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221

Operation Snowbound, 1949 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

Chapter 10 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230

11. A National Policy on Disaster Relief . . . . . . . . . . . . 233

The Federal Works Agency and the Army . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233

Disasters of 1950 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236

Floods in the St. Paul District , 1950 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238

Federal Disaster Relief Act of 1950 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240

Observations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241

Chapter 11 Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242

The New England hurricane of 1938 drowned 

almost five hundred people.

NOAA Photo Library, C&GS Season’s Report 

Thomas 1938-84

In 1949 the Army responded to a massive 

blizzard that affected seven states.

U.S. Army photograph

An explosion in South Amboy, New Jersey, 

heavily damaged the town in 1950.

Historical archives of the Sadie Pope Dowdell 

Library of South Amboy, New Jersey
Table of Contents ■ vii

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245

Annotated Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265

Cover photos, clockwise from top right:

Galveston Hurricane, 1900. Library of Congress, 

LC-USZ62-120221

Baltimore Fire, 1904. Library of Congress, 

LC-F8-44295

Texas City Explosion, 1947. Office of History

Pueblo Flood, 1921. Denver Public Library, 

Western History Collection, 

Arthur Osbourne Ridgway, Z-5076

Foreword ■ ix

Foreword

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 

is best known for its water resource 

development and military construction 

missions, but its emergency response work is 

a vital endeavor that has grown in importance 

and visibility in the wake of the terrorist attacks 

of September 11, 2001, and Hurricane Katrina 

in 2005. It is an old mission. For more than 

two centuries, the Corps has employed highly 

trained and well-equipped engineers at offices 

strategically located throughout the nation to 

conduct civil works and build fortifications, 

and, on a case-by-case basis, Congress or the 

president would frequently tap these resources 

to provide rescue and relief during local emergencies. In 1882 Congress made it official and 

formally tasked the Corps of Engineers with a 

rapid emergency response mission. 

In the ensuing years, Army Engineers 

responded to hundreds of emergencies resulting from floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, 

earthquakes, volcanoes, and other natural and 

manmade disasters in America and abroad. 

Statutory authorities and Army regulations 

evolved, requiring the engineers to undertake 

emergency operations to save lives and property 

during disasters, and afterwards, by direction 

of Congress or the president, to assist state and 

local governments with urgent restoration and 

recovery efforts. 

This volume on the history of the Army 

Engineer disaster assistance mission traces the 

federal program from its tentative beginnings 

in the nineteenth century to the enactment of a 

permanent federal policy on disaster assistance 

in 1950. It explains how the Engineers came to 

acquire that mission during the great Mississippi 

River flood of 1882, describes the development of the Corps’ statutory authorities and 

the Army’s regulations for emergency operations, and tells the stories of Corps and Army 

Engineer operations during various calamities. 

For nearly 130 years now, Army Engineers have 

performed the often perilous task of emergency 

response with intelligence, determination, 

and courage. 

R. L. Van Antwerp

Lieutenant General, U.S. Army

•

Chief of Engineers
x Situation Desperate

S

ituation Desperate has followed a 

long and circuitous path to publication. Leland Johnson wrote the first 

draft in 1976 on contract with the Office of 

History, Headquarters, U.S. Army Corps of 

Engineers. The project originally fell under 

the management of former chief of the office, 

Jesse Remington, and staff historian Albert 

Cowdrey. Later iterations were influenced by 

Remington’s successors, John Greenwood and 

Paul Walker, and a long line of staff historians, 

including Martin Gordon, Frank Schubert, 

Fred Beck, Dale Floyd, Charles Walker, Martin 

Reuss, and Charles Hendricks. As a staff 

historian, I picked up the project in 2002, saw 

its importance in the wake of the recent terrorist attacks, and recommended the manuscript 

for publication.

With interest renewed in the project, Johnson 

initiated a series of limited revisions to the text, 

and this office scanned the typescript pages to 

create an editable and machine-readable file. 

In 2008 the office set up a team comprised of 

staff historians Matt Pearcy and Eric Reinert 

and editor Doug Wilson to shepherd the project 

to completion. Mr. Wilson carefully incorporated previous edits to the manuscript made by 

Mickey Loughlin and former office editor Jean 

Allen and made additional edits. Next came the 

important task of selecting images. Mr. Wilson 

took the lead in identifying photos from those 

that Dr. Johnson had collected during his 

research, from the Office of History’s research 

collections, and from the Library of Congress, 

the National Archives, and dozens of image 

repositories around the country. He uncovered 

a good number of images spanning more than 

a century of disasters, and we began preparing 

for a heavily illustrated publication. Over time 

the office’s historians and editor continued to 

develop the text, which took on an encyclopedic 

organization that reflects the unique nature 

of each emergency and subsequent response. 

The final product lends itself both to readers 

who wish to read start-to-finish and to those 

who will find value in the manuscript as a 

reference tool. 

We were fortunate to obtain the services of 

EEI Communications in Alexandria, Virginia, 

to handle layout and design. Thankfully, Jayne 

Sutton, who worked closely with this office to 

produce the prize-winning publication, Capital 

Engineers (2008), and others, was EEI’s project 

manager for this effort as well. 

Preface
Preface ■ xi

The final publication highlights the Army 

Engineers’ long history of emergency operations through 1950. It sheds valuable light on 

the evolution of that mission narrated against 

the general background of developing federal 

disaster assistance policies and precedents dating 

back to the early nineteenth century. It also 

describes the seven major phases through which 

federal disaster assistance passed before the statutory establishment in 1950 of modern policies. 

Years of hard work by many have led to this 

attractive and useful publication that contributes 

to our understanding of the important mission, 

role, and activities of the U.S. Army Corps of 

Engineers during disasters and emergencies.

Dr. John C. Lonnquest

Chief, Office of History

Headquarters, U.S. Army 

•

Corps of Engineers
Above: The Corps of Engineers responded to the 

terrorist attacks of September 11 at the Pentagon 

and in New York.

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

Below: The Corps and the Army 

helped Florida recover after 

Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

Left: The drift collection vessel Hayward recovered 

wreckage from American Airlines Flight 587 from 

Jamaica Bay, New York, in November 2001.

New York District (Brian Aballo)
Federal Assistance ■ 1

Federal Assistance : 

Constitutional Questions

How did the United States Army 

Corps of Engineers acquire a disaster 

assistance mission? Answering this 

question requires an investigation into how the 

Army became involved in disaster recovery; that 

is, when and how did the Army first receive 

statutory authority to engage in disaster relief? 

An even more fundamental issue arises: When 

and how did Congress determine that providing 

assistance to disaster victims was a legitimate 

exercise of federal power?

The Army Engineers first received congressional authority to participate in disaster relief 

efforts in 1882. The Army, specifically its 

Quartermaster Corps, first received disaster 

assistance authority at the end of the American 

Civil War. At nearly the same time, Congress 

first approved federal disaster assistance to help 

the recently freed men of the South, regarded 

then as wards of the federal government.

Yet, before then, as early as 1811, Congress had 

enacted various laws that have been cited as 

precedents for national policy on disaster assistance. In 1950 the Library of Congress compiled 

a useful list of these prewar precedents and 

published it in the Congressional Record. Before 

exploring the post–Civil War role of the Army 

and its Corps of Engineers in disaster relief, 

review of prewar precedents and the accompanying congressional debates over the constitutional 

questions they raised is instructive and indicates 

that disaster relief was a highly controversial 

issue during early American history. National 

leaders then questioned whether granting federal assistance to disaster victims was permitted under the Constitution, and perhaps the 

majority of Congress then questioned whether 

the federal government should engage in any 

disaster relief whatsoever. Others contended a 

humanitarian obligation, higher even than the 

Constitution, demanded granting aid to disaster 

victims and that the constitutional authority of Congress to “provide for the ... general 

welfare” encompassed such disaster assistance. 

These constitutional questions first arose in 

Congress in debates between a president of the 

Continental Congress and the “Father of the 

Constitution.”

James Madison, a Virginia congressman subsequently elected president and remembered as 

the “Father of the Constitution,” thought the 

proposed federal assistance legislation before the 

House of Representatives in 1794, if enacted, 

would set a dangerous precedent. He feared 

it might be “perverted to the countenance of 

purposes very different from those of charity.” 

Nothing in the Constitution, he argued, granted 

Congress the right to expend public revenues for 

charitable relief. He warned the House that once 

rules laid down in the Constitution were broken 

it would become impossible to predict “to what 

extremities this practice might be carried.”1

Congressman Elias Boudinot of New Jersey, a 

former president of the Continental Congress, 

arose in the House to oppose Madison’s interpretation of the Constitution. “To refuse the 

assistance requested,” said Boudinot, “would be 

to act in direct opposition both to the theory 

and practice of the Constitution.” Congress, 

he pointed out, had extended relief to destitute 

1
2 Situation Desperate

Indian tribes and had provided subsistence 

for prisoners-of-war—just where were these 

practices authorized by the Constitution? He 

proclaimed that charitable relief rested on the 

law of nature, the law of nations, and moral 

obligations higher than the Constitution itself. 

As to legal theory, Boudinot suggested members 

of Congress should closely examine the first 

clause of the eighth section of the Constitution. 

“By that clause,” he declared, “the Congress is 

warranted to provide for exigencies regarding 

the general welfare.”2

Thus, as early as February 1794 were drawn 

the battle lines for constitutional debates over 

the legality of federal assistance in the wake 

of disasters; and the debates would continue 

in Congress and out for more than a century. 

Madison and Boudinot stated clearly the lines 

of argument, defined as strict versus broad construction, or interpretation, of the Constitution.

Strict constructionists argued the federal government had no constitutional authority to 

expend public funds for charitable purposes or 

disaster relief. Broad constructionists contended 

that these benevolent activities were authorized under the “general welfare” clause of the 

Constitution. Strict constructionists declared 

disaster assistance to be solely the responsibility of private charities and state governments. 

Broad constructionists asserted that the federal 

government should share in this responsibility. 

Debates over these differing interpretations of 

the foundation document of the United States 

marked the proceedings of Congress each time 

a major disaster afflicted the nation during the 

nineteenth century. Strict constructionists had 

the upper hand in the debates until after the 

Civil War, when special circumstances opened a 

door for the broad constructionists.

The ongoing constitutional debates in effect prevented federal agencies from participating officially in disaster relief activities, no matter how 

serious the disaster or enormous the needs. In 

the case of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 

individual officers of the Corps occasionally 

assisted in local disaster relief activities as volunteer humanitarian gestures, but the Corps itself 

had no official role in disaster assistance until 

1882. With their limited numbers fully occupied 

with transportation and military engineering 

projects across the nation, the Army Engineers 

before the Civil War lacked both the substantial 

resources and the legal authority necessary to 

undertake disaster assistance missions. To understand the origins of Army Engineer involvement 

in disaster assistance, it is worthwhile to explore 

the earliest federal activities in that regard and 

the limitations imposed upon those activities 

by constitutional questions and thereby find 

principles guiding federal efforts to respond to 

emergencies and Army Engineer participation in 

those efforts into the twenty-first century.

•

The French Refugee Bill , 1794

The James Madison and Elias Boudinot debate 

of 1794 concerned the first bill proposed in 

Congress that touched on the issue of federal 

funding for humanitarian purposes. Thousands 

of Frenchmen had fled to the United States 

during the summer of 1793 to escape the 

Haitian revolution, where slaves had risen 

against French slaveholders. Penniless and 

without skills, many French aristocrats became 

public wards, supported by aid from charities and state and local governments. On New 

Year’s Day of 1794, a committee from the state 
Federal Assistance ■ The French Refugee Bill 3

of Maryland advised Congress that its state 

funds supporting indigent French immigrants 

had been exhausted and it petitioned for federal 

aid. An investigating committee of the House 

of Representatives reported as many as three 

thousand Frenchmen were indeed suffering in 

America and it recommended that Congress 

take appropriate action.3

When Madison and Boudinot stated their 

positions on the constitutionality of aid to the 

French refugees, Congressman John Nicholas of 

Virginia agreed with James Madison in opposing any federal aid for the refugees, asserting 

that for the Congress “to bestow the money of 

their constituents on an act of charity, though 

it would be extremely laudable, was yet beyond 

their authority.” Samuel Smith of Maryland disagreed, pointing out the great debt of gratitude 

that the United States owed to France and its 

people for their assistance during the American 

Revolution. James Madison noted that the 

United States also owed a large war debt to 

France for loans made during the Revolution, 

and a payment on that debt would soon fall due. 

Shrewdly, he suggested Congress might sidestep 

constitutional issues by furnishing the necessary 

subsistence to the French refugees and deducting costs of the subsidy from the next installment due on the war debt.4

Artwork by Jacques François Joseph Swebach-Desfontaines depicts citizens 

fleeing the city as Cap-Français (now Cap-Haïtien) burned in 1793.

Bibliothèque Nationale de France
4 Situation Desperate

This arrangement neatly avoided constitutional 

issues and Congress accepted Madison’s solution. On 12 February 1794 it appropriated 

$15,000 to be expended under the direction of 

President George Washington for relief of needy 

French immigrants and ordered that the sum be 

“charged to the debt of the French Republic.” 

The president then distributed relief funding to 

1,950 penniless refugees in ten states.5

Thus was established a precedent and a pattern 

that Congress would follow during subsequent 

decades until 1865. When a major disaster 

came to the attention of Congress and some of 

its members suggested the federal government 

should provide disaster relief, other members 

commonly argued that constitutional limitations 

did not permit federal participation in disaster 

recovery activities. Compromise prevailed by 

furnishing the desired federal assistance only 

under a federal power clearly authorized by the 

Constitution.

•

Library of Congress List

When Congress studied the advisability of 

creating an official federal policy on disaster 

relief in 1950, it asked the Library of Congress 

to conduct a thorough search of federal legislation enacted since the Republic’s formation 

to identify laws that might conceivably be 

construed as precedents for disaster relief legislation. Although Library of Congress researchers 

ignored the aid extended to French refugees 

in 1794, perhaps because the distress in that 

instance did not result from a natural disaster, 

they produced a long list of laws that might be 

interpreted as precedents for federal intervention 

in disaster recovery efforts.6

Prominent on the library’s list were eight laws, 

all enacted prior to the Civil War, whose roles 

as precedents for federal disaster assistance were 

rather questionable. Three of the eight merely 

delayed the collection of federal customs taxes at 

American port cities damaged by fires—an act 

of 1803 allowed an additional year for merchants 

who suffered losses in a major fire at Portland, 

Maine, to pay their customs taxes without penalty; an act of 1804 granted a similar privilege to 

victims of a conflagration at Norfolk, Virginia; 

and an act of 1836 allowed a similar extension to 

people who lost property in the memorable New 

York City fire of 1835.7

Congress debated none of these three acts 

because delaying tax collections clearly fell 

within federal authority to regulate taxation. 

None of the acts contributed funds directly to 

disaster relief and recovery, nor did they materially differ from scores of private bills enacted 

in each session of Congress to grant certain 

exemptions from the tax laws. Federal power to 

engage in disaster relief activities was never at 

issue in these cases.

The library’s list of possible precedents also 

included a special act of 17 February 1815 

permitting citizens who had lost their lands 

to the New Madrid, Missouri, earthquake of 

1811 (still the greatest earthquake of record on 

the North American continent) to take up an 

“to bestow the money of their constituents 

on an act of charity, though it would 

be extremely laudable, was yet beyond 

their authority.”
Federal Assistance ■ Library of Congress List 5

Inhabitants were forced to flee their homes during the New Madrid earthquake of 1811. State Historical Society of Missouri

TEE GREAT EARTHQUAKE AT NEW MADRID 
6 Situation Desperate

equal amount of acreage from the public lands 

without cost. Congress here, however, exercised 

its unquestioned authority to dispose of public 

lands, and it did not debate the bill as a disaster 

relief measure. If the bill had been presented as 

such, President James Madison probably would 

have vetoed it, his opposition to federal disaster 

assistance having been well known since 1794.8

•

Venezuela Earthquake , 1812

The first federal legislation that, taken at face 

value, may have constituted direct federal 

disaster relief was an act of May 1812 that 

appropriated $50,000 to purchase provisions 

for earthquake victims in Venezuela. Yet, other 

considerations lay behind the enactment of this 

charitable measure.

A tremor shook Caracas on the afternoon of 26 

March 1812, leveling the city and surrounding towns and killing some twenty thousand 

people. News of the catastrophe dispatched from 

the American consul in Venezuela arrived in 

the United States in late April, and on 8 May 

The Convent of the Carmelites in Caracas suffered severe damage during the 

1812 quake and had not been repaired by the time engraver Richardson Cox 

captured the scene in the 1850s.

Courtesy of the National Information Service for Earthquake Engineering, 

EERC, University of California, Berkeley
Federal Assistance ■ Venezuela Earthquake 7

Congress authorized President James Madison 

to export $50,000 worth of provisions to sustain 

the Venezuelans. Madison, who in 1794 had 

declared federal disaster assistance unconstitutional, approved the aid extended to Venezuela 

without comment even though $50,000 was 

a sizeable expenditure in a year when federal 

revenues totaled $22.6 million. Indeed, the 

emergency supplies sent to Caracas proved to be 

the only federal aid given to any foreign disaster 

victims prior to the Messina, Italy, earthquake 

of 1909.9

Although Congressman John C. Calhoun of 

South Carolina supported the 1812 appropriation for disaster relief of Venezuela, he later 

commented that he opposed federal involvement in disaster relief activities generally. He 

distinguished between foreign aid and domestic 

relief. The assistance furnished Venezuela, he 

contended, was authorized under federal powers 

to make treaties and to conduct foreign relations, while domestic disaster assistance clearly 

was unconstitutional.10

Official records praised this $50,000 gift 

simply as humanitarian assistance, but circumstantial evidence indicates other motives. 

Humanitarianism doubtless had a role in the 

measure, but the aid sent to Venezuelans also 

involved foreign policy considerations. Led 

by Simón Bolivar and Francisco de Miranda, 

revolutionaries in 1811 had formed a republic, making Venezuela one of the first Latin 

American nations to declare its independence 

from Spain. Both Bolivar and Miranda had 

visited the United States prior to 1811 in search 

of American support, and Miranda, with 

covert American assistance, had undertaken an 

abortive attempt to seize control of Venezuela 

in 1806.11

The Madison administration, with James 

Monroe as secretary of state, was favorably disposed toward the new republic, and Americans 

generally viewed the Venezuela revolution as a 

gratifying emulation of the American Revolution. The Madison administration wished to 

support the Bolivar and Miranda government 

but preferred not to recognize its independence 

officially because of the baleful effects doing so 

might have on American relations with Spain at 

a time when the United States was preparing for 

war with Great Britain.12

The 1812 earthquake had shaken the Bolivar–

Miranda government as well as the Venezuelan 

countryside. Collapsing barracks killed or 

injured many of the revolutionary troops, and 

the quake left the majority of Venezuelans 

homeless. The American consul reported that 

Spanish royalist priests were depicting the 

earthquake as the “chastisement of Heaven,” 

and after the quake the royalist forces counterattacked. These circumstances strongly suggest 

the provisions sent to Venezuela in 1812 were 

intended to resupply the revolutionary army and 

to help restore public confidence in the Bolivar–

Miranda administration.13

Secretary of State James Monroe sent five shiploads of provisions to Venezuela in the charge of 

a new American consul with instructions that 

specified: “You will not fail to intimate, in suitable terms, that this interposition for the relief 

of the distressed people of Venezuela is a strong 

proof of the friendship and interest which the 

United States takes in their welfare.”14 The new 

consul and the provisions reached Venezuela 

in June 1812, and the consul reported the gift 

was received with gratitude and made a lasting 

impression on the people, many of whom would 

have starved without it. A historian of American 
8 Situation Desperate

diplomatic relations, however, later commented 

that the subsidy arrived too late to have the 

desired political impact. Before the end of 1812 

the royalist forces had driven the republican 

government from power.15

The James Madison administration and 

Congress apparently viewed the aid to Venezuela 

as an instrument of foreign policy—as a means 

of supporting the Bolivar–Miranda government 

without embarrassing American relations with 

Spain. Again, if the congressional act had been 

presented as a disaster assistance program, no 

doubt President Madison would have vetoed it. 

This early charitable effort therefore cannot be 

regarded as a clear precedent for later federal 

policies on disaster assistance.

•

Alexandria Fire , 1827

Fifteen years elapsed before Congress took up 

another issue pertaining to disaster assistance. 

Many members of Congress witnessed the 

January 1827 conflagration in Alexandria, now 

located in Virginia but then part of the District 

of Columbia. Disturbed by the disaster, Senator 

William Henry Harrison of Indiana and 

Congressman Charles Miner of Pennsylvania 

soon introduced resolutions for a $20,000 appropriation to succor the seventy families made 

homeless by the fire and now suffering severely 

from the cold. A major debate ensued in the 

House over the power of government to offer 

assistance to the victims, and this debate reflects 

the congressional attitudes of the time.16

Congressman Tristam Burges of Rhode Island 

insisted the appropriation for Alexandria should 

clearly state that it was limited specifically to 

the people of the District of Columbia “so that 

sufferers might not be coming to this House for 

relief whenever any calamity happened in any 

part of the country.” He declared if this were 

not made plain in the bill’s wording, he would 

oppose it.17 Frank Johnson of Kentucky rose 

to declare he would vigorously oppose the bill, 

even if its benefits were restricted entirely to 

the District of Columbia, because it clearly was 

unconstitutional.18

“When was it ever contended before,” retorted 

William Brent of Louisiana, “that Congress 

had not the power embraced in this bill? Sir, 

the Government has often gone far beyond the 

principles of this bill.” As precedents, he mentioned the land grant for victims of the 1811 

New Madrid earthquake and the $50,000 gift to 

Venezuela in 1812.19 Brent found support from 

Thomas Newton of Virginia, who had voted in 

1812 to send aid to Venezuela. Newton took the 

floor of the House and read aloud a copy of the 

1812 act for aid to Venezuela.20

Andrew Stevenson of Virginia responded that 

the act of 1812 was not a precedent: it had been 

enacted under the foreign relations powers of 

the federal government. Aiding the people of 

Alexandria, Stevenson argued, would entail 

“Sir, the Government has often gone 

far beyond the principles of this bill.”

...the gift was received with gratitude

 and made a lasting impression on 

the people.
Federal Assistance ■ Alexandria Fire 9

“the exercise of a dangerous and unconstitutional power.” If Congress could give aid to 

the Alexandrians, he asked, “why may we not 

undertake to compensate the inhabitants of 

Florida, and Michigan, and Arkansas, for the 

ravages of the Indians?” Although Stevenson 

recognized the intention of the aid proposed 

for Alexandria as benevolent, he warned, “The 

liberties of no country were ever overthrown, 

that it was not placed to the account of some 

supposed good.”21

William Archer of Virginia contended that state 

versus federal powers under the Constitution 

were not at issue in Alexandria’s case: because 

the District of Columbia had no state government, the federal government had to act to 

alleviate the crisis. He reasoned that to deny the 

power to distribute public funds to the District 

also denied the power to tax the District and 

take funds from its people. James Hamilton 

of South Carolina agreed: disaster relief for 

Alexandria was merely a municipal function 

exercised by Congress.22

Silas Wood of New York and William Drayton 

of South Carolina called for broader views 

of the subject. The justification for aiding 

Alexandria rested not only on Congress’s 

special relationship with the District but also 

on its constitutional authority to provide for 

the nation’s general welfare.23 Drayton maintained the Constitution’s general welfare clause 

allowed Congress to assist any part of the 

United States and any foreign country it wished 

whenever a great calamity rendered citizens 

helpless and a burden on their communities. 

Drayton declared:

But by ministering to their wants—by supplying them with food, clothes, implements 

of trade, of husbandry, and habitations, they 

would be enabled to provide the means of 

their subsistence, and would gradually, by 

their labor and exertions, contribute toward 

the wealth and defence [sic] of the nation. 

Would not money thus expended be for 

the general welfare? Before this could be 

denied, it must be denied that the prosperity of individuals conduces to the general 

welfare of the body politic, of which they are 

members.24

After full debate, the House enacted the 

$20,000 appropriation for the relief of 

Alexandria’s fire victims by a vote of 109 to 

67. Emphasizing the special relationship of 

Congress with the District of Columbia in its 

discussions, the Senate, by a vote of 27 to 17, 

also passed the bill, and President John Adams 

signed it into law.25

Despite Congressman Drayton’s eloquent appeal 

for a broad interpretation of the Constitution’s 

general welfare clause to include disaster assistance, it appears Congress would never have 

aided the Alexandria fire victims had not the 

town lay within the District of Columbia. The 

consensus of Congress then was that disaster 

relief was a state government or charitable institution responsibility, not a federal function. The 

proponents of states’ rights, insisting on strict 

interpretation of the Constitution, maintained 

that the federal government lacked legal authority to dispense funds for disaster assistance, even 

in the District of Columbia.

“The liberties of no country were ever 

overthrown, that it was not placed to the 

account of some supposed good.”
10 Situation Desperate

The Library of Congress list of disaster relief 

precedents strangely included an act of February 

1836 authorizing the Army Quartermaster 

Corps to distribute emergency rations to settlers driven from their Florida homes by the 

Seminole tribe. Although war could qualify as 

a disaster, provisioning persons displaced by 

war has not generally been considered a disaster 

relief measure. Certainly Congress did not 

debate the 1836 act as a federal effort to assist 

disaster victims.26

Supplying war refugees who sought safety at 

military camps and fortifications was common but on such a small scale that congressional approval was not sought, nor even 

thought necessary. At times, however, the 

Army—often through its primary supply 

arm, the Quartermaster Department or 

Corps—also extended aid to civilians afflicted 

by calamities. For example, in 1838, following 

a citywide fire, the Quartermasters, without 

congressional authority, assisted the residents 

of Charleston, South Carolina, by giving them 

temporary quarters in Army barracks and harbor fortifications.27

•

Ships for Disaster Relief , 1847

The last pre–Civil War precedent for federal 

disaster assistance came in 1847 when Congress 

approved the loan of two American ships to 

transport privately-contributed food to faminestricken Ireland. As many as a million people 

starved in Ireland during the 1840s when a 

blight destroyed the potato crop, and another 

million fled to the United States. American 

charities funded the purchase of emergency 

food supplies but needed a means of transporting the food overseas to the Emerald Isle.28

Congress approved the loan of U.S. Navy ships 

to deliver food to Ireland following a public 

conflict between the Whig and Democratic 

parties over the constitutionality of the measure. The debate began when Whig Senator 

John Crittenden of Kentucky proposed that the 

federal government purchase $500,000 worth 

of food and send it to Ireland, copying in his 

bill the exact wording of the act that had sent 

provisions to Venezuela in 1812. Whig leaders evidently hoped thereby to obtain the Irish 

vote and embarrass James K. Polk’s Democratic 

administration, which opposed federal disaster 

assistance.29

During the Senate debate, Senator John Niles, 

Democrat of Connecticut, pointed out that 

the federal government had never relieved the 

distresses of Americans, and he declared the 

Crittenden proposal a “dangerous exercise of 

power.” Democratic Senator Arthur Bagby 

of Alabama agreed with Niles, denying that 

Congress had any constitutional authority to 

engage in disaster relief at home or abroad.30

Senator John C. Calhoun of South Carolina 

mentioned that he had voted in 1812 to send 

aid to Venezuela and that he would vote for the 

Irish aid also but solely because both fell under 

federal powers to conduct foreign relations.31

The Crittenden bill appropriating $500,000 for 

Irish relief passed the Senate, with voting along 

party lines, but died in the House Committee 

on Ways and Means. A committee member later 

declared the committee had killed the bill to save 

President Polk the embarrassment of vetoing it. 

Polk had warned he would veto the bill on constitutional grounds if it passed, but he expressed 
Federal Assistance ■ Observations 11

his personal sympathy with the Irish plight by 

contributing $50 to private Irish aid funds.32

As a substitute for the direct relief proposed by 

Senator Crittenden, Congress approved an act 

loaning two U.S. Navy ships—the Macedonian 

and the Jamestown—to private charities to carry 

their contributions overseas. The act required 

that the charities purchase new sails and rigging 

for the ships and also pay their crews, holding 

the government free of operational costs. In the 

end, the ships sailed to Ireland and delivered the 

vital foodstuffs.33

The 1847 loan of Navy warships set a precedent emulated later in the century. In 1871 

Congress sent the U.S. Navy ship Worcester to 

France to deliver privately contributed supplies 

to starving victims of the Franco–Prussian War. 

Another special act of 1880 resembling the 

1847 Irish relief act allowed the antique warship 

Constellation to deliver food to Ireland. Still, in 

1892 a bill to deliver food aboard the same warship to suffering Russian peasants met defeat 

at the hands of such Democrats as William 

Jennings Bryan, who still maintained that federal disaster assistance in any form whatsoever 

was unconstitutional.34

•

Observations

The Library of Congress list of disaster relief 

legislation also cited three other laws enacted 

In a drawing by Fitz H. Lane, the Jamestown is leaving Boston in March 1847 

bound for Cork, Ireland, on an errand of mercy.

Drawing by Fitz H. Lane; Lane & Scotts, Lithographers.
12 Situation Desperate

during the American Civil War and immediately after as precedents for federal disaster assistance. In two acts in 1864 and 1866, Congress 

granted a total of $4,500 to victims of an explosion in the Washington Arsenal, where the 

accidental detonation of seventy-five thousand 

carbine cartridges killed twenty workers and 

wounded scores. These acts perhaps better qualify under the category of employee death and 

disability benefits than disaster relief. A third 

act approved payment of $200,000 to victims 

of Sioux Indian raids in Minnesota. This 1863 

appropriation came from the annuities normally 

paid to the tribes, and the law properly belongs 

in a category other than disaster relief.35

The legislation mentioned in this chapter was 

cited frequently in subsequent congressional 

debates as early precedents for federal disaster 

assistance, but none of the acts precisely qualified. Instead, the various laws rested upon some 

unquestioned federal power such as the power 

to regulate taxation, govern the District of 

Columbia, or conduct foreign relations. The 

prevailing opinion of Congress prior to 1866 

held that federal assistance to victims of natural 

disasters was probably unconstitutional and 

certainly undesirable and that disaster relief 

was a responsibility of private charities or 

state and local governments. Still, principles 

upon which federal policies eventually rested 

were first broached early in the nation’s history. Congressman Elias Boudinot in his 1794 

debate with James Madison concisely stated 

the case for federal disaster assistance, arguing the Constitution’s general welfare clause 

and, indeed, higher moral laws justified federal 

contributions to disaster relief and recovery. In 

1827 Congressman William Drayton extended 

this argument, declaring the criterion for federal 

assistance should be the magnitude of the disaster: whenever a calamity was so great that private, state, or local resources proved inadequate, 

then the federal government should intervene 

to restore disaster victims as contributors to the 

national community. These principles laid the 

foundation of subsequent federal policies on 

disaster assistance.

When did the Army Engineers, the Army, and 

the Congress initiate federal disaster assistance? 

Review of the evidence indicates it was not 

before the American Civil War. Constitutional 

questions—exacerbated by the political and 

sectional divisions that also counted as causes 

of that war—prevented the development of a 

federal policy on disaster assistance. In early 

American history, Congress sometimes authorized humanitarian aid for disaster victims but 

only on grounds of some unquestioned federal 

power. In those years, if an Army or engineer 

officer supplied food or temporary housing to 

disaster victims it was done without congressional authority or funding. As it did to many 

aspects of American society and public policy, 

the American Civil War changed the federal 

approach to disaster relief.

•

...whenever a calamity was so great that 

private, state, or local resources proved 

inadequate, then the federal government 

should intervene.
Federal Assistance ■ Notes 13

Chapter 1 Notes

1. Annals of Congress, 3d Cong., 1st sess., 1794, 

170–73.

2. Ibid.

3. Merle E. Curti, American Philanthropy Abroad: A 

History (Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 

1963), 9–10.

4. Annals of Congress, 3d Cong., 1st sess., 1794, 

170–73.

5. Curti, American Philanthropy Abroad, 9–10; Annals 

of Congress, 3d Cong., 1st sess., 1417–28, prints the 

act.

6. Congressional Record, 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950, 

11900–902, prints the Library of Congress’s list of 

disaster assistance legislation. Office of Emergency 

Preparedness, Federal Disaster Assistance Program 

Handbook, OEP Circular 4000.78, March 1971, 

p. v, asserted: “As early as 1803, however, the 

Federal Government rendered assistance in special 

cases.” Other publications also identify 1803 as the 

date of the earliest federal disaster assistance, 

obtaining their information from the Library of 

Congress list.

7. Congressional Record, 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950, 

11900–902.

8. Annals of Congress, 7th Cong., 2d sess., 1803, 375, 

380, 401, 465, 515; Annals of Congress, 8th Cong., 

1st sess., 1804, 278, 1093; Congressional Debates, 

24th Cong., 1st sess., 1836, 14, 46–48, 103, 114–

29, 391–92, 1092, 1875, 1991–94, 2239–40, 2703–

17, 3117–20; Annals of Congress, 14th Cong., 2d 

sess., 1815, 1153.

9. Niles Weekly Register, 25 Apr. 1812, 131–32; Curti, 

American Philanthropy Abroad, 10–13; Annals of 

Congress, 12th Cong., 1st sess., 1812, 226–28, 

1366, 1378, 2294.

10. Congressional Globe, 29th Cong., 2d sess., 1847, 

534–35.

11. Charles C. Griffin, The United States and the 

Disruption of the Spanish Empire, 1810–1822 (New 

York: Columbia University Press, 1939), 50, 55, 66; 

Julius Goebel, Jr., The Recognition Policy of the 

United States (New York: Columbia University 

Press, 1915), 116–19.

12. Goebel, Recognition Policy, 116–19.

13. William R. Manning, ed., Diplomatic 

Correspondence of the United States Concerning the 

Independence of the Latin-American Nations 1 (New 

York: Oxford University Press, 1925), 14–16; 

Robert Lowry to Secretary of State, 5 June 1812, 

National Archives and Records Administration 

[hereafter NARA], Record Group [RG] 59, 

Dispatches from U.S. Consuls in La Guaira, 

Venezuela, 1810–1906, Roll 1, Microfilm 84.

14. Manning, Diplomatic Correspondence, 1:14–16.

15. Alexander Scott to Secretary of State, 16 Nov. 

1812, NARA, RG 59, Roll 1, Microfilm 84; Niles 

Weekly Register, 6 June 1812, 240; House 

Committee on Foreign Affairs, Alexander Scott, 

20th Cong., 2d sess., 1829, H. Rept. 72, passim; 

Griffin, The United States and the Disruption of the 

Spanish Empire, 66.

16. Congressional Debates, 19th Cong., 2d sess., 1827, 

68–71, 76, 747, 752–73.

17. Ibid., 752–53.

18. Ibid., 754.

19. Ibid., 755.

20. Ibid.

21. Ibid., 756–58.

22. Ibid., 760–65.

23. Ibid., 766, 770–73.

24. Ibid., 772.

25. Ibid., 68–71, 773, and p. i of Acts.

26. Congressional Record, 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950, 

11900.

27. Erna Risch, Quartermaster Support of the Army: A 

History of the Corps, 1775–1939 (Washington, D.C.: 

Quartermaster General Office, 1962), 728–29.

28. Congressional Record, 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950, 

11900; Curti, American Philanthropy Abroad, 

43–64.

29. Curti, American Philanthropy Abroad, 43–64.

30. Congressional Globe, 29th Cong., 2d sess., 1847, 

512–14.

31. Ibid., 534–35.

32. Curti, American Philanthropy Abroad, 43–64.

33. Ibid.; Congressional Globe, 29th Cong., 2d sess., 

1847, 557, 572, and Appendix, 440–41.

34. Curti, American Philanthropy Abroad, 77–78, 

94–96, 102–07.

35. Congressional Record, 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950, 

11900; Congressional Globe, 37th Cong., 3d sess., 

1863, 179–81, 192, 556, 763, 915, 947, 1054; U.S. 

Army, Chief of Ordnance, Reports 3 (1860 to 1889) 

(Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 

1890): 595–96 [hereafter GPO]. 
Scenes from the 1884 Ohio River flood were 

published in Harper’s Weekly.

Above right: Harper’s Weekly from 

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-128028

RELIEF BOAT 

NEWPORT 

1<1. m.~ .... n'IUJH, M'I011 ,., .... 
Disaster Relief Origins ■ Portland Fire 15

Disaster Relief Origins

I

n the last year of the American Civil War, 

Congress took extraordinary steps to facilitate the transition from slavery to freedom 

in the erstwhile Confederacy. These efforts saw 

the federal government abandon a strict laissezfaire approach and assume full responsibility for 

the welfare of former slaves as they adjusted to 

their new status. When a great Mississippi River 

flood in 1866 destroyed crops and left thousands 

destitute, Congress issued tons of rations to 

flood victims, most of whom were poor former 

slaves. This incident established a precedent that 

would later open the door to a wider application of this principle—that the federal government had a responsibility to relieve suffering 

in the wake of great disasters. Originally, that 

responsibility fell to the Freedmen’s Bureau and 

the Army Quartermasters, but another great 

Mississippi River flood in 1882 saw Congress 

turn to the Army Corps of Engineers.

•

Portland Fire, 1866

“Now, sir, where is this to stop? What is to be 

the line?” asked Senator Lyman Trumbull of 

Illinois during an 1866 debate over federal disaster relief. “We have already, at the present session of Congress, and since this dreadful fire in 

Portland, passed one or two resolutions for the 

benefit of the sufferers. We have passed one resolution authorizing the furnishing of tents and 

other accommodations from the quartermaster’s 

department. We have passed another resolution 

or bill relieving the parties from the payment of 

taxes.” Another senator quickly corrected: “Only 

suspending the collection of taxes.”1

A wind-swept fire had ravaged Portland, 

Maine, on the Fourth of July, 1866, destroying 

a large section of the community and leaving 

twelve thousand people homeless. Congress 

quickly responded, authorizing the Treasury 

Department to suspend tax collections at 

Portland and the quartermaster general to dispatch surplus Army clothing, tents, and camp 

gear to the homeless. A few days later, however, 

when Senator Reverdy Johnson proposed a 

$50,000 appropriation to be dispensed to the 

fire victims by the governor of Maine, Senator 

Trumbull thundered his opposition.2

“Sir,” Trumbull declared, “you can hardly take 

up a newspaper in the United States that you 

will not see an account of a fire somewhere. 

Where is the line? Where is the distinction? 

If you commence appropriating money to distressed people who have been burned out, you 

cannot stop at Portland!”3

“This is a loss by fire such as never occurred 

anywhere else,” replied Johnson. “It is a loss, 

the sufferings caused by which cannot be provided for and hardly mitigated, by individual 

contributions of citizens of the State in which 

it occurred.” As precedents for his proposal, 

2

“This is a loss by fire such as never occurred 

anywhere else.”
16 Situation Desperate

Johnson recited the land given to New Madrid 

earthquake victims in 1811, the aid given 

Venezuela in 1812, and the relief supplied to 

the homeless after the 1827 Alexandria fire. He 

added that the Freedmen’s Bureau Act of 1865 

provided millions for the subsistence and education of former slaves in the prostrated South, 

and he declared this act clearly qualified as a 

direct public relief measure. Pointing out that 

Senator Trumbull had voted for the Freedmen’s 

Bureau Act, he asked why Trumbull could not 

also support extending similar assistance to 

Portland’s destitute and homeless people.4

Senator Trumbull retorted that the prewar 

laws cited by Johnson were not precedents for 

federal legislation on disaster relief. Besides, he 

added, the Congress had never been governed 

by precedents.5

 “I wish such precedents could be 

set oftener than they are; they would endear the 

Government of the United States to the hearts 

of the people,” interrupted Senator Benjamin 

Wade, who took the broadest view of the subject. 

“Let relief be extended when these great overwhelming calamities occur,” he said. “Where 

they are not so great but that the benevolence 

of the surrounding communities can relieve the 

sufferers, there the Government does not step 

in; but upon a great occasion like this there is no 

civilized Government that would withhold its 

aid, and I hope of all others ours will not.”6

The city of Portland, Maine, lay in ruins after the fire on 4 July 1866.

Library of Congress, LC-DIG-ppmsca-09960
Disaster Relief Origins ■ Federal Disaster Measures During Reconstruction 17

The Johnson and Wade argument that the 

national government should supply direct 

relief to victims when a disaster exceeded the 

resources of state and local governments proved 

persuasive in the Senate, which enacted the bill 

for the relief of Portland. The bill died in the 

House, however, and Portland’s homeless had 

to be content with a tax suspension and such 

emergency supplies as the Army Quartermasters 

could deliver.7

•

Federal Disaster Measures 

During Reconstruction

With the states’ rights elements of the national 

political parties weakened after the Civil War, 

members of Congress who thought disaster 

assistance to be constitutional federal power 

had a freer hand. Although they seldom 

could muster sufficient votes to appropriate 

funds for direct disaster relief, their persistent 

efforts sometimes carried bills authorizing 

the Quartermaster Corps and the Freedmen’s 

Bureau to dispense Army rations, clothing, and 

tents to suffering victims of catastrophes.

These measures were especially important 

on the Mississippi River where flooding was 

frequent and sometimes devastating. For more 

than a century, the riparian landowners had 

built earthen embankments, or levees, along the 

river. These levees served to protect most of the 

major basins of the Mississippi valley. Through 

the mid-nineteenth century, local landholders 

assumed sole responsibility for the construction 

and maintenance of levees. In 1849 Louisiana 

led a congressional fight to transfer swamp and 

overflowed lands from the federal government 

to the states of the Mississippi valley, culminating in the Swamp Land Grants of 1849 and 

1850. Generally the states drained these lands 

and sold them to individuals. Revenue thus 

raised paid for further levee improvements and 

encouraged the organization of levee districts 

throughout the lower valley. Over time, these 

districts acquired substantial authority, but they 

still lacked sufficient financing and coordination, and damaging floods persisted. The Civil 

War had disrupted proper levee maintenance 

and the Union armies had breached some levees 

for military purposes. When a major flood a 

year after the war’s end inundated thousands of 

acres in the Mississippi delta, destroying crops 

and leaving thousands destitute, the Army, 

through the Freedmen’s Bureau, issued tons of 

rations to flood victims.8

In March 1865 Congress established the 

Freedman’s Bureau as a branch of the U.S. 

Army for the purpose of providing aid in the 

form of education, health care, and employment 

to four million destitute and landless former 

slaves. Gen. Oliver Otis Howard served as commissioner of the bureau throughout its existence; 

under him was an extensive hierarchy of assistants and subassistants. Assistant commissioners 

headed the bureau’s state-level offices, supported by staffs that included a superintendent 

“...upon a great occasion like this there is no civilized Government 

that would withhold its aid.”
18 Situation Desperate

of education, a traveling inspector, and, during 

the early months of the bureau’s activities, a 

surgeon-in-chief. Despite the handicaps of inadequate funds and poorly trained personnel, the 

bureau built hospitals for and gave direct medical assistance to one million freedmen.9

During the Reconstruction era, several major 

floods covered the delta, and issuing Army 

rations to refugees became standard operating 

procedure. In the 1867 flood, for instance, the 

Freedmen’s Bureau distributed $500,000 worth 

of life-sustaining rations to people impoverished 

by the flood and the consequent crop failures. 

The rations were vital yet spartan: one bushel 

of corn and eight pounds of salt pork per person monthly, with children receiving half that 

amount. This so-called plantation ration became 

the standard issue, and the Army commonly 

dispensed it after major floods in the South 

until 1913 and perhaps later.10

The Freedmen’s Bureau also issued firewood 

and provided free medical care to the refugees. 

When Congress authorized it, the bureau distributed seeds to provide the flood victims with 

an opportunity to raise new food crops, replacing the plantings destroyed by the floods. This 

simple form of assistance, aimed at restoring 

the flood victims self-sufficiency, would later be 

classified a “rehabilitation” measure.11

If Congress, through the Freedmen’s Bureau, 

could grant disaster relief to the emancipated 

slaves and poor whites of the South, it seemed 

logical that it had a similar power in the North 

to alleviate the impacts of calamities. In the 

northern states, disaster assistance fell to the 

Army Quartermaster Corps rather than the 

Freedmen’s Bureau. There, Congress approved 

quartermaster distribution of rations and tents 

to people made homeless by disastrous fires, 

not only at Portland, Maine, in 1866, but also 

in Michigan and Wisconsin and, in 1871, at 

Chicago, Illinois.12

After the great Chicago fire of October 1871, 

Lt. Gen. Philip Sheridan, at the request of 

Chicago’s mayor, posted troops in the burned 

district to prevent looting and ordered that 

quartermaster supplies be dispatched to the city. 

Maj. D. C. Houston, commanding the Corps of 

Engineers Chicago office, lacked the authority 

to assist with the fire fight or support the relief 

measures; he occupied himself and his staff with 

efforts to save Army Engineer property and 

records from his office before the fire ruined the 

building.13

The city of Chicago, in fact, handled disaster 

relief, rehabilitation, and reconstruction largely 

on its own without federal assistance. Other 

than the emergency assistance from Sheridan’s 

forces, the sole federal contributions to Chicago’s 

recovery were acts of Congress suspending federal tax collection and remitting import duties 

on incoming building materials.14

In 1872 Congress phased out the Freedmen’s 

Bureau and its assistance programs in the South 

and it began to rely on the Army Quartermaster 

Corps for prompt response to disasters in both 

the South and the North. In the immediate 

postwar years, however, the Corps of Engineers 

occupied itself with its traditional duties. In 

1867, for example, Corps officers numbered 

around one hundred, many of them serving 

far from Washington in the engineer offices 

responsible for carrying out projects in the 

field (the predecessors of Corps districts). 

Twelve officers were assigned exclusively to 

river and harbor improvements throughout 
Disaster Relief Origins ■ Federal Disaster Measures During Reconstruction 19

the country, as far west as the Pacific coast, 

and thirty-nine served in offices that both 

constructed coastal and frontier defenses and 

improved waterways. The officers relied on a 

force of civilian employees—including engineers, mariners, and laborers—to perform the 

work required. In the year prior the Corps’ river 

and harbor work totaled around $3.5 million for 

forty-nine projects and twenty-six surveys. The 

remainder of officers took up various duties—

five worked on the Great Lakes Survey; 

thirteen were with the engineer battalion; and 

others served on the staff of military departments or were detached to other organizations, 

such as the Lighthouse Board, the northwest 

boundary commission, and the commission 

for a Pacific railway.15 Any disaster assistance, 

however, rendered by the Army Engineers 

During the Chicago fire of 1871, the Corps of Engineers lacked authority to assist in firefighting or relief efforts. The blaze destroyed much of the 

business district, including the Piano Manufacturing Building. National Archives, 59-HB-1
20 Situation Desperate

before 1882 was strictly unofficial and consisted 

largely of volunteer humanitarian efforts by 

individual officers. For instance, witness the 

case of Lt. Eugene Woodruff.

•

Humanitarian Services 

by Individuals

He died because too brave to abandon his 

post even in the face of a fearful pestilence 

and too humane to let his fellow beings perish without giving all the aid in his power to 

save them. His name should be cherished, 

not only by his many personal friends, but 

by the Army, as of one who lived purely, 

labored faithfully, and died in the path 

of duty.16

Capt. Charles Howell sorrowfully penned this 

tribute in 1873 to his deputy in the Corps’ New 

Orleans office, Lt. Eugene Woodruff. Howell 

had ordered the young officer to supervise the 

clearing of a great log raft blocking the Red 

River of Louisiana. Capt. Henry Shreve in 1837 

had first cleared a path through the log jam 

to open river navigation to Texas, but logs and 

driftwood had blocked the passage again during 

the war and years of neglect.17

Woodruff left his workboats and crew on the 

Red River in September 1873 to recruit new 

workers at Shreveport, Louisiana, where he 

found the city in the grip of a yellow fever epidemic. Fearing that he might carry the disease 

back to his workers at the raft if he returned, he 

elected to stay and tend the sick. He volunteered 

his personal services to the Howard Association, 

a Louisiana disaster relief charity, and traveled 

from house to house, delivering food, medicine, 

and good cheer to the sick and dying. While 

rendering this service, he contracted the disease 

and perished on the last day of September “a 

martyr,” according to Shreveport’s newspaper, 

“to the blessed cause of charity.”18

“His conduct of the great work on which he was 

engaged at the time of his death,” said the Corps 

of Engineers commander at New Orleans, “will 

be a model for all similar undertakings and 

the completion of the work a monument to his 

memory.” Howell then assigned the responsibility for finishing the Red River clearance project 

to the lieutenant’s brother, George Woodruff.19 

Thanks to the lieutenant’s reluctance to carry 

yellow fever back to the job, the workers escaped 

the epidemic and broke through the log raft the 

following November. The Corps subsequently 

named a powerful snagboat, built to clear log 

Lt. Eugene A. Woodruff, Corps of Engineers, lost his life in 

1873 while tending the sick during a yellow fever epidemic at 

Shreveport, Louisiana. USMA Archives
Disaster Relief Origins ■ Humanitarian Services by Individuals 21

snags from inland rivers, in tribute to Eugene 

Woodruff; and even a century later the people 

of Shreveport still cherished the memory of the 

lieutenant’s sacrifice.20

Although tangential to the story of the Corps 

of Engineers’ official role in disaster assistance 

programs, the unofficial service during disasters 

by Corps officers merits mention. Of the several 

cases, one as early as 1762 involved a British 

army officer who later joined the U.S. Army. 

British army engineer Thomas Hutchins issued 

relief supplies to American Indians driven 

by flooding into Fort Pitt (Pittsburgh) at the 

head of the Ohio River. Although the British 

royal government had no disaster relief policy, 

Hutchins then was responsible for distributing “presents” to the native tribes allied with 

the British against French forces in middle 

America. The safe refuge and emergency 

supplies Hutchins gave to the flood victims 

therefore were considered a normal function 

of Hutchins’ mission. During the Revolution, 

Hutchins left the British army and joined 

the Continental Army in America, where his 

expertise was welcomed, and in 1781 Congress 

appointed him a Geographer of the United 

States.21

In addition to the disaster relief given by Hutchins 

to the Indians, the 1762 flood at Fort Pitt occasioned a study by the British that perhaps qualifies 

as the first disaster after-action report written 

by Army engineers in America. In it, British 

engineers recommended that Fort Pitt either be 

relocated to hills above the river’s floodplain or its 

buildings raised to place their floors above flood 

levels. Modern engineers recognize that these 

recommendations constituted floodplain management and flood-proofing of buildings. These 

protective techniques eventually became standard 

means of reducing flood damages, but the British 

command did not implement the techniques at 

Fort Pitt in 1762 and the fort was nearly destroyed 

by an even higher flood in 1763.22

A second highlight of volunteer Army Engineer 

initiative during a natural disaster involved 

Col. Joseph Swift, the Army’s Chief Engineer 

during the War of 1812. Swift left the Army 

after the war and accepted employment with 

the Corps as a civilian specialist on New York’s 

harbor project. When a fire in December 1835 

threatened to destroy New York City, Swift 

volunteered to stop the spreading flames by 

demolishing buildings, thus opening a firebreak. 

Planting demolition charges to collapse the 

buildings inward without damaging adjacent 

buildings, Swift opened a firebreak that brought 

the advancing fire to a halt. The city officials 

subsequently voted their thanks to Swift for 

saving their community from general destruction. This service had been performed on Swift’s 

personal initiative, of course, not as a representative of the Corps of Engineers.23

•

While rendering this service, [Woodruff] contracted the disease 

and perished on the last day of September “a martyr to the blessed 

cause of charity.”
22 Situation Desperate

First Official Engineer 

Disaster Mission , 1882

In the spring of 1882 virtually the entire 

alluvial valley of the Mississippi River below 

Cairo, Illinois, was inundated by two flood 

waves: the first crested at Cairo on 3 February 

and the second on 23 February. These waves 

overwhelmed the local levees, causing 284 

crevasses (breaks in the earthen levees) with an 

aggregate length of more than 56 miles. Indeed, 

entire levees were destroyed by the flooding 

and thousands of cold and hungry people took 

refuge on the hills in the back of the valley. 

The delivery of emergency supplies to these 

refugees in some instances became a matter of 

life or death.24

To relieve the suffering, Congress appropriated $100,000 for quartermaster supplies to be 

given to the homeless. Senator George Vest of 

Missouri learned, however, that a large portion 

of the fund might be consumed by transportation charges for delivering the supplies to 

locations in the valley. Vest then contacted the 

owners of steamboats at St. Louis to ask if they 

might deliver the relief supplies without charge; 

the owners refused but told the senator that the 

Army Corps of Engineers had a large fleet of 

In 1835 retired Col. Joseph Swift, a Corps employee, acted on his own to create firebreaks and halt the spread of fire in New York City.

Library of Congress, LC-DIG-pga-01587
Disaster Relief Origins ■ First Official Engineer Disaster Mission 23

workboats stationed at several river ports that 

could make the deliveries at low costs.

Indeed, the years following the Civil War had 

seen a steady rise in the Corps’ workload, resulting in increases to its civilian workforce and 

fleet, although the number of officers assigned to 

the Corps rose much less dramatically. By 1882 

the Corps had approximately 120 officers, many 

of whom directed the 371 projects and 135 surveys that comprised $19 million worth of river 

and harbor work that year. Approximately 2,900 

civilians worked for the Corps of Engineers, only 

about 150 of whom were in Washington. That 

figure does not include a fluctuating number 

of hourly and daily laborers hired directly to 

work on specific projects or during particular 

seasons. In 1883 some 1,200 such laborers were 

on the rolls. The Corps had also developed 

into an organization that was truly national in 

geographic scope. Its members were involved in 

river and harbor improvements and construction 

of coastal and border defenses along three coasts, 

on the Great Lakes, and on inland rivers most 

everywhere but the arid west. The Corps had a 

presence there too; officers assigned to the Army 

departments, along with their assistants, were 

surveying, examining, and mapping the lands 

west of the one hundredth meridian.25

Because one of the primary and growing missions of the Corps was to improve the nation’s 

navigable waterways, naturally it maintained a 

A levee in Louisiana was breached during the Mississippi River flood of 1882, the 

year the Corps officially received its disaster response mission.

Center for Louisiana Studies, University of Louisiana at Lafayette
24 Situation Desperate

large and growing fleet of workboats, officially 

referred to as floating plant. The vessels ranged 

from large dredges to small skiffs and launches 

and included derrick boats, pile drivers, graders, 

snagboats (to remove obstructions from the rivers), maneuver boats, tugboats, towboats, lighters, concrete mixing plants, and quarterboats 

to house workers. Crews on the larger vessels 

often consisted of masters, pilots, mates, engineers, watchmen, laborers, clerks, machinists, 

cooks, carpenters, blacksmiths, “cabin boys,” 

“laundresses,” and “ chamber maids.” In 1883 

the Department of the Interior reported that the 

Corps (and the Mississippi River Commission) 

owned a total of eighty-two “vessels,” a number 

that would rise significantly in following years 

as the workload assigned to the Corps increased 

concomitantly. Ten years later the fleet topped 

two hundred. These figures do not include 

hundreds of smaller or unmanned craft, such as 

scows and barges, that often went uncounted. By 

1913, the first year in which the chief of engineers submitted an exhaustive inventory as part 

of his annual report, the Corps owned almost 

five hundred vessels, a number that tops one 

thousand when quarterboats, barges, and small 

craft are included. Some of these were stationed 

on the west coast, but the majority worked the 

rivers in the South and Midwest. The district at 

St. Louis, for example, maintained 386 pieces 

of floating plant of all types that year, and the 

office in Memphis had 156. In contrast, the 

districts in Boston, New London, and Newport 

operated a combined total of fourteen. Although 

the engineer fleet was much smaller in 1882, it 

still provided a ready and cost-effective means to 

rescue people and deliver relief supplies.26

Having been reminded of the Corps’ workboats, Vest visited the office of Secretary of 

War Robert Lincoln on 10 March to meet with 

the secretary, the Army’s commissary general, 

and Chief of Engineers Maj. Gen. Horatio G. 

Wright. Wright agreed that the Corps’ fleet 

on the Mississippi could deliver the emergency 

rations because, after all, it could not work on 

the river-improvement projects until the flooding 

had receded. Wright pointed out, however, that 

the fleet’s operations were paid from appropriations for river and harbor projects, and therefore 

the fleet could not assist in the disaster relief 

efforts unless Congress granted the authority.27

Accepting this suggestion, Vest drafted a congressional joint resolution that would make the 

Corps’ fleet available for disaster assistance on 

the Mississippi. The first resolution of its kind, 

it read:

Resolved, ... That the Secretary of War 

be authorized in his discretion, to use the 

steamers and other boats and vessels belonging to or now employed by the Government 

upon the Mississippi River and its tributaries, or as many thereof as may be necessary, 

in the transportation and distribution of the 

rations and supplies furnished by the United 

States, or individuals, to the sufferers by the 

recent overflow of said rivers, the expenses 

of manning, equipping, and navigating such 

steamers and boats to be defrayed out of 

any money in the Treasury not otherwise 

appropriated, which necessary sum is hereby 

appropriated for that purpose.28

Congress approved Vest’s resolution that same 

day and President Chester Arthur immediately 

signed it. Wright telegraphed his mobilization orders to his field commanders in the 

Mississippi valley, directing them to cooperate 

fully with the Quartermaster Corps’ commis-
Disaster Relief Origins ■ Levees and Work Relief 25

sary officers to deliver rations vital to the flood 

refugees’ survival.29

Capt. Oswald H. Ernst, the Corps’ engineer 

officer at St. Louis, contacted the commander 

of the quartermaster depot at St. Louis and 

proffered use of the Corps’ steamboat Anita. 

The quartermaster officer accepted the offer, 

equipped the Anita with yawls for rescue operations, loaded the emergency rations, and dispatched the boat toward Memphis with orders 

to pick refugees off rooftops and threatened 

levees and take them to safety while also dispensing food to the hungry.30

Captain, soon to be Major, Alexander 

Mackenzie, the Corps commander at Rock 

Island, Illinois, sent the snagboat General 

Barnard and the towboat Coal Bluff to St. Louis 

where they were loaded with quartermaster 

supplies. The Coal Bluff left St. Louis towing 

barges carrying 1,689 barrels of cornmeal, 383 

boxes of bacon, and seventeen bales of tents. 

It delivered these supplies to New Madrid, 

Missouri; Memphis, Tennessee; and Helena, 

Arkansas, and arrived at Vicksburg, Mississippi, 

where the quartermasters released it to return 

north for repairs. The General Barnard completed three trips from St. Louis south, two to 

Helena and one to Vicksburg, delivering a total 

of 750 tons of relief supplies.31 The quartermasters also asked the help of the engineer 

office at Little Rock, which dispatched the 

snagboat C. B. Reese down the Arkansas River 

to distribute rations to the hungry along the 

lower Mississippi River.32

All told, the Quartermaster Corps spent 

$369,000 assisting one hundred thousand flood 

refugees. Of this total, about $15,000 was credited to the Corps of Engineers for the use of its 

boats. These transportation costs were substantially less than the costs of chartering commercial steamboats for similar service.33

The Corps of Engineers’ disaster assistance 

mission thus began in support of the Quartermaster Corps’ ration distribution efforts, and 

the decentralized organization of the Corps 

of Engineers civil works program yielded an 

unexpected bonus for the American taxpayers: it 

made available a cadre of trained and equipped 

personnel at the field offices who could respond 

quickly to widely-dispersed disaster situations.

•

Levees and Work Relief

After the Corps of Engineer workboats left on 

their missions of mercy, Congress debated a 

new approach to the disaster assistance problem. 

In March 1882 Congress considered a resolution appropriating $150,000 for the relief of 

Mississippi River flood victims and extending 

to the secretary of war the novel authority “to 

expend such part thereof as he may deem advisable for labor only on strengthening the levees 

of the Mississippi at the points in his discretion, 

but he shall only employ persons to whom he is 

issuing rations on account of their destitution 

“...these people who are receiving the 

bounty of the Government, if practicable, 

should be employed by the Government, in 

order that they may not get the impression 

they are to be provided for in the future by 

the bounty of the United States.”
26 Situation Desperate

caused by the floods and overflow of said river 

and its tributaries.”34

Congressman Frank Hiscock of New York 

explained to the House that this resolution 

would ensure “that these people who are receiving the bounty of the Government, if practicable, should be employed by the Government, 

in order that they may not get the impression 

they are to be provided for in the future by the 

bounty of the United States.” People displaced 

by the floods would be employed by the Corps 

of Engineers to repair the broken levees; this 

was a plan later labeled “work relief.” When 

Congressman Richard Townshend asked that 

the work relief program be extended to the Ohio 

River, to include restoration of the levee around 

Shawneetown, Illinois, Hiscock protested. He 

asserted that the former slaves of the South were 

wards of the federal government and had special 

claims upon it: “There is no more reason that 

the State of Illinois and the State of Ohio and 

the State of Kentucky should get that aid from 

the General Government,” proclaimed Hiscock, 

“than there is that my own State of New York 

should obtain it when she has her temporary 

freshets on the Hudson River and her citizens 

suffer thereby.”35

George Robinson of Massachusetts complained 

that the proposed resolution was an entering 

wedge to involve the federal government in 

flood control on the Mississippi River. “We 

will give these sufferers food, we will give them 

support,” he said, “but let us not pay for labor 

on works upon which this Congress has never 

entered.” To appease opponents of federal participation in flood control work, the resolution 

was amended, adding the phrase: “Provided, 

During the nineteenth century, those displaced by floodwaters often camped 

on the levees. National Archives, 77-MRC-5-71736-058
Disaster Relief Origins ■ The 1884 Flood 27

That nothing herein contained shall commit 

the United States to the improvement or maintenance of the Mississippi River levees.” The 

Senate passed this amended resolution, but the 

House deleted the section requiring the flood 

refugees to work repairing the levee system.36

Later that year opponents of federal involvement 

suffered a legislative setback. Congress had 

established the Mississippi River Commission 

(MRC) a few years earlier in 1879 to develop 

plans to remake the Mississippi River into a 

dependable commercial artery to support a 

young and developing industrial nation. It was 

composed of seven members nominated by the 

president of the United States and confirmed 

by the Senate. Three of the organization’s 

members, including its president, were officers 

of the Army Corps of Engineers. In its early 

years the commission coordinated the activities 

of the numerous levee districts up and down the 

lower river but did not itself have the authority to build levees or flood control structures. 

However, with additional support coming in the 

wake of the 1882 floods, the proponents of federal construction of levees along the Mississippi 

carried legislation in August 1882 that granted 

the MRC greater latitude to repair and construct levees in light of the recent flood and 

the damage it caused. The Corps of Engineers 

would execute the work for the commission, 

which divided the construction responsibilities 

among four districts at ports along the river, 

each commanded by a Corps of Engineers officer. This expansion into federal levee-building 

was one of the first cracks in the door toward 

eventual federal involvement in flood control, 

not fully realized until 1936.37

•

The 1884 Flood on the Ohio 

and Mississippi

Col. William Merrill, commanding the Corps 

office at Cincinnati, stepped into a skiff to 

inspect the February 1884 flood on the Ohio 

River. He rowed eight blocks through flooded 

streets to reach what formerly had been the 

riverfront; he then boarded the steamboat City 

of Madison, which was moored to a submerged 

freight train. Buildings along the Cincinnati 

riverfront were entirely submerged.

The City of Madison steamed downriver on 

the crest of the flood, and when it reached 

Lawrenceburg, Indiana, Merrill was shocked by 

what he saw. He returned to his skiff and rowed 

into the town. “The highest part of the streets 

was ten feet underwater,” he said, “many cottages were wholly submerged, with nothing but 

the chimneys visible, and about one half of the 

second floors were underwater.”38

Dodging buildings floating in the streets and 

guiding his skiff over telephone wires, Merrill 

searched out Lawrenceburg’s mayor, who 

had asked him to visit the town while it was 

flooded to help plan a levee for flood protection. After learning the mayor had the town’s 

evacuation and care for the homeless in hand, 

Merrill resumed his inspection voyage. In his 

subsequent report on the Lawrenceburg situation, Merrill declared the town sorely needed 

protection against flooding and a levee should 

accomplish that goal. However, the levee would 

not benefit river navigation, then the only 

type of project approved by Congress for the 

Ohio River.39

The Valentine’s Day flood of 1884, so remembered because it crested at Cincinnati on that 
28 Situation Desperate

day, followed the major Ohio River floods of 

1882 and 1883 that set records that stood until 

1937. After the 1884 flood Congress received 

scores of appeals for disaster assistance, and it 

considered a resolution providing $300,000 for 

relief of the needy in the Ohio valley. Some 

members of Congress opposed this relief, arguing that early disaster assistance had gone to 

the emancipated slaves of the lower Mississippi 

valley, and these were special wards of government. Disaster assistance in the Ohio valley 

and the North, however, was unprecedented 

and unconstitutional. Their opposition failed, 

nevertheless, when Congress approved the resolution and also directed the Corps of Engineers 

to use its workboats to deliver emergency supplies to flood refugees.40 Officers of the Army 

Quartermasters at Pittsburgh and Cincinnati 

obtained the necessary relief provisions and 

distributed them up and down the Ohio 

aboard chartered steamboats and such Corps 

of Engineers workboats as the Bee, sent to the 

scene from the Corps office at Charleston, West 

Virginia.41

An interesting aspect of the 1884 flood-relief 

campaign was the superb work of Clara Barton 

and the American Red Cross in that organization’s first flood-related relief mission. Clara 

Barton chartered the steamer Josh V. Throop to 

Stranded residents of Portsmouth, Ohio, were rescued by boat during the flood of 1884.

Southern Ohio Museum and Ohio Historical Society

“...many cottages were wholly submerged, 

with nothing but the chimneys visible.”
Disaster Relief Origins ■ The 1884 Flood 29

dispense relief supplies along the Ohio from 

Pittsburgh to Cairo, Illinois; she also chartered the Mattie Belle for similar work on the 

Mississippi between St. Louis and New Orleans. 

In four months she distributed $175,000 worth 

of relief to flood victims, winning national 

recognition for her fledgling charitable institution and launching it as the principal private 

charity for disaster relief in the United States.42

Below Cairo the 1884 flood on the Mississippi 

River approached the record set in 1882, and 

the chief of engineers ordered his field offices 

there to cooperate with the Quartermaster 

Corps as they had in 1882. Maj. Oswald H. 

Ernst at St. Louis turned the steamboat A. A. 

Humphreys, fully manned, over to the quartermasters, who loaded it to the gunnels with 

relief supplies sent to the lower Mississippi valley. Maj. Alexander Mackenzie at Rock Island 

dispatched the snagboat General Barnard to 

St. Louis, where the quartermasters used it for 

emergency services.43

The Corps field officers in 1884 had no 

authority to use floating plant for rescue and 

relief without prior approval from the chief of 

engineers, but as the flood ravaged the lower 

Mississippi valley the Corps commander at 

Vicksburg, Capt. William Marshall, telegraphed the chief to urge immediate steps 

to “fish people and stock out of the water.” 

Receiving this authority, Marshall sent the 

Floodwaters, at their peak, covered the intersection of Second and Elm Streets 

in Cincinnati on 14 February 1884. Ohio Historical Society
30 Situation Desperate

towboat Vidalia to save people from their refuge 

on rooftops, treetops, and levees for delivery to 

high ground.44

Col. Amos Stickney at New Orleans reported 

that nearby areas had been inundated after 

parties of armed men breached the levees. He 

inspected the flooded areas, then telegraphed 

the chief of engineers that people in the areas, 

already impoverished by the 1882 and 1883 

floods and resulting crop failures, needed government assistance even to survive. “In giving 

general relief there will of course be many cases 

of impositions,” Stickney warned, “but this 

must be expected in efforts to reach all that are 

in need.” On this advice, together with similar 

reports from other sources, Congress appropriated an additional $200,000 for flood relief on 

the lower Mississippi.45

•

North Carolina Storm , 1884

Shortly after Congress voted relief for flood 

refugees, cyclones struck Alabama, Georgia, 

and the Carolinas on 19 February 1884, wreaking destruction and killing hundreds of people. 

Senators Joseph Brown of Georgia and Matt 

Ransom of North Carolina promptly introduced 

a bill to aid victims of this disaster.

“So unexpected, so sudden, so awful, and 

so destructive of life and property,” declared 

Ransom of the storm, that “there are now in 

that afflicted district thousands of people without a shelter, without clothing, without food.” 

Senator Isham Harris, formerly the Confederate 

governor of Tennessee, repeated the position 

taken in Congress before the Civil War, declaring: “While my sympathies go out as readily to 

those who have suffered by calamities such as 

have been described, while I would be as ready 

as an individual as any other to the extent of 

my little means to aid those sufferers, I cannot 

and will not at any time cast my vote in favor 

to taking one dollar out of the Treasury for any 

such purpose, because I believe that I have no 

Constitutional power to do so.”46

The resolution to aid North Carolina went 

to the Senate Committee on Appropriations, 

which corresponded with the governors of the 

affected states. The committee reported on 29 

February that it believed the suffering resulting 

from the storms was “not of that widespread, 

transcendent, and paramount character of 

impending ruin which baffles all local, individual, municipal and State relief and demands for 

the preservation of its citizens the Intervention 

of the Government.”47

It pleased Ransom that the committee had 

merely reported that federal disaster assistance 

was not needed in North Carolina, not that such 

assistance was unconstitutional. The principle, 

he asserted, is that “whenever in the judgment 

of Congress there is such widespread distress 

and suffering and such imminent and impending ruin to the people of any section of the 

country that local and state aid cannot relieve 

it, it is the duty of the Government to save the 

lives of their people. In my judgment the power 

is unquestioned, but there should be the great-

“So unexpected, so sudden, so 

awful, and so destructive of life 

and property...”
Disaster Relief Origins ■ Charleston Earthquake 31

est discretion and an undoubted necessity in 

its exercise.”48

Although states’ rights advocates such as Harris 

continued to maintain that disaster assistance 

was not a proper federal activity, the 1884 

appropriation for relieving Ohio River flood 

victims in the North, reinforced by debates on 

the southern cyclones, firmly established the 

principle that Congress might step in whenever 

public distress resulting from a disaster was so 

acute and widespread that it exhausted private 

and local government resources. Moreover, 

disaster assistance was no longer restricted to 

those people—such as the emancipated slaves 

and residents of the District of Columbia—

with special relationships with the national 

government.

•

Charleston Earthquake, 1886

With guidelines for federal disaster assistance 

thus emerging, Congress and the executive 

branch expanded the role of the Corps of 

Engineers in such work. The first non-flood 

disaster involving the Corps came after an 

earthquake shook Charleston, South Carolina, 

on the last day of August 1886, in which forty 

people perished. The quake so damaged buildings that people feared to enter them and 

resume their normal lives and reopen their businesses. In this emergency, Charleston’s mayor 

asked the secretary of war to rush engineers to 

the city to survey damages and certify building 

safety and thereby restore public confidence. 

Charlestonians living in tents could then return 

to their buildings before the return of summer 

rains.49

“It is to be hoped that the wish expressed in 

Charleston for a Government survey of the 

houses that have been affected may be gratified, 

with no loss of time by means of the official 

routine,” editorialized the New York Times. 

“The Secretary of War has under his orders a 

considerable number of engineers competent to 

make such a survey.”50

When Charleston’s mayor agreed to reimburse 

the costs of damage surveys, the secretary 

of war ordered Capt. William Bixby, of the 

Wilmington office, to the stricken city to meet 

with Lt. Frederic Abbot, of the Charleston 

office, for the survey. Because it was the Corps’ 

first non-flood disaster mission, the secretary’s 

generously broad orders may be of interest:

Representations have been made to the 

Dept. that the greatest need in Charleston, 

now, is to know what buildings are safe 

and what are unsafe, and that their local 

Corps of Engineers and Architects is very 

small; and in view of this, request has been 

made that Officers of the Engineer Corps 

be asked to at once advise with the City 

Authorities and upon personal examination, show the people what to do in this 

emergency. The President therefore directs 

as necessary for the public service that in 

addition to your public duties you repair 

to Charleston and confer with the Mayor 

of Charleston and do whatever lies in your 

power as an officer of the Engineer Corps, 

“...it is the duty of the Government to save the lives of their people.”
32 Situation Desperate

to advise with him in regard to relieving 

these afflicted people in this moment of 

their great necessity.51

Bixby and Abbot met with the mayor and 

accepted appointment to a commission headed 

by William Speir, a Treasury Department building inspector, to inspect the damaged structures, 

determine the extent of damages, and report 

whether they were safe for occupancy. For this 

task, the commission collected a small staff 

headed by J. P. Allen, senior civil engineer in the 

Corps’ Charleston office.

The commission conducted building inspections 

continuously from dawn to dusk each day from 

8 to 23 September. They examined some five 

thousand buildings, and of this number selected 

sixteen hundred for detailed study. They prioritized and first inspected federal and municipal 

buildings, then hospitals, churches, and factories, then businesses and residences. They 

identified safety hazards and devised means 

of correcting them, determining which buildings should be demolished and which might be 

restored, then delivered their recommendations 

to city authorities.

Corps employees surveyed damaged buildings in Charleston after an earthquake struck in 1886. Hundreds of structures, like this brick house, 

were severely compromised. U.S. Geological Survey, Photograph by J. K. Hillers
Disaster Relief Origins ■ Observations 33

The engineers estimated total damages to 

Charleston’s buildings at approximately $6 

million. In their final report, they proposed 

measures for use in reconstruction to minimize building damages in future earthquakes: 

Masonry walls should be bonded throughout 

their thickness and securely anchored with iron 

reinforcing bars to floors, ceilings, and roof timbers; the use of projecting parapets and cornices 

should be discontinued; and porches and piazzas 

should be firmly anchored to buildings and 

adequately supported. No federal assistance was 

offered Charleston for its post-disaster reconstruction, which was left to local authorities and 

private enterprise.52

With the official thanks of the city of 

Charleston, the engineers completed their 

mission at the end of September and returned 

to their civil works duties. These engineers 

had performed the first damage survey work 

assigned to the Corps, and because the Corps 

had substantial structural engineering expertise, 

it would receive many similar damage survey 

assignments in following decades.

•

Observations

During the Reconstruction era, Congress 

developed the federal policies on disaster assistance that were to prevail into the twenty-first 

century. While the states’ rights elements of 

political parties continued their prewar opposition to federal disaster relief, the proponents 

of federal action to alleviate national distresses 

gradually achieved their goal. The first federal 

disaster aid, administered by the Freedmen’s 

Bureau, was initially for the benefit of the 

emancipated slaves of the South during major 

Mississippi River floods. When the Freedmen’s 

Bureau closed in 1872, it transferred its disaster 

assistance functions to the Army Quartermaster 

Corps, which continued providing relief services 

well into the twentieth century.

While individual Corps of Engineers’ personnel 

often volunteered to assist people during major 

disasters, the Corps itself had no official mission. That mission first came in response to the 

Mississippi River flood of 1882 when Congress 

drafted the Corps’ floating plant to deliver 

emergency supplies to flood refugees. In 1884, 

when the Ohio River flooded, Congress for the 

first time provided disaster assistance outside the 

South—to the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, 

Kentucky, and West Virginia—thus establishing 

the principle that northern as well as southern 

states qualified for federal emergency aid. Then 

in 1886 at earthquake-shaken Charleston, South 

Carolina, the Corps conducted its first nonflood emergency operation when the president 

and secretary of war ordered the Corps to assist 

municipal officials with damage surveys and 

reconstruction studies. Thus was born the disaster assistance mission that has challenged the 

Army Engineers since.

•

“...do whatever lies in your power as an officer of the Engineer Corps, to 

advise with him in regard to relieving these afflicted people in this moment of 

their great necessity.”
34 Situation Desperate

1. Congressional Globe, 39th Cong., 1st sess., 1866, 

3917.

2. Ibid., 3759, 3792, 3811, 3916–21.

3. Ibid., 3917.

4. Ibid., 3918.

5. Ibid., 3920.

6. Ibid.

7. Ibid., 3921, 4110.

8. James E. Sefton, The United States Army and 

Reconstruction, 1865–1877 (Baton Rouge: 

Louisiana State University Press, 1967), 10; 

Howard A. White, The Freedmen’s Bureau in 

Louisiana (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State 

University Press, 1970), 64–76.

9. See Eric Foner, Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished 

Revolution 1863–1877 (New York: Harper & Row, 

1988).

10. White, Freedmen’s Bureau, 64–76; Paul D. Phillips, 

“A History of the Freedmen’s Bureau in Tennessee” 

(Ph.D. diss., Vanderbilt University, 1964), 44, 

64–80, 84–112; Joe Gray Taylor, Louisiana 

Reconstructed, 1863–1877 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana 

State University Press, 1974), 344–45.

11. Congressional Joint Resolution of 30 March 1867 

(15 Stat. 28, No. 29), approved transferring 

$50,000 of Freedmen’s Bureau funds to the 

Commissioner of Agriculture for purchasing seeds 

to distribute to flood victims. Ernest Bicknell of 

the American Red Cross coined the word 

“rehabilitation” in 1906.

12. Erna Risch, Quartermaster Support of the Army: A 

History of the Corps, 1775–1939 (Washington, D.C.: 

Quartermaster General Office, 1962), 728–29, 

discusses the Quartermaster role in disaster relief. 

Army supplies sent to Portland, Maine, in 1866 

had authority of an act of Congress; supplies sent 

to Chicago and Michigan and Wisconsin in 1871 

were dispatched by order of the Army Department 

commander.

13. D. C. Houston to Chief of Engineers, 11 October 

1871, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, Rivers and Harbors, 1871,” File 

1934.

14. Congressional Globe, 42d Cong., 2d sess., 1872, 

406–09, 482–83, 521, 548–49, 556–64; Robert 

Cromie, The Great Chicago Fire (New York: 

McGraw-Hill, 1958), passim; House of Reps., 

Report of the Secretary of War, 42d Cong., 3d sess., 

1872, H. Exdoc. 1, 7–8. General Sheridan’s reports 

on the Chicago fire are in NARA, RG 94, “Letters 

Received by the Adjutant General’s Office, 1871–

1880,” Roll 33, Microfilm 666.

15. War Department, Annual Report of the Chief of 

Engineers for 1867 (Washington, D.C.: 

Government Printing Office, 1867), 1–2 [hereafter 

ARCE]; Office of History, U.S. Army Corps of 

Engineers, The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers: A 

History (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing 

Office, 2008), 47.

16. Charles Howell to E. D. Townsend, 13 Oct. 1873, 

NARA, RG 94, Eugene A. Woodruff ACP file.

17. ARCE (1874), 3, 702–03, 709.

18. See sources in notes 16 and 17 and Daily Shreveport 

Times, 2 Oct. 1873.

19. Charles Howell to E. D. Townsend, 13 Oct. 1873, 

NARA, RG 94, Eugene A. Woodruff ACP file.

20. Ibid.; Hubert Humphreys, “Photographic Views of 

Red River Raft, 1873,” Louisiana History 12 

(Spring 1971): 101–08.

21. General Henry Bouquet Report, 10 Apr. 1762, 

Bouquet Papers, Pennsylvania Historical 

Commission, Series 21648, Part 1, 70f.

22. “Colonel Eyre’s Journal of His Trip from New 

York to Pittsburgh, 1762,” Western Pennsylvania 

Historical Magazine 27 (Mar. 1944): 37–50.

23. Joseph G. Smith, Memoirs (Worcester, Mass.: F. S. 

Blanchard & Co., 1890), 222, 270; Charles 

Walker, “A Globe of Compression: BG Joseph G. 

Swift and the New York Fire of 1835,” Historical 

Vignettes (Office of History, HQUSACE, 1980), 

passim; Stephen F. Ginsberg, “Police and Fire 

Protection in New York City, 1800–1850,” New 

York History 52 (Apr. 1971): 133–50.

24. Robert W. Harrison, Levee Districts and Levee 

Building in Mississippi (Greenville: Mississippi 

Levee Commission, 1951), 69–70; Harper’s Weekly, 

4 Mar., 11 Mar., and 1 Apr. 1882.

25. ARCE (1882), 1–2, passim; Office of History, 

Corps of Engineers: A History, 47; House of Reps., 

Official Register of the United States, containing a list 

of Officers and Employés in the Civil, Military, and 

Naval Service on the First of July, 1883, together with 

a List of Vessels belonging to the United States, 48th 

Cong., 1st sess., 1883, H. Misdoc. 4/1, 306–85, 

411–12; Martin Reuss, The Corps of Engineers and 

Water Resources in the Progressive Era (1890–1920), 

Essays in Public Works History, ed. Martin V. 

Melosi, no. 28 (Kansas City, Mo.: APWA Press, 

2009), 2–6.

Chapter 2 Notes
Disaster Relief Origins ■ Notes 35

26. House of Reps., Official Register of the United 

States..., 48th Cong., 1st sess., 1883, H. Misdoc. 

4/1, 372–73, 385; House of Reps., Official Register 

of the United States..., 53d Cong., 2d sess., 1893, 

H. Misdoc. 29/1, 455–58, 467, 475; Dept. of 

Commerce, Bureau of Navigation, Forty-fifth 

Annual List of Merchant Vessels of the United States...

for the Year Ended June 30, 1913 (Washington, D.C.: 

Government Printing Office, 1913), 440–51; 

ARCE (1913), appendix KKK.

27. Congressional Record, 47th Cong., 2d sess., 1882, 

1777–78.

28. Ibid.

29. ARCE (1882), 1793.

30. Amos Beckwith to Secretary of War, 12 Mar. 

1882, and O. H. Ernst to Chief of Engineers, 13 

Mar. 1882, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, 1882.”

31. Roald Tweet, A History of the Rock Island District, 

Corps of Engineers (Rock Island, Ill.: U.S. Army 

Engineer District, 1975), 116; ARCE (1882), 

1793–94.

32. ARCE (1882), 1572.

33. House of Reps., Report of the Secretary of War, 47th 

Cong., 2d sess., 1882, H. Exdoc. 1, xi–xii; House 

Committee on Appropriations, Destitution from 

Overflow of Mississippi River, 47th Cong., 2d sess., 

1882, H. Exdoc. 126, passim; Senate Committee 

on Military Affairs, Reports...Relative to Amount of 

Supplies...for Relief of Sufferers by the Overflow of the 

Mississippi River, 47th Cong., 2d sess., 1882, 

S. Exdoc. 144, passim. 

34. Congressional Record, 47th Cong., 2d sess., 1882, 

1928–31.

35. Ibid.

36. Ibid.; see also 1944–45, 2118.

37. Albert E. Cowdrey, The Delta Engineers: A History 

of the United States Army Corps of Engineers in the 

New Orleans District (New Orleans: U.S. Army 

Engineer District, 1971), 24–25; Charles A. 

Camillo and Matthew T. Pearcy, Upon Their 

Shoulders: A History of the Mississippi River 

Commission from Its Inception Through the Advent of 

the Modern Mississippi River and Tributaries Project

(Vicksburg, Miss.: Mississippi River Commission, 

2004).

38. William Merrill to Chief of Engineers, 10 Mar. 

1884, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, 1884.”

39. Ibid.

40. Congressional Record, 48th Cong., 2d sess., 1884, 

1032–40, 2215–17.

41. O. A. Clark to William Merrill, 15 Apr. 1884, 

William Craighill to Chief of Engineers, 15 Feb. 

1884, and Robert Lincoln to H. G. Wright, 25 

Feb. 1884, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, 1884”; Citizens Relief 

Committee of Pittsburgh, The Flood of 1884 in the 

Ohio Valley (Pittsburgh: Committee, 1884), passim; 

John L. Vance, The Great Flood of 1884 in the Ohio 

Valley (Gallipolis, Ohio: author, 1884), passim; 

Cincinnati Relief Committee, The Flood in the 

Ohio, February, 1884 (Cincinnati: Chamber of 

Commerce, 1884), passim; Fred Way, “Adventures 

in the 1884 Flood,” S & D Reflector 10 (Mar. 

1973): 37–41.

42. Foster Rhea Dulles, The American Red Cross: A 

History (New York: Harper & Bros., 1950), 27–28.

43. O. H. Ernst to Chief of Engineers, 31 Mar. 1884, 

NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, “Letters 

Received, 1884”; ARCE (1884), 1547.

44. William Marshall to Chief of Engineers, 21 Mar. 

1884, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, 1884.”

45. Amos Stickney to Chief of Engineers, 25 Mar. 

1884, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, 1884.”

46. Congressional Record, 48th Cong., 2d sess., 1884, 

1339–40.

47. Ibid., 1479.

48. Ibid.

49. “The Great Earthquake,” Public Opinion 1 (11 

Sept. 1886): 431–34.

50. New York Times, 4 Sept. 1886.

51. William Bixby to Chief of Engineers, “Report on 

Examination of Buildings in Charleston, SC, 

Injured by the Recent Earthquake of August 

1886,” NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, 1886.”

52. Ibid.
Right: Floodwaters encroached 

upon Pennsylvania Avenue in 

Washington, D.C., 1889.

Office of History

Below: A temporary bridge crossed 

the Conemaugh River in Johnstown, 

Pennsylvania, 1889.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-79364

Left: Flood victims used a railroad bridge to reach a 

relief camp near Richmond, Texas, 1899.

Courtesy of the Fort Bend County 

Museum Association, Richmond, Texas
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Johnstown Flood 37

The Corps Builds 

A Tradition

I

n the last decade of the nineteenth century, 

the Corps of Engineers developed valuable 

expertise in its emergency response mission and was no longer restricted to providing 

food and supplies and rescuing flood victims 

from rooftops. The Johnstown flood of 1889, 

for example, gave the Corps of Engineers the 

opportunity to apply some of its technical expertise in clearing away a wire-tangled debris mass 

lodged against the stone bridge in the downtown area, and yet another massive Mississippi 

River flood in 1890 found engineers tasked with 

securing levees in desperate flood fights up and 

down the river. These efforts and others were 

rewarded with a new resolution in 1896 that 

gave the Army Engineers standing authority 

to take measures to save life and property from 

natural disasters without prior approval from 

headquarters. An additional flood fight in 1897 

saw the Corps of Engineers establish itself as 

the preferred agency for the administration of 

disaster relief operations.

•

Johnstown Flood, 1889

President and Mrs. Benjamin Harrison spent 

Sunday, 2 June 1889, with Secretary of War 

Redfield Proctor reading the poignant and 

shocking dispatches coming from Johnstown, 

Pennsylvania. An old earthen dam upstream of 

the city had given way on the last day of May, 

unleashing a flood wave that caused 2,209 fatalities. The failure of South Fork Dam released a 

wave onto already swollen streams that smashed 

its way down the Conemaugh valley, ripping 

up trees, wiping out villages, and engulfing 

entire trains. By the time it reached the city at 

the confluence of the Little Conemaugh River 

and Stony Creek, a mass of debris was rolling 

on its crest. Johnstown was destroyed by what 

would become the most deadly river flood in 

American history.1

President Harrison was so moved by the 

disaster that he presided at a mass meeting in 

Washington to collect contributions for the 

victims, and he telegraphed the governor of 

Pennsylvania to ask what could be done to help. 

The governor requested temporary bridges: 

all bridges at Johnstown, except a stone bridge 

blocked by debris, had been washed out. Lack of 

bridges gravely hampered relief efforts, and people were unable to learn the fate of relatives and 

friends living on opposite sides of the streams.2

Harrison ordered the Corps of Engineers to 

Johnstown to install temporary bridges across 

the streams. The Corps had one ponton bridge 

at the Military Academy at West Point, where 

Superintendent John Parke used it to train 

cadets. Colonel Parke had a personal interest 

in the Johnstown emergency: his nephew and 

namesake, John Parke, a summer employee 

at the South Fork Dam, had made a historic 

horseback ride down the valley to warn that the 

dam was failing. Parke the elder had his pontons 

(flat boats) aboard a train and on the way to 

Johnstown before noon on 4 June. He placed 

Lt. John Biddle and a thirty-man detachment 

from Company E of the Battalion of Engineers 

in charge of the bridge and its placement.3

3
38 Situation Desperate

Col. William King, commandant of the 

Engineer School at Willets Point, New York, 

had surplus Civil War–era pontons in storage 

at the school. He loaded the pontons and unassembled bridge trestles onto railroad cars and 

placed them in charge of Capt. Eric Bergland, 

who commanded Lieutenants Mason Patrick 

and Thomas Rees and sixty-nine enlisted men 

skilled in bridge construction.

To plan operations and command the mission, 

the chief of engineers sent Capt. Clinton B. 

Sears to Johnstown. Reaching the devastated 

city on 5 June, Sears met with Pennsylvania’s 

adjutant general and arranged for Baltimore 

and Ohio Railroad engineers to erect a temporary trestle bridge over Little Conemaugh, 

leaving Stone Creek for Corps attention. Sears 

inspected the stream and selected sites for two 

bridges over the creek at points where bridges 

had stood before the flood.4

Because railroad washouts and congestion 

delayed the arrival of the Corps pontons, Sears 

had ramps constructed next to the railroad for 

unloading and a road cut from the tracks down 

to Stony Creek’s bank. The ramps and road 

were ready when the trains arrived the night 

of 7 June, and at dawn the engineers moved 

the pontons from the cars down the ramps and 

floated them into Stony Creek.5

Continuing rains kept the creek at a high stage 

with swift currents and dangerous floating and 

After the 1889 flood at Johnstown, the military established a post on Kernville 

Hill overlooking the devastated city where men could get some rest.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-52432
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Johnstown Flood 39

submerged debris threatening the pontons. 

The engineers had left West Point and Willets 

Point in such haste that they left behind their 

rubber boots and ponchos; moreover, they had 

gotten little sleep while aboard the train. Yet, 

they disregarded personal discomforts and got 

to work in a hurry. On the first day, by 1:30 pm

they had opened a 200-foot bridge wide enough 

to carry wagons, and by 5:00 pm the second 

bridge, 320-feet long, was in service. In ensuing 

days, both bridges carried heavy and constant 

traffic.6

The rapid progress and the presence of uniformed troops cheered the despondent residents 

of Johnstown. In addition, Clara Barton and 

the American Red Cross arrived the same day, 

bringing medical supplies and provisions. After 

dispensing these vital supplies, Barton launched 

the Red Cross’s first rehabilitation effort—

building wooden apartment buildings to house 

the homeless.7

After their bridges were in service, the engineer 

troops erected tent camps nearby and rendered 

any minor services requested by local authorities. 

Because coordinating the relief efforts of state, 

local, and volunteer workers was challenging, a 

Capt. Clinton B. Sears of the Corps of Engineers recommended methods for 

removing the debris that blocked the river at the only remaining bridge in 

Johnstown. Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-79363
40 Situation Desperate

citizens’ committee requested Sears take complete charge of all relief and recovery operations. 

Sears refused, later explaining: “As there was 

no officially responsible person to back me up, 

and, as I was a commissioned officer of the 

United States, and in a manner representing 

the Secretary of War, such action on my part 

might be construed as committing the United 

States in a way not intended.” He confined his 

activities to furnishing technical advice on the 

operations.8

By request of Pennsylvania’s adjutant general, 

Sears undertook to devise a workable plan for 

systematically removing the mountains of debris 

and wreckage from the city. After inspecting the 

operations and the needs, he prepared a coordinated plan that divided the city’s damage areas 

into five districts. He assigned civil engineers, 

contractors, and volunteers to each district, 

thereby greatly reducing confusion and conflicts 

in the disaster area.9

Removing the immense wire-tangled debris 

mass lodged against the stone bridge in downtown Johnstown proved a major challenge. 

Blocking the flow of the stream, it contained 

human bodies and animal carcasses that 

constituted a health hazard. After the bodies 

were removed, a private demolition expert, 

Arthur Kirk, began blasting the pile apart, but 

the resulting detonations broke windows and 

cracked walls in the buildings that had survived 

the flood, leading to public complaint that 

explosives would destroy what the flood had 

missed. Observing that the blasting was not 

removing the debris, merely changing its location, Sears recommended the use of small steam 

engines and hoisting derricks, similar to those 

used aboard Corps of Engineers snagboats to 

clear debris from rivers. Once separated and 

stacked on land, the debris could be put to the 

torch. Pennsylvania authorities accepted Sears’ 

plan, obtained the equipment, and soon had 

the debris cleared away to open the stream’s 

flow.10

“As the work was now properly organized and 

well in hand,” Sears declared, “I could be of no 

further use, and asked for a recall.” Sears and 

most of the engineers left Johnstown on 15 June. 

Patrick and fifty-three enlisted men remained 

behind to construct temporary trestle bridges. 

They returned the pontons, no longer needed, 

to their depots in early July. The chief of engineers commended the troops for their energetic 

work; President Harrison expressed his personal 

satisfaction with their services; and the city of 

Johnstown presented its public resolution of 

gratitude to the Corps.11

In this first use of engineer troops for disaster 

emergency service, the troops’ primary mission 

had been delivering, placing, and maintaining 

the temporary bridges, and they performed well. 

Although declining to manage the recovery 

projects, Sears furnished useful technical assistance for the post-disaster debris removal efforts. 

The Red Cross and the Johnstown Relief 

Commission conducted the principal relief, 

recovery, and rehabilitation programs, expending $1.8 million in doing so, none of which 

came from the federal government.12

•

...they disregarded personal discomforts 

and got to work in a hurry.
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Mississippi River Flood Fight 41

The 1890 Mississippi River 

Flood Fight

“It was a very angry looking break,” reported 

Capt. Dan Kingman, the MRC district commander at New Orleans, vividly describing the 

Morganza levee crevasse in 1890. “The swamp 

had not yet filled with water and there was a fall 

of several feet right in the throat of the crevasse. 

The water dashed in among the trees, which were 

trembling and falling, and the noise of the rushing water could be heard for more than a mile.”13

Eight years of administration by the Mississippi 

River Commission and levee construction by 

local organizations led to real progress by 1890 

when a flood surpassed all crest records on the 

Mississippi below the mouth of the Arkansas 

River. The lower Mississippi River levee system 

had been breached at 284 places during the 

1882 flood, 224 places in 1883, 204 places in 

1884, but only 23 places in 1890, when the river 

continued at flood stages longer than during the 

earlier floods.14

On 1 March 1890 the Army’s chief signal 

officer, then in charge of weather forecasting, 

warned that the coming flood would exceed the 

records set in 1882 on the lower Mississippi. He 

estimated the flood would force the evacuation 

of ninety thousand people, and he warned that 

loss of life was probable. The Corps had only 

$8,701 left in its flood emergency budget, and 

the Mississippi River Commission appealed 

to Congress for an early and adequate emergency appropriation for the coming flood fight. 

Congress obliged.15

Capt. Willard Young and Senior Civil Engineer 

Arthur Hider fought the flood from Memphis. 

They stationed the steamboats Emma Etheridge, 

Osceola, and Vidalia with double crews at 

“The water dashed in among the trees, 

which were trembling and falling, and the 

noise of the rushing water could be heard 

for more than a mile.”

Both convict and paid laborers worked with wheelbarrows to close the crevasse 

in the Morganza levee south of Old River, Louisiana, during the flood of 1890.

Mississippi River Commission
42 Situation Desperate

strategic points along the river to conduct rescue 

operations and deliver flood-fight materials 

where needed. The local levee districts supplied 

the labor, and the government furnished the 

materials: 440,000 sandbags, 35,700 pounds 

of bagging, 2,520 pounds twine, and 470,000 

board feet of lumber.

The engineers planned and supervised the 

action. Laborers topped the levees with sandbags laid in tiers. Brush topped with sandbags 

checked the sloughs (erosion points) on the 

back sides of levees, and seepage was slowed by 

dumping loose earth or placing canvas weighted 

with sandbags on the river side of the levees. 

Where bank caving threatened, the engineers 

directed the construction of dikes to deflect 

river currents: workers drove wooden piles ten 

feet apart and tied the piling together with wire 

cables, laid willows and brush against the cables, 

and dropped sacks of earth behind the brush.16

As the flood crest approached, the first break in 

the levee system came at Opossum Fork north of 

Arkansas City where twenty-five desperate men 

armed with Winchesters drove away the levee’s 

guards and deliberately breached the levee, inundating two Arkansas counties. These villains 

hoped thereby to relieve pressure on the downstream levees that protected their own homes 

and farms. Other crevasses, caused chiefly by 

foundation weaknesses, then followed.17

“Had it not been for the very energetic and 

heroic work of the several State levee organizations,” commented Young, “supplemented by 

the timely and liberal assistance rendered by the 

General Government, a very considerable portion of the levee line would have been breached, 

and the overflow would have been much more 

general and disastrous.” At points the flood 

climbed fully two feet up the side of the sandbags stacked on the levee crown.18

A labor shortage hampered the flood fight near 

Memphis. For example, at one crevasse Hider 

could not recruit the workers needed to close 

the gap, even though the levee and the Corps of 

Engineers quarterboats were crowded with male 

refugees fished out of the flood. “They are an 

improvident set of people,” complained Hider, 

“and should the U.S. begin issuing rations, it 

would utterly demoralize the labor and do more 

harm than good at present.”19

Eventually the Corps found a solution to this 

challenge, although Young later had to explain 

to the chief of engineers a certain item listed 

as a flood-fight expenditure. Local laborers 

were accustomed to enjoying whiskey rations 

as part of their normal compensation, and the 

Army engineers felt compelled to offer the same 

fringe benefit. “The men refused to work unless 

they were supplied with this whiskey ration as 

before,” Young admitted, “and as a failure to 

hold the laborers would have resulted in the loss 

of the levee line a part barrel of whiskey was ... 

issued to the men.” In time the chief approved 

this emergency cost.20

Kingman and Senior Civil Engineer H. S. 

Douglas at New Orleans encountered similar 

challenges. They sent sacks, lumber, tarpaulins, 

nails, shovels, and wheelbarrows to threatened 

levees aboard the General Newton but could 

not hire sufficient temporary labor even for the 

“Had it not been for the very energetic and 

heroic work...the overflow would have 

been much more general and disastrous.”
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Mississippi River Flood Fight 43

munificent wage of ten cents an hour. Even 

those laborers who did accept their generous 

offer refused to work on Saturday afternoons or 

Sundays.21

As crevasses farther north relieved pressures 

against other levees, the river stage in the upper 

part of the Fourth MRC District began dropping. Kingman warned the local levee managers 

that a second crest would come when the water 

that had escaped through the upstream crevasses 

flowed back into the Mississippi via the Yazoo 

and Red rivers. Apparently no one believed 

his warning, however, and the laborers left for 

home. Then came the second rise.

Kingman and his staff, with such labor as they 

could locate, managed to raise the Morganza 

levee an additional foot with heaped earth and 

sandbags, to no avail. A storm the night of 

21 April sent waves crashing over the sandbag 

topping, driving back the workers and causing 

the “angry looking break.” Two more breaks 

occurred in the district at Nita and Martinez 

levees, and the Corps lost the fight.22

With floating plant fully committed to the 

flood fight, the commander at Memphis asked 

for authority to purchase twenty skiffs and to 

charter steamboats for the rescue of stranded 

people. Congress then considered a resolution 

to allow the Corps the use of river and harbor appropriations to purchase watercraft for 

rescue work.

Congressman James Blount of Georgia suggested limiting the expenditures for rescue boats 

Beattyville, on the Kentucky River, was inundated during the 1890 flood.

National Archives, 77-RH-34
44 Situation Desperate

to $3,000. Congressman Thomas Catchings 

of Mississippi immediately objected to any 

cost limitations. “I would like also to impress 

upon the House the fact that the president of 

the Mississippi River Commission is General 

[Cyrus] Comstock, who is well known to many 

here present, and there is not today in the service 

of the Government a more prudent, painstaking, or efficient officer,” Catchings explained. 

“He will have the disposition of this fund, and, 

knowing him as I do, I would not hesitate, if it 

were a contribution from my own private funds, 

to leave it entirely to his discretion.” Catchings’ 

argument proved persuasive and Congress did 

not restrict the rescue expenditures.23

Poignant pleas for help poured in to Washington 

during April 1890, and the House Committee 

on Appropriations investigated them. It 

requested damage reports from state governors 

and from the Corps commanders at Mississippi 

River districts. In reply, Kingman at New 

Orleans dispatched a blunt telegram: “There are 

both suffering from destitution and danger of 

loss of life. There are many breaks in levees and 

fears that but few levees withstood the storm of 

last night. Suffering universal. It is beyond the 

power of the state to make any provision for such 

widespread calamity. Situation is desperate.”24

Receiving similar telegrams from other officials, 

the House committee recommended an urgent 

appropriation of $150,000 to subsist thirty-five 

thousand people for twenty-one days, at a cost 

of twenty cents per ration. During the House’s 

consideration of the bill, Congressman Richard 

Bland of Missouri demanded to be told what 

article of the Constitution justified such an 

appropriation. House Speaker Joseph Cannon 

of Illinois thundered in reply: “In the starving 

condition of 35,000 poor people who cannot be 

relieved otherwise.” Congress quickly enacted 

the relief bill, and the Corps steamboat Emma 

Etheridge delivered the sustaining food supplies 

to the refugees.25

The 1890 Mississippi River flood marked the 

first large-scale emergency response of its sort 

performed under Corps management. In its 

aftermath, the Corps began studies of crevasses, 

sloughs, and sandboils (large leaks), seeking better methods of handling these levee-threatening 

conditions. It became clear to the Corps, moreover, that close liaison with Congress, always 

important, is vital during emergencies requiring swift legislative action. In turn, Congress 

learned the Corps could be counted upon for 

accurate reporting of disaster situations, while 

the public deluged Congress with alarming 

rumors and exorbitant demands for federal aid.

•

Discretionary Disaster 

Authority , 1896

On 8 December 1896, Brig. Gen. William P. 

Craighill, Chief of Engineers, issued Circular 

No. 18 granting authority to engineer officers 

engaged in civil works projects to undertake 

emergency rescues. This first standing authority for Corps officers to take measures to save 

life and property from natural disasters without 

awaiting approval from headquarters specifically 

“Suffering universal. It is beyond the power 

of the state to make any provision for such 

widespread calamity. Situation is desperate.”
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Discretionary Disaster Authority 45

envisioned the use of Corps workboats during 

flooding:

By authority of the Secretary of War, permission is given to officers of the Corps of 

Engineers having charge of Government 

property, to use or loan Government boats, 

barges, and other appliances, in cases of sudden emergency not permitting request for 

previous authority, when life is endangered. 

The use of such plant is also permitted to 

save property; provided that no suitable 

private boats or appliances are available, that 

the plant can be spared without detriment 

to Government works, and that no extra 

expense to the United States is incurred. 

Prompt report, with full statement of facts, 

will be made to the Chief of Engineers of all 

such use of Government property.26

Circular No. 18 did clear up misunderstanding 

about the role of the Corps during emergencies 

and encouraged field commanders to respond 

more aggressively to disaster situations. Some 

confusion, however, still remained; for instance, 

the phrase “extra expense” was difficult to interpret in that the cost of fuel and wages for boat 

crews on emergency service could be considered 

“extra.” Nor did the circular fully explain the 

responsibilities of individual engineers engaged 

in emergency response. A case involving an 

engineer commander in Minnesota and an ice 

jam in Wisconsin illuminated this problem.

In early December 1896, Col. William Jones, 

commanding at St. Paul, Minnesota, received 

an urgent plea for help from the mayor of 

Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin. A forty-foot-high 

ice gorge had formed downstream of the city, 

damming the river’s flow, and the Chippewa 

River had begun rising at the rate of a foot an 

hour. The city had used two thousand pounds of 

dynamite trying to break up the ice jam without 

success, and the mayor wanted Jones to advise 

on how to dislodge the ice. When Jones reached 

the city, he told the mayor that dynamiting 

the ice was useless; he directed sandbagging to 

save the town. His mere presence on the scene 

helped to quell public panic. After the river itself 

had forced open a new channel through the ice, 

the waters began to subside. His mission accomplished, Jones stayed another day to help the city 

engineer plan a local flood protection project, 

then he returned to his office.27

A month later, the mayor of Chippewa Falls was 

shocked to receive a bill from Jones for $200 to 

cover his professional services in the emergency. 

The mayor then took up the bill with the Army 

adjutant general, explaining that, while the colonel’s services had been valuable, the Chippewa 

River was a navigable waterway of the United 

States, and the city therefore should not be 

required to pay a public officer for his services.28

When the adjutant general referred the question to Jones for report, Jones responded that 

the Chippewa River did not flow within his 

command area and that it had no authorized 

federal waterways project funds from which to 

reimburse his services. He had explained this to 

the mayor before he went to Chippewa Falls. He 

further elaborated the situation:

I went there prepared to meet the emergency in whatever shape it might appear. I 

“I went there prepared to meet the 

emergency in whatever shape it might 

appear.”
46 Situation Desperate

took an Assistant along who was conversant 

with the river in that locality. I was not. I 

sacrificed three days of the leave of absence 

to which I am entitled under the regulations, there being no other lawful way I 

could absent myself for this duty. I left 

the City with no word of thanks for my 

services. No offer to reimburse my expences 

[sic]. I waited for a month for some sort of 

public recognition of my services, some 

offer to meet my expences, and then sent in 

a bill.29

Because no Chippewa River project existed, 

because the ice jam site was outside his area of 

responsibility, because he used his personal leave 

to undertake the mission, Jones thought the 

technical assistance he supplied Chippewa Falls 

had the character of consulting engineer services 

for which the city was liable. “I should say,” he 

concluded, “that no municipality was entitled to 

the public service of a public officer unless the 

same had been specifically provided for by Act 

of Congress.”30

Craighill vehemently disagreed with Jones. 

“A terrible disaster threatened the people of the 

city,” said the chief of engineers, “and I am of 

the opinion that it was the duty of the nearest 

engineer officer, within the limits of whose 

When the Red River overtopped its banks in 1897 and flooded surrounding areas, citizens of Fargo, North Dakota, refused federal assistance, 

preferring to rely on one another to get through the ordeal. Institute for Regional Studies, NDSU, Fargo (2042.10.2)
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Flood Fight Operations 47

district even a portion of the river is situated, 

to aid without charge, by his wise counsel and 

professional knowledge, in allaying the fears of 

the alarmed and excited people.” Jones never 

collected his Chippewa Falls account.31

During his rugged tour at St. Paul, Jones 

seemed fated for disaster. On 11 April 1897, 

after receiving pleas for help from people living 

along the flooded Red River of the North, Jones 

boarded the Corps steamboat Ogama at Grand 

Forks, North Dakota, loaded it with privatelycontributed relief supplies, and dodged ice floes 

to get downstream to supply refugees. Seventeen 

miles below Grand Forks, the Ogama rammed 

an underwater obstruction, smashing the boat’s 

hull. With swift work, Jones and the captain 

managed to ground the boat in twelve feet of 

water, preventing its sinking in midstream with 

probable loss of life. Rowboats carried Jones and 

the relief party safely to the bank, but the relief 

supplies were ruined.32

The 1897 Red River flood was also marked by 

an unusual event, perhaps unique in American 

history. On 8 April Congress enacted a resolution approving the distribution of $50,000 

worth of relief supplies to flood victims along 

the Red River. When this news reached Fargo, 

North Dakota, the town’s mayor called a mass 

meeting of its citizens. They politely told 

Congress thanks, but no thanks—they would 

handle disaster relief on their own, without a 

dime of federal assistance.33

•

Flood Fight Operations , 1897

Record floods in 1897 were not limited to the 

Red River of the North. New flood records 

were set on the Monongahela, Cumberland, 

and Tennessee rivers in January, and high water 

reached New Madrid on the Mississippi River 

on 20 March, remaining at flood stage there 

until 4 April. The flood peaked at Vicksburg on 

16 April at 52.5 feet—3.4 feet higher than previous records. Lasting fifty-nine days, the 1897 

Mississippi River flood was of shorter duration than the floods of 1882 and 1884, yet was 

higher because the improved levee system kept 

the river more closely confined to the channel.34

The 1897 flood fight began on the upper 

Mississippi near Rock Island, Illinois, where 

Col. William King and Senior Civil Engineer 

Montgomery Meigs patrolled the river in steam 

launches. These vessels transported sandbags 

to local levee districts in Illinois and Iowa and 

riprap stone to armor levees where waves threatened to erode the earthen dikes. One crevasse, 

resulting from tunnels made through the levee 

by muskrats, occurred near Rock Island, and 

King sent the snagboat General Barnard and 

labor to help the local levee managers close the 

crevasse.35

The Mississippi River Commission in 1897 

had three Corps officers in charge of its four 

districts on the lower river. Capt. Graham 

Fitch commanded the First and Second districts covering the Mississippi between Cairo 

and the mouth of the White River; Lt. Henry 

Newcomer had charge of the Third District 

“...it was the duty of the nearest engineer officer...to aid without 

charge, by his wise counsel and professional knowledge, in allaying 

the fears of the alarmed and excited people.”
48 Situation Desperate

responsible for the river between the mouth of 

the White River and Warrenton, Mississippi; 

while Maj. George Derby commanded the 

Fourth District at New Orleans.36

Fitch prepared for the flood fight in the First 

and Second districts in early March, placing an 

assistant in direct charge of each levee section 

and sending the Titan and other towboats up 

and down the river to place barges loaded with 

lumber and sandbags at convenient locations. 

These materials could be used by local levee 

boards as needed during the flood fight, while 

the barges also served as central rescue stations 

for refugees.

The MRC joined with local levee boards in the 

First and Second districts to raise the levees, using 

mule-drawn scrapers to heap earth atop the levee 

crowns and armor the fresh earth with sandbags 

to reduce wave erosion. Their work proved futile, 

however, for the 1897 flood crest along that river 

section reached up to 4.6 feet higher than the 

record set in 1890. Armed villains deliberately 

breached a levee near Caruthersville, Missouri, 

and fourteen crevasses occurred at other points. 

The river actually flowed over the top of one 

eleven-mile levee section.37

Newcomer and the Third District began their 

flood fight well in advance of the crest. They 

sent the steamboats Emma Etheridge, Vedette, 

Meter, and Thomas B. Florence to deliver barges 

filled with lumber, sandbags, and tools, along 

with quarterboats for housing laborers and refugees, to strategic points throughout the district.

Local levee districts hired all available laborers 

and put them to work raising the levees. Muleteam scrapers dragged earth into place atop the 

levee crowns; workers dropped sandbags along 

the river side of the levees; and sometimes the 

engineers and laborers provided additional 

height by installing wooden bulkheads—two 

parallel rows of planks with the space between 

filled with earth—on the top of the levees. As 

the flood crest drew nearer, the workers moved 

earth from the landward side of levee crowns to 

heap on the river side. The 371 miles of levees in 

the Third District, nevertheless, had inadequate 

grades to withstand a flood as much as three 

feet higher than previous crests. Eight crevasses 

broke the levee system, flooding forty-eight 

hundred square miles of land in Mississippi, 

Arkansas, and Louisiana.38

In his post-disaster report, Newcomer mentioned two problems experienced during the 

flood fight. First, the fight consumed 986,000 

sandbags, far more than necessary. Local levee 

boards apparently thought sandbags the panacea 

for all high-water troubles and used them to 

prevent wave wash and to slow sloughing, the 

sliding down of the levees’ landward slopes. 

Some even used them to build ramps and roadways. Second, cattle driven up onto the levees 

for safety during the flood mired down in the 

saturated earth and caused dangerous sloughing. 

Levee guards had orders to shoot cattle and keep 

them off the levees, with much resulting ill will 

in the surrounding country.39

Derby and Senior Civil Engineer W. J. Hardee 

conducted a masterful flood fight along the 

452 miles of river in the Fourth District. They 

started by placing forty-two barges and quarterboats loaded with materials and tools at fifteenmile intervals along the lower Mississippi, with 

towboats stationed at sixty-mile intervals to 

move the barges and perform rescues.40
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Flood Fight Operations 49

For rapid inspection of threatened levees, 

Hardee implemented a novel system. In January 

1897, as a condition of employment, Hardee had 

required each levee inspector to purchase and 

use a bicycle. During the flood fight, he kept his 

inspectors constantly bicycling along the levees, 

and he personally covered thirty miles of levee 

each day on his bike, including stops for observation (and presumably to catch his breath).41

During the emergency, Derby coordinated the 

operations of six independent forces: individual 

planters, railroads, parish governments, levee 

districts, state governments, and the Corps—

not an easy task. Often the first agency on the 

scene began raising and repairing a levee then 

argued with the forces that arrived later about 

how work was to be allocated and what methods 

should be used.

Derby and Hardee later reported that pan 

scrapers (sometimes called fresnoes or wheelers) 

pulled by mule teams were the most economical 

means of raising levee grades. Where scrapers 

could not be used, workers moved the earth 

with wheelbarrows or used sandbags. Wave 

wash protection was provided by driving stakes 

into the levee crown and nailing planks to the 

stakes. Hardee directed that seepage be plugged 

by dumping dirt into the river at the site of 

the leak. Laymen thought it foolish to dump 

dirt into the river, but Hardee had learned this 

technique by watching rivermen at New Orleans 

plug leaky barges by dumping sawdust into the 

water near the leaks. The dirt, like the sawdust, 

was drawn into the weak levee section by the 

water’s flow, thus plugging the path of seepage. 

Larger leaks, often called sandboils, were cut 

off by placing a sandbag ring or dike around 

the leak’s outlet behind the levee. When water 

A Mississippi River levee failed near Stokes Plantation in April 1897.

National Archives, 77-MRC-5-71736-003
50 Situation Desperate

inside the sandbag ring rose to the level of the 

river on the opposite side of the levee, it equalized pressures and flow through the leak ceased.

Stopping sloughing was more difficult. Water 

standing against the levees for long periods percolated or seeped through the levees and caused 

rottening, the softening of the inside landward 

slopes. The soils in the levees became semifluid and sloughed, or moved down and out, 

reducing the width of the levee. If not checked, 

another slough would follow higher up the levee 

and so on until the river broke through. An 

older method for checking sloughs consisted of 

dropping brush into the slough and weighting 

the brush down with sandbags to preserve the 

drainage and somewhat improve levee stability. 

Hardee, however, became convinced in 1897 

that the best protection against sloughing consisted of cutting a ditch at the landward base of 

the levee to carry off the water as it percolated 

through instead of allowing it to stand. These 

ditches eventually became common in standard 

levee designs.

Using these innovative techniques, the Fourth 

District directed a flood fight that involved capping two hundred miles of levees. Derby proudly 

reported that the Fourth District had successfully passed the greatest flood of record, which 

had stood against the levees for two months, 

with only a single major break at the Glasscock 

levee, and that break had resulted from muskrat 

burrowing.42

Downstream from New Orleans in the Lake 

Borgne area, however, there were no organized 

levee districts in 1897 and nothing was done 

to reduce flooding, but the Corps did perform 

rescue operations. At the request of the mayor 

of Dyersburg, Tennessee, Capt. John Biddle, 

in charge at Nashville, exercised his authority under Circular No. 18 (1896) and used the 

Corps barges and quarterboats near Dyersburg 

to rescue and shelter about one hundred people 

flooded out along west Tennessee’s Obion 

and Forked Deer rivers. Assistant Engineer 

Benjamin F. Cheatham, who had charge of the 

rescue operations at Dyersburg, was a son of the 

Confederate general of the same name. He left 

the Engineers in 1898 to serve in Cuba with the 

Quartermasters, and in 1925 he took command 

of the Army Quartermaster Corps.43

John A. Ockerson, the Mississippi River 

Commission’s senior engineer at its St. 

Louis headquarters, dispatched the steamers 

Minnetonka and Vidalia to rescue people flooded 

out between New Madrid and Memphis. Those 

two steamers in seven days saved 145 people 

along with their household effects and livestock. 

The Memphis-based steamboat Itasca picked up 

177 refugees and their 95 horses and mules, 173 

cattle, 82 hogs, and bundles of rescued household effects, while the survey boat Abbot brought 

out 63 people plucked from rooftops and trees. 

With no escape avenue other than these boats, 

many of the refugees might have drowned.44

•

Executive Initiative

In April 1897 Congress appropriated $200,000 

for Mississippi River flood relief at the request 

of President William McKinley. In making 

his request, McKinley reviewed the calamitous 

losses, then explained:

Under these conditions, and having exerted 

themselves to the fullest extent, the local 

authorities have reluctantly confessed their 
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Executive Initiative 51

inability to further cope with this distressing situation unaided by relief from the 

Government. It has therefore seemed to 

me that the representatives of the people 

should be promptly informed of the nature 

and extent of the suffering and the needs of 

these stricken people, and I have communicated these facts in the hope and belief that 

the legislative branch of the Government 

will promptly reinforce the work of the local 

authorities in the States named.45

Congress, not the executive branch, had initiated most disaster relief measures prior to 1897, 

after its members had received specific requests 

for aid from their constituents and a committee of Congress had investigated each situation. Presidents, such as Benjamin Harrison 

in 1889, had occasionally ordered the Army to 

take certain emergency measures, but the relief 

furnished during the Mississippi River flood of 

1897 was the first authorized at the request of a 

president who had investigated the disaster situation and had determined that the need for relief 

exceeded local resources.

President McKinley’s request did not go 

unopposed. Congressman Joseph Walker of 

Massachusetts protested any relief appropriation, declaring that he thought federal disaster 

assistance not only violated the Constitution 

but also presented an affront to the “manliness 

of the States involved.” Walker proclaimed that 

“there is nothing that could come to the citizens 

of those States that would have so good a moral 

and economic effect as to call upon them or 

rather have them to take care of their own people 

in the injuries now done, leaving them to do it.”46

Sydney Mudd of Maryland resented Walker’s 

opinion, asserting that Congress should 

never stand on technical construction of the 

Constitution when the issue was the relief of 

human suffering. “Men must be able to exist 

before they can prosper,” he said, “and I understand it is conceded that under the general welfare clause of the Constitution, Congress has the 

right to bring prosperity to this country.”47

In the Senate, William Bate of Tennessee preferred to transfer the mission of federal disaster 

relief from the Corps and the Quartermasters 

to the Marine Hospital Service, which was a 

Treasury Department bureau that administered 

marine hospitals for boatmen at St. Louis, 

Cairo, Louisville, Memphis, Vicksburg, New 

Orleans, and other ports. Arkansas Senator 

James Jones opposed such a transfer, contending 

that disaster relief should continue under War 

Department management. He reasoned:

The War Department has all along these 

rivers where the flood now prevails officers 

in charge of local works. It has boats, it has 

crews of men, it has officers already at work. 

The men are along the levees that have been 

threatened recently; they are in the overflowed districts; they are familiar with the 

local conditions everywhere, and they are 

the men of all others who know where aid 

ought to be rendered, where suffering is to 

be relieved, and where no relief is needed.48

Jones’s argument that the organization of the 

Corps of Engineers, with its strategically located 

civil works offices and trained and experienced 

personnel, was best suited to manage flood 

assistance prevailed in 1897. Congress enacted 

the appropriation requested by President 

McKinley, and the flood victims received 

the vital assistance dispensed by the Army 

Quartermasters and delivered by the Corps 

of Engineers. Although the Mississippi River 

floods were attention-grabbing, widespread 
52 Situation Desperate

disasters, the more localized disasters also 

received Corps assistance. Two of these exemplify the Corps’ emergency operations at the end 

of the nineteenth century.

•

Shawneetown Emergency , 1898

On 3 April 1898 the levee holding the flooded 

Ohio River out of Shawneetown, Illinois, 

suddenly failed. First reports said the failure 

drowned two hundred people, but more accurate 

information that followed reduced the number 

to fifty. The disaster left some two thousand 

residents of the town huddled without shelter 

or food along the top of the remaining levees 

and on nearby hills. Senator Shelby Cullom 

of Illinois appealed to the chief of engineers 

to hurry workboats to the site for rescue and 

relief. Ten minutes after receiving Cullom’s 

request, the chief had telegrams on the wires to 

the MRC districts at St. Louis and Memphis, 

directing them to rush boats to Shawneetown.49

Capt. H. E. Waterman at St. Louis ordered the 

steamboat Vidalia loaded with emergency supplies at Cairo for delivery to the stricken comResidents watched as floodwaters covered the streets of Shawneetown on 3 April 1898. The Corps rushed workboats to the town for rescue 

operations. Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-24140
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Brazos River & New Bern Floods 53

munity. Lt. Mason Patrick at Memphis sent the 

steamer Chisca north. After stopping at an inadequate clearance under the bridge at Cairo, the 

Chisca paused while its crew cut off its smokestacks, then proceeded on to Shawneetown. 

The two workboats retrieved the stranded 

townspeople and dispensed relief supplies in the 

vicinity for several days. When they departed, 

their crews carried formal letters of appreciation 

from the community.50

•

Brazos River & New Bern 

Floods , 1899

“Devastation great. Immense loss of life probable. Prompt actions very important,” warned 

the telegram sent by Governor Joseph Sayers of 

Texas to the secretary of war in July 1899. The 

governor went on: “Please immediately order by 

wire boats at Galveston to ascend rivers using 

launches and yawls to rescue people from the 

waters which are widespread over the lands of 

the lower Brazos.”51

During early July heavy rains had flooded the 

Brazos valley, the Cotton Belt of Texas. The 

widespread flooding drowned three hundred 

people and marooned a thousand or more on 

rooftops and in trees.52 Responding to this 

tragedy, the secretary of war replied to Governor 

Sayers’ telegram: “The Chief of Engineers 

will place at your order all boats available at 

Galveston and the commanding officer at San 

Antonio has been directed to place at your 

immediate disposal 10,000 rations and to confer 

with you as to points of delivery.”53

Capt. C. S. Riche, commanding at Galveston, 

dispatched eight men under direction of 

Assistant Engineer William Burke with four 

yawls, one life boat, and one skiff to the flooded 

area. He ordered Capt. W. W. Woolford, in 

charge of the tugboat Anna, to Velasco, five 

miles above the mouth of the Brazos. Burke 

and his team loaded the boats on railroad cars 

at Galveston and went to Sugar Land, where 

they launched their craft on 8 July to float down 

the Brazos. At no small personal hazard, they 

descended the river on the flood, dodging trees 

and floating debris. Listening carefully for signals from the trees and visiting every flooded 

homestead, they retrieved several bodies and 

picked up many people who had been stranded 

for days without food. They took these refugees 

to safety on high ground, where the Galveston 

Relief Committee furnished them shelter and 

subsistence.

Woolford aboard the Anna arrived at Velasco on 

9 July and continued upriver with relief supplies 

and the rescue yawls, constantly blowing the 

boat’s whistle to attract attention and stopping 

to search flooded homes. That first afternoon, 

the Anna saved forty people and took them 

to Brazoria. “Their condition was pitiable,” 

lamented Woolford.54

At daybreak the following day the Anna

resumed its rescue efforts. Woolford’s detailed 

report on the work illuminated the situation:

Our first work on this day was the rescue 

of a woman and her four children from the 

attic of their home, where they had been 

for several days without food except green 

“Devastation great. Immense loss of life 

probable. Prompt actions very important.”
54 Situation Desperate

corn. They were brought aboard the Anna 

and given every possible attention. A boat 

manned by Captain Chester and Brick 

Pomeroy was patrolling the bottom about 

three miles from the river. This boat party 

discovered a slight ridge on which about 

200 people had taken refuge. These people, 

too, were without provisions, except green 

corn. 50 of them were brought on board the 

Anna and the remainder, who preferred to 

stay where they were, were given provisions. 

A second trip was made in this vicinity and 

from two houses 17 people were rescued. 

A third boat party rescued 15 people from 

house tops about one mile from the river.55

After delivering the refugees to Columbia, 

where a local relief committee saw to their 

needs, the Anna returned to Galveston. The 

engineer commander at Galveston subsequently 

recommended that the Corps personnel who 

risked their lives in the rescue mission on the 

flooded river be awarded official commendations, but no records of an award survive.56

The last Corps disaster relief mission of the 

1800s occurred on 22 October 1899. The 

commander at Wilmington, Capt. E. W. Van 

Lucas, received an urgent request from the 

people of New Bern, North Carolina, for help 

with the rescue of marooned flood victims at 

Ocracoke on the outer banks. Under the discretionary authority of Circular No. 18 (1896) 

for emergency use of floating plant to save lives 

and property, Van Lucas dispatched the Corps 

steamer General George Thom to Ocracoke, 

The Brazos River flood nearly covered a railroad bridge outside of Richmond, Texas, in 1899.

Courtesy of the Fort Bend County Museum Association, Richmond, Texas
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Observations 55

where it saved the lives of thirty people. The 

Citizens’ Relief Committee of New Bern subsequently reimbursed the Corps for the cost of the 

rescue operation.57

•

Observations

At the dawn of the twentieth century, the 

Corps of Engineers had established a tradition 

of effective emergency response to natural disasters in the field and had become, along with 

the Quartermaster Corps, the Army’s preferred 

agency for the administration and performance 

of disaster assistance operations during major 

floods. The Corps’ civil works mission, with 

highly trained staff in offices dispersed throughout the nation, allowed it to respond quickly 

to any emergency, and its reputation for integrity and capability inspired the confidence of 

Congress and the public. Its specialty, of course, 

was flood disasters, but in the twentieth century 

it was tested also by earthquakes and fires.

•
56 Situation Desperate

1. Leland R. Johnson, “19th Century Engineering: 

The Johnstown Flood,” Military Engineer 66 (Jan. 

1974): 42–45; David McCullough, The Johnstown 

Flood (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1968), 

passim; John Bach McMaster, “The Johnstown 

Flood,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History 58 

(1933): 209–43, 316–54.

2. New York Times, 3 June and 5 June 1889.

3. ARCE (1889), 475–76; McCullough, The 

Johnstown Flood, 20.

4. Johnstown flood reports are in files 2420–A, 

3401–A, 2429–A, 2430–A, 2601–A, 2489–A, 

2651–A, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received and Sent, 1889.” See especially 

Clinton Sears after-action report of 15 June 1889 

in 2651–A.

5. Ibid.; Richard O’Connor, Johnstown: The Day the 

Dam Broke (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Co., 

1957), 225.

6. James H. Walker, The Johnstown Horror!!! 

(Philadelphia: H. L. Warren & Co., 1889), 447–

48; Clinton Sears after-action report, 15 June 1889, 

NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, “Letters 

Received and Sent, 1889,” file 2651–A.

7. Foster Rhea Dulles, The American Red Cross: A 

History (New York: Harper & Bros., 1950), 30–31.

8. Clinton Sears after-action report, 15 June 1889, 

NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, “Letters 

Received and Sent, 1889,” file 2651–A.

9. Ibid.; New York Times, 14 June 1889.

10. New York Times, 9 and 11 June 1889; Arthur Kirk, 

“Use of Dynamite in Breaking up the Jam at 

Johnstown,” Transactions of the Engineers Society of 

Western Pennsylvania 5 (1889): 123–48.

11. Clinton Sears after-action report, 15 June 1889, 

NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, “Letters 

Received and Sent, 1889,” file 2651–A.

12. Dulles, American Red Cross, 30–31.

13. ARCE (1890), 3294.

14. Ibid., 3271.

15. House Committee on Rivers and Harbors, Floods 

in the Mississippi River, 51st Cong., 2d sess., 1890, 

H. Exdoc. 281, passim.

16. ARCE (1890), 3256–61.

17. “The Mississippi Floods,” Harper’s Weekly 34 (19 

Apr. 1890): 307; Robert W. Harrison, Levee 

Districts and Levee Building in Mississippi

(Greenville: Mississippi Levee Commission, 1951), 

112–16.

18. ARCE (1890), 3255–56.

19. Arthur Hider to Willard Young, 29 Mar. 1890, 

NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, “Letters 

Received, 1890,” File 2723.

20. Willard Young to Chief of Engineers, 15 May 

1890, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, 1890,” Files 3524 and 3608.

21. ARCE (1890), 3316–23.

22. Ibid., 3289–93.

23. Congressional Record, 51st Cong., 2d sess., 1890, 

2821–23.

24. Chief Clerk Schmidt to Chief of Engineers, 23 

Apr. 1890, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“Letters Received, 1890,” File 3127.

25. Congressional Record, 51st Cong., 2d sess., 1890, 

3822–25; “The Mississippi Floods,” Harper’s 

Weekly 34 (22 Mar. 1890): 219; House Committee 

on Rivers and Harbors, Floods Upon the Mississippi 

River, 51st Cong., 2d sess., 1890, H. Exdoc. 291, 

passim; House Committee on Appropriations, 

Affairs in the Overflowed Districts of Louisiana, 51st 

Cong., 2d sess., 1890, H. Exdoc. 342, passim.

26. See reports in NARA, RG 77, Engineer 

Department, “General Correspondence, 1894–

1923” [hereafter Entry 103], File 100210.

27. NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 19255 contains 

reports on the 1896 Chippewa Falls Incident; New 

York Times, 3, 4, 5 Dec. 1896.

28. City Attorney of Chippewa Falls to Adjutant 

General, 25 Jan. 1897, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, 

File 19255.

29. W. A. Jones to Chief of Engineers, 1 Mar. 1897, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 19255.

30. Ibid.

31. John Wilson to Adjutant General, 13 Feb. 1897, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 19255.

32. W. A. Jones to Chief of Engineers, 28 Apr. 1897, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 19255; 

Minneapolis Journal, 12 Apr. 1897.

33. New York Times, 10 Apr. 1897; Congressional 

Record, 55th Cong., 1st sess., 1897, 1469.

34. Harrison, Levee Districts and Levee Building, 140–

53; ARCE (1897), 3523–27.

35. William King to Chief of Engineers, 1 May 1897, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 20784.

36. Each officer’s after-action report is printed in 

ARCE (1897).

37. ARCE (1897), 3705–07.

38. Ibid., 3730–32.

39. Ibid., 3743–47.

40. Ibid., 3812–23.

41. Ibid., 3813.

42. Ibid., 3812–23.

43. John Biddle to Chief of Engineers, 8 Apr. 1897, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 20413.

44. ARCE (1897), 3663–67, 3709–10.

45. Congressional Record, 55th Cong., 1st sess., 1897, 

636–40, 648–50.

46. Ibid.

47. Ibid.

48. Ibid.

Chapter 3 Notes
The Corps Builds A Tradition ■ Notes 57

49. New York Times, 4, 5, 6 Apr. 1898; Shelby Cullom 

to Secretary of War, 4 Apr. 1898, NARA, RG 77, 

Entry 103, File 21730.

50. After-action reports by Captain Waterman and 

Lieutenant Patrick are in NARA, RG 77, Entry 

103, File 21730. After repeated flood disasters, 

capped by the 1937 inundation, the people of 

Shawneetown moved to higher elevations.

51. Joseph Sayers to Secretary of War, 5 July 1899, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 31748.

52. New York Times, 1–12 July 1899.

53. New York Times, 7 July 1899.

54. C. S. Riche to Chief of Engineers, 6 Sept. 1899, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 31748.

55. Ibid.

56. Ibid.

57. E. W. Van Lucas to Chief of Engineers, 8 Sept. 

1899, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 32620.
Right: Freight yards and warehouses were flooded in Kansas City, 1903.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-47149

Above: One of the dynamite crews 

charged with bringing down unsafe walls 

in San Francisco, 1906.

Library of Congress, 

LC-USZ62-52426

Right: The Army blasted dangerous and 

precarious structures in San Francisco, 

1906.

Courtesy of The Museum of the 

City of San Francisco

Below: The National Guard kept back the crowd during 

the Baltimore fire, 1904.

Library of Congress, LC-DIG-npcc-18736
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Galveston Hurricane 59

Disaster Mission Expansion , 

1900–10

During the nineteenth century most 

Corps of Engineers disaster missions 

were responses to flooding, but in 

the early twentieth century the Corps’ assignments included responses to various types of 

disasters. Soon after the 1900s began, the Corps 

was tested by a great hurricane, a shocking 

earthquake, and urban wildfires, along with a 

panoply of smaller emergencies that presented 

new challenges to Corps civilian specialists, 

engineer troops, and the headquarters command. All responded splendidly with one 

exception: when the most powerful hurricane 

of the era struck Galveston, Texas, the Corps 

of Engineers’ response was entirely inadequate, 

principally because the storm destroyed all 

available Corps equipment and facilities in the 

Galveston area.

•

Galveston Hurricane , 1900

In number of lives taken, the Galveston hurricane of 8 September 1900 remains the most 

devastating natural disaster in American history. No one knows how strong the storm’s 

winds were—the storm blew away the official 

anemometer after it recorded ninety-six miles 

per hour. Barometric pressure dropped to 28.48, 

the lowest recorded to that date, and the tide at 

Galveston reached epic proportions. High winds 

and tides put the highest point of Galveston 

Island under five feet of water and wiped out the 

city. At least six thousand died.1

Although the engineer office at Galveston had 

performed well during the Brazos River flood of 

1899, it was completely unable to respond to the 

hurricane of 1900. The storm destroyed its office 

building, drowned some of its personnel along 

with their families, and sank or disabled its 

fleet. Even its giant seagoing dredge Comstock

was beached high and dry.2

 Nearby Corps 

facilities also suffered the storm’s devastation. 

E. N. Sanctuary, in charge of the Sabine River 

sub-office, for example, relayed the following sad 

report to headquarters: “I regret to report the loss 

of all property in my charge excepting the launch. 

My office building has entirely disappeared and 

even the Life-Saving Station is ruined. We are 

hunting for property and I sincerely hope I may 

recover some of the instruments.”3

The coastal artillery fortifications at Galveston 

were destroyed along with everything else. 

An officer stationed in Galveston the day of 

the disaster dispatched to headquarters a vivid 

description of the losses:

Island entirely inundated, water five 

feet deep on highest ground on Island. 

All bridges swept away, nearly all docks 

wrecked, water works, electric light works, 

every telegraph wire in city destroyed, 

over five thousand residences demolished 

4

“I regret to report the loss of all property in 

my charge excepting the launch. My office 

building has entirely disappeared...”
60 Situation Desperate

.... Loss of life probably will never be 

known. I fear it will reach three thousand. 

Fortifications at Travis, Crockett, and San 

Jacinto practically destroyed; guns can be 

saved .... No article of government property 

saved; men and officers are absolutely 

destitute.4

The officer’s estimate was greatly exceeded as 

final tallies of those killed topped six thousand, 

and the Corps of Engineers was unable to provide any immediate disaster assistance to the 

Galveston community.

To manage the recovery operations, the surviving people of Galveston established a commission, with each member in charge of a separate 

task: body recovery and disposal, relief supply 

distribution, finances, and so forth. This organization proved so effective in the exigencies that 

the city continued it after its recovery efforts 

ended, and later political scientists generally 

recognized it as the original commission form of 

city government.5

The commission printed public appeals for aid 

in newspapers throughout the country, and 

their appeals met with overwhelming response 

from individuals, businesses, and communities. 

Andrew Carnegie sent $20,000; Standard Oil 

gave $10,000; even the people of Johnstown 

contributed. All told, private relief contributions 

amounted to $2.5 million. Clara Barton and 

the American Red Cross provided major aid for 

Galveston, Barton’s last act of charitable service 

in the disaster field.6

President William McKinley directed the secretary of war to furnish any quartermaster rations 

or tents needed at Galveston, and the Army 

shipped tons of these supplies to the island from 

Fort Sam Houston. So immense were the private 

donations, however, that there was little actual 

need for Army supplies. When Army troops, 

who had been performing street security duty, 

withdrew from Galveston on 15 September, 

they reported no continuing suffering of any 

kind in the city; indeed, there were “more physicians than patients.” Congress appropriated no 

funds for the relief of Galveston, nor does it 

appear that the Corps of Engineers furnished 

any immediate disaster assistance.7

The Corps’ contribution lay principally in 

the Galveston recovery and reconstruction 

program—the planning for construction of a 

A dredge boat was stranded three miles from sea after the 

Galveston hurricane of 1900.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-68828

“Island entirely inundated, water five feet deep on highest ground...every 

telegraph wire in city destroyed, over five thousand residences demolished.”
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Bridging the Kansas River 61

huge seawall and subsequently raising the island’s 

level to protect it against future hurricanes. This 

immense project, completed in 1904, was tested 

and proved successful during many later hurricanes, notably the great hurricane of 1915.8

During the 1915 hurricane, Galveston Engineer 

District again lost a great part of its floating plant. Its commander reported the dredge 

Barnard had sunk and sixteen of its crew 

drowned. The remainder of the crew somehow stayed afloat in rough water for twenty 

hours, washing ashore twenty miles west of 

Galveston. The district’s schooner, Dora Allison, 

was dashed to smithereens against the walls 

of Fort Crockett, but its master and crew were 

saved through heroic efforts by Company E, 

2d Engineer Battalion, commanded by Capt. 

Ulysses S. Grant III at Fort Crockett.9

•

Bridging the Kansas River , 

1903

Other engineer troops distinguished themselves 

during an emergency bridging mission that was 

reminiscent of the work performed by troops at 

Following the hurricane, the Corps of Engineers and Galveston County planned, designed, and built new sea walls to protect the city of Galveston.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-124585
62 Situation Desperate

Johnstown in 1889. A major flood struck the 

Kansas (or Kaw) River in 1903 above where 

it joins the Missouri River at Kansas City. As 

much as fifteen inches of rain fell over the 

Kaw River basin in late May 1903, flooding 

Lawrence, Topeka, Manhattan, and Kansas 

City. Homes bobbing off downriver left twentytwo thousand people without shelter. The floating buildings smashed into bridges, destroying 

all crossings over the Kansas River except the 

Missouri Pacific Railroad bridge, which was 

saved by weighting it down from end to end 

with locomotives.10

Congressmen and Kansas City’s mayor appealed 

to the secretary of war to send assistance. 

“Kansas City, with a population of sixty thousand, has one fourth of the people rendered 

homeless by reason of the floods,” declared 

the mayor. “We need food, shelter and police 

protection. Give authority to the commander of 

Fort Leavenworth to issue all rations and tents 

called for by the Mayor of this city and also furnish soldiers for police protection.”11

Fort Leavenworth’s commander, by orders of 

the secretary of war, issued thousands of rations, 

plus tents, cots, and blankets, and sent two 

companies from the 6th Infantry to restore order 

in Kansas City.12 Companies A and C of the 

1st Engineer Battalion were ordered from Fort 

Leavenworth to Lawrence, Kansas, to install a 

temporary bridge. Captains Thomas Rees and 

C. A. F. Flagler commanded the companies, 

assisted by Lieutenants Robert Ralston, Horton 

Stickle, Nathaniel Bower, and Laurence Frazier. 

Rees in 1889 had commanded one of the engineer bridging details sent to Johnstown.13

Flooded, muddy roads mired the engineers 

and their mule-drawn wagons transporting 

the bridge equipage, and when they reached 

Lawrence they found their 225 feet of ponton 

equipment insufficient to bridge the 700 feet 

of channel between north and south Lawrence. 

In this exigency they innovated, devising and 

constructing a “flying ferry” to be driven back 

and forth across the river by the current. They 

decked two ponton boats to form a platform 

large enough to contain three wagons and 

teams and attached this platform by cable to an 

upstream anchorage on the bank. By changing 

the angle of the boat’s hull to the current, the 

engineers ferried a steady line of people and 

wagons back and forth over the stream. Several 

troops operated the ferry until mid-July, while 

the remaining troops went to work with their 

wagons and teams to clear away flood debris.14

The secretary of war had also ordered Company 

B, 1st Engineer Battalion, with Capt. Herbert 

Deakyne commanding, from Fort Leavenworth 

to Kansas City, where the mayor requested 

that they bridge the Kansas River between the 

two Kansas Citys. Having only nine pontons, 

Deakyne planned to bridge the 678-foot-wide 

river with pontons over the deep channel and 

temporary trestles over the shallows. The mayor 

promised to furnish old barges for use as pontons and to supply timbers for construction of 

the temporary trestles. Yet, days passed and the 

mayor supplied nothing.

Maj. Smith Leach, commanding 1st Engineer 

Battalion, inspected Company B and found 

them loitering. Concerned by the mayor’s 

non-cooperation, Leach commented, “Every 

morning it is stated that a dozen things will 

begin right after dinner, and every afternoon 

it is again stated that the same dozen things 

will be begun immediately after breakfast in 

the morning. Meanwhile, several dinners and 
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Bridging the Kansas River 63

During the 1903 flood at Kansas City, locomotives parked on the Missouri Pacific Railroad bridge helped prevent the flood and 

debris from taking out the bridge. National Archives, 77-RH-34E-1

.-

I I 

, . 

~~; ~ " l\ ' 

:,' .' . · ... ; • .,~ 11' '.' . :.' \ ~ 

-.... I • -• -

- .. .. , . 
64 Situation Desperate

breakfasts have passed and they have not yet 

been begun.” Leach proposed withdrawing 

Company B if Kansas City authorities did not 

soon provide the materials.15

Seeing his mission might fail, Deakyne 

requested help from the Corps civil works 

office at Kansas City, calling on its commander, 

Capt. Hiram Chittenden. Chittenden was 

employing the snagboats Suter and McPherson

to clear flood debris from the navigable channels of the Kansas and Missouri rivers, and at 

Deakyne’s request he directed the snagboat 

crews to pull old barges out of the flood debris, 

pump water out of them, and tow them to the 

temporary bridge site. Deakyne and the troops 

then caulked and repaired them for service as 

pontons. The troops also retrieved usable timbers from the flood debris for supports in the 

trestle bridge section.16

Company B had the pontons and barges in place 

and a pile driver pounding bents into place for 

the trestle section by 20 June. A twenty-six-foot 

span to join the last ponton in the floating section to the last trestle bent was needed to open 

the bridge. Deakyne quickly designed a timber 

span that would carry a twenty-eight-thousandpound load, and the engineers built it and had it 

in place by 22 June.

A railroad tank car came floating down on the 

flood, threatening to smash the new bridge, but 

the bridge’s guards had the presence of mind 

to move the pontons and let it pass through 

the open gap. Working throughout the night, 

Company B reassembled the bridge and put 

in back in service. Leaving Sgt. John Law 

and a detail to care for the pontons, Deakyne 

then returned with his weary troops to Fort 

Leavenworth.17

The St. Louis and San Francisco Railroad freight yard in Kansas City was nearly destroyed by the floods of 1903.

NOAA Photo Library
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Baltimore Fire 65

The after-action reports on the 1903 Kansas 

River flood emphasized the military value of 

the training obtained during disaster assistance 

operations. Leach pointed out several weaknesses in standard bridge equipage that he 

discovered during the disaster operations, and 

the chief of engineers promptly remedied these 

defects by revising the contract specifications 

issued for ponton equipment. Leach also recommended that the experience secured while building the flying ferry at Lawrence be incorporated 

into the engineer field manual for military 

bridge construction, and the chief of engineers 

ordered it done.18

•

Baltimore Fire , 1904

Maj. Edward Burr at Washington Barracks in 

the District of Columbia answered the telephone just after noon on 7 February 1904. The 

caller, the Army’s chief of staff, instructed him 

to proceed immediately to Baltimore, Maryland, 

which was on fire. After reporting to Mayor 

Robert McLane, Burr was to demolish buildings 

to create a firebreak, aiming to stop the winddriven flames that were consuming the city.

Burr located Capt. Claudius Gillette, Lt. 

George Pillsbury, and Lt. Edward Dent, and all 

boarded the next train to Baltimore. Burr left 

orders for Capt. James McIndoe to follow them 

A National Guardsman patrolled the northeastern edge of the fire line on East Baltimore Street during the 1904 fire.

Courtesy of Enoch Pratt Free Library/State Library Resource Center, Baltimore, Md.
66 Situation Desperate

quickly with detachments from Company G and 

Company H of 2d Engineer Battalion and to 

bring a supply of high explosives. At Baltimore, 

Burr and his associates met the mayor and fire 

chief and went with them to the fire front. 

McIndoe, with ninety enlisted men and ample 

explosives, caught the train to Baltimore and 

reported to Burr at 4 pm.

By the time the troops arrived, however, Burr 

and the mayor had decided that demolishing 

buildings was unnecessary. The municipal fire 

department was checking the advance of the 

flames, and the National Guard had evacuated 

and secured the fire district. Because people 

were excluded from the area, the standing but 

damaged buildings did not constitute such an 

imminent threat to life that their demolition was 

required, and the mayor wanted careful study of 

the buildings made before they were destroyed.

After advising Baltimore officials on the 

proper demolition procedures for removing the 

burned buildings, Burr withdrew the engineer 

troops, catching the train back to Washington. 

Baltimore’s mayor subsequently extended his 

commendation to Burr for the expert advice. 

Although demolition had not been required to 

stop the fire at Baltimore, the engineers’ timely 

response had been impressive.19

Taking advantage of the opportunity to study 

the effects of fire on so-called fireproof buildings, the chief of engineers sent Capt. John 

Sewell to Baltimore to inspect the structures and 

identify methods for improving fire-resistant 

features. Sewell’s report was later used by the 

Corps and by the insurance underwriters association to improve structural fire safety designs.20

•

San Francisco Earthquake , 

1906

Brig. Gen. Frederick Funston, commanding the Army Department of California, was 

awakened by the quake, later identified as 8.3 

on the Richter scale, at 5:15 on the morning 

of 18 April 1906. While dressing, he walked 

out of his home and saw smoke columns rising from downtown San Francisco. Striding 

quickly down the street toward the city, he saw 

the fires were out of control, water mains were 

broken, and the fire department was helpless. 

He decided to order out troops to guard federal 

property and to aid the municipal police and 

fire departments. Because telephone lines were 

down, he sent his orders by mounted messenger to the Presidio and to Capt. Meriwether 

Walker, commanding at Fort Mason.21

Walker, of the Corps of Engineers, had also 

been awakened by the quake, but, seeing 

no damage to Fort Mason, had returned to 

bed. Soon he was reawakened by the messenger pounding at his door with orders from 

Funston to report with all available troops to 

the City Hall of Justice. He roused his officers, 

Capt. William Kelly and Lieutenants Arthur 

Ehrnbeck, A. D. Barber, and Thomas H. 

Emerson, plus 150 troops of Companies C and 

D, 1st Engineer Battalion.22

Carrying rifles and twenty rounds of ammunition per man, the detachment set off at doublestep. Thirty minutes later, the first troops to 

arrive in the devastated city reached the Hall of 

Justice where they reported to Funston. “The 

arrival of these troops,” Funston later commented, “was greeted with demonstrations of 

approval by the many people on the streets.” 
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ San Francisco Earthquake 67

Following the engineers came detachments of 

artillery, infantry, and cavalry. The Marines and 

Navy landed. The California National Guard 

was called out. Assistance to San Francisco 

involved all branches of the armed services.23

Once these troops began street security patrols, 

Funston telegraphed a message to Secretary of 

War William H. Taft: “We need thousands of 

tents and all rations that can be sent. Business 

portion of city destroyed and about 100,000 

people homeless. Fire still raging; troops all on 

duty assisting police. Loss of life probably 1,000. 

Best part of residential district not yet burned 

.... I shall do everything in my power to render 

assistance, and trust to War Department to 

authorize any action I may have to take.”24

Secretary Taft ordered tents and rations sent to 

San Francisco from all military depots on the 

West Coast, and he telegraphed Funston: “Of 

course, do everything possible to assist in keeping order, in saving life and property, and in 

relieving hunger ....”25

The troops on street patrol had strict orders to 

“keep the crowds moving on, to allow no one to 

enter buildings unless satisfactorily identified as 

proprietor, to keep people away from the buildings as much as possible to avoid danger from 

falling debris, and to allow no one to go through 

the lines toward the fire unless passed by an 

officer.”26

“...do everything possible to assist in 

keeping order, in saving life and property, 

and in relieving hunger.”

Army officers were in charge of dynamiting on Van Ness Street in San Francisco, 1906.

U.S. Geological Survey, Photograph by R. B. Marshall
68 Situation Desperate

The troops enforced these orders rigorously. Col. 

William Harts, for example, was the Corps officer managing the California Debris Commission, 

and he learned the fire was threatening the commission’s office at the Flood Building. He tried 

to reach the building in time to save the commission’s records, but he could not pass through the 

line of troops in time and the fire destroyed the 

records along with the building.27

The 1st Engineer Battalion performed security 

duty through the night with meager rations 

and no sleep. Barber had to disperse looters in a 

liquor store and Ehrnbeck had to chase drunks 

from a boarding house, but the crowds generally 

were quiet, even somber. Although the Army 

subsequently was censured for its security activities, it was the police and National Guardsmen 

who shot nine looters, not the regular troops.28

The street security patrols were far from routine, 

however, and after the fire department began 

blowing buildings in an effort to check the 

spreading fires, Kelly, commanding the engineers patrolling Montgomery Street, became 

concerned. Later, he penned a vivid description 

of what he saw:

Much of the effect was lost in breaking 

windows, and tumbling down bricks, etc. 

that had been loosened by the earthquake 

Dangerous free-standing walls and other buildings in San Francisco had to be demolished for reasons of safety.

Courtesy of The Museum of the City of San Francisco
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ San Francisco Earthquake 69

on buildings within a radius of five blocks 

from the blast. About the same time the 

gas in the sewers began to explode. I saw 

a manhole cover at the corner of Bush 

and Montgomery streets blown at least 

50 feet in the air. In front of the Russ 

House either the gas main or the sewer 

blew up under a horse and buggy, throwing the horse down and overturning the 

buggy. Fortunately the asphalt pavement 

prevented any fragments from flying. 

Between the blasts and the exploding 

sewers Montgomery street became a very 

uncomfortable place.29

By ten that morning a rising wind drove the 

flames toward the west, forcing the engineer 

troops to retreat before them. Seeing the fires 

had gotten out of control, Walker volunteered 

to take his command to Van Ness Street and 

begin dynamiting houses to create a firebreak. 

When he reached Van Ness Street, however, he 

learned that the city had exhausted its supply of 

explosives. At this juncture, he received orders 

from Funston to return quickly with the troops 

to Fort Mason.30

While Walker and his detachment were on 

street patrols, Lt. Jarvis Bain with twenty-four 

troops remained at Fort Mason, where a mass 

of refugees came in search of water, food, and 

shelter. Bain erected tents, filled them with the 

refugees, then filled the barracks, and still they 

came. Bain thought the refugees a disorderly lot, 

and he and his detail patrolled the area throughout the night to avert riots. On the morning of 

19 April, the county’s convicts came to the fort, 

driven by fire from the jail, further complicating Bain’s situation. The crowd clamored for 

food, water, and blankets. Distributing what 

supplies he found in the post’s commissary, 

Bain opened the post hospital to care for the 

sick and injured.31

When the engineer troops returned from 

security patrols, they built more latrines in the 

fort and put up more tents as materials arrived. 

By evening the crowd had consumed the fort’s 

foodstuffs and requested more. Bain later 

described how this nutritional challenge was 

resolved:

About 9 pm a boat from Stockton passed 

our dock loaded with supplies and Lieut. 

Barber who was on the dock succeeded in 

getting from it a large number of blankets 

and some food. Then came the task of getting these supplies up to the Post. Civilian 

wagons were seized, but the horses were 

so tired out and weak for want of food and 

water that men had to be sent with each 

wagon to help it up the hill. This work was 

not completed till 3 am April 20th 1906, 

but it made it possible to issue food to the 

refugees at breakfast time that morning and 

this marked the end of all real suffering for 

want of food at Fort Mason.32

In addition to Walker’s command at Fort 

Mason, three other engineer officers were 

“...either the gas main or the sewer blew up under a horse and buggy, throwing 

the horse down and overturning the buggy. ... Between the blasts and the 

exploding sewers Montgomery street became a very uncomfortable place.”
70 Situation Desperate

stationed in San Francisco at the time of the 

earthquake: Harts of the California Debris 

Commission, Col. William Heuer of the San 

Francisco engineer office, and Col. Charles 

McKinstry, chief engineer of the Army’s Pacific 

Division. All worked in various capacities to 

help the stricken city. McKinstry inspected 

structural damages to buildings; Harts handled 

relief supply for the quartermasters; and Heuer 

dynamited buildings to create firebreaks.33

At noon on 19 April the advancing fires made it 

necessary to blow away all buildings on the east 

side of Van Ness Street between Golden Gate 

Avenue and the Pacific Ocean, a distance of a 

mile, and all available explosives were rushed to 

the action. The Navy brought a ton and a half 

of explosive gun cotton from Mare Island, and 

Heuer commandeered three hundred pounds 

of dynamite from the San Francisco engineer 

office. Even field artillery was employed, firing 

high explosive shells pointblank into the buildings. Determined to create a firebreak no matter 

the costs, the military destroyed about $1 million worth of buildings.34

The engineer troops in the meantime fought to 

save Fort Mason from destruction. Walker saw a 

fire roaring toward the fort at dawn on 20 April. 

He turned out a dynamiting detail to prepare 

for action while the remaining troops tore down 

the fences and outhouses between the fort and 

the advancing flames. Soldiers formed bucket 

brigades to douse the sparks flying onto the 

buildings.35

Walker asked the Navy and the Quartermaster 

Corps to send their fire tugs Fortune and 

General Mifflin to the Fort Mason dock. 

Scavenging fifteen hundred feet of city fire hose 

found heaped on Van Ness Street, the engineers 

ran the hose from the fire tugs to Fort Mason 

and up the hill to a fire engine left in the street 

by exhausted firemen. The troops, some of 

whom had once worked in fire departments, 

put the engine back in service. The fire tugs at 

the dock pumped water directly from the bay 

through the hose to the fire engine, where the 

engineers sprayed water to depress the fire along 

Van Ness Street to prevent it jumping across the 

firebreak gap. They contained the flames at Van 

Ness and finally checked its spread on 21 April, 

perhaps saving the western section of the city 

from destruction.36

In his post-disaster report to the Army’s Pacific 

Division commander, Harts estimated the 

earthquake and fire had destroyed thirty-four 

Company D of the 20th U.S. Regulars takes a meal break in one of the burned 

districts of San Francisco. Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-58756
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Recovery Work at San Francisco 71

hundred acres and more than $300 million 

worth of property and caused about five hundred fatalities. Subsequent official Red Cross 

figures listed 498 fatalities, 415 major injuries, 

28,188 homes destroyed, and three hundred 

thousand people left homeless.37

•

Recovery Work at 

San Francisco

Offers of assistance poured into San Francisco. 

At the White House, President Theodore 

Roosevelt moved to expedite matters even 

though he was mindful of the political and legal 

implications: “I do not intend that any red tape 

shall interfere with at once succoring the San 

Francisco people in their dire need,” he addressed 

Mabel Boardman of the Red Cross, “but we 

have to remember that when once the emergency 

is over there will be plenty of fools and plenty 

of knaves to make accusations against us, and 

plenty of good people who will believe them.”38

The president offered California Governor 

George Pardee the federal government’s full 

support and called for charitable contributions 

to be sent to the Red Cross at San Francisco. 

His impulsive announcement that the Red Cross 

would handle private relief donations caused 

consternation at San Francisco, where a local 

relief coordinating committee had formed to 

manage the funds. Roosevelt then issued a second public notice asking that private relief funds 

go to the San Francisco committee instead of 

the Red Cross.39

Congress enacted a joint resolution authorizing 

the secretary of war to issue up to $1 million 

worth of quartermaster supplies at San Francisco 

and directing the secretaries of treasury, navy, 

commerce, and labor to cooperate fully with 

recovery efforts. By the time Congress acted, the 

Army had $1.5 million worth of rations, tents, 

bedding, and medical supplies in or on the way 

to San Francisco. The secretary of war asked for 

an additional $1.5 million in disaster assistance 

funding, and Congress approved his request.

Senator Francis Newlands introduced a bill 

on 2 May to loan up to $150 million to San 

Francisco for its reconstruction and rehabilitation. His bill failed, however, after the Senate 

Committee on Finance reported it was beyond 

“the legitimate province of Congressional 

action.”40

Maj. Gen. Adolphus Greely, famed Arctic 

explorer and former chief signal officer of the 

Army, commanded the Pacific Division in 

1906 and was en route to Washington at the 

time of the earthquake. He arrived back at San 

Francisco on 21 April and, at the request of the 

mayor and governor, took charge of relief and 

recovery efforts. Greely told Secretary of War 

Taft that the situation demanded unified control 

and the secretary agreed to let him manage it 

without interference. Taft warned Greely that 

he “must not be blind to proper limitations upon 

our actions.”41

Greely opened his disaster headquarters at 

Fort Mason, where the 1st Engineer Battalion 

“...there will be plenty of fools and plenty 

of knaves to make accusations against us, 

and plenty of good people who will 

believe them.”
72 Situation Desperate

was caring for twenty thousand refugees. The 

engineers had doubled the kitchen force to 

operate a continuous mess. They had converted 

their barracks to hospitals, established orderly 

tent camps, and hauled in potable water aboard 

Navy ammunition barges. They dug latrines 

and impressed able-bodied refugees to clean the 

camps of garbage and litter.

Many civilians volunteered to help the troops 

care for the refugees, but some of their assistance apparently was misdirected. “I was very 

much hindered by some persons who wore red 

crosses,” lamented Bain, “and who demanded 

all kinds of assistance and favors themselves, 

and who were working apparently alone and 

without organization of any kind. Others of 

the Red Cross ... did great work and much to 

alleviate the sufferings of the victims of the 

conflagration.”42

During recovery operations, Greely thought it 

might be necessary for the Army to restore the 

city’s public utilities and transportation, and 

he assigned Heuer, Harts, and McKinstry to 

plan the restoration. These engineer officers, 

after investigation, reported that utility and 

transportation companies were handling the 

crisis promptly so they furnished only technical advice to local officials. Their discretion 

proved fortunate because the mayor and his 

associates were later indicted for accepting a 

bribe from a transportation company during 

the emergency.43

Army-issued tents provided shelter for tens of thousands of refugees following the San Francisco quake and fire in 1906.

Courtesy of The Museum of the City of San Francisco
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Recovery Work at San Francisco 73

One lesson the Army and the Corps of 

Engineers learned during the disaster was the 

value of motor vehicle transport during emergencies. Two hundred private automobiles in 

the city were impressed into public service and 

used by Army and local officials for damage 

surveys and recovery coordination. The officials 

found they could cover much more ground in 

automobiles than by horse. According to the San 

Francisco Chronicle, “the automobile played an 

all but indispensable part in saving the western 

part of San Francisco, and at the same time has 

proved invaluable in the serious business of governing the city through its greatest stress.”44

Greely ordered Harts, Walker, Emerson, and 

an engineer detachment to cooperate with city 

authorities demolishing weakened and unsafe 

buildings. The city engineer asked them to 

dynamite twelve buildings, but Harts objected 

in two cases. One building was located only a 

hundred feet from the central gas and electric 

plant, and Harts did not want to chance further 

damage to utility services. The second was the 

cupola of the Hall of Justice, which, after careful 

inspection, Harts concluded was structurally 

sound.

The demolition began, however, on ten other 

buildings. At one site, the McCormick Hotel at 

Turk and Market Streets, Sergeant Robbins of 

the 1st Engineer Battalion was setting a charge 

in the basement when the entire building, eight 

stories tall, collapsed. By chance, several girders 

arched over him, sheltering him against the falling bricks and masonry. The troops ran to him, 

dug him from the debris, and rushed him to the 

hospital, where he was pronounced uninjured. 

“His escape was marvelous,” said Harts, “and his 

courage during his rescue was admirable.” After 

Robbins’ narrow escape, Harts assembled his 

troops and told them that thereafter the work 

would be entirely voluntary. The entire detachment volunteered, and the remaining buildings 

went down without incident.45

In his after-action report, Harts was highly 

critical of the demolition methods used by local 

authorities during efforts to create firebreaks. 

Lacking sufficient dynamite, the local authorities had substituted black blasting powder, 

which merely started new fires. They had also 

blown buildings that were already aflame, thus 

scattering fire brands. The lack of central control had hampered the demolition and, Harts 

believed, had resulted in the loss of several city 

blocks that might have been saved. “Had the 

The Pacific Engineer Division staff designed pre-fabricated buildings to 

house San Francisco’s homeless. The Red Cross had many of them built in 

Lobos Square. California Historical Society

“His escape was marvelous and his courage 

during his rescue was admirable.”
74 Situation Desperate

dynamiting work been placed in the hands of 

the Engineer troops at the first,” he boasted, 

“these soldiers, who are drilled in just this kind 

of work, could have easily held the fire much 

farther back, even without water.”46

Greely placed forty-five Army officers in charge 

of relief supply distribution under the command of Col. Lea Febiger. Febiger divided San 

Francisco into seven administrative sectors, each 

supervised by a senior officer assisted by several 

junior officers. Harts took charge of the fourth 

sector, where he found private charities issuing 

relief supplies without system or coordination, 

creating a situation ripe for abuse by rogues 

moving from one source of supplies to another. 

Harts consolidated the relief effort, reducing the 

distribution stations from forty to twenty-eight. 

He established an identification card system for 

ration recipients and ledger accounting for issues 

to families, thus putting a stop to “repeating.”47

Harts also learned that supplies were being “lost” 

while delivery wagons transported them from 

depots to the dispensing stations. He reduced 

these losses by instituting a strict accounting 

system for teamsters and by sending a soldier 

to guard each wagon during the trips. During 

the first week of recovery, the Army supervised 

the daily issue of 245,379 rations. Through 

tight controls and as a result of revived business 

activities, the daily ration issues were gradually 

The damage to the city was extensive. Many buildings in the area north of Bush 

Street and east of Grant Avenue were completely destroyed.

U.S. Army photograph
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Recovery Work at San Francisco 75

reduced, declining to 44,289 by 31 May, and on 

1 July Greely closed the food relief mission.48

Greely also assigned the engineers a role in 

providing temporary housing. One camp 

site chosen by the engineers in Lobos Park 

at Buchanan and Bay streets was assigned to 

Kelly and Emerson. The two designed the camp 

with 850 wall tents, four shower bathhouses, 

four large mess buildings, an administration 

and storage building, and the necessary number 

of privies. The officers obtained the construction materials and directed the two-hundredman force that built it. With water piped in 

from an artesian well, the camp was ready for 

occupancy by 1 May.49

In the area east of Kearney Street, the Mills Building (at left) remained standing 

amid the rubble. U.S. Army photograph
76 Situation Desperate

Harts and the Pacific Engineer Division staff 

prepared three designs for prefabricated wooden 

buildings: an eight-family tenement that could 

be assembled by four carpenters in eight days 

at a cost of $681.16; a two-room, single-family 

cottage that four carpenters could build in a day 

for $93.96; and a small four-room house that 

cost $138.86.50 Harts recommended use of the 

single-family unit because he thought the comfort and privacy afforded by the design would 

outweigh cost considerations. On construction 

procedures, he suggested “the cheapest method 

of constructing these houses would be to prepare 

plans and specifications and let the entire work 

by contract to lowest bidder, after soliciting 

proposals.” The Red Cross accepted his plans 

and contracted for the construction of sixty-two 

hundred single-family cottages capable of housing twenty thousand refugees. The occupants 

eventually were allowed to move the cottages 

from the camp sites to private property for permanent use.51

Ernest Bicknell of the Red Cross coined the 

term rehabilitation during the San Francisco 

recovery efforts. To him the term meant that in 

addition to furnishing housing, the Red Cross 

issued tools to craftsmen, sewing machines 

to seamstresses, and new stock inventories to 

merchants to help them again become selfsupporting. The organization also made small 

cash loans to the earthquake victims, but after 

quickly learning that the funds were seldom 

repaid, it discontinued the practice.52

The activities of the engineers at San Francisco 

in 1906 had many similarities to late twentiethcentury disaster relief missions. As the troops 

first on the scene, the engineers performed 

street security patrol and helped with the 

firefighting. They furnished emergency relief 

directly, supplying refugees with water, food, 

shelter, and sanitary facilities. After the emergency phase ended, engineer forces assisted 

local authorities and other agencies with the 

restoration of utility and transportation services, 

demolition of unsafe structures, and design and 

construction of temporary housing.53

Greely proudly declared the Army’s emergency 

relief efforts at San Francisco clearly demonstrated the value of trained and organized forces 

during natural disasters. Independent observers 

confirmed his statement, and the editors of 

Harper’s Weekly commented: “The business of 

the Army is to meet emergencies, and in such a 

case as that of San Francisco its training and its 

system are invaluable.”54

•

Operational Challenges , 1907

The use of Corps expertise during natural 

disasters was not confined to the large-scale 

operations like the San Francisco crisis that are 

normally considered as disaster assistance. Corps 

personnel who were engaged in civil works operations often had to take emergency measures. 

For example, consider the threatened failure of 

a Corps navigation dam on the Allegheny River 

in 1907 and rescues performed at sea by Corps 

channel dredges based in Savannah.

Weary, worried, and rain soaked, Maj. William 

Sibert and his senior civil engineers returned 

to their office in January 1907 to discuss the 

troubles they faced at Allegheny River Dam 3. 

Early that afternoon they had received an 

urgent call from the lockmaster at Lock 3, 

warning that a flood was undermining the 

dam’s abutment.55
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Operational Challenges 77

By the time Sibert and his assistants reached 

the dam, its abutment was washed away and the 

concrete bank protection was rapidly crumbling 

into the breach. Although the dam itself had 

withstood the flood currents, the river was 

pouring through the abutment and around the 

dam, cutting an ever-growing new channel. By 

late afternoon buildings were dropping into the 

flood and the erosion threatened to destroy a 

factory and the main line of the Pennsylvania 

Railroad.56

Sibert and his staff discussed the challenge 

through the evening. If the dam held in place, 

and it seemed it would, the river would continue 

eating its way into the bank, finally severing the 

railroad and consuming a million-dollar factory. 

Sibert made his decision late that evening: The 

dam would have to go. He dashed off a telegram 

explaining the situation to the chief of engineers 

and issued orders to blast the dam out of the 

river the next morning.

At dawn, Corps personnel rowed a skiff loaded 

with dynamite onto the flood above the dam, 

floated downstream, and dropped anchors. 

From this mooring, the crew unreeled rope to 

slowly slip their skiff down to the edge of the 

dam, where they placed and detonated fivehundred-pound dynamite charges to blow off 

the dam’s crest. They continued the blasting 

until a central 560-foot section of the dam was 

destroyed, opening a gap to return the river to 

its channel.57

“Now,” Sibert told the chief of engineers, “we 

have a fighting chance to save the Heidenkamp 

plant. We are placing stone on the bank as fast 

as we can unload it.”58 After 23,479 tons of 

stone had been dumped from railcars onto the 

riverbank, the erosion stopped. Allegheny River 

Dam 3 was severely damaged, but its blasting 

saved the railroad and factory. The New York 

Sun subsequently published a biting critique 

of the slow construction progress it perceived 

In 1907 the Corps of Engineers broke open Dam 3 on the Allegheny River to prevent bank erosion and property damage. The remnants of the dam 

are in the foreground. Library and Archives Division, Sen. John Heinz History Center
78 Situation Desperate

on many waterways projects, but, the editors 

commented, “no charge of dilatoriness can be 

brought against the officer who a few weeks 

ago saved a million dollars worth of property 

by assuming the responsibility of blowing up 

$80,000 worth of dam.”59

The chief of engineers praised Sibert’s quick 

work at Dam 3 and commended his “ability 

and judgment of a high order.” Sibert may have 

been the only Corps officer ever so honored for 

destroying a government dam, yet he was first 

to admit that the real heroes of the incident 

were the men who had rowed the skiff-load of 

dynamite out on the flooded river to set the 

charges.60

Six months later an operational emergency 

prompted quick response from personnel at 

the Savannah office. On the evening of 17 July 

the steamship Alleghany, loaded with rosin, 

turpentine, and lumber, caught fire near the 

mouth of the Savannah River. Hearing the 

ship’s distress signal, Captains Nimrod Long 

and George Thomas of the sea-going dredges 

Cumberland and Savannah responded immediately. They closed on the burning ship, lowered 

life boats, and rescued the passengers and crew. 

Thomas of the Cumberland later reported:

We ran up as close as safe and sent out all 

our boats to look for people. The Alleghany

at this time was blazing very badly amidships. While our boats were away they 

picked up 2 boats from the burning ship 

with 5 people, including the Mate. Our 

No. 1 boat, 2nd Mate Thompson in Charge, 

took off the last 10 people from the bow 

of the Alleghany including the captain and 

chief engineer.61

The Cumberland and Savannah picked sixty-two 

people off the burning ship and out of the water 

and no lives were lost. The dredges were back at 

work the following morning, and the engineer 

commander reported to the chief of engineers 

that the rescue was accomplished at very little 

cost in the name of humanity. “I am sorry to 

say,” he concluded, “that no recognition of this 

“No charge of dilatoriness can be brought against the officer who a few weeks 

ago saved a million dollars worth of property by ... blowing up $80,000 

worth of dam.”

Spectators watched as floodwaters rose on Sixth Street in Pittsburgh during the 

flood of 1907. Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Operational Challenges 79

service has been made by the master, the owners, the underwriters, or the passengers.”62

“The Chief of Engineers is much gratified 

by the courage and devotion shown by these 

employees, and desires this fact to be communicated to them,” replied Brig. Gen. Alexander 

Mackenzie. “That no recognition of this service 

was made by the master, owners, underwriters, 

or passengers is greatly to be regretted, but such 

recognition is not necessary to complete the 

consciousness of having well performed a very 

dangerous duty.”63

There were limits, nonetheless, to the scope of 

the Corps of Engineers’ emergency response 

capabilities. After a Platte River flood in 

March 1910 took out a bridge at Columbus, 

Nebraska, Congressman James Latta asked the 

chief of engineers to send a two-thousand-foot 

ponton bridge for service until a new bridge 

could be built. The chief of engineers explained 

there was not two thousand feet of ponton 

bridging in the entire Army. Even if there was, 

assembling and building the bridge would 

cost no less than $6,000 and its construction 

would deprive engineer troops of pontons they 

needed for training maneuvers. “Moreover,” 

the chief added, “the use or loan of public 

property for private purposes, excepting in 

emergencies involving danger of loss of life or 

property, is prohibited, excepting as authorized 

by Congress.”64

•

In 1907 the Corps dredge Savannah rescued passengers and crew from the 

steamship Alleghany, which had caught fire at the mouth of the Savannah River.

Office of History
80 Situation Desperate

Observations

From its nineteenth-century focus on rescue and 

relief during river floods, the Corps expanded 

its disaster assistance mission during the early 

twentieth century in response to a wide variety 

of disasters: hurricanes, earthquakes, fires, 

and combinations thereof. At the calamitous 

Galveston hurricane of 1900, the Corps’ 

response to the emergency was limited, largely 

because the storm blew away or flooded all of its 

property in the vicinity, leaving nothing useful 

in service for rescue work. Relief and recovery 

efforts were managed well by Galveston’s local 

government, largely with privately-contributed 

funding rather than federal assistance.

Ranking with the 1889 Johnstown flood as 

one of the most memorable natural disasters in 

American history, the San Francisco earthquake 

of 1906 involved Corps officers and personnel 

in every phase of crisis management. Engineer 

troops patrolled the streets, fought the fires, 

demolished buildings, and succored needy refugees. Engineer officers consulted on the postdisaster recovery efforts that eventually restored 

the city to a modicum of normalcy.

Installing temporary bridges at Kansas City, 

fighting fires in Baltimore—the requests to the 

Corps of Engineers for emergency assistance 

came from all sectors of the nation during the 

twentieth century. In its own civil works mission 

the Corps often faced operational challenges 

that tested its expertise and grit. The disaster 

response missions of the twentieth century 

certainly called for far more than delivering 

quartermaster rations to southerners flooded out 

by the Mississippi River.

•
Disaster Mission Expansion ■ Notes 81

1. E. B. Garriott, “The West Indies Hurricane of 

September 1–12, 1900,” National Geographic 11 

(Oct. 1900): 384–92. The National Hurricane 

Center puts the death toll at 8,000 (and possibly as 

high as 12,000). See http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/

pdf/NWS-TPC-5.pdf, page 7, accessed 29 Dec. 

2008.

2. John E. Weems, A Weekend in September (New 

York: Henry Holt and Co., 1957), 57, 87; C. S. 

Riche to Chief of Engineers, 10 Sept. 1900, 

NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, “General 

Correspondence, 1894–1923” [hereafter Entry 

103], File 36620.

3. E. N. Sanctuary to Henry Adams, 10 Sept. 1900, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 36620.

4. Henry Roberts to Adjutant General, 14 Sept. 

1900, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 36620.

5. Weems, Weekend in September, 157–59.

6. Ibid., 146–47; Foster Rhea Dulles, The American 

Red Cross: A History (New York: Harper & Bros., 

1950), 34–35.

7. Weems, Weekend in September, 146–47; Chambers 

McKibbin to Adjutant General, 16 Sept. 1900, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 36620.

8. Weems, Weekend in September, 159–62.

9. C. S. Riche to Chief of Engineers, 14 June 1915, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 98646.

10. Robert L. Branyan, Taming the Mighty Missouri: A 

History of the Kansas City District, Corps of 

Engineers, 1907–1971 (Kansas City, Mo.: U.S. 

Army Engineer District, 1974), 42–44.

11. W. H. Craddock to Secretary of War, 31 May 

1903, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 47306.

12. Adjutant General H. C. Corbin to Commanding 

General at Chicago, 31 May 1903, NARA, RG 77, 

Entry 103, File 47306.

13. Smith Leach to Post Adjutant, Leavenworth, 18 

June 1903, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 47306.

14. Ibid.

15. Ibid.; Herbert Deakyne, “Bridging the Kaw River 

in the 1903 Flood,” Military Engineer 20 (May 

1928): 198–200.

16. Deakyne, “Bridging the Kaw River,” 198–200; 

Hiram Chittenden to Chief of Engineers, 8 June 

1903, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 47408.

17. Deakyne, “Bridging the Kaw River,” 198–200.

18. Smith Leach to Post Adjutant, Leavenworth, 18 

June 1903, and endorsements, NARA, RG 77, 

Entry 103, File 47306. For the flood at St. Louis, 

see Thomas L. Casey to Chief of Engineers, 17 

June 1903, File 47306.

19. Edward Burr to Chief of Engineers, 9 Feb. 1904, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 50089.

20. Edwin O. Sachs, A Record of the Baltimore 

Conflagration, February 7 and 8, 1904 (London: 

British Fire Prevention Committee, 1904), 13–22.

21. Frederick Funston, “How the Army Worked to 

Save San Francisco,” Cosmopolitan Magazine 41 

(July 1906): 239–48; Funston’s disaster report is 

printed in Annual Report of the Secretary of War for 

1906.

22. Meriwether Walker to Chief of Engineers, 11 May 

1906, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 59169. 

Walker’s report is printed in Henry E. Noyes, “An 

Earthquake Chronicle,” Journal of the Military 

Service Institution 39 (1906): 107–11.

23. See sources cited in notes 21 and 22.

24. Frederick Funston to Secretary of War, 18 Apr. 

1906, in Committee on Appropriations, Relief for 

San Francisco, 59th Cong., 1st sess., 1906, 

H. Doc. 714, 5.

25. Secretary of War to Frederick Funston, 19 Apr. 

1906, in ibid.

26. A. B. Barber to Adjutant, Fort Mason, 17 May 

1906, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 59169 

[hereafter file 59169]. This file also contains 

reports of all 1st Engineer Battalion officers in 

San Francisco.

27. Chief Clerk, California Debris Commission, to 

Chief of Engineers, 4 May 1906, NARA, RG 77, 

Entry 103, File 58858.

28. See reports of Barber and Erhnbeck in File 59169. 

The shootings were reviewed in James J. Hudson, 

“The California National Guard in the San 

Francisco Earthquake and Fire of 1906,” California 

Historical Quarterly 55 (Summer 1976): 137–49.

29. William Kelly to Adjutant, 1st Engineer Battalion, 

18 May 1906, File 59169.

30. Meriwether Walker to Chief of Engineers, 11 May 

1906, File 59169.

31. Jarvis Bain to Adjutant, Fort Mason, 17 May 1906, 

File 59169.

32. Ibid.

33. Chief Clerk, California Debris Commission, to 

Chief of Engineers, 23 Apr. 1907, NARA, RG 77, 

Entry 103, File 59185. 

34. William Harts to A. W. Greely, “Report on 

Demolition,” 14 May 1906, File 59169; Leroy 

Bartlett, Jr., “Demolition in Civil Conflagration,” 

Military Engineer 27 (May 1935): 178–81.

35. See reports of Walker and 1st Engineer Battalion 

officers in File 59169.

36. Ibid.; first name of Private Schraeder is not 

provided in the file.

37. William Harts to A. W. Greely, 18 May 1906, 

File 59169. Casualty and damage numbers often 

conflict in disaster reports; those listed are from 

L. Don Leet, “Earthquakes,” Annals of the 

American Academy of Political and Social Science

309 (1957): 121.

Chapter 4 Notes
82 Situation Desperate

38. Theodore Roosevelt to Mabel Boardman, 22 Apr. 

1906, in Elting E. Morison, ed., The Letters of 

Theodore Roosevelt 5 (Cambridge: Harvard 

University Press, 1952): 216.

39. Theodore Roosevelt to George Pardee, 18 Apr. 

1906, in Morison, Letters of T. Roosevelt, 213, 

219–20.

40. Congressional Record, 59th Cong., 1st sess., 1906, 

5506, 5510, 5555–56, 5660–62, 6244–48, 6435.

41. Adolphus W. Greely, Reminiscences of Adventure 

and Service: A Record of Sixty-Five Years (New York: 

Scribner’s, 1927), 219–24; William H. Taft to 

A. W. Greely, 5 May 1906, File 59169.

42. Jarvis Bain to Adjutant, Fort Mason, 17 May 1906, 

File 59169.

43. William Harts to Chief of Engineers, 21 May 

1906, enclosing report to Greely on public utilities, 

File 59169; Morison, Letters of T. Roosevelt, 219–

20, discusses indictment of San Francisco’s mayor.

44. Greely in Annual Report of the Secretary of War for 

1906 emphasized the automobile’s value in 

emergencies. Motor vehicle services in the disaster 

are discussed and the San Francisco Chronicle is 

quoted in John B. Rae, The Road and Car in 

American Life (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1971), 55.

45. William Harts to A. W. Greely, “Report on 

Demolition,”14 May 1906, File 59169. File does 

not list the full name of Sergeant Robbins.

46. Ibid.

47. Frank D. Ely, “Feeding Stricken San Francisco,” 

Journal of the Military Service Institution 39 (1906): 

197–204.

48. Ibid.; William Harts to Lea Febiger, 13 May 1906, 

File 59169.

49. See reports of Kelly and Emerson in File 59169.

50. William Harts to A. W. Greely, 4 June 1906, File 

59169.

51. Ibid.; Dulles, American Red Cross, 105–07; 

J. Eugene Haas, Robert W. Kates, and Martyn J. 

Bowden, Reconstruction Following Disaster

(Cambridge: MIT Press, 1977), 71–72. 

52. Dulles, American Red Cross, 105–07.

53. See the Corps officers’ reports in File 59169.

54. Greely, Reminiscences of Adventure and Service, 224; 

Harper’s Weekly 50 (12 May 1906): 654.

55. Edward B. Clark, William L. Sibert, the Army 

Engineer (Philadelphia: author, 1930), 94–95; 

ARCE (1907), 1700–04.

56. ARCE (1907), 1700–04; William Sibert to Chief 

of Engineers, 16 Jan. 1907, NARA, RG 77, Entry 

103, File 15732. 

57. William Sibert to Chief of Engineers, 16 Jan. 

1907, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 15732.

58. William Sibert to Chief of Engineers, 18 Jan. 

1907, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 15732.

59. Ibid.

60. Ibid.; Clark, William L. Sibert, 94–95.

61. Dan Kingman to Chief of Engineers, 24 July 1907, 

enclosing reports of Long and Thomas, NARA, 

RG 77, Entry 103, File 64436.

62. Ibid.

63. Alexander Mackenzie to Dan Kingman, 30 July 

1907, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 64436.

64. James Latta to Chief of Engineers, 22 Apr. 1901, 

and related correspondence in NARA, RG 77, 

Entry 103, File 75879.

Above: Flood refugees gathered at a 

Baptist church in New Madrid, 

Missouri, 1912. Library of Congress, 

LC-USZ62-109378

Right: Floods reached high water at 

Rochester, New York, on 28 March 

1913. National Archives, 77-FC-1-1

Below: The railway station at Cary, 

Mississippi, barely escaped the 

devastating 1913 flood.

National Archives, 27-G-1A-2-2
The Flood Fights ■ Lower Mississippi River Flood 85

The Flood Fights 

of 1912 and 1913

Memories of the great floods of 1912 

and 1913 in the Mississippi valley 

have long ago faded, supplanted by 

those of the more catastrophic floods of 1927 

and 1937. Yet these earlier disasters rank among 

the most destructive in American history, striking the South in 1912 and the North in 1913. 

The Mississippi River climbed to record stages 

in early 1912, devastating the delta plantations, 

and in 1913 terrific floods north of the Ohio 

River wrecked Dayton and Hamilton, Ohio, 

then traveled downriver to surpass the records 

set the year before, again inundating portions of 

the delta.

During these floods, the Corps of Engineers 

applied the lessons it had learned in earlier 

disasters—conducting advance planning and 

coordinating campaigns with local officials to 

save the levees instead of merely reacting to 

the calamities. Moreover, out of these floods 

emerged the impetus for developing federal 

policies aimed at reducing flooding disasters and 

damages in the Mississippi valley and throughout the United States. These largely forgotten 

catastrophes therefore merit close attention.

•

Lower Mississippi River 

Flood, 1912

In early 1912 a combination of high water from 

the Ohio, Cumberland, Wabash, Tennessee, 

and upper Mississippi rivers, with contributions 

from the St. Francis and White rivers, brought 

the lower Mississippi to flood stage at Memphis 

5

Refugees bided time on a barge during the Mississippi River flood in 

Louisiana, 1912. Library of Congress, LC-B2-2398-14
86 Situation Desperate

on 24 March. The river remained at flood 

stage sixty days, cresting on 6 April, subsiding, 

and then rising to a second crest in May. All 

previous flood crest records were broken along 

the entire Mississippi below Cairo except at 

Vicksburg, where the 1897 record stood because 

levees there failed before the 1912 crest arrived, 

sending high water into the back country. The 

flood drowned about fifty people, but the exact 

number may never be known.1

Col. Henry Jervey, commanding the Corps 

office at Cincinnati, directed the 1912 flood 

fight along the lower Ohio River. He sent 

his senior assistants Robert R. Jones and 

Clinton Harris to threatened levees in Illinois 

at Shawneetown, Mound City, and Cairo to 

help those communities fight the flood. At 

Shawneetown, where the levee had broken with 

disastrous results in 1898, the people were prepared and held the levees there with ease, but 

Harris encountered major challenges at Mound 

City and Cairo near the Ohio’s confluence with 

the Mississippi.

The 1912 flood caught the town of Mound City 

without reserve cash and without means of borrowing funds to conduct a flood fight. Harris 

therefore used federal levee project funds to purchase materials and, with volunteer local labor, 

raised Mound City’s levees. He capped them 

A flooded store was “still doing business” in Hickman, Kentucky, 1912.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-110682
The Flood Fights ■ Lower Mississippi River Flood 87

with a wooden bulkhead known as a mudbox—

two rows of planks nailed to stakes driven into 

the levee with earth tamped between the rows 

and protected by a sandbag revetment to prevent 

wave erosion. The Ohio rose a foot over the top 

of the levee, stood against the mudbox capping, 

but did not break through to inundate the town. 

Levees protecting the bottomlands behind 

Cairo and Mound City broke at several places, 

however, leaving the two towns isolated by the 

floodwaters.2

The flood arrived at Cairo at a time when 

the Mississippi River Commission’s districts 

at Memphis, Vicksburg, and New Orleans 

were strapped for funding. They had already 

exhausted their annual appropriation for the 

fiscal year, and the commission therefore 

requested an emergency allotment of $250,000. 

To ensure that fully adequate funding was 

available, Secretary of War Henry Stimson 

asked for $350,000, and Congress provided this 

amount on 3 April. This appropriation limited 

the expenditures to the Mississippi River and 

did not fund flood fights on its tributaries. 

Congressmen from Illinois and Kentucky soon 

brought this oversight to Congress’s attention, 

and it amended the act to remedy this omission.3

Maj. Clarke Smith at Memphis managed the 

flood fight on 443 miles of the Mississippi 

between Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and 

the White River’s mouth near Rosedale, 

Mississippi. At the upper end of his district, 

he worked with local levee districts to raise the 

levees before the flood’s arrival, but this effort 

was to little avail because the river crested there 

as much as four feet above the levee crowns. 

Farther south, the district employed 350 men 

and supplied fifty thousand sacks to help 

the Reelfoot levee managers hold their area. 

Nevertheless, floodwater was standing about 

a foot up the sandbags atop the Reelfoot levee 

crown when on 5 April a windstorm drove 

waves over the bags, washing them out and 

destroying a mile of levee. Likewise, levees in 

the lower St. Francis area were sandbagged and 

held until the river climbed five feet above all 

previous records; three crevasses at St. Claire, 

Wyanoke, and Golden Lake, Arkansas, then 

inundated the countryside. Other levees along 

the Arkansas bank of the Mississippi held out 

the flood until 6 April when a crevasse occurred 

at Modoc, followed by others at Laconia Circle 

and Ferguson Landing.4

In the levee district of the upper Yazoo, east of 

the Mississippi River from the Tennessee line 

to Bolivar County, Mississippi, advance planning proved successful. By 1912 its system had 

been built to sufficient grade that even a flood 

cresting 2.4 feet above all records did not overwhelm the levees. At the crest stage, the Yazoo 

levees still had several feet of freeboard (the 

A levee broke near Modoc, Arkansas, in April 1912.

Mississippi Department of Archives and History
88 Situation Desperate

vertical distance between the water surface and 

the levee crown) and held without a break.

Smith estimated flood damages in the city of 

Memphis alone at $3 million. Backwater from 

Bayou Gayoso, Cypress Creek, and Nonconnah 

Creek had crept into Memphis’s suburban and 

industrial areas and climbed into the first stories 

of many buildings. The flood also entered the 

city’s water supply and gas plants, putting them 

out of operation.5

A highly organized flood fight began in the 

Vicksburg Engineer District on 6 April. Maj. 

J. A. Woodruff, its commander, and his senior 

engineer, Arthur Hider, had made plans well in 

advance of the crest. They stationed engineers 

on both sides of the river, one in charge of levees 

in Mississippi and the other managing flood 

fights in Arkansas and Louisiana. They dispatched the district’s six towboats up and down 

the river to deliver barge loads of construction 

materials and quarterboats for housing labor at 

strategic intervals along the levee system.6

The MRC district at Vicksburg raised and 

revetted (covered with stone or other materials) 

all levees along the Mississippi’s main stem and 

along the lower Red River within the district’s 

boundaries. The area’s most desperate flood fights 

occurred at Lake Beulah levee on the Mississippi, 

where state authorities sent eight hundred convicts to help place the sandbags. Lake Beulah 

levee was piled with sandbags twenty feet high 

when it suddenly caved in on 17 April, and water 

roaring through the crevasse caught and drowned 

six convicts. Other breaks followed at Lake 

Jefferson, Panther Forest, and Salem levees.

Capt. Clarence O. Sherrill of the MRC district 

at New Orleans assigned each local levee board 

the responsibility for holding specific levee sections while he and Army engineers took direct 

charge over the remaining sections. As in the 

Vicksburg District, quarterboats for labor and 

barges loaded with tools, lumber, nails, and bags 

were stationed at strategic locations. To monitor 

the crisis, Sherrill instituted continuous levee 

inspections. He declared the inspections absolutely essential to prevent crevasses. “Frequently 

small depressions in the levees, such as worn 

ramps, cattle trails, etc., will be allowed to go 

unreported by the people of the locality,” he 

explained, “until the water begins to go over the 

levee and a crevasse results before anything can 

be done.”7

Three crevasses occurred in Sherrill’s district 

during 1912, with the major break on 14 May 

at Hymelia levee thirty-five miles upstream of 

New Orleans. The Corps and MRC had never 

before attempted to close a crevasse, leaving that 

job to local levee districts, but Sherrill received 

a warning that a second crest was on the way 

and decided to try closing the Hymelia crevasse 

before the next rise. He recruited a twelvehundred-man workforce who began driving 

timbers in a double row of piling that arched 

around the crevasse from each side of the break, 

dropping sandbags between the rows of piling 

to block the river’s flow through the crevasse. 

Some $60,000 had been expended on this 

temporary dam when the rising river took out 

another levee section on 25 May, eroding it well 

past the end of the temporary dam. Emergency 

repairs stopped, and not until the flood receded 

in July was it possible to plug the crevasse.8

Although the Corps spent over $450,000 on 

emergency preparations and response efforts in 

1912, the record crest made most of its efforts 

futile. The flood broke the levees at sixteen 
The Flood Fights ■ Rescue and Relief 89

places, destroyed an aggregate of 70,822 feet 

of levee, and overflowed 10,812 square miles 

of delta lands. Exclusive of direct damages 

to the levee system, the Corps estimated 

property damages resulting from the flood at 

$43 million.9

•

Rescue and Relief 

in the 1912 Flood

On 4 April 1912 Congressmen Ollie James of 

Kentucky and Joseph Russell of Missouri asked 

the House Appropriations Committee to report 

out a resolution for emergency flood relief. 

When the committee refused, they promptly 

went to the White House to discuss it with 

President William H. Taft. Of this meeting, 

Russell later recalled:

We went to see the President and showed 

to him some of the messages received and 

made our statements, and in his own words 

he said, “Boys, I will try to help you out.” 

I shall never forget his assuring words, nor 

cease to thank him for giving expression to 

them. He at once sent for the Quartermaster 

General, and in our presence said to him, 

“General, get busy. Send the necessary men 

into the flooded districts; send tents, blankets, and provisions necessary to relieve the 

suffering people, and I will trust Congress 

to protect me in the expenses necessarily 

incurred.”10

The continued lack of a clearly defined federal policy and standard channels for disaster 

assistance appropriations often resulted in confusion and delay. Congressmen wanting disaster 

assistance for their constituents first tried the 

House and Senate committees, then the executive branch, until they found someone or some 

agency willing to take action. If a president took 

the initiative in disaster situations, he hoped for 

subsequent approval from Congress. In all cases 

of record, Congress did approve the president’s 

emergency action, thus precluding a potentially 

embarrassing legal situation and jurisdictional 

dispute.

On receiving his orders directly from President 

Taft in 1912, Quartermaster General James B. 

Aleshire sent Maj. James Normoyle to Hickman, Kentucky, to organize flood relief efforts. 

He also contacted Brig. Gen. William H. Bixby, 

Chief of Engineers, to advise that the president 

had approved use of the Corps’ fleet for emergency supply delivery. Bixby then sent the message to the Mississippi River Commission and 

its districts, where the fleet was already engaging in rescue work—the steamboat W. R. King

had saved 40 people near Cairo and the snagboat John N. Macomb had picked 525 people off 

rooftops near Memphis.11

Logs of the 1912 disaster reaction have survived, 

and the journal of clerk W. J. Allen aboard the 

Corps steamboat Nokomis reveals the typical 

routine and humanitarian features of the rescue 

and relief mission. Towing a quarterboat for 

sheltering refugees and three barges loaded 

with rations, tents, and livestock forage, the 

Nokomis, commanded by Capt. Walter Irwin, 

left St. Louis on 8 April and two days later was 

on patrol near the Missouri bootheel.12

“Found his children perched on roof of 

cow pen, where he had cattle scaffolded. 

His house completely under water.”
90 Situation Desperate

After stopping to check conditions and leave 

supplies both at Caruthersville, Missouri, and 

on the river’s opposite side, the Nokomis stopped 

at Barr’s Point and met the plantation owner. 

The boat’s clerk described the crisis at the 

plantation:

Found his children perched on roof of cow 

pen, where he had cattle scaffolded. His 

house completely under water. He and his 

four children came aboard. The people 

reported that there were 150 head of stock 

at this point. Some are in danger, others are 

O.K. unless storm should arise. They are 

all anxious to get stock out, but majority 

would not go without stock; the women and 

children refused to go without the father 

or brother. Succeeded in getting 27 people 

to leave; majority women and children .... 

These people state there are about 20 families left there who refused to leave without 

stock, and they are in a very serious position. 

About 17 houses have already gone away. 

Post office entirely wiped out; nothing 

saved.

After similar rescue stops at Carrs Landing, 

Gold Dust Landing, and Osceola, Arkansas, 

the Nokomis reached the Wilson plantation, 

The engineer snagboat J. N. Macomb (shown ca. 1907) rescued over five hundred people from Memphis rooftops in 1912.

Office of History
The Flood Fights ■ Rescue and Relief 91

“About 17 houses have already gone away. 

Post office entirely wiped out; nothing 

saved.”

where the boat’s clerk graphically described the 

conditions:

The water is rising and the current is very 

swift. Capt. Irwin, in charge of ship, states 

it is running about 10 miles and is strongest 

he was ever in. Reports of large numbers 

of hogs and chickens drowned in wake of 

flood. A number of people reported left on 

the 10th instant. About 150 negroes located 

in gin mill made of concrete and galvanized iron, which is considered safe. Fifty 

negroes are also safe in another mill. Mr. 

Wilson states he is feeding the destitute. 

Ship’s captain and Capt. Kinney took out of 

huts about 25 negroes who were in danger 

of being swept away with the current and 

placed on board ship.13

On that day the Nokomis rescued ninety-two 

people and took them to Memphis safely. It 

continued on south to New Orleans, rescuing 

another five hundred people while on the way. 

Following it downriver were the Corps snagboat 

J. H. Simpson and the W. R. King, rescuing the 

people missed by the Nokomis and providing 

them with rations and shelter.

During its downstream voyage, the Nokomis

passed the Minnetonka heading upstream 

with the Quartermaster Corps’ commander 

Normoyle and Red Cross director Ernest 

Bicknell aboard. Normoyle and Bicknell established refugee camps at points such as New 

Madrid, Missouri, and Hickman, Kentucky, 

leaving quartermaster officers at each camp to 

manage relief ration issues.14

Because his quartermaster officers were 

all assigned to stations north of Memphis, 

Normoyle gave the relief mission on the lower 

Mississippi to engineer officers. The Vicksburg 

District commander used all available Corps 

boats for the rescue and relief efforts and even 

the discharge-pipe pontons of the cutterhead 

dredge Gamma. On the Black and Tensas rivers, 

the snagboats Humphreys and Ransdell conducted the rescue and relief operations. At the 

New Orleans District, Sherrill committed the 

entire district fleet to humanitarian service. The 

steamboat John Newton alone saved 470 people 

and 1,590 head of livestock.15

After picking up the stranded people, the boats 

delivered them to tent camps on high ground. 

There the Corps fed them rations furnished by 

the Quartermaster Corps while the American 

Red Cross provided medical services and regulated the camps with National Guard assistance. 

The operation became immense: camps opened 

at Hickman, Kentucky; Tiptonville, Dyersburg, 

and Memphis, Tennessee; Vicksburg, 

Mississippi; Helena, Arkansas; and Baton 

Rouge, Louisiana, sheltering forty thousand 

refugees, some of them well into the following 

summer.16

Normoyle then followed the flood crest downriver from Hickman to New Orleans, not closing 

the Quartermaster relief effort until 22 June after 

expending more than $500,000. In his postdisaster report, he paid tribute to the assistance 

he received from the Engineer Corps, to which 

“we are deeply indebted for hearty cooperation 

and assistance, which was especially valuable 

in the early stage of relief work in the several 
92 Situation Desperate

districts, enabling us to get speedy and satisfactory action when conditions were most acute.”17

Some engineer officers, nevertheless, had 

reservations about the free ration distribution 

as administered by quartermaster personnel. 

The engineer officers had difficulty securing 

enough workers for the levee flood fights, and 

they attributed this labor shortage to the ration 

distributions. Mississippi’s governor had been 

forced to send state convicts to help shore up 

the levees, and Edward H. “Boss” Crump, 

Memphis’s mayor, had conscripted two hundred 

loiterers in the city and shipped them off to 

the levees.18

Many rumors about the abuse of the free ration 

issues also circulated. Col. Lansing Beach of 

the Corps of Engineers, stationed at Jackson 

Barracks near New Orleans during the flood, 

heard the rumors and launched his own private 

investigation. He traveled through the flood 

area wearing civilian clothing and discussed 

the flood and relief efforts with people he met. 

His inquiries convinced him that not more 

than 15 percent of the rations issued by the 

Quartermaster Corps actually went to needy 

flood victims. It seemed the quartermaster 

officers, all sent to the mission from outside the 

delta, relied on local citizens’ committees to distribute rations to bona fide flood refugees. Yet, 

nearly all tenant farmers were needy, though not 

necessarily as a result of flooding, and some of 

the Army rations had gone to plantation owners who charged the rations against the sharecroppers’ annual deficits at the plantation stores. 

Beach heard of one planter who distributed 

enough “free” rations to fill the debit accounts 

of his tenants for two years, thereby making two 

cotton crops at government expense. He learned 

The steamboat Lucile rescued people during the 1912 flood.

Library of Congress, LC-B2-2412-5
The Flood Fights ■ Dayton Flood 93

in another case of a planter who fed the rations 

to his hogs.19

Beach continued his private inquiries during 

the flood of 1913, which brought him a second 

opportunity to observe the free rations program 

in action. Because his study was unauthorized, 

Beach did not at that time report his findings to 

the chief of engineers or the adjutant general.

•

Dayton Flood, 1913

Col. Lansing Beach observed two storms crossing the northern Ohio River valley in the third 

week of March 1913; they dropped as much as 

eleven inches of rain and caused raging floods 

in the Wabash, Scioto, Muskingum, and Miami 

rivers. Heavy runoff and high-velocity currents 

took 415 lives and damaged property worth 

$200 million. Because the havoc was greatest 

at Dayton, Ohio, in the Miami River basin, 

the public later remembered it as the Dayton 

flood.20

Secretary of War Lindley Garrison directed 

Brig. Gen. William Bixby, Chief of Engineers, 

to mobilize his civil works districts in the damaged area of Ohio for relief efforts in cooperation with the Quartermaster Corps. Although 

Bixby directed his district commanders to work 

closely with Maj. James Normoyle and other 

quartermaster officers, cooperation proved 

extremely difficult because the flood had disrupted communications and the quartermaster 

officers were constantly on the move.21

At the Pittsburgh Engineer District, most of 

which lay east of the disaster area, Col. Francis 

Shunk loaded the Corps towboat Thomas P. 

Roberts and the chartered steamer Admiral 

Dewey with relief supplies contributed by 

private charities and dispatched them down 

the Ohio River to Marietta, Ohio, to supply 

the Muskingum valley. Fallen bridges blocked 

Muskingum River navigation, however, and the 

relief materials destined upstream to Zanesville 

were forwarded on by rail.22

T. G. Ridge, in charge of the Wheeling 

District’s fleet moored at Marietta, lost his 

boats when a wooden bridge floated out of the 

Muskingum and rammed them, sending them 

spinning down the Ohio. When he managed 

to recover the fleet, he used it to move people 

marooned in the upper stories of Marietta 

buildings to high ground. “The conditions here 

in Marietta are beyond description,” Ridge 

reported. “Nearly everyone in the flooded district has lost all their household goods and a 

great many of them all their clothes except what 

they wore.”23

Col. Frederick Alstaettler at Wheeling assigned 

his military assistants, Captains William 

Mitchell and John Hodges, to recovery operations. After trying unsuccessfully to contact 

Normoyle, the officers initiated the emergency 

response on their own. They beckoned the 

Corps towboat James Rumsey and launch Nanina

from the Corps sub-office at Charleston, West 

“The conditions here ... are beyond 

description. Nearly everyone in the flooded 

district has lost all their household goods 

and a great many of them all their clothes 

except what they wore.”
94 Situation Desperate

Virginia, to descend the Kanawha River to the 

Ohio River for rescue missions, even though 

the Rumsey’s smokestacks had to be cut off to 

get under the bridges across the flooded river. 

These workboats went to Parkersburg, West 

Virginia, and Marietta for rescue service, 

while Hodges took the launch Burke farther 

downriver for urgent work at Huntington, 

West Virginia.24

Normoyle and Ernest Bicknell of the Red 

Cross established their central office for disaster assistance in Ohio’s capitol building at 

Columbus, where they could work closely with 

state officials. To improve communications with 

the Corps districts, Normoyle sent Maj. James 

Logan to Louisville, Kentucky, to open an 

emergency coordinating office at the engineer 

district office. Normoyle also selected several 

Army officers as his deputies and sent them to 

Marietta, Parkersburg, and Huntington to work 

directly with Corps of Engineers personnel.

To conduct the relief mission along the Ohio 

River efficiently, the quartermaster and engineer 

officers created floating bases, each composed 

of Corps towboats and barges supported by a 

small-craft flotilla. The first two floating bases 

formed up at Marietta and Parkersburg and 

included the towboats Loma, Guyandot, Miami, 

James Rumsey, and General Craighill together 

with the necessary barges and small craft. 

Quartermaster officers requisitioned or purchased rations, tents, blankets, and other vital 

items and loaded them aboard the floating bases 

at Parkersburg and Marietta for delivery along 

the Ohio River.

Farther south, Hodges helped local authorities restore power and telephone services 

at Huntington, then went to Catlettsburg, 

Kentucky, where he found extremely hazardous conditions. At the mayor’s request, Hodges 

and the Corps took charge—directing debris 

cleanup, organizing rations distribution, and 

supervising sanitary work to prevent the spread 

of disease.

Surplus commodities sent to the river by the 

Navy included canned meats and rations of 

higher quality than the typical Army quartermaster supplies, and the Corps gave these Navy 

shipments special treatment. The Corps loaded 

the rations aboard the towboat Guyandot and 

barges at Parkersburg to form a “naval” floating 

base with Navy Paymaster L. N. Wertenbaker 

in charge. The naval base left Parkersburg 

The flood destroyed much of Middle Hickory Street in Chillicothe, Ohio, 1913.

Library of Congress, PAN US GEOG - Ohio no. 33
The Flood Fights ■ Dayton Flood 95

on 4 April and proceeded downstream, delivering the Navy’s superior rations to the hardest-hit 

communities.25

Because telephone and telegraph communication with Normoyle proved impossible, Col. 

Henry Jervey, commanding the Cincinnati 

Engineer District, went to Columbus to meet 

with the quartermaster commander. Jervey 

immediately dispatched Capt. John Kingman 

and Lt. Henry Finch to stricken Hamilton, 

Ohio, on the Miami River.26 There they found 

that Hamilton’s public sanitation needed 

urgent attention. Finch took charge of collecting and burning the animal carcasses littering 

the streets, while Kingman met with the city 

health officers to plan restoration of water and 

sewer services. The destruction of property in 

Hamilton was great and the loss of life could 

only be estimated, about twenty-five bodies 

having been recovered up to that time. Kingman 

reported to the chief of engineers from 

Hamilton: “Several hundred dead horses and 

mules were scattered about the city; the light, 

water and sewer systems were all out of commission; food supplies were coming in by motor 

trucks from Cincinnati, but the inhabitants 

were tired out and demoralized.” At Kingman’s 

request the Army adjutant general dispatched 

Medical Corps officers to Hamilton.27

Horse carcasses dotted the streets of Dayton, Ohio, after the 1913 flood.

Library of Congress, LC-H261-2581
96 Situation Desperate

Finch saw that the people of Hamilton were 

tending to human needs on their own, but they 

had delayed disposing of the dead animals in the 

streets as the result of a misconception. He later 

wrote a vivid description of his solution, along 

with comments on the value of military training 

during disaster relief:

It fell to my lot to cleaning up the carcasses 

and for two lively days gangs of volunteer 

laborers and commandeered trucks were 

busy gathering up the dead animals and 

carting them out to the baseball park where, 

covered with wreckage and baptized with 

crude oil, they made a great bonfire. No 

doubt the inhabitants of Hamilton would 

have done this earlier but for the fact that 

they had the idea that the carcasses must be 

buried in order to be disposed of, but army 

training had shown how easy it was to do 

the business with fire. Over 300 animals, 

mostly horses, were thus handled. The 

carcasses were found everywhere: I recall 

getting one dead horse out of the cloak 

room on the second floor of the public 

school building. A herd of them had been 

led up the stairway as the water drove them 

off the first floor.28

Once he had the Hamilton mission in hand, 

Finch, at Normoyle’s request, proceeded south 

to Helena, Arkansas, with a detachment of five 

noncommissioned officers for flood duty on the 

Mississippi River. Kingman returned briefly 

to Cincinnati and then went on to investigate 

the emergency at Lawrenceburg, Indiana, near 

where the Miami River enters the Ohio.29

Boarding a launch at Cincinnati, Kingman 

dodged drift and debris to make the trip to 

Lawrenceburg, where he found the levee had 

failed and the town mostly submerged. Boating 

back to the hills, he found an operating telephone and called Logan of the Quartermaster 

Corps in Louisville. He arranged with Logan 

to have the Corps towboat Scioto loaded with 

fifty thousand rations and emergency supplies 

at Cincinnati for delivery to Lawrenceburg and 

points downriver.

Kingman made the Scioto and its barges a floating supply base, dropping off vital supplies at 

the Indiana towns of Lawrenceburg, Aurora, 

Patriot, Florence, Utica, and Milton on its 

way to Louisville, Kentucky. The Louisville 

Engineer District had a fully-equipped repair 

shop on Shippingport Island that quickly fabricated forty small rowboats for the rescue and 

relief work. These small craft went aboard the 

Scioto and the towboats Cherokee and Kentucky,

which were then proceeding down the Ohio 

Hundreds fled to elevated railroad tracks in Lima, Ohio, on 25 March 1913. Library of Congress, PAN US GEOG - Ohio no. 5
The Flood Fights ■ Dayton Flood 97

River from Louisville to offer disaster assistance 

to devastated communities such as Uniontown 

in Kentucky and Shawneetown and Cairo in 

Illinois along the lower river.30

The rescue and relief services during the Dayton 

flood of 1913 were the result of a true joint 

effort by local, state, and federal authorities. 

Citizens’ committees in nearly all damaged 

towns performed valiant emergency work. In 

Ohio, Governor James Cox declared martial law 

and put the National Guard to work; among the 

mobilized units were the 5th Ohio Engineers, 

tasked with restoring Dayton’s water supply 

system. Participating Army forces included the 

Quartermaster, Engineer, and Medical corps. 

The Navy sent ship crews from the USS Essex

and Dorothea to Cleveland for rescue service and 

also provided superior-quality rations to feed 

hungry flood refugees. Moreover, the U.S. Life 

Saving Service, forerunner of the U.S. Coast 

Guard, performed gallantly.31

U.S. Life Saving Service crews from stations 

at Louisville; Cleveland; Chicago; Lorain, 

Ohio; and Michigan City, Indiana, took their 

surfboats to the flood disaster area where 

they rendered splendid service. The Louisville 

crew, for instance, reached Dayton while it 

was still underwater to save people stranded by 

the flood. The crew’s commander, Capt. Jack 

Gillooly, later explained that his crew braved 

the swift currents and obstructions to enter the 

city and found entire families in attics crying 

for food and water. His small boats did not 

permit evacuating the marooned crowds, but he 

took the sick and injured to safety.32 Returning 

with rations and bottled water, the crews then 

dragged their boats over and around the wreckage blocking Dayton’s streets, supplying eight 

hundred stranded victims with necessities. The 

small boats the Life Saving Service rowed, 

along with the crews’ extensive marine training, 

allowed them to reach many buildings that were 

otherwise inaccessible.33

Secretary of War Garrison and Maj. Gen. 

Leonard Wood, Army chief of staff, personally 

inspected the damages and the disaster relief 

efforts in Ohio on 29 March. There, Normoyle 

of the Quartermasters assured them that the 

Corps of Engineers was cooperating in every 

way possible and working to the limits of its 

efficiency.34

“...laborers...were busy gathering up the 

dead animals and carting them out to the 

baseball park where, covered with wreckage 

and baptized with crude oil, they made a 

great bonfire.”
98 Situation Desperate

Normoyle’s generous assessment was not shared, 

however, by everyone. An Ohio congressman 

became disgruntled when the chief of engineers declined to send Corps ponton bridges to 

Hamilton, where the flood had destroyed all 

bridges. The chief explained that the ponton 

bridges would not reach Hamilton until long 

after the need for them had ended. Hamilton 

officials instead located a retired engineer sergeant who, in just thirty hours, assembled small 

barges found in the area into a temporary bridge 

spanning the Miami River. The bridge served 

well during the emergency.35

The Army Medical Corps and American Red 

Cross handled the post-disaster recovery mission, with Maj. Thomas Rhoads of the Medical 

Corps in charge. He divided Dayton into recovery districts and employed four thousand workers for four weeks. They hauled away 133,600 

wagonloads of flood debris, cleaned and 

disinfected 12,131 homes, removed 1,420 dead 

horses, recovered 98 bodies, gave 2,100 people 

medical treatment, and issued 580,000 quartermaster rations. The Red Cross provided medical 

facilities and soup kitchens, built small cottages 

as temporary housing for the flood refugees, and 

helped people resume their livelihoods.36

In June, Jervey at Cincinnati advised the chief of 

engineers that the principal challenge encountered by the Corps during the Dayton flood 

was the disruption of communications. Because 

telegraph and telephone lines were down, 

Corps officers had to take independent initiative because they could not contact Normoyle 

for instructions. As a future remedy, Jervey 

recommended building a chain of wireless radio 

stations along the Ohio River for service during 

emergencies and also for management of Corps 

lock and dam operations. He estimated each 

two-kilowatt radio station would cost $2,750, 

but the chief of engineers rejected the proposed 

radio network as too costly. As a result, Corps 

Fire, flood, and rain coalesced along the Mahoning River at Warren, Ohio, March 1913.

Youngstown Historical Center of Industry and Labor and Ohio Historical Society
The Flood Fights ■ Mississippi River Flood 99

installations in the Ohio River basin still lacked 

adequate radio communications during the 1936 

and 1937 floods, and personnel were forced then 

to rely on volunteer broadcasting services offered 

by commercial stations.37

•

Mississippi River Flood, 1913

“Such a sequence of violent storms has never 

before been recorded in the Mississippi Basin,” 

reported the Mississippi River Commission 

describing the 1913 floods. Two major floods 

washed down the Mississippi in early 1913 

before the levees damaged by the flood of 1912 

had been entirely restored. In January a flood 

took the gauge at Cairo, Illinois, to 48.9 feet 

and caused a crevasse at Lake Beulah levee as 

it passed downriver. The levees along the river 

remained saturated when the Dayton flood 

roared down the Ohio, shooting the Cairo gauge 

to 54.7 feet and surpassing the records of 1912. 

The April 1913 flood climbed up the levees to 

the highest stages ever before recorded between 

Cairo and Helena, Arkansas, and between St. 

Joseph, Louisiana, and Natchez, Mississippi.38

Sandbags hold back the water at a levee break at Poydras near New Orleans 

in May 1913. National Archives, 77-MRC-5-88605-975
100 Situation Desperate

The Corps commanders at Memphis, 

Vicksburg, and New Orleans braced for the 

assault in March. The Vicksburg commander 

had to get the Lake Beulah crevasse, left by the 

January flood, closed quickly before the Dayton 

flood arrived. He negotiated an emergency 

contract with the Illinois Central Railroad for 

swift construction of a rock-fill levee across the 

gap left by the crevasse. The railroad laid a track 

atop the levee, drove piling in a line straight 

across the gap to form a trestle bridge, then 

dropped trainload after trainload of riprap stone 

from the trestle to lodge against the piling. It 

finished this unique rock-fill levee in time to 

hold out April’s flood.39

As had become customary by 1913, in preparation for flooding, the Corps districts on the 

Mississippi laced barges of materials and quarterboats for labor at intervals along the river and 

joined with the local levee boards in the flood 

fight. Advance preparations in 1913 extended 

also to the rescue and relief plans. On 29 March, 

The railroad tracks at Cary, Mississippi, were surrounded by floodwaters in 1913.

National Archives, 27-G-1A-2
The Flood Fights ■ Mississippi River Flood 101

recognizing that the flood would climb to new 

record levels, Maj. Edward Markham requested 

that tents for emergency shelter be sent to 

Hickman, Caruthersville, Memphis, and Helena 

and that necessary relief supplies be gathered 

before the crisis came. The job went, again, to 

Maj. James Normoyle of the Quartermaster 

Corps, who in April was still in Ohio managing the Dayton flood recovery effort. Normoyle 

activated the same disaster relief plans he had 

used in 1912—forming floating bases that 

transported rations and forage down the rivers to 

flood victims and performing rescue and relief 

with the Corps of Engineers’ fleet.40

The floating base—composed of the towboats 

Scioto, Kentucky, and Cherokee of the Cincinnati 

and Louisville districts—that had distributed 

relief supplies along the lower Ohio River to 

Cairo in March merely continued its relief 

voyage on to Memphis in April. At St. Louis, 

the quartermasters loaded the Corps steamer 

Nokomis and sent it downriver for rescue and 

relief, just as it had in 1912. During its 1913 

voyage, a barge loaded with hay for livestock 

caught fire off the bow of the Nokomis, but its 

captain never stopped. He simply sent his crew 

out on the tow to empty the burning barge while 

the steamboat’s paddlewheel kept thrashing the 

river on its way to New Orleans.41

When the Nokomis reached the Skipwith 

crevasse—one of six that occurred during the 

1913 flood—its captain learned that people 

behind the crevasse urgently needed immediate rescue from rooftops. Breaking a barge out 

of the Nokomis’s tow and shooting it through 

the gap in the levee, the captain went after the 

stranded victims. One Army officer who witnessed this courageous exploit later commented:

I also wish to commend the Captain and 

crew of the Steamer Nokomis for the fine 

service rendered and especially Captain 

Walter Irwin, who, when a barge was 

needed inside the levee to help in the rescue 

work, ran one of the steel barges of the

Nokomis through the break at Skipwith, 

Miss., with himself and three others on the 

barge; the three others being the second 

mate Harry Wells, Deckhand Schuler, and 

Sergeant Remington, 9th Infantry.42

It was a busy flood season, and Army Engineers 

displayed courage and tenacity throughout the 

region.

Lt. Henry Finch, who had disposed of the 

dead horses in Hamilton, Ohio, in March and 

then went south to join the April flood fight at 

Helena, Arkansas, penned a vivid description of 

April’s action, comparing it to combat duty:

Flood duty on the Mississippi River 

nowadays means a fight to help the levees 

to hold. And my hat is off to the men 

who do it. I cannot conceive of a more 

“Flood duty on the Mississippi River nowadays means a fight to help 

the levees to hold. And my hat is off to the men who do it. I cannot 

conceive of a more nerve-taxing contest in time of peace....such a 

campaign is as good as a war any day!”
102 Situation Desperate

nerve-taxing contest in time of peace. 

The immense stretch of levee length to be 

patrolled, the problem of placing the field 

force (always inadequate at such times) to 

the best advantage, ... the task of getting 

tools and sandbags to the right place in 

time, the matters of feeding, housing and 

transportation—such a campaign is as good 

as a war any day!43

Floods and natural disasters were also similar to 

war in that both created victims and opportunities for corruption.

As the flood fight ensued, Finch grew increasingly concerned about the problems attending 

the free issue of Army rations during disasters. 

Finch thought the free rations had vicious 

effects on the people living along the rivers. In 

his opinion, the food gifts encouraged shiftlessness among the tenant farmers and prostituted 

the planters, who took full advantage of the 

opportunity to charge off the cost of caring for 

their tenants, even if they were not threatened 

by the high water. “In spite of the good intentions of the army officers in charge,” Finch 

asserted, “in spite of their uniform high integrity, in spite of the sincere regret of the better 

class of men in every community, in spite of all 

efforts at control, there ensued ... the most pernicious reign of graft that ever affected so large 

a section of this country.” The existing methods 

of federal disaster assistance, Finch concluded, 

had to be changed.44

•

W. H. Brown’s gin house, two miles above the Skipwith crevasse at Addie, 

Mississippi, succumbed to floodwaters in 1913.

National Archives, 27-G-1A-2
The Flood Fights ■ Observations 103

Observations

The record-setting floods of 1912 and 1913 

ranked among the most destructive and costly 

in American history. During these years, 

the Mississippi River Commission spent a 

million dollars on its flood fights, and the 

Quartermaster Corps distributed another million dollars’ worth of Army rations and emergency supplies. These were considered enormous 

expenditures in 1913, and they encouraged 

policy makers to look for other approaches.

Statesmen such as Theodore Roosevelt published critiques protesting the expenditure of 

millions of dollars for disaster relief but only 

pennies for flood protection. Roosevelt proposed the construction of better levees on the 

Mississippi together with reservoirs on its tributaries for flood control and allied purposes. He 

declared that one act of Congress would suffice: 

“We can lift the rivers out of politics by enacting 

a single adequate measure, establishing a policy 

and providing continuing funds exactly as was 

done in the case of the Panama Canal.”45

In 1913 the Corps of Engineers, which held 

an attitude similar to Roosevelt’s, received 

the blessing of Congress to conduct studies of 

various federal flood control measures and of 

improved methods for federal disaster assistance. The flood control studies that began 

in 1913 became the engineering foundation 

of the historic Flood Control acts of 1917, 

1928, and 1936 that authorized federal flood 

protective measures in the Mississippi River 

basin and elsewhere. The Corps’ criticism of the 

disaster relief program, then conducted by the 

Quartermaster Corps, was to result in 1916 in 

reassignment of the entire federal disaster assistance mission to the Corps of Engineers.

•

“In spite of the good intentions of the army 

officers in charge ... there ensued ... the 

most pernicious reign of graft that ever 

affected so large a section of this country.”
104 Situation Desperate

Chapter 5 Notes

1. Bobby Joe Williams, “Mid-South Views the 

Floods of 1912 and 1913,” West Tennessee Historical 

Society Papers 29 (1975): 71–85.

2. Henry Jervey to Chief of Engineers, 8 and 9 Apr. 

1912, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“General Correspondence, 1894–1923” [hereafter 

Entry 103], File 7540.

3. Charles Potter to Chief of Engineers, 31 Mar. 

1912, and Henry Stimson to President, 2 Apr. 

1912, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 84753; 

Congressional Record, 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912, 

421–24; House Committee on Appropriations, 

Estimate of Appropriation on Account Mississippi 

River Floods [sic], 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912, 

H. Doc. 704, passim.

4. Mississippi River Commission [MRC], 

Expenditure of Emergency Funds for Flood Protection

(Washington, D.C.: Senate Committee on 

Commerce, 1912), passim; ARCE (1912), 3887–90.

5. ARCE (1912), 3887–90.

6. Ibid., 3916–20.

7. Ibid.; Robert W. Harrison, Levee Districts and 

Levee Building in Mississippi (Greenville: 

Mississippi Levee Commission, 1951), 212; Senate, 

Mississippi River Floods, 63d Cong., 1st sess., 1913, 

S. Doc. 204, 27; MRC, Expenditure of Emergency 

Funds, 6–7.

8 “Methods and Costs of Damming the Hymelia 

Crevasse,” Professional Memoirs, Corps of Engineers

5 (Washington, D.C.: 1913): 57–77.

9. ARCE (1912), 3722–23; “Bridling the Mississippi,” 

Literary Digest 44 (20 Apr. 1912): 798–99.

10. Congressional Record, 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912, 

5910–11.

11. J. B. Aleshire to Chief of Engineers, 4 Apr. 1912, 

and Charles Potter to Chief of Engineers, 2 July 

1912, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 84753.

12. House of Reps., Flood Sufferers in the Mississippi 

and Ohio Valleys, 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912, 

H. Doc. 1453, 14–15.

13. Both quotes in ibid.

14. Ibid., 1–20.

15. Ibid.; ARCE (1912), 3754–57, 3965–66, 3975.

16. “The Red Cross in the Mississippi Floods,” 

Literary Digest 44 (15 June 1912): 1258.

17. House of Reps., Flood Sufferers in the Mississippi 

and Ohio Valleys, 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912, 

H. Doc. 1453, 75; Senate Committee on 

Appropriations, Relief of Sufferers from Floods in the 

Mississippi and Ohio Valleys, 62d Cong., 2d sess., 

1912, S. Rept. 699, passim; House Committee on 

Appropriations, Subsistence of Flood Sufferers along 

the Mississippi River, 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912, 

H. Doc. 711, passim.

18. Williams, “Mid-South Views the Floods,” 71–85.

19. Lansing Beach to Chief of Engineers, 19 Feb. 

1916, NARA, RG 407, Adjutant General Office 

[AGO], Central Files, 1917–1929, Dec. 400.38, 

Box 929. Abuse of free rations was common; see 

Committee on Appropriations, Sufferers from the 

Overflow of Rivers in the South, 43d Cong., 2d sess., 

1874, H. Exdoc. 14, passim.

20. Arthur E. Morgan, The Miami Valley and the 1913 

Flood (Dayton, Ohio: Miami Conservancy 

District, 1917), 1–80; Herbert Koch, “The Flood 

of 1913,” Cincinnati Historical Society Bulletin 25 

(Jan. 1967): 136–49; “A Birdseye View of 

Conditions in the Ohio Flood Districts,” 

Engineering News 69 (17 Apr. 1913): 794–98; H. K. 

Barrows, Floods, Their Hydrology and Control (New 

York: McGraw-Hill, 1948), 106–09; “Tornado, 

Flood, and Fire,” Literary Digest 46 (5 Apr. 1913): 

753–55; Alfred J. Henry, The Flood of 1913 in the 

Rivers of the Ohio and Lower Mississippi Valley, 

Bulletin Z (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Dept. of 

Agriculture, Weather Bureau, 1913), 81–88.

21. William Bixby to Chief of Staff, 11 Apr. 1913, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 88925.

22. Francis Shunk to Chief of Engineers, 21 May 

1913, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 88972; see 

also the note in S & D Reflector 7 (Mar. 1970): 

12–17.

23. T. G. Ridge to E. J. Carpenter, 10 Apr. 1913, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 88925.

24. Wheeling District Engineer to Chief of Engineers, 

26 Apr. 1913, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 

889925.

25. “Report of Major J. E. Normoyle in Charge Relief 

Operations, Flood Sufferers, Mississippi and Ohio 

Valleys, 1913,” NARA, RG 407, AGO Central 

Files, Dec. 400.38, File 2103191.

26. Henry Jervey to Chief of Engineers, 2 June 1915, 

NARA Central Plains Region (Kansas City, Mo.), 

RG 77, Box NA16, File M430.

27. John Kingman to J. E. Normoyle, 12 May 1913, in 

“Report of Major J. E. Normoyle in Charge Relief 

Operations, Flood Sufferers, Mississippi and Ohio 

Valleys, 1913,” NARA, RG 407, AGO Central 

Files, Dec. 400.38, File 2103191.

28. H. A. Finch, “Personal Experiences on Flood 

Duty,” Military Engineer 15 (Sept.–Oct. 1923): 

398–400.

29. Ibid.

30. Ibid.; ARCE (1913), 2675.

31. Morgan, Miami Valley and the 1913 Flood, 80–113; 

“Response to Flood Calls,” Survey 30 (5 Apr. 

1913): 1–2.

32. House of Reps., Rescuing Flood Victims in the 

Middle Western States, 63d Cong., 1st sess., 1913, 

H. Doc. 94, passim.

33. Ibid., 2.
The Flood Fights ■ Notes 105

34. J. E. Normoyle to Chief of Staff, 31 Mar. 1913, in 

“Report of Major J. E. Normoyle in Charge Relief 

Operations, Flood Sufferers, Mississippi and Ohio 

Valleys, 1913,” NARA, RG 407, AGO Central 

Files, Dec. 400.38, File 2103191.

35. William Bixby to Secretary of War, 27 Mar. 1913, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 88925.

36. Thomas Rhoads to Secretary of War, 31 May 

1913, “Report on Work of Sanitary Department at 

Dayton, Ohio, and Vicinity, March 28 to April 25, 

1913,” NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 88925; “In 

the Wake of the Flood,” Survey 30 (12 Apr. 1913): 

53; Winthrop Lane and Lewis Stein, “The Houses 

the Red Cross Built,” Survey 30 (5 July 1913): 

481–88.

37. Henry Jervey to Chief of Engineers, 3 June 1913, 

NARA Central Plains Region (Kansas City, Mo.), 

RG 77, Box NA16, File M430.

38. ARCE (1913), 336–77.

39. Harrison, Levee Districts and Levee Building, 

213–17.

40. E. M. Markham to Chief of Engineers, 29 Mar. 

1913, and Leonard Wood to Adjutant General, 31 

Mar. 1913, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 88972.

41. J. B. Aleshire to Chief of Engineers, 6 Apr. 1913, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 88972.

42. W. A. Blain to H. M. Bankhead, 18 May 1913, in 

“Report of Major J. E. Normoyle in Charge Relief 

Operations, Flood Sufferers, Mississippi and Ohio 

Valleys, 1913,” NARA, RG 407, AGO Central 

Files, Dec. 400.38, File 2103191.

43. Finch, “Personal Experiences on Flood Duty,” 

398–99.

44. H. A. Finch to Third District Engineer, 23 Feb. 

1916, NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, 1917–

1925, Dec. 400.38, Box 929.

45. Theodore Roosevelt, “The Ohio Floods: Can Such 

Calamities Be Prevented?” Outlook 103 (5 Apr. 

1913): 765–66. Post-disaster studies are House of 

Reps., Report of Ohio [River] Flood Board, 63d 

Cong., 1st sess., 1913, H. Doc. 246; House 

Committee on Rivers and Harbors, Prevention of 

Damage by Floods, 63d Cong., 2d sess., 1914, 

H. Doc. 914; and House Committee on Flood 

Control, Flood Protection and Prevention, 64th 

Cong., 2d sess., 1916, H. Doc. 1792.
Right: The rail yard at 

Asheville, North Carolina, 

was flooded in 1916.

Schandler Family Collection, 

Special Collections, 

D.H. Ramsey Library, 

University of North Carolina 

at Asheville

Left: A 1915 hurricane destroyed parts 

of New Orleans.

Collection of H. George Friedman Jr.

Right: Floodwaters covered 

Chattanooga, Tennessee, on 

7 March 1917.

National Archives, 27-G-1A-7
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Louisiana Hurricane 107

The Corps Initiates 

Work Relief

Fierce hurricanes, spirit-dampening 

floods, politics, bureaucracy, war in 

Europe—the nation had little respite 

from troubles from 1915 to 1917. As one natural 

disaster followed another, the Corps initiated 

a new approach to federal relief and recovery 

programs: “No Work, No Rations.” The conception of work relief, at the federal level, usually 

has been associated with President Franklin 

Roosevelt’s program to restore economic vitality 

during the Great Depression—projects that put 

the unemployed to work rather than offering 

them the dole. The Corps of Engineers, however, applied this concept to a federal program 

prior to the First World War and on the heels 

of a hurricane and major floods afflicting the 

South.

Federal disaster assistance had begun in the 

South after the Civil War to benefit the former 

slaves who suffered intensely during Mississippi 

River floods. With some exceptions, notably 

the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, federal 

disaster relief had largely been confined to the 

South during the late nineteenth century and 

consisted of free rations dispensed by the Army 

Quartermaster Corps and transported by the 

Army Engineers. Troubled by shortages of the 

labor needed for emergency work on levees during the Mississippi floods of 1912 and 1913, 

the Corps proposed its new approach: instead 

of providing free rations to flood victims, offer 

them paying temporary jobs. During the flooding disaster of 1916 in the southern states, 

Congress gave the Corps an opportunity to 

implement its work relief program and test its 

concept. Considering the results, the Army in 

1917 reviewed its disaster assistance responsibility, comparing the merits of the Corps’ 

work relief concept with the traditional ration 

distribution.

•

Louisiana Hurricane, 1915

Maj. William Caples was commanding the 

Corps’ New Orleans office when a hurricane 

blew ashore at the end of September 1915. His 

situation report, telegraphed to the chief of 

engineers, graphically described what he saw:

Employees safe. Roofs partly off at depot. 

Quarterboat and coal flat ashore near 

Chalmette. Navy dock drifted around and 

blocked by wrecks. Navy wants wrecks 

removed. No available funds. Wrecks out 

of vessel track. Estimate four thousand. 

Request instructions. Levee above New 

Orleans moderately damaged. Wave fences 

about forty percent gone. One levee near 

Donaldsville apparently undermined. 

Damages outside of new levee probably 

under forty thousand. Levee just below 

New Orleans badly damaged. Washed past 

crown in several places. Would not stand 

high water. Visible losses apparently quarter 

million. Loss to shipping in harbor confined 

largely to coal fleet, tugs, and small craft. 

City wharves damaged. Wharves below 

city about half destroyed. Leave today to 

investigate reported loss of forty miles levees 

below city.1

6
108 Situation Desperate

Waves sent inland by the hurricane raised the 

Mississippi River’s level by five feet with maximum wind and wave action. The storm swept 

the wharves clean, whipped the bark off trees, 

and carried boats and barges crashing over tops 

of levees. When Caples examined the damage downstream of New Orleans he found the 

Barataria levees broken at thirty-three places 

and the Lake Borgne levees at twenty-three.

No disaster assistance mission came on the heels 

of the September hurricane, but Caples and the 

New Orleans District had to repair the levee 

system before spring floods arrived in 1916, 

a herculean task considering the storm had 

obliterated eighteen miles of levees and damaged another ninety-five miles of the system. 

Employing all the hired labor he could obtain 

and entering into emergency contracts with 

construction firms, Caples began immediate 

Broken utility lines dangled precariously in New Orleans, 1915.

Collection of H. George Friedman Jr.

Streetcars were among the victims of the hurricane in New Orleans, 1915. Collection of H. George Friedman Jr.
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ No Work, No Rations 109

repairs. The rushed work persisted through the 

winter and the repairs were done just before the 

flood came in February 1916.2

•

No Work, No Rations in 

February Floods, 1916

The flood crest at Cairo in early February 

1916 was 1.5 feet lower than the record set in 

1913. Downstream, however, the White River 

climbed to record levels and combined with 

extremely high waters on the Arkansas River 

to raise the Mississippi between Sunflower 

Landing and Natchez to a new peak. There, it 

reached 1.4 feet higher than all previous floods 

at Vicksburg.3

Congress was inundated by another flood—

the appeals for federal disaster assistance, for 

the free rations issued during earlier disasters. 

A committee at New Orleans also cornered 

Maj. Gen. Leonard Wood and, believing the 

1916 flood was worse than those of 1912 and 

1913, they asked that quartermaster officers 

be detailed to the scene, engineer workboats 

get up steam, and emergency funding be made 

available for rescue and relief. Senator Joseph 

Robinson received telegrams from Arkansas 

asking him to use his influence to have the 

Quartermaster Corps send Lt. Frederick Hanna, 

who had supervised free ration distribution there 

in 1912, to again supervise the relief operations.4

Robinson introduced a resolution to appropriate $100,000 and direct the secretary of war 

to initiate disaster relief work. Robinson had 

reports from his state insisting that many lives 

had already been lost to flooding and hundreds 

were marooned without food. His resolution 

swiftly flowed through the Senate but abruptly 

hit a snag in the House. Congressman John 

Fitzgerald of New York read to the House 

copies of messages handed him by the chief of 

engineers. A telegram from Maj. J. R. Slattery at 

Vicksburg, for example, described the flood:

Levees being subjected to severe test but no 

point specially endangered yet. Excellent 

chance of holding line if white population 

will put up proper fight. Can give employment and subsistence to all persons in 

flooded parts of Arkansas. Have already 

offered such assistance and am extending 

further offers. At present am having to pay 

fancy prices for labor to hold commission 

levees on Arkansas River. Arkansas authorities advised by my assistant several days ago 

that government boats would proceed to 

any point where life was in danger. It would 

materially help situation if all hope of free 

rations were squelched.5

The telegrams from Maj. Edward Markham at 

Memphis and Caples at New Orleans resembled 

Slattery’s: the flood damages had not exceeded 

state and local resources for relief assistance and 

the issuance of free federal rations would hamper the flood fight in progress. In view of this 

opposition by Corps officers in the field, the 

“The storm swept the wharves clean, whipped the bark off trees, and 

carried boats and barges crashing over tops of levees.”
110 Situation Desperate

House adjourned on 5 February without action 

on Senator Robinson’s resolution.6

The Corps officers’ stance against federal disaster assistance shocked some congressmen, and 

Chief of Engineers Dan Kingman therefore 

requested additional information from the field. 

Knowing that Col. Lansing Beach and Capt. 

Henry Finch had personally studied disaster 

relief efforts in 1912 and 1913, Kingman ordered 

Beach to New Orleans and Finch to Vicksburg 

to investigate the situation and report.7

Over the weekend of 6 and 7 February, public 

pressure on Corps officers increased. Answering 

questions from the Vicksburg Herald, Slattery 

advised he would employ any person immediately on levee work. “Persons thus employed 

will be fed, sheltered, and paid fifty cents a day, 

and worked [emphasis original],” Slattery told 

the newspaper, adding: “Women and children 

driven from their homes by the water will be 

sheltered as far as accommodations of quarterboats permit. Food will be provided them and 

the cost thereof deducted from pay earned by 

their husbands and fathers. An endeavor will 

be made to provide employment for unmarried 

or widowed women, as there is considerable 

work that can be readily performed by such.” He 

told the news reporters that if they could name 

a single person or locality in need of relief, he 

would send the boats to get them today and put 

them right to work on the levees.8

In a 7 February report to the chief, Slattery 

explained his actions just as he had to the 

reporters. He had deployed the entire Vicksburg 

District fleet strategically along the levees, well 

equipped with sandbags, shovels, and wheelbarrows, awaiting only the arrival of laborers to 

start the flood fight. He complained that the 

efforts by certain interests to secure free rations 

had caused serious difficulty obtaining the 

workers needed to raise the Arkansas levees.9

When Congress reconvened on Monday, 

Robinson presented letters from people of 

Hickman, Kentucky, and Clarendon and Lake 

Village, Arkansas, stating that the floodwaters had driven thousands from their homes 

and these refugees were suffering and needed 

prompt relief. Judge Harry Cook of Chicot 

County, Arkansas, castigated Slattery:

Slattery first refuses aid, then grants insufficient aid; arbitrary and dictatorial in every 

instance. Government rations have always 

been refused where anyone refuses levee or 

other emergency work, and Maj. Slattery 

cannot truthfully assert the contrary .... 

Unless immediate relief is granted thousands of stock and many human lives will 

perish. Maj. Slattery unacquainted with 

suffering of people and too brutal and 

inhumane to conserve their dire necessities. 

County has dispatched physicians to aid sick 

and exposed on levee fronts. Women and 

children, hundreds in number, cribbed up; 

over 6 to 15 feet of water; three-fourths of 

county submerged.10

“Women and children, hundreds in number, 

cribbed up; over 6 to 15 feet of water; 

three-fourths of county submerged.”

“It would materially help situation if all 

hope of free rations were squelched.”
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ No Work, No Rations 111

Congressman Alben Barkley of Kentucky 

rose to the floor of the House and read a telegram concerning public distress at Hickman. 

Stopping short of calling Markham and Slattery 

liars, he urged the House to disregard the engineers’ reports and at once enact a resolution for 

the relief of flood victims.

In response, Fitzgerald of New York read to the 

House another report sent by Maj. E. J. Dent 

from Little Rock. Dent stated the Clarendon 

levee on the White River had broken the night 

of 5 February, but the Corps towboats Quapaw

and A. D. Allen were at the site. “Nothing 

alarming in situation at Clarendon,” he concluded. “Inhabitants living in upper stories. No 

food shortage.” The House then dropped its 

consideration of the disaster relief bill pending 

further information.11

Beach and Finch began their field investigations on 9 February. Reports from Lake 

Village, Arkansas, indicated four thousand 

people were in dire need; Beach found four. 

In his opinion, the demands for free rations 

came from people who apparently desired to 

handle the rations distribution or to make 

political capital by being the first to arrange the 

distribution. He recommended that the chief 

of engineers seek to modify any congressional 

The White River reached the rooftops at Calico Rock, Arkansas, in early 1916. National Archives, 27-G-1A-7
112 Situation Desperate

resolutions authorizing disaster relief to allow 

issue of free rations only “in the discretion of 

the Secretary of War.” Beach was convinced 

that issuing free rations would hamper the 

Corps’ flood fight.12

On receiving Beach’s report, Kingman contacted the manager of the Associated Press and 

asked that the false reports of dire needs in 

Arkansas be taken off the wires. He did so, he 

said, “knowing that Associated Press desired to 

have its reports correct, and would request that 

correspondents be notified to send only truthful dispatches.” He also passed along copies of 

Beach’s report to the appropriate members 

of Congress.13

At noon on 10 February the House of 

Representatives resumed its consideration of 

the resolution authorizing disaster relief to 

Mississippi River flood victims. “It makes no 

difference what the War Department says,” 

proclaimed Congressman W. A. Oldfield of 

Arkansas, alluding to the Corps’ opposition to 

issuing federally funded subsistence. “I think 

the officers of the War Department spend 

most of their time on the Mississippi River, 

trying to keep the levees from breaking,” he 

explained. “I do not blame them because they 

no doubt are doing their duty as they see it, 

but they ought not to come here and try to 

prevent this House from giving needed and 

immediate relief.”

Congressman Henderson Jacoway declared the 

entire Arkansas delegation had called on Chief 

of Engineers Kingman to appeal to his humanity. The general told them he did not want to 

sound ungracious or unsympathetic, but the 

War Department would not act until Congress 

enacted a proper resolution authorizing disaster 

assistance. Alben Barkley said he too had visited 

the chief’s office, carrying with him telegrams 

begging for disaster relief, but Kingman had 

merely shown him telegrams he had received 

from Markham, Slattery, Dent, and Beach. 

Those telegrams showed, thundered Barkley, 

that people were living in upper stories of their 

homes because the lower stories were filled with 

water. Just what, Barkley asked, did the Corps 

of Engineers think would be a condition justifying federal assistance?

Benjamin Humphreys of Mississippi pointed out 

that he personally had suffered through several 

floods and had seen the free rations issued time 

and again. “But, Mr. Speaker,” he concluded, 

“we have it from a poet 2,000 years ago that 

‘the gods have destroyed whole families by 

answering their prayers.’” Humphreys said it had 

been his experience that federal issuance of free 

rations did more harm than good.

Percy Quin of Mississippi took umbrage at that 

idea. “Mr. Humphreys of Mississippi said he 

was willing to let them have tents and medicine, 

but he is opposed to them getting provisions,” 

said Quin. “My God, gentlemen, what good 

will tents do a man, what good will medicine 

do a child, when their bellies are empty, gnawing, and hungry?” After being interrupted by 

applause, he continued. “It seems to me that it 

is heartless. I do not want to refer to my distinguished friend here, but he said that in his 

judgment it disorganizes labor. Do you mean 

“My God, gentlemen, what good will 

tents do a man, what good will medicine 

do a child, when their bellies are empty, 

gnawing, and hungry?”
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Work Relief 113

to say that some great employer does not want 

the poor people to receive relief simply because 

some of his labor might not be there to go to 

work Monday morning? That kind of sentiment, 

gentlemen, ought not to reach the Halls of the 

United States Capitol.”

After lengthy and heated debate, the House 

defeated the resolution to authorize the secretary of war to supply flood victims with tents, 

rations, and other supplies. The House then 

took up a substitute, offered by Irvine Lenroot 

of Wisconsin, which differed from the defeated 

resolution by adding the words “in his discretion,” meaning the secretary of war could 

issue rations and supplies at a time he thought 

appropriate.

Congressman Thaddeus Caraway of Arkansas, 

upset by what he thought were slurs upon his 

state, took the floor. “I want to tell you that 

nobody on God’s earth gives more liberally 

of his means than our people do. You do not 

have to open subscription lists so you can get 

your name published in the paper in order to 

get relief, either.” He declared that Arkansas 

would care for its own to the limits of its ability. 

“We do not want your charity; we do not ask 

it,” he continued. “If you defeat this legislation, the result to some poor, helpless people 

is going to be death, and if you can escape 

your moral responsibility for sending some of 

them to death by voting against this resolution 

and justify it in your consciences, bless your 

hearts, go ahead and do it....” The House then 

passed the substitute allowing the secretary of 

war to issue relief rations and supplies “in his 

discretion” by a vote of 93 to 44.14

•

Work Relief

The 1916 flood fight on the Mississippi River 

proved eminently successful. Throughout the 

fourteen hundred miles of main levees on the 

Mississippi there was only a single crevasse—at 

Buck Ridge on 15 February. Breaks occurred, 

however, on levees along tributaries for 

which the federal government then had no 

responsibility.15

The Corps snagboats Joseph E. Ransdell and 

C. W. Howell and the dredge Waterway conducted rescue operations on the Red, Tensas, 

and Black rivers; and the towboats A. D. Allen, 

Quapaw, Lafourche, and snagboat Ben Humphreys

performed rescues where needed along the 

Arkansas River. Maj. J. R. Slattery at Vicksburg 

placed Capt. Henry Finch in charge of the 

relief operations along the Arkansas, and Finch 

strictly enforced the newly authorized policy of 

“no work, no rations.”16

When the New Orleans District commander, 

Maj. William Caples, heard of suffering near 

St. Joseph, Louisiana, he asked that a quartermaster officer be sent to investigate. Capt. 

William Hunt of the Quartermaster Corps met 

Caples at St. Joseph, where the major told him 

the test to be applied before issuing rations was 

whether people were willing to work for the 

“If you defeat this legislation, the result to some poor, helpless people 

is going to be death...”
114 Situation Desperate

same. After inspecting conditions in Tensas, 

Catahoula, and Concordia Parishes, Hunt 

declined issuing rations.17

In a confidential and acerbic report, Hunt 

reviewed at length his assessment of the situation and new policy:

Political phases of appeals and requests for 

Government assistance were very apparent. 

The state election in Louisiana takes place 

about the middle of April. The political pot 

is boiling hot. The primaries are past. All 

candidates for offices felt that they had of 

necessity to show to their constituents that 

they had exhausted their efforts to secure 

Government aid. They did not resent, neither did they feel badly at the investigations 

which were made by the Engineer officers 

and myself to find the actual conditions, 

but were glad that such investigations were 

made, as thereby they were able to tell their 

constituents that they had done the best 

The engineer snagboat Ben Humphreys (shown in 1908) rescued people along the Arkansas River in 1916. Office of History
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Work Relief 115

they could, and at least it was through no 

fault of theirs that Government aid was not 

forthcoming. I am convinced that the policy 

pursued this year, of personal investigation of appeals and requests by an Army 

Officer is the proper way to handle this 

matter. It is far from safe to take as gospel 

truths, appeals as forwarded to and through 

congressmen. My policy was to arrive 

unannounced at the place to be investigated 

and in advance of the time when I might 

be expected. So arriving, the local committee, if there were any, and many times 

no local committee at all had been formed, 

was not prepared and had no story carefully 

thought out. There were various hints that 

other crevasses might have occurred had the 

ration issue been started, etc. It is impossible to state whether or not such malicious 

breaks would have occurred.18

Editorial cartoon from the New Orleans Times-Picayune, 9 February 1916. New Orleans Times-Picayune
116 Situation Desperate

Finch declared in his final report that the “work 

relief” policy was the best ever devised, ensuring 

a labor supply for flood fights without pauperizing or demoralizing people. He admitted that 

a system of issuing rations to needy people only 

might be developed, but it would entail great 

cost and so much red tape that people would be 

either dead or helped by private charities before 

federal aid could reach them. Finch concluded: 

“It may well be the Engineer Department in 

adopting its policy this year believed the holding 

of the laborers in hand to be the first consideration. As important as this point undoubtedly 

is, I am positive that the greatest good has 

resulted to the communities themselves, because 

by enforcing this policy they have so far been 

spared a repetition of the demoralizing experiences of 1912 and 1913.”19

Finch’s report was approved by his superiors and 

submitted to the Army’s adjutant general and 

quartermaster general for consideration. When 

a major Mississippi River flood occurred in 

1922, the Army chief of staff reviewed the 1916 

reports by Finch and Col. Lansing Beach on the 

issuance of free rations. No massive free ration 

issue followed in 1922, nor ever again. The 

Corps of Engineers helped with rescue and conducted flood fights, the Quartermaster Corps 

supplied refugees with tents and medical supplies, but feeding the destitute was left chiefly to 

the American Red Cross and other charities.20

•

Southern States Floods , 1916

The southern states floods of July 1916, nearly 

a forgotten disaster, resulted in a unique disaster assistance mission. The Corps’ “no work, 

no rations” policy a few months earlier on the 

Mississippi River was so admired that Congress 

gave the Corps an opportunity to apply this 

policy outside the Mississippi delta. This application of the policy proved so difficult, however, 

that the Army never used it again.

On 5 July 1916 a hurricane slammed ashore at 

Mobile, Alabama, causing extensive damage. It 

practically destroyed the Corps’ fleet, sinking 

the Biloxi and Chickasaw, driving the Demopolis

and Dauphin ashore, and setting the district’s 

dredge adrift in Mobile Bay. After savaging 

the coast, the storm moved inland, dumping 

heavy rains on the South. Flooding nearest 

the coast consisted of lowlands inundation, 

but up to fifteen inches of rain in mountainous 

North Carolina and West Virginia caused 

flash flooding that washed out bridges and 

destroyed communications. News of the disaster’s impact and scope filtered slowly out of 

the mountains, carried by mouth rather than 

the wires.21

Southern agrarians, already reeling from crop 

losses due to flooding in 1912, 1913, and the 

spring of 1916, plus the boll weevil’s inroads, 

were approaching collapse when the July 1916 

flood again destroyed their crops. News of 

this situation reached Congress and the chief 

of engineers in mid-July. Maj. Gen. William 

Black, for example, received an appeal from 

Selma, Alabama, that asserted the floods there 

had so damaged crops that planters could no 

longer care for their tenants and disaster assistance was essential to prevent much poverty and 

its attendant crime.22

Black relayed that telegram and others, along 

with instructions to investigate the circumstances, to Capt. Edward Schulz at Mobile 

and Capt. C. L. Sturdevant commanding the 
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Southern States Floods 117

Montgomery District. These officers and their 

staffs personally inspected crop damage and 

interviewed the planters and tenants, concluding that economic collapse was indeed imminent: the flood had destroyed both cotton and 

corn crops. The earlier floods and crop losses 

had impoverished the people, and they could 

obtain no further credit, neither to eat nor to 

plant new crops. Sturdevant strongly recommended that the Department of Agriculture 

be requested to issue seeds to the needy for 

planting. Schulz made more far-reaching 

recommendations.23

Schulz reported on 21 July that floodwaters 

had stood on croplands in the Tombigbee and 

Warrior river basins of Alabama and the Leaf 

and Chickasawhay river basins of Mississippi for 

ten days; that at least five hundred families near 

Demopolis, Alabama, and Merrill, Mississippi, 

were in dire straits; and that the yearly crops 

were gone and people had nothing to eat and no 

hope for the future. He estimated that $10,000 

to $15,000, if appropriated by Congress and 

distributed by the Red Cross, would subsist 

five hundred families for three months. “As an 

alternate proposition,” Schulz suggested, “the 

Engineer Department could handle $10,000 to 

$15,000 in funding to remove overhanging trees 

and improve the banks along the Tombigbee 

and Black Warrior rivers if such an appropriation could be made. The wages paid would be 

temporarily below the normal, and only worthy 

sufferers employed. The amounts received by the 

laborers would enable them to feed their families 

until better conditions prevail.” Schulz reminded 

his superiors that he had requested $50,000 for 

Tombigbee River navigation projects during the 

fiscal years, but had received only $35,000.24

The July 1916 hurricane sank steamers at Mobile, Alabama.

NOAA Photo Library
118 Situation Desperate

At the Charleston District in South Carolina, 

Maj. Gilbert Youngsberg investigated disaster 

conditions in the Yadkin, Santee, Wateree, Pee 

Dee, and Catawba valleys of North and South 

Carolina, learning that farmers and laborers 

in the area faced starvation. He found fifteen 

hundred people in the flooded areas without 

food or prospect for crops, and he suggested 

they needed some sort of construction work 

to furnish employment and some seeds for 

replanting.25

Maj. Lytle Brown and Capt. Jarvis Bain from 

Nashville and Chattanooga checked conditions in the mountains of Tennessee and North 

Carolina, learning that the fifteen inches of rain 

that had fallen in a single day near Asheville, 

North Carolina, had ruined crops and destroyed 

roads and bridges. Brown reported that the 

destruction of transportation routes had become 

the single greatest obstacle to recovery in North 

Carolina, and he suggested that the needy might 

be employed to repair the roads.26

Chief of Engineers Black summarized the disaster situation for the Army chief of staff, Maj. 

Gen. Hugh Scott: Corps investigations revealed 

severe flood damages in Georgia, Alabama, 

Mississippi, and North and South Carolina, 

with crops, roads, and bridges damaged and 

stream channels clogged—human suffering 

would be great by winter if action were not 

taken. “It is the general belief,” he concluded, 

A temporary railroad bridge was built across the Catawba 

River at Fort Mill, South Carolina, in 1916.

NOAA Photo Library

“...whatever relief is afforded 

should be in the form of an 

opportunity to work.”
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Southern States Floods 119

“that whatever relief is afforded should be in the 

form of an opportunity to work.”27

Black also relayed the damage surveys to 

members of Congress, pointing out the disaster 

was not an emergency in the ordinary sense of 

immediate danger to life; rather, it was a longterm problem involving subsisting the destitute 

until they could support themselves. If Congress 

wished to offer disaster assistance, Black recommended the employment of the needy on such 

public works as roads. “It is a question of policy 

that Congress must determine,” he declared. 

“I know of no instance where the United States 

has undertaken the care of sufferers from a 

widespread calamity for longer than a very 

temporary period.”28

On 29 July the secretary of war sent available information on the disaster to the House 

Committee on Military Affairs along with 

his estimate that supplying work relief to the 

destitute for three months could cost $540,000. 

Oscar Underwood of Alabama then introduced 

a joint resolution appropriating $540,000 for the 

“relief of persons suffering and in destitution by 

reason of recent floods in the States of North 

Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, 

Florida, Tennessee, and Mississippi.” The resolution authorized the secretary of war to issue 

seeds to planters for producing fast-growing 

crops and to employ the destitute at moderate 

wages under direct supervision of Army officers 

in cooperation with local governments. “This 

is not as large or as great a calamity as that 

presented by the earthquake conditions in San 

Francisco that we relieved, but proportionately 

it is as great,” Underwood asserted. “If this great 

flood had happened in the Middle Western 

States or in the East, every newspaper in the 

country would have been full of it.”

Senator Lee Overman of North Carolina 

declared that destruction of roads and bridges 

in his state had been so complete that he had 

not heard of the losses until two weeks after the 

storm. He got news of the conditions in western 

North Carolina after a friend had walked “for 

days and days in order to get to some place from 

which he could send a letter off in the mail.”29

Opposition to the resolution came chiefly from 

Senator Boies Penrose of Pennsylvania, who 

issued a wry warning to his Senate colleagues:

If after due consideration the Senate shall 

conclude to pass this resolution, I shall make 

no very great amount of opposition to it; 

but I was a little curious to know whether 

the party now in power intends to meet 

all cases of floods with the same liberal 

disbursement of the public funds. Doubtless 

the Allegheny and the Monongahela rivers will again overflow their banks, as 

they have done almost every spring, or the 

Susquehanna or the Delaware may again 

rise and destroy property along their banks, 

and I did not know but that I might have 

the support of the Senator from Alabama 

and other Senators in having a resolution 

passed appropriating perhaps a million dollars to compensate the unfortunate sufferers 

who live along those streams.30

“If this great flood had happened in the Middle Western States or in the East, 

every newspaper in the country would have been full of it.”
120 Situation Desperate

Congress passed the resolution on 3 August. 

Soon after it became law, several West Virginia 

congressmen saw need for their state to be 

appended to the list of recipients of federal funding. On the night of 5 August a storm dropped as 

much as fifteen inches of rain on the Coal River 

and Cabin Creek mining regions in the Kanawha 

River basin, causing flash floods that took thirtysix lives, destroyed hundreds of homes, and heavily damaged railroads and mines.31

Capt. John C. H. Lee of Wheeling surveyed 

the damages, traveling by rail to Charleston, by 

muleback to the Cabin Creek area, and by raft 

through a flooded railroad tunnel into the Coal 

River valley where he hired another mule. “The 

heavy downpour on the hills caused many slips 

and slides which left a debris of rock, gravel, 

mud and timber that created a large portion of 

the financial loss,” Lee reported. “The mouths 

of the Kayford–High Coal tunnel were practically closed by this debris, trains were buried, 

houses covered over, railroad tracks blocked in 

many places, and on the Coal River the stream 

was completely dammed for a short space of 

time in several localities.”32

Lee noticed the 2d West Virginia Infantry at 

Camp Kanawha had supplied rations, tents, and 

blankets to refugees and had maintained excelResidents inspected the devastation at Asheville, North Carolina, 1916.

Schandler Family Collection, Special Collections, D.H. Ramsey Library, University of North Carolina at Asheville
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Southern States Floods 121

lent order and sanitation in the refugee camp. 

He therefore recommended that the federal 

government initiate no relief work in the Cabin 

Creek and Coal River areas, other than crediting the National Guard for the supplies consumed by refugees during the emergency.33

While Lee conducted his investigation, Senator 

E. E. Chilton of West Virginia introduced a resolution to appropriate $200,000 for federal relief 

in the Kanawha River valley. Senator Penrose of 

Pennsylvania promptly proposed an amendment 

to the resolution, giving a few hundred thousand 

dollars to Pittsburgh. By way of explanation, he 

read into the record a news clipping stating that 

a storm and resulting flash flood on 6 August 

killed two and caused a million dollars’ worth of 

damages at the Steel City.

“I do not think this request,” retorted Chilton, 

“should be met in the contemptuous or the 

laughing way suggested by the remarks of the 

Senator from Pennsylvania .... I do not think it 

is a time when we should be making merriment 

over the distress of women and children.” In 

view of what he labeled the reckless and lavish 

spending by Congress in 1916, Penrose declared 

he would not object to consideration of Chilton’s 

resolution and would allow the “merry dance” 

to continue. “It is,” he philosophized, “a fairly 

Residents milled around on a damaged bridge in Asheville, North Carolina, 1916.

Schandler Family Collection, Special Collections, D.H. Ramsey Library, University of North Carolina at Asheville
122 Situation Desperate

good campaign contribution to the Senator from 

West Virginia.”

Senator Jacob Gallinger of New Hampshire protested that he personally had been moved by the 

accounts of suffering in West Virginia and he 

certainly would vote for the resolution. “I hope, 

however,” he concluded thoughtfully, “that after 

a while we will take up this whole subject and 

see whether or not it is wise for the Congress to 

make appropriations whenever a calamity of this 

kind occurs in any part of the country.” “These 

appropriations will cease when the rainy season 

is over,” forecast Penrose. The Senate enacted 

the resolution, but the House amended it, making West Virginia eligible for assistance under 

the earlier act of 3 August that provided for 

work relief in the southern states.34

The secretary of war, now with authority from 

Congress to spend disaster relief funding in 

West Virginia, also retained Lee’s report that 

federal assistance there was unnecessary. He 

called on Maj. William Wallace of the West 

Virginia National Guard to inspect and submit 

another report on the disaster, and Wallace 

replied that no suffering existed in the disaster 

area, the demands for labor there exceeded the 

supply, and the National Guard had issued five 

thousand rations plus tents during the emergency and deserved reimbursement.35

At a conference on 28 August the secretary of 

war and the chief of engineers explained the 

situation to Senator Chilton, who still insisted 

something be done for West Virginia. The secretary therefore allotted $10,000 to the Corps 

of Engineers for flood relief in West Virginia, 

and the chief of engineers sent the funds to the 

Wheeling District commander, who reimbursed 

the National Guard for the emergency supplies it provided victims during the flood and 

returned the remainder to the Treasury.36

•

Work Relief Administration

No work relief was undertaken in West Virginia 

in 1916, but the Corps did oversee the relief 

program included in the congressional resolution for those southern states ripped by the 

storm flooding. Black ordered his district commanders at Mobile, Montgomery, Charleston, 

and Nashville to begin, in cooperation with 

local officials, improving public roads damaged 

by flooding by hiring the destitute to perform 

grading, ditching, repairs, and other tasks for 

which advance planning and design were unnecessary. “Prompt action is needed,” ordered the 

chief of engineers, “and exercise of wide discretion is authorised.”37

Youngsberg at Charleston divided the disaster 

area in his district into six sectors according to 

river basin: the Yadkin, Catawba, and Broad 

rivers in North Carolina and the Wateree, Pee 

Dee, and Santee rivers in South Carolina. He 

appointed an assistant to supervise the efforts 

in each sector, directing them to work hand 

in hand with local officials in repairing public 

roads, bridges, and drainage systems. The 

Charleston District employed thirty-five thousand workers and issued rations to one thousand 

who were physically unable to work, expending 

$185,000 before the work ceased in March 1917.

“I do not think it is a time when we should 

be making merriment over the distress of 

women and children.”
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Work Relief Administration 123

In Mobile District, Schulz employed thirtyeight hundred workers and seven hundred mule 

teams to clear and restore the disaster area’s 

streams and public roads, paying laborers $.70 

and drivers with teams $2.50 a day and also 

supplying weekly rations to people unable to 

work. The work performed in eleven Alabama 

counties and nine Mississippi counties ended in 

November 1916 and cost $96,768.

Sturdevant at Montgomery began the work 

relief in Wilcox, Dallas, and Perry counties, 

eventually expanding the mission to include 

fifteen Alabama counties and one in Georgia. 

Laborers received $.75 a day and families 

without able-bodied workers were given weekly 

rations of one peck of cornmeal and three 

pounds of salt pork per person. At the mission’s 

peak, the Montgomery District employed 3,509 

laborers in 121 work parties and it issued 13,755 

weekly rations to the needy.

Brown at Nashville placed the work relief mission in Buncombe, Henderson, and Transylvania 

counties near Asheville, North Carolina, under 

the local direction of Capt. Jarvis Bain, who 

required applicants for work relief to submit 

forms stating their disaster losses and their 

needs before he offered them employment. 

Paying $1.00 a day, the Nashville District 

repaired 89.5 miles of roads and rebuilt two 

bridges at a total cost of $14,429. Because the 

district had been allotted $30,000 for work 

relief, it returned the $15,571 balance to the 

Treasury.38

In August 1916 Maj. Harold Fiske, who 

replaced Slattery at the Vicksburg District, 

received a surprise telegram from the chief 

of engineers stating that people in Webster, 

Choctaw, Montgomery, Attalla, and Carroll 

counties in Mississippi had requested work relief 

in the aftermath of a flood disaster. Neither 

Fiske nor the local newspaper and weather 

bureau had learned of flooding in that vicinity, so Fiske located the six people who had 

relayed news of the disaster to the chief. After 

investigation, Fiske found that the six knew of 

no specific cases of destitution resulting from 

flooding, and he therefore declined to offer 

disaster work relief.39

One feature of the August 1916 congressional 

resolution on disaster assistance provided that 

the secretary of war would dispense seeds for 

fast-growing food crops to victims of floods. 

Seed distribution had been done many times 

before, but always by the Department of 

Agriculture. The secretary of war therefore 

persuaded the agriculture secretary to administer the seed program, allotting $50,000 for 

the purpose. The Corps of Engineers supplied 

estimates of how many destitute farmers lived in 

each county, and the Department of Agriculture 

mailed bags of seeds to each county agent who 

distributed them to 20,554 families.40

Administering work relief in 1916 proved an 

eye-opener for many of the Corps personnel involved in the mission, and after-action 

reports flowed up to the chief of engineers. 

H. C. Mower, mission manager for the Mobile 

District, found the action astonishing:

This work has been along new lines of 

endeavor for most of us; from its inception, 

it has been one succession of surprises, 

amusing and otherwise (usually otherwise), 

while the methods employed have been 

effective and, generally, satisfactory. The 

astonishing ideas found to prevail in some 

localities as to how “the Government money 
124 Situation Desperate

should be parceled out” and the ignorance 

of the best available local employees in other 

localities have been responsible for a great 

many misunderstandings and embarrassing 

problems.41

But these problems were not unique to the Deep 

South.

Bain, who had served at Fort Mason during the 

1906 San Francisco earthquake, commented 

that his service at Asheville, North Carolina, in 

1916 differed substantially from his experience 

after the quake. At San Francisco it had been 

clearly evident who was in need of assistance, 

but many people in western North Carolina 

lived continuously at levels that would be rated 

elsewhere as poverty. Bain, like others, had 

difficulty determining which persons were destitute solely as a result of the disaster. He also 

learned that people in every part of the disaster 

area wanted more relief funds spent in their 

locality than in the neighboring communities. 

“Relief work, such as we have been doing in 

North Carolina,” he concluded, “is not a pleasant duty, but it is my opinion that no one is as 

well prepared to do this work as district engineer officers of the Engineer Department, on 

account of their local knowledge and organizations for carrying on river improvement work.”42

Maj. W. L. Guthrie, who succeeded Schulz 

as district engineer in Mobile, made an acidic 

review of the program. He thought much of 

the public distress resulted from the curse of 

“absentee landlordism and tenant farming,” 

pointing out that tenants were charged as much 

as 10 percent interest per month on their credit, 

plus high percentages of their crops as land 

rental. He reported the suffering of tenants during the disaster forced many to migrate to the 

North, and he doubted they would ever return. 

The disaster therefore became, in his opinion, a 

blessing in disguise. “Taking this larger view of 

the situation,” he philosophized, “the District 

Officer is impelled to state that Federal Relief 

Work is, in general, a mistaken charity.”43

The political response to the Corps’ work relief 

effort was much more favorable than Guthrie’s. 

Congressman John Burnett sent a letter of 

appreciation to the chief of engineers on behalf 

of the people of Cherokee County, Alabama, 

and in a personal note he declared:

It was a very happy thought of yours to have 

the provisions inserted in the bill requiring 

them to work for the Government aid. It 

was an innovation in bills of this kind, and 

while at first there was some opposition 

to the proposition in the House, its merit 

soon became apparent and the opposition 

ceased.44

The Corps of Engineers in 1916 won over the 

secretary of war and Congress to the work relief 

concept, but engineers in the field supervising 

the work did not find the mission appetizing, 

especially the pork-barrel appearance the work 

took on because 1916 was an election year. The 

final summary report on mission performance 

was not completed at the Office of the Chief of 

Engineers until 1919, and then it was filed away, 

never printed, and forgotten.

“Relief work...is not a pleasant duty, 

but it is my opinion that no one is as 

well prepared to do this work as district 

engineer officers...”
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Special Regulation No. 67 125

Within the Corps there was no subsequent rush 

to press for additional work relief assignments. 

Sturdevant and the Montgomery District, for 

example, met two disaster challenges soon 

after the 1916 mission. In February 1917 a tornado ripped across Hollins and Clay County, 

Alabama, and Sturdevant’s survey showed the 

storm had blown away thirty-six homes, three 

churches, and three schools. He reported that 

putting the victims to work on public roads 

would not help them, because they needed funds 

to rebuild, and he recommended that this effort 

be left to the American Red Cross and local 

charities.45

Similarly, when the Alabama River flooded in 

December 1919 to a stage six feet higher than 

in 1916, and Corps workboats rescued people 

from the flood at Montgomery, Selma, and 

Wetumpka, hundreds were left homeless. The 

Red Cross and local charities were at work, 

however, and the Corps did not recommend 

federal disaster assistance.46

•

Special Regulation No. 67

The Army War College, perhaps interested in 

differences between the Quartermasters’ free 

ration distribution and the Corps’ work relief 

approach to disaster assistance, recommended to 

the Army chief of staff in September 1916 that 

federal policies on disaster relief be reviewed 

and reformulated. “The idea is to prepare a plan 

that will be practicable, quickly put into operation, that will afford relief to the really needy,” 

read the recommendation. The chief of staff 

appointed three officers to a board “to formulate 

a policy and regulations to govern in future 

flood relief work of the War Department.” 

The officers were Maj. Herbert Lord of the 

Quartermaster Corps, Maj. Frank Cocheu of the 

General Staff, and Maj. William Kelly of the 

Corps of Engineers, who had distinguished himself during the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.47

The officers asked the chief of engineers to 

submit information about flood relief missions, 

and he in turn called for confidential reports 

from the officers who had supervised work relief 

in the South during 1916. Their reports candidly revealed their conflicts with members of 

Congress and local officials who sought political capital from the relief operations, as well as 

efforts to stop people from attempting to abuse 

or defraud the federal efforts to issue rations or 

employ the needy.48

In his report, Maj. J. R. Slattery of Vicksburg 

District described the abuse of free ration 

distribution during the 1912 Mississippi River 

flood. He mentioned that certain prominent 

men in Arkansas laughed about a quartermaster 

officer who had released rations to them with 

a free hand and to whom they had awarded a 

silver service as sign of their gratitude. When 

the Army adjutant general reviewed this report, 

he ordered Slattery to name the officer, and 

Slattery reluctantly named Lt. Frederick Hanna. 

Hanna then responded that the silver service 

had been a gift to his wife, presented in the 

presence of his commanding officer, Maj. James 

Normoyle, since deceased. The adjutant general 

advised Hanna that accepting the silver service 

was not conduct becoming to an officer.49

The real issue in contention was whether the 

Quartermasters or the Engineers would administer disaster assistance in the future. The board 

in 1917 broadened its studies to include fires, 

earthquakes, and great calamities in addition to 
126 Situation Desperate

floods; nevertheless, its members proved unable 

to agree upon disaster relief procedures. That 

June the board submitted three sets of recommendations: a majority report signed by Lord 

and Cocheu, a minority report by Kelly, and a 

memorandum of change in the minority report 

submitted by the chief of engineers.

The majority report, supported by the quartermaster general, required that the senior officer 

present at a major disaster report the facts to 

the adjutant general of the Army department 

commander who had jurisdiction over the area 

where the disaster occurred. The department 

commander would then control rescue work and 

manage relief operations. All military stores 

and personnel in the area, including Corps of 

Engineers districts, would at once fall under 

command of the Army department until relief 

efforts ended.

Kelly’s minority report questioned the Army’s 

authority to undertake disaster relief under the 

existing regulations, and he believed Congress 

should spell out this authority in law. He recommended that the Corps’ civil works districts take 

charge of all relief operations during floods and 

that the district commanders should also command any troops detailed to assist with disaster 

recovery. During non-flood disasters, the 

Army’s department commanders would command the response.50

Differing with both the majority and minority reports, Maj. Gen. William Black, Chief 

of Engineers, pointed out that the character 

and duration of disaster relief operations varied 

widely. He described the 1906 San Francisco 

earthquake as a disaster of such proportions that 

command and control by the Army’s department commander was necessary; he thought the 

southern states flood of 1916 and subsequent 

work relief program a mission best performed 

by the Engineers; and he mentioned tornadoes, 

From Cameron Hill, men view the swollen river and distant bridges in 

Chattanooga, Tennessee, 1917. National Archives, 27-G-1A-7
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Special Regulation No. 67 127

requiring only the issuance of tents and rations, 

as a mission best done by the Quartermasters. 

Thus, Black recommended a flexible policy 

wherein the secretary of war in each case selected 

the best approach to specific disaster situations.51

After reviewing the three reports, the War 

College Division of the General Staff decided 

the Army’s department commander, as the normal representative of the Army within the limits 

of his territorial command, should manage 

emergency responses; placing disaster relief work 

in charge of Corps officers and their civil works 

districts would be unwise. It recommended that 

the Army adopt the majority report of Lord and 

Cocheu, and the chief of staff and the secretary 

of war concurred.52

Special Regulation No. 67 of 12 October 1917 

set policies to govern War Department relief 

work during floods, earthquakes, and other 

calamities. It made Army department commanders responsible for planning disaster 

missions within their areas. Appended to this 

regulation were detachable standard forms for 

requesting free rations from the Quartermaster 

Corps and for applying to the Corps of 

Engineers for work relief. The question of 

whether to issue quartermaster emergency supplies, or to offer the Corps’ work relief program, 

or to implement other measures was left to the 

discretion of the individual department commanding generals.53

With publication of Special Regulation No. 67, 

the Army’s role in federal disaster assistance 

entered a new phase. No longer would Corps 

civil works commanders or quartermaster 

officers conduct disaster relief operations independently, reporting to the respective chiefs of 

their corps. After 1917 these officers reported 

during disasters to the cognizant Army department commander, who made the necessary 

Floodwaters reached the bridge at McCallie Avenue in Chattanooga, Tennessee, 

7 March 1917. National Archives, 27-G-1A-7
128 Situation Desperate

assignments. In a 1920 administrative reorganization, however, the old Army departments 

were abandoned, supplanted by nine corps areas 

plus the District of Washington, with the commander in each corps area responsible for military activities and emergency response within 

his designated section of the United States.54

•

Observations

The Corps blamed the labor shortages it experienced during the 1912 and 1913 Mississippi 

River floods and the losses it suffered during 

flood fights at the levees in part on the federal 

practice of providing flood victims with free 

rations issued by the Quartermaster Corps, a 

custom that had prevailed since the Civil War. 

Although the rations were generally of poor 

quality—often merely cornmeal and bacon—

engineer field officers at the civil works districts heard rumors that tenant farmers made 

homeless by flooding were too lazy to work at 

the levees if they were given free subsistence. 

Moreover, rumors circulated that land owners 

sometimes defrauded the government, taking 

the free rations, distributing them to tenants, 

and charging them to their tenants’ accounts at 

the plantation stores. Considering these rumors, 

and the Corps’ need for a flood fight work force, 

the Corps conceived a new approach: work 

relief. Rather than receiving free rations, flood 

victims would earn their subsistence by working 

at the levees.

After intensely debating the issues, Congress 

gave the Corps an opportunity to test its work 

relief approach after the devastating southern 

states floods of 1916. These floods, however, 

did not require shoring up the Mississippi River 

levees and instead involved flood destruction 

east of the Mississippi and as far north as West 

Virginia. No levee system there needed restoration, so the Corps instead put the victims to 

work clearing flood debris from streams and 

repairing damaged public roads. This work 

proved useful and the employment relief provided was sincerely appreciated, but the Corps 

was troubled by the mission’s political aspects. 

First, 1916 was a presidential election year and 

the work relief assignment smelled of pork barrel 

politics nationally. Local politics also reared its 

ugly head in many places, influencing where the 

work was done and who deserved employment. 

The field officers in charge found the work 

relief program both astonishing and unpleasant.

As the work relief mission wound down, the 

Army initiated a review of its role in federal 

disaster assistance. It appointed a board to study 

the merits of free rations versus work relief and 

to recommend how the Army should manage its 

emergency responses. Although the board could 

not reach consensus, and the chief of engineers 

objected to its conclusions, the majority recommended that Army department commanders 

control the disaster missions and have authority 

for a flexible response, using free rations, work 

relief, or other measures where appropriate. The 

Army accepted the majority’s recommendations, 

which subsequently limited the Quartermasters’ 

disaster response activities. The Corps’ civil 

works districts maintained primary responsibility for preparations in advance of flooding, for 

managing flood fights, and for rescuing people 

and property from floods. None of the Army’s 

department or corps area commanders ever 

sought to limit or interfere with the Engineers’ 

congressionally mandated programs.
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Observations 129

Although the Corps’ work relief concept, as 

applied in 1916, proved abortive, its “no work, 

no rations” approach to disaster recovery proved 

appealing to the American public. During the 

Great Depression of the 1930s, the Roosevelt 

administration revived and reapplied the work 

relief concept to restore economic vitality by getting people off the dole and on federal payrolls. 

Perhaps it is more than coincidence that many 

managers of the Civilian Conservation Corps 

and the Works Progress Administration of the 

Depression years came from the ranks of the 

Corps of Engineers and, moreover, that the 

work undertaken included flood control and 

stream-channel improvement projects.

•
130 Situation Desperate

1. William Caples to Chief of Engineers, 1 Oct. 

1915, NARA, RG 77, Engineer Department, 

“General Correspondence, 1894–1923” [hereafter 

Entry 103], File 99050.

2. Ibid.; ARCE (1916), 3304, 3307–08, 3498–99.

3. ARCE (1916), 3304.

4. Leonard Wood to Secretary of War, 4 Feb. 1916, 

NARA, RG 94, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, 

File 2473515; Congressional Record, 64th Cong., 2d 

sess., 1916, 2003, 2104–06.

5. Congressional Record, 64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916, 

2003, 2104–06, 2186–87.

6. Ibid.

7. Dan Kingman to Lansing Beach, 3 Feb. 1916, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 100210.

8. J. R. Slattery to Vicksburg Herald, 7 Feb. 1916, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 100210.

9. J. R. Slattery to President, Mississippi River 

Commission, 7 Feb. 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 

103, File 100210.

10. Congressional Record, 64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916, 

2251–52.

11. Ibid., 2275–76.

12. Lansing Beach to Chief of Engineers, 9, 10, and 19 

Feb. 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 

100210.

13. Dan Kingman to Melville Stone, 11 Feb. 1916, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 100210.

14. All quotations in this section in Congressional 

Record, 64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916, 2367–79.

15. ARCE (1916), 3418, 3447–48, 3451, 3485–86, 

3491.

16. Vicksburg District Engineer to Chief of Engineers, 

“Use of Government Boats to Save Lives and 

Property,” 21 Mar. 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 

103, File 100210.

17. William Hunt to Adjutant General, 15 Mar. 1916, 

NARA, RG 94, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, 

File 2473515.

18. Ibid.

19. L. D. Gasser to Deputy Chief of Staff, 18 Apr. 

1922, NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, 1917–

1925, Dec. 400.38, Box 929; the box also contains 

copies of Lansing Beach and Henry Finch reports 

of 1916 and endorsements by superiors; see also 

ARCE (1916), 3309–10.

20. Beach and Finch reports, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Central Files, 1917–1925, Dec. 400.38, Box 929.

21. Mobile District Engineer to Chief of Engineers, 

6 and 10 July 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, 

File 101816; see also reports of other district 

commanders in this file.

22. Edwin Webb to Chief of Engineers, 20 July 1916, 

and William Black to C. L. Sturdevant, 17 July 

1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 101816.

23. C. L. Sturdevant to Chief of Engineers, 12 July 

1916, and Edward Schulz to Chief of Engineers, 

21 July 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 

101816.

24. Edward Schulz to Chief of Engineers, 21 July 

1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 101816.

25. Gilbert Youngsberg to Chief of Engineers, 24 and 

28 July 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 

101816.

26. Jarvis Bain to Chief of Engineers, 25 July 1916, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 101816.

27. Chief of Engineers to Chief of Staff, 25 July 1916, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 101816.

28. Chief of Engineers to Gordon Lee, 26 July 1916, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 101816.

29. Congressional Record, 64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916, 

11904–11, 11933, 11990–91, 12006–07, and 

appendix 1624–25, 2075–76.

30. Ibid.

31. Ibid., 12631–32.

32. John C. H. Lee to Wheeling District Engineer, 

19 Aug. 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 

102171.

33. Ibid.

34. Congressional Record, 64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916, 

12631–32, 12542–43, 12652.

35. William Black to Wheeling District Engineer, 2 

Oct. 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 10271.

36. Ibid.; Chief of Engineers to Secretary of War, 29 

Aug. 1916, and Chief of Engineers, “Report on 

Operations of Engineer Department for the Relief 

of Flood Sufferers in the States of North Carolina, 

South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, 

Tennessee, Mississippi, and West Virginia, 

August, September, and October 1916,” 14 Feb. 

1919, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 10271.

37. Chief of Engineers to District Engineers, 3 Aug. 

1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 102171.

38. Chief of Engineers, “Report on Operations of 

Engineer Department for the Relief of Flood 

Sufferers...1916.”

39. Ibid.

40. Ibid.

41. H. C. Mower, “Admin. Of Flood Relief, Mobile 

District,” 16 Nov. 1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 

103, File 102800.

42. Jarvis Bain to Nashville District Engineer, 17 Oct. 

1916, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 102800.

43. W. L. Guthrie to Chief of Engineers, 18 Nov. 

1918, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 102800.

44. John Burnett to Chief of Engineers, 13 Nov. 1916, 

NARA, RG 94, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, 

File 2506697.

45. C. L. Sturdevant to Chief of Engineers, 1 Mar. 

1917, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 10673.

Chapter 6 Notes
The Corps Initiates Work Relief ■ Notes 131

46. Montgomery District Engineer to Chief of 

Engineers, 12 Dec. 1919, NARA, RG 77, Entry 

103, File 126187.

47. W. W. Macomb, War College Division, to Chief 

of Staff, 25 Sept. 1916, NARA, RG 94, AGO 

Central Files, File 2473515; War Department, 

Special Orders No. 251, 26 Oct. 1916.

48. Confidential reports and endorsements in NARA, 

RG 94, AGO Central Files, File 2473515; and in 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 102800.

49. Slattery’s report and endorsements are in NARA, 

RG 94, AGO Central Files, File 2473515.

50. Joseph Kuhn, War College Division, to Chief of 

Staff, 2 June 1917, NARA, RG 94, AGO Central 

Files, File 2473515.

51. Ibid.; William Black to Adjutant General, 21 Mar. 

1917, NARA, RG 94, AGO Central Files, File 

2473515.

52. Joseph Kuhn, War College Division, to Chief of 

Staff, 2 June 1917, and Tasker Bliss, Chief of Staff, 

to Adjutant General, 5 June 1917, NARA, RG 94, 

AGO Central Files, File 2473515.

53. War Department, Special Regulations, No. 67, 

Regulations Governing Flood Relief Work of the War 

Department, 1917 (Washington, D.C.: 

Government Printing Office, 1917), passim. The 

regulations permitted either work relief or free 

ration issues; paragraph 10 described “plantation 

rations” as consisting of one pound of cornmeal, a 

half-pound of salt meat, a gill of molasses, and 

small quantities of coffee and sugar to be issued at 

regular intervals; paragraph 44 required employing 

disaster refugees on government work at wages not 

exceeding 75% of normal wages.

54. War Department, General Orders No. 50, 20 Aug. 

1920.
Right: Sandbag cells reinforced a 

locally-built floodwall at Vicksburg, 

Mississippi, on 3 May 1927.

National Archives, 68-AM-289

Left: Floodwaters came perilously 

close to the Vicksburg city front 

in May 1927. Office of History

Left: Many victims found 

refuge in tent camps at 

Vicksburg in May 1927.

NOAA Photo Library
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Arkansas River Flood at Pueblo 133

Roaring Floods of 

the Twenties

The Army’s response to natural disasters 

became increasingly cautious during 

the 1920s for several reasons. First, 

Special Regulation No. 67 of 1917 ended the 

free-wheeling relief work of the Quartermasters 

and Engineers of earlier decades; under No. 67 

these technical corps necessarily coordinated 

their activities with the commanding generals 

of the appropriate Army corps areas. Second, 

the frugal national administrations of the 1920s 

constricted funding for the Army generally and 

for its disaster relief work specifically. Where 

the Army earlier had expected and received 

nearly automatic validation and reimbursement 

for its disaster services, several times during the 

1920s it had to eat the costs, making its officers 

wary of rushing to the rescue. Finally, the Corps 

continued to insist on its “no work, no rations” 

policy—feeding hungry refugees should be done 

by the American Red Cross and private charities, not by the Army.

Still, there were memorable calamities that 

elicited the best work, sacrifices, and even heroism from the Army, the Corps of Engineers, 

and allied relief agencies. Especially notable 

is the historic Mississippi River flood of 1927, 

which was fought to the death on the levees by 

Corps personnel and was followed by the largest 

relief and recovery mission since the 1906 San 

Francisco earthquake. Another highlight came 

at Pueblo, Colorado, in 1921, when a Corps 

officer managed what might well be termed the 

first “modern” disaster assistance mission.

•

Arkansas River Flood at 

Pueblo , 1921

Col. William Caples was a disaster “magnet”—

catastrophes followed him around the country, 

from the New Orleans hurricane of 1915 to the 

Mississippi River floods of 1916 and in 1921 to 

Pueblo, Colorado. Cloudbursts over the upper 

Arkansas River basin on 3 June 1921 caused a 

rapid rise in the Arkansas River and in Fountain 

Creek at Pueblo. They climbed as much as 3.5 

feet in fifteen minutes and overtopped Pueblo’s 

floodwall and levees. The flood crested 6.5 feet 

over the levees and high velocity currents swept 

the city, destroying bridges, water supply and 

sewage systems, telephone communications, and 

electric power lines. The flood washed out all 

but one bridge, destroyed five hundred buildings, and drowned 156 people.1

Recovery efforts had just begun when Schaeffer 

Dam up Beaver Creek failed, releasing another 

wall of water. The resulting flood destroyed the 

towns of Portland and Swallows and, because 

Pueblo’s flood protection system was already 

breached, it disastrously inundated the city a 

second time. The ensuing crisis far exceeded 

the ability of Pueblo’s municipal government to 

respond.2

The city council appealed to Congress for 

assistance, explaining that property damages 

exceeded $15 million and that the loss of life 

could not be determined because the city could 

not remove the debris and recover the bodies. 

The council requested funding to clear the 

7
134 Situation Desperate

debris, restore utility services, and repair flood 

protection structures.

In the Senate, Lawrence Phipps of Colorado 

declared that in his opinion the secretary of 

war had standing authority to render immediate assistance during disasters. Senator Oscar 

Underwood disagreed: “He may render aid and 

have his action approved by Congress subsequently, but under the law I do not think he has 

any authority to do it.” Few disputed Pueblo’s 

need, however, and Congress enacted a resolution approving the release of quartermaster 

rations to the victims and restoration of utility 

and sanitation systems by the Army without 

specific restrictions on expenditures.3

The Colorado Rangers and National Guard 

entered Pueblo to secure the city. Under martial 

law, the National Guard employed every willing 

citizen in the city to clear flood debris at a fixed 

wage of $.43 per hour. Transients unwilling to 

volunteer were rounded up and forced to work 

without pay under military guard.4

The Eighth Corps Area commander ordered 

Caples to Pueblo with an Army field hospital 

and sufficient bedding and tents for two thousand refugees. Caples camped with the supplies 

next to the city hospital, and after observing 

some refugees leaving with blankets and other 

When Fountain Creek in Pueblo, Colorado, flooded in June 1921, bridges and 

roads were washed out.

Denver Public Library, Western History Collection, 

Arthur Osbourne Ridgway, Z-5009
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Arkansas River Flood at Pueblo 135

property, he surrounded the camp with wire 

and arranged National Guard patrols. He did 

not issue free rations, but the Salvation Army 

opened a kitchen and mess hall in the camp. 

Caples then surveyed the ravaged city, estimating damages at $10 million. The flood left some 

seven hundred homeless, destroyed inventories 

and bankrupted merchants, and ruined the city’s 

sanitation. The disaster was, he reported, truly 

one of “national magnitude.”

After providing temporary shelter for the homeless and ascertaining the damages, Caples began 

the “temporary sanitary measures” approved by 

Congress. He saw three urgent needs: debris 

removal, water supply restoration, and levee 

repairs. The secretary of war approved his estimates of $100,000 for debris removal, $80,000 

for water supply restoration, and $26,000 for 

levee repairs. Although the debris removal 

later proved more costly, the water supply and 

levee repairs were less, allowing completion of 

the mission within original cost estimates, a 

remarkable feat then as now.5

The Eighth Corps Area commander sent 

Company A, 8th Engineers, under Capt. C. E. 

McKee, from Fort Bliss, Texas, to assist Caples. 

McKee and his company, with twenty-four 

mules pulling five wagons loaded with tools, 

reached Pueblo on 16 June. Caples detailed the 

Union Avenue in Pueblo was covered with debris, mud, and silt from the 

Arkansas River flood in June 1921.

Denver Public Library, Western History Collection, 

Arthur Osbourne Ridgway, Z-5082
136 Situation Desperate

ninety enlisted men to debris clearance, and 

noncommissioned officers served as foremen 

of civilian street cleaning gangs. The company 

later undertook levee repairs, dumping slag 

from railroad cars and using mule-drawn drag 

scrapers to place it.6

Caples maintained communications with the 

Army corps area commander by aircraft—the 

first recorded use of aircraft for disaster relief. 

He gathered a staff and assigned officers to 

manage specific missions: debris removal, 

water supply restoration, levee repairs, finances, 

personnel, and motor pool. Two of his staff were 

of the Army Engineers: Capt. S. L. Damon 

in charge of water supply and Lt. E. F. Barnes 

responsible for debris removal. For their guidance and for the information of civilian authorities, Caples laid down four principles:

A. Both the city and the private property 

owners must put forth their utmost efforts. 

Aid by the United States will be limited to 

what is clearly beyond their ability.

B. Federal aid will be limited to work of a 

clearly defined sanitary nature and consist 

of removal of unsanitary debris and the 

restoration of sanitary works or equivalent 

work in lieu thereof. No work amounting to 

betterment will be undertaken.

Refugee compounds and supplies were surrounded with barbed wire fencing 

near Pueblo, Colorado, 1921.

Copyright, Colorado Historical Society 

(Garrison Collection, Scan #20008013)
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Arkansas River Flood at Pueblo 137

C. All work will be conducted in the most 

economical manner consistent with preventing disease. Unreasonable demands for rentals, wages, or materials will be rejected, so 

long as unsanitary conditions are not created 

thereby, even though the work be greatly 

prolonged due to lack of adequate force.

D. Unsightliness, high fire risk and objectionable features other than lack of sanitation will not be considered.7

These principles guided all work during the 

flood and its aftermath.

When Caples took charge of debris removal, 

the city had five hundred workers under the 

supervision of Capt. Durban Van Law of the 

Engineer Reserves. Caples combined this force 

with Company A. Pueblo was buried beneath 

two feet of mud and collapsed buildings, intermingled with animal carcasses and human 

remains. Building cellars had filled with debris, 

but, except at the direction of the U.S. Public 

Health Service, the workers could not enter 

private property. Caples agreed, however, to 

remove the debris after the property owners carried it from the cellars onto the adjacent streets.

Because the flood had drowned draft animals 

and ruined motor vehicles, the city began the 

debris removal manually. Caples swiftly mechanized the work, renting motor trucks, cranes, 

and shovels and obtaining assistance from a 

motorized Army Cavalry unit. The city council 

supplied the disposal sites, guaranteeing the 

United States against damage suits and caring 

for sanitation at the dump sites. Deposits of river 

mud were taken to the levees and compacted 

into place as reinforcement.

Caples and Barnes organized for speedy debris 

removal. Tractors and wagons hauled animal 

carcasses to crematories outside town. Army 

tractors and tanks smashed and pulled down 

buildings strewn across public streets. Steampowered cranes and clamshell shovels were each 

assigned nine to twelve trucks that carried the 

debris to the dump sites; labor gangs trailed the 

heavy equipment to shovel remaining debris 

into wagons. By 13 August, when the job was 

finished, the Army, employing 330 men for 

fifty-one days, had removed 106,440 cubic yards 

of debris at a cost of $115,000.

The city of Pueblo had signed a cost-plus contract for repair of its levees, but Caples, who 

thought cost-plus contracts extravagant, refused 

to accept any arrangement whereby the federal 

government reimbursed the costs. He took over 

the levee repair job on 26 June, the city closed 

its contract, and Caples rented the contractor’s 

equipment—at a figure estimated to give the 

contractor a $1,500 profit—and put Company 

A, 8th Engineers, to the task.

After consultation with Adelbert Weiland, a 

local member of the American Society of Civil 

Engineers, Caples determined that area soils 

were adequate for levee foundations and the 

Pueblo levee failures had resulted from overtopping. About 27,500 cubic yards of earth fill and 

1,814 cubic yards of furnace slag paving closed 

the six levee breaks at a cost of $18,497.74. “All 

that has been done,” reported Caples, “is to give 

Both the city and the private property owners must put forth their 

utmost efforts. Aid by the United States will be limited to what is 

clearly beyond their ability.
138 Situation Desperate

the city the same measure of protection which 

formerly existed until such time as it can be 

decided what measures will be necessary to give 

adequate flood protection.”8

While levee repair plans were underway, Caples 

turned to Pueblo’s water supply. The city’s supply system was an antiquated, makeshift relic of 

earlier times before the city had formed through 

the merger of several small towns. The flood 

had destroyed one of the city’s water storage 

dams and had broken many of the old water 

mains. At Caples’ request the chief of engineers 

sent hydraulic engineer J. A. Grant to help plan 

the water supply restoration.

Caples rejected many of the projects the city’s 

water commission requested because the work 

could be classified as “betterments.” The commission, for instance, wanted the Army to repair 

the water mains, but Caples refused because 

the mains had been cheaply built, they were 

in perilous condition before the flood, and, he 

said, it “would have been hard to stop short of 

rebuilding the water system.”9

Damon managed repairs to Pueblo’s water supply 

dam. The city asked for a concrete gravity dam; 

the engineers, receiving excellent cooperation 

from local industry, instead built an economical 

rock-fill dam with an impervious slag core. The 

Denver and Rio Grande Railroad furnished 

pile drivers, engines, crews, and most materials 

at actual cost; and the Colorado Fuel and Iron 

Company furnished a crane and crew at nominal 

cost together with the slag used in the dam.

Crews repaired the levee at Fourth Street along the flooded Arkansas River in 

Pueblo, June 1921.

Denver Public Library, Western History Collection, 

Arthur Osbourne Ridgway, Z-5147
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Mississippi River Flood 139

In July the pile drivers pounded steel rails across 

the old dam and the break, forming a trestle 

for slag and stone delivery. Dumping materials 

from the trestle to rebuild the dam stopped on 

2 August when a sudden cloudburst and flood 

washed out the construction trestle; however, 

the dam was nearly completed and withstood 

the test. The engineers completed the dam in 

August at a cost of $26,000.10

When Caples closed the mission at Pueblo in 

August, he and his team had cleared the debris 

from all streets and alleys, restored flood protection, and repaired the water service. Caples 

lacked the authority to do more, although he 

admitted that permanent rehabilitation of 

the city and its people remained to be accomplished—a task he thought should be done by 

the city itself rather than the Army.

“One great and very important problem is the 

prevention of disasters such as occurred here,” 

summarized Colonel Caples at his mission’s 

end. “This problem concerns not merely the city 

of Pueblo but also the whole valley of the river 

in three states. Additional Federal aid in the 

study of this problem, as has been granted in 

the Mississippi, Ohio, and Sacramento Valleys, 

appears to be well justified.” In this remark 

he referred to the flood control measures that 

Congress had approved in 1917 for the three 

basins he named; but Congress did not extend 

similar measures to the Arkansas and other rivers until the late 1930s.11

The city of Pueblo and the state of Colorado 

asked the chief of engineers to assign Caples to 

stay on after the recovery period to plan additional flood protection for the city. Lacking the 

authority and funds, however, the chief declined 

their request. Instead, the city contracted its 

flood protection study to Arthur Morgan, who 

had designed and built a flood control system 

for Ohio’s Miami River basin.12

The work of Caples and his colleagues at Pueblo 

in 1921 seems, in retrospect, to be the first 

“modern” disaster relief mission performed by 

the Corps of Engineers. Tasks included clearing 

debris, supplying temporary housing, restoring 

water supply, and repairing flood protection 

structures. That work, and the policies and 

priorities set in accomplishing it, presaged legislation of the 1950s that set modern disaster 

assistance policies and activities. In fact, with 

only minor revisions, Caples’ after-action report 

on the Pueblo disaster might easily substitute 

for more recent after-action reports such as that 

written on the Johnstown, Pennsylvania, flood 

disaster of 1977.

•

Mississippi River Flood , 1922

When Brig. Gen. Lansing Beach became the 

chief of engineers in 1920 he had definite 

opinions about the disaster relief mission. He 

had, after all, been the Corps officer who first 

questioned the value of issuing free rations when 

workers were sorely needed on the levees. The 

“no work, no rations” policy was his. When 

a flood came roaring down the Mississippi 

in the spring of 1922, therefore, he quickly 

reassured the Vicksburg District commander: 

“All relief will be furnished by the Red Cross. 

No rations will be issued by the Government.”13

Much of the 1922 flood came out of the White 

River and set a new record from its mouth 

down the Mississippi to Carrollton, Louisiana; 

as a consequence, the severest test fell on 

Maj. J. A. O’Connor commanding at Vicksburg 
140 Situation Desperate

and Maj. Richard Coiner at the Fourth MRC 

District at New Orleans.14

With the cooperation of local levee districts, 

O’Connor and the Vicksburg District raised 

many miles of levees in advance of the flood. 

The water climbed 1.5 feet higher than previous 

records at Vicksburg, however, and the flood 

fighters were nearly exhausted when the landward side of a levee near Arkansas City sloughed 

down into the borrow pit, threatening to break 

open a crevasse. Reporting that the effort had 

exhausted local resources, O’Connor urgently 

requested a $250,000 allotment to continue the 

fight.15

“My action is somewhat contrary to regulations, but the present emergency demands it,” 

O’Connor stated. “This communication is not 

written from an alarmist point of view. We 

have every confidence of preventing a break. 

Difficulties undoubtedly will arise when we 

come to the question of settlement, and I am 

sending this forward requesting support for my 

action. Congressional action seems necessary.” 

Congress wisely appropriated $1 million in 

response to O’Connor’s plea.16

O’Connor recommended that Army Special 

Regulation No. 67 be implemented to care for 

refugees fleeing the backwater (water accumulating behind the levee system because it could 

not flow into the flooded river), but the secretary of war declined the request. The secretary 

did not consider backwater flooding an unexpected catastrophe warranting Army support. 

Although he thought loaning tents as emergency 

shelter, with costs borne by local communities, 

might be acceptable, he did not approve general 

application of No. 67.17

The argument of the secretary and Beach 

against issuing free Army rations gained support from Louisiana’s Governor John Parker, 

who was determined to care for flood victims 

with state resources and Red Cross assistance. 

He urged Beach, however, to dispatch Corps 

officers to help local levee managers hold the 

line. Beach sent Maj. John Butler from Florence, 

Alabama, and Maj. Paul Reinecke from 

Galveston, Texas, to Louisiana and assured the 

governor that anything necessary “to help win 

the high water fight will be done. May we be 

successful.”18

Observing growing hysteria over the free rations 

issue, O’Connor at Vicksburg requested that 

the secretary of war release a statement that all 

disaster assistance would come from the Red 

Cross. O’Connor reported: “Owner of overflowed island stated if Red Cross issues rations 

he will care for his own help, that he never gave 

Red Cross enough [to] entitle him to assistance 

now. But if government issues rations he is going 

after everything coming to him. My opinion [is] 

my recommendation will simplify and expedite 

relief question for all concerned.”19

The secretary telegraphed the Fourth Corps 

Area commander that federal aid would be 

strictly limited and warned:

Undoubtedly numerous calls for relief will 

be made. These must be resisted and your 

“My action is somewhat contrary to 

regulations, but the present emergency 

demands it. This communication is not 

written from an alarmist point of view.”
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Mississippi River Flood 141

representatives warned that no authority of 

law exists for same except under conditions 

stated in paragraph one Special Regulations 

sixty-seven which must be strictly adhered 

to. Primary function of District Engineers 

and their equipment is levee protection and 

repair work and no calls on them for relief 

work will be allowed to interfere with this 

primary function. Food supplies will be 

issued only after War Department approval 

of recommendation made by you and concurred by in District Engineer Officer and 

local levee board officials.20

The American Red Cross managed practically 

all relief and recovery activities during and 

after the 1922 flood. The Corps relief effort at 

Vicksburg consisted only of using its boats to 

take refugees from the lower Tensas basin to 

safety. At the request of Louisiana’s governor, 

Workers added reinforcements to a threatened break in Ashbrook Dike on the Mississippi, 26 April 1922. Office of History

“Owner of overflowed island stated if Red Cross issues rations he 

will care for his own help....But if government issues rations he is 

going after everything coming to him.”
142 Situation Desperate

the secretary of war directed the Fourth MRC 

District commander to loan supplies to the Red 

Cross: Coiner sent 1,646 tents, 18 ranges, 1,040 

cots, and 1,090 sleeping bags.21

Thus the Corps of Engineers effectively held the 

line against issuing free rations during the 1922 

flood on the Mississippi, also holding the main 

levee line without crevasses. This success made 

the Mississippi River Commission overly optimistic about the levee system. Four years later, 

the commission predicted that a glorious end to 

the fight for control of flooding along the lower 

Mississippi River was at hand.

•22

Convict labor and mules worked to stop a levee slough in the Upper Yazoo River basin near Tunica, Mississippi, 1922.

National Archives, 77-RH-34T-1
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Lorain Tornado 143

Five Minutes of Hell on 

Earth, Lorain Tornado

“At 14 minutes after 5 o’clock, the monster of 

the heavens came lashing and crashing through 

the city—killing, maiming and wrecking in 

its path. It was five minutes of hell on earth 

for Lorain,” reported a colorful contemporary 

account of the tornado. Lorain, Ohio, a Lake 

Erie port, was a Saturday-night town in 1924. 

Farmers and transients from miles around were 

in Lorain on Saturday, 28 June, when a tornado 

struck, killing seventy, injuring six hundred, 

and damaging every downtown building and 

some five hundred homes in outlying sections. 

Although Red Cross director Henry Baker had 

A tornado severely damaged Lorain, Ohio, on 28 June 1924. National Archives, 27-G-15-28244-B
144 Situation Desperate

participated in eighty-seven previous disaster 

recoveries, he lamented: “It is the most complete 

destruction I have ever seen.”23

At the request of Lorain’s mayor, Ohio’s governor sent the National Guard and asked for charitable contributions—eventually half a million 

dollars in aid went to Lorain. The commander 

of the 112th Engineers of the Ohio National 

Guard at Cleveland mobilized his troops by 

telephone that evening and hired thirty-five 

taxicabs to rush them to Lorain. As the first 

troops to reach the stricken city, the engineers 

secured the streets and established their camp 

among the fallen trees on the public square.24

Col. Spencer Cosby, the Great Lakes Division 

commander for the Corps, motored from 

Cleveland to Lorain to inspect the damages and 

report. “The wonder is,” he asserted after seeing the mess, “that the loss of life was not much 

greater considering the extent of the damage.”25

Cosby saw no wrecked boats or damages to the 

harbor’s breakwaters on Lake Erie that required 

the attention of his office. He wended through 

the debris, located the 112th Engineers’ commander, and offered any materials, personnel, or 

other assistance that the Great Lakes Division 

might muster, but the National Guard had matters in hand. Every street corner was guarded; 

gangs of workers cleared the debris; and volunteers, food, and medical supplies came to Lorain 

from all directions. Cosby reported to the Fifth 

Corps Area commander that state and local 

authorities controlled the situation and federal 

disaster assistance was not needed by the Lorain 

tornado survivors.26

Most natural disasters, even on the smallest 

scale, drew the Corps’ attention. The nearest officer surveyed damages and reported, 

responding to the emergency if need be and, 

if not, as in the case at Lorain, recommending 

that no federal action be taken. But even smaller 

disasters could lead to complications, as was the 

case in 1925 on the Altamaha River.

•

Georgia Rivers Flood , 1925

When heavy rain in January 1925 flooded 

southern Georgia’s rivers and inundated several 

towns, Georgia’s senators requested action from 

the secretary of war, who ordered the commander of Fort Screven, Georgia, to investigate. 

Aboard a boat supplied by Capt. Dan Sultan, 

commanding Savannah District, several Army 

officers toured the stricken area. They recommended federal assistance for the flooded 

Georgia towns of Newton on the Flint River 

and Townsend near the Altamaha.

Newton, where houses had been submersed 

to the eaves, suffered from a great threat of 

epidemic disease. Fort Screven’s commander 

therefore sent a Medical Corps detachment to 

the town, where they opened a dispensary. No 

epidemic ensued, the flood subsided, and no 

further federal assistance was offered.

Floodwaters had isolated Townsend, and Sultan 

sent a motor launch to transport rations and 

cots from Fort Screven to the community. The 

launch steamed by sea to the Sapelo River, then 

to Cedar Point, where rowboats distributed the 

emergency supplies to the needy.

“...the monster of the heavens came lashing and crashing through 

the city—killing, maiming and wrecking in its path.”
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Georgia Rivers Flood 145

The Altamaha flood relief mission ended in 

February after the Red Cross had spent $3,500 

on recovery and the Army had issued supplies 

worth $733.57.27 Reviewing this account, the 

War Department budget officer noted the small 

cost to the Army, and he recommended that the 

Army not ask Congress for reimbursement and 

merely request a resolution validating its actions.28

Although the amount was small, the principle 

was important to Brig. Gen. Fox Conner. He 

disagreed with the budget officer, complaining:

The Army’s humane work is a necessary 

National service and should be continued. 

No provision is made for it in the Budget. 

Formerly the Army could undertake this 

work with confidence that it would not suffer in consequence because Congress would 

reimburse it for its necessary expenditures. 

The action in the case of the Japanese relief 

has removed this feeling of confidence.29

Conner made the $733.57 an issue because the 

Army came out the loser in the aftermath of the 

terrible Japanese earthquake of 1923. After the 

quake had killed many thousands, Brig. Gen. 

Frank McCoy headed an American relief expedition to Japan with military doctors and nurses 

Two men in a boat attempted to rescue a cow in the Flint River’s high water near Albany, Georgia, January 1925.

Courtesy of Georgia Archives, Vanishing Georgia Collection, dgh246-86

“The Army’s humane work is a 

necessary National service and 

should be continued.”
146 Situation Desperate

and Army supplies from San Francisco. Total 

cost of the expedition exceeded $6 million.

This relief expedition had been initiated with 

the approval of President Warren Harding but 

without advance authorization and funding by 

Congress—a practice that had been standard 

for the Army for years. When it came time to 

settle accounts, however, Calvin Coolidge had 

succeeded Harding as president, and Coolidge 

did not dispense federal funds with quite the 

free hand that had characterized the Harding 

administration. Coolidge disapproved the 

Army’s request for a deficiency appropriation 

to replace the Army supplies dispensed to the 

Japanese earthquake sufferers. It did not fit into 

Coolidge’s budget.30

The Army’s loss of funding for the relief expedition to Japan, in an era of severely constricted 

federal budgets, shook officers such as Conner. 

They lost confidence that the Army’s emergency 

relief activities would be automatically approved 

and reimbursed. The Army’s budget officer 

sought to reassure Conner by commenting that 

Congress always replaced Army supplies dispensed during emergencies if the Army’s normal 

operations demonstrated a need for the replacements, and that the president had decided the 

costs of supplies issued to the Japanese earthquake victims would not disrupt the Army’s 

normal functioning. Because these costs had 

totaled more than $1 million, the budget officer 

asserted the loss of $733.57 worth of supplies 

issued to Altamaha flood refugees surely did not 

adversely affect normal Army operations.31

After reviewing the comments by Conner and 

the budget officer, Secretary of War Dwight 

Davis concurred with the budget officer. He 

merely asked Congress to confirm the validity 

of the Army relief work on the Altamaha River 

and charged the $733.57 to contingencies.32

An earthquake devastated Tokyo and Yokohama, Japan, on 1 September 1923. Brig. Gen. Frank McCoy headed an American 

relief expedition with military doctors and nurses and Army supplies from San Francisco.

U.S. Geological Survey Photographic Library, George A. Lang Collection, No. 4
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Mississippi River Flood 147

A direct cause-effect relationship between the 

fiscal decisions on the Japanese earthquake 

and the Altamaha flood and the reduced scope 

of total Army response to disasters of the late 

1920s and the 1930s cannot be established. 

The reduced role may be attributable to other 

circumstances: the increased resources available 

to the American Red Cross, the Corps’ “no 

rations” policy, the formation of federal work 

relief agencies during the Depression, or the 

tight-fisted military budget (when the Army 

often trained Reserves and Guard units with 

wooden weapons because it could not afford 

the real thing). Certainly the fiscal decisions 

on the Army’s disaster missions could not have 

enhanced its response, because officers familiar 

with those decisions might have hesitated before 

rushing to the rescue.

•

Mississippi River Flood , 1927

In October 1926 the Mississippi River rose to a 

forty-foot stage at Vicksburg. Maj. John C. H. 

Lee noted that in previous years when the river 

surpassed the thirty-foot stage in October, a 

major flood followed in the spring. He ordered 

the Vicksburg District to prepare emergency 

mobilization plans with contingency procedures 

for all flood categories. Working with local levee 

boards, the district established an emergency 

management organization with complete plans 

for levee patrol, labor and equipment deployment, and public relations activities.33

Streams in the Mississippi valley remained 

at high levels through the autumn of 1926, 

and on New Years’ Day a new record flood 

crest hit Nashville on the Cumberland River. 

Precipitation continued to fall on wet soils, and 

by March the Mississippi River Commission 

knew that major floods were headed down from 

the Ohio, Tennessee, and Missouri rivers. Water 

stood against the Mississippi levees throughout 

March, and they became saturated. Still, the 

commission thought the levees would hold and 

could withstand even greater flooding, provided 

high winds and waves did not erode them or 

floods from the Arkansas, White, and Red 

rivers did not also attack them. In April and 

May the Corps of Engineers proved luckless—

every combination of nature worked against the 

levee protection.34

On 1 April the Mississippi River Commission 

advised Maj. Gen. Edgar Jadwin, Chief of 

Engineers, that the worst flood of history was 

expected. Thus forewarned, Jadwin informed 

the secretary of war that all Corps boats on 

the Mississippi would be needed to conduct 

the flood fight, and he asked that no boats be 

diverted from this work to perform disaster 

relief duty. The secretary so ordered.35

When the Corps inspection boat, the Inspector, 

reached Cairo, the rivers stood against the 

floodwall there at 56.3 feet on the gauge, a foot 

and a half higher than ever before recorded. 

Cairo had become an island in an inland sea. 

Cairo’s leaders boarded the boat to plea for help; 

they were exhausted but still fighting with their 

backs to the wall.36

Maj. D. H. Connolly at Memphis committed 

all his men and equipment to the flood fight, 

battling the flood successfully, except for 

one crevasse at Dorena, Missouri, opposite 

Hickman, Kentucky. There the river stood at 

record levels, but from Columbus, Kentucky, 

south to Memphis its crest averaged a foot less 

than the record set in 1913.37
148 Situation Desperate

South of Memphis, however, the 1927 flood 

exceeded previous records, sometimes by up to 

four feet. Had it not been for crevasses releasing 

water into the back country, the flood would 

have overtopped the levees. The Corps could 

never have won a fight against such a flood, 

and some of its officers knew it at the time. 

Maj. W. H. Holcombe at the MRC in New 

Orleans later explained why he had continued 

the hopeless sandbagging of the levees. It would 

have accomplished nothing, he declared, “by 

telling the people behind the levees that further 

topping was unnecessary because the river would 

break through above, nor would any attempt to 

curtail the work have been possible under the 

tense conditions then existing. A high-water 

fight on the Mississippi River is about the nearest thing to war imaginable, and morale must be 

kept up just as in military operations.”38

Confronting major floods on the Mississippi, 

White, and Arkansas rivers, Lee divided the 

Vicksburg District into six sectors, each with a 

separate commander, and he inspected the action 

daily, flying over in a crop duster loaned by the 

Department of Agriculture. He requested seaplanes and pilots from the Pensacola Naval Station 

and converted the snagboat John N. Macomb into 

a floating refueling base for the aircraft. Thirteen 

Navy seaplanes transported medical supplies and 

located stranded refugees from the air but did not 

attempt rescue because of the hazards of landing 

amidst snags and floating debris.39

Radio communications first played a significant 

role in disaster relief during the 1927 flood. The 

larger Corps boats were radio equipped, and 

Navy radios were installed on other craft during the emergency. Maj. Stuart Godfrey aboard 

the Inspector noted on 21 April: “Only the radio 

connects us with the outside world—and what 

a satisfaction to have that, even though its messages today can bring little comfort.” The radio 

brought news that a levee crevasse had flooded 

Greenville, Mississippi, and the Arkansas River 

levees near Pendleton, Arkansas, had failed.40

Both the river and the sandbag stacks atop the 

levees continued to rise. Workers on both sides 

of the Mississippi determined that when a crevasse came it would be on the opposite bank. 

“We were truly catching hell and high water,” 

remarked Lee, describing the high winds on 

“A high-water fight on the Mississippi 

River is about the nearest thing to war 

imaginable...”

Shortwave radio sets like this aboard the Nashville District towboat Warioto

maintained communications during the floods of the 1920s and 1930s.

National Archives, 77-RH-33VV-3
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Mississippi River Flood 149

the night of 21 April that sent waves crashing 

against the levee while driving rain drenched 

the workers piling on the sandbags. Lee penned 

a vivid account of the flood fight at North Bend 

levee on the Arkansas River:

During the fight much heroism is possible, 

and we had our share. The men who were 

defeated at Pendleton during a storm on 

the afternoon of April 21, when the waves 

washed off the sacked topping and the men 

were unable to stand, moved on up the line 

to South Bend to make the fight there. A 

spur dike had caved in to the levee line and 

a vicious current sweeping around the point 

was eating into the main levee. For ten 

days, they held this front. The levee itself 

“The men in charge worked in water until 

they could no longer wear shoes over their 

swollen, blackened feet.”

Convicts constructed a mudbox atop a levee near Fulton to hold out the Mississippi River flood in 1927. National Archives, 77-MRC-5-94431-92
150 Situation Desperate

was almost entirely eaten away and only 

held by a new sack levee built up behind. 

Added to this great difficulty was sand-boil 

trouble. Huge springs would break out 

behind the levee and even on the embankment slopes—boiling up sand. They had to 

be checked immediately to avoid disaster. 

The men in charge worked in water until 

they could no longer wear shoes over their 

swollen, blackened feet. But they did not 

stop .... It was here that Captain Porterfield 

lost his life. He was the master of one of our 

hydraulic graders.41

The Corps delivered more sandbags to the 

levee by aircraft, and the fight continued. 

National Guardsmen and state convicts joined 

the work force and put up the bags for ten days 

and nights. Finally the river went over the top. 

“Defeat after a fight like that,” lamented Lee, 

“is bitter.”

“Defeat after a fight like that 

is bitter.”

The Cabin Teele levee crevassed at Madison Parish, Louisiana, in May 1927. Office of History
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Mississippi River Flood 151

Following its loss on the Arkansas River, the 

Vicksburg District focused its attention on 

the crisis at Cabin Teele on the Mississippi. 

Water from an upstream crevasse cut south over 

the bottomlands through the Yazoo basin to 

Vicksburg where it again entered the river. It 

climbed 4.5 feet up the levee’s sack topping on 

the Louisiana side and broke through at Cabin 

Teele. As the pressure threatened to widen the 

crevasse, Lee directed a week-long campaign 

there, dropping in barge-loads of stone to stabilize the levee. This effort stopped the spreading crevasse, and Lee estimated that it saved a 

quarter-million dollars worth of levee repairs 

and damages to the region behind it.42

In these appalling conditions, the Corps surrendered its effort to hold out all of its boats 

for the flood fights. As the levees caved away, 

rescue and relief became imperative, and Corps 

towboats from the St. Louis, Cincinnati, and 

Louisville offices went south to concentrate at 

Memphis as reinforcements.43

As the fleet headed south, the Mississippi River 

Commission aboard the Inspector landed at 

Greenville where they were greeted by an unforgettable scene. Godfrey attempted a description:

The hundreds of families, white and black, 

living huddled in tents or rude shelters or 

having no shelter; the long lines filing past 

the savory soup kitchens for their dole; the 

other columns waiting to be “shot” by a 

busy doctor with typhoid vaccine; the cows 

and horses and dogs of every description 

wandering up and down the levees; the furniture, every kind of treasured junk imaginable; the stories of how the levee went out in 

spite of the most desperate fight to hold it; 

the five babies that were born on the levee 

last night!44

Holcombe, who managed the flood fight 

below Vicksburg, had to contend with record 

floods coming down the Red, Black, Tensas, 

and Ouachita rivers and an unusual condition at the Old River, which connects the Red 

and Atchafalaya rivers with the Mississippi. 

Ordinarily the Old River flowed from east to 

west, but in 1927 it flowed first in one direction, 

then in the other, and finally in both directions 

at the same time. First, it carried the Mississippi 

flood west to the Atchafalaya, then the Red 

River flood east to the Mississippi, and, after 

those floods had passed, it carried backwater 

from the Tensas River into the Mississippi and 

Atchafalaya rivers simultaneously.

In Holcombe’s district, an average of six thousand workers, with a peak of fifteen thousand, 

worked on the levees each day for more than 

six weeks. Some were lodged aboard nineteen 

Corps quarterboats and five barges, the largest 

of which bunked four hundred. The equipment 

included fifty scrapers, five thousand wheelbarrows, ten thousand shovels, seventy-six barges 

towed by ten steamboats, plus levee machines 

and derricks. These moved three hundred 

thousand cubic yards of earth, eight million 

sandbags, and five million board feet of lumber 

during the flood fight at a cost of $2.5 million, 

an expense that Holcombe felt was more than 

justified. “War is always expensive,” he declared, 

pointing out that many levee breaks were prevented, and any one of them could have resulted 

in property damages exceeding the cost of the 

flood fight.45

“...the five babies that were born on the 

levee last night!”
152 Situation Desperate

As much as fourteen inches of rain fell in the 

lower Mississippi valley, flooding New Orleans 

behind its levees because its pumping system 

could not handle such a downpour. Then on 

23 April a tanker ship accidentally rammed the 

levee forty miles downstream of the Crescent 

City, causing a crevasse.46 Fearing further disaster, the city asked that the Caernarvon levee 

between Poydras and Braithwaite be deliberately 

breached to relieve pressures on the levee in 

front of New Orleans. The city and state government promised to reimburse land owners for 

property losses in the sparsely populated area to 

be deluged. Citizens of the parishes that would 

be flooded held mass protests, arguing the 

levee’s destruction would be futile and the flood 

would break levees upstream of New Orleans 

without human assistance.47

The secretary of war told Louisiana’s governor 

that he would not oppose the destruction of 

Caernarvon levee, provided the chief of engineers and the Mississippi River Commission 

did not object. On 25 April a delegation from 

New Orleans met with the MRC aboard the 

Inspector and passed a resolution requesting the 

chief of engineers approve its request to breach 

the levee. Jadwin reached Vicksburg the next 

A tanker ship collided with a levee on the Mississippi River forty miles downstream from New Orleans on 23 April 1927.

National Archives, 27-G-1A-4
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Flood Relief Mission 153

day and conferred with the MRC. Subsequently, 

Jadwin and the commission raised no objection 

to the levee’s destruction. Jadwin emphasized, 

however, that the Corps would not take part in 

its destruction nor issue a permit for the breach; 

it would merely withhold objections.48

The first dynamite charges detonated at 

Caernarvon on 29 April opened only a trickle 

through the levee. Two days later, diver Ted 

Herbert placed underwater charges that fully 

opened the crevasse, and the flood stage at 

New Orleans began to subside. Those blasts, 

historians have noted, dynamited the “levees 

only” policy out of existence. In 1928 the 

Mississippi River Commission ceded much of 

its independence to the Corps of Engineers, and 

following the blasting of the levee the Corps 

and MRC began planning floodways, reservoirs, 

and other engineering measures to supplement 

the protection afforded by the Mississippi River 

levee system.49

•

The 1927 Flood Relief 

Mission

“This flooded area vitally in need of martial 

law,” proclaimed Lt. A. C. Dimond in his 25 

April report on flood conditions at Hollandia, 

Mississippi, to the Army’s Seventh Corps Area 

commander. “Need soldiers and motor boats,” 

he urged. “Unless some help is furnished quick 

people are going to drown like rats.”50

In response to this and similar critical situations, 

rescue operations got underway. Corps floating 

plant was assisted in the mission by all available private craft, including the giant steamboat 

Sprague and Standard Oil Company towboats 

for the massive evacuation of Greenville, 

Mississippi. One observer of the Greenville 

situation related:

There on the levees were men and women 

whose wits had fled, for they had seen 

loved ones swept away and disappear, their 

fates unknown, imagination dictating but 

one thought. There were broken arms and 

broken legs, untended wounds, desolation, 

despair. There was lack of food and shelter, 

the nights cool to coldness, danger of sickness. There was death and no burial place 

but the river.51

The suffering affected rich and poor, though 

the latter were often pushed to the very limits of 

survival.

Recognizing the crisis demanded action, 

President Coolidge appointed a Mississippi 

Flood Committee, headed by Secretary of 

Commerce Herbert Hoover, who had directed 

American relief efforts during the First World 

War. Hoover and Jadwin selected Memphis as 

the disaster relief headquarters, with the commanders of the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Army 

corps areas coordinating activities through a 

liaison officer sent to Memphis. The Red Cross 

supplied food and medical aid while the corps 

area commanders furnished quartermaster 

tents, cots, blankets, and mobile kitchens. 

Quartermaster supplies issued during the 

1927 flood relief mission totaled a staggering 

$2.5 million.52

“Unless some help is furnished 

quick people are going to drown 

like rats.”
154 Situation Desperate

The Army, Navy, Coast Guard, Public Health 

Service, and Corps of Engineers sent representatives to Memphis to assist Hoover in planning 

the disaster assistance. Hoover appointed a 

Railway Transportation director and a Refugee 

Depot director, and Col. George Spalding from 

the Louisville District became Hoover’s Water 

Transportation director, in charge of boat rescue 

and logistics operations.53

Spalding organized the rescue work as if it were a 

military campaign, with an advance guard, main 

body, reserves, and lines of supply. Captains 

J. C. Gotwals and Douglas Gillette headed the 

main rescue fleet collected at Memphis to follow 

the flood downriver. Capt. Lewis Pick became 

Hoover’s aide, relaying to the secretary the engineering data sent by the Corps.54

The rescue fleet comprised 72 towboats, 163 

motor boats, 255 barges, 27 aircraft, and 328 

small boats from the Corps, Coast Guard, Navy, 

and private owners. The aircraft performed 

field reconnaissance. The towboats and barges, 

surrounded by small craft, steamed up bayous 

to moor at strategic spots, then the small boats 

scattered to locate the refugees and return them 

to the mother ship for sustenance and medical 

attention. After the towboats and barges filled 

with refugees, they steamed to the Army tent 

camps operated by the Red Cross and policed by 

the National Guard. In the disaster area the Red 

Cross operated 154 camps caring for more than 

three hundred thousand people.55

Godfrey remembered the days at Hoover’s 

headquarters as a confused succession of broken 

levees and unbroken hours of work, of supply 

boats running shuttles to the camps, of shifting 

pins on a big campaign map on the wall. He 

was impressed by Secretary Hoover’s grasp of all 

phases of disaster relief. Each morning, Hoover 

studied the maps, conducted a conference to 

hear reports from his department heads, and 

then issued his daily orders.56

Hoover kept in mind the limits of his relief 

committee’s role, and, directing a federal program in southern states, he felt compelled to 

outline his thinking on federal disaster assistance policy:

I believe in state rights, but state rights 

carry with them state responsibilities. We 

will rescue and feed and give medical care 

and clothes to every person in need for four 

or six weeks or whatever time is necessary. 

We will move them back to their homes. 

We may be able to give them cotton seed 

for the crop which still can be planted and 

harvested this year. But the longer work 

of rehabilitation must be met by the states 

themselves.57

Hoover, who was in effect the first coordinator 

of federal disaster assistance, emphasized the 

policy characteristic of national administrations of the 1920s: cooperative responsibilities 

between the public and private sectors and 

between the federal and state governments. 

He arranged a post-flood rehabilitation effort, 

for example, by organizing local bankers into 

corporations to finance low-interest loans to 

planters and sharecroppers on a business basis. 

“There were broken arms and broken legs, 

untended wounds, desolation, despair....

There was death and no burial place 

but the river.”
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Flood Relief Mission 155

Stories from the time recount how, in a meeting with Memphis bankers, he demanded they 

raise a $5 million rehabilitation fund before his 

train left that evening. If the requested funds 

were not made available, he threatened to 

begin moving the flood refugees—the regional 

labor pool—north for resettlement that very 

evening. The bankers found the necessary 

capital.58

As was often the case, the American Red Cross 

received public criticism for its programs during the 1927 flood. The Corps of Engineers, 

however, recognized the Red Cross’s meager 

funds and only semi-official status curtailed 

its response ability; indeed, the Corps had 

little save praise for the agency. The sole Corps 

critique came from Lee, who contended the 

Red Cross lacked a clear chain of command, 

resulting in confusion. He suggested the Red 

Cross could improve its management by recruiting retired military officers accustomed to 

command.59

Flood victims at Arkansas City, Arkansas, camped on the levees in May 1927. Office of History
156 Situation Desperate

When the Corps closed its emergency 

operations in June, Spalding took the occasion to highlight the connection between 

military preparedness and disaster assistance. 

“True military preparedness is never a waste, 

but a bulwark of defense against attack and 

a reservoir of relief for the Red Cross in case 

of disasters,” he philosophized, concluding 

grandly: “And the officers and men of the Army 

and Navy ... form an organized force that will 

serve just as willingly and just as loyally in 

peace in relief work under the great banner of 

the Red Cross, as we will in battle under the 

Stars and Stripes.”60

•

Observations

The Corps suffered a major defeat and achieved 

a significant victory in its disaster work during 

the 1920s. The 1927 flood and the devastation 

The engineer steamer Tuscumbia unloaded flood victims and mules on 18 May 1927. National Archives, 77-MRC-3-88
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Observations 157

it visited upon the Mississippi Delta forced a 

wholesale reappraisal of the Corps’ levee policy 

and galvanized legislative and popular support 

for comprehensive river improvements that 

would include levees, bank revetments, cut-offs, 

outlets, and reservoirs. The landmark 1928 

Flood Control Act and subsequent legislation in 

1936, 1938, and 1941 set the Corps on a course 

to become the nation’s premier dam builders.

The Corps persisted in its campaign to squelch 

the issuance of free quartermaster rations during disasters, instead offering the victims useful 

employment as “work relief.” Its policy prevailed 

against strong public protest, and by 1927 emergency food was supplied by the Red Cross and 

private charities, not by the Army. Indeed, the 

“work relief” concept became a principal tool 

in combating the economic depression of the 

1930s, and many Corps of Engineers officers 

became managers in New Deal agencies.

•
158 Situation Desperate

1. James Munn and J. L Savage, “The Flood of June, 

1921, in the Arkansas River at Pueblo, Colorado,” 

Transactions of the American Society of Civil 

Engineers 85 (1922): 1–65; Arthur O. Ridgeway, 

The Case of Train Number 3 (Denver: Rocky 

Mountain Railroad Club, 1956), passim.

2. Munn and Savage, “The Flood of June, 1921,” 

1–65.

3. Congressional Record, 67th Cong., 1st sess., 1921, 

2198–99, 2226.

4. ARCE (1921), 27–28; William Caples, “Report of 

Operations of Pueblo Flood Relief, June 6 to 

August 15, 1921,” NARA, RG 77, Engineer 

Department, “General Correspondence, 1894–

1923” [hereafter Entry 103], File 13137.

5. Caples, “Pueblo Flood Relief.”

6. Ibid.; see also C. E. McKee to William Caples, 15 

Aug. 1921, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 13137.

7. Caples, “Pueblo Flood Relief.”

8. Ibid.

9. Ibid.

10. Ibid.

11. Ibid.

12. Ibid.

13. Lansing Beach to J. A. O’Connor, 29 Apr. 1922, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 133894.

14. Robert W. Harrison, Levee Districts and Levee 

Building in Mississippi (Greenville: Mississippi 

Levee Commission, 1951), 232–33.

15. Ibid.; J. A. O’Connor to President, Mississippi 

River Commission, 18 Apr. 1922, NARA, RG 77, 

Entry 103, File 133894.

16. J. A. O’Connor to President, Mississippi River 

Commission, 18 Apr. 1922, NARA, RG 77, Entry 

103, File 133894.

17. Secretary of War to J. A. O’Connor, 26 Apr. 1922, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 133894.

18. John Parker to Lansing Beach, 26 Apr. 1922, 

NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 133894.

19. J. A. O’Connor to Chief of Engineers, 29 Apr. 

1922, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 133894.

20. Assistant Chief of Staff to Adjutant General, 28 

Apr. 1922, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 

133894.

21. J. A. O’Connor to Chief of Engineers, 13 May 

1922, and Richard Coiner to Adjutant General, 28 

Apr. 1922, NARA, RG 77, Entry 103, File 

133894.

22. Harrison, Levee Districts and Levee Building, 

232–33.

23. Tex Deweese and Rudy Moc, Lorain Tornado: 

Souvenir and Memorial Book (Lorain, Ohio: Moc 

and Deweese, 1924).

24. Ibid.; Spencer Cosby to Chief of Engineers, 30 

June 1924, NARA Washington National Records 

Center [hereafter WNRC] (Suitland, Md.), RG77, 

Civil Works, 1923–42, File 7398-1.

25. Spencer Cosby to Chief of Engineers, 30 June 

1924, NARA WNRC, RG77, Civil Works, 1923–

42, File 7398-1.

26. Ibid.

27. Fourth Army Corps commander to Adjutant 

General, 10 Mar. 1925, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 929.

28. Kenzie Walker to Chief of Staff, 1 Apr. 1925, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 929.

29. Fox Conner to Kenzie Walker, 7 Apr. 1925, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 929.

30. Ibid. Reports on the Japanese Relief Expeditions 

of 1923 also are in NARA, RG 407, AGO Central 

Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 929.

31. Walker’s endorsement on letter from Fox Conner, 

7 Apr. 1925, NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, 

Dec. 400.38, Box 929.

32. Dwight Davis to Speaker of House of 

Representatives, 22 May 1925, Box 929, NARA, 

RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 

929.

33. John C. H. Lee, “A Flood Year on the MidMississippi,” Military Engineer 20 (July 1928): 

305–12.

34. ARCE (1927), 1837–41.

35. Edgar Jadwin to Secretary of War, 16 Apr. 1927, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2417.

36. Stuart Godfrey, “Notes from a Mississippi River 

Flood Diary,” Military Engineer 19 (Nov. 1927): 

489–93.

37. ARCE (1927), 1837–41.

38. Ibid.; W. H. Holcombe, “Flood Fight on the 

Lower Mississippi,” Military Engineer 19 (Sept. 

1927): 384–91.

39. Lee, “Flood Year on the Mid-Mississippi,” 305–12; 

Pete Daniel, Deep’n As It Come: The 1927 

Mississippi River Flood (New York: Oxford 

University Press, 1977), 69–72.

40. Godfrey, “Notes from a Mississippi Flood Diary,” 

489.

41. Lee, “Flood Year on the Mid-Mississippi,” 

308–09.

42. Ibid., 308–12.

43. Albert E. Cowdrey, The Delta Engineers: A History 

of the United States Army Corps of Engineers in the 

New Orleans District (New Orleans: U.S. Army 

Engineer District, 1971), 29–32; Fred Way, “1927,” 

S & D Reflector 14 (June 1977): 13.

Chapter 7 Notes
Roaring Floods of the Twenties ■ Notes 159

44. Godfrey, “Notes from a Mississippi Flood Diary,” 

490.

45. Holcombe, “Flood Fight on the Lower 

Mississippi,” 384–91.

46. Cowdrey, Delta Engineers, 29–32; Way, “1927,” 13.

47. Cowdrey, Delta Engineers, 29–32; Way, “1927,” 13; 

Daniel, Deep’n As It Come, 50.

48. Dwight Davis to Adjutant General, 26 Apr. 1927, 

and Edgar Jadwin to Secretary of War, 26 Apr. 

1927, NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2418.

49. Cowdrey, Delta Engineers, 29–32; Daniel, Deep’n 

As It Come, 50.

50. A. C. Dimond to Adjutant General, 25 Apr. 1927, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2418. 

51. Standard Oil Company, The Stanocolan, 5 May 

1927, passim.

52. Malin Craig, Army Fourth Corps, to Adjutant 

General, 14 June 1927, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 2418; Arthur 

Kellogg, “Behind the Levees,” Survey 58 (1 June 

1927): 277–92; J. S. Chambers, “Quartermaster 

Activities in the Mississippi Flood,” Quartermaster 

Review 7 (May 1928): 14–20.

53. Daniel, Deep’n As It Come, 76; George Spalding to 

Chief of Engineers, 2 May 1927, NARA, RG 407, 

AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 2418.

54. Godfrey, “Notes from a Mississippi Flood Diary,” 

491–93.

55. Ibid.; Bette Tilly, “Memphis and the Mississippi 

Valley Flood of 1927,” West Tennessee Historical 

Society Papers 24 (1970): 41–56.

56. Godfrey, “Notes from a Mississippi Flood Diary,” 

491–93.

57. Kellogg, “Behind the Levees,” 277–92.

58. Ibid.

59. Daniel, Deep’n As It Come, 133–41.

60. Godfrey, “Notes from a Mississippi Flood Diary,” 

493.
Right: The Quartermaster Depot at 

Jeffersonville, Indiana, was flooded 

on 27 January 1937 with immense 

loss of government property.

National Archives, RG407, 

AGO Central File 1926-1939, 

Decimal 400.38

Left: A levee was heavily sandbagged along the 

Nonconnah Creek backwater south of Memphis, 

10 February 1937. Office of History

Below: Floodwaters filled city streets in Huntington, 

West Virginia, 25 January 1937, interrupting a 

showing of The Charge of the Light Brigade at the 

Orpheum Theatre. Huntington District
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Vermont Flood 161

Emergency Service and 

Military Training

Lt. Gen. Leslie Groves became famous 

during the 1940s as the builder of the 

Pentagon near Washington and as 

head of the Manhattan Project, responsible 

for developing the first nuclear weapons. Both 

projects involved intensely difficult management 

tasks and were extremely stressful and urgent, 

and scholars studying them may wonder where 

Groves received the training that permitted 

him to manage them so successfully. Groves 

had indeed managed emergencies before the 

Second World War, once during a natural 

disaster in Vermont and again in Nicaragua. 

These missions have long been largely forgotten, 

and Groves did not even mention them in his 

autobiography, yet they merit historical attention 

as samples of the symbiosis between emergency 

response and military mobilization or crisis 

management in any form.

When the superfloods of 1936 and 1937 

afflicted the nation’s midsection as the greatest 

natural disasters of the era, officers in addition 

to Groves distinguished themselves by service in 

peace as well as in war. During the Depression 

years, Congress and the president had at their 

disposal the forces of the Civilian Conservation 

Corps and Works Progress Administration, 

two work relief agencies offering useful labor 

for the unemployed, and used these forces to 

the maximum for post-disaster recovery and 

rehabilitation efforts. The American Red Cross 

managed the immediate relief needs of refugees, 

thus leaving the Corps of Engineers to pursue 

its primary objective: shoring up the levees to 

prevent flood damages. Largely as a result of 

public support generated by the losses endured 

during these floods, Congress acted in 1936 and 

again later to assign the Corps the mission to 

reduce flood damages throughout the nation.

•

Vermont Flood, 1927

The Winooski River cut Vermont’s capital off 

completely from the outside world in November 

1927. Eight inches of rain in thirty-eight hours 

destroyed 1,258 bridges in the Green Mountain 

state and severed all telephone and telegraph 

lines into Montpelier. Desperate for information, Maj. Gen. Preston Brown of the First 

Corps Area at Boston ordered the commander of 

Fort Ethan Allen to send reconnaissance forces 

into Montpelier. Washed out roads and bridges 

prevented even mounted patrols from reaching the capital, but Capt. William Mayer and 

Lt. Francis Gardner dismounted and continued 

on foot, marching fifteen miles and swimming 

the swollen Winooski to reach Montpelier.1

When the two Army officers contacted state 

officials and relayed news of the disaster back 

to headquarters, Brown sent forward an eightwagon mule train carrying rations, medical supplies, and Army physicians. Repairing the roads 

as they advanced, the cavalry got through to the 

capital with the mule train and initiated the relief 

effort. To overcome communication gaps, Brown 

dispatched aircraft to photograph damages, drop 

messages to isolated communities, and transport 

Army and federal officials into the area.2

8
162 Situation Desperate

Brown flew into Montpelier and, at the governor’s request, sent troops for temporary security 

duty and sent engineer officers to help plan 

restoration of bridges, roads, and public utilities. He met with Red Cross representatives and 

arranged for them to handle all the relief needs 

and to furnish receipts for any Army supplies 

issued to them. The Red Cross requested that 

engineers travel to Burlington to replace bridges 

destroyed by floods with ponton bridges, and 

Brown relayed their request to the president.3

In the meantime, a resident of Cavendish, 

Vermont, somehow found an operating telephone line and called his cousin to ask for help. 

His cousin happened to be President Calvin 

Coolidge, born in Vermont. The president 

beckoned Maj. Gen. Edgar Jadwin, Chief of 

Engineers, to the White House and personally 

explained Vermont’s needs. Jadwin ordered Col. 

W. J. Barden, Lt. Col. Robert Ralston, and Maj. 

F. B. Downing to Montpelier to furnish technical assistance. He called Col. Sherwood Cheney, 

commanding the Corps’ Boston office, and 

directed him to contact the president’s cousin; 

Cheney then sent Capt. Cecil Moore toward 

Cavendish. Driving a roadster, Moore got into 

Cavendish following dirt roads along the ridges. 

He met the president’s cousin, a pleasant fellow 

and, surprisingly, a Democrat. Moore prepared 

a report on flood damages at Cavendish, then 

continued his “windshield survey” of flood 

damages across Vermont and New Hampshire 

via the ridge roads, and finally motored into 

Boston with his report. The Corps officers 

sent to Montpelier helped state engineers plan 

utility and road repairs and arranged a loan of 

pile drivers from the Corps depot at Columbus, 

Ohio, to speed the bridge repairs.4

Col. George Hoffman, commanding the 

1st Engineers at Fort DuPont, selected his 

Company D to serve at Burlington, Vermont’s 

largest city, under command of Lieutenants 

Caving banks undermined a railroad in Vermont, 1927. Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-56133
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Vermont Flood 163

Leslie Groves and Vincent Esposito. Company 

D boarded a railway express to Burlington with 

sixteen pontons, a 1.5-ton truck, and a motorcycle with sidecar. After reaching Burlington, 

they quickly installed the temporary ponton 

bridge between two milldams on the Winooski 

River, opening it to traffic on 12 November and 

thereby facilitating relief and recovery efforts.5

As he had earlier in the year for the Mississippi 

River flood, President Coolidge appointed 

Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover as the 

federal disaster coordinator, and Hoover sent his 

aide, Rankin Sleight, to the area. When a plane 

crash killed Sleight, Hoover went in person to 

Montpelier where Barden briefed him on the 

situation. Hoover met with Vermont’s governor 

and state officials and determined that they had 

the emergency under control. Brown withdrew 

the troops, except for the Corps of Engineers. 

He later reported the Army had expended 

$17,400 on disaster relief, most of it debited to 

the American Red Cross.6

Debris floated down Main Street in Montpelier, Vermont, November 1927.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-133840
164 Situation Desperate

Groves and Company D remained at Burlington 

in charge of the ponton bridge. On 1 December 

they lost the bridge when a heavily loaded truck 

sank a ponton, setting the remaining pontons 

adrift to float downstream and go over a dam to 

their destruction. Groves brought in more pontons and reinstalled the bridge.7

The Winooski River froze over in January 

1928, and floating ice packed against the 

ponton bridge. To break up the ice jam, 

Company D fused blocks of TNT and threw 

them onto the ice. On 2 February one of the 

explosive charges detonated prematurely in 

the hands of Sergeant Littlefield, killing him, 

injuring two privates, and wounding Groves 

in the face. After Groves was injured, Moore 

returned to Vermont to take command of the 

detachment and the bridge.

Captain Moore, who during World War II 

would become the Army’s chief engineer in 

Europe, remembered his trying experiences in 

Vermont that winter and subsequently related:

There’s a couple of instances in my life I 

came so near to disaster, and one of them 

was at that bridge. A disaster, in any outfit 

that you’re commanding, usually means a 

disaster for you. When we started to put 

that bridge back in, we still had the cable 

that ran across. The old anchor system 

wouldn’t work .... You’d start a boat with 

a bunch of people, and they’d have to work 

their way across, slide across this cable. 

Well, they had a cook in there who was very 

scared to death, and he got a hold of the 

next rope over .... He got the boat almost 

sideways. It seemed pretty nearly turned 

over. I yelled at him to let it go, which he 

didn’t much like doing, but he did, and let 

it go. If that thing had upset, if that guy 

had held on another minute, he would have 

dumped a whole bunch of men into the 

river. It was the nearest thing to a tragedy or 

a disaster that I ever had, I think. 

Moore declared it a tricky mission because ice 

coming over the upstream dam could strike the 

ponton bridge and send it downstream to be 

destroyed over the second dam. He relied on 

warnings from local old-timers about the river’s 

ice breaking up and took timely measures to 

narrowly prevent loss of the bridge. Moore and 

Company D held their bridge against ice attack 

until the following spring melt when they withdrew from Vermont.8

•

Managua Earthquake , 1931

Three years after freezing in a Vermont winter, Lt. Leslie Groves sweltered in Nicaragua 

in the midst of a major fire. He was with the 

Provisional Engineer Battalion assigned to the 

Nicaragua Canal Survey when an earthquake 

shook Managua on 31 March 1931, killing two 

thousand and starting fires that threatened to 

consume the entire town. The earthquake fault 

had broken the city’s water mains and covered 

its pumping plant with a landslide.9

Stationed at Granada, thirty-two miles 

from Managua, the engineers hardly felt the 

tremors. When news of the disaster reached 

“There’s a couple of instances in my life I came so near to disaster, and one of 

them was at that bridge. A disaster, in any outfit that you’re commanding, 

usually means a disaster for you.”
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Managua Earthquake 165

Granada, however, Maj. Dan Sultan, at the 

request of Nicaraguan officials, mobilized his 

command. He and Lieutenants Groves, B. B. 

Talley, and Kenneth Nichols, with twenty-five 

enlisted men, collected explosives and boarded 

a train for Managua. Lt. H. L. Calvin of the 

Quartermasters, Maj. Paul Hawley of the 

Medical Corps, and three corpsmen joined the 

engineer command.10

The group reached Managua in the afternoon. 

Hawley and the corpsmen opened a field 

hospital, performing ten major and twenty 

minor surgeries in fourteen hours. Sultan sought 

out the 2d Marine Brigade commander at 

Managua, who was assisting the local Guardia

with street security patrol. The marine asked 

the engineers to try to stop the fires. No rain 

had fallen in eight months, a high wind was 

driving flames through the city, and fifteen 

city blocks were on fire when the engineers 

went to work.11

Water supply was nonexistent. Fallen buildings 

blocked the streets and formed debris bridges 

across which the fires roared from block to 

block. Most people had fled the city, so the 

engineers had to fight the fire alone—just 

twenty-five enlisted men and four officers to 

save the entire city from combustion.

Sultan and his men felt the only feasible way to 

slow the destruction was to prevent the spread 

Maj. Dan Sultan drew a map of Managua, Nicaragua, after the earthquake of 1931. The Military Engineer, Vol. 23, No. 134, July 1931
166 Situation Desperate

of wind-driven fire. They cleared away the 

debris bridges across the streets, removed flammable materials from buildings facing the street 

in burning blocks, and knocked down with 

explosives any badly damaged tall buildings that 

might let loose sparks and embers high up where 

the wind could catch them.12

Once the conflagration entered a city block, 

it was hopeless to try to save the buildings; 

the engineers’ firefight had to be made in the 

streets. Bodies littered the area, but the engineers had no time or personnel for burial details. 

Frequent aftershocks toppled more buildings, 

and the troops often risked their lives by climbing ladders propped against weak walls or by 

entering ruined buildings to take down burning embers. Talley especially remembered the 

sounds that orchestrated their three-day fire 

fight: the cries of distress, the whining of bullets fired by madmen who shot at anything that 

moved, the rattle of volleys as those madmen 

and looters were executed, and the thumps of 

the blasting.13

Time and again the engineers thought they had 

the fire stopped, only to see it jump the gap to 

another block and force them to renew their 

fight at the next street. They slowed the fire in 

front of the prevailing winds, stopped its spread 

laterally and against the wind, and at last on 

2 April checked it completely after it had consumed thirty-one city blocks. Sultan left Talley 

and Nichols with a detail to guard against new 

fires springing from the smoldering ruins. He 

sent Groves and another detail to help restore 

the city’s water supply.

Landslides had buried the city’s water pumps at 

Lake Asososca. The dam and reservoir nearby 

and the water mains in the city were undamaged, but the pipe leading from the reservoir to 

the city was broken at the fault line. Groves and 

his men first installed a temporary pumping 

plant at two old wells and forced the well water 

The earthquake and fire in Managua, Nicaragua, April 1931, left the National 

Palace in ruins. The Military Engineer, Vol. 23, No. 134, July 1931
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Floods of 1936 167

into the city mains. Then they began repairs to 

the main system. They excavated the landslides 

at Lake Asososca to uncover the pumping plant, 

built a retaining wall to protect against more 

slides, restored the pumps to operation, and 

repaired the water main between the reservoir 

and the city.14

Meanwhile, Talley and Nichols, working with 

Nicaraguan officials, inspected buildings for 

safety, demolished dangerous walls, and opened 

the vaults of banks and public agencies located 

in the burned buildings. Talley recalled with 

amusement opening an elaborate concrete and 

steel bank vault with two shots of TNT, the 

door booming like an anvil and sailing across 

a patio. When the bank rebuilt the vault, it 

rejected a bid from the original manufacturer 

on grounds that it had been of such poor quality 

that the Yankees had opened it in two minutes.15

At the request of Nicaragua’s president and the 

Red Cross, Sultan took charge of sustaining the 

homeless. He divided the city into eight zones, 

appointing a committee in each zone to register 

the needy and see that no ineligibles received 

free food. He employed able refugees in labor 

gangs to clear away the rubble under his supervision. At the peak of the recovery, he and the 

relief committee employed or fed twenty-five 

thousand people a day.16

Seventeen days after the earthquake, the 

engineers returned to their Granada base. For 

months afterwards they had trouble sleeping, 

never sure that the walls would not crumble 

down on them at night. American Red Cross 

chairman John Payne was impressed by the 

engineers’ work at Managua and shared his 

opinion with Army Chief of Staff Douglas 

MacArthur. MacArthur relayed the message 

to Sultan, adding: “Your efforts and those of 

your fine command give all in authority here the 

greatest satisfaction.”17

In his after-action report, Sultan asserted the 

principal lesson of the Managua earthquake 

emergency was that hasty demolition could not 

check the progress of a fire. “It is only by the 

systematic clearing out of a lane on the leeward 

side of the fire that definite results can be 

secured,” he observed, warning: “This of course 

means that ample labor and considerable time 

must be available. In other words, you cannot 

stop a fire on a broad front by working immediately to the leeward of the burning section; you 

must move back far enough to give you room 

and time.”18

The Corps initiated studies of demolition 

techniques in the aftermath of the Managua 

emergency, paying special attention to lessons 

learned there and at San Francisco in 1906. 

Demolition squads in combat engineer battalions received thorough training in the use of 

explosives of all types and instructions on the 

proper methods of checking fires in urban areas 

with explosives.19

•

Floods of 1936

Four storms crossed the northeastern United 

States in March 1936, dropping rain that, in 

“Your efforts and those of your fine 

command give all in authority here the 

greatest satisfaction.”
168 Situation Desperate

combination with snowmelt, generated record 

flows on many streams from West Virginia to 

Maine. The Susquehanna at Harrisburg crested 

3.5 feet above all records; the Ohio at Pittsburgh 

surpassed previous records by 6.1 feet; and the 

Connecticut River at Hartford climbed 8.6 feet 

higher than ever before.20

Congressman Herman Koppleman toured 

flooded Hartford, Connecticut, by boat and 

vividly described what he saw. He saw “grim 

humor” in the brickyard building that had 

floated downriver from Windsor but also “stark 

tragedy” considering the losses suffered by its 

owner. The huge fuel storage tanks he saw 

hurling down the river, ripping and destroying everything in their path, concerned him, 

although he also saw a Corps boat pushing them 

to bank where they could be anchored. “I was 

amazed at the havoc wrought,” he lamented. 

“Up the river, jammed against the Willimantic 

Railroad bridge, were whole houses that had 

been swept from their foundations into the 

river .... A heavy stillness like the quiet of a 

desolate cemetery hung over everything. The 

only motion was that of the water. Here there 

was no human activity.”21

Leaving the boat, Koppleman visited the governor’s office, where local, state, and federal 

officials collected to manage relief and rehabilitation work. At the meeting, Maj. Mason 

Young, heading the Corps’ Providence District, 

spent most of his time attempting to answer the 

question: “What are you going to do to prevent 

another such catastrophe?” It was a leading 

question—Congress at that moment was considering the Flood Control Act of 1936 to make 

flood protection a standard national goal.22

Despite the great damages from the widespread 

flooding of March 1936, the role of the Corps 

of Engineers in the ensuing disaster relief mission was minimal for at least two reasons. First, 

the Army’s corps area commanders viewed 

the Corps of Engineers’ civil works districts as 

reconnaissance, warning, and damage survey 

units, not as part of the relief and recovery 

team; Army corps area commanders during 

the Depression instead relied upon the quasimilitary Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) 

for rescue and evacuation. Second, post-disaster 

recovery and rehabilitation were largely handled 

then by the Red Cross in cooperation with 

the Works Progress Administration (WPA) 

and other work relief agencies created by the 

Franklin Roosevelt administration.

Maj. Gen. Albert Bowley, commanding Third 

Corps Area headquartered at Baltimore, for 

example, explained how he managed the respective missions of the Corps of Engineers and 

other agencies:

Arrangements were made through the various U.S. District Engineer Offices for a 

system of flood outposts to furnish prompt 

information on flood conditions. These outposts supervised by the District Engineers, 

who made frequent personal inspections, 

were in excellent position, not only to watch 

the streams themselves, but also to advise 

the Commanding General and his staff 

whether the danger to life and property was 

sufficiently serious to justify action by Army 

agencies to aid the local authorities, the Red 

“I was amazed at the havoc wrought.... 

A heavy stillness like the quiet of a desolate 

cemetery hung over everything.
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Floods of 1936 169

Cross and other organizations who might 

volunteer to render some form of assistance 

.... An essential feature of the relief plans, as 

they were developed, was to obtain advance 

authority from the War Department for 

the use of any facilities available, including CCC supplies and equipment. Later, 

the President’s order covering the use of 

CCC enrollees for relief work gave the 

Commanding General ample means for the 

temporary relief of homeless persons and for 

assistance in cleaning up towns and cities 

after the flood water receded.23

Unlike the Mississippi River districts, the Corps 

districts in northeastern states had no large 

fleet of workboats available for rescue and, in 

1936, they had no significant levee maintenance 

responsibilities. That year the Corps took few 

actions in the flooded northeastern states that 

resembled Mississippi River flood fights, except 

perhaps at Washington, D.C. In the District 

of Columbia, the Corps supervised WPA and 

CCC workers building a sandbag dike along the 

western edge of the Mall to divert water from 

Constitution Avenue and prevent inundation 

of nearby buildings. At its crest, the Potomac 

Railroad gondola cars were used for bank protection along the Allegheny River in Braeburn, Pennsylvania, 25 March 1936. Pittsburgh District
170 Situation Desperate

River damaged the Potomac Park and National 

Airport areas but did not flood the city proper.24

In western Pennsylvania the Corps’ Pittsburgh 

District conducted rescue operations near 

its locks and dams and supplied refugees at 

Vandergrift, which was hard hit by Kiskiminetas 

River flooding. The district commander, 

Maj. W. D. Styer, devoted most of his attention 

to saving a navigation dam on the Allegheny 

River and the Emsworth Dam on the Ohio, 

checking erosion that threatened the two dams 

by dropping tons of stone to stabilize the adjacent riverbanks.25

After the 1927 Winooski River flood, the Corps 

planned a flood protection project in Vermont. 

The New York Engineer District directed 

Civilian Conservation Corps workers who built 

two flood control dams at Wrightsville and 

East Barre in the Winooski basin to protect 

Montpelier. Although the March 1936 flood 

equaled that of 1927, the two CCC dams 

prevented millions of dollars worth of damages 

in the Winooski valley.26

The intersection of Stanwix Street and Fort Duquesne Blvd. in Pittsburgh, 

Pennsylvania, was covered with floodwaters on 18 March 1936.

Pittsburgh District
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Superflood on the Ohio 171

Because Congress was debating national flood 

control policy when the 1936 floods caused such 

great damages, the chief of engineers immediately mandated studies to determine the full 

extent of flood damages in order that appropriations and planning for flood control might bear 

a closer relation to the facts. He made Col. Glen 

Edgerton responsible for the surveys in eastern Pennsylvania and New York, Col. George 

Spalding in New England, and Col. Roger 

Powell in the Ohio River basin. Information 

they collected went to the appropriate congressional committees.27

President Franklin Roosevelt appointed a 

cabinet-level Flood Emergency Committee to 

coordinate relief and recovery activities and 

made $43 million available for the efforts. The 

Secretaries of War, Treasury, and Navy, the 

American Red Cross chairman, and the Civilian 

Conservation Corps director served on the committee, but the president relied chiefly on the 

WPA’s administrator, Harry Hopkins, giving 

him blanket authority to restore public roads, 

bridges, sewage systems, buildings, and water 

and power plants. With a quarter-million laborers already on the WPA rolls, Hopkins was able 

to perform the restoration tasks in short order.28

Thus, the 1936 flood relief effort was managed 

primarily by the Red Cross—supported by CCC 

detachments assigned the mission by the Army’s 

corps area commanders—and the WPA and 

allied work relief agencies handled the rehabilitation work.29

Although the Corps of Engineers was not 

involved in remedying the widespread destruction resulting from the March 1936 floods, the 

disaster generated broad public support for a 

national flood control policy. When Senator 

Royal Copeland asked Maj. Gen. Edward 

Markham, Chief of Engineers, to comment on 

the draft of a bill authorizing construction of 

dams and reservoirs to protect the Ohio River 

basin only, the chief replied that, while the 

proposed projects were meritorious, he thought 

their authorization “should be considered only 

in connection with such a general program, the 

terms of which thereafter may be construed as 

a basic policy definitive of Federal interest.” 

Copeland therefore modified the bill to include 

the phrase “it is the sense of Congress that flood 

control on navigable waters or their tributaries 

is a proper activity of the Federal Government.” 

This bill became the historic Flood Control Act 

of 1936, which launched nationwide flood protection programs.30

•

Superflood on the Ohio , 1937

The log kept by the Corps lockmaster at Ohio 

River Dam 44 near Leavenworth, Indiana, during the January 1937 flood graphically outlines 

the scope of the disaster all along the Ohio.

Date Remarks

Jan. 21 Dam all down

Jan. 22 Began snowing 5 p.m.

Jan. 23 Depth of snow 5 in.

Jan. 24 Oil house gone

Jan. 25 Garage gone

Jan. 26 Maneuver boat 252 gone

Jan. 27 Warehouse gone

Jan. 28 Most of Leavenworth gone

Jan. 29 Leavenworth still leaving31

Leavenworth never fully recovered from the 

disaster, and the dam was later relocated.
172 Situation Desperate

“Rare meteorological conditions had created this 

calamitous inundation of almost Biblical proportions,” wrote Capt. Paschal Strong, the Corps 

deputy at Cincinnati in 1937, better known 

publicly as author of the “Jack Armstrong, 

All-American Boy” serial. “A large anticyclone 

developed off the South Atlantic coast and its 

high pressure area continued in constant shape 

and position for almost a month,” he elaborated. 

“The clockwise rotation of its air currents sent 

into the Ohio Valley a continuous mass of warm 

and wet air, which met a Polar Canadian air 

mass over the lower Ohio Valley, resulting in an 

intense and unprecedented deluge.”32

When Strong and his district commanders at 

the Huntington, Cincinnati, and Louisville 

offices dispatched their early reports of 

major flooding, the chief of engineers was 

A man clung to a ledge of a building above floodwaters in Huntington, West Virginia, 25 January 1937. Huntington District
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Superflood on the Ohio 173

surprised—no major flooding had occurred at 

Pittsburgh, the headwaters of the river. Orders 

went to Capt. B. B. Talley, now stationed at 

Wright Field near Dayton, Ohio, to fly over the 

river and report what he saw. Upon his return, 

Talley telephoned Washington that the situation 

appeared even more serious than reported.33

Because rains fell first on the lower Ohio valley, 

the river hit flood stages there earlier than in the 

upper valley, leading to rumors that the flood 

wave had traveled upstream instead of down, 

though the crest actually proceeded downstream 

in a regular fashion. The flood exceeded all 

records on the Ohio below Point Pleasant, 

West Virginia. Huntington, West Virginia, was 

wet but communications continued there. The 

Portsmouth, Ohio, floodwall was under ten feet 

of water, Cincinnati was without utility services, 

and community services on the lower river had 

been wiped out. Towns along the lower Ohio 

were located on bluffs with lowlands behind 

them; the lowlands had flooded first, cutting off 

communications and transportation, turning the 

towns into isolated islands of misery.34

At the flood’s beginning, Corps offices along 

the Ohio distributed sandbags to the few communities that had levees, but the distribution 

stopped when it became apparent the flood 

would overtop existing levees by five or more 

feet. Corps crews stationed at the forty-six locks 

and dams on the river began rescue and evacuation efforts, using the skiffs and flats available 

at the locks; they even caught floating houses 

and secured them with cables to trees. Divers 

stationed at the locks for repair work also undertook emergency underwater repairs to damaged 

municipal gas mains in various localities.

In Huntington, Corps personnel crawled 

through second-story windows to enter their 

offices and relied on portable water, heat, and 

sanitary units. They learned that ample relief 

supplies were available from the Army and 

the Red Cross, but broken communications 

made determining the needs of isolated towns 

difficult. Huntington’s Corps commander 

established separate bases at Marietta and 

Portsmouth in Ohio, Point Pleasant in West 

Virginia, and Maysville in Kentucky, from 

which the Corps workboats embarked on daily 

patrols to ascertain public needs, perform rescue, 

and deliver supplies.

To allow the Corps fleet at Cincinnati to move 

to the lower river, the chief of engineers transferred control of the upper end of Cincinnati 

District to the Huntington District, placing 

emergency operations in charge of Lt. George 

Lincoln. Maj. Frederick Frech left Huntington 

for the lower river to open a Corps rescue and 

evacuation base at Paducah, Kentucky. Later, 

he followed the flood crest from Paducah to 

Memphis and New Orleans.35

The Corps’ Cincinnati office installed pontons 

at one end of a bridge to restore access, allowing emergency vehicles to cross from Ohio to 

Kentucky, and it dispatched its towboats Scioto

and Chenoka onto the flood. These secured 

floating fuel tanks to prevent further spread of 

“...this calamitous inundation of almost Biblical proportions...

an intense and unprecedented deluge.”
174 Situation Desperate

the fire that broke out in Cincinnati on Black 

Sunday, 24 January, after spilled storage tanks 

caught fire and burned thirty-two buildings. 

The flood crested on 26 January at nine feet 

above Cincinnati’s previous record stage.36

Col. M. M. Kimmel inspected the actions at 

Cincinnati and Huntington for the Fifth Corps 

Area commander and filed a complimentary 

report on the Corps’ emergency response:

Many thousands of refugees owe their lives 

to these brave men, who worked day and 

night at this perilous task. Some of these 

men and boats operated in the Cincinnati 

area. A river depot was established and many 

government boats supplied to volunteer 

rescue parties. They supervised the building 

of a pontoon bridge to the L and N Bridge 

which sent fresh vegetables into Newport, 

Kentucky, for the first time in days.37

As the crest passed Cincinnati, towboats, 

skiffs, and emergency equipment moved from 

the upriver to the downriver districts, where 

they evacuated entire towns and cities. Threefourths of Louisville, Kentucky, was flooded, 

and 175,000 people were evacuated as the city 

was placed under martial law. Among the 

Army units sent to Louisville was Company 

B, 5th Engineers, from Fort Belvoir, Virginia. 

Commanded by Capt. Robert McDonough and 

Lieutenants Kenneth Nichols, John Davis, and 

Ralph King, the 106 enlisted men of Company 

B set up portable water purification units and 

built floating bridges to facilitate Louisville’s 

The 113th Engineers constructed a ponton bridge in Evansville, Indiana, in 1937. National Archives, 77-RH-35T-1
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Superflood on the Ohio 175

evacuation.38 Because the Corps’ Louisville 

office was flooded, its commander, Lt. Col. 

Dabney Elliott, established his emergency operations center at Evansville, Indiana, nearer the 

massive evacuation mission on the lower river 

and where the Red Cross and U.S. Coast Guard 

had established emergency offices. He also 

opened emergency bases at Tell City, Indiana, 

and Owensboro and Paducah in Kentucky on 

the lower river.39

With authority from the chief of engineers, 

Elliott established a special flood district at 

Golconda, Illinois. Col. Charles Gross, Frech, 

and ten officers from Fort Belvoir directed the 

special district’s activities at Golconda. The 108th 

Engineers, Illinois National Guard, opened roads 

from Golconda to the interior and maintained 

telephone lines to permit communications with 

other Corps offices. This special district managed the evacuation of entire towns, such as 

Shawneetown, Illinois, along the lower Ohio.40

At Paducah, where thirty-three thousand of 

its thirty-eight thousand residents had to be 

evacuated, the Corps collected the refugees 

in small craft and delivered them to a barge 

anchored at the Irvin Cobb Hotel, whence 

larger craft took them to Red Cross and CCC 

camps on higher ground. The St. Louis District 

towboat Penniman, equipped with a short-wave 

radio transmitter, provided communications at 

Paducah. Its radio reports to St. Louis were forwarded to the chief’s office at Washington. The 

Corps office at Cincinnati had no radio system 

then, so to communicate with its field offices it 

resorted to daily broadcasts over powerful commercial AM stations in the valley, which volunteered their services during the crisis.41

To supplement the boats from the Corps 

offices along the Ohio, the Tennessee Valley 

Authority and the Corps offices at St. Louis, 

Kansas City, and Nashville also sent rescue 

vessels to Golconda and Paducah. The Nashville 

office, for example, sent seven towboats, twelve 

launches, three quarterboats, three derrick boats, 

six barges, twelve flatboats, and eighteen skiffs. 

This fleet could not descend the Cumberland 

River’s channel to the Ohio because bridges 

over the river were too low for the larger boats 

to pass under. Despite the risks of hitting power 

and telephone lines, the fleet steamed out across 

flooded fields and over the approach ramps to 

bypass the bridges and reach their destination.42

With no advance flood emergency plans in 

place, the Corps offices located along the 

Ohio improvised as the crisis dictated. Their 

three-fold mission was, in order of priority, to 

protect government property, to collect and disseminate hydrologic information, and to render 

local authorities all possible assistance. The 

Corps encountered substantial public pressure 

in favor of the third mission at the expense of 

the first two. Local officials at Shawneetown, 

for instance, insisted that the Corps evacuate sick refugees to Evansville, although Red 

Cross facilities were available at Shawneetown 

itself. Because officials at Carrollton, Kentucky, 

demanded that a Corps towboat remain there 

to quell panic in their community, the Corps 

complied and immobilized a boat that was badly 

needed elsewhere.43

“Many thousands of refugees owe their lives 

to these brave men, who worked day and 

night at this perilous task.”
176 Situation Desperate

Despite frequent conflicts with local officials, 

the rescue and evacuation mission generally proved successful. Paducah’s Disaster 

Committee estimated the engineer fleet saved 

no fewer than five thousand lives in the Paducah 

area, and a reporter there for Engineering NewsRecord wrote from the drowned city:

Conditions on this river are simply hell. 

The people simply refuse to evacuate ahead 

of the time of serious danger, and then the 

rescue load comes all at once. The army 

engineers stepped into this strange job of 

rescue and evacuation in great style. They 

are doing all that is humanly possible to 

bring order out of chaos: I have seen it happen right here today.44

In addition, the 1937 superflood on the Ohio 

provided three memorable lessons for the 

Corps of Engineers. First, cooperation among 

Corps offices, through loans of personnel and 

equipment, provided the increased flexibility 

and resources needed during emergencies to 

perform all missions adequately. Second, firstclass radio communications were vital during 

emergencies and needed for routine operations. 

Third, advance planning for disaster response 

was imperative. Thereafter all Corps offices in 

the Ohio valley prepared comprehensive flood 

emergency contingency plans.

•

45

Engineers loaded rescue craft in flooded Nashville, Tennessee, 1937.

National Archives, 77-RH-33VV-2
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Mississippi River Flood 177

Mississippi River Flood , 1937

As the Ohio River crisis abated, the floodwaters 

raged on toward the Mississippi. “A super flood 

is on the way,” Col. Eugene Reybold, commanding at Memphis, cabled to the chief of engineers. “Water will surge almost ten feet above 

any recorded stage. There will be fifty-five feet 

in Memphis before the water now in sight from 

the Ohio moves out.”46

Reybold and his Memphis staff carefully 

watched the dispatches from the Ohio River. 

By 22 January it had become apparent that the 

flow passing Cincinnati in conjunction with 

water coming down other rivers threatened 

unprecedented disaster in the Memphis District. 

Reybold mobilized defenses, launching a campaign to raise the levee and floodwall at Cairo 

with sandbags and mudboxes high enough to 

protect against the predicted sixty-one-foot 

stage. He then ordered that work begin to raise 

all 598 miles of levees in his district to a height 

capable of withstanding the expected sixty-one 

foot crest. The approaching crest, however, 

climbed to sixty-two feet at Cairo, a foot higher 

than predicted.47

Meeting with Maj. Gen. Stanley Ford, commander of the Army’s Seventh Corps Area, 

Reybold requested and received flood fight 

assistance from the Civilian Conservation 

“Conditions on this river are simply hell. The people simply refuse to 

evacuate ahead of the time of serious danger....The army engineers 

stepped into this strange job of rescue and evacuation in great style.”

Civilian Conservation Corps workers helped move people 

into the camp for flood victims at Forrest City, Arkansas, 

in 1937.

Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-123851
178 Situation Desperate

Corps. He also arranged for rescue and relief 

efforts by the Army, Coast Guard, and Red 

Cross in order that Corps boats and personnel might concentrate on saving the levees. He 

therefore withdrew the Corps dredge Potter

and steamboats Jupiter, Minnesota, and Nolty 

from rescue work and sent them to assist with 

levee reinforcements. The Red Cross and the 

Coast Guard assembled a rescue fleet totaling 

19 steamboats, 6 dredges, 59 cutters, 279 power 

boats, 37 skiffs, 14 airplanes, and 1 dirigible 

with an aggregate crew of 1,370.48

Resistance to the massive evacuation came at 

the New Madrid–Birds Point Floodway in 

Missouri. There, the Corps had purchased most 

flowage rights and had planned to construct a 

fuseplug levee—a section built to collapse during 

a flood to allow Mississippi River floodwaters to 

escape through the floodway, relieving pressures 

against the Cairo floodwall. Reybold ordered 

that evacuation of the floodway begin on 21 

January and spread the news through radio 

broadcasts and by aircraft dropping leaflets. 

The government had not, however, acquired all 

flowage easements in the floodway at the time 

Mudboxes protected Cairo, Illinois, from high waters in 1937. Office of History the flood came, the Corps had not yet degraded 
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Mississippi River Flood 179

the fuseplug to blow out on its own, and some 

residents opposed the inundation of their lands 

to save Cairo; in fact, men with shotguns went 

to the fuseplug levee expecting to repulse any 

Corps personnel sent to open the plug.49

Col. George Spalding, who had directed flood 

rescue efforts along the Mississippi in 1927, was 

assistant to the Army chief of staff in 1937, and 

in Washington he helped coordinate the Army 

and the Corps civil works emergency response. 

He discussed the Birds Point situation personally with Secretary of War Harry Woodring, 

who asked Missouri’s governor to remove any 

armed resistance from the fuseplug area and 

permit the Corps to open the floodway. “Time 

is a vital factor,” said Woodring, “and the levee 

must be blown within a very few hours or heavy 

loss of life is almost certain to follow.”50

The governor sent state police and National 

Guard units to clear and patrol the levee, and 

at 4:40 pm on 25 January Reybold’s assistant, 

Maj. R. D. Burdick, began dynamiting the 

Birds Point fuseplug (picks and shovels having 

been ineffective). Blasting stopped temporarily 

at the governor’s request to allow completion 

of the evacuation, then resumed at noon on 

26 January. By late that evening, the river was 

moving through the floodway, eventually carrying a 500,000-cubic-feet-per-second flow, 

about a quarter of the total river flow past Cairo. 

When blasting had begun, the Cairo gauge 

had reached 58.6 feet, less than two feet below 

the top of Cairo’s floodwall, and was set to rise 

several feet more. After the floodway opened, 

the Cairo stage fell to 57.9 feet on the morning 

of 28 January, then resumed its slow rise.51

The American Red Cross opened refugee 

camps at Charleston, Sikeston, and East Prairie, 

Missouri, near the floodway, where the WPA 

put up tents supplied by the Quartermaster 

Corps and built the necessary sanitary facilities. 

National Guard units furnished security for the 

camps.52 The Corps, in the meantime, directed 

eight hundred civilians, twelve hundred WPA 

workers, and five hundred CCC recruits as they 

sandbagged and built mudboxes atop the Cairo 

floodwall to raise it high enough to protect 

against a sixty-three-foot stage. Near Cairo, the 

Mound City levee failed on 28 January, and the 

Corps evacuated its entire population. They also 

moved women and children out of Cairo as a 

precaution.53

“Cairo will be ready tonight,” Reybold declared 

on 30 January, “for the full assault on its seawall 

and levees predicted for next Wednesday.” Maj. 

Gen. Edward Markham, Chief of Engineers, 

traveled to Cairo to inspect the flood fight and 

was in the city on 3 February when the rivers 

crested. The wall held and Cairo was saved.54

Reybold concentrated his forces near Cairo at 

first, then moved them downriver, raising the 

levees ahead of the oncoming flood crest. By 

30 January he commanded an army of fifteen 

thousand at work raising the 598 miles of levees 

in the Memphis District an average of two feet. 

The district furnished more than seven million 

sandbags and two million board feet of lumber 

for the task. As the crest moved downstream, 

Reybold threw reserve forces of WPA, CCC, 

and convict labor into the fight, and at one point 

these forces saved a levee even after water had 

begun running over its top.55

“Time is a vital factor and the levee must be blown within a very few hours or 

heavy loss of life is almost certain to follow.”
180 Situation Desperate

Although the 1937 stages exceeded the 1927 

records, Reybold and his Memphis District 

forces successfully held the Mississippi River’s 

mainline levees with only backwater flooding 

and flooding along tributaries marring their 

efforts. “My military training,” Reybold later 

heralded, “and similar training of countless 

Engineer officers sent to my assistance had a 

lot to do with the safe passage of the greatest flood the lower Mississippi valley ever 

experienced.”56

The Vicksburg and New Orleans districts had it 

somewhat easier than did Memphis. The 1937 

flood set new records at all gauges between 

Cairo and Helena, Arkansas, but below Helena 

only Natchez, Mississippi, reported a new flood 

stage record. The Vicksburg and New Orleans 

offices had raised the levees in their areas to 

levels above the 1927 records before 1937, and 

they now took prudent measures—raising low 

points, installing wooden revetments, and 

placing sandbags to reduce wave-wash erosion. 

The New Orleans office also began to open 

the Bonnet Carré spillway for the first time on 

28 January. Eventually 285 of its 350 bays were 

opened to reroute the floodwaters, which served 

to hold the Carrollton gauge at New Orleans to 

a twenty-foot reading.

The 1937 superflood flowed downriver at a 

rate about fifty percent greater than the 1913 

flood, yet the Corps had made such progress 

with the system, including the channel rectification and cutoff program begun in 1932, that 

the 1937 flood passed to the Gulf of Mexico 

without a single major crevasse occurring in the 

Mississippi River levees—a successful first.57

The Corps of Engineers’ reservation was surrounded during the high water mark at Memphis, Tennessee, on Valentine’s Day 1937. Office of History
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Observations 181

Administratively and geographically, the flood 

involved six of the nine Army corps areas in 

the continental United States, beginning with 

the upper Ohio River in Third Corps Area 

and passing through the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, 

Eighth, and finally the Fourth corps areas. 

The corps area commanders dispatched troops 

wherever needed and stripped quartermaster 

depots from San Francisco to New York of supplies for Red Cross use in the post-disaster relief 

mission. Army commanders also relied heavily 

on the Civilian Conservation Corps, rather than 

regular troops, during the emergency. More 

than twenty-two thousand CCC recruits led by 

four hundred officers and using two thousand 

trucks helped with the rescue, sandbagging, and 

supply delivery. Seventy-five CCC camps provided shelter for flood refugees.58

National coordination of relief and recovery 

operations had begun in January at a meeting 

attended by Army Chief of Staff General Malin 

Craig, WPA Director Harry Hopkins, Chief 

of Naval Operations Admiral William Leahy, 

and Coast Guard Commandant Rear Adm. 

Russell Waesche. They agreed that the 

American Red Cross would act as the official 

relief agency, the WPA would furnish labor 

and equipment for the cleanup, and the Public 

Health Service would furnish medical supplies.59 President Roosevelt also appointed 

Harry Hopkins of WPA, Surgeon General 

Thomas Parran, Chief of Engineers Edward 

Markham, and “Calamity Jim” Fieser of the 

Red Cross to a committee to monitor and 

supervise disaster relief fieldwork.60

The relief agencies assembled a massive rescue 

fleet at Memphis, similar to the one that performed so well in 1927. It included not only 

one-fifth of all Coast Guard vessels but also Navy 

vessels and amphibious aircraft and tonnage chartered by the Red Cross. Thanks to the levee system and the expeditious levee work by the Corps, 

this immense fleet saw little service in 1937.

• 61

Observations

Commanding troops and civilian forces during 

disaster emergencies clearly was perceived by 

Corps of Engineers and other officers as equivalent to combat service. Those who performed 

outstanding services soon received promotions 

to more responsible positions. Leslie Groves, 

of course, became leader of the Manhattan 

Project in 1942 and completed one of the largest 

and surely the most secretive design and construction missions in Corps history. His work 

helped bring the Second World War to an abrupt 

and successful conclusion. Like Groves, Eugene 

Reybold distinguished himself as a leader during 

a natural disaster. Before 1937 he was just one of 

the colonels commanding an engineer district, 

but his successful management of the flood crisis 

in the Memphis District brought him national 

attention, making logical his appointment as the 

Army’s chief of engineers in the Second World 

War, during which his organization managed 

the construction of military bases, airfields, and 

combat facilities throughout the world.

When the Army questioned, as it sometimes has, 

the assignment of military officers to the Corps’ 

civil works program, the Corps has responded 

that managing civil works design and construction, especially during emergencies, is the most 

valuable experience any officer can obtain for 

military mobilization. The events related in this 

chapter support the validity of this argument.

•
182 Situation Desperate

1. Congressional Record, 70th Cong., 2d sess., 1928, 

2799–80; Joseph Abair, The Flood of November 3 

and 4, 1927, Montpelier, Vermont (Montpelier: 

author, 1928), passim; Preston Brown to Adjutant 

General, “Report of use of Regular Army troops, 

First Corps Area, in Flood Relief Work,” 23 Dec. 

1927, NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2417.

2. Preston Brown to Adjutant General, 23 Dec. 1927, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2417.

3. Ibid.

4. Cecil R. Moore to Adjutant General, 11 Nov. 

1927, and W. J. Barden to Chief of Engineers, 13 

Nov. 1927, NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, 

Dec. 400.38, Box 2417; Cecil R. Moore, interview 

by John Greenwood, 12–14 Dec. 1978 [hereafter 

Moore interview], Research Collection, Office of 

History, USACE, Alexandria, Va.

5. McRae to Adjutant General, 9 Nov. 1927, and 

Preston Brown to Adjutant General, 6 Feb. 1928, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2417.

6. Preston Brown to Adjutant General, 23 Dec. 1927, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2417.

7. Preston Brown to Adjutant General, 1 and 4 Dec. 

1927 and 6 Feb. 1928, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 2417.

8. Ibid.; Moore interview.

9. Dan Sultan, “The Managua Earthquake,” Military 

Engineer 23 (July 1931): 354–61.

10. Ibid.; Dan Sultan to Chief of Engineers, 1 Apr. 

1931, NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2410.

11. Dan Sultan to Chief of Engineers, 1 Apr. 1931, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2410; F. B. Garrett, 2d Marine 

Brigade, to Marine Commandant, 16 Apr. 1931, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2410.

12. Sultan, “The Managua Earthquake,” 354–61.

13. B. B. Talley, “When the Earth Trembles,” Military 

Engineer 24 (Nov. 1932): 618–19; B. B. Talley to 

Chief of Engineers, 29 Mar. 1933, NARA, RG 

407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 2408.

14. Sultan, “The Managua Earthquake,” 354–61.

15. Talley, “When the Earth Trembles,” 618–19.

16. Sultan, “The Managua Earthquake,” 354–61.

17. Talley, “When the Earth Trembles,” 618–19; John 

Payne to Douglas MacArthur, 7 May 1931, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2410; Douglas MacArthur to Dan 

Sultan, 3 April 1931, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 2410. 

18. Sultan, “The Managua Earthquake,” 354–61.

19. Leroy Bartlett, Jr., “Demolition in Civil 

Conflagration,” Military Engineer 27 (May 1935): 

178.

20. “Record Floods from New England to the 

Potomac,” Engineering News-Record 116 (2 Apr. 

1936): 495–96; E. K. Morse and Harold A. 

Thomas, “Floods in the Upper Ohio River and 

Tributaries,” Transactions of the American Society of 

Civil Engineers 103 (1938): 624–30.

21. Congressional Record, 74th Cong., 2d sess., 1936, 

4511–12.

22. Ibid.

23. Third Corps Commander, “Flood Relief 

Narrative,” NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, 

Dec 400.38, Bulkies, Paper 2-17-36.

24. “The Army in Flood Times,” Quartermaster 

Review 15 (Mar. 1936): 33–35.

25. Ibid.; “Navigation Dams near Pittsburgh Damaged 

by Floods,” Engineering News-Record 116 (30 Apr. 

1936): 630–31; W. D. Styer to Chief of Engineers, 

21 Mar. 1936, NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil 

Works, 1923–1942, Box 1243, Folder 7402.

26. John A. Salmond, The Civilian Conservation Corps, 

1933–1942 (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 

1967), 127–28; New York Engineer District, News 

Release, 23 Mar. 1936, NARA WNRC, RG 77, 

Civil Works, 1923–1942, Box 1243, Folder 7402.

27. “Record Floods from New England to the 

Potomac,” Engineering News-Record 116 (2 Apr. 

1936): 442; “The Army in Flood Times,” 

Quartermaster Review 15 (Mar. 1936): 35.

28. “WPA Gets Flood Repair Funds,” Engineering 

News-Record 117 (26 Mar. 1936): 473; Henry H. 

Adams, Harry Hopkins (New York: G. P. Putnam’s 

Sons, 1977), 93–94; Samuel I. Rosenman, ed., The 

Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt 

5 (New York: Random House, 1938), 133–35, 

140–44.

29. Paul Kellogg, “Shock Troops and the Floods,” Survey

72 (Apr. 1936): 100–101; “Red Cross Disaster Relief 

Operations,” Survey 72 (Apr. 1936): 98; Congressional 

Record, 74th Cong., 2d sess., 1936, 4243–44.

30. Secretary of War to Royal Copeland, 7 Apr. 1936, 

NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 1923–1942, 

Box 1243, Folder 7402; House Committee on 

Flood Control, Comprehensive Flood Control Plan 

for Ohio and Lower Mississippi Rivers: Hearings on 

H.R. 7393 and H.R. 7646, 75th Cong., 1st sess., 

1937, 49 U.S. Statutes 1570, 16.

31. Log of Lockmaster Thomas J. Reid printed in 

S & D Reflector 6 (Mar. 1969): 2.

32. Paschal N. Strong, “The Great Flood of the Ohio,” 

Military Engineer 29 (May 1937): 157.

33. John Eschrick, “He Knows the Fury of War and 

Floods,” Louisville (Ky.) Courier-Journal, 7 Apr. 

1946 (interview with B. B. Talley).

Chapter 8 Notes
Emergency Service and Military Training ■ Notes 183

34. Stanley J. Horn, “The Flood of 1937 in the Ohio 

Valley,” Civil Engineering 7 (May 1937): 326–28; 

George P. Stimson, “River on a Rampage: An 

Account of the Ohio River Flood of 1937,” 

Cincinnati Historical Bulletin 22 (Apr. 1964): 91–109; 

Gustave A. Breaux, “1937 Flood at Louisville,” 

Filson Club History Quarterly 11 (Apr. 1937): 109–18.

35. Leland R. Johnson, Men, Mountains and Rivers: An 

Illustrated History of the Huntington District, U.S. 

Army Corps of Engineers (Washington, D.C.: 

Government Printing Office, 1977), 169–74.

36. Ibid.; Paschal N. Strong to Louisville District 

Engineer, “Report on Flood of January–February 

1937,” 11 Nov. 1937, NARA Central Plains 

Region (Kansas City, Mo.), RG 77, Louisville 

District Files, Box NA1115, File 1713.33.

37. Report of M. M. Kimmell in “Report of C.G., 

5th Corps Area on Flood Relief Activities, 1937,” 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Bulkies, Paper 6-14-37.

38. Leland R. Johnson, The Falls City Engineers: A 

History of the Louisville District, Corps of Engineers, 

United States Army (Louisville, Ky.: U.S. Army 

Engineer District, 1975), 203–08; “Report of Brig. 

Gen. Daniel Van Voorhis, Corps Area Commander 

in Western Kentucky,” NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Bulkies, Paper 6-14-37.

39. Johnson, Falls City Engineers, 203–08; R. G. 

Powell to Louisville District Engineer, 28 Jan. 

1937, NARA Central Plains Region (Kansas City, 

Mo.), RG 77, Louisville District Files, Box 

NA1114, File 1713.33.

40. Strong, “The Great Flood on the Ohio,” 157–58.

41. Johnson, Falls City Engineers, 203–08.

42. Ibid.; Bernard Smith to Chief of Engineers, 25 

Mar. 1937, NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 

1923–1942, Box 461, Folder 5803.

43. Strong, “The Great Flood on the Ohio,” 158–59.

44. “Superflood Devastates Lower Ohio and Now 

Threatens Mississippi Levee System,” Engineering 

News-Record 118 (4 Feb. 1937): 205.

45. For an example of early emergency planning, see 

Huntington Engineer District, “Ohio River Emergency Flood Plans,” 15 Dec. 1937, NARA Central 

Plains Region (Kansas City, Mo.), RG 77, Box 

NA2421.

46. Eugene Reybold to Chief of Engineers, 25 Jan. 

1937, NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 1923–

1942, Box 378, File 7402.

47. See correspondence in NARA WNRC, RG 77, 

Civil Works, 1923–1942, Box 378, File 7402 and 

Eugene Reybold to Lewis Pick, 22 Dec. 1949, in 

The Chief of Engineers’ Memorandum to the Secretary 

of the Army on the Hoover Commission Proposal to 

Transfer Civil Works from the Corps of Engineers 

(Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Corps of 

Engineers, 1950), Section 4:1–6.

48. See correspondence in NARA WNRC, RG 77, 

Civil Works, 1923–1942, Box 378, File 7402; 

American Red Cross, The Ohio–Mississippi Valley 

Flood Disaster of 1937 (Washington, D.C.: 

American Red Cross, 1937), 91–97.

49. American Red Cross, Flood Disaster of 1937, 103–

05; “How Birds Point Fuseplug Levee Was 

Breached with Dynamite,” Engineering NewsRecord 118 (4 Feb. 1937): 155.

50. Harry Woodring to Lloyd Stark, 24 Jan. 1937, 

NARA, RG407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, 

Box 2407.

51. Lloyd Stark to Harry Woodring, 24 Jan. 1937, 

NARA, RG407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, 

Box 240.; George R. Clemens, “The Mississippi 

Meets the 1937 Flood,” Civil Engineering 7 (May 

1937): 379–83; E. M. Markham testimony in 

House Committee on Flood Control, 

Comprehensive Flood Control Plan for Ohio and 

Lower Mississippi Rivers: Hearings on H. R. 7393 

and H. R. 7646, 75th Cong., 1st sess., 1937, 49 

U.S. Statutes 1570, 57–58.

52. American Red Cross, Flood Disaster of 1937, 

103–05.

53. “Conditions in Flood-Beleaguered Cairo,” 

Engineering News-Record 118 (4 Feb. 1937): 

153–55.

54. Eugene Reybold to Chief of Engineers, 30 Jan. and 

1 Feb. 1937, NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 

1923–1942, Box 378, File 7402.

55. Ibid.

56. Eugene Reybold to Lewis Pick, 22 Dec. 1949, in 

The Chief of Engineers’ Memorandum to the Secretary 

of the Army, 1–6.

57. ARCE (1937), 1:1678–79, 1739–44; Albert E. 

Cowdrey, The Delta Engineers: A History of the 

United States Army Corps of Engineers in the New 

Orleans District (New Orleans: U.S. Army 

Engineer District, 1971), 39–40.

58. American Red Cross, Flood Disaster of 1937, 

182–85.

59. Ibid., 54–55, 85–87; Congressional Record, 75th 

Cong., 1st sess., 1937, 1401–03.

60. Adams, Harry Hopkins, 113–14.

61. “High Water, High Marks,” Survey 73 (Mar. 

1937): 73–74; Foster Rhea Dulles, The American 

Red Cross: A History (New York: Harper & Bros., 

1950), 311–14; American Red Cross, Flood Disaster 

of 1937, 85–87; Committee on Flood Control, 

Comprehensive Flood Control Plan for Ohio and 

Lower Mississippi Rivers: Hearings on H. R. 7393 

and H. R. 7646, 75th Cong., 1st sess., 1937, 49 U.S. 

Statutes 1570, 6.
Above: A levee at Sand Mills, Arkansas, 

was reinforced by members of the 

354th Engineer Regiment, May 1943.

Library of Congress, 

LC-USW33-029183-C

Left: The 1938 hurricane disrupted 

rail traffic through Peterborough, 

New Hampshire.

National Archives, 69-MPH-6-42

Right: The 1938 hurricane damaged 

buildings in Keene, New Hampshire.

National Archives, 69-MPH-6-29

Below: National Guardsmen were on 

duty in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, 

after the 1938 hurricane.

National Archives, 69-MPH-5-23
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ Los Angeles Flood 185

Emergency Planning 

and Mobilization

The Corps’ role in responding to 

national emergencies passed through 

a transition as the nation mobilized 

for the Second World War. In the wake of the 

massive flooding of 1937, the chief of engineers 

mandated emergency planning for various 

disaster contingencies, and in 1939 the Army 

revised its disaster assistance procedures. These 

plans and regulations envisioned continued 

reliance on the Depression-era work relief 

agencies for the labor required for flood fights 

and disaster recovery. Yet, the rules changed 

swiftly as military mobilization began and the 

work relief agencies closed, the workers moving 

into the military services or into war-production 

industries.

With the advent of war and massive military 

recruiting, the Corps lost its labor pool for 

emergency response. During floods in 1943 

it obtained the work force needed to shore up 

the levees from engineer troops at stateside 

camps, where they were training for combat; the 

flood fights offered chances for these troops to 

practice their construction and bridge-building 

skills. By 1945 most of the troops had moved 

to overseas combat theaters and severe labor 

shortages confronted the Corps during natural 

disasters. In this exigency, the Corps obtained 

prison workers, both convicts from state prisons 

and prisoners-of-war from internment camps 

near the disaster areas. In the opinion of Corps 

officers, these prisoners performed satisfactorily 

at the levees.

•

Los Angeles Flood, 1938

“The sensational nature of our press, and the 

universal desire to raid the Federal Treasury, 

may produce false alarms of floods from time 

to time and misrepresent the needs for Federal 

aid,” commented Col. William Caples in his 

report on advance planning for flood emergencies in the Ninth Corps Area. The 1937 floods 

had stimulated interest in emergency planning 

throughout the nation, and the Ninth Corps 

commander at San Francisco had directed 

Caples to investigate the potential for flood 

disaster on the West Coast.1

Caples, a proponent of “work relief” before the 

First World War and the superb manager of the 

Corps’ first “modern” disaster recovery effort 

at Pueblo in 1921, wielded a wicked pen. A 

superior once commented that in Caples’ hands 

a telegram seemed a deadly weapon. Caples 

was cynical about federal disaster assistance 

generally, and his investigation of West Coast 

flooding history revealed that chances for such 

disasters were extremely remote, indeed “all but 

negligible.”2

When Caples made his report in 1937, the West 

Coast had not experienced catastrophic flooding 

9

“The sensational nature of our press, and 

the universal desire to raid the Federal 

Treasury, may produce false alarms of 

floods from time to time...” 
186 Situation Desperate

since the nineteenth century. Unfortunately, 

the year following Caples’ forecast proved him 

wrong. Intense rains in December 1937 sent 

raging flows down the Sacramento and San 

Joaquin rivers in California’s Central Valley, 

destroying property worth $15 million. Three 

months later a March storm dropped up to 

thirty inches of rain along the coastal slopes of 

the San Gabriel and San Bernardino mountains 

in southern California, sending seething floods 

through Los Angeles that caused eighty-seven 

fatalities and damaged more than $78 million 

worth of property. Although Caples had thought 

the chances of flood disaster were negligible, 

they were quite real.3

Los Angeles County experienced a two-day 

nightmare during the 1938 flood, with telephone, transportation, and postal services 

completely disrupted. Maj. Theodore Wyman, 

District Engineer at Los Angeles, turned out 

all available forces at the peak of the flood on 

2 March, established a disaster field office in 

Norwalk, and sent thirty-seven Corps trucks 

with personnel to the Norwalk and Artesia area 

The May 1938 flood of the Los Angeles River destroyed this railroad bridge in 

downtown Los Angeles. Office of History
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ Los Angeles Flood 187

on the San Gabriel River for rescue operations. 

The Corps saved two hundred people from 

flooded homes and delivered them to local refugee centers.4

The 1938 flood disaster dramatized the need 

for advance flood emergency planning on the 

West Coast, and the Los Angeles Corps office 

devised a comprehensive plan for efficiently allocating manpower, materials, and equipment that 

greatly improved its response during subsequent 

disasters. In 1938 Chief of Engineers Maj. Gen. 

Julian Schley ordered all Corps district offices 

to develop flood emergency plans, and similar 

planning efforts went on at the Army’s corps 

area commands and at Army headquarters.5

Special Regulation No. 67, drawn up in 1917 

as guidance for the Army during disaster relief 

missions, had been renumbered in 1924 as Army 

Regulation 500-60. By 1938, however, AR 500-

60 had become obsolete. The Army General 

Staff undertook a complete revision aimed at 

making the American Red Cross the primary 

coordinating agency for disaster assistance and 

incorporating into the regulations formal rules 

on the roles of the Civilian Conservation Corps 

and on cooperation with work relief agencies 

such as the Works Progress Administration. 

The effort went on for better than a year before 

A temporary dumped-rock levee failed, causing flooding and erosion in 

downtown Los Angles during the 1938 flood. National Archives, 77-CF-1
188 Situation Desperate

the revised AR 500-60 was published. With the 

end of the CCC and the WPA’s absorption by 

the Federal Works Agency in the early 1940s as 

the nation mobilized for war, AR 500-60 once 

again became obsolete.6

The extensive and lengthy revision of Army 

regulations, however, had little impact upon the 

customary role of the Corps of Engineers during 

disasters. The principal provision relating to the 

Corps in the revised AR 500-60 read:

Officers of the Corps of Engineers having water transportation at their disposal 

should be prepared to use this transportation in rescue and evacuation of inhabitants 

of flooded and threatened areas under the 

coordination of the Red Cross or an agency 

acting for the Red Cross when in their 

discretion the transportation may be spared 

from vital flood prevention activities. 

Corps Area Commanders and the officers 

of the Corps of Engineers on River and 

Harbor duty on rivers subject to destructive 

floods will also be prepared for the possibility that the Army may be called upon 

to assume full charge, nationally or locally, 

of all rescue and evacuation activities either 

by direction of the President, or by local 

arrangement.7

This provision merely reinforced what was 

already being done. Since 1882 the Corps had 

used its boats for rescue during flooding, generally in cooperation with the Red Cross, and 

engineer officers routinely worked with the 

Army’s corps area commanders during major 

disasters.

•

New England Hurricane , 1938

After the 1936 Connecticut River flood, the 

Corps of Engineers office at Providence, Rhode 

Island, initiated advance planning to improve 

its emergency response. It put its plan into 

effect when a hurricane blew toward the New 

England coast in September 1938—it alerted 

its field offices at Hartford in Connecticut and 

Springfield and Holyoke in Massachusetts; 

sent hydrologic survey teams to the field; and 

dispatched a team to the local Weather Bureau 

office to coordinate the hydrologic data sent by 

the field teams. Col. John Bragdon, Providence 

District Engineer, and Col. A. K. B. Lyman, 

Boston District Engineer, made contact with 

the Army’s First Corps Area commander to 

keep him advised of hurricane and resultant 

flooding conditions.8

After crossing Long Island, the hurricane 

slammed into the Connecticut and Rhode 

Island shore, then plunged north through the 

Connecticut River valley into Canada. High 

winds and tides devastated the coastal areas. 

Heavy rainfall exceeded thirteen inches in 

some areas and led to flooding throughout New 

England. The storm drowned 494 people, injured 

708, and destroyed nine thousand homes.9

The secretary of war ordered Brig. Gen. Max 

Tyler, Assistant Chief of Engineers, into the 

disaster area with full authority to call upon 

Army resources as needed. Bragdon and Tyler, 

accompanied by the Corps’ North Atlantic 

Division Engineer, E. L. Daley, inspected 

the flood fights in progress at Northampton, 

Springfield, and Hartford.10

The most critical situation was at Hartford 

near the Colt firearms plant. Corps personnel 
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ New England Hurricane 189

led the “Battle of Colt’s Pike” with a thousand 

WPA, CCC, and volunteer laborers. They 

worked around the clock yet remained only a 

single layer of sandbags ahead of the flood. On 

24 September the Connecticut River crested at 

36.4 feet, nearly four feet up the sandbag capping placed atop the dike. The capping held, 

preventing some $4 million worth of damages to 

the city’s power and sewage plants, airport, and 

the firearms factory.11

Flood fights at Northampton and Springfield 

also proved successful, although only quick 

work by the Corps saved West Springfield. 

The Corps’ Providence office had completed 

a dike and floodwall at West Springfield in 

1936 and transferred it to local government for 

operation. The 1938 hurricane flooding tore 

open a thirty-foot-wide crevasse in the dike. 

West Springfield authorities evacuated the 

area but made no effort to plug the crevasse. 

A stone bridge in Hillsboro, New Hampshire, was swept away by flooding and wind from the September 1938 New England hurricane.

National Archives, 69-MPH-6-20
190 Situation Desperate

The local Corps office, however, mobilized all 

available personnel and plugged the crevasse in 

four hours, preventing damages that would have 

totaled four times the cost of the flood protection project.12

The 1938 hurricane flooded the Lackawaxen 

and Rancocas rivers in Pennsylvania and New 

Jersey. When the north branch of the Rancocas 

threatened to inundate Pemberton’s water supply plant, Maj. C. W. Burlin of the Corps’ 

Philadelphia office appealed to the Army’s corps 

area commander for support. The commander 

ordered a detachment of the 1st Engineer 

Battalion from Camp Dix to Pemberton, where 

the men emplaced a sandbag dike that protected 

the town’s water supply pumps.13

Once the 1938 hurricane’s flooding subsided, 

the CCC, WPA, and Red Cross handled 

most relief and recovery efforts with some 

assistance from the Corps of Engineers. At 

Montpelier, Vermont, for instance, at the city 

council’s request, the Army’s First Corps Area 

commander sent New York Engineer District 

personnel and CCC workers, who were then 

building Waterbury Dam in the Winooski 

River valley, to clear away the flood debris. 

The hurricane that struck New England in September 1938 left part of the Pleasant View Hotel on Misquamicut Beach, Rhode Island, standing 

precariously in the rubble. National Archives, 69-MPH-7-2A
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ Engineer Readiness 191

With the eighty-eight trucks and tractors available at the Waterbury Dam, the Corps and 

CCC laborers had the cleanup at Montpelier 

done in a week.14

•

Engineer Readiness

The 1938 New England hurricane set unforgettable storm standards. Any hurricane approaching New England thereafter aroused public fears 

that it might match the 1938 disaster. None of 

the subsequent storms occurring between 1938 

and 1942 attracted national media attention, 

nor were they usually ranked as major disasters, 

yet some would have qualified under the federal 

disaster assistance policies prevailing after 1950. 

In these cases, the benefits derived from the 

emergency operations advance planning mandated by the chief of engineers in 1938 became 

apparent.

Tornado disasters rarely mobilized the Corps 

of Engineers prior to 1950 because these wind 

storms rarely caused the widespread flooding 

that automatically involved the Corps. Tornado 

victims typically needed temporary shelter 

Trees on Manchester Street in Manchester, New Hampshire, were uprooted and toppled by the 1938 hurricane, damaging a number of buildings 

along the street. National Archives, 69-MPH-6
192 Situation Desperate

and help with removing the debris caused by 

the winds. The Quartermaster Corps and 

National Guard normally supplied the needs 

of tornado-stricken towns, and it therefore was 

merely chance that mobilized the Corps office 

at Charleston, South Carolina, in response to a 

1938 tornado.

Three tornadoes raked through Charleston 

on the morning of 29 September 1938. One 

destroyed a three-story building across the street 

from the Charleston Engineer District office 

in the Federal Customs House. Learning that 

people had been buried by the falling building, 

Maj. Reading Wilkinson called out his office 

staff to dig through the debris to rescue the living and recover the bodies.

That afternoon Wilkinson and his staff conducted damage surveys in Charleston and 

mapped the damaged area to outline the paths 

of the three tornadoes. He presented the results 

to the Army’s Fourth Corps Area commander 

and to local officials. The commander ordered 

troops from Fort Moultrie to conduct street 

security patrols to deter looting and directed 

Wilkinson to use the Corps’ boats for patrol 

of the Charleston waterfront. Wilkinson also 

offered Corps personnel and equipment to assist 

the Red Cross recovery efforts, but this aid 

proved unnecessary.15

A similar emergency response in March 1939 

saved Glasgow, Montana, from flooding. After 

rapid snowmelt and ice raised the Milk River 

two feet higher than ever before, threatening 

Glasgow with flooding, Maj. Clark Kittrell, 

commanding the Corps office at Fort Peck, sent 

crews to blast the ice jammed against bridges 

while he went to Glasgow. There he found leaks 

in the levee and called his crews and equipment 

from Fort Peck. The crews directed WPA and 

volunteer labor; together they built sandbag 

rings around the leaks and revetted the levee 

with sandbags to prevent further erosion, thus 

protecting Glasgow from disaster.16

In August 1940 the New Orleans Engineer 

District responded effectively when a hurricane 

dropped up to thirty-three inches of rain in the 

vicinity of Vermilion Bayou and Lake Arthur. 

The New Orleans commander, Capt. Robert G. 

Lovett, offered Corps support to the American 

Red Cross for rescue operations, and at their 

request dispatched twelve Corps launches to the 

disaster area. In four days these boats rescued 

1,397 people and delivered ten thousand pounds 

of Red Cross food and medical supplies to communities isolated by the flood.17

In the same month, flooding occurred along 

North Carolina’s Roanoke River. Col. G. W. 

Gillette at Wilmington sent assistants by one 

road to reconnoiter the flood while he took 

another route to Weldon near Roanoke Rapids. 

Gillette found the Weldon authorities caring for 

150 refugees, but their city’s water supply plant 

had been flooded and they feared an outbreak of 

typhoid. He agreed to find a water purification 

unit for their use, but he learned that all purification units in the Fourth Corps Area were with 

the Third Army on training maneuvers. Gillette 

placed a call at 9:30 on Sunday evening to Maj. 

Gen. Julian Schley, Chief of Engineers, and 

found him at home.

Schley called the commanding officer at Fort 

Belvoir, and by 11:30 that evening a water 

purification unit was on the way to Weldon in 

charge of Sgt. Alexander Angus. Angus set up 

the unit, capable of delivering 110,000 gallons 

daily, the following morning. Weldon officials 
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ Engineer Readiness 193

also requested the loan of dump trucks to help 

restore the city’s water plant to operation, and 

Gillette placed calls in attempts to fulfill their 

request. Fort Bragg could not furnish the trucks, 

but Fort Belvoir sent six trucks in charge of Lt. 

Charles Bonesteel of the 5th Engineers. Once 

they reached Weldon, they removed flood 

debris from the water supply plant and hauled in 

replacement pumps.18

After locating and securing the equipment, 

Gillette motored down alongside the Roanoke 

River, offering assistance to each community 

and learning that none was needed. When the 

emergency passed, Gillette reported his actions 

to the Fourth Corps Area commander and the 

adjutant general. Reviewing the report, the 

adjutant general asked the chief of engineers 

to explain by what authority the actions had 

been taken and why the Fourth Corps Area 

commanding general had not been advised 

in advance in order that he might reject or 

approve the actions. Schley pointed out that 

Gillette had informed Fort Bragg’s commander and had received no help. Because a 

typhoid epidemic threatened North Carolina 

and the water purification units were with 

the Third Army on maneuvers, the chief of 

engineers had assumed the necessary authority 

and responded to the emergency. Schley sent 

instructions afterwards, however, to all Corps 

Rescuers sorted through the rubble of Charleston’s City Market, destroyed by a tornado on 29 September 1938. The building 

across the street from the Corps of Engineers’ Charleston District office was also destroyed in the storm.

Courtesy of The Charleston Museum, Charleston, South Carolina
194 Situation Desperate

field commanders, reminding them that regulations required prompt reports to Army corps 

area commanders.19

Two weeks after the Roanoke River flood, a 

cloudburst dropped up to fifteen inches of rain 

in eight hours over an area between Smyrna, 

Delaware and Fort Dix, New Jersey. The 

resulting flood destroyed sixty small private 

dams in the area and drowned four people. 

This flood also occurred on a Sunday, 

1 September 1940, but Maj. H. B. Vaughan, 

commanding the Corps’s Philadelphia office, 

located personnel and rushed them to the disaster area for reconnaissance. Local authorities 

needed little assistance, however, and Vaughan 

merely supplied sandbags to the town of 

Wenonah, New Jersey, and arranged delivery of 

a water purification unit from the 1st Engineer 

Battalion at Fort Dupont to Bridgeton, New 

Jersey, which had lost its pumping plant to the 

flood.20

The Corps’ Galveston office saved many lives 

during the 1899 Brazos River flood, and it 

returned to the Brazos in 1940 for a similar 

rescue mission. After five days of heavy rain 

in November 1940, floods descending the 

Brazos, San Jacinto, and Colorado rivers moved 

so rapidly that they stopped navigation on the 

Houston Ship Channel and Louisiana–Texas 

Intracoastal Waterway. Currents were so swift 

that they overturned the Corps dredge Dorothy

and sank it at Matagorda. Corps personnel went 

In 1939 the Corps of Engineers reinforced the levees protecting Glasgow, Montana, from flooding caused by ice dams and snowmelt. The city was 

nearly surrounded by water but remained dry. Montana Historical Society Research Center, Photographic Archives, Helena, Montana
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ Reorganization and Manpower 195

out onto the flooded Brazos in small skiffs and 

rescued stranded victims to transport to Red 

Cross camps.21

Although these emergencies, from the 1938 

Charleston tornado to the 1940 Brazos River 

flood, have generally been forgotten, they 

provided the first tests of Corps emergency 

operations under the advance planning procedures mandated by the chief of engineers, and 

the improved emergency response was notable. 

Except where the threat of damages to navigable channels or flood protection structures 

had been clear, the Corps’ response to disasters 

prior to 1938 had often seemed passive; that is, 

the Corps waited until local governments or the 

Red Cross requested assistance or until superior 

authorities directed that it take action. After 

1938 all Corps district offices had contingency 

plans and emergency management organizations; and they acted aggressively during disasters, going immediately into stricken areas for 

damage surveys and offering assistance directly 

to local governments and relief agencies. Before 

1938 the costs of emergency operations were 

reimbursed either by special or deficiency 

appropriations by Congress, by Army contingency funding, or by funding for civil works 

operations and maintenance. In Section 5 of 

the Flood Control Act of 18 August 1941, 

however, Congress provided continuing funding for Corps emergency services by authorizing the secretary of war to allot $1 million 

each fiscal year to finance any necessary rescue 

work and the repair and maintenance of flood 

protection structures threatened or destroyed 

by floods.22

•

Reorganization and

Manpower

The national defense mobilization that began in 

1940 forced changes in planning for response to 

disasters because the Corps and Red Cross could 

no longer count on assistance from the CCC 

and WPA; these Depression-era work relief 

agencies were phased out at the advent of war 

and their disaster assistance roles filled by the 

armed services. Liaison between the Corps civil 

works organization and the Army’s corps area 

commands (succeeded by Army Service Forces 

commands) became closer because the Corps 

relied on troop support during flood emergencies. When available troop numbers were 

reduced by increasing overseas combat requirements during the later years of World War II, 

the Corps obtained the necessary manpower for 

emergency operations from prisoners-of-war.

Realizing that WPA and CCC labor and 

equipment would no longer be available, the 

chief of engineers began a study of the emergency manpower problem in 1942. An Army 

reorganization that year had placed all support 

and logistics functions in the United States—

including the Corps of Engineers—under 

Services of Supply, later renamed Army Service 

Forces. In January 1943 the chief of engineers 

recommended to the Services of Supply commander that engineer troops training for combat 

be made available during flood emergencies. 

Pointing out that flood fights could provide 

superb training for engineer troops, the chief 

asked that he be permitted to order engineer 

troops under field command into flood fights in 

support of his civil works districts, and that the 

commander of the Engineer Training Center at 

Camp Claiborne, Louisiana, report directly to 
196 Situation Desperate

the Mississippi River Commission during flood 

emergencies. The secretary of war approved 

these procedures.23

•

The 1943 Floods

Conditions in 1943 brought a real test of the 

new procedures when floods of varying severity covered more than nine million acres in the 

Mississippi River basin, killing sixty-two people 

and causing damages exceeding $96 million.24

The 1943 flooding, as often in the past, started 

in the Mississippi basin’s northern sector. “I 

started the troops on Monday night, May 17, 

1943,” reported Col. C. Lacey Hall, commanding the Corps division at Cincinnati. “The rains 

started on Saturday night, May 15, 1943, and 

by Monday it became evident we were going 

to have a superflood, or it looked like it; and 

the commanding general of the Fifth Service 

Command very kindly met all my requests for 

troops. In the meantime I had sent Engineer 

Department employees capable of handling the 

jobs to each of the danger centers. The troops 

arrived and helped out very greatly.”25

To ensure full coordination of his military construction and supply missions, Hall had moved 

his Cincinnati office to Columbus, Ohio, in 

1942 near the headquarters of the Fifth Service 

Command. When floods began in 1943, he 

naturally turned to the Fifth Service Command 

for troop assistance.26

Army troops placed sandbags along the Illinois River near Beardstown, Illinois, during the 1943 flooding.

National Archives, 77-RH-34C-1
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ The 1943 Floods 197

The 1943 flood in the Ohio River basin concentrated along the Wabash River and lower 

Ohio River, and the Corps office at Louisville, 

Kentucky, implemented its emergency flood 

plan on 11 May, opening field offices at 

Logansport, Terre Haute, Vincennes, and 

Evansville, Indiana, to direct flood fights along 

the Wabash and Ohio.

Corps personnel, for example, supervised four 

hundred volunteers and seven hundred engineer 

troops detailed from Fort Benjamin Harrison, 

Indiana, as they raised the levee protecting 

Vincennes. They closed road and railroad 

openings with sandbags and built a mudbox 

bulkhead atop the floodwall to protect against 

the flood. Terre Haute’s levee proved weak, so 

the Corps and troops evacuated the city and 

then controlled the seepage, boils, and sloughs 

to save the levee and prevent inundation of western Terre Haute. The flood overtopped a levee 

at Peru, Indiana, before the Corps and troops 

arrived, but they sandbagged another section to 

prevent inundation of part of the town.27 Hall 

later submitted a vivid report on the Corps’s 

Wabash River flood fight:

Our principal rescue job was done at West 

Terre Haute, Ind. We had considerable 

difficulty there because a lot of people 

did not want to move from their homes, 

and the greatest tact had to be displayed 

by the troops to persuade them they had 

better get out before they were drowned. 

In other places, the rescue was not so difficult because there seemed to be plenty of 

notice, but the assistance in trying to hold 

the levees involved a tremendous amount of 

work.28

To prevent the inundation of vital military 

production plants near the Ohio River at 

Louisville, 415 troops of the 382d Engineer 

Combat Battalion from Fort Knox placed eleven 

thousand sandbags on fifteen hundred yards of 

levee in a single day. This protection kept the 

plants in production, thereby contributing to the 

national defense effort.29

Seeing that severe flooding would occur 

along the Illinois and upper Mississippi rivers, Col. Malcolm Elliott, commanding the 

Corps’ Upper Mississippi Valley Division, 

called Maj. Gen. Henry S. Aurand of the 

Sixth Service Command at Chicago to request 

troop assistance with the flood fights. Aurand 

mobilized troops from Fort Sheridan, Jefferson 

Barracks, Camps Ellis and Grant, the Scott, 

Chanute, and George Army airfields, and the 

Engineer Depot at Granite City, Illinois.30

“...the greatest tact had to be displayed by 

the troops to persuade them they had better 

get out before they were drowned.”

Soldiers from the 75th Engineer Light Ponton Company in a Ford GPA amphibious 

jeep rescued a man and woman stranded on a roof near Biscoe, Arkansas, in 

May 1943. Office of History
198 Situation Desperate

Col. James Brownell at Granite City first sandbagged the levees around his depot to protect 

it, then dispatched assistance to other flooded 

areas. The depot stored large quantities of sandbags stockpiled for use in combat as temporary 

fortifications and also housed many assault 

boats designed for river crossings.31 Trucks 

full of sandbags rushed north from the depot 

to Beardstown, Illinois, where an epic flood 

fight was underway against the Illinois River. 

Beardstown was saved by thirty-two officers and 

eight hundred enlisted men of the 732d Military 

Police Battalion, commanded by Col. Amory 

Miller. The men worked around the clock to 

cap the levee with sandbags. To keep his troops 

alert at night, Miller had his band loudly play 

martial music. The flood fight at Beardstown 

thus became the only one of record that was set 

to music in the grand Hollywood tradition.32

Laboring under supervision of forty student 

engineer officers sent from the Officers 

Candidate School at Fort Belvoir, Virginia, the 

military police, troops from Fort Sheridan, and 

other units filled and placed a million sandbags 

along sixty-four miles of the lower Illinois 

River, preventing the inundation of seventysix thousand acres. By the struggle’s end, the 

Sixth Service Command had committed 21,390 

troops to the action and had supplied 331 

trucks, 257 assault boats, 60 amphibious jeeps, 

and other equipment. It also cooperated with 

the Red Cross, establishing three refugee camps 

and furnishing tents, blankets, and cots.33

Regular troops also served during the 1943 floods 

on the Missouri and Kansas rivers. The Corps 

fleet, as usual, performed rescue work, evacuating 

210 families and two thousand head of livestock 

as well as vehicles, tractors, and household effects. 

The Corps offices in the area received assistance 

with levee patrol and sandbagging from twentyfive hundred troops detailed from Fort Leonard 

Wood and Jefferson Barracks.34

More regular troops mobilized for flood fights 

along the White, Arkansas, and St. Francis 

rivers under the command of Col. Jarvis Bain. 

A veteran of the Spanish–American and First 

World wars, Bain had served in the 1906 San 

Francisco earthquake recovery mission and 

other natural disasters.35 Recalled to active duty 

during World War II, Bain commanded the 

Memphis Engineer District, and he requested 

the assistance of forty-five hundred engineer 

troops, who reported to him on 14 May 1943. 

Under the arrangement devised by the chief of 

engineers, Bain commanded the troops during the flood fight while the unit commanders retained control of the normal supply and 

discipline functions. His command included 

the 359th, 95th, and 398th Engineer General 

Service Regiments from Camp Claiborne, 

Louisiana, the 527th Light Ponton Company 

During the May 1943 floods of the Missouri and Mississippi river systems, 

soldiers were mobilized to shore up the levee on the White River at Peach 

Orchard Bluff, Arkansas. Water purification equipment operated by the 364th 

Engineer General Service Regiment provided drinking water to the troops.

Office of History
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ The 1943 Floods 199

from Camp Swift, Texas, the 511th Light 

Ponton Company from Camp Bowie, Texas, 

the 78th Light Ponton Company from Camp 

Beauregard, Louisiana, and the 853d Engineer 

Aviation Battalion from Dyersburg Army Air 

Base near Halls, Tennessee.

Bain ordered these troops to critical areas 

along the Arkansas, White, St. Francis, and 

Mississippi rivers where they sandbagged and 

held all levees except at Booth’s Point on the 

Mississippi. There, the 853d Engineer Aviation 

Battalion raised a road embankment used as a 

secondary levee by two feet before it crevassed. 

Because engineer troops had evacuated the area 

behind the levee, no lives were lost.36

The Arkansas River crested four feet above 

previous records between Fort Smith and Pine 

Bluff, where the Corps’ Little Rock office managed a flood fight by nineteen thousand troops 

from Camps Chaffee and Robinson in Arkansas 

and Camp Livingston in Louisiana, plus the 

National Guard and German and Italian 

prisoners-of-war. The troop organization typically consisted of an engineer company matched 

with two infantry companies under supervision 

of Corps personnel. The Corps officers later 

commented that the prisoners generally worked 

hard to combat the flood, although guards had 

to thwart two escape attempts.37

On 15 May the flood broke a water main across 

the Arkansas River that supplied water to Camp 

Chaffee, so three engineer battalions from 

Oklahoma and Texas delivered water purification units that provided 745,000 gallons of 

water daily for the camp. The troops then built 

a ponton bridge across the Arkansas, capped 

the water main, and installed other water lines 

across the river to restore normal water supply, 

all done within twenty-four hours.38

The Corps office at Vicksburg committed 162 civilian personnel to flood fights in 

the lower Arkansas River valley below Pine 

Bluff. Obtaining assistance from the National 

Guard and the 372d Engineer General Service 

Regiment from Camp Claiborne, their efforts 

proved successful.39

In company with Lt. Gen. Eugene Reybold, 

Senate Majority Leader Scott Lucas inspected 

the Arkansas disaster area, and upon returning 

Soldiers of the 359th Engineer General Service Regiment repaired a slough in the 

Jackson Bayou levee along the White River during the 1943 flood. Troops on the 

far bank filled sandbags, which were handed over the water for placement on 

the near side. U.S. Army photograph, SC183397
200 Situation Desperate

to Washington, Lucas described the emergency 

to the Senate. He introduced a resolution to 

fund repairs to flood protection structures and 

to allow the Corps to improve them by raising 

the levees to adequate grades and sections rather 

than simply restoring the inadequate levees. As 

enacted, the resolution provided $10 million for 

emergency levee restoration.

The Red Cross, in the meantime, took care of 

immediate relief needs resulting from the 1943 

floods, while the Farm Credit Administration 

financed replanting of crops and the Disaster 

Loan Corporation made available low interest 

loans for rebuilding homes and businesses. Help 

with restoring community water, sewer, and 

utility services came from the Federal Works 

Agency, then managed by Brig. Gen. Philip 

Fleming of the Corps of Engineers, although 

this agency had no other connection with the 

Corps.40

•

The 1945 Floods

Except in the St. Louis Engineer District, 

1944 passed without a major flood emergency. 

During an April flood, the St. Louis office 

had the assistance of 5,053 Illinois State Guard 

troops (which replaced the National Guard 

then on active duty in federal service), 7,800 

Regular Army troops, and 834 prisoners-of-war 

to strengthen levees along the Mississippi from 

St. Louis to Cairo. The flood breached several 

levees, but losses were not catastrophic.41

Corps offices reviewed their emergency plans in 

advance of the 1945 flood season and scheduled 

major planning conferences in January and 

February. The chief of engineers’ staff met with 

the Mississippi River Commission, the Upper 

Mississippi Valley and Ohio River divisions, 

the Louisville and Memphis districts, and the 

Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) to plan 

emergency responses.

TVA had received major defense funding 

to complete its multipurpose dams on the 

Tennessee River, dams to supply power to the 

Oak Ridge nuclear complex and aircraft aluminum production facilities. The Flood Control 

Act of 1944 had directed TVA to coordinate the 

operation of its dams and reservoirs to reduce 

flooding along the Ohio and lower Mississippi 

rivers. At the 1945 conferences with the Corps 

of Engineers, TVA agreed to regulate releases 

from its dams to help reduce flooding when the 

Corps’ Ohio River Division deemed it necessary. It was agreed that flood danger existed on 

the lower Ohio and Mississippi rivers whenever a forty-four-foot river stage at Cairo was 

predicted.

The Memphis District staff met with the 

American Red Cross managers in February 

1945 to formulate evacuation plans for the Birds 

Point–New Madrid Floodway. The plans called 

for the Memphis office to alert residents in the 

floodway at least five days in advance of evacuation; for the Army’s Seventh Service Command 

to send the troops and equipment needed to 

carry out the evacuation; and for the Red Cross 

to house, subsist, and care for the evacuees.

When the Cairo gauge climbed to forty feet in 

February 1945, the planned emergency operations began. To preserve central control for procurement of equipment, supplies, and troops, the 

Corps district offices cleared all their requests 

through the Mississippi River Commission. 

Stationing technical personnel and Army Signal 
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ The 1945 Floods 201

Corps officers with radios in each engineer 

district in the Mississippi River valley assured 

uninterrupted and secure communications during the flood fight. Because engineer troops of 

Army Service Forces and Ground Forces had 

left for the combat theaters by 1945, the commander of Army Service Forces agreed to supply 

prisoners-of-war and mobilize the state home 

guard units for action during the coming floods.

At Vicksburg, Mississippi, on 20 March the 

Corps met with officers of the Fourth, Seventh, 

and Eighth service commands to discuss the 

use of prisoner-of-war labor. Some of the 

agreed-upon rules provided that service commands would establish tent camps for lodging 

250 prisoners; Corps districts would furnish 

the transportation for prisoners to and from 

work sites; prisoners would work no more than 

twelve hours per day, although night shifts were 

permitted if lighting and extra guards were 

available; fraternization with prisoners would 

be strictly prohibited; and only members of the 

Signal Corps would be permitted to photograph 

prisoners. In addition, the prisoners would be 

compensated for their labor.42

Col. C. Lacey Hall began the 1945 flood fight 

on the Ohio River at Portsmouth, Ohio, on 6 

March. The Cincinnati Corps office supervised 

troops of the Ohio State Guard, who built 2,900 

feet of temporary earth dike and l,450 feet of 

sandbag dike to protect Portsmouth from a river 

stage four feet higher than the city’s existing 

levees. Working hastily, with sandbag bundles 

dropped at the last minute from Army aircraft, 

the Corps and the Ohio Guard beat the flood, 

which crested three feet up the side of the temporary capping on the levee.

Axis prisoners of war were put to work on various tasks, and paid, during the 

Mississippi River basin floods of December 1944, including construction of 

drainage channels. Office of History
202 Situation Desperate

At the time, Mill Creek Barrier Dam at 

Cincinnati was only partly completed and 

protected the city’s industrial section only to a 

sixty-five-foot river stage. The Corps’ construction workers and the Ohio State Guard used 

sandbags to raise the protection to a seventy-foot 

river stage, but their effort failed because the 

foundation beneath the sandbag dike washed out. 

Jeffersonville and Clarksville, Indiana, at the Falls 

of the Ohio had a local flood protection project 

underway in 1945, but the military mobilization 

had suspended its construction. To protect the 

towns, the Corps office at Louisville, Kentucky, 

called in 120 prisoners-of-war and two military 

companies from Camp Atterbury, Indiana, to 

raise the uncompleted levee sections with sandbags. The Corps installed portable pumps, closed 

traffic openings and sewer lines through the 

levees, and topped the levees with mudbox reinforcements, thus saving the towns from flooding. 

Across the Ohio, the Corps and prisoners-ofwar attempted to sandbag the Point section of 

Louisville, Kentucky, to protect riverside industry 

and housing. This heroic effort failed, however, 

when the flood went over the temporary dike.

Farther down the Ohio at Paducah, Kentucky, 

where the local floodwall’s construction also 

had been suspended during the war, the Corps 

brought in more prisoners-of-war to help the 

city’s forces sandbag street openings in the 

levee. Because pumps had not been installed 

at Paducah’s twelve pumping stations in the 

floodwall, the Corps trucked in portable pumps 

for the flood fight. The Corps also converted its 

suction dredges Jewett and Harris into powerful temporary pumping plants to keep the city 

dry behind its floodwall. Thus, Paducah was 

protected from the type of flood disaster it has 

suffered in 1937.43

In his after-action report, Hall noted that no 

previous flood fights in the Ohio valley had 

produced such good results: the emergency 

planning and the local flood protection projects 

had done much to avert property damages. He 

also commended the prisoners-of-war for their 

efforts, concluding:

Part of the credit is due to the presence of 

considerable amounts of labor in the form of 

prisoners-of-war, but the most conspicuous 

fact is that the inhabitants of the valley have 

become extremely flood educated and that 

a very large number of civil officials know 

exactly what to do. It is to be particularly 

noted that the Governor of Ohio handled 

the flood fighting in the State without calling on the Federal Government for either 

labor or equipment. Some of the work done 

by the Ohio State Guard under the orders 

of the Governor of Ohio was really remarkable, and was especially noteworthy in 

that most of the soldiers were enlisted only 

because they were physically unfit for service 

during the war.44

By late March persistent rains battered the 

lower Mississippi valley, and the Corps offices 

at Memphis, Vicksburg, and New Orleans 

called upon the Army’s service commands for 

prisoner-of-war labor. By April a total of 3,870 

prisoners were engaged in flood fights along the 

Mississippi and its southern tributaries. Three 

successive flood crests roared past Cairo in 

thirty days: the first on 11 March at 53.9 feet, 

the second on 21 March at 53.8 feet, and the 

third on 4 April at 53.7 feet.

“...inhabitants of the valley have become extremely flood educated...”
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ The 1945 Floods 203

The Memphis office mobilized the personnel 

and equipment needed to evacuate people and 

open the Birds Point–New Madrid Floodway, 

but evacuation did not prove necessary that 

spring. At Booths Point, Tennessee, where a 

road embankment used as a levee had failed 

in 1943, the Corps began sandbagging on 

10 March 1945, with the assistance of Tennessee 

state convicts. The embankment failed again, 

however, causing the inundation of twenty-six 

thousand acres but no loss of life.45

Another critical flood fight in the Memphis 

District occurred at the Hannaberry Lake levee 

on the Arkansas River. When the river began 

eroding the main levee there, the Corps built a 

loop levee four thousand feet long and six feet 

high, which was finished on 10 March. When it 

became apparent that erosion might take out the 

loop levee also, the Corps began construction 

of a second loop levee farther landward. The 

floodwaters breached the first emergency loop 

on 15 March, but the second loop held.

When a dangerous situation on the White River 

threatened levees in Woodruff, Prairie, and 

Monroe counties, Arkansas, the Memphis office 

secured help from four engineer combat battalions and one light ponton company. The troops, 

110 officers and 2,275 men, in 100-man details, 

sandbagged critical points along the levees 

and ringed sandboils. They also bridged the 

Cache River with pontons and conducted rescue 

operations in Army assault boats. One soldier 

drowned when an assault boat capsized.

On 18 March, while the White River flood fight 

was still in progress, the engineer battalions were 

In April 1945, flooding on the Arkansas River caused the main levee at 

Hannaberry Lake to fail (upper left). An emergency loop levee was built to hold 

back the water, and a second loop levee was constructed behind the first.

Office of History
204 Situation Desperate

ordered back to their home stations to depart for 

overseas combat theaters. The Memphis office, 

therefore, obtained the 1800th Engineer General 

Service Battalion (18 officers and 352 men) from 

the Fourth Service Command as replacements 

for the departing troops.46

More than four inches of rain fell on the White 

River watershed in early April, renewing the 

attack on the already saturated levees. The situation became so critical that all troops working 

on the White River levees were ordered to wear 

life vests. Water began to trickle over the levees 

and soon several crevasses flooded Woodruff, 

Prairie, and Monroe counties. Sixty Army M–2 

assault boats and four Coast Guard boats went 

into the rough water and saved all the endangered residents. The troops were left marooned 

atop the damaged levees, but eventually they 

were evacuated by boat to join the flood fight 

nearer New Orleans.

The Corps office at Vicksburg used 250 prisoners-of-war to sandbag levees near Pine Bluff, 

Arkansas, and used Mississippi state convicts in 

the Yazoo River basin. At Jonesville, Louisiana, 

on the Black River, the town attempted to protect 

itself by building a ring levee of sandbags entirely 

around the community. The labor situation was 

so critical there that half of the volunteers carrying bags to the levee were women. Again, the 

Corps brought in prisoners-of-war to alleviate 

the labor shortage and to finish the ring levee.47

One interesting sidelight of Vicksburg’s flood 

fights was the installation of a Bailey bridge by 

troops from Camp Shelby to restore traffic on 

A diver from the 1298th Engineer Battalion checked for debris in the Cache River 

near Cotton Plant, Arkansas. The 1298th built a sturdier temporary bridge to 

replace this emergency bridge built by the 516th Engineer Light Ponton Company 

after the 1945 floods washed out the highway. Office of History
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ Observations 205

Highway 51 in Mississippi. The flood had submerged the highway, and the temporary bridge 

reopened it for emergency use. Bailey bridges 

had a large role in combat operations overseas, 

but this was the first time such a bridge was 

used in a domestic disaster situation.48

The Corps’ New Orleans office relied on the 

Eighth Service Command for manpower. It sent 

many prisoners-of-war to construct wave-wash 

fences, emplace sandbags, build mudboxes, and 

generally strengthen the levees. The Corps 

opened the Bonnet Carré spillway on 23 March 

and by April all 350 of its bays were opened 

to pass the floodwaters. The 1800th Engineer 

Battalion, earlier marooned on a White River 

levee after it failed, reported to the spillway in 

April and armored its slope with stone to prevent erosion.

Plans also called for opening the Morganza 

Floodway in Louisiana when stages increased. 

The Corps closed its railroad and highway gaps 

and warned residents in the floodway that it 

would be opened on 9 April. When days passed 

without additional rains and flooding, however, opening the Morganza Floodway became 

unnecessary.

On the flooded Red River, the Corps established 

an emergency office at Marksville, Louisiana, 

and used prisoners-of-war to strengthen the 

levees. The levee at Harris Ferry, however, began 

to cave in, and the Corps rushed all available 

private and military earth-moving equipment to 

the spot, building in just five days a new 1,000-

foot levee that looped behind the other. The new 

levee held back the flooded river.49

Corps records mentioned no misbehavior by the 

prisoners-of-war who volunteered to work on 

the levees, work that contributed to the successes 

of the 1945 flood fights. In fact, there was at 

least one instance of heroism: a German prisoner 

found a small levee break and threw his own 

body into the leak, plugging it until sandbags 

could be placed. In the opinion of Corps officers, the prisoners-of-war served effectively as 

emergency manpower and performed well under 

proper guard and supervision.50

•

Observations

The nation fortunately suffered few major 

natural disasters during its military mobilization from 1938 to 1945, and certainly none on 

the scale of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake 

or the 1927 Mississippi River flood. Such a 

large-scale disaster would have diverted critical 

materials, equipment, labor, and public attention 

from the worldwide military efforts.

The Corps’ civil works organization and the 

Army’s command in 1938 planned to rely on 

the Depression-era work relief agencies for 

emergency and disaster recovery labor, but both 

military recruiting and the closing of the agencies decreased the available labor pool. During 

the war’s early phase, the Corps obtained emergency reinforcements from the engineer troops 

training near disaster areas, but these troops 

had gone to war by 1945. Rather than diverting 

soldiers from the military effort in 1945, the 

Corps obtained assistance from state convicts, 

prisoners-of-war, and the state home guards, 

and found their contributions useful. With the 

war’s end, however, the prewar emergency plans 

and disaster assistance policies became obsolete.

•
206 Situation Desperate

1. William Caples, “Possibility of Flood Relief by the 

Army in the Ninth Corps Area,” 2 Mar. 1937, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2407.

2. Ibid. Colonel Curtis Townsend made the “deadly 

weapon” comment after Caples complained that 

his telegrams were being censored.

3. Harvey McGlashan and R. C. Briggs, Floods of 

December 1937 in Northern California (Washington, 

D.C.: U.S. Geological Survey, Water Supply Paper 

No. 843, 1938), passim; Sacramento District 

Engineer to Adjutant General, 11 Dec. 1937, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Box 2407; Harold Troxell, Floods of March 

1938 in Southern California, Water Supply Paper 

No. 844 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Geological 

Survey, 1942), passim.

4. Theodore Wyman, Jr., to Chief of Engineers, 11 

Mar. 1938, NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 

1923–1942, File 7398-8.

5. Anthony Turhollow, A History of the Los Angeles 

District, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 1899–1965

(Los Angeles: U.S. Army Engineer District, 1975), 

158–65.

6. Papers relating to revision of AR500–60 are in 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Paper 1-17-37, Section 1, Part 5, 

Miscellaneous.

7. Copy of 1939 revised regulation in NARA, RG 

407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Paper 1-17-

37, Section 1, Part 5, Miscellaneous.

8. John Bragdon to Commander, First Corps Area, 

21 Sept. 1938, NARA, RG 407, AGO Central 

Files, Dec. 400.38, Bulkies.

9. James Grant, “Engineering Aspects of the New 

England Hurricane of September, 1938,” Military 

Engineer 31 (Mar. 1939): 79–86; New London 

(Conn.) Evening Day, 1 Oct. 1938; New York Times, 

23–25 Sept. 1938; New Hampshire Disaster 

Emergency Committee, Flood and Gale, September 

1938 (Concord: Disaster Emergency Committee, 

1938), passim; Providence District Engineer to 

Chief of Engineers, 29 Nov. 1938, NARA 

WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 1923–1942, 

Providence District Records, File 7395.

10. New York Times, 23–25 Sept. 1938; George D. 

Freeman, Jr., to Commanding General, First 

Corps Area, 23 Sept. 1939, NARA, RG 407, 

AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Bulkies, Paper 

10-6-38.

11. New York Times, 23–25 Sept. 1938; “Report of 

Activities, 1st Corps Area, During Hurricane and 

Flood Emergency,” Sept. 1938, NARA, RG 407, 

AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Bulkies.

12. Providence District Engineer to Chief of 

Engineers, 29 Nov. 1938, NARA WNRC, RG 77, 

Civil Works, 1923–1942, Providence District 

Records, File 7395.

13. C. W. Burlin to North Atlantic Division, 24 Sept. 

1938, NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 1923–

1942, Box 622, File 7395.

14. First Corps Area, “G-2 Journal on Flood and 

Hurricane Relief,” NARA, RG 407, AGO Central 

Files, Dec. 400.38, Bulkies.

15. Reading Wilkinson to Chief of Engineers, 3 Oct. 

1938, NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 1923–

1942, Charleston District Records, File 7398-8.

16. Clark Kittrell to Chief of Engineers, 13 May 1939, 

NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 1923–1942, 

Fort Peck District Records, Box 859, File 7402.

17. R. G. Lovett to Chief of Engineers, 16 Oct. 1940, 

NARA, RG 77, Civil Works, 1923–1942, New 

Orleans District Records, Box 33, Bulkies.

18. G. W. Gillette to Adjutant General, 26 Aug. 1940, 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Papers 1-1-41 to 12-31-41.

19. Ibid., see endorsements.

20. H. B. Vaughn to Chief of Engineers, 12 Sept. 

1940, NARA WNRC, RG 77, Civil Works, 1923–

1942, Philadelphia District Records, Box 622, File 

7395.

21. L. H. Hewitt to Gulf of Mexico Division 

Engineer, 20 Nov. 1940, NARA WNRC, RG 77, 

Civil Works, 1923–1942, Galveston District 

Records, Box 185, File 7395.

22. ARCE (1943), 1135–36.

23. C. L. Sturdevant to Commander, Services of 

Supply, 6 Jan. 1943, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Decimal Files, 1940–45, Dec. 370.14.

24. 1942 disaster reports from Kansas City, Omaha, 

and St. Louis Districts, and from Brehon 

Somervell to Washington, D.C., District are in 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 

400.38, Boxes 3151 and 3135. A Portland District 

report on the Willamette River flood of 31 Dec. 

1942 was located, in 1981, in Hydrologic 

Engineering Section, HQUSACE. Some 1943 

flood damage estimates are in Committee on 

Flood Control, Emergency Repairs to Flood Control 

Works, 78th Cong, 1st sess., 1943, H. Rept. 596, 2.

25. C. Lacey Hall testimony in House Committee on 

Flood Control, Flood-Control Plans and New 

Projects, Hearings on H. R. 4485, 78th Cong., 1st 

sess., 1943, 64.

26. A. Mitchell Stein, “History of Ohio River 

Division,” 1972, Stein Historical Document 

Collection, Lakes and Rivers Engineer Division, 

Cincinnati, Ohio, passim.

Chapter 9 Notes
Emergency Planning and Mobilization ■ Notes 207

27. “Report on Flood of May 1943, Louisville 

District,” 1943, Hydrologic Engineering Section, 

HQUSACE, 41–42.

28. C. Lacey Hall testimony in House Committee on 

Flood Control, Flood-Control Plans and New 

Projects, Hearings on H. R. 4485, 78th Cong., 1st 

sess., 1943, 64.

29. Fred Wallace, Fifth Service Command, to Army 

Service Forces commander, 6 Apr. 1943, NARA, 

RG 407, AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 

3151.

30. “Chronological Report of Action Taken by the 

Sixth Service Command to Give Assistance during 

Flood, May–June 1943,” NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 3149.

31. James R. Ryall, “Castles on the River,” Military 

Engineer 35 (Oct. 1943): 527–30.

32. “Chronological Report of Action Taken by the 

Sixth Service Command.”

33. Ibid.; Ryall, “Castles on the River,” 527–30.

34. Roald Tweet, A History of the Rock Island District, 

Corps of Engineers (Rock Island, Ill.: U.S. Army 

Engineer District, 1975), 122–23; Robert L. 

Branyan, Taming the Mighty Missouri: A History of 

the Kansas City District, Corps of Engineers, 1907–

1971 (Kansas City, Mo.: U.S. Army Engineer 

District, 1974), 45; Kansas City Engineer District, 

“Report on Floods & Flood Damages in the 

Kansas City District during 1943,” 1943, 

Hydrologic Engineering Section, HQUSACE, 

passim.

35. See discussions in earlier chapters of Jarvis Bain’s 

services in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake 

disaster and 1916 southern states flood.

36. Memphis Engineer District, “Report of High 

Water Fight on the Mississippi River and 

Tributaries in the Memphis Engineer District 

during May and June 1943,” 1943, Hydrologic 

Engineering Section, HQUSACE, passim.

37. Floyd Clay, A History of the Little Rock District 

(Little Rock, Ark.: U.S. Army Engineer District, 

1971), 38; War Department Bureau of Public 

Information, News Release, 17 May 1943, NARA, 

RG 407, AGO Decimal Files, 1940–45, Dec. 

370.14, Box 2775.

38. War Department News Release, 17 May 1943.

39. Vicksburg District Engineer to Chief of Engineers, 

“Report on May–June 1943 Flood,” 22 Sept. 1943, 

Hydrologic Engineering Section, HQUSACE, 

passim.

40. Congressional Record, 78th Cong., 1st sess., 1943, 

4919–21, 6702–03, 6841–44.

41. L. B. Feagin to Adjutant General, 25 Apr. 1944, 

and related correspondence in NARA, RG 407, 

AGO Central Files, Dec. 400.38, Box 3149; 

Committee on Commerce, Emergency Repairs to 

Flood Control Works, 78th Cong., 2d sess., 1944, S. 

Rept. 882, 2.

42. President, Mississippi River Commission [MRC], 

“Resume of High Water of 1945, Lower 

Mississippi River & Tributaries,” 14 May 1945, 

Hydrologic Engineering Section, HQUSACE, 

passim.

43. Ohio River Division, “Report on Flood of March 

1945 in Ohio River Basin,” 1945, Hydrologic 

Engineering Section, HQUSACE, 16–23.

44. Ibid.; ARCE (1945), 1511–27.

45. President, MRC, “Resume of High Water of 

1945,” passim.

46. Ibid.

47. Ibid.

48. Ibid.

49. Ibid.

50. Ibid.; Clay, History of the Little Rock District, 38.
The Columbia River near 

Bonneville Dam flooded 

in May 1948.

Portland District

Many buildings were 

destroyed by the Texas City 

explosion, 16 April 1947.

Office of History
Postwar Emergencies ■ Texas City Disaster 209

Postwar Emergencies

During the postwar years the Army 

Corps of Engineers continued to grow 

its disaster assistance mission. The 

Texas City explosion of 1947 represented one of 

the greatest peacetime calamities in American 

history, and the Galveston District arrived on 

the scene almost immediately with firefighting equipment and other necessities. Over the 

next few days, it cooked food, launched tugs to 

remove the dead and debris from port waters, 

and relayed radio transmissions in what became 

a textbook response to major urban disasters. 

A series of storms across the Missouri and 

Mississippi river valleys in June 1947 and major 

flooding in the Pacific Northwest the following 

year raised public awareness of Corps activities 

and bolstered expectations of federal disaster 

assistance. Congress responded by investigating the need for a federal agency to coordinate 

disaster assistance and a permanent national 

policy on disaster relief.

•

Texas City Disaster, 1947

“The press is filled with accounts of one of 

the greatest holocausts ever visited upon the 

United States,” proclaimed Congressman 

John Connally, informing the House of 

Representatives about the Texas City explosion of 1947. “When the news first came to 

me,” he went on, “I took the matter up with 

Gen. Jonathan Wainwright, commanding 

general of the Fourth Army at San Antonio, 

with the regional director of the War Assets 

Administration, Gen. Casper B. Rucker at 

Dallas, and with the Chief of Engineers of the 

War Department.”1

Lt. Gen. Raymond Wheeler, Chief of 

Engineers, told Connally that engineer personnel and equipment were already at Texas City 

fighting fires and furnishing all assistance 

requested to local officials. Personnel from the 

Corps’ repair depot in Galveston had heard 

the deafening blast and immediately set out for 

Texas City by automobile. They found the chief 

of police forty-five minutes after the explosion 

and, at his request, used their portable units to 

establish and maintain radio communications 

until the town restored its police radio network 

to service. Col. David Griffiths, commanding 

at Galveston, and his staff boarded the survey 

10

When the explosion and fire knocked out other means of communication, 

Army Engineers used a radio car to communicate with other elements of the 

relief effort at Texas City. Office of History
210 Situation Desperate

launches Ralph Millis and Guyer and headed for 

Texas City by water, arriving just thirty minutes 

after the first Corps personnel reached the devastated town in automobiles.2

Griffiths transmitted his personal description of 

the Texas City disaster to Fort Crockett’s commander in Galveston harbor. At 9:12 the morning of 16 April 1947, the ship Grandcamp, loaded 

with ammonium nitrate, exploded; it had been 

on fire an hour before the explosion. The blast 

wiped out Texas City’s fire department, both 

men and equipment. It also caused a fifteen-foot 

wave in the harbor that flooded the surrounding area. It hurled burning cargo and metal 

fragments into a nearby Monsanto chemical 

plant, starting more fires that touched off more 

blasts. Griffiths asked Fort Crockett to report 

the Texas City crisis to headquarters and to send 

Army medical assistance. The Corps’ Galveston 

District meanwhile would coordinate emergency 

operations by transmitting messages from its 

Soldiers and cooks from the 41st Infantry Battalion and the 66th Tank Battalion 

worked round the clock to provide food for rescuers and residents in Texas City 

in the aftermath of the massive explosions.

U.S. Army photograph, SC280974-S

“The press is filled with accounts of one of the greatest holocausts ever 

visited upon the United States.”
Postwar Emergencies ■ Texas City Disaster 211

mobile radios to its survey launches for relay on 

to the district office and Fort Crockett.3

Galveston District’s motor pool vehicles took 

firefighting equipment, first aid supplies, and 

blankets to the disaster site. They transported 

the dead and injured to morgues and hospitals 

and supplied mobile emergency services until 

organized relief agencies arrived. When Fourth 

Army sent kitchens but no cooks, Corps personnel set the facilities up and cooked meals for the 

firefighters and evacuation crews. Along the 

waterfront, Corps launches and tugs removed 

the dead and injured and relayed radio transmissions. Griffiths escorted General Wainwright 

through the disaster area, and Wainwright 

established Fourth Army’s emergency office at 

Fort Crockett and directed the Corps to continue assisting in the ruins of Texas City.

Because the blast had set afire the ship High 

Flyer, which also had a cargo of ammonium 

nitrate, the people of Texas City evacuated to 

a safe distance. This ship exploded that night, 

igniting oil tanks located around the harbor. 

After the second detonation, the Corps resumed 

its search for bodies, and Corps launches began 

a fathometer survey of the Texas City basin to 

locate navigation obstructions. At the mayor’s 

request, the Corps also commenced damage 

surveys of the ruined waterfront, reporting the 

findings to local authorities and Congress.4

The Corps performed emergency services 

at Texas City until 23 April, then prepared 

its after-action review. For their emergency 

Flames and smoke poured from oil storage tanks set on fire by the ship 

explosion at Texas City. U.S. Army photograph, SC280968
212 Situation Desperate

response efforts, General of the Army Dwight 

Eisenhower awarded personal commendations 

to Griffiths and the participating Galveston 

District personnel. Galveston District’s response 

to the Texas City emergency later became a textbook model, studied by Corps officers attending 

the disaster recovery lectures at the Fort Belvoir 

Engineer School.5

Red Cross figures showed that Texas City 

blasts and fires killed 512 and injured 1,784 

and caused estimated property damages of $47 

million. At the time of the explosion, President 

Harry Truman issued an executive order directing federal agencies to do everything possible 

to help Texas City recover; and, upon enactment of Public Law 233 (Aiken Act) on 25 July 

1947, Truman ordered the Army to give surplus 

equipment and materials to Texas City authorities responsible for repairing and restoring public facilities.6

With the crisis under control, officials turned 

to long-range problems. To avert an economic 

disaster resulting from closing the port of 

Texas City—and the subsequent unemployment 

that would have followed when plants closed 

for lack of materials—Griffiths sought authority for the Corps to clear wreckage from the 

harbor. Although much of the wreckage was 

After the explosions and fires, the Texas City railroad yard was filled with destroyed vehicles and buildings. U.S. Army photograph, SC280975-S
Postwar Emergencies ■ The Aiken Act 213

located at privately owned docks, the chief of 

engineers found the authority to approve the 

work under Section 20 of the 1899 Rivers and 

Harbors Act.7

•

The Aiken Act

Senator George Aiken of Vermont sponsored a 

bill in July 1947 to offer disaster-stricken communities federal assistance in the form of surplus 

military property. In 1946 the military underwent a severe retrenchment from World War II 

levels, and the services had warehouses full of 

materials left over from the war that would not 

be needed by the reduced armed forces. Aiken 

explained to the Senate how his bill would put 

those surplus materials to good use to assist with 

disaster recovery:

The bill provides, first, that the President 

must make a determination that a catastrophe has occurred. A good example was 

the Texas City catastrophe. Another good 

example is the recent catastrophes from 

floods and other causes. When the President 

makes a determination, then the War Assets 

Administration is authorized to turn over to 

the Federal Works Administration [sic] any 

property which may be useful in alleviating 

the suffering of the victims. The Federal 

Works Administration will dispose of such 

surplus property to States and local governments, with or without compensation. Then 

the States and local governments will have 

the property wholly in their hands, and will 

make such arrangements as can be made to 

rehabilitate the people within their States or 

cities, under agreement, of course, with the 

Federal Works Administration.8

Aiken’s bill became law on 25 July 1947 and 

authorized the Federal Works Agency (FWA), 

after the president declared a “major disaster,” 

to loan or give to state or local governments 

rations, medicines, trucks, and bulldozers for 

recovery and reconstruction purposes. The 

FWA, however, could not supply the fuel or 

other materials needed to operate the equipment, nor could it recruit and pay the labor 

employed for debris removal and reconstruction.9

Maj. Gen. Philip Fleming, an engineer officer 

who headed the Federal Works Agency from 

1941 to 1949, had been selected by President 

Roosevelt in 1933 as deputy administrator of 

the Public Works Administration (PWA). 

While still ranking in the Corps of Engineers, 

he served successively in several New Deal 

agencies: as coordinator of the Resettlement 

Administration, administrator of the Wage and 

Hour Division under the Fair Labor Standards 

Act, and administrator of the Federal Works 

Agency. One of only two men in uniform 

privileged to witness the 1945 inauguration 

of President Truman, he was later selected by 

Truman to serve as undersecretary of commerce 

and then as ambassador to Costa Rica.

Fleming’s Federal Works Agency was a hodgepodge, an administrative umbrella consolidating remnants of the “alphabet” agencies of the 

Depression years; it also included the Bureau 

of Public Roads and the Public Buildings 

Administration. Fleming placed the disaster 

assistance function assigned him in 1947 in the 

Bureau of Community Facilities, which had 

built federal housing projects near Army installations during the Second World War. This 

bureau had nine regional offices scattered across 

the nation, staffed by engineers, architects, and 
214 Situation Desperate

personnel familiar with the design, construction, and management of public facilities.10

The president and Congress expected the 

FWA to fill the gaps left in the federal disaster 

relief program by the demise of the Works 

Progress Administration. Under this logic, the 

Corps of Engineers and the Army would manage flood fights and rescue, evacuation, and 

emergency needs; the Red Cross would continue 

to handle individual relief and rehabilitation 

needs; and the FWA would assist communities to restore or replace damaged schools, 

hospitals, water and sewer systems, and other 

public facilities.

The key to implementation of the Aiken Act 

was a presidential determination that a “major 

disaster” had occurred, thus invoking the act’s 

federal assistance provisions. President Truman 

took full advantage of the act in 1947, declaring 

eight major disasters.

First, he interpreted the Aiken Act retroactively, applying it to the Texas City blast, a 

flood in Rutland County, Vermont, and flooding in the Missouri and Mississippi valleys. 

He then declared major disasters in the 

aftermath of a Gulf Coast hurricane, floods 

in New York, forest fires in Maine, and a 

tornado that crossed Louisiana and Arkansas. 

Of these eight official disasters, the Corps of 

Engineers responded to four: the Texas City 

explosion, the Rutland flood, the Missouri and 

Mississippi floods, and the Gulf Coast hurricane. (Hurricanes were not then assigned names 

alphabetically.) The FWA also exercised its new 

authority in disaster operations during the first 

year of the Aiken Act.11

•

Rutland Flood , 1947

Four days of rain in early June 1947 filled 

to capacity the four reservoirs owned by the 

Central Vermont Public Service Corporation 

along East Creek between Rutland and 

Chittenden, and six-foot-high flashboards atop 

its Chittenden Dam failed. Water released 

from this dam uppermost on the stream had a 

domino effect, subsequently causing failures of 

the East Pittsford, Glen, and Patch dams. A 

fifteen-foot-high wall of water gushed down 

the narrow valley, demolishing bridges, homes, 

and public buildings, disrupting water, sewer, 

and utility services, and layering the streamside 

towns with mud. A cloudburst two days later 

caused more damages and changed the course of 

the Neshobe River.

Col. William F. Heavey, commanding the 

New York District, went immediately to the 

disaster area and, through the chief of engineers 

and the First Army’s commander, arranged 

for engineer troops from Fort Belvoir to bring 

water purification and chlorinating units to the 

area. These units supplied all the potable water 

needed until the municipal systems resumed 

operations.12

A rumor spread on 5 June that Chittenden 

Dam had utterly failed, releasing a new flood 

wave down the valley. The resulting panic 

proved a near catastrophe: everyone in Rutland 

scrambled for the hills, gorging all roads leading out of town with automobiles, five abreast. 

When the leading drivers reached high ground, 

they stopped to watch the expected flood, 

blocking the escape route for the cars following. To allay public fears and persuade them 

to return home, Heavey and the First Army’s 

engineers inspected the dam and pronounced it 
Postwar Emergencies ■ Missouri and Mississippi River Floods 215

safe, and Army vehicles equipped with public 

address systems broadcast that fact to the 

crowds, restoring order and convincing people to 

return to town.13

First Army detachments, Red Cross representatives, and local governments had the emergency 

relief situation in hand by 1 August when 

President Truman declared the damaged section 

of Rutland County a “major disaster” area. With 

this authorization, the FWA loaned trucks, 

tractors, and surplus equipment to the Vermont 

Highway Department and local governments to 

help restore public roads and facilities.14

•

Missouri and Mississippi 

River Floods , 1947

A series of storms crossing the Missouri River 

and upper Mississippi River valleys in June 1947 

caused severe flooding in the Corps’ St. Louis 

and Rock Island districts. Although no Corps 

levees failed and the Fort Peck dam cut 2.5 feet 

off the Missouri River’s flood crest, major damages occurred along uncontrolled streams: the 

Des Moines, Raccoon, Nishnabotna, Nodaway, 

Platte, Grand, Chariton, Republican, Elkhorn, 

Kansas, and Kaskaskia rivers.15

Col. Robert E. Smyser, commanding at St. 

Louis, reported two river crests at the city, 

Engineer officers inspected the erosion under the spillway apron of Chittenden Dam after the Rutland, Vermont, flood of June 1947.

Office of History
216 Situation Desperate

reaching 36.5 feet on 14 June. His St. Louis 

District workboats and vehicles assisted with 

rescue operations and delivered 1.8 million 

sandbags and other materials valued at $275,380 

for the flood fight. Corps personnel furnished 

technical assistance to the communities and 

drainage districts engaged in the struggle to 

hold the flood.16

At Rock Island District, Col. William Leaf 

concentrated the Corps’ rescue efforts at 

Ottumwa and Keokuk, Iowa, where swift currents had overturned small rescue craft manned 

by volunteers. He ordered Corps personnel in 

large craft with powerful engines to take control 

of the rescue and evacuation mission. At the 

levees, Leaf furnished sandbags and materials 

worth $235,000 for the flood fights. He committed eighty-five personnel as well as Corps 

dredges, bulldozers, cranes, vehicles, barges, and 

skiffs to the fight to maintain the levees.17

When President Truman, at Fleming’s recommendation, invoked the Aiken Act for the 

Midwestern flood disaster, the FWA sent 

stricken communities earthmoving equipment, 

temporary bridges, and concrete, steel, and lumber to repair roads and public facilities. At the 

mission’s end, the FWA’s Bureau of Community 

Facilities transferred to the communities 22,774 

war surplus items ranging from Bailey bridges to 

air compressors and sewer pipe.18

Sandbags helped keep floodwater out of the Iowa Memorial Union building at the University of Iowa, June 1947.

Iowa Memorial Union, University of Iowa
Postwar Emergencies ■ Vanport Debacle 217

After the flood, President Truman called a conference on 12 July 1947 to consider the future 

of the Missouri and Mississippi river valleys. 

Congressional support had grown for creating 

a Missouri Valley Authority similar to TVA to 

manage water resources. Proponents of such an 

organization claimed both the Corps’ and the 

Bureau of Reclamation’s plans for the Missouri 

were inadequate. At the planning conference, 

Lt. Gen. Raymond Wheeler presented a joint 

report from the War, Interior, and Agriculture 

departments proposing a ten-year flood protection program for the valley. The plan envisioned 

Corps construction of reservoirs, levees, and 

spillways; Bureau of Reclamation construction 

of reservoirs for irrigation and water storage; 

and Soil Conservation Service management of 

runoff control measures.19

In his memorandum on the July conference, Arthur Morrell, deputy to Fleming at 

the Federal Works Agency, commented that 

Wheeler expected the joint plan the Corps 

had presented to quash support for a Missouri 

Valley Authority. Morrell observed that the 

FWA could perform the proposed construction 

in the valley better than the Corps or Bureau 

of Reclamation. Whether the Corps or other 

agencies were aware of the FWA’s ambitions is 

not apparent, yet the Corps subsequently proved 

unreceptive to any expansion of the FWA’s roles, 

including its function as federal disaster assistance coordinator.20

•

Vanport Debacle , 1948

Flooding in the Pacific Northwest was 1948’s 

most memorable disaster. It began in May 

when the Kootenai River hit flood stage and 

Col. Theron Weaver, North Pacific Division 

Engineer, mobilized Corps offices at Seattle 

and Portland for the emergency. When Idaho’s 

governor requested Corps assistance at Bonners 

Ferry on the Kootenai because the local levees 

could not protect the town against the flood, 

the Seattle office sent personnel with 110,000 

sandbags to the town. The Corps also requested 

assistance from the Sixth Army commander, 

who dispatched the 5th Engineer Battalion from 

Fort Lewis with eighty-four pieces of construction equipment. They raised the levee with 

several feet of earth and sandbags, but the levee 

blew out on 23 May, a result of leakage through 

animal burrows. Their flood fight, however, had 

afforded time for residents of Bonners Ferry to 

evacuate with their property.21

When the St. Joe River threatened levees protecting St. Maries, Idaho, the Corps’ Seattle 

Troops of the 2d Infantry Division placed sandbags to reinforce the levee 

protecting Portland Air Base, threatened when the Columbia River flooded in 

June 1948. Office of History
218 Situation Desperate

office supervised sandbagging by an engineer 

detachment sent from Fort Lewis. Their work 

prevented the inundation of St. Maries, and 

similar success occurred at Cle Elum on the 

Yakima River, where Corps personnel and 

engineer troops raised an old levee and built a 

temporary dike. Farther downstream on the 

Yakima, however, erosion caused by debris 

jamming the channel and diverting currents 

breached several levees.22

In the neighboring Portland District, Col. 

Orville Walsh also requested troops from the 

Sixth Army commander. The commander dispatched three thousand soldiers equipped with 

sandbags, trucks, and equipment to assist local 

diking districts with their preparations for a 

Columbia River flood.

The river’s rise threatened Vanport, a public 

housing project built during the war for forty 

thousand workers at the Portland, Oregon, 

shipyards. Located in the Columbia River 

floodplain, the housing project was completely 

surrounded by levees, one being a substantial 

railroad embankment. Concerned for the safety 

of eighteen thousand people then living in 

Vanport, the Corps discussed evacuation with 

Residents of Vanport struggled to evacuate the flooded town, jamming the exit ramps with cars. The low-lying housing project was inundated by 

the Columbia River in May 1948. The Oregonian
Postwar Emergencies ■ Vanport Debacle 219

the housing authority. This disruptive action 

seemed unnecessary, however, because levees 

protected the community up to a 47-foot river 

stage and the predicted flood crest was only 

thirty feet. Just in case, constant levee patrol 

began and plans were made for evacuating the 

community if and when fire and air-raid sirens 

screamed. The housing authority distributed a 

circular advising the residents that overtopping 

of the levees was improbable and that they would 

receive advance warning if an emergency arose.23

“It has widened out since we looked at it,” said 

one of the men patrolling the railroad embankment that served as a levee. He had seen a small 

boil behind the embankment, went to find an 

engineer, and returned with him to examine the 

boil. At that moment the levee blew out, forcing the two to run for their lives. The river then 

stood at a 29-foot stage, well below the embankment’s top, but the levee had failed as a result of 

a foundation failure beneath.24

Attempts to sound the warning signals also 

failed because the power lines went down. Water 

gushed into Vanport, bowling over the wooden 

military-type buildings that served as housing. 

People trying to escape in their automobiles 

jammed traffic at the exist ramps, trapping 422 

vehicles within the levee. Other residents scrambled up the levees and out on foot, or floated out 

while clinging to debris. Eighteen drowned, and 

the death toll surely would have been higher if 

the disaster had occurred on a weekday instead 

of Memorial Day weekend when many residents 

were traveling out of town.25

Because recovering the bodies could not be 

accomplished until the river subsided, and 

because it was difficult to account for the 

Vanport residents absent on vacation at the time, 

rumors circulated that the government agencies 

clandestinely removed bodies at night to conceal 

the disaster’s scope and that six hundred bodies 

were iced down in a secret morgue. Because the 

housing authority had advised residents that 

constant levee patrols would provide adequate 

warning for the need to evacuate, the public 

blamed the authority, the Corps of Engineers, 

and the federal government generally for their 

losses. Personnel of the Corps’ North Pacific 

Division received personal threats from angry 

residents who saw them walking through the 

division office’s parking lot.26

Weaver and local civic leaders explained the 

facts to the media: The failed railroad embankment had a 75-foot top width while levees on 

the other side of the town were only fourteen 

feet wide; the 30.2 feet stage of the flood was 

four feet lower than the record crest of 1894 

and far below the protection thought to be provided by the levees; the levees were constantly 

patrolled as planned; the embankment break 

was unexpected and came suddenly; the evacuation plan had not included a second warning 

system independent of the power supply; the 

warning and evacuation were not the Corps’ 

responsibility. Nothing could mollify the suffering residents of Vanport—who sued for millions 

in damages—but the facts of the case convinced 

the courts, which subsequently found no negligence by the Corps.27

President Truman traveled aboard the train he 

used in his reelection campaign and reached 

Vanport on 11 June to inspect the disaster scene 

on foot. He met Weaver and Maj. Gen. Philip 

Fleming of the FWA there and on the spot 

signed an order to provide temporary housing 

for the flood victims. He ordered Fleming to 

coordinate the work of thirteen federal agencies 
220 Situation Desperate

that would provide various forms of assistance to 

the disaster victims.28

With tents and kitchens furnished by Sixth 

Army, the Red Cross cared for the most urgent 

needs at Vanport. For the first time in the history of the federal disaster program, mobile 

homes were brought in and set up to house the 

refugees. Fleming had located six hundred warsurplus trailers made available under the Aiken 

Act and had them installed on a federal reservation as temporary housing. Under the Lanham 

Act, which had funded the wartime construction of the Vanport project, Fleming found the 

authority and the funds needed to remove debris 

from the flooded community. Thus, Fleming, 

under various authorities, restored some order in 

the community.29

At the time of the Vanport debacle, the Senate 

Public Works Committee was conducting 

hearings on establishing a permanent federal 

agency to coordinate responses to disasters. At 

the hearings on 14 June, Maj. Gen. Roscoe C. 

Crawford of the Corps of Engineers outlined 

the Corps’ historic role during flood and disaster 

emergencies. He emphasized the effectiveness of 

the Corps’ response to flooding in the Columbia 

An Army Bailey bridge temporarily replaced a washed-out span over the Methow River in Washington, June 1948.

Office of History
Postwar Emergencies ■ Other 1948 Floods 221

River basin, pointing out the Corps had committed four thousand civilian employees plus 

troops to the local flood fights.30

Crawford said the Corps and the Army opposed 

the creation of a permanent federal coordinating agency as proposed in the bill then under 

consideration by Congress. He read a letter from 

Secretary of the Army Kenneth Royall outlining 

the Army’s opposition to the bill:

In all catastrophes the entire resources of 

the Army are made available for rescue and 

relief work. Army personnel, equipment, 

and supplies strategically located throughout 

the United States and most needed in such 

emergencies are made available promptly 

and without awaiting administrative findings by any other official or officials. In case 

of catastrophe due to flood, the Corps of 

Engineers acting pursuant to existing law, 

has always taken the lead among Federal 

agencies doing rescue work and in preventing excessive flood damages. If an additional Federal agency is given authority to 

intervene later under the provisions of this 

bill, the result will be confusion, delay and 

reduction in the Army’s effectiveness in providing emergency relief and in rescue work. 

It is accordingly recommended that S. 2831 

be not enacted in its present form.31

Congress accepted this argument and did not 

establish an agency to coordinate federal disaster 

assistance at that time, but after each subsequent disaster, the president issued executive 

orders appointing the FWA to administer the 

program. Fleming usually handled the liaison in 

Washington and assigned field work management to George Field, head of the Bureau of 

Community Facilities, and to the chiefs of the 

bureau’s regional offices.32

•

Other 1948 Floods

Though Vanport made the headlines in 1948, 

other memorable floods that year also forced 

mobilization of Corps and Army resources. 

Col. William Cassidy at Vicksburg, for instance, 

had two hundred Corps employees working 

with local levee district workers and two hundred state convicts during flooding in February 

near Greenwood, Mississippi. Cassidy’s crews 

sandbagged levees and stopped the flow through 

a crevasse on the right bank of Roebuck Lake. 

Because this flood inundated only farm lands, 

however, Truman did not issue a major disaster 

declaration.33

Col. Walter Wilson Jr., commanding at St. Paul, 

and Col. William Leaf, commanding at Rock 

Island, managed flood fights along the upper 

Mississippi and Red River of the North in the 

spring of 1948. The Corps used amphibious 

vehicles for rescue missions and also supplied 

sandbags, trucks, pumps, and other materials 

to local levee districts in efforts to hold off the 

river. Although these floods inundated farm 

“If an additional Federal agency is given authority to intervene...

the result will be confusion, delay and reduction in the Army’s 

effectiveness in providing emergency relief and in rescue work.”
222 Situation Desperate

lands, they caused no losses of life and were not 

designated major disasters.34

The most unusual disaster assistance effort of 

1948 began in April when Col. Joseph Twitty 

at Mobile District received an urgent telegram 

from Senator Spessard Holland of Florida:

Have wire from Board of County 

Commissioners, Jackson County, Marianna, 

Florida, reading as follows: Quote, Damage 

caused by recent heavy rains have us in a 

terrible plight. Schools closed over entire 

county. 75% of all bridges on county roads 

washed out. Any suggestions as to aid that 

would enable us to get over this situation 

would be appreciated. Unquote. Your consideration and advice will be appreciated.35

The Federal Works Agency and commanders at 

Eglin Air Force Base, Tyndall Air Force Base, 

and Fort Benning also received similar requests 

from members of Congress, including Senators 

Claude Pepper of Florida and Walter F. George 

of Georgia. Twitty went to Jackson County 

and met with the county commissioners and 

Congressman Robert Sikes. He learned fifteen 

inches of rain fell on the Chattahoochee River 

basin on 31 March and 1 April. Subsequent 

flooding destroyed 185 county bridges and made 

roads impassable.

These rains, after a wet winter, had raised the 

groundwater table by five to fifteen feet. The 

poor drainage in that area had caused subsurface 

flooding as well as surface runoff. Maximum 

flood crests occurred three weeks after the last 

rainfall and after the topsoil had dried out. Parts 

of Jackson and nearby counties remained inundated because floodwaters could neither run off 

nor be absorbed by the soils. Instead, the water 

ponded in sink holes atop the limestone bedrock 

that had few surface streams for drainage.

The commanders of Eglin and Tyndall Air 

Force bases and Fort Benning told Twitty they 

would comply with local requests for assistance 

if he would coordinate the mission. Twitty 

secured approval and on 7 April sent troops, 

equipment, and supplies to Jackson County 

for road and bridge repairs under Corps supervision. Twitty later observed that because “use of 

Air Force and Army facilities in the flood control program afforded an excellent field training 

exercise for the military personnel involved, it 

was possible to justify limited troop participation in this program as a training measure prior 

to allocation of emergency flood control funds 

to the District Engineer.”36

Twitty selected Chipola Junior College (formerly 

Marianna Army Air Base)—where old barracks 

and an airstrip were available—to serve as the 

mission’s field office. They opened a field mess, 

motor repair shop, and post exchange on the 

campus, and a military police detachment and 

radio communications team began work. Heavy 

construction equipment came from as far away 

as the Schenectady and Marion engineer depots.

Initial plans called for loaning heavy equipment 

to Jackson County for work under the county 

commissioners’ supervision. Two military assistants, three civilian engineers, and a survey party 

from Mobile District acted in advisory capacities, 

“Damage caused by recent heavy rains have us in a terrible plight.”
Postwar Emergencies ■ Other 1948 Floods 223

allocating military personnel and equipment to 

work at sites chosen by the county commissioners. These plans presented operational difficulties, however, and Twitty took control from the 

county to assure that resources were not wasted 

on inefficient operations that could not be completed within limits. He obtained additional support from Fort Bragg’s 307th Airborne Engineer 

Battalion and organized a system whereby the 

Army and Air Force crews and equipment would 

support the Corps of Engineers—similar, he 

remarked, to combat support provided by an 

artillery battalion for an infantry regiment.

Reopening school bus, mail, and farm-tomarket roads had the priority. By May the 

Corps and Third Army personnel had restored 

thirty-two bridges, repaired fifty road washouts, 

and moved twenty-three thousand cubic yards 

of earth into embankments, thereby reopening 

two hundred miles of Jackson County roads. 

The work extended into adjacent Washington 

County, where another fifty miles of roads 

were reopened.37

Water covered some roads because saturated soils 

and high water tables prevented percolation of 

Engineers used heavy equipment to excavate Snead’s Canal near Marianna, Florida, June 1948. The deepened canal drained floodwaters away 

from roads and buildings. Office of History
224 Situation Desperate

the ponded water into the substrata to be carried 

off through underground channels in the limestone. Twitty’s alternatives were either to haul 

in earth and raise the road fills above the water 

levels or to ditch new surface canals to drain the 

ponds. Because improved drainage would also 

restore farmlands to production, Twitty selected 

canal drainage as the cost-effective method.

The Corps excavated four drainage canals in 

Jackson County. One near Malone connected a 

chain of ponds extending over seven and a half 

miles and involved excavating ninety thousand 

cubic yards of soil. A second near Hornsville was 

fifteen hundred feet long and required seventyfive hundred cubic yards of excavation; a third 

near Sneads was forty-two hundred feet long; 

“...use of Air Force and Army facilities in the flood control program afforded an 

excellent field training exercise for the military personnel involved.”

The floods in Florida in 1948 were fought using drainage canals to divert water from towns, roads, and farmland. Workers placed explosive charges 

to expand Malone Canal near Marianna, Florida. Office of History
Postwar Emergencies ■ Operation Snowbound 225

and the fourth near Cottondale was two miles 

long. These canals drained the ponded water, 

thus reopening roads and farmlands for use.

In adjacent Houston County, Alabama, three 

and a half miles of canals drained three large 

ponds after the Corps moved one hundred thousand cubic yards of material. Twitty considered 

similar canal excavation in Decatur, Liberty, 

Seminole, Gadsden, and Calhoun counties, 

but conditions there did not seem to be an 

emergency. Any relief in that area of Florida, 

Alabama, and Georgia was left to a long-range 

program for treating drainage problems.

By late April, the Corps’ Mobile office and 

the Third Army had seventy-three pieces of 

engineer equipment and eighty-two pieces of 

ordnance equipment in the area repairing roads 

and digging canals. Road repair units consisted 

of a Traxcavator, ten dump trucks, a D-6 dozer, 

and two graders. On the canal jobs, bulldozers 

and scrapers removed top soils while draglines 

opened the ditches. Where soils were covered 

with water or too soft to support draglines, 

excavation was done with explosives—in fact, 

the Cottondale canal was dug entirely with 

explosives.

When the Third Army commander requested 

the return of military personnel and equipment 

on 3 May, most of the mission had been accomplished. The Mobile District then rented civilian equipment and shifted field operations to a 

civilian basis. The mission field office moved to 

Dothan, Alabama, where the work was closed 

by 9 July 1948.38

Twitty’s after-action review mentioned that 

he had few public relations problems because 

no daily newspapers published in the disaster 

area. Besides, he noted, because “it was impossible to satisfy all requests for assistance in the 

flood area, and in order to discourage initiation of additional requests, only a minimum 

of information on the flood control program 

was released to the public.” He was relieved 

the flood had occurred prior to the construction and impoundment of Jim Woodruff Dam 

and Lake, thinking that if the disaster had 

occurred later the Corps might have been 

slapped with lawsuits blaming the flooding 

on the filling of the reservoir. He also noted 

that the road construction units were highly 

efficient, and he recommended that the Army 

adopt the same combination of equipment and 

trucks he had used for all combat road construction units.39

•

Operation Snowbound, 1949

The outstanding disaster relief mission of 1949 

proved to be Operation Snowbound, the first 

snow removal emergency handled by the Corps 

of Engineers. The mission began in January 

when blizzards coated Wyoming, Colorado, 

and Nebraska with sixteen inches of snow drifting to thirty feet. At Red Cross request, the 

Fifth Army commander sent snow plows and 

M–29 cargo carriers (Weasels) to isolated towns 

and ranches for rescue and emergency supply. 

The Tenth Air Force launched its companion 

Operation Haylift, dropping food, blankets, 

and clothing to stranded ranchers and bales of 

“...it was impossible to satisfy all requests 

for assistance in the flood area.”
226 Situation Desperate

hay supplied by the Department of Agriculture 

to starving livestock herds.40

The weather moderated in mid-January, but 

later in the month a second blizzard snowed 

in parts of Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, and 

Wyoming, and the requests for aid swelled 

to an overwhelming volume. On 22 January 

Maj. Gen. Lewis Pick, commanding the 

Corps’ Missouri River Division, called in his 

district commanders to define their mobilization plans. They drew up lists of available 

supervisory personnel, contractors and their 

equipment, and state highway stations and 

repair shops. They identified on maps the 

highways and railroads that were open and 

those that were closed.

The Army furnished its initial assistance under 

the authority of AR 500-60 until Maj. Gen. 

John Lucas of Fifth Army on 27 January toured 

the snow-stricken area, finding an average 

snow depth of thirty-six inches and towering drifts. Recognizing that human suffering 

could be severe and that nearly two million 

head of livestock might be lost, he asked the 

Army chief of staff to find adequate authority 

and funding to cope with the emergency. He 

also asked that Pick and the Corps be directed 

to head the emergency response, soon to be 

known as Operation Snowbound. Two days 

later President Truman declared the region a 

major disaster area, approving the use of Corps 

personnel and civil works funding for the relief 

work and directing the Federal Works Agency 

to coordinate the federal efforts.

Pick established the headquarters of the Fifth 

Army’s disaster force in the Omaha Engineer 

District, selecting Omaha’s commander, Col. 

Louis Prentiss, as his chief of staff. Maps, 

personnel rosters, and mobilization plans were 

ready, and by that night Corps personnel from 

the Garrison, Fort Randall, Harlan County, 

and Cherry Creek dam projects moved into 

the disaster area. Fifteen officers from the Fort 

Belvoir Engineer School and twenty-five officers with heavy equipment expertise joined the 

civilian technicians.

The Corps opened field offices for local 

management of disaster recovery. Col. John 

Paxton managed the area office at Ainsworth, 

Nebraska; Col. Craig Smyser directed the 

Alliance, Nebraska, office; Col. H. A. Morris 

became area engineer at Pierre, South Dakota; 

Col. J. S. Seybold supervised the Bismarck 

office; and Maj. William Mullin and Capt. John 

Morris headed the North Platte, Nebraska, 

The amount of snowfall during the blizzard of 1949 was so great that to deliver 

supplies, food, and mail, the Army used tracked vehicles called Weasels. This 

Weasel made a delivery to a ranch near Phillip, South Dakota.

Rapid City Journal
Postwar Emergencies ■ Operation Snowbound 227

office. These area office commanders submitted daily consolidated reports to Pick at 

Omaha, who assessed the daily requirements 

and realigned the crews and equipment to fit 

the needs. Because snow often blocked overland 

transport, the Corps’ geographically decentralized field organization contributed to operational success.

Relief supplies quickly got to the field, and by 

1 February nearly seven thousand people had 

been rescued, forty-six thousand cattle sustained, and 175 miles of roads reopened. The 

president, however, continued to add new territory to the official disaster region; eventually 

it included 193,000 square miles in Nebraska, 

Wyoming, South Dakota, and North Dakota.

Pick used his Missouri River Division and 

its district offices as the framework on which 

Operation Snowbound was built. He mobilized 

all division resources to manage the crews and 

equipment coming from Fifth Army or hired 

from contractors. He formed task forces for each 

selected area under the immediate direction of 

a Corps officer or experienced civilian. When 

air reconnaissance located stormbound people, 

Army Weasels equipped to run atop snow 

An Army bulldozer cleared snow from a road near Pierre, South Dakota. The Army coordinated more than one thousand bulldozers and heavy 

tractors used to help reach stranded towns, ranches, and livestock.

Photo courtesy of the State Archives of the South Dakota State Historical Society
228 Situation Desperate

moved out with vital supplies. The Weasels were 

followed by self-contained mobile strike forces, 

consisting of bulldozers, snowplows, fuel trucks, 

wreckers, tractors, and cargo vehicles, which 

cut their way through the snow into the isolated 

communities.

From his Omaha headquarters, Pick coordinated the responses of federal, military, Red 

Cross, state, county and local agencies. The 

Red Cross, transported in Army and Air Force 

vehicles or aircraft, went in to relieve human 

distress. The Corps, with its own and rented 

equipment, handled large-scale road clearance 

tasks. The logistics of the operation were as 

immense as a military campaign. When building the Ledo Road during the Second World 

War, Pick had available only 394 bulldozers; in 

Operation Snowbound he mobilized 1,320.

Tenth Air Force’s Operation Haylift merged 

into Operation Snowbound, its aircraft continuing to fly reconnaissance in difficult conditions and also air-dropping rations and hay into 

the areas of direst need. The 809th Engineer 

Aviation Battalion was also mobilized at Fort 

Francis Warren to clear snow from the roads 

leading to Lusk, Casper, Rawlins, Laramie, and 

Cheyenne, Wyoming.41

Extended exposure to high winds, biting cold, 

and drifting snow and the movement of heavy 

equipment made service during the mission 

extremely uncomfortable and hazardous. Winds 

and blizzards often closed roads behind the 

task forces, and drifts became so high that 

rotary snowplows sometimes could only tunnel 

through them. The work crews suffered frostbite 

and snow blindness, and one soldier and six 

civilians lost their lives in accidents.42

At its peak, 6,237 personnel participated in 

Snowbound. This number included 807 officers, 959 Corps civilians, and 4,008 contractors 

and crews, plus Navy, Air Force, and Red Cross 

workers. The heavy equipment clearing the snow 

totaled 1,665 units: 1,320 dozers, 121 graders, 

44 snowplows, and 168 Weasels. All participants 

in the mission lauded the Weasels, the M–29 

cargo carriers that moved over snow on the perilous rescue tasks that grabbed the headlines.

The job in Wyoming, Nebraska, and South 

Dakota was largely completed by 27 February, and 

Pick went east to become chief of engineers. Brig. 

Gen. George Stewart relocated the mission headquarters to Bismarck, North Dakota, where he 

mopped up and closed the mission on 15 March. 

Operation Snowbound had opened 115,048 

miles of roads, restoring access to 243,574 people 

and feeding more than four million livestock.43

This operation became the first disaster assistance mission for which Army Commendation 

Ribbons were awarded. Lt. Richard Hartline of 

the Missouri River Division was the only officer 

who received the ribbon, and among the six 

enlisted men thus distinguished were Corporals 

John Donnelly and Melvin Shoemaker of the 

Corps of Engineers. Corps civilian employees 

received meritorious civilian service awards.44

Snowbound’s after-action reviews recommended many improvements in combat equipment for cold weather operations. The most 

significant recommendation, however, was 

“It has been a battle, a battle waged against 

man’s oldest enemy—the forces of nature.”
Postwar Emergencies ■ Observations 229

to improve local responses to disasters. Most 

communities or county governments then had 

no organized disaster service committees to 

cooperate with the Army and Red Cross, and 

few civilians understood the procedures for 

obtaining assistance; often they telegraphed 

their congressmen, losing precious time while 

their requests filtered back to the Fifth Army 

disaster force. Fifth Army recommended that 

local disaster response committees be formed 

throughout the United States, with their functions coordinated by a national civil defense 

organization.45

In retrospect, Lucas of the Fifth Army heralded 

Operation Snowbound as valuable training 

experience for the army:

It has been a battle, a battle waged against 

man’s oldest enemy—the forces of nature. 

It has been excellent training for the 

Fifth Army Staff as well as for the staff of 

General Pick. Each one of these has operated exactly as it would in time of war and 

in actual battle.46

•

Observations

During the postwar years, the Corps confronted 

various emergency response challenges, and 

the manner in which it handled those missions 

brought increased recognition that it could deal 

effectively with disasters in addition to floods. 

Floods, however, remained the special province 

of the Corps. During the same time, the public 

had rising expectations of federal disaster assistance. After every disaster, the public expected 

that the Corps and the Army would arrive 

quickly with relief, just as they expected the 

cavalry to reach the fort on schedule in each 

Hollywood western. They also expected other 

federal agencies to step in immediately and offer 

various forms of aid to disaster victims. The 

political response to these rising expectations 

began with the Aiken Act of 1947 and continued with a probing congressional review of the 

needs for a federal agency to coordinate disaster 

assistance and a permanent national disaster 

relief policy.

•
230 Situation Desperate

1. Congressional Record, 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947, 

3583.

2. Ibid.; Galveston Engineer District, “Reports and 

Correspondence on the Texas City Disasters, April 

16–17, 1947,” 1947, Technical Library, 

HQUSACE, 1–12.

3. Galveston Engineer District, “Texas City 

Disasters, April 16–17, 1947,” 1947, 1–12; Freda 

M. Boyle, “The Army in Disaster Relief,” Army 

Information Digest 9 (Apr. 1954): 47–52; 

Congressional Record, 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947, 

A1852–53, A2435; Senate Committee on Public 

Works, Coordinating Emergency Activities of Federal 

Agencies in Disaster Areas, Hearings of June 14, 1948, 

80th Cong., 2d sess., 1948, 7.

4. Galveston Engineer District, “Texas City 

Disasters, April 16–17, 1947,” passim.

5. Ibid.; U.S. Army Engineer School, Information 

Handbook for Disaster Recovery Course (Fort Belvoir, 

Va.: Engineer School, 1956), 7-1 to 7-10.

6. Foster Rhea Dulles, The American Red Cross: A 

History (New York: Harper & Bros., 1950), 521–

22; Carter L. Burgess, “The Armed Forces in 

Disaster Relief,” Annals of the American Academy of 

Political and Social Science 309 (1957): 71; Bureau of 

Community Facilities, “Report on Disaster Surplus 

Property Program, December 31, 1947,” 7–8, 

NARA, RG 162, Federal Works Agency, Fleming 

Papers, Box 19.

7. Galveston Engineer District, “Texas City 

Disasters, April 16–17, 1947,” 33–57.

8. Congressional Record, 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947, 

8300.

9. Ibid.; House Committee on Expenditures, 

Alleviation of Damage from Flood or Other 

Catastrophe, 80th Cong., 1st sess., 16 July 1947, H. 

Rept. 959, passim.

10. See NARA, RG 162, Federal Works Agency, 

Fleming Papers.

11. Bureau of Community Facilities, “Disaster Surplus 

Property Program,” 1–6.

12. W. F. Heavey to Chief of Engineers, “Report on 

Rutland Flood,” 7 July 1947, Hydrologic 

Engineering Section, HQUSACE, passim.

13. Ibid.; Commander, First Army, to Director of 

Plans and Operations, 26 Aug. 1947, NARA, RG 

407, AGO Decimal Files, 1946–49, Dec. 400.38.

14. Commander, First Army, to Director of Plans and 

Operations, 26 Aug. 1947, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Decimal Files, 1946–49, Dec. 400.38; Bureau of 

Community Facilities, “Disaster Surplus Property 

Program,” 9–10, 14–17; Commander, Fourth 

Army, to Plans and Operations Division, “Detailed 

Activity Report on Hurricane Disasters, New 

Orleans, Louisiana, 19–23 September 1947,” n.d., 

NARA, RG 407, AGO Decimal Files, 1946–49, 

Dec. 400.38.

15. Rock Island Engineer District, “Flood of June 

1947 within the Rock Island District,” 1947, 

Hydrologic Engineering Section, HQUSACE, 

passim.

16. St. Louis Engineer District, “Report on Flood of 

April–July 1947,” n.d., Hydrologic Engineering 

Section, HQUSACE, passim.

17. Rock Island Engineer District, “Flood of June 

1947 within the Rock Island District,” passim; 

Davenport (Iowa) Times, 6 June 1947.

18. Congressional Record, 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947, 

A2873; Bureau of Community Facilities, “Disaster 

Surplus Property Program,” 11–13.

19. Congressional Record, 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947, 

A3083; Arthur Morrell to George H. Field, 14 

July 1947, NARA, RG 162, Federal Works 

Agency, Fleming Papers, Box 19.

20. Arthur Morrell to George H. Field, 14 July 1947, 

NARA, RG 162, Federal Works Agency, Fleming 

Papers, Box 19.

21. Senate Committee on Public Works, Coordinating 

Emergency Activities of Federal Agencies in Disaster 

Areas, Hearings of June 14, 1948, 80th Cong., 2d 

sess., 1948, 6–9, 66–67; Roy Scheufele, The History 

of the North Pacific Division, U.S. Army Corps of 

Engineers, 1888 to 1965 (Portland, Ore.: U.S. Army 

Engineer Division, 1969), 28–29; Seattle Engineer 

District, “Flood Emergency Report, 1948 

Columbia River Flood,” 1948, Hydrologic 

Engineering Section, HQUSACE, passim.

22. Seattle District, “Flood Emergency Report,” 1948, 

passim.

23. Portland Engineer District, “Report on Flood of 

May–June 1948,” 1949, Hydrologic Engineering 

Section, HQUSACE, passim.

24. Ibid.; Senate Committee on Public Works, 

Coordinating Emergency Activities of Federal Agencies 

in Disaster Areas, Hearings of June 14, 1948, 80th 

Cong., 2d sess., 1948, 38–42.

25. Portland District, “Report on Flood of May–June 

1948,” passim.

26. New York Times, 31 May, 1–2 June 1948; Stewart 

Holbrook, “The Mythmakers,” New Yorker 24 (31 

July 1948): 35–36; Scheufele, North Pacific 

Division, 28–29.

Chapter 10 Notes
Postwar Emergencies ■ Notes 231

27. Portland District, “Report on Flood of May–June 

1948,” passim; Scheufele, North Pacific Division, 

28–29.

28. New York Times, 12 June 1948.

29. Senate Committee on Public Works, Coordinating 

Emergency Activities of Federal Agencies in Disaster 

Areas, Hearings of June 14, 1948, 80th Cong., 2d 

sess., 1948, 38–42.

30. Ibid., 9.

31. Ibid.

32. See NARA, RG 162, Federal Works Agency, 

Fleming Papers.

33. William Cassidy to Adjutant General, 21 Feb. 

1948, NARA, RG 407, AGO Decimal Files, 

1946–48, Dec. 400.38, Box 1351.

34. Walter K. Wilson, Jr., to Chief of Engineers, 25 

June 1948, and R. L. Dean to Chief of Engineers, 

6 July 1948, untitled reports at Hydrologic 

Engineering Section, HQUSACE.

35. Mobile Engineer District, “Report on Emergency 

Flood Control Operations of Mobile District in 

Western Florida, Southeastern Alabama, and 

Southwestern Georgia, 5 April–9 July 1948,” 1948, 

Hydrologic Engineering Section, HQUSACE.

36. Ibid.

37. Ibid.

38. Ibid.

39. Ibid.

40. House Committee on Appropriations, Disaster 

Relief in Storm Stricken Areas, Hearings, Jan. 26, 

Feb. 1, 1949, 81st Cong., 1st sess., 1949, 1–12; 

Melvin B. Voorhees, “Battling the Blizzards,” 

Army Information Digest 4 (Apr. 1949): 10–20; 

Freda M. Boyle, “The Army in Disaster Relief,” 

Army Information Digest 9 (Apr. 1954): 47–52; 

Lewis A. Pick, “Operation Snowbound,” Military 

Engineer 41 (May 1949): 192–94. In the Fort 

Worth, Texas, flood of 17 May 1949, Galveston 

Engineer District supported Fourth Army; see 

Commander, Fourth Army, to Director of Plans 

and Operations, 6 June 1949, NARA, RG 407, 

AGO Decimal Files, 1949, Dec. 400.38.

41. Fifth Army, History Operation Snowbound: 29 

January–15 March 1949, n.d., printed by Fifth 

Army headquarters, Technical Library, 

HQUSACE, passim; Fifth Army Disaster Force, 

Disaster Operation Snowbound: Nebraska, Wyoming, 

South Dakota, and North Dakota, 29 January–March 

1949, 1949, Hydrologic Engineering Section, 

HQUSACE, passim.

42. Casualty list in Appendix Z, Fifth Army Disaster 

Force, Disaster Operation Snowbound, Z-1.

43. Fifth Army, History Operation Snowbound, passim; 

Fifth Army Disaster Force, Disaster Operation 

Snowbound, passim.

44. Military and civilian award recipients in Appendix 

Y, Fifth Army Disaster Force, Disaster Operation 

Snowbound.

45. List of lessons learned in Fifth Army Disaster 

Force, Disaster Operation Snowbound.

46. Pick, “Operation Snowbound,” 194.
10 opening Columbia Riv 

1948 Sim nostrud magniam 

consecte conse dolobortio 

odo commy nismodolor ad te 

diamcore volore dolor 

inciduisci tat am dolore te 

nismodolor ad te diamcore 

volore dolor inciduisci tat am.

Library of Congress

St. Vincent, Minnesota, was inundated by the flooding Red River in April 1950. Office of History
A National Policy on Disaster Relief ■ The Federal Works Agency and the Army 233

A National Policy on 

Disaster Relief

Through Maj. Gen. Philip Fleming, 

the Army Corps of Engineers played 

a leading role in the establishment of 

national disaster relief policy and, ultimately, a 

fulltime coordinating agency. In addition to his 

position with the Corps of Engineers, Fleming 

headed the Federal Works Agency (1939–49), 

which had participated in a number of major 

disaster recoveries and managed almost twenty 

thousand employees, including engineers. In 

1948 he called for the creation of a fulltime 

coordinating agency and assumed that the 

FWA would take on those responsibilities. He 

was wrong. With the passage of the Disaster 

Relief Act of 1950, Congress for the first time 

authorized a coordinated federal response to 

major disasters but no single coordinating 

agency emerged. That would wait another 

three decades for the creation of the Federal 

Emergency Management Agency in 1979.

•

The Federal Works Agency 

and the Army

“This source of materials and equipment is 

shrinking steadily,” Fleming warned President 

Truman. During its first year of operations 

under the Aiken Act, Fleming’s Federal Works 

Agency had responded to eight major disasters, 

dispensing medicines, blankets, nails, sheets, 

clothing, generators, water purifiers, tractors, 

bulldozers, and thousands of other items valued 

at $4 million.

The surplus stockpile from the Second World 

War had dwindled at an alarming pace. Noting 

that the extent of human and community needs 

that followed in the wake of disasters was 

almost endless, Fleming pointed out that Red 

Cross resources were limited and that disaster 

assistance remained a fertile field that needed 

plowing by federal agencies.1

In Fleming’s opinion, the Disaster Surplus 

Property Program had proven its worth in areas 

where equipment and materials were not locally 

available to fill the unforeseen gaps. It contrasted well with the earlier record of improvised 

and generally inadequate disaster relief provided 

by Congress on a case by case basis. Fleming 

concluded with a flourish: “Both my own 

experience and the nature of the problem lead 

me to believe that the time has come to consider a national policy for Federal aid in these 

emergency situations. The Federal Government 

should be ready to furnish more immediate aid, 

including financial assistance, and to act as the 

coordinating center for all Government help.”2

“Thank you for your timely letter,” replied 

President Truman, adding that this subject had 

been on his mind for some time. “I am gratified 

to know that you are studying this problem and 

I want to thank you for your consistent efforts to 

11

“...the time has come to consider a national 

policy for Federal aid in these emergency 

situations.”
234 Situation Desperate

coordinate disaster relief. We should now give 

consideration to making a permanent arrangement for disaster relief.”3

Fleming and his FWA staff drafted a bill to 

establish a continuing national policy on disaster relief and a fulltime coordinating agency. 

The Senate Public Works Committee took up 

the bill during the summer of 1948. Fleming 

naturally expected that all federal coordination of disaster assistance would be assigned to 

his Federal Works Agency and its Bureau of 

Community Facilities. It had, after all, acted by 

executive order as the coordinating agency at 

various disasters since 1947.

The FWA in 1948 administered the Bureau 

of Public Roads, the Public Buildings 

Administration, and the Bureau of Community 

Facilities. The Bureau of Public Roads had 

seven thousand employees, many of them 

capable engineers, and considerable heavy 

construction expertise. The Public Building 

Administration, with twelve thousand employees, had efficient structural and utility engineering capabilities. The Bureau of Community 

Facilities, which managed public housing and 

community service programs, had two thousand 

employees with administrative and federal–local 

liaison skills.

During the 1948 hearings, Fleming told the 

Senate Public Works Committee that warsurplus stockpiles would soon be exhausted. 

He argued that surplus property distribution 

as disaster relief should be replaced with a permanent national policy and disaster assistance 

should be coordinated by a federal agency to 

assure efficient relief administration. He then 

mentioned that thirteen different federal agencies had come under his purview during the 

Vanport disaster on the Columbia River. His 

staff seconded his arguments, contending that 

a coordinating agency could save both time and 

money in disaster crises.

Col. John Gerety of the Army General Staff’s 

Plans and Operations Division told the Public 

Works Committee the Army opposed the 

creation of a federal coordinating agency that 

might interfere with the timely Army and Corps 

of Engineers responses to disasters. The Army 

would not object to such an agency, however, if 

it had authority only for post-disaster cleanup, 

recovery, and reconstruction. As an illustration, 

he said the Army could furnish trench latrines 

during disaster operations, but it wanted no 

involvement with restoration of community 

sewage systems and similar public facilities.4

The U.S. Coast Guard’s representative said his 

service wanted a clear distinction made between 

emergency search-and-rescue and recoveryand-rehabilitation operations. The Coast Guard 

therefore preferred the formation of two federal 

coordinating agencies, one for the upfront crises 

and another for the backburner missions.5

Maj. Gen. Roscoe C. Crawford, the deputy 

chief of engineers, advised the committee that 

the Corps of Engineers did not wish to enlarge 

its emergency response duties to include postdisaster recovery, nor had it any opposition to 

the formation of an agency to manage federal 

rehabilitation efforts. It insisted, nevertheless, 

that the integrity of its authority in flood control 

“We look upon this flood fighting up there 

as a front-line fight...”
A National Policy on Disaster Relief ■ The Federal Works Agency and the Army 235

and flood fight contingencies not be abrogated. 

“We look upon this flood fighting up there as 

a front-line fight,” Crawford insisted, “and we 

want to be able to carry that on and get that over 

with and then pull out, and then some other 

agency can coordinate all this relief.”6

Because the bill under consideration in 1948 

did not distinguish between the urgent crisis 

management by the Army, Coast Guard, and 

Corps of Engineers and the secondary recovery 

and rehabilitation efforts, the Public Works 

Committee tabled it. President Truman then 

directed Fleming and the FWA to confer with 

all interested federal agencies and draw up a 

new bill designed to establish a permanent federal policy on disaster assistance. As drafted in 

1949, the new bill created a fund to reimburse 

federal agencies for their disaster relief costs 

and to allocate monies to local governments 

for rebuilt public facilities, the latter in lieu 

of the war-surplus property dispensed under 

the 1947 Aiken Act. The bill designated the 

Federal Works Agency as disaster assistance 

coordinator of all federal activities, but again it 

made no clear distinction between urgent rescue 

and relief operations and subsequent recovery 

tasks. In the meantime, Fleming retired, and 

in 1949 the FWA became the General Services 

Administration.7

Army authorities divided over the effectiveness of the new bill. The chief of engineers and 

the director of logistics recommended that the 

Army, instead of the Federal Works Agency, 

be designated the coordinating agency for all 

federal disaster assistance. The Army General 

Staff’s Plans and Operations Division, however, 

supported the proposed bill for several reasons. 

First, it would supply ample funding for disaster 

operations, ending the need to submit deficiency 

appropriation requests to Congress for reimbursement of funds depleted during disaster 

operations. Second, in the wake of each disaster, 

the Army received many pleas for assistance 

from governors, members of Congress, and 

other civil officials, and the proposed coordinating agency would protect the Army from 

the criticism that often came when it could not 

honor all the competing requests for assistance. 

Finally, the Army needed to maintain its distance from civil functions.8

The Plans and Operations Division strongly 

emphasized the importance of its last reason, 

philosophizing:

This overall coordinating agency should 

not be from the NME [National Military 

Establishment] as the disaster might be 

coincident with the commencement of hostilities or occur during war-time when the 

NME (Army) is fully committed to its primary mission. We must refrain from getting 

our command structure, communications 

net, and resources involved in the primary 

responsibility for disaster work which might 

seriously interfere with our principal role. 

Even in a peace time disaster it should 

not be a military function to coordinate 

the relief activities of agencies such as the 

Departments of Agriculture and Interior. 

There has already been popular criticism of 

“Major disasters in the future, as in the past, will from time to time 

require prompt Federal assistance to stricken communities.”
236 Situation Desperate

military men and agencies taking over civil 

functions.9

The principles advocated by the Plans and 

Operations Division prevailed, and the Army 

issued its tentative approval of legislation 

designed to establish a coordinating agency and 

a permanent national policy on disaster relief. In 

his budget message of 1950, President Truman 

noted his support for the legislation: “Major 

disasters in the future, as in the past, will from 

time to time require prompt Federal assistance 

to stricken communities. I again urge enactment 

of pending legislation to provide in advance 

adequate funds to meet such needs.”10

•

Disasters of 1950

There were no disasters in 1950 on the scale of 

the Texas City blast of 1947, the Vanport flood 

of 1948, or Operation Snowbound in 1949. 

But, like most years, natural disasters occurred 

on a scale sufficient to mobilize the Corps of 

Engineers. To provide a relatively complete 

account of the Corps’ emergency response 

record, a brief description of the calamities of 

1950 is required.

A Wabash River flood washed through Indiana 

and Illinois in January 1950. Col. John Person, 

commanding at Louisville, mobilized his 

district and secured reinforcements from Fort 

Knox. The Corps directed the troops, who built 

a mudbox bulkhead atop the floodwall protecting Vincennes, Indiana, and saved the town 

from inundation. The town’s mayor expressed 

his appreciation to the chief of engineers: “It is 

quite a coincidence that these same gentlemen 

rescued our people and city in 1943 and again so 

efficiently in 1950. Is it any wonder that we find 

it hard to express our thanks adequately?”11

Fourteen inches of rain fell over Kansas and 

Nebraska during three days in May, causing 

record flooding and twelve drownings. As usual, 

the Omaha and Kansas City Corps offices 

applied their full resources to help communities maintain their flood protection structures 

against the rising waters. Corps personnel from 

the two offices boarded skiffs with outboard 

motors to retrieve people from the flooded 

towns of Marysville, Kansas, and Beatrice, 

DeWitt, and Talmage, Nebraska.12

Soldiers of Company A, 10th Engineer Battalion collected 

unexploded ammunition that was strewn around the vicinity 

of South Amboy, New Jersey, when an ammunition barge 

exploded in the harbor in May 1950.

Historical archives of the Sadie Pope Dowdell Library 

of South Amboy, New Jersey
A National Policy on Disaster Relief ■ Disasters of 1950 237

A violent non-deluge disaster occurred on 19 

May 1950 when an ammunition barge in the 

harbor at South Amboy, New Jersey, exploded, 

heavily damaging the town and killing thirtyone. The governor of New Jersey called the First 

Army’s commander for assistance, and he sent 

troops from Fort Monmouth to patrol the town. 

These troops found undetonated ammunition lying about the streets, so the commander 

ordered an engineer demolition team to South 

Amboy from Fort Devens, Massachusetts. 

Twenty-five troops of Company A, 10th 

Engineers, led by Lt. Hugh Casey, cleared the 

town of explosive ammunition. They recovered 

six thousand mines—and also twelve bodies, 

which they sent to the local coroner. The Fifth 

Army commander subsequently remarked that 

the engineers’ efforts curtailed further losses and 

injuries, making the situation a “sudden” event 

instead of a “major” disaster.13

Col. J. S. Seybold, leading the Corps’ South 

Pacific Division, oversaw the response to 1950’s 

westernmost disaster, the destructive floods 

caused by snowmelt in the Sacramento–San 

Joaquin river basins and the Truckee, Carson, and 

Receding floodwaters from the Truckee River flowed through the streets of Reno, Nevada. The Riverside Hotel (left) shows the high water mark 

on its façade. Sacramento District
238 Situation Desperate

Walker river valleys in California and Nevada. 

Although the Corps’ Sacramento office helped 

local officials with flood fights and the evacuation of twenty-five thousand people, property 

damages still totaled $37.5 million. In the flood’s 

aftermath, the Sacramento office spent $1.1 million repairing the levees at seventy points.14

•

Floods in the 

St. Paul District , 1950

The most memorable deluges of 1950, however, 

occurred on the Red River of the North and 

the upper Mississippi River at the very time 

Congress was debating the necessity of establishing a permanent federal policy on disaster 

assistance.

On the Red River of the North, which flows 

north between Minnesota and North Dakota 

to Canada’s Lake Winnipeg, snow and ice melt 

first along its southern headwaters. As the melt 

flows north, it sometimes encounters ice on 

the river’s main stem. When this phenomenon 

occurred in the spring of 1950, water backed 

over 1.2 million acres of land in the basin, 

causing damages estimated at $33 million. It 

flooded many communities and took five lives 

at Pembina, North Dakota, near the Canadian 

border.15

Col. Leverett G. Yoder at St. Paul issued flood 

warnings and sent survey teams to the disaster 

site, declaring an emergency and distributing 

sandbags to the local governments attempting to raise levees. Yoder also opened liaison 

with the Red Cross and Canadian engineers to 

Engineer soldiers patrolled near Aitkin, Minnesota, in an amphibious DUKW. The vehicle was equipped with a makeshift rack in case of 

livestock rescue. Office of History
A National Policy on Disaster Relief ■ Floods in the St. Paul District 239

keep them posted on the flood’s advance; the 

Canadians subsequently conducted an epic flood 

fight at Winnipeg.16

Simultaneously, the Corps office contended 

with floods on the upper Mississippi River and 

along the Sheyenne in the Missouri River basin. 

At Aitkin, Brainerd, and Palisade in Minnesota, 

the upper Mississippi River hit record stages and 

the Corps performed rescue and evacuation in 

skiffs and amphibious vehicles.17

After inspecting the critical situation in the 

Sheyenne valley, Yoder decided to operate the 

Baldhill Dam for flood control, even though 

the dam then was not entirely completed. He 

directed the dam project’s resident engineer, 

W. C. Lincoln, to take his staff to Valley City, 

North Dakota, and fight the river there to 

save the city’s power plant. On these successful efforts, Senator William Langer of North 

Dakota later commented: “Valley City was 

saved by the Baldhill Reservoir and Mandan 

by the Heart Butte Dam, 110 miles upstream. 

Baldhill was constructed by the Army Corps of 

Engineers, and Heart Butte by the Bureau of 

Reclamation. Mandan had the added protection 

of a high levee constructed by the Army engineers, without which Mandan would have been 

flooded by the runoff from the watershed below 

the Heart Butte Dam.”18

On 20 April President Truman determined 

that “major disasters” existed in the states of 

Minnesota and North Dakota. He allocated 

$400,000 from his executive emergency fund 

and directed the regional office of the General 

Services Administration (GSA) to administer 

the assistance. Through the Federal Property 

and Administrative Services Act of 1949, the 

GSA had absorbed the Federal Works Agency. 

By the end of fiscal year 1950, just before 

Congress enacted a permanent federal policy on 

disaster relief, the GSA had disbursed $745,000 

from the president’s emergency fund for the 

disaster relief extended during four disasters: a 

During the flooding of 1950, the 682d Engineer Battalion used DUKWs to rescue 

people trapped in their houses in Grand Forks, North Dakota.

Minnesota Historical Society (Lee-Evanson Studio)

“Valley City was saved by 

the Baldhill Reservoir...

constructed by the Army 

Corps of Engineers...”
240 Situation Desperate

Montana snowstorm, floods in North Dakota, 

floods in Minnesota, and floods in Nebraska.19

•

Federal Disaster Relief Act

of 1950

During the floods in the St. Paul Engineer 

District, Senators Edward Thye and Hubert 

Humphrey and Congressman Harold Hagen 

inspected the disaster areas with Yoder and Brig. 

Gen. Don Shingler, the division engineer. The 

legislators were studying federal disaster policies at the time, and later they described what 

they saw during the spring floods of 1950 to 

the House and Senate Public Works committees. Hagen sponsored the bill that became the 

Federal Disaster Act of 1950.20

When the House debated a bill on 7 August to 

establish continuing funding and a coordinating agency for disaster relief, Hagen presented 

a long list of disaster assistance precedents compiled by the Library of Congress. He declared 

the proposed policies would eliminate the 

haphazard methods of handling disaster assistance that had prevailed since 1803. Michigan’s 

George Dondero seconded Hagen, arguing that 

this bill would bring order out of chaos. “When 

a disaster occurs in the United States,” said 

Dondero, “under the present law we appropriate 

the money without its being previously authorized, or someone rushes in here and introduces 

a bill in order to provide the money. That takes 

time, and before that time elapses the question 

of the need of the people has passed.”

Congressman John Byrnes of Wisconsin feared 

the proposed bill would result in the shirking of 

responsibilities by state and local governments. 

Sounding much like the states’ rights southerners who opposed federal disaster relief before 

the Civil War, Byrnes issued a dire warning: 

“This just establishes the principle, this is just 

a beginning. It will be like every other new 

Government program; it will grow, and grow, 

and grow. Five or ten years from now it will be 

$25,000,000 instead of five.”

Kenneth Keating of New York agreed with 

Byrnes. He lamented that the bill merely “set up 

an additional kitty for the President to pass out 

any time he sees fit, here, there, or yonder, without any satisfactory standards.” He urged retention of the case-by-case disaster relief program 

of earlier years in order that Congress might 

exercise full control over the purse strings.

John Kunkel of Pennsylvania objected that the 

bill merely established another bureaucracy. “If it 

is once made permanent,” he said of the proposed 

coordinating agency, “then you will get away 

from emergency relief and you will begin adding 

new functions. The next thing you know we will 

have a bureau, and that bureau will come up here 

wanting more and more functions given to it.”21

Despite these vocal objections, the bill received 

overwhelming approval in the House; it 

went to the Senate, where debates began on 

19 September. Senator John McClellan of 

Arkansas, as the bill’s principal proponent, 

fielded the questions. Remembering that a 

“It will be like every other new Government program; it will grow, and grow, 

and grow.”
A National Policy on Disaster Relief ■ Observations 241

flash flood had recently damaged Botetourt 

and Rockbridge counties in his state, Senator 

A. Willis Robertson of Virginia asked if the bill 

would apply to that disaster, or to disasters of 

that scope, pointing out that even the loss of a 

single home constituted a “major disaster” in the 

eyes of the homeowner.

McClellan answered at length, denying that the 

bill applied to all disasters large or small, or that 

it intended to compensate people suffering losses 

everywhere. Its application would be restrictive, 

he elaborated:

The purpose of the bill is to meet emergency 

needs, and to meet a situation which the 

local people cannot meet except at the cost 

of great suffering and hardship. It is not to 

make whole everyone who may lose property 

or may sustain damage. If we were going to 

do that, of course, the Government would 

get into everything. But this plan is something which has been used before. We have 

made appropriations such as this before. At 

this time we are attempting to provide for 

a somewhat different administration of the 

program.22

The Federal Disaster Relief Act passed in the 

Senate by voice vote, and President Truman 

signed it into law on 30 September 1950. Initially, 

federal coordination of disaster relief fell to the 

Housing and Home Finance Agency. Over several years, a succession of Department of Defense 

organizations took over the mission. In 1979 the 

newly-created Federal Emergency Management 

Agency took over the role of coordinating disaster 

relief as its primary mission. Although the Corps 

of Engineers had viewed with trepidation the formation of an organization to coordinate disaster 

assistance, it actually expanded the Corps’ role in 

disaster recovery missions.

•

Observations

Before 1950 the Corps typically participated 

in rescue, relief, and flood fight activities 

but seldom in the recovery, reconstruction, 

or rehabilitation phases. After passage of the 

Federal Disaster Relief Act, the Corps still 

led the first-phase activities under its statutory 

responsibilities and Army Regulation 500-

60, and the Housing and Home Finance 

Agency and its successors also began relying 

on the Corps’ expertise for help with its postdisaster operations. The disaster reconstruction 

programs—clearing debris, restoring utility services, building temporary housing for 

refugees—required engineering and construction management capabilities for which the 

Corps was famous, and the Corps’ civil works 

organization had the skilled personnel available 

in field offices across the country. Why should 

the coordinating agency staff up for this work 

when the Corps could accomplish it at lower 

long-range costs to the nation?

•

“The purpose of the bill is to meet emergency needs, and to meet a 

situation which the local people cannot meet except at the cost of great 

suffering and hardship.”
242 Situation Desperate

1. Philip Fleming to the President, 1 Mar. 1948, 

NARA, RG 162, Federal Works Agency, Fleming 

Papers, Box 19.

2. Ibid.

3. Harry Truman to Philip Fleming, 3 Mar. 1948, 

NARA, RG 162, Federal Works Agency, Fleming 

Papers, Box 19.

4. Senate Committee on Public Works, Coordinating 

Emergency Activities of Federal Agencies in Disaster 

Areas, Hearings of June 14, 1948, 80th Cong., 2d 

sess., 1948, 33–35, 50; includes Fleming’s 

testimony.

5. Ibid., 21.

6. Ibid., 13–15.

7. House Committee on Public Works, Aid to States 

and Local Governments in Major Disasters: Hearings, 

18–19 July 1950, 81st Cong, 2d sess., 1950, 1–9.

8. Ray Maddocks, Director of Plans and Operations, 

to Chief of Staff, “Proposed Disaster Relief 

Legislation,” 14 Feb. 1949, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Decimal Files, 1949, Dec. 400.38, Paper 1-1-49.

9. Ibid.; see Frank Pace, Jr., Secretary of Army, to 

Director, Bureau of Budget, 20 Jan. 1951, NARA, 

RG 407, AGO Decimal Files, 1951–52, Dec. 

400.38, Box 732.

10. As quoted in House Committee on Public Works, 

Aid to States and Local Governments in Major 

Disasters: Hearings, 18–19 July 1950, 81st Cong, 2d 

sess., 1950, 76.

11. ARCE (1950), 1819; Henry Schricker to Lewis 

Pick, 28 Jan. 1950, and William Betz to Lewis 

Pick, 26 Jan. 1950, John Person File, Stein 

Historical Document Collection, Lakes and Rivers 

Engineer Division, Cincinnati, Ohio.

12. Kansas City District, “Report on Floods and Flood 

Damages in the Kansas City District during 1950,” 

7 Jan. 1951, Hydrologic Engineering Section, 

HQUSACE, passim.

13. Commander, First Army, to Adjutant General, 19 

July 1950, NARA, RG 407, AGO Decimal Files, 

1949–50, Dec. 370.1.

14. Sacramento Engineer District, “Report on 

November–December 1950 Floods,” 1951, 

Hydrologic Engineering Section, HQUSACE, 

passim.

15. House Committee on Public Works, Aid to States 

and Local Governments in Major Disasters: Hearings, 

18–19 July 1950, 81st Cong, 2d sess., 1950, 32–36.

16. Department of Mines and Natural Resources, 

Province of Manitoba, Notes on Red River Floods 

with Particular Reference to the Flood of 1950

(Winnipeg, Man.: C. E. Leech, 1950), passim; 

L. G. Yoder to Chief of Engineers, 21 Aug. and 

6 Oct. 1950, Hydrologic Engineering Section, 

HQUSACE.

17. L. G. Yoder to Chief of Engineers, 6 Oct. 1950, 

Hydrologic Engineering Section, HQUSACE.

18. House Committee on Public Works, Aid to States 

and Local Governments in Major Disasters: Hearings, 

18–19 July 1950, 81st Cong, 2d sess., 1950, 96–99; 

Congressional Record, 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950, 

5778–91.

19. House Committee on Public Works, Aid to States 

and Local Governments in Major Disasters: Hearings, 

18–19 July 1950, 81st Cong, 2d sess., 1950, 82.

20. Lewis Pick to Secretary of Army, 26 Apr. 1950, 

and Frank Pace, Secretary of Army, to Luther 

Youngdahl, 24 Apr. 1950, NARA, RG 407, AGO 

Decimal Files, 1949–50, Dec. 400.38, Box 794.

21. Congressional Record, 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950, 

11895–11914.

22. Ibid., 15095–98.

Chapter 11 Notes

Above: Corps of Engineers officials arrived within 

hours after the tornadoes struck in Pleasant Hill, 

Missouri, on the afternoon of 4 May 1977.

Office of History

Two Corps employees discussed debris 

removal at Cabot, Arkansas, which was 

devastated by tornadoes in 1976.

Office of History
Summary ■ 245

Summary

Reviews of federal disaster assistance frequently list 1803 as the date of the first

 disaster relief law enacted by Congress, 

a date taken from the 1950 Library of Congress 

list of disaster relief legislation. Because of 

the legal circumstances surrounding the early 

legislation, however, any precedents cited that 

predate 1865 are questionable as to legislative 

intent. Before 1865 Congress provided disaster 

relief in special circumstances under its foreign 

relations and territorial prerogatives, and it did 

not clearly assert any federal power to assist 

disaster victims.

Federal disaster assistance actually began just 

after the Civil War in efforts to help the former 

slaves of the South survive Mississippi River 

flooding of the late 1860s. Once disaster relief 

had been extended to the former slaves, it 

became increasingly difficult for Congress to 

resist providing similar assistance to other citizens on the grounds of constitutional objections.

Federal disaster relief, beginning in the South, 

retained a southern flavor through the 1940s 

because the South, subject to earthquakes, 

floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, and various 

combinations thereof, simply experienced more 

disasters than other sections of the nation. It 

was in the South that the Corps of Engineers 

performed its first disaster relief mission during 

the Mississippi River flood of 1882 in support 

of the Army Quartermasters’ emergency ration 

distribution program.

With equipment and trained personnel stationed 

along American waterways, the Corps’ civil 

works team was the best suited among all federal or military agencies for conducting rescue 

and providing relief during floods. By the end of 

the nineteenth century, the term “flood fight” 

automatically aroused public visions of the Army 

Engineers managing immense labor forces 

chucking thousands of sandbags into place on 

the levees or steaming up the bayous to pluck 

refugees from treetops and floating houses.

The special training, experience, and expertise 

of the Corps soon brought it additional disaster 

assistance missions. Preparing damage surveys, 

installing temporary bridges, fighting urban 

conflagrations—these tasks and more were 

assigned to the Corps by the president, secretary 

of war, Army department commanders, and by 

ratifying acts of Congress.

While the Corps’ first disaster missions involved 

transporting quartermaster emergency rations 

to refugee camps, by 1913 its officers had come 

to question this form of disaster assistance, 

chiefly because they needed labor for the levee 

flood fights and had trouble obtaining it when 

refugees could secure free food and shelter in 

the camps administered by the Red Cross. The 

Corps advocated substituting a “no work, no 

rations” policy for the free rations program, 

and in 1916 Congress extended the Corps an 

opportunity to test its concept. Briefly in 1916 

the Corps replaced the Quartermasters as the 

primary federal agency involved in disaster assistance, implementing its work relief program that 

foreshadowed the federal employment agencies 

created to combat the Great Depression.
246 Situation Desperate

The promising start made with the work relief 

concept proved abortive, however, when the 

Army in 1917 reorganized its disaster relief 

responsibilities. The Army transferred command and control in disaster crises to its 

departmental or corps area officers, who typically funneled disaster assistance through the 

American Red Cross. Although the Corps 

retained its duty to preserve navigation and 

flood control structures, it acted at the behest 

of Army department or corps area commanders and in support of the Red Cross during the 

rescue, relief, and recovery phases of natural 

disasters.

Some great disasters far exceeded the resources 

of the American Red Cross, however, and during the devastation of the 1927 Mississippi River 

flood the president appointed the first disaster 

assistance coordinator, Herbert Hoover, who 

managed the services offered by the Red Cross, 

the Army, the Corps, and all participating 

federal agencies. During the Depression of the 

1930s, federal relief efforts found reinforcement 

from work relief agencies such as the Civilian 

Conservation Corps and Works Progress 

Administration.

After experiencing the challenges presented by 

the 1937 floods on the Ohio and Mississippi 

rivers, the Corps initiated efforts to improve 

its emergency response. It undertook advance 

planning and improved its communications 

networks, thus perceptively improving its 

A fire in remote Bethel, Alaska, in 1978 left the town without water and sewer service. The Corps of Engineers designed and built an emergency 

above-ground replacement system so innovative that it won an engineering design award. Office of History
Summary ■ Lessons Learned 247

readiness both for natural disasters and for war. 

These steps reaped benefits during the Second 

World War, when the Corps supplemented its 

meager forces with combat engineer troops and 

prisoners-of-war to achieve success during flood 

fights and other emergencies. This improvement also became apparent in postwar disasters 

such as the Texas City explosion and Operation 

Snowbound.

By 1950 the Corps had an established reputation for swift, effective responses to all kinds of 

emergencies. Its geographically dispersed civil 

works organization staffed by highly trained 

specialists brought it disaster relief missions 

of a wide variety. Indeed, a few Corps officers 

would have supported making the total federal 

program of disaster assistance a Corps responsibility, but the Army’s General Staff, fearing that 

disaster relief assignments might interfere with 

national defense capabilities, disapproved of 

involving the Army in what it viewed as a civil 

function. The Corps, nevertheless, preserved its 

role as the leading federal agency during flood 

disasters, and the Housing and Home Finance 

Agency, which in 1951 assumed the mission of 

federal disaster relief coordination, soon learned 

to rely on the Corps to respond to any emergency with its traditional 

•

Essayons spirit.

Lessons Learned

Although it is admittedly risky to generalize 

about disaster relief operations so varied as 

those performed by the Corps from 1882 to 

1950, identifiable patterns do emerge. After 

every disaster mission, after-actions reviews are 

required by regulation to contain a list of lessons 

learned. It is through study of these lessons that 

the Corps improves its emergency management 

skills. The history of Corps performance during 

disasters up to 1951 reveals some general lessons:

Decentralization: The Corps has a wellestablished tradition of being the first federal 

agency to reach disaster sites to provide assistance and to conduct damage assessments. This 

tradition resulted from the Corps’ geographically decentralized civil works organization, 

with field offices generally much closer to disaster sites than other federal organizations. The 

availability of trained personnel and equipment 

useful during emergencies at installations scattered across the nation is a feature that brought 

the Corps its earliest disaster relief assignments 

and has stood it in good stead since. The Corps 

has been able to respond quickly to every major 

flood disaster and at least has been near the 

locations of disasters of every kind.

Personnel: Many disaster recovery tasks were 

assigned to the Corps because it had personnel 

available with special talents and experience. 

The Corps had employees skilled in hydraulic 

engineering, structural engineering, demolition 

technology, temporary bridge construction, 

and other specialty fields. Its employees could 

manage complex operations, handle boats in 

rough waters, and perform other tasks while also 

complying with government regulations and 

responding to command instructions.

Liaison: Emergency responses require the Corps 

to deal directly with the public, the media, 

state and local officials, elected federal representatives, and various public and private relief 

agencies. Recovery from disaster is enhanced if 

liaison has been established in advance so that 

mutual confidence prevails. No finer example 

of the benefit of good relationships is found 
248 Situation Desperate

than a congressman’s opposition during the 

1890 Mississippi River flood to any limits 

on the Corps’ response because he knew the 

Mississippi River Commission’s president personally and trusted him implicitly. Emergency 

response effectiveness can always be improved 

through advance contacts with appropriate 

officials so that mutual confidence exists when 

disasters strike.

Planning: The advance planning for emergency 

contingencies that the chief of engineers initiated in 1938 reduced response times, decreased 

confusion and delays, and encouraged aggressive 

action by Corps field personnel. Rather than 

passively waiting for victims to request aid, 

Corps field teams moved into disaster areas to 

offer all the assistance available under existing 

law and regulations.

Uniforms: The demoralized people of Johnstown 

were given hope in 1889 when uniformed engineer troops arrived, and the engineers marching 

into San Francisco streets in 1906 were cheered 

by the earthquake victims. The appearance of 

a single Corps officer at an 1896 disaster site 

quelled public panic.

Leadership: As participants in emergency 

response efforts before 1950 often noted, disaster 

assistance missions and combat engineering are 

similar. Military training in adverse conditions 

can enhance the response to natural disasters; 

experience during disasters can develop combat 

capabilities. Disaster missions often require 

close liaison with National Guard and Regular 

Army units, and the Corps’ military leadership 

provides that liaison.

Demolition: In 1904, 1906, 1931, and on other 

occasions the Corps was called upon to manage 

demolition during urban conflagrations. During 

other types of disasters, demolition technology 

also was used to break ice jams in rivers, remove 

ammunition and explosives from disaster sites, 

and manage ammonium nitrate threats. The 

Corps certainly will maintain demolition capabilities for combat engineering, which will be 

available if needed in response to disaster.

Flood fights: Since the beginnings of the Corps’ 

flood protection and flood control missions in 

the 1880s, the Corps has managed flood fights 

because it has expertise and resources unavailable to other agencies. A central control is often 

vital to successful management of emergency 

measures necessary to reduce flood damages.

Reviews: After-action reviews of Corps disaster 

recovery missions often contain recommendations for equipment and management improvements based on experiences during actual 

operations. Post-disaster reports, for example, 

made useful recommendations on bridging 

equipage after the 1903 Kansas River flood, on 

construction equipment after the 1921 Pueblo 

flood and 1948 Florida flood, and on Army 

cold weather operations after 1949’s Operation 

Snowbound.

These then are the obvious lessons learned 

of the Corps disaster relief operations before 

1950; there were many others pertaining to 

unique situations that can be traced through 

examination of the contemporary after-action 

reviews. Such a course was followed in 1950 

“...a trained and experienced military organization actually working and 

living on the ground,...has a better chance of successfully fighting a major flood 

than any civilian organization that could possibly be put together.”
Summary ■ Lessons Learned 249

when Maj. Gen. (soon to be Lt. Gen.) Lewis 

Pick, Chief of Engineers, sought to prevent the 

transfer of Corps civil works missions to another 

agency. He prepared a publication that described 

the history of Corps disaster assistance efforts 

together with related missions to outline the 

reasons why civil works should remain an Army 

responsibility. Pick collected supporting information from retired Corps officers to include in 

his publication. Among the materials gathered 

was a communication from Lt. Gen. Eugene 

Reybold, the former chief of engineers who 

had managed, masterfully, the 1937 flood fight 

on the Mississippi River. “In my judgment,” 

Reybold summarized, “a trained and experienced military organization actually working 

and living on the ground, with key personnel 

talking the same language, has a better chance 

of successfully fighting a major flood than any 

civilian organization that could possibly be 

put together.”1

•

Navy divers from the Mobile Diving and Salvage Unit operated from the Corps 

crane barge Wade during search and recovery efforts following the collapse of 

the I-35 bridge in Minneapolis, 8 August 2007.

U.S. Navy photograph (MCSN Joshua Adam Nuzzo)

Note

1. Eugene Reybold to Lewis Pick, 22 Dec. 1949, in The Chief of Engineers’ Memorandum to the Secretary of the Army 

on the Hoover Commission Proposal to Transfer Civil Works from the Corps of Engineers (Washington, D.C.: U.S. 

Army Corps of Engineers, 1950), Section 4:5.

Annotated Bibliography ■ Archival Sources 251

Archival Sources

U.S. Army. Corps of Engineers. Field Operating Agencies. Corps Districts and Divisions maintain historical files 

containing information on specific disasters in their geographic region. Consult published histories of each office 

for citations.

U.S. Army. Corps of Engineers. Office of the Chief of Engineers. The Hydrologic Engineering Section in 1981 

stored copies of storm, flood, and disaster operations reports since 1945, with some dating back to 1930. Reports like 

these have since been absorbed by the Headquarters/HECSA Library.

U.S. Army. Corps of Engineers. Office of the Chief of Engineers. The Technical Library in 1981 stored many 

technical reports, including printed and mimeographed after-action reviews of Corps disaster relief operations. The 

Technical Library has since become the Headquarters/HECSA Library.

U.S. Army. Corps of Engineers. Office of the Chief of Engineers. National Archives, Record Group 77. This large 

and complex collection of the Chief of Engineers’ retired records contains correspondence and after-action reports on 

Corps disaster relief missions. The DeGrange Index accesses the earliest records prior to 1866; for 1867 to 1893 each 

year’s letters sent and received are separately indexed; “General Correspondence, 1894–1923” (Entry 103) covers the 

years stated, and “Civil Works, 1923–1942” (then at Washington National Records Center, Suitland, MD) includes 

the Rivers and Harbors files and District files including Bulkies. For records since 1942, accession numbers must 

be obtained. The files of specific Corps Divisions and Districts may be found in various Federal Regional Records 

Centers or at the originating offices until the records are retired.

U.S. Department of State. National Archives, Record Group 59. Dispatches from U.S. Consuls in La Guaira, 

Venezuela, 1810–1906. Microfilm 84, 23 rolls. Roll 1, September 6, 1810, to December 12, 1827, contains the 

dispatches of Robert Lowry and Alexander Scott, who administered the disaster relief extended to victims of the 

Venezuelan earthquake of 1812.

U.S. Federal Works Agency. National Archives, Record Group 162. In 1981 the records of this agency, 1930–1950, 

were in the Natural Resources Branch of the National Archives. They contain the General Philip B. Fleming papers 

and records of the Bureau of Community Facilities, which administered disaster relief under the 1947 Aiken Act.

U.S. War Department. Adjutant General Office. National Archives, Record Groups 94 and 407. This voluminous 

collection contains copies of correspondence and after-action reports on Army and Corps disaster relief missions. It is 

especially valuable for the period after 1917 when the Army’s Corps area commanders became responsible for disaster 

assistance in assigned geographic areas of the United States.

Congressional Documents

In addition to congressional debates and actions as recorded in the Annals, Debates, Globe, and Record, and in 

committee prints of hearings, the following materials were consulted in this study.

U.S. Congress. House. Committee on Foreign Affairs. Alexander Scott. Report prepared by Edward Everett. 

20th Cong., 2d sess., 1829. H. Rept. 72. A claim by the American consul who distributed provisions to Venezuelan 

earthquake victims in 1812.

U.S. Congress. House. Report of the Secretary of War. 42d Cong., 3d sess., 1872. H. Exdoc. 1. Reports Army activities 

during 1871 Chicago fire but does not mention the Corps of Engineers.

———. Committee on Appropriations. Supplies to Sufferers from Overflow of Southern Rivers. Report prepared by 

William W. Belknap. 43d Cong., 2d sess., 1874. H. Exdoc. 14. Report on issue of Army supplies to flood victims 

along Mississippi, Tombigbee, Warrior, and Alabama rivers under act of Congress, 23 April 1874. Discusses abuse of 

Quartermaster ration issues; it does not mention the Corps of Engineers.

Annotated Bibliography
252 Situation Desperate

———. Committee on Foreign Affairs. Relief for the Irish People. Report prepared by Jacob Dolson Cox. 46th Cong., 

2d sess., 1880. H. Rept. 465. Recommends relief of famine in Ireland in 1880; discusses legislative precedents for 

disaster relief appropriations and concludes there should be no constitutional objections to extending relief to Ireland.

———. Senate. Committee on Military Affairs. Reports...Relative to Amount of Supplies...for Relief of Sufferers by the 

Overflow of the Mississippi River. Report prepared by Robert T. Lincoln. 47th Cong., 2d sess., 1882. S. Exdoc. 144. 

Secretary of War reports on relief furnished to flood victims by the Army during the 1882 Mississippi River flood.

———. House. Committee on Appropriations. Destitution Caused by the Overflow of the Mississippi River. Report 

prepared by Robert T. Lincoln. 47th Cong., 2d sess., 1882. H. Exdoc. 126. Secretary of War reports on damages of 

flooding in 1882 and work of the Army supplying the disaster victims.

———. House. Report of the Secretary of War. 47th Cong., 2d sess., 1882. H. Exdoc. 1. Contains information on 1882 

Mississippi River flood.

———. Committee on Rivers and Harbors. Floods in the Mississippi River. Report prepared by Redfield Proctor. 

51st Cong., 2d sess., 1890. H. Exdoc. 281. Army Signal Officer reports on flood fight on Mississippi River in 

March 1890.

———. Floods upon the Mississippi River. Report prepared by Redfield Proctor. 51st Cong., 2d sess., 1890. 

H. Exdoc. 291. Chief of Engineers and President of Mississippi River Commission report on the flood fight on 

Mississippi River in 1890.

———. Committee on Appropriations. Affairs in the Overflowed Districts of Louisiana. Report prepared by Redfield 

Proctor. 51st Cong., 2d sess., 1890. H. Exdoc. 342. Army Quartermaster report on 1890 flood emergency in St. 

James and Ascension parishes, Louisiana.

———. Senate. Sufferers by the Recent Floods in the Mississippi Valley. Report prepared by William McKinley. 55th 

Cong., 1st sess., 1897. S. Doc. 25. President William McKinley recommends Congress offer disaster relief to 1897 

Mississippi River flood victims.

———. Report on Introduction of Domestic Reindeer into Alaska. Report prepared by Sheldon Jackson. 55th Cong., 

3d sess., 1898. S. Doc. 34. Report on using reindeer to deliver relief supplies to destitute miners in the Klondike; no 

Corps of Engineers involvement.

———. Committee on Public Buildings and Grounds. Government Buildings Damaged in San Francisco. Report 

by Leslie M. Shaw. 59th Cong., 2d sess., 1905. S. Doc. 433. Secretary of Treasury lists damages to government 

buildings by earthquake and heroic work of Lt. C. C. McMillan of Revenue Cutter Bear during the disaster; no 

Corps of Engineers involvement.

———. House. Committee on Appropriations. Army Supplies at San Francisco. Report prepared by Theodore 

Roosevelt. 59th Cong., 1st sess., 1906. H. Doc. 781. Secretary of War asks $500,000 to pay for Army disaster relief 

after the earthquake.

———. Repair and Preservation of Fortifications in San Francisco Harbor. Report prepared by Leslie M. Shaw. 59th 

Cong., 1st sess., 1906. H. Doc. 851. Chief of Engineers asks $5,000 to repair fortifications damaged by earthquake.

———. Relief for San Francisco. Report prepared by Theodore Roosevelt. 59th Cong., 1st sess., 1906. H. Doc. 714. 

Secretary of War asks $1 million for disaster relief and includes reports by Army Quartermaster, Commissary, and 

Medical corps.

———. Senate. Committee on Foreign Relations. Appreciation of...Sympathy Shown by Foreign Individuals, 

Corporations, Municipalities, and Governments with Reference to the Recent Disaster at San Francisco. Report prepared by 

Theodore Roosevelt. 59th Cong., 1st sess., 1906. S. Doc. 427. Lists aid furnished San Francisco by foreign nations.

———. House. Flood Sufferers in the Mississippi and Ohio Valleys. Report prepared by J. E. Normoyle. 62d Cong., 2d 

sess., 1912. H. Doc. 1453. Quartermaster report on relief to 1912 flood victims; includes maps and photos.

———. House. Committee on Appropriations. Appropriations for the Relief of Sufferers from Floods in the Mississippi 

and Ohio Valleys. Report prepared by John Joseph Fitzgerald. 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912. H. Rept. 631. Recommends 

$697,179 for Army relief to 1912 flood victims.

———. Estimate of Appropriation on Account [of] Mississippi River Floods. Report prepared by Franklin MacVeagh. 

62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912. H. Doc. 704. Chief of Engineers, Quartermaster General, and Commissary General 

report on need for flood fight and disaster relief funding during the 1912 flood.
Annotated Bibliography ■ Congressional Documents 253

———. Subsistence of Flood Sufferers along the Mississippi River. Report prepared by Franklin MacVeagh. 62d Cong., 

2d sess., 1912. H. Doc. 711. Army estimates needs of 83,000 flood refugees in 1912.

———. Senate. Mississippi River Floods. Report prepared by C. McD. Townsend. 63d Cong., 1st sess., 1913. 

S. Doc. 204. President of Mississippi River Commission thinks levees are only practical means of preventing flood 

damages in lower Mississippi valley.

———. House. Elements of Flood Control. Report prepared by C. McD. Townsend. 63d Cong., 1st sess., 1913. 

H. Doc. 51, President of Mississippi River Commission advocates “levees only” program for flood protection.

———. Rescuing Flood Victims in the Middle Western States. Report prepared by S. I. Kimball. 63d Cong., 1st sess., 

1913. H. Doc. 94. Life Saving Service reports rescues during 1913 Ohio floods.

———. Report of Ohio Flood Board. Report prepared by William T. Rossell. 63d Cong., 1st sess., 1913. H. Doc. 246. 

Special Corps of Engineers board studies flood damage causes during 1913 Ohio floods and recommends extending 

federal jurisdiction over navigable waterways to include all waters, thereby preventing encroachments on stream 

channels.

———. Committee on Rivers and Harbors. Prevention of Damage by Floods. Report prepared by Lindley M. 

Garrison. 63d Cong., 2d sess., 1914. H. Doc. 914. Ohio Flood Board discusses flood protection methods.

———. Committee on Flood Control. Flood Protection and Prevention. Report prepared by Newton D. Baker. 

64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916. H. Doc. 1792. Ohio Flood Board recommends surveys for flood protection and federal 

regulation of encroachments on stream banks.

———. Committee on Military Affairs. Relief of Flood Sufferers in Southern States. Report prepared by Stanley 

Hubert Dent, Jr. 64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916. H. Rept. 1070. Secretary of War reports damages from Southern floods 

in July 1916 and the need for disaster assistance.

———. Relief of Destitute Persons in Districts Overflowed by the Mississippi River. Report prepared by William Jason 

Fields. 64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916. H. Rept. 162. Committee on Military Affairs recommends Secretary of War be 

authorized to furnish disaster relief to victims of the Mississippi River flood of the spring of 1916.

———. Senate. Committee on Appropriations. Floods in the Mississippi Delta. Report prepared by Joseph Taylor 

Robinson. 64th Cong., 2d sess., 1916. S. Rept. 106. Committee recommends Secretary of War furnish tent shelter to 

victims of the spring 1916 flood on the Mississippi River.

———. Committee on Military Affairs. Relief of Sufferers from Floods in Vicinity of Fabens and El Paso, Tex., in 

September, 1925. Report prepared by James Wolcott Wadsworth, Jr. 69th Cong., 2d sess., 1926. S. Rept. 1193. 

Secretary of War reports on Army relief furnished to Rio Grande flood disaster victims; no mention of Corps of 

Engineers.

———. Committee on Appropriations. Flood Relief, Mississippi River. Report prepared by Calvin Coolidge. 70th 

Cong., 2d sess., 1928. S. Doc. 56. Bureau of Budget asks $1.5 million to reimburse Mississippi River Commission for 

costs of 1927 flood fight.

———. Estimate for Flood Relief in Vermont and New Hampshire. Report prepared by Calvin Coolidge. 70th Cong., 

2d sess., 1928. S. Doc. 78. Recommends $3.3 million to restore roads damaged by November 1927 flood.

———. House. Committee on Roads. Vermont Flood Relief. Report prepared by John Marshall Robinson. 70th 

Cong., 2d sess., 1928. H. Rept. 952. Recommends appropriation to restore roads destroyed by November 1927 flood.

———. Relief of the State of Kentucky. Report prepared by John Marshall Robinson. 70th Cong., 2d sess., 1928. 

H. Rept. 907. Recommends appropriation to restore roads damaged by the 1927 flood in eastern Kentucky.

———. Senate. Committee on Military Affairs. Relief of Sufferers of the Mississippi River Flood of 1927. Report 

prepared by David Aiken Reed. 71st Cong., 3d sess., 1931. S. Rept. 1360. Secretary of War asks funds to reimburse 

Army expenses during 1927 flood fight.

———. Senate. Relief of Flood Sufferers, 1937. Report prepared by C. B. Baldwin. 75th Cong., 1s sess., 1937. 

S. Doc. 84. Resettlement Administration reports grants to rehabilitate 1937 flood victims.

———. Senate. Committee on Commerce. Emergency Flood Control Works. Report prepared by John Holmes 

Overton. 78th Cong., 1st sess., 1943. S. Rept. 360. Recommends $10 million to repair damages to flood control 

structures in 1943.
254 Situation Desperate

———. House. Committee on Flood Control. Emergency Repairs to Flood Control Works. Report prepared by William 

Madison Whittington. 78th Cong., 1st sess., 1943. H. Rept. 596. Recommends $10 million to repair damages to 

flood control structures resulting from 1943 floods.

———. Senate. Committee on Commerce. Emergency Repairs to Flood Control Works. Report prepared by Joel 

Bennett Clark. 78th Cong., 2d sess., 1944. S. Rept. 882. Recommends $12 million appropriation to restore flood 

control structures damaged by 1944 floods.

———. House. Committee on Flood Control. Emergency Repairs to Flood Control Works. Report prepared by William 

Madison Whittington. 78th Cong., 2d sess., 1944. H. Rept. 1444. Recommends $12 million to restore flood control 

structures; includes flood damage report by Chief of Engineers.

———. Emergency Repairs to Flood Control Works. 79th Cong., 1st sess., 1945. H. Rept. 581. Report prepared by 

William Madison Whittington. Recommends $12 million to restore flood control structures; includes report on 

1945 flood damages by Chief of Engineers.

———. Senate. Committee on Commerce. Emergency Flood Control Relief Act. Report prepared by John Holmes 

Overton. 79th Cong., 1st sess., 1945. S. Rept. 245. Recommends $12 million to restore flood control structures 

damaged by 1945 floods.

———. Committee on Appropriations. Appropriation for Emergency Flood Control Work. Report prepared by Kenneth 

Douglas McKellar. 79th Cong., 1st sess., 1945. S. Rept. 327. Lists 1945 flood damages and recommends $12 million 

to restore flood control structures.

———. House. Committee on Appropriations. Appropriation for Emergency Flood Control Work. Report prepared by 

Clarence Andrew Cannon. 79th Cong., 1st sess., 1945. H. Rept. 652. Recommends $12 million for restoration of 

flood control structures.

———. Senate. Committee on Expenditures in the Executive Departments. Alleviation of Damage from Flood or 

Other Catastrophe. Report prepared by George David Aiken. 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947. S. Rept. 435. Recommends 

enactment of bill allowing distribution of war surplus property to disaster victims (Aiken Act).

———. House. Committee on Expenditures in the Executive Departments. Alleviation of Damage from Flood 

or Other Catastrophe. Report prepared by Clare Eugene Hoffman. 80th Cong., 1st sess., 1947. H. Rept. 959. 

Recommends enactment of bill allowing distribution of war surplus property to disaster victims (Aiken Act).

———. Senate. Committee on Public Works. Coordinating Emergency Activities of Federal Agencies in Disaster Areas: 

Hearings on S. 2831. 80th Cong., 2d sess., 1948. Study of creating a permanent federal policy on disaster assistance 

and a coordinating agency; includes testimony by R. C. Crawford for Corps of Engineers.

———. House. Committee on Appropriations. Disaster Relief in Storm Stricken Areas: Hearings, Jan. 26, Feb. 1, 1949. 

81st Cong., 1st sess., 1949. Hearings on funding Army disaster force in snowbound states.

———. House. Committee on Public Works. Authorizing Federal Assistance to States and Local Governments in 

Major Disasters. Report prepared by William Madison Whittington. 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950. H. Rept. 2727. 

Recommends enactment of Federal Disaster Relief Act of 1950.

———. Committee on Public Works. Aid to States and Local Governments in Major Disasters: Hearings, 18–19 July 

1950. 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950. Testimony on establishing a permanent federal policy on disaster relief; includes 

information about the Red River of the North flood of 1950.

———. Senate. Committee on Public Works. Authorizing Federal Assistance to State and Local Governments in Major 

Disasters. Report prepared by John Little McClellan. 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950. S. Rept. 2571. Recommends 

enactment of Federal Disaster Relief Act of 1950.

———. House. Committee on Public Works. Disaster Relief: Hearings, 18–19 June 1950. 81st Cong., 2d sess., 1950. 

Testimony on the need for establishing a permanent federal policy on disaster relief.

———. Senate. Committee on Public Works. Amending Section 5 of the Flood Control Act of August 18, 1941. Report 

prepared by Dennis Chavez. 84th Cong., 1st sess., 1955. S. Rept. 540. Recommends funding for advance flood 

preparations and deleting word “maintenance” from 1941 Flood Control Act. (This investigation led to enactment of 

PL 99-84.)
Annotated Bibliography ■ Government Publications and Pamphlets 255

Government Publications and Pamphlets

Branyan, Robert L. Taming the Mighty Missouri: A History of the Kansas City District Corps of Engineers, 1907–1971.

Kansas City, Mo.: U.S. Army Engineer District, 1974. Well-researched history that reviews Missouri River flooding 

and Kansas City District’s flood fights.

Cincinnati Relief Committee. The Flood in the Ohio, February, 1884. Cincinnati: Chamber of Commerce, 1884. 

Pamphlet. Describes private relief efforts at Cincinnati during the 1884 flood. No mention of the Corps of 

Engineers mission.

Citizens’ Relief Committee. Report of the Citizens’ Relief Committee Appointed after the Great Baltimore Fire, February 

7 and 8, 1904. Baltimore: Relief Committee, 1904. Pamphlet. Lists charitable disbursements after 1904 Baltimore 

fire—485 families received assistance. No mention of the Corps of Engineers mission.

Citizens’ Relief Committee of Pittsburgh. The Flood of 1884 in the Ohio Valley. Pittsburgh, 1884. Pamphlet. Summary 

of charitable relief activities during the 1884 flood in the upper Ohio River basin. Discusses assistance supplied by 

Army Quartermasters.

Clay, Floyd. A History of the Little Rock District. Little Rock: U.S. Army Engineer District, 1971. Standard official 

history with minor treatment of emergency operations.

Cowdrey, Albert E. The Delta Engineers: A History of the United States Army Corps of Engineers in the New Orleans 

District. New Orleans: U.S. Army Engineer District, 1971. This District history includes extensive discussions of 

flood fights and flood disasters on the lower Mississippi River.

Follansbee, Robert, and Edward F. Jones. The Arkansas River Flood of June 3–5, 1921. Water Supply Paper 487. 

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Geological Survey, 1922. A hydrologic investigation of the 1921 Pueblo flood that includes 

interviews with eyewitnesses and excellent flood and damage pictures.

Galveston Engineer District. “Reports and Correspondence of the Texas City Disaster, April 16–17, 1947.” 

Galveston: U.S. Army Engineer District, 1947. Bound mimeographed report. An after-action report that contains 

interesting discussion of the authorities under which action was taken.

Henry, Alfred J. The Flood of 1913 in the Rivers of the Ohio and Lower Mississippi Valley. Bulletin Z. Washington, 

D.C.: Department of Agriculture, Weather Bureau, 1913. Hydrologic investigation of the spring 1913 floods.

Johnson, Leland R. Engineers on the Twin Rivers: A History of the Nashville District, Corps of Engineers, United States 

Army, 1769–1978. Nashville: U.S. Army Engineer District, 1978. A district history that discusses flooding and Corps 

disaster assistance missions in the Cumberland and Tennessee river basins.

———. The Falls City Engineers: A History of the Louisville District, Corps of Engineers, United States Army. Louisville: 

U.S. Army Engineer District, 1975. This history includes discussions of flooding and Corps disaster assistance 

missions in the lower Ohio River basin.

———. The Headwaters District: A History of the Pittsburgh District, Corps of Engineers, U.S. Army, 1754–1977. 

Pittsburgh: U.S. Army Engineer District, [1979]. This district history includes discussions of flooding and Corps 

disaster assistance missions in the upper Ohio River basin.

———. Men, Mountains and Rivers: An Illustrated History of the Huntington District, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 

1754–1974. Huntington, W. Va.: U.S. Army Engineer District, 1977. This district history includes discussions of 

flooding and Corps disaster assistance missions in the middle Ohio River basin.

Louisiana Relief Commission. Report of the Relief Commissioners of the Overflowed Districts, State of Louisiana. New 

Orleans: Times-Democrat Print, 1882. Pamphlet. Includes a list of disbursements and recipients of disaster assistance 

after the 1882 Mississippi River flood; the commission distributed supplies furnished by the Army Quartermasters.

Lumsden, L. L. Sanitation of Flood-Stricken Towns and Cities, with Special Reference to Conditions Observed in River 

Towns and Cities of Kentucky. Public Health Service Report 131. Washington, D.C.: USPHS, 1913. Investigation of 

sanitary problems after the 1913 flood at Catlettsburg, Maysville, Paducah, Columbus, and Wycliffe, Kentucky, and 

measures taken by Public Health Service and Red Cross; includes damage photographs.

McGlashan, Harvey D., and R. C. Briggs. Floods of December 1937 in Northern California. Water Supply Paper 843. 

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Geologic Survey, 1938. Hydrologic investigation of floods of December 9–12, 1937, in the 

Kaweah, Pit, and Trinity river basins of California, with maps and disaster damage photographs.
256 Situation Desperate

Manitoba. Department of Mines and Natural Resources. Notes on Red River Floods with Particular Reference to the 

Flood of 1950. Winnipeg, Man.: C. E. Leech, 1950. Describes 1950 flood fight at Winnipeg.

Mississippi River Commission. Expenditure of Emergency Funds for Flood Protection. Printed for use of Senate 

Committee on Commerce, 62d Cong., 2d sess., 1912. A nine-page report that describes the 1912 flood fight 

on the Mississippi and explains emergency expenditures.

Morrill, Park. Floods of the Mississippi River. Bulletin E. Washington, D.C.: Department of Agriculture, Weather 

Bureau, 1897. Describes precipitation patterns and flooding in the Mississippi valley during the 1897 flood and 

includes weather maps and disaster photographs.

New Hampshire. Disaster Emergency Committee. Flood and Gale, September 1938. Concord: Disaster Emergency 

Committee, 1938. State agency record of the September 1938 hurricane that describes storm, damages, and relief 

measures and includes maps of damaged areas.

Office of Emergency Preparedness. Federal Disaster Assistance Program Handbook. Circular 4000.78. Washington, 

D.C.: OEP, March 1971. This pamphlet reviews federal policies of 1971 on disaster assistance and offers a brief 

history of such policies.

Orange, Massachusetts. Enterprise and Journal. A Story in Pictures of the Hurricane and Flood of September 21, 1938.

Orange: Enterprise and Journal, 1938. Pamphlet. A souvenir of the 1938 flood disaster at Orange that includes 

photographs of the flood.

Risch, Erna. Quartermaster Support of the Army: A History of the Corps, 1775–1939. Washington, D.C.: Quartermaster 

General, 1962. This standard history of the Quartermaster Corps contains a brief discussion of the Quartermaster 

role in the early federal program of disaster assistance.

Scheufele, Roy. The History of the North Pacific Division, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 1888 to 1965. Portland, Ore.: 

U.S. Army Engineer Division, 1969. This history discusses the 1948 Vanport disaster, the 1964 Alaska earthquake, 

and the 1964 Christmas floods in Oregon and Washington.

Troxell, Harold C. Floods of March 1938 in Southern California. Water Supply Paper 844. Washington, D.C.: U.S. 

Geological Survey, 1942. Hydrologic study of the March 1938 floods from San Diego north to San Luis Obispo 

including damage estimates, streamflow measurements, and flood photographs.

Turhollow, Anthony F. A History of the Los Angeles District, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 1898–1965. Los Angeles: 

U.S. Army Engineer District, 1975. This history discusses flood disasters within the district and includes damage 

photographs.

Tweet, Roald. A History of the Rock Island District, Corps of Engineers. Rock Island, Ill.: U.S. Army Engineer District, 

1975. This history briefly mentions the Corps disaster relief mission of 1882 and discusses other flood disasters.

U.S. Army. Chief of Ordnance. Reports, 1860–1889. Vol. 3. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1890. 

This third volume of reports contains descriptions of the disastrous explosion at Washington Arsenal in 1863.

———. Corps of Engineers. The Chief of Engineers’ Memorandum to the Secretary of Army on the Hoover Commission 

Proposal to Transfer Civil Works from the Corps of Engineers. Washington, D.C.: Chief of Engineers, 1950. Bound 

mimeographed study. In this document, the Chief of Engineers maintains that military training was valuable during 

natural disaster operations, and, in support of his thesis, he submits letters from J. C. H. Lee, Eugene Reybold, and 

other Corps officers who describe their experiences during disasters.

———. Corps of Engineers. Engineer School. Information Handbook for Disaster Recovery Course. Fort Belvoir, Va.: 

Engineer School, 1956. Training text for emergency planning and disaster recovery operations. Discusses Corps 

response to the Texas City explosion, the 1955 California floods, and Operation Noah.

———. Fifth Army Disaster Force Snowbound. Snowbound: Nebraska, Wyoming, South Dakota, and North Dakota. 29 

January–March 1949. Omaha: Fifth Army Disaster Force, 1949. Bound mimeographed report. After-action report 

by commander of Fifth Army Disaster Force that includes correspondence, photographs, newspaper clippings; it 

perhaps is the best after-action report ever written on a disaster recovery mission.

———. Headquarters, Fifth Army. History: Operation Snowbound, 29 January–15 March 1949. Chicago: Fifth Army, 

1949. An after-action report by Fifth Army on the relief rendered during the Great Plains blizzards of 1949 that 

includes copies of correspondence and many photographs.
Annotated Bibliography ■ Articles, Pamphlets, and Dissertations 257

U.S. War Department. Chief of the Militia Bureau. Annual Reports. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing 

Office, 1921–1932. These annual reports describe National Guard disaster operations; the reports later became the 

annual report of the Chief of the National Guard Bureau.

———. Corps of Engineers. Annual Report of the Chief of Engineers (ARCE). Washington, D.C.: Government Printing 

Office, 1867–1950. This serial set describes Corps emergency responses, especially in connection with flooding.

Articles, Pamphlets, and Dissertations

Abair, Joseph G. The Flood of November 3 and 4, 1927, Montpelier, Vermont. Montpelier: author, 1928. Pamphlet. 

Popular account of the 1927 Vermont flood disaster that includes photographs; it mentions the Red Cross’s role in 

disaster relief but not the Corps of Engineers’.

Andersson, K. S. “Soo Bascule Bridge Failure.” Military Engineer 34 (May 1942): 242–44. Describes failure of the 

bridge over St. Mary’s Falls Canal locks on 7 October 1941 and the consequent loss of a train, followed by body 

recovery, channel clearance, and bridge restoration; includes operations pictures.

“The Army in Flood Time.” Quartermaster Review 15 (Mar.–Apr. 1936): 33–35. Describes the Army response to 

936 floods in the northeastern states, the Quartermaster disaster relief efforts, and Corps flood fights; includes a 

photograph of the Potomac River flooding in Washington, D.C.

Bain, George C. “The St. Louis Disaster.” Harper’s Weekly 40 (6 June 1896): 570. News account of the tornado 

disaster at St. Louis, Missouri, on 27 May 1896; no mention of the Corps of Engineers.

Bartlett, Leroy, Jr. “Demolition in Civil Conflagration.” Military Engineer 27 (May–June 1935): 17–81. Lieutenant 

Bartlett describes demolition methods used by engineers at San Francisco in 1906 and at Managua in 1931 and 

suggests improved methods of demolition to stop fires; includes pictures of demolition at San Francisco and Managua.

Bassford, Homer. “What a Cyclone’s Attack on a Great Community Means.” Harper’s Weekly 40 (13 June 1896): 594. 

Eyewitness report of tornado disaster at St. Louis, Missouri, on 27 May 1896.

Bell, J. Franklin. “Flood Control on the Sacramento.” Military Engineer 21 (Jan.–Feb. 1929): 6–9. Colonel Bell 

discusses the history of storms and flooding in the Sacramento River basin, California; includes map and photographs.

Beretta, J. W. “Emergency Ponton Bridge at Hidalgo, Texas.” Military Engineer 33 (May–June 1941): 239–43. 

Captain Beretta describes hasty construction of ponton bridge over the Rio Grande, replacing one that collapsed on 

12 November 1939. Beretta, a reserve officer who built the bridge, used wooden pontons assembled at the site. The 

article includes diagrams and photographs.

“A Birdseye View of Conditions in the Ohio Flood Districts.” Engineering News 69 (17 Apr. 1913): 794–98. 

Reporters describe the 1913 floods in the Ohio River basin; includes excellent flood and damage pictures.

Boyle, Freda N. “The Army in Disaster Relief.” Army Information Digest 9 (Apr. 1954): 47–52. Reviews the 

Army’s roles.

Brandt, Lilian. “Rehabilitation Work in San Francisco.” Charities and the Commons 17 (Oct. 1906): 25–46. Discusses 

the activities of Red Cross and local relief committees for 1906 earthquake victims, with photographs of relief work.

Breaux, Gustave A. “1937 Flood at Louisville.” Filson Club History Quarterly 11 (Apr. 1937): 109–18. History of Ohio 

River floods and eyewitness account of the 1937 flood at Louisville, Kentucky; no mention of the Corps of Engineers.

“Bridling the Mississippi.” Literary Digest 44 (20 Apr. 1912): 798–99. News reports about the 1912 Mississippi River 

flood; includes disaster photographs and a cartoon.

Burgess, Carter L. “The Armed Forces in Disaster Relief.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social 

Science 309 (1957): 71. Social analysis of Army role.

Chambers, J. S. “Quartermaster Activities in the Mississippi Flood.” Quartermaster Review 7 (May–June 1928): 

14–20. Quartermaster officer discusses the operations during the 1927 Mississippi River flood and in Vermont and 

Kentucky; includes copies of correspondence and disaster photographs.

Clemens, George R. “The Mississippi Meets the 1937 Flood.” Civil Engineering 7 (1937): 379–83. Account of 

Memphis Engineer District’s flood fight in 1937 by an engineer who helped build mudboxes at the Cairo, Illinois, 

floodwall; includes flood fight pictures.
258 Situation Desperate

Dains, Mary K. “The St. Louis Tornado of 1896.” Missouri Historical Review 47 (Apr. 1972): 431–50. History and 

photographs of the tornado and damages at St. Louis on 27 May 1896; no mention of federal assistance.

Deakyne, Herbert. “Bridging the Kaw River in the 1903 Flood.” Military Engineer 20 (May–June 1928): 198–200. 

Deakyne recalls his service during the Kansas River flood of June 1903 when constructing a temporary bridge at 

Kansas City.

Deweese, Tex, and Rudy Moc. Lorain Tornado: Souvenir and Memorial Book. Lorain, Ohio: authors, 1924. Pamphlet. 

Thrilling account of the June 28, 1924, tornado and post-disaster cleanup with excellent photographs and a list of 

casualties; no mention of the Corps of Engineers mission.

Ely, Frank D. “An Earthquake Chronicle: Feeding Stricken San Francisco.” Journal of the Military Service Institution

39 (1906): 197–204. Captain Ely describes the relief dispensed by the Army to victims of the 1906 earthquake.

Eschrick, John. “He Knows the Fury of War and Floods.” Louisville (Ky.) Courier-Journal (7 April 1946). An 

interview with B. B. Talley mentions his work during the 1937 Ohio River flood.

Eyre, Jehu. “Colonel Eyre’s Journal of His Trip from New York to Pittsburgh, 1762.” Western Pennsylvania Historical 

Magazine 27 (Mar.–June 1944): 37–50. British engineer reports on flood at Pittsburgh in 1762.

Finch, Henry A. “Personal Experiences on Flood Duty.” Military Engineer 15 (Sep.–Oct. 1923): 398–400. Captain 

Finch recalls his emergency service at Hamilton, Ohio, and Helena, Arkansas, during 1913 floods. He discusses the 

“no work, no rations” policy; includes flood fight photographs.

Fogle, Fred. “It Happened to Jeff.” Quartermaster Review 16 (Mar.–Apr. 1937): 17–19, 63–66. Quartermaster officer 

reviews the 1937 flood at Jeffersonville Quartermaster Depot on the Ohio River; includes photographs of the flood.

“Four Stages of the Flood.” Survey 58 (1 July 1927): 357. Discussion of Red Cross coordination with five federal 

agencies under the Mississippi Flood Committee headed by Herbert Hoover during the 1927 Mississippi River flood.

Funston, Frederick. “How the Army Worked to Save San Francisco.” Cosmopolitan Magazine 41 (July 1906): 239–48. 

Memoir by Funston, who directed Army efforts to secure the city and stop the fire after the earthquake; includes 

disaster relief photographs.

Garriot, F. B. “The West Indian Hurricane of September 1–12, 1900.” National Geographic 11 (Oct. 1900): 384–92. 

Weather Bureau officials describe the hurricane that devastated Galveston, Texas, on 8 September 1900 and provide 

maps showing the storm’s course.

Ginsberg, Stephen H. “The Police and Fire Protection in New York City, 1800–1850.” New York History 52 (Apr. 

1971): 133–50. A survey that mentions the fire of 1835 and prints an illustration but does not mention Joseph Swift’s 

role in stopping the fire.

Glenn, Mary N. “A Task for Fortitude and Delicacy.” Charities and the Commons 17 (1906): 626–29. Personal memoir 

by a disaster recovery worker following the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

Godfrey, Stuart C. “Notes from a Mississippi Flood Diary.” Military Engineer 19 (Nov.–Dec. 1927): 489–93. 

Selections from Major Godfrey’s diary, 19 April to 1 June 1927, detailing the Corps flood fight and rescue efforts 

along the Mississippi; includes flood, rescue, and relief photographs.

Grant, James A. “Engineering Aspects of the New England Hurricane of September, 1938.” Military Engineer 19 

(Mar.–Apr. 1939): 79–86. Placing the storm in historic perspective, Grant discusses storm meteorology and flood 

damages, providing weather maps, barometer reading graph, and damage photographs.

“The Great Earthquake.” Public Opinion 1 (11 Sep. 1886): 431–34. Prints a selection of newspaper reports on the 

August 1886 earthquake at Charleston, South Carolina.

“The Great Floods.” Harper’s Weekly 26 (11 Mar. 1882): 135, 156, 203. Series on the 1882 floods in the Ohio and 

Mississippi river basins that includes excellent sketches by staff artists of the floods and damage.

Greely, Adolphus W. “The Mississippi Floods.” North American Review 102 (May 1890): 618–30. Army Chief Signal 

Officer attempts to explain causes of the 1890 Mississippi River flood.

Harger, Charles M. “The Recent Floods of the Middle West.” Review of Reviews 28 (July 1903): 74–78. Account of 

the 1903 floods at Topeka, Kansas City, and St. Louis with pictures of the floods and damage.

“High Water, High Marks.” Survey 73 (Mar. 1937): 73–74. Red Cross personnel at Cincinnati, Louisville, and 

Frankfort report on the 1937 flood disaster.
Annotated Bibliography ■ Articles, Pamphlets, and Dissertations 259

Holbrook, Stewart. “The Mythmakers.” New Yorker 24 (31 July 1948): 35–38. Reporter describes rumors of secret body 

disposal by federal agencies arising after the 1948 Vanport disaster and attempts to determine the rumors’ origins.

Holcombe, W. H. “Flood Fight on the Lower Mississippi.” Military Engineer 19 (Sep.–Oct. 1927): 384–91. 

Holcombe, who was New Orleans District commander during the 1927 flood, buttresses his eyewitness account with 

excellent flood pictures.

Horn, Stanley J. “The Flood of 1937 in the Ohio Valley.” Civil Engineering 7 (May 1937): 326–30. Captain Horn, 

assistant to the Louisville District engineer, describes emergency operations in the district during the flood and 

provides flood and damage photographs.

“How Birds Point Fuseplug Levee Was Breached with Dynamite.” Engineering News-Record 118 (4 Feb. 1937): 155.

Hudson, James J. “The California National Guard in the San Francisco Earthquake and Fire of 1906.” California 

Historical Quarterly 55 (Summer 1976): 137–49. Scholarly study of the controversy surrounding National Guard 

disaster operations that concludes there was some looting and misconduct by Guardsmen but that they performed 

creditably on the whole; includes excellent disaster photographs.

Humphreys, Hubert. “Photographic Views of the Red River Raft, 1873.” Louisiana History 12 (Spring 1971): 101–08. 

Record of work performed by Lt. Eugene A. Woodruff and the Corps of Engineers on the Red River Raft in 1873; 

includes a map and superb photographs of the raft and Corps snagboats.

“In the Wake of the Flood.” Survey 30 (12 Apr. 1913): 53. Brief account of rescue and relief work during the 1913 

flood disaster in the Ohio River basin.

Jewett, Henry C. “A History of the Corps of Engineers to 1915.” Military Engineer 14 (Sep.–Oct. 1922): 304–06. 

Jewett mentions Corps services during civil disasters and riots.

Johnson, Leland R. “19th Century Engineering: The Johnstown Flood.” Military Engineer 66 (Jan.–Feb. 1974): 

42–45. An account of the first disaster relief mission performed by Engineer troops, who placed temporary bridges at 

Johnstown in 1889; includes a map and photographs.

———. “No Work, No Rations: Army Engineers’ Work Relief in Southern States.” Journal of Mississippi History 67 

(Summer 2005): 107–33. Scholarly history of the evolution of work relief in the Deep South.

Kellogg, Arthur. “Behind the Levees.” Survey 58 (1 June 1927): 277–92. Red Cross official describes the 1927 

Mississippi River flood and disaster recovery work by his agency and the Corps of Engineers; includes excellent 

pictures of rescue and relief work.

Kellogg, Paul. “Shock Troops and the Floods.” Survey 82 (Apr. 1936): 100–101. Eyewitness description of Red Cross 

and WPA disaster relief work in Pennsylvania during the 1936 flood.

Kirk, Arthur. “Use of Dynamite to Break Up the Jam at Johnstown.” Transactions of the Engineers’ Society of Western 

Pennsylvania 5 (1889): 123–48. Demolition expert discusses his effort to remove debris lodged against the stone 

bridge at Johnstown after the 1889 flood.

Knowles, Morris. “Lessons from Ohio Reservoirs.” Survey 30 (10 May 1913): 216–18. Hydraulic engineer describes 

the failures of canal reservoirs during the March 1913 flood in Ohio and concludes the failures did not contribute to 

flood damages; includes photographs of dam failures.

Koch, Herbert F. “The Flood of 1913.” Cincinnati Historical Society Bulletin 25 (Jan. 1967): 136–49. Eyewitness 

account of the 1913 flood in Ohio by a volunteer who helped bury the dead at Hamilton.

Lane, E. W. “History of Flood Control on the Mississippi.” Civil Engineering 4 (Feb. 1934): 1–67. Reviews flooding 

on the Mississippi River and provides maps showing locations of levee crevasses in 1912, 1913, 1916, 1922, and 1927.

Lane, Winthrop D., and Lewis E. Stein. “The Houses the Red Cross Built.” Survey 30 (5 July 1913): 481–88. 

Discusses Red Cross work in Ohio after the 1913 flood and the temporary housing built for the victims; includes 

disaster and recovery photographs.

Lee, John C. H. “A Flood Year on the Mid-Mississippi.” Military Engineer 20 (July–Aug. 1928): 305–12. Exciting 

account of the 1927 flood by Vicksburg District commander, emphasizing the relation of military training to 

emergency operations.

Leet, L. Don. “Earthquake.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 306 (1957): 121.
260 Situation Desperate

“Lessons in the Rising of the Waters.” Literary Digest 46 (12 Apr. 1913): 814–15. News accounts of 1913 flood 

damages in Ohio and Indiana and pictures of the flood, damages, and relief operations.

McMaster, John Bach. “The Johnstown Flood.” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 57 (1933): 209–43.

Account by a distinguished historian of the 1889 Johnstown flood; superseded by later studies.

“The Mississippi Floods.” Harper’s Weekly 34 (22 Mar. 1890): 219, 307, 327. News accounts of the 1890 floods on the 

Mississippi River and emergency levee construction with artists’ sketches of the disaster.

“The Mississippi Floods.” Literary Digest 44 (4 May 1912): 929–31. Study by H. C. Frankenfield, U.S. Weather 

Bureau, of the 1912 Mississippi River flood; includes flow graphs and pictures of levee repairs and flood emergency 

operations.

Moore, Lewis E. “Bridge Construction in the New England Hurricane Area.” Military Engineer 31 (Nov.–Dec. 

1939): 407–09. Colonel Moore reviews emergency work during the September 1938 hurricane in New England and 

the repairs made to 552 damaged bridges; includes four damage photographs.

Morse, E. K., and Harold A. Thomas. “Floods in the Upper Ohio River and Tributaries.” Transactions of the American 

Society of Civil Engineers 103 (1938): 624–30. Views of two consulting engineers on flooding near Pittsburgh during 

the March 1936 flood; they urged funding for flood control reservoir construction.

Muller, Edwin. “The Galveston Flood.” North American Review 246 (Winter 1938): 331–40. Popular account of the 

September 1900 hurricane at Galveston; superseded by later studies.

Munn, James, and J. L. Savage. “The Flood of June, 1921, in the Arkansas River, at Pueblo, Colorado.” Transactions 

of the American Society of Civil Engineers 85 (1922): 1–65. Hydrologic investigation of the 1921 flood at Pueblo 

including maps, stream discharge graphs, and damage photographs.

“Navigation Dams near Pittsburgh Damaged by Floods.” Engineering News-Record 116 (30 Apr. 1936): 630–31. 

Report on the flood damages to Allegheny River Lock and Emsworth Dam on the Ohio during the March 1936 

flood and of the efforts by the Pittsburgh Engineer District to save the dams from destruction.

Nelson, Elmer R. “Red River of the North Basin Flood, April–June, 1950.” Monthly Weather Review 79 (Sep. 1951): 

169–77. Hydrologic investigation of the causes of the spring 1950 flood on the Red River of the North; includes 

maps, precipitation charts, and temperature records.

Noyes, Henry E. “An Earthquake Chronicle.” Journal of the Military Service Institute 39 (1906): 100–22. Diary Noyes 

kept during the 1906 San Francisco earthquake; it also prints reports of Engineer and Quartermaster officers who 

served during the relief and recovery phases and newspaper accounts of the disaster together with damage pictures.

“Observations Made on Mississippi River Flood of 1937.” Civil Engineering 7 (May 1937): 354–55. Description of 

Corps flood gauging methods during the 1937 flood and a map of the lower Mississippi River basin.

Pearcy, Matthew T. “A History of the Ransdell-Humphreys Flood Control Act of 1917. Louisiana History XLI 

(Spring 2000): 133–59. Discusses the impact of the Mississippi River floods of 1912, 1913, and 1916 on shaping the 

debate over the 1917 Flood Control Act.

———. “After the Flood: A History of the 1928 Flood Control Act.” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 95 

(Summer 2002): 172–201. Tracks the devastation of the 1927 Mississippi River flood and the politics behind the 

1928 Flood Control Act.

Petersen, William J. “Mississippi River Floods.” The Palimpsest 46 (July 1965): 305–64. Prints “Steamboat Bill” 

Petersen’s flood history for upper Mississippi River with flood stage records for Iowa towns from 1864 to 1965 and 

pictures of the 1965 flood fight on the Mississippi.

Phillips, Paul D. “A History of the Freedmen’s Bureau in Tennessee.” Ph.D. diss., Vanderbilt University, 1964. Devotes 

a chapter to the history of disaster relief furnished by the Freedmen’s Bureau following the 1867 flood disaster.

Pick, Lewis A. “Operation Snowbound.” Military Engineer 41 (May–June 1949): 192–94. General Pick’s summary 

of the Army relief effort during 1949’s Great Plains blizzards.

“Record Floods from New England to the Potomac.” Engineering News-Record 116 (2 Apr. 1936): 495–96. News 

reports of damages that occurred during the March 1936 floods in northeastern states.

“Red Cross Disaster Relief Operations.” Survey 82 (Apr. 1936): 98. Discusses Red Cross organization after the March 

1936 floods in the northeast and prints a map showing the Red Cross field office locations during recovery work.
Annotated Bibliography ■ Articles, Pamphlets, and Dissertations 261

“The Red Cross in the Mississippi Floods.” Literary Digest 44 (15 June 1912): 1258. Reviews Red Cross relief 

activities during the 1912 Mississippi River flood and mentions cooperation between the Red Cross and the Army.

“Reformatory Inmates Saved Town from Flood.” Survey 30 (7 June 1913): 317–18. Describes the work of prison 

inmates during a 1913 flood fight to save Jeffersonville, Indiana, and its Quartermaster Depot from flooding.

“Rehabilitation Work at Dayton.” Survey 30 (26 Apr. 1913): 129–30. Study of Red Cross efforts to care for refugees 

and repair and restore housing at Dayton after the March 1913 flood disaster.

Reid, Thomas J. His 1937 flood log as printed in S & D Reflector 6 (Mar. 1969): 2.

“Response to Flood Calls.” Survey 30 (5 Apr. 1913): 1–2. Reviews Red Cross activities during the 1913 Ohio and 

Indiana floods and the Omaha tornado.

Robbins, Peggy. “Galveston’s Hurricane Hell.” American History Illustrated 10 (Nov. 1975): 4–9, 49–54. Account of 

the Galveston hurricane disaster of September 1900, well illustrated with photographs of body disposal.

Roosevelt, Theodore. “The Ohio Floods: Can Such Calamities Be Prevented?” Outlook 103 (5 Apr. 1913): 765–66. 

A former president running for reelection tells how he would reduce flood damages.

Ryall, James R. “Castles on the River.” Military Engineer 35 (Oct. 1943): 527–30. Lt. Ryall describes contributions of 

the Granite City Engineer Depot to the flood fights in the upper Mississippi River basin in 1943; includes pictures 

of engineer troops performing sandbagging and rescue work.

Scharff, H. R. “Sanitation at Dayton.” Survey 30 (19 Apr. 1913): 120–23. Reviews methods used at Dayton, Ohio, 

after the March 1913 flood disaster to dispose of animal carcasses, restore water supply and sewer services, and 

perform other sanitary measures. The Army Medical Corps and Red Cross performed this work.

Sibert, William L. “The Huai River Conservancy Project.” Professional Memoirs, Corps of Engineers 7 (Jan.–Feb. 

1915): 113–20. The Corps loaned General Sibert’s services to the Red Cross in 1914 to plan projects to prevent a 

recurrence of the floods that ravaged the Yellow and Huai River valleys of China.

Smythe, Augustine T. “The Earthquake in Charleston, 1886.” South Carolina Historical Magazine 49 (Apr. 1948): 

69–75. Eyewitness account of the earthquake and disaster recovery efforts that mentions the damage surveys 

performed by the Corps of Engineers.

Stimson, George P. “River on a Rampage: An Account of the Ohio River Flood of 1937.” Cincinnati Historical Bulletin 

22 (Apr. 1964): 91–109. Eyewitness account of the 1937 flood at Cincinnati and subsequent rescue and relief efforts.

Strong, Paschal N. “The Great Flood of the Ohio.” Military Engineer 29 (May–June 1937): 157–61. Gen. “Pat” 

Strong, author of the Jack Armstrong series, furnishes a vivid description of the 1937 Ohio River flood and his view 

of the situation as military assistant to the Ohio River Division Engineer; includes a map and flood pictures.

Sultan, Dan I. “The Managua Earthquake.” Military Engineer 23 (July–Aug. 1931): 354–61. Sultan commanded 

the engineer detachment that used demolition to stop the fires following the Nicaraguan earthquake of 1931; it also 

restored water supply, demolished unsafe buildings, and supervised rations distribution to refugees. This summary 

includes several disaster photographs.

“Superflood Devastates Lower Ohio and Now Threatens Mississippi Levee System.” Engineering News-Record 118 

(4 Feb. 1937): 151–55, 205–06. Reporters describe Paducah’s evacuation, Cairo’s flood fight, and opening the Birds 

Point floodway during the 1937 flood; includes maps and flood fight pictures.

Talley, B. B. “When the Earth Trembles.” Military Engineer 24 (Nov.–Dec. 1932): 618–19. Talley was with the 

engineer troops that saved Managua, Nicaragua, from fire after the 1931 earthquake.

Thomason, John W., Jr. “Catastrophe in Galveston.” American Mercury 45 (Oct. 1938): 223–33. A review of the book 

35,000 Days in Texas by Sam Acheson that quotes from eyewitness accounts of the September 1900 hurricane at 

Galveston, Texas.

Tilly, Bette B. “Memphis and the Mississippi Valley Flood of 1927.” West Tennessee Historical Society Papers 24 (1970): 

41–56. Historical study of the disaster.

“Tornado, Flood, and Fire.” Literary Digest 46 (5 Apr. 1913): 753–55. Reporter’s descriptions of the March 1913 

flood in Ohio and tornado at Omaha; includes photographs of the disasters.
262 Situation Desperate

Unmacht, George F. “First Aid in Floods.” Quartermaster Review 1 (July–Aug. 1921): 29–30. Captain Unmacht of 

the Quartermaster Corps assisted Maj. J. E. Normoyle during the 1912 and 1913 flood relief efforts, and he discusses 

the Quartermaster relief mission in general, providing disaster and rescue photographs.

Vance, John L. The Great Flood of 1884 in the Ohio Valley. Gallipolis, Ohio: n.p., 1884. Describes disaster relief 

activities during the flood in the central Ohio River basin.

Vorhees, Melvin B. “Battling the Blizzards.” Army Information Digest 4 (Apr. 1949): 10–20. Discussion of Operation 

Snowbound in the Midwest during 1949.

“WPA Gets Flood Repair Funds.” Engineering News-Record 116 (26 Mar. 1936): 473. News announcing the WPA 

would restore public facilities in 1936.

Way, Fred. “Adventures in the 1884 Flood.” S & D Reflector 10 (Mar. 1973): 37–41. Capt. Fred Way recounts 

the adventures of steamboatmen during the 1884 flood on the Ohio; mentions federal disaster relief and includes 

photographs of the boats involved.

———. “1927.” S & D Reflector 14 (June 1977): 13. Memoir on the 1927 flood.

White, Walter. “The Negro and the Flood.” Nation 124 (22 June 1927): 688–89. Reporter White visited refugee 

camps during the 1927 Mississippi River flood and described the relief afforded during that disaster.

Williams, Bobby Joe. “Mid-South Views the Floods of 1912 and 1913.” West Tennessee Historical Society Papers 29 

(1975): 71–85. A study of the activities of the Corps of Engineers and other agencies during the 1912 and 1913 flood 

disasters in the Memphis area.

Youngsberg, Gilbert A. “The Civil Activities of the Corps of Engineers.” Military Engineer 3 (Jan.–Feb. 1921): 

73–77. In this defense of the civil works functions of the Corps of Engineers, Youngsberg describes the value of 

military leadership of a civil works organization.

Books

Adams, Henry H. Harry Hopkins. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1977. This biography includes discussions of 

Hopkins’ and the WPA’s role in recovery work after the 1936 and 1937 flood disasters.

American Red Cross. The Ohio–Mississippi Valley Flood Disaster of 1937. Washington, D.C.: American Red Cross, 

1937. Red Cross report on 1937 flood relief activities that mentions coordination with the Corps of Engineers; 

includes maps, pictures of rescue work, and a bibliography.

———. Spring Floods and Tornadoes, 1936: Official Report of Relief Operations. Washington, D.C.: American Red 

Cross, 1938. Account of Red Cross work during floods in the Northeast and tornadoes in the Southeast; includes 

maps of disaster areas and photographs of relief work.

Anderson, William A. Military–Civilian Relations in Disaster Operations. Disaster Research Center Report No. 

5. Columbus: Ohio State University, 1968. Sociological study of the Army’s role during disasters that describes 

the 1953 tornado at Warner-Robins, Georgia, the 1953 Waco, Texas, tornado, the 1964 Alaska earthquake, the 

1966 Belmond, Iowa, earthquake, the 1966 Topeka, Kansas, tornado, and the 1967 Oak Law, Illinois, tornado. It 

mentions the Corps of Engineers’ work during the 1967 Fairbanks, Alaska, flood. The author argued that Army 

participation in disaster relief provided valuable training for post-nuclear attack recovery.

Barrows, H. K. Floods, Their Hydrology and Control. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1948. Engineering study of flooding 

history and various flood control methods. It includes pictures, maps, and charts but does not discuss disaster 

recovery operations.

Barry, John M. Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America. New York: Simon & 

Schuster, 1997. Popular history of the great 1927 Mississippi River flood and its aftermath. 

Briggs, Peter. Rampage: The Story of Disastrous Floods, Broken Dams, and Human Fallibility. New York: David McKay 

Company, Inc., 1973. The editor of Ladies’ Home Journal provides his popular summary of the history of disaster on 

the Mississippi, at Johnstown, Galveston, Rapid City, and during Tropical Storm Agnes. He proposes better weather 

forecasts, increased floodplain management, and improved disaster assistance coordination.
Annotated Bibliography ■ Books 263

Camillo, Charles A. and Matthew T. Pearcy. Upon Their Shoulders: A History of the Mississippi River Commission from 

Its Inception Through the Advent of the Modern Mississippi River and Tributaries Project. Vicksburg, Miss.: Mississippi 

River Commission, 2004. Scholarly history that tracks most of the great Mississippi River floods through 1937 and 

the Army response. 

Clark, Edward B. William L. Sibert, the Army Engineer. Philadelphia: author, 1930. This is the only biography of 

General Sibert and offers little information on his role in civil disasters.

Cromie, Robert. The Great Chicago Fire. New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1958. Fine history of the 1871 Chicago fire 

that describes Army disaster relief after the fire and the controversy it caused; includes illustrations of the disaster.

Curti, Merle E. American Philanthropy Abroad: A History. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1963. 

Scholarly history of public and private assistance to foreign countries, especially during the nineteenth century; 

includes an excellent bibliography.

Daniel, Pete. Deep’n As It Come: The 1927 Mississippi River Flood. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977. Popular 

history of the 1927 flood based largely on interviews and contemporary sources; some treatment of the role of the 

Corps of Engineers during the flood fight and rescue effort with excellent flood photographs.

Dulles, Foster Rhea. The American Red Cross: A History. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1950. Scholarly history of the 

activities of the Red Cross with excellent coverage of its disaster relief functions.

Foner, Eric. Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution 1863–1877. New York: Harper & Row, 1988. A thorough 

study of the period with superb coverage of the Freedmen’s Bureau.

Goebel, Julius, Jr. The Recognition Policy of the United States. New York: Columbia University Press, 1915. Standard 

history with information on the U.S. aid sent in 1812 to the Miranda government after the Venezuelan earthquake.

Greely, Adolphus W. Reminiscences of Adventure and Service: A Record of Sixty-Five Years. New York: Charles 

Scribner’s Sons, 1927. Autobiography of the Arctic explorer, Army Chief Signal Officer, and commander of the 

Army Pacific Division during the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

Griffin, Charles C. The United States and the Disruption of the Spanish Empire, 1810–1922. New York: Columbia 

University Press, 1939. Standard history contains information about the aid sent in 1812 by the United States to 

Venezuela earthquake victims.

Haas, J. Eugene, Robert W. Kates, and Martyn J. Bowden. Reconstruction Following Disaster. Cambridge: MIT 

Press, 1977. Sociological comparison of recovery and reconstruction efforts in San Francisco (1906), Anchorage 

(1964), Rapid City (1972), and Managua (1972). Treatment of Corps disaster recovery work is minimal.

Harrison, Robert W. Levee Districts and Levee Building in Mississippi. Greenville, Miss.: Mississippi Levee 

Commission, 1951. Important study of state and local levee construction history. Describes major flood fights from 

1882 to 1927 and includes photographs of the flood disasters.

Kane, Harnett. Deep Delta Country. New York: Duell, Sloan & Pearce, Inc., 1944. A history of the delta that includes 

eyewitness accounts of the 1915 hurricane, a 1922 crevasse, and the 1927 dynamiting of the Poydras levee, but only 

minor treatment of disaster relief activities.

Kartman, Ben, and Leonard Brown. Disaster. Freeport, N.Y.: Books for Libraries Press, 1971. Collection of articles 

from Time, Newsweek, and newspapers describing natural disasters in the United States. It has little information, 

however, about the Corps role in disaster assistance.

Leuchtenburg, William E. Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal 1932–1940. New York: Harper & Row, 1963. 

A standard survey of the era and the WPA, CCC, and other New Deal agencies.

McCullough, David G. The Johnstown Flood. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1968. This detailed history of the 1889 

Johnstown flood omits any discussion of the Corps’ important role in the disaster recovery.

Manning, William R., ed. Diplomatic Correspondence of the United States Concerning the Independence of the LatinAmerican Nations. New York: Oxford University Press, 1925. Prints correspondence between the Secretary of State 

and Consuls to Venezuela concerning the 1812 Caracas earthquake and the provisions sent to victims by Congress.

Mason, Herbert M., Jr. Death from the Sea: Our Greatest Natural Disaster, the Galveston Hurricane of 1900. New 

York: Dial Press, 1972. Well-written account of the Galveston disaster and recovery efforts that includes excellent 

photographs, a short bibliography, and discussion of the seawall planned by Col. Henry N. Robert of the Corps 

of Engineers.
264 Situation Desperate

Morgan, Arthur E. The Miami Valley and the 1913 Flood. Dayton, Ohio: Miami Conservancy District, 1917. 

Technical report on the 1913 flood in the Miami River basin by the chief engineer of the Miami Conservancy 

District; includes eyewitness accounts of the flood, maps, and flood damage photographs.

Morison, Elting E., ed. The Letters of Theodore Roosevelt. Vol. 5. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1952. Prints 

correspondence of the president relating to Army disaster relief efforts after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

O’Connor, Richard. Johnstown: The Day the Dam Broke. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1957. Popular 

history of the 1889 Johnstown flood disaster that describes the role of engineer troops in the disaster recovery.

Rae, John B. The Road and Car in American Life. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1971. A useful survey of the automobile in 

American history that mentions the role of motor vehicles in disaster recovery operations.

Reuss, Martin. Designing the Bayous: The Control of Water in the Atchafalaya Basin, 1800–1995. Office of History, 

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers: Alexandria, Va., 1998. Scholarly treatment of early flood control efforts along the 

Mississippi River and the impacts of recurrent flood disasters. 

Ridgeway, Arthur O. The Case of Train Number 3. Denver: Rocky Mountain Railroad Club, 1956. Eyewitness 

account of the 1921 Arkansas River flood and disaster at Pueblo, Colorado; includes disaster photographs.

Rosenman, Samuel I., ed. The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt. 13 vols. New York: Random House, 

1938. In volumes 5 and 6 are the president’s messages and news releases about the 1936 and 1937 flood disasters.

Sachs, Edwin O. A Record of the Baltimore Conflagration, February 7 and 8, 1904. London: British Fire Prevention 

Committee, 1904. Technical reports including the report by Capt. John Sewell, Corps of Engineers, who investigated 

the fire to determine methods to improve fireproofing of buildings; includes many fire damage photographs.

Salmond, John A. The Civilian Conservation Corps, 1933–1942. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1967. 

Standard history of the CCC discusses flood control work done by the agency under Corps of Engineers’ 

management and CCC services during disaster recovery.

Sefton, James E. The United States Army and Reconstruction, 1865–1877. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University 

Press, 1967. Scholarly history of the work of the Army in the South just after the Civil War that discusses Army relief 

for flood victims but does not mention the Corps of Engineers.

Shallat, Todd. Structures in the Stream. Austin: University of Texas, 1994. Best history of the early Army Corps of 

Engineers and its evolution. 

Swift, Joseph G. Memoirs. Worcester, Mass.: F. S. Blanchard & Company, 1890. Colonel Swift, Chief Engineer, 

describes his volunteer services during the 1835 New York fire and mentions early technical developments for 

demolishing buildings.

Taylor, Joe G. Louisiana Reconstructed, 1863–1877. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1974. Scholarly 

history of reconstruction in Louisiana describes the floods of 1866 and 1867 on the Mississippi River, the resulting 

damages, and the disaster relief furnished by the Freedmen’s Bureau.

Walker, James Herbert. The Johnstown Horror!!! Philadelphia: H. L. Warren and Company, 1889. Thrilling 

account of the 1889 flood disaster by a news reporter who was there and who mentions the Army Engineer disaster 

recovery services.

White, Howard A. The Freedmen’s Bureau in Louisiana. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1970. 

Well-researched history of the Bureau that discusses the 1867 Mississippi River flood and the disaster relief supplied 

by the Army and the Bureau; no mention of the Corps of Engineers.
Index ■ 265

Abbot, Frederic, 31, 32

Aiken Act, 212–14, 216, 218, 229, 233, 235

Alabama, 10, 30, 117–19, 123, 125, 225, 231

Cherokee County, 124

Clay County, 125

Demopolis, 117

Dothan, 225

Florence, 140

Hollins County, 125

Houston County, 225

Mobile, 116–17

Selma, 116

Alabama River, 125

Alaska

Bethel, 246

Aleshire, James B., 89

Alexandria, Va., fire (1827), 8–10, 16

Allegheny River, 76–77, 169–70

Allegheny River Dam 3, 76–77

Alstaettler, Frederick, 93

Altamaha River, 144, 146

American Airlines Flight 587, x

American Society of Civil Engineers, 137

Angus, Alexander, 192

Arkansas, 9, 42, 48, 51, 87–88, 109–10, 112–13, 125, 

199, 214, 240

Arkansas City, 42, 140, 155

Biscoe, 197

Cabot, 244

Calico Rock, 111

Camp Chaffee, 199

Camp Robinson, 199

Carrs Landing, 90

Chicot County, 110

Clarendon, 110

Cotton Plant, 204

Gold Dust Landing, 90

Golden Lake, 87

Forrest City, 177

Hannaberry Lake, 203, 203

Helena, 25, 91, 96, 99, 101, 180

Lake Village, 110–11

Modoc, 87

Monroe County, 203

Osceola, 90

Peach Orchard Bluff, 198

Pendleton, 148

Pine Bluff, 204

Prairie County, 203

St. Claire, 87

Sand Mills, 184

White County, 198

Woodruff County, 203

Wyanoke, 87

Arkansas River, 25, 41, 109, 113–14, 133–39, 135, 138,

147–49, 151, 198, 199, 203, 203

Arkansas River flood at Pueblo (1921), 133–39, 134, 

135, 136, 138

Army Corps Areas, 128, 133, 136, 153, 168, 171, 181, 

187–88, 190, 194–95, 246

First, 161, 188, 190

Third, 168, 181

Fourth, 140, 181, 192–93

Fifth, 144, 174

Sixth, 153

Eighth, 134–35

Ninth, 185

Army Engineer School, 38, 212, 226

Army Medical Corps, 95, 97–98, 144, 165

Army Quartermaster Corps, 1, 10, 17–19, 23–24, 28, 

32, 50, 55, 70, 91–93, 96, 103, 107, 109, 113, 116, 

125, 127–28, 179, 192

Army Regulation 500-60, 187–88, 226, 241

Army Service Commands, 201, 203

Fourth, 153, 201 

Fifth, 196, 225–27, 229, 231, 237

Sixth, 153, 197–98, 217–18, 220

Seventh, 201

Eighth, 135, 137, 181, 201

Arthur, Chester, 23

Atchafalaya River, 151

Aurand, Henry S., 197 

Bain, Jarvis, 69, 72, 118, 123–24, 198–99

Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, 38

Baltimore fire (1904), 58, 65–66

Barnes, E. F., 136–37 

Barton, Clara, 27, 39, 60

See also Red Cross.

Battalions

1st Engineer, 62, 66, 68, 71, 73, 162, 190, 194

2d Engineer, 61, 65

5th Engineer, 174, 193, 217

8th Engineer, 135, 137

10th Engineer, 236, 237

41st Infantry, 210

Index
266 Situation Desperate

66th Tank, 210

113th Engineer, 174

307th Airborne Engineer, 223

382d Engineer Combat, 197

682d Engineer, 239

732d Military Police, 198 

809th Engineer Aviation, 228

853d Engineer Aviation, 199

1298th Engineer, 204

1800th Engineer General Service, 204–05

Provisional Engineer, 164

Beach, Lansing H., 92–93, 110–12, 116, 139–40

Bicknell, Ernest, 34, 76, 91, 94

Bixby, William H., 31–32, 89, 93

Black, William M., 116, 118–19, 122, 126–27

Black River, 91, 113, 151, 204

Black Warrior River, 117

Boats. See Floating plant.

Bonnet Carré Spillway, 180, 205

Boston Engineer District, 162, 188

Bowley, Albert, 168

Bragdon, John, 188

Brazos River flood (1899), 53–55, 54, 59, 194

Brazos River flood (1940), 194–95

Broad River, 122

Brown, Lytle, 118, 123

Brown, Preston, 161–63

Burlin, C. W., 190

Cabot, Ark., tornado (1976), 244

Cache River, 203, 204

Calhoun, John C., 7, 10 

California, 66, 71, 186, 238

Los Angeles, 185–187, 186

San Francisco, 58, 66–76, 67, 68, 70, 72, 73, 74,

75, 80, 107, 119, 124, 125, 126, 133, 146, 167, 

181, 185, 198, 205, 248

San Gabriel Mountains, 186

San Bernardino Mountains, 186 

California Debris Commission, 68, 70

California National Guard, 67

Camp Atterbury, Ind., 202

Camp Beauregard, La., 199

Camp Chaffee, Ark., 199

Camp Claiborne, La., 195, 198–99

Camp Livingston, La., 199

Camp Robinson, Ark., 199

Caples, William, 107–09, 113, 133–39, 185–86

Carnegie, Andrew, 60

Carson River, 237–38

Cassidy, William, 221, 231

Catawba River, 118, 118, 122

Chariton River, 215

Charleston earthquake (1886), 31–33, 32

Charleston Engineer District, 32–33, 118, 122, 192

Charleston fire (1838), 10

Charleston tornado (1938), 192, 193

Chattahoochee River, 222

Cheatham, Benjamin F., 50 

Chicago fire (1871), 18, 19, 34

Chickasawhay River, 117

Chippewa River, 45–46

Chittenden Dam failure (1947), 214, 215

Cincinnati Engineer District, 27, 86, 95, 101, 151, 

172–73, 175, 196, 201

Cincinnati flood (1884), 14, 27–29, 28, 29, 33

Cincinnati flood and fire (1937), 99, 160, 161, 171–176, 

172, 174

Circular No. 18, 44–45, 50, 54

Civil War, 1–2, 4, 10, 12, 23, 30, 38, 128

damage to levees, 17

rise of federal power, 2, 17, 240

precedent of Freedmen’s Bureau for federal aid, 

15, 17–18, 107, 245

Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), 170, 171, 188, 195

role in disaster relief, 161, 168–69, 171, 175, 177, 

177, 179, 181, 187, 189, 190–91, 246

Army Engineer role in administration, 129, 168, 

181

Coal River, 120–21

Coast Guard, 97, 154, 175, 178, 181, 204, 234–35

Cocheu, Frank, 125–27

Colorado, 194, 225 

Pueblo, 133–39, 134, 135, 136, 138

Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, 138

Colorado National Guard, 134

Colorado Rangers, 134

Colorado River, 194

Columbia River, 208, 217, 218, 218, 220–21, 234

Comstock, Cyrus, 44

Conemaugh River, 36, 37, 38

Connecticut, 10, 188

Hartford, 168, 188

New London, 24

Windsor, 168

Connecticut River, 168, 188–89 

Connecticut River flood (1936), 168

Conner, Fox, 145–46

Connolly, D. H., 147

Constitutional issues 

broad vs. strict construction, 1–4, 7–12, 17, 28, 

30, 44, 51, 245

“general welfare” clause, 1–2, 9, 12, 51

Coolidge, Calvin, 146, 153, 162–63

Copeland, Royal, 171

Cosby, Spencer, 144

Craig, Malin, 181

Craighill, William P., 44, 46, 94
Index ■ 267

Crawford, Roscoe C., 220–21, 234–35

Crump, Edward H. “Boss,” 92

Cumberland River, 47, 85, 147, 175

Daley, E. L., 188

Damon, S. L., 136, 138

Davis, Dwight, 146

Dayton flood (1913), 85, 93–101, 95

Deakyne, Herbert, 62, 64

Delaware, 194

Smyrna, 194

Delaware River, 119

Derby, George, 48–50

Des Moines River, 215

Dimond, A. C., 153

Disasters. See disasters by type (Earthquakes, 

Hurricanes, etc.).

District of Columbia, 8, 9, 12, 31, 65, 169

See also Washington, D.C.

Division, 2d Infantry, 217

Douglas, H. S., 42 

Earthquakes, 55, 59, 125, 127, 245

precedent for Army Engineers in relief, 4, 55

Charleston (1886), 31–33, 32

Japan (1923), 145–47, 146

Managua, Nicaragua (1931), 164–67, 165, 166

Messina, Italy (1909), 7

New Madrid (1811), 4, 5, 8, 16

San Francisco (1906), 58, 66–76, 67, 68, 70, 72,

73, 74, 75, 80, 107, 119, 124, 125, 126, 133, 

167, 198, 205, 248

Venezuela (1812), 6–8, 6

Edgerton, Glen, 171

Eglin Air Force Base, 222

Elkhorn River, 215

Elliott, Dabney, 175

Elliott, Malcolm, 197

Engineering News–Record, 176

Equipment, 40, 137, 174, 181, 193, 198, 198, 200, 205, 

209, 211, 212, 213, 215, 216, 217, 221, 222–23, 223, 

225, 226, 227, 228, 233, 248

automobiles, 73

flying ferry, 62, 65

levee machines, 137, 147, 151

pontons, 37–40, 62–65, 79, 98, 162–64, 173, 174, 

199, 203, 204

radios, 98–99, 148, 148, 175, 176, 178, 201, 209, 

209, 211, 222

storage at depot, 40, 67, 74, 160, 162, 181, 197, 

198, 222

telephones, 66, 94–96, 98, 144, 161, 162, 173, 

175, 186

Weasels, 225, 226, 227, 228

Ernst, O. H., 25, 29

Explosions

South Amboy (1950), 236, 237

Texas City (1947), 208, 209–213, 210, 211, 212,

236, 247

Washington Arsenal (1864), 12

Explosives used in disaster response, 40, 45, 58, 66, 67, 

69–70, 73–74, 77–78, 153, 164, 165–66, 167, 179, 

224, 225, 248

Famine in Ireland (1847), 10–11, 11

Febiger, Lea, 74

Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), 

233, 241

Federal Works Agency (FWA), 188, 200, 213, 217, 

222, 226, 233, 234, 235, 239

See also Fleming, Philip.

Finch, Henry, 95, 96, 101, 102, 110, 111, 113, 116

Fires

Alexandria, Va. (1827), 8–10, 16

Baltimore (1904), 58, 65–66

Bethel, Alaska (1978), 246

Charleston (1838), 10

Chicago (1871), 18, 19, 34

Cincinnati (1937), 174

Managua, Nicaragua (1931), 164–167

New York City (1835), 4, 21, 22

Norfolk, Va. (1804), 4

Portland, Maine (1803), 4

Portland, Maine (1866), 15–18, 16

San Francisco earthquake and fire (1906), 58, 

66–76, 67, 68, 70, 72, 73, 74, 75, 80, 107, 119, 

124, 125, 126, 133, 167, 198, 205, 248

Texas City (1947), 208, 209–213, 210, 211, 212,

236, 247

Fiske, Harold, 123

Fitch, Graham, 47, 48

Flagler, C. A. F., 62 

Fleming, Philip, 200, 213, 216–17, 219–21, 233–35

Flint River, 144, 145

Floating plant, x, 60, 79, 90, 114, 148, 156, 176

destruction of, 61

number of, 24

staffing, 24

use in rescue operations, 24, 29, 33, 43, 54, 153

Flood control

bank protection, 42, 77, 157, 169

debates in Congress, 171

drainage channels, 201, 223, 224, 224

evolution of, 26–27, 103, 129, 248

floodwalls/seawalls, 61, 61, 132, 132, 133, 147, 

173, 177–79, 189, 197, 202, 236

legislation, 103, 139, 157, 168, 171, 195, 200

reservoirs, 103, 153, 157, 171, 200, 214, 217
268 Situation Desperate

See also Constitutional issues; Legislation; 

Levees; Mississippi River Commission.

Flood response planning

advance planning, 85, 87, 88, 100–101, 125, 127, 

147, 171, 175, 176, 185, 187, 188, 191, 195, 

197, 200, 202, 205, 246, 248

Engineers’ relationship with other entities, 85, 

169, 200

staging equipment, 100

Floods

Arkansas River at Pueblo (1921), 133–39, 134, 

135, 136, 138

Brazos River (1899), 53–55, 54, 59, 194

Brazos River (1940), 194–95

Cincinnati, Ohio (1884). See Floods: Valentine’s 

Day in Cincinnati, Ohio (1884).

Columbia River (1948). See Floods: Vanport, 

Ore. (1948).

Dayton (1913), 85, 93–101, 95

Fort Pitt (1762), 21

Georgia rivers flood (1925), 144–45, 145

Johnstown, Pa. (1889), 36, 37–40, 38, 39, 62, 80, 

248

Johnstown, Pa. (1977), 139

Kansas (or Kaw) River (1903), 58, 61–65, 63, 64, 

248

Kansas–Nebraska (1950), 236

Los Angeles (1938), 185–87, 186, 187

Mississippi River (1866), 15

Mississippi River (1867), 18

Mississippi River (1882), 15, 22–27, 41, 47

Mississippi River (1883), 28, 30, 41

Mississippi River (1884), 29–30, 41, 47

Mississippi River (1890), 37, 41–44

Mississippi River (1897), 47–50, 51, 86

Mississippi River (1912), 84, 85–93, 92

Mississippi River (1922), 116

Mississippi River (1927), 132, 133, 147–57

Mississippi River (1937), 160, 161, 177–81

Mississippi River (1947), 215–17

Missouri River (1947), 215–17

New Bern, N.C. (1899), 53–55

Ohio River (1882), 28, 30

Ohio River (1883), 28, 30

Ohio River (1884), 14, 27–29, 28, 29, 33

Ohio River (1937), 99, 160, 161, 171–76, 172, 174

Ohio River (1943), 185, 196–200

Red River of the North (1897), 46, 47

Red River of the North (1950), 238–40, 238, 239

Rutland, Vt. (1947), 214–15, 215

Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers (1950), 

237–38

Shawneetown, Ill. (1898), 52–53, 53

Southern States (1916), 116–25, 117, 118, 120, 121

Upper Mississippi River (1950), 238–39

Valentine’s Day in Cincinnati, Ohio (1884), 14, 

27–29, 28, 29, 33

Vanport, Ore. (1948), 217–21, 218, 234, 236

Vermont (1927), 161–64

Wabash River (1943), 197

Wabash River (1950), 236

Winooski River (1927), 161–64, 170

Florida, x, 9, 10, 119, 222, 225, 231, 248

Marianna, 222, 223, 224

Flying ferry, 62, 65

Ford, Stanley, 177

Forked Deer River, 50

Fort Belvoir, Va., 174, 175, 192, 193, 198, 212, 214, 226

Fort Benjamin Harrison, Ind., 197

Fort Benning, Ga., 222

Fort Bliss, Tex., 135

Fort Bragg, N.C., 193, 223

Fort Crockett, Tex., 60, 61, 210, 211

Fort Devens, Mass., 237

Fort Dix, N.J., 190, 194

Fort Dupont, Del., 162, 194

Fort Ethan Allen, Vt., 161

Fort Francis Warren, Wyo., 228

Fort Knox, Ky., 197, 236

Fort Leavenworth, Kans., 62, 64

Fort Leonard Wood, Mo., 198

Fort Lewis, Wash., 217–18

Fort Mason, Calif., 66, 69– 71, 124

Fort Monmouth, N.J., 237

Fort Moultrie, S.C., 192

Fort Peck, Mont., 192, 215

Fort Peck Engineer District, 192

Fort Pitt flood (1762), 21

Fort Randall, S.Dak., 226

Fort Sam Houston, Tex., 60

Fort Screven, Ga., 144

Fort Sheridan, Ill., 197, 198

Fort Smith, Ark., 199

France, 3, 11

Frech, Frederick, 173, 175

Freedmen’s Bureau, 15–18, 33

Freedmen’s Bureau Act of 1865, 16

French Refugee Bill, 2–4

Galveston Engineer District, 53, 54, 59, 61, 140, 194, 

209–12

Galveston hurricane (1900), 59–61, 60, 61, 80

Galveston hurricane (1915), 59, 61

Garrison, Lindley, 93, 97

General Services Administration, 235, 239

Georgia, 30, 43, 118, 119, 123, 144, 222, 225, 231

Albany, 145
Index ■ 269

Fort Screven, 144

Newton, 144

Savannah, 76

Townsend, 144

Georgia rivers flood (1925), 144–45, 145

Gerety, John, 234

Gillette, Douglas, 154

Gillette, G. W., 192, 193

Gillooly, Jack, 97

Godfrey, Stuart, 148, 151, 154

Gotwals, J. C., 154

Grand River, 215

Great Lakes Division, 144

Greely, Adolphus, 71–76

Griffiths, David, 209–12

Gross, Charles, 175

Groves, Leslie, 161, 164, 166

Gulf of Mexico Division, 180

Guthrie, W. L., 124

Hagen, Harold, 240

Haiti, 2, 3

Hall, C. Lacey, 196–97, 201–02

Hanna, Frederick, 109, 125

Hardee, W. J., 48–50 

Harding, Warren G., 146 

Harper’s Weekly, 14, 76

Harrison, Benjamin, 37, 40

as member of the Mississippi River 

Commission, 51

Harts, William, 68, 70, 72–74, 76

Heart Butte Dam, 239

Heuer, William, 70, 72

Hider, Arthur, 41, 42, 88

Hoffman, George, 162

Holcombe, W. H., 148, 151

Hoover, Herbert, 153, 154, 163, 246

Hopkins, Harry, 171, 181

Houston Ship Channel, 194

Hudson River, 26

Humphrey, Hubert, 240

Humphreys, Benjamin, 112

Huntington Engineer District, 173–74

Hurricanes, 59, 61, 80, 107, 214, 245

Andrew (1992), x

Galveston (1900), 59–61, 60, 61, 80

Galveston (1915), 59, 61

Louisiana (1915), 106, 107–09, 108

Mobile (1916), 116, 117

New England (1938), 184, 188–91, 189, 190, 191

New Orleans (1915), 106, 107–09, 108

New Orleans (1940), 192

Hutchins, Thomas, 21

Idaho

Bonners Ferry, 217

St. Maries, 217

Illinois, 15, 26, 33, 44, 47, 52, 86, 87, 97

Beardstown, 196, 198

Cairo, 22, 29, 47, 51–53, 86, 87, 89, 97, 99, 101, 

147, 177, 178, 178, 179, 180, 200, 202

Chicago, 18, 19, 97, 197

Golconda, 175

Granite City, 197–98

Rock Island, 25, 29, 47, 215, 216, 221

Shawneetown, 26, 52–53, 52, 86, 97, 175 

Illinois Central Railroad, 100

Illinois National Guard, 175, 200

Illinois River, 196, 197, 198

Indian raids in Minnesota (1863), 12

Indiana, 8, 33, 96, 236

Aurora, 96

Camp Atterbury, 202

Clarksville, 202

Evansville, 174, 175, 197

Florence, 96

Fort Benjamin Harrison, 197

Jeffersonville, 160, 202

Lawrenceburg, 27, 96

Leavenworth, 171

Michigan City, 97

Milton, 96

Patriot, 96

Peru, 197

Tell City, 175

Terre Haute, 197

Utica, 96

Vincennes, 197, 236 

Iowa, 47, 216

Keokuk, 216

Ottumwa, 216

Iowa, University of, 216

Irish famine (1847), 10

Italy, 7

Jadwin, Edgar, 147, 152, 153, 162 

Japanese earthquake (1923), 145–47, 146

Jervey, Henry, 86, 95, 98

Jim Woodruff Dam, 225

Johnstown, Pa. flood (1889), 36, 37–40, 38, 39, 62, 80, 

248

Johnstown, Pa. flood (1977), 139

Jones, William, 45–47

Kanawha River, 94, 120, 121

Kansas

Kansas City, 62

Lawrence, 62, 65
270 Situation Desperate

Manhattan, 62

Marysville, 236

Topeka, 62

Kansas City Engineer District, 64, 80, 175, 236

Kansas River, 61–65, 198, 248

Kansas River flood (1903), 58, 61–65, 63, 64, 248

Kaw River. See Kansas River.

Kelly, William, 66, 68, 75, 125–26

Kimmel, M. M., 174 

Kentucky, 8, 10, 26, 33, 87, 89, 96, 101, 111, 173

Beattyville, 43

Carrollton, 175, 180

Catlettsburg, 94

Columbus, 147

Hickman, 86, 89, 91, 101, 110, 111, 147

Louisville, 94, 96, 97, 101, 151, 154, 172, 174, 

175, 197, 200, 202, 236

Maysville, 173

Newport, 174

Owensboro, 175

Paducah, 173, 175, 176, 202

Uniontown, 97

Kentucky River, 43

King, William, 38, 47

Kingman, Dan C., 41–44, 110, 112 

Kingman, John, 95–96

Kiskiminetas River, 170

Kittrell, Clark, 192

Kootenai River, 217

Labor, 25, 41, 42–43, 48, 86, 107, 108, 110, 112–13, 

116, 122, 128, 137, 167, 171, 181, 185, 189, 192, 195, 

204, 205, 245

payment of, 42–43, 109, 117, 123, 131, 201, 213

by prisoners, 41, 88, 92, 142, 149, 150, 179, 185, 

203, 204, 205, 221

by prisoners–of–war, 185, 195, 199, 200–202, 

201, 204, 205, 247

Lackawaxen River, 190

Lanham Act, 220

Leach, Smith, 62, 64, 65

Leaf, William, 216, 221

Leaf River, 117

Leahy, William, 181

Lee, John C. H., 120–22, 147–51, 155

Legislation

Aiken Act of 1947, 212–14, 216, 218, 229, 

233, 235

Federal Disaster Relief Act of 1950, 240–41

Flood Control Act of 1917, 103, 139

Flood Control Act of 1928, 103, 157

Flood Control Act of 1936, 27, 103, 157, 161, 

168, 171

Flood Control Act of 1941, 157, 195

Flood Control Act of 1944, 200

Freedmen’s Bureau Act of 1865, 16

French Refugee Bill, 2–4

Lanham Act, 220

Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899, 213

Levees

Barataria, 108

breaches and crevasses, 17, 22, 23, 30, 41–44, 

47–48, 77, 87–88, 99–102, 113, 115, 133, 140, 

142, 147–148, 150, 151–153, 180, 189, 190, 

199–200, 203–204, 218, 221 

Cabin Teele, 150, 151

Caernarvon, 152, 153

Clarendon, 111

fuseplug, 178–79 

Glasscock, 50

Hannaberry Lake, 203, 203

Hymelia, 88

inspections, 49, 88, 219

Jackson Bayou, 199

Lake Beulah, 88, 99, 100

Lake Borgne, 50, 108

Lake Jefferson, 88

local levee boards, 48, 88, 100

maintenance of, 17, 27, 169, 195

Martinez, 43

Mississippi River, 17, 22, 23, 25–27, 37, 41–44, 

47–50, 49, 87–89, 92, 99–103, 102, 107–10, 

112–13, 133, 147–49, 152–53, 180, 199–200

Morganza, 41, 41, 43, 205

Mound City, 86–87, 179

Nita, 43

North Bend, 149

Panther Forest, 88

Pueblo, 133, 137, 138

Reelfoot, 87

ring, 49, 192, 203, 204 

rock–fill, 100, 138

sandbag, 42–50, 87, 88, 99, 102, 110, 132,

148–51, 160, 169, 173, 177, 179–81, 189–90, 

192, 196, 197-99, 199, 201–05, 216, 216, 217,

217–18, 221, 238, 245 

Salem, 88

Life Saving Service, 97

Little Rock Engineer District, 25, 111, 199

Logan, James, 94, 96

Long, Nimrod, 78

Lorain tornado (1924), 143–44, 143

Lord, Herbert, 125–27

Los Angeles Engineer District, 186, 187

Los Angeles River flood (1938), 185–87, 186, 187

Louisiana, 8, 17, 20, 23, 41, 48, 85, 88, 107, 114, 140, 

141, 151, 152, 214

Baton Rouge, 91
Index ■ 271

Carrollton, 139, 180

Jonesville, 204

Madison Parish, 150

Marksville, 205

New Orleans, 20, 29, 30, 41, 42, 44, 48, 49, 50, 

51, 87, 88, 115

St. Joseph, 99, 113

Shreveport, 20, 20, 21

Louisiana hurricane (1915), 106, 107–09, 108

Louisiana–Texas Intracoastal Waterway, 194

Louisville Engineer District, 96, 101, 151, 154, 172, 

175, 197, 200, 202, 236

Lovett, Robert G., 192 

Lucas, John, 226, 229

Lyman, A. K. B., 188 

MacArthur, Douglas, 167

Mackenzie, Alexander, 25, 29, 79 

Madison, James, 1–4, 6–8

Mahoning River, 98

Maine, 15, 168, 214

Portland, 4, 15, 16, 18

Managua, Nicaragua, earthquake and fire (1931), 

164–67, 165, 166

Markham, Edward M., 101, 109, 111, 112, 171, 

179, 181 

Marshall, William, 29

Maryland, 3, 51

Baltimore, 38, 58, 65–66, 65, 80

Massachusetts, 26, 51, 237

Boston, 11, 24, 161, 162, 188

Fitchburg, 184

Holyoke, 188

Springfield, 188–89

McCoy, Frank, 145

McKee, C. E., 135 

McKinley, William, 50, 51, 60 

McKinstry, Charles, 70, 72

Memphis Engineer District, 24, 109, 177, 179, 180, 

180, 181, 198, 200, 202–04

Messina, Italy, earthquake (1909), 7

Methow River, 220

Miami River, 93, 95, 96, 98, 139

Michigan, 9, 18, 240

Milk River, 192

Mill Creek Barrier Dam, 202

Minnesota, 9, 18, 240

Aitkin, 238, 239

Brainerd, 239

Palisade, 239 

St. Paul, 45, 47, 221, 238–39, 240

St. Vincent, 232

Mississippi, 44, 48, 88, 92, 112, 118, 119, 123, 204, 205

Addie, 102

Bolivar County, 87

Cary, 84, 100

Greenville, 148, 151, 153

Greenwood, 221

Lake Beulah, 88, 99, 100

Merrill, 117

Natchez, 99, 109, 180

Rosedale, 87

Tunica, 142

Vicksburg, 25, 47, 51, 86, 91, 109, 110, 113, 132,

141, 147, 151, 152, 201

Warrenton, 48

Mississippi Flood Committee, 153

Mississippi River Commission, 24, 41, 43, 44, 50, 52, 

87, 88, 89, 99, 103, 140, 142, 147, 148, 151, 152, 

196, 248

First and Second Districts (Memphis), 43, 

47–48, 52–53, 87, 100, 147

Third District (Vicksburg), 29, 47, 87–88, 100, 

110, 139–40

Fourth District (New Orleans), 41, 44, 48, 87, 

88, 100, 140, 148

Headquarters (St. Louis), 50, 52

origins, 27

relationship to Corps, 27, 47–48, 147, 153, 200

Mississippi River flood (1866), 15

Mississippi River flood (1867), 18

Mississippi River flood (1882), 15, 22–27, 41, 47

Mississippi River flood (1883), 28, 30, 41

Mississippi River flood (1884), 29–30, 41, 47

Mississippi River flood (1890), 37, 41–44

Mississippi River flood (1897), 47–50, 51, 86

Mississippi River flood (1912), 84, 85–93, 92

Mississippi River flood (1922), 116

Mississippi River flood (1927), 132, 133, 147–57

Mississippi River flood (1937), 160, 161, 177–81

Mississippi River flood (1947), 215–17

Mississippi River levee districts, 17, 27, 42, 50, 87, 88, 

140, 221

Mississippi valley, 17, 24, 28, 29, 85, 139, 147, 152, 180, 

202, 209, 214

Missouri, 22, 44, 89, 178, 179, 226

Cape Girardeau, 87

Caruthersville, 48, 89, 90, 91

Charleston, 179

Dorena, 147

East Prairie, 179

Kansas City, 58, 62, 63, 64, 64, 80

New Madrid, 4, 5, 8, 16, 25, 47, 50, 84, 91, 178, 

200, 203

Pleasant Hill, 244

St. Louis, 22

Sikeston, 179

Missouri Pacific Railroad Bridge, 62, 63
272 Situation Desperate

Missouri River, 62, 64, 147, 198, 198, 214, 215–17, 239

Missouri River Division, 226, 227, 228

Missouri River flood (1947), 215–17

Missouri valley, 209, 214, 217

Missouri Valley Authority, 217

Mobile Engineer District, 116, 122, 123, 124, 222, 225

Mobile hurricane (1916), 116, 117

Monongahela River, 47, 119

Monroe, James, 7

Montana, 240

Glasgow, 192, 194

Montgomery Engineer District, 117, 122, 123, 125

Moore, Cecil, 162, 164

Morganza Floodway, 205

Mudboxes, 87, 149, 177, 178, 179, 197, 202, 205, 236

Muskingum River, 93

Nashville Engineer District, 50, 118, 122, 123, 148, 175

National Guard, 58, 65, 66, 68, 91, 97, 121, 134, 135, 

144, 150, 154, 179, 184, 192, 199, 200, 248

108th Engineer Battalion, Ill., 175

112th Engineer Battalion, Ohio, 144

California, 67

Colorado, 134

Ohio, 144, 201, 202

Illinois, 175, 200

West Virginia, 122

Navy, 10, 11, 67, 70, 71, 72, 94, 95, 97, 107, 148, 154, 

156, 171, 181, 228, 249

Nebraska, 225–28, 236, 240

Ainsworth, 226

Beatrice, 236

Columbus, 79

DeWitt, 236

North Platte, 226

Talmage, 236

Neshobe River, 214

Nevada, 238

Reno, 237

New Bern, N.C., flood (1899), 53–55

New England hurricane (1938), 184, 188–91, 189,

190, 191

New Hampshire, 122, 162

Hillsboro, 189

Keene, 184

Manchester, 191

Peterborough, 184

New Jersey, 1, 190, 237

Bridgeton, 194

South Amboy, 236, 237

Wenonah, 194

Newlands, Francis, 71

New Madrid, Mo., earthquake (1811), 4, 5, 8, 16

New Madrid–Birds Point Floodway, Mo., 178, 179, 

200, 203

New Orleans Engineer District, 20, 91, 107–08, 109, 

113, 180, 192, 202, 205

New Orleans hurricane (1915), 106, 107–09, 108

New Orleans hurricane (1940), 192

New York, 9, 21, 26, 109, 111, 171, 214, 240

Jamaica Bay, x

New York City, x, 4, 21, 22, 181

Rochester, 84

Willets Point, 38, 39

New York City fire (1835), 4, 21, 22

New York Engineer District, 170, 190, 214

New York Sun, 77

New York Times, 31

Nicaragua, 161, 164, 165, 166, 167

Nichols, Kenneth, 165, 166, 167, 174

Nishnabotna River, 215

“No Work, No Rations,” 107, 109–13, 116, 129, 133, 

139, 147, 245

Nodaway River, 215

Norfolk fire (1804), 4

Normoyle, James, 89, 91, 93–98, 101, 125

North Atlantic Division, 188

North Carolina, 30, 116, 118, 119, 122, 124, 192, 193

Asheville, 106, 118, 120, 121, 123, 124

New Bern, 53–55

North Carolina storm (1884), 30–31

North Dakota, 227, 238, 239, 240

Bismarck, 226, 228

Fargo, 46, 47

Grand Forks, 47, 239

Pembina, 238

Valley City, 239

North Pacific Division, 217, 219

Obion River, 50

Ockerson, J. A., 50 

O’Connor, J. A., 139, 140 

Ohio, 38, 139, 173, 202

Chillicothe, 94

Cincinnati, 27, 28, 29, 86, 95, 96, 98, 101, 151, 

172–75, 177, 196, 201, 202

Columbus, 94, 95, 162, 196

Dayton, 85, 93–99, 95, 100, 101, 173

Hamilton, 85, 95, 96, 98, 101

Lima, 96

Lorain, 97, 143–44, 143

Marietta, 93, 94, 173

Portsmouth, 28, 173, 201

Warren, 98

Ohio National Guard, 144, 201, 202

Ohio River Division, 200
Index ■ 273

Ohio River flood (1882), 28, 30

Ohio River flood (1883), 28, 30

Ohio River flood (1884), 14, 27–29, 28, 29, 33

Ohio River flood (1937), 99, 160, 161, 171–76, 172, 174

Ohio River flood (1943), 185, 196–200

Ohio valley, 28, 172, 173, 176, 202

Oklahoma, 199

Old River, 41, 151

Omaha Engineer District, 226

Operation Haylift, 226, 228

Operation Snowbound, 225–29, 226, 227

Oregon, 218

Portland, 208, 217–18, 217

Vanport, 217–21, 218, 234, 236

Ouachita River, 151

Pacific Division, 70, 71

Pacific Northwest flood (1948), 217–21, 208, 217, 218, 

220, 234

Pardee, George, 71

Parke, John, 37, 140

Patrick, Mason, 38, 40, 53

Payne, John, 167

Paxton, John, 226

Pee Dee River, 118, 122

Pennsylvania, 8, 37, 38, 40, 119, 121, 170, 171, 190, 240

Braeburn, 169

Johnstown, 36, 37–40, 38, 39, 60, 62, 80, 248

Pittsburgh, 21, 28, 29, 78, 93, 121, 168, 170, 

170, 173

Pennsylvania Railroad, 77

Person, John, 236

Philadelphia Engineer District, 190, 194

Pick, Lewis A., 154, 226, 227, 228, 229, 249 

Pittsburgh Engineer District, 77, 93, 169, 170

Platte River, 79, 215

Pleasant Hill, Mo., tornado (1977), 244

Portland, Maine, fire (1803), 4

Portland, Maine, fire (1866), 15–18, 16

Portland Engineer District, 208, 217, 218

Potomac River, 169, 170

Powell, Roger, 171

Prentiss, Louis, 226

Providence Engineer District, 168, 188, 189

Public Law 233 (Aiken Act), 212–14, 216, 218, 229, 

233, 235

Public Works Administration (PWA), 213

Quin, Percy, 112

Raccoon River, 215

Rancocas River, 190

Ransom, Matt, 30

Rations, 10, 15, 17, 53, 60, 62, 67, 68, 71, 103, 107, 120, 

122, 125, 127, 134, 135, 142, 213, 245

adverse effects of free distribution, 42, 92–93, 

102, 107, 109, 113–16, 125, 128, 140, 157

delivery of, 24–25, 44, 74, 80, 89, 91, 94–95, 

96–98, 101, 144, 161, 228

description of, 18, 94, 123, 128, 131

“no work, no rations,” 107, 109–13, 116, 129, 133, 

139, 147, 245

Red Cross, 28, 39, 40, 60, 71, 72, 73, 76, 91, 94, 98, 

116, 117, 125, 133, 139, 140–42, 143, 145, 147, 

153, 154, 155–56, 157, 161, 162, 163, 167, 168, 171, 

173, 175, 178, 179, 181, 187, 188, 190, 192, 195, 198, 

200, 212, 214, 215, 220, 225, 228, 229, 233, 238, 

245, 246

See also Barton, Clara.

Red River of Louisiana, 20, 43, 88, 147, 151, 205

Red River of the North, 46, 47, 221, 232, 238–40

Red River of the North flood (1897), 46, 47

Red River of the North flood (1950), 238–40, 238, 239

Rees, Thomas, 38, 62

Relief missions

to Ireland, 10–12, 11

to Japan, 145–47, 146

to Venezuela, 6–8, 6

Republican River, 215

Reybold, Eugene, 177–80, 181, 199, 249

Rhoads, Thomas, 98

Rhode Island, 8, 188

Misquamicut, 190

Newport, 24

Providence, 168, 188, 189

Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899, 213

Roanoke River, 192, 193, 194

Robinson, Joseph, 109, 110

Rock Island Engineer District, 25, 29, 215, 216, 221

Roosevelt, Franklin, 107, 129, 168, 171, 181, 213

Roosevelt, Theodore, 71, 103

Royall, Kenneth, 221

Rucker, Casper B., 209 

Rutland, Vt., flood (1947), 214–15, 215

Sabine River, 59

Sacramento Engineer District, 237, 238

Sacramento River, 186, 237

St. Francis River, 85, 87

St. Joe River, 217

St. Louis Engineer District, 24, 25, 29, 151, 175, 200, 

215, 216

St. Paul Engineer District, 45, 221, 238–40, 238, 239

Sanctuary, E. N., 59 

San Francisco Chronicle, 73

San Francisco earthquake and fire (1906), 58, 66–76, 

67, 68, 70, 72, 73, 74, 75, 80, 107, 119, 124, 125, 126, 

133, 167, 198, 205, 248
274 Situation Desperate

San Francisco Engineer District, 70, 73, 74, 76, 185

San Gabriel River, 187

San Jacinto River, 194

San Joaquin River, 186, 237

Santee River, 118, 122

Sapelo River, 144

Savannah Engineer District, 76, 78, 144

Savannah River, 78, 79

Schaeffer Dam, 133

Schley, Julian L., 187, 192, 193 

Schulz, Edward, 116, 117, 123, 124

Scioto River, 93

Scott, Hugh, 118

Sears, Clinton B., 38, 39, 40 

Seattle Engineer District, 217

Seminole Wars, 10

September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, x

Sewell, John, 66

Seybold, J. S., 226, 237 

Shawneetown, Ill., flood (1898), 52–53, 53

Sheridan, Philip, 18

Sherrill, Clarence O., 88, 91

Shingler, Don, 240 

Shreve, Henry, 20

Shunk, Francis, 93

Sibert, William, 76–78

Slattery, J. R., 109–13, 123, 125 

Sleight, Rankin, 163

Smith, Clarke, 87, 88

Smyser, Robert E., 215 

Snowstorms, 171, 225–29, 226, 227, 236, 240, 247, 248

Operation Haylift (1949), 226, 228

Operation Snowbound (1949), 225–29, 226, 227

South Carolina, 7, 9, 10, 118, 119, 122

Charleston, 10, 31–33, 32, 118, 122, 192, 193,

195

Fort Mill, 118

South Dakota, 227, 228

Phillip, 226

Pierre, 226, 227

South Pacific Division, 237

Southern States floods (1916), 116–25, 117, 118,

120, 121

Spalding, George, 154, 156, 171, 179

Special Regulation No. 67, 125–28

Stickney, Amos, 30

Stimson, Henry, 87

Stony Creek, 37, 38

Storms, 93, 99, 167, 191, 209, 215

North Carolina storm (1884), 30–31

See also Hurricanes; Snowstorms; Tornadoes.

Strong, Paschal, 172

Sturdevant, C. L., 116, 117, 123, 125 

Styer, W. D., 170 

Sultan, Dan, 144, 165, 165, 166, 167

Swift, Joseph G., 21, 22

Taft, William H., 67, 71, 89 

Talley, B. B., 165–67, 173 

Temporary housing

barracks, 10, 69

cottages, 75–76, 98

tents, 15, 17, 18, 25, 31, 39, 60, 62, 67, 69, 71, 72, 

75, 89, 91, 94, 101, 112–13, 116, 120, 122, 

127, 132, 134, 140, 142, 151, 153, 154, 179, 

198, 201, 220

Tennessee, 30, 50, 51, 118, 119, 203

Booths Point, 203

Chattanooga, 106, 126, 127, 118

Dyersburg, 50, 91, 199

Halls, 199

Memphis, 24, 25, 41, 42, 43, 50, 51, 52, 53, 85, 

87, 88, 89, 91, 92, 101, 109, 147, 148, 151, 

153, 154, 155, 160, 173, 177, 180, 181

Nashville, 50, 118, 122, 123, 147, 175, 176

Tennessee River, 47, 85, 87, 147, 200

Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), 175, 200, 217

Tensas River, 91, 113, 114, 141, 151

Texas, 20, 53, 199

Brazoria, 53

Camp Bowie, 199

Camp Swift, 199

Fort Bliss, 135

Fort Worth

Galveston, 53, 54, 59–61, 60, 61, 80, 194, 209–12

Richmond, 36, 54

Sugar Land, 53

Texas City, 208, 209–213, 210, 211, 212, 214, 

236, 247

Velasco, 53

Texas City explosion and fire (1947), 208, 209–213, 

210, 211, 212, 214, 236, 247

Thomas, George, 78

Tombigbee River, 117

Tornadoes

Cabot, Ark. (1976), 244

Charleston (1938), 192, 193

Lorain, Ohio (1924), 143–44, 143

Pleasant Hill, Mo. (1977), 244

Truckee River, 237, 237

Truman, Harry, 212, 213, 214, 215, 216–17, 219, 221, 

226, 233, 235, 236, 239, 241

Twitty, Joseph, 222–25

Tyler, Max, 188

Tyndall Air Force Base, 222

University of Iowa, 216

Upper Mississippi River flood (1950), 238–39
Index ■ 275

Upper Mississippi Valley Division, 197

U.S. Military Academy, 37, 39

Valentine’s Day flood (1884), 14, 27–29, 28, 29, 33

Van Lucas, E. W., 54

Vanport, Ore., flood (1948), 217–21, 218, 234, 236

Vaughan, H. B., 194

Venezuela earthquake (1812), 6–8, 6, 10, 16

Vermont, 161–64, 170, 213, 215

Burlington, 162–64

Cavendish, 162

Montpelier, 161–63, 170, 190, 191

Rutland, 214–15, 215

Vermont flood (1927), 161–64

See also Rutland, Vt., flood (1947).

Vest, George, 22, 24

Vicksburg Engineer District, 88, 91, 110, 123, 125, 147, 

148, 151, 180, 199, 202, 204, 221

Vicksburg Herald, 110

Virginia, 1, 3, 8, 9, 241

Fort Belvoir, 174, 175, 192, 193, 198, 212, 214, 

226

Norfolk, 4

Wabash River, 85, 93, 197, 236

Wabash River flood (1943), 197

Wabash River flood (1950), 236

Waesche, Russell, 181

Wainwright, Jonathan, 209, 211

Walker, Meriwether, 66, 69, 70, 73

Walker River, 238

Wallace, William, 122

Walsh, Orville, 218

Warrior River, 117

Washington, 220

Washington, D.C., 8, 9, 12, 18, 23, 31, 36, 37, 44, 65, 

66, 71, 161, 169, 173, 175, 179, 200, 221

Washington, George, 4

Washington Arsenal explosion (1864), 12

Wateree River, 118, 122

Waterman, H. E., 52

Weaver, Theron, 217, 219

West Point, 37, 39

West Virginia, 33, 116, 120, 121, 122, 128, 168

Cabin Creek, 120–21

Charleston, 28, 93, 120

Huntington, 94, 160, 172, 172, 173, 174

Parkersburg, 94

Point Pleasant, 173

West Virginia National Guard, 122

Wheeler, Raymond A., 209, 217

Wheeling Engineer District, 93, 120, 122

White River, 47, 48, 85, 87, 109, 111, 111, 139, 147, 148, 

198, 198, 199, 199, 203, 204, 205

Wilkinson, Reading, 192

Willets Point, 38, 39

Wilmington Engineer District, 31, 54, 192

Wilson, Walter, Jr., 221

Winooski River, 190

Winooski River flood (1927), 161–64, 170

Wisconsin, 18, 113, 240

Chippewa Falls, 45

Wood, Leonard, 97, 109

Woodring, Harry, 179

Woodruff, Eugene, 20–21, 20

Woodruff, J. A., 88

Work relief, 107, 109–13, 116, 129, 133, 139, 147, 245

Works Progress Administration (WPA), 129, 161, 168, 

169, 171, 179, 181, 187, 188, 189, 190, 192, 195, 214, 

246

Wright, Horatio G., 24

Wyman, Theodore, 186

Wyoming, 225–28

Casper, 228

Cheyenne, 228

Laramie, 228

Lusk, 228

Rawlins, 228

Yadkin River, 118, 122

Yakima River, 218

Yazoo River, 43, 87, 142, 151, 204

Yoder, Leverett G., 238–40

Young, Mason, 168

Young, Willard, 41, 42

Youngsberg, Gilbert, 118, 122