The Coconino sun., 1919-02-28
Millions Are Thrown Away and Negro
 Soldiers Are Enslaved
By Shell Smith

WASHINGTON-Waste of many millions of dollars of the money of the people in military camps of the country since the signing of the ar mistice, through extravagant expendi- ture and carelessness in handling property, and systematic enslaving of negroes in the south under guise of military discipline, have been proven in unimpeachable evidence presented by Representative Dillon, of South Dakota, in a sensational speech before the house.
 Declaring that the most fragrant case of the kind uncovered by him was that in the vicinity of Newport News, Va, he said that the government had built there, and without the slightest necessity, cement highway six miles in length, in the construction of { which negro soldiers had been em- ployed; that numerous buildings had been built for the Morrison aviation field there and and on low ground which had to be abandoned; that 800 cottages and other dwellings of the most modern design were built for workmen who do not and never will occupy them, that arrangements are even now being made to build 500 more such houses there; that though the streets are impossible because of mud and water and the town of Hill ton, as it is now called, lies in swampy ground, it is the intention to fill in around the houses, pave the streets and build fifteen miles of sidewalk; and that large ditches are being dug by negro soldiers at S30 a month each.
 Dillon said he had found in his per sonal investigations made on the spot that mile out of Hilton, in steve dore camp now part of Camp Alex ander, he had found many open-air storage buildings, 20 by 113 feet in dimension and costing S2600 each, and in them were supposed to be stored 400 caterpillar tractors and fourteen armored tanks, each costing $55 1000, but that the latter were flying in the mud and rain, to become hopeless waste. A little further on were twen- ty-four covered warehouses, 150 by 250 feet in dimension, with nothing in them. Nearby he found carrals, op- erated by the animal embarkation di- vision of the army, and containing several thousand horses and mules, standing in several inches of mud and with nothing but mud to lie in. It was reported to him that some of them had been there since August, 1918, and had cost the government S240 each.
 At Old Point Comfort, in the same vicinity, Dillon disclosed several hun dred cantonment buildings built on such impossible sites that pumping plant had been constructed to pump sand into the water about them. Sev- eral hundred ammunition trucks and tractors he found exposed to the, salt air and the elements in such way as to assure their speedy ruin through rust.
 Sinister Motive in Deals.
 In explaining the sinister meaning of all this, Dillon explained to his colleagues that ''in Newport News are ten apartment houses built by the war department. All of them contain eight apartments of four rooms each and are used by the officer clerks of the port authorities and by employees of the shipping board. They are said to be built on land owned by the, New port News Shipbuilding and Drydock company. They are stucco buildings with slate roofs and have all modern improvements. The president of this company is Homer l.. Ferguson. He is a brother of Gen. Frank K. Fer guson, the commanding officer of that army district. Capt. L. G. Thom is assistant to the executive officer and in charge of the labor department. He is a brother-in-law of one of the Fergusons. It will thus be seen that this family controls practically the commercial and governmental activi- ties at Newport News, and also the military activities in that entire army district. Thus they cooperate among themselves and with various govern ment activities and have mutual in- terests in the upbuilding of that com munity, including the phantom city, Hilton, in the swamp"
 Dillon went on to reval that eighty acres of this swampy land was pur- chased from straw company set up for the purpose for S40,100. "So help me God" exclaimed the white-haired South Dakotan, "I would not pay S10 an acre for that land!" Yet S3,550,- 1, 900 of the money of taxpayers was turned over to this straw company Tor development, with the land and inn provements, as security. Street cars were purchased at cost of S11 400 | each and leased to the railway com { pany at five per cent on the invest | ment for no other purpose than car rying workmen from the phantom Hil- ton to Newport News, and it was agreed that later the company should be allowed to purchase them at re- duced cost. Four companies station | ed there had nine captains, fourteen first lieutenants and eight second lieu tenants. Negro soldiers, worked in construction beside laborers making s3 per day. were charged $10 to $15 for affidavits attached to applications for discharge.
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 THIRTY-FOOT SNOWDRIFTS.