The weekly times-record. (Valley City, N.D.) 1912-1922, 1917-09-27
Lloyd Witter Writes Interesting
Letter from San Antonio Camp

The following extracts from letter
received from Lloyd D. Witter a uni
h versity student, NV at Fort San
Houston, Texas, contains much of in
terest regarding the progress OF
things there:
"San Antonio has something over a
hundred thousand inhabitants, beau
tiful city, a city that seems to me to
be typically southern, mainly | sup
pose, because of the peculiar archltec'
tual style of the buildings. For the
most part the houses are either very
large and beautiful or else all mere
huts; there are comparatively few
regular" residences. They nearly
all have large French windows that
are. always open day and night, and
the double doorways, many with a
sort of an inner court with the open
sky overhead. There is always that
Wilderness seen in PICTURES of the south,
houses are painted that way or are
built of the abundant white granite
and sandstone that there is around
there. In the business section, the
stores all have permanent awnings,
odd at first but certainly very neces-
sary for the heat Of the day is all that
the word intense" indicates.
There are in and around San An
tonic some 10000 soldiers. These are
located in various camps around the
city and a mixture there is, artillery
and cavalry troops, wagon trans, mo-
tor groups, machine gun companies,
aviation squadrons, signal corps, ord
nance. remount stations, and last but
BY no means the least, the quarter
masters. I am located in the @. M. C.
deta chment right at the old fort itself,
or within stones throw of it, Old
Fort Sam Houston that has so many
old tales concerning it. 1t is known
as the quadrangle" and is used for
the officers of the Southern Depart
ment Headquarters. This post is sit
uated about three miles from the bus
1ness center of San Antonio to the
northeast, and, with the new Camp
Travis, occupied the greater portion of
the northeastern section of the city.
The Third cavalry, the Third field
artillery, the Nineteenth infantry and
the Quartermaster's corps detachment
are all located at this particular post,
beside few smaller organizations, |
supply troops, etc. About half mile
from here is located the new Camp
TRAY IS Of which you have probably
heard, the camp where Uncle Sam is
going to train those he has chosen
to help win this great fight of princi-
PIE. In two weeks time this camp
will have 10000 men in it.-when
arrived few short weeks ago, it was
a stretch of cactus and mesquite; now
In 60 days it has been transformed
into a city of 100000, electrically light
ed, sewers and water mains complete,
q large telephone system, everything
In perfect running order Talk of
miracles of olden times-they cannot
touch those of today l never realized
the magnitude of governmental work
until had the opportunity of watch
ing the construction, Of this camp,
seemingly permanent city of two story
Buildings.
The Quartermasters corps detach-
hnent is merely higher form of the
recruit depots, a Capitalization point
I suppose it could be called. When
D man enllsts he is sent to receiving
barracks as I was sent to Jefferson
Barra cks. From these he is sent to
one of the several department head
quarters for assignment to duty. All
men are assigned to duty through
headquarters, the personnel branch.
From five to 1900 men are kept here at
all times and as they are assigned,
their places are filled by shipments
from receiving barracks. The places
that the men are assigned to are wide
and varied to say the least, to all
places on the globe. l am fortunate
to be here where l can watch the whole
system work out. The men here be-
fore they are assigned are required
to drift every morning for two hours.
In the afternoon they have few hours
fatigue" piling wood, pulling up
fences, building them, digging bitches,
and about everything else you can
imagine. The work is hardener
though and few weeks of it together