United States Army Depot Brigades in World War I

By Alexander F. Barnes & Peter Belmonte

McFarland and Company, 2022

Michael Hanlon, Reviewer

How the Depot Brigades Were Supposed to Work

To open this review, which I intend to be of the positive sort, I'm going to do something presumptuous for a reviewer.  I'm going to suggest an alternate and more ambitious title for Peter Belmonte and Alexander Barnes' new work—The Hilt of  the Sword: How America Built the AEF. In a metaphor used to great effect by wartime Army Chief of Staff Peyton March, the AEF in France was the "Blade" of America's sword and the War Department and the Army's training system was its "Hilt." Both were essential to victory. Central to the functioning of the stateside "Hilt"—and the subject of the title the authors or publisher chose—was a new piece of military organization called the "Depot Brigade." While they thoroughly examine the concepts behind these units and their applications, and shortcomings, Barnes  and Belmonte range much wider in their writings, examining many other fascinating aspects of General March's "Hilt" in an almost comprehensive way.  Hence, I would have liked a broader title for this work.

Now, don't get me wrong, for anyone who's ever sat through an organizational theory seminar, these depot brigades are fascinating social specimens. In the course of the nation's short 20 months of waging war, they would be conceived, get implemented army-wide on the fly, mutate wildly via mission creep, and, then, like MacArthur's old soldier, fade away with the demobilization of the four million man force it had assembled. But what makes this book especially enjoyable is the style with which the authorial team presents their material. They seem to have collected an amazing number of soldierly anecdotes, biographies, and photos, and they present them in a smooth flowing manner. (They reminded me of Joseph Wambaugh, who must have compiled every cop story  and legend in the history of the LAPD and used all of them in his novels.) 

First, though, what exactly was a "Depot Brigade?" Initially, the umbrella-like units were charged with all the tasks necessary to turn civilians—by the tens of thousands—into your basic (not yet extremely well trained) American soldier. This included housing,  feeding, and clothing them; screening out the unfit: teaching the troops basic military skills from saluting to shooting; fitting them to their best occupations: and then shipping them out for their advanced training post or final assignment. That was the starting concept, anyway, but as we all know, stuff happens.   

The "Hilt" soon discovered it needed to provide other types of support for the Pershing's "Blade" in France and much of the new burden would fall on the depot brigades. What about identifying and training the leaders, officers and NCOs for the millions in the new drafts? And, at the other end of the spectrum, what to do about the thousands of marginal or unfit new privates, the "Lame, Halt, and Blind," as the authors titled one of their chapters? Further, all sorts of complications grew from the segregated nature of the army, the need for highly skilled soldiers in certain specialties, the need to promptly replace casualties suffered by divisions deployed to the Western Front, and stateside demands for manpower—things were not calm on the Mexican border, for example, and the country's ports, railroads, and factories needed guarding against saboteurs. The depot brigades found themselves in the middle of these issues, and the two writers provide interesting  insights how the problems were solved, although sometimes in a "close enough for government work" way.

Typical Crowded Barracks in One of the New Camps

After reading United States Army Depot Brigades in World War I,  two things stand out for me.  First, the authors have really done overdue justice to the two million or so Doughboys who never made it overseas but had reported in,  underwent the indignities of basic training, and were ready to fight in the 1919 campaign, that—thank the Lord—proved unnecessary. Barnes and Belmonte do a fine job of delineating the who, how, what, when, and why of their honorable service.

Second are the little know facts about America's war effort that the authors have uncovered for us. I loved them. I've read a lot about the AEF, but here's a short list from the extravagance of new details I learned.

1.  General Leonard Wood, politically unpopular with the Wilson Administration and generally considered to have been kept away from the action Over There, got himself wounded by a trench mortar explosion on a visit to the front line during the early days of the AEF's deployment.

2.  The "total war" effort of the U.S.  led to the creation of some unusual army specialties and units.  For instance, the  Hoboken Port of Embarkation hosted army Ship Repair Shop Unit Number 301,  made up of soldiers charged with maintaining the navy's transport ships for conveying the troops overseas.

3.  An all-Puerto Rico National Army division, the 94th, was planned but was still being organized at the time of the Armistice.

4.  The last full AEF combat unit to arrive in France, the 8th Infantry of the 8th Division, would be among the first to arrive back in France in WWII, landing on Utah Beach on 6 June 1944.

5. Some things never change—a number of draftees, who had no wish or intention to see combat, feigned injuries, language difficulties, psychiatric disorders., etc., etc., to gain assignment to "Development Battalions" for special counseling and training. Naturally, the most talented actors held out getting "cured" until after the Armistice.

6. Every AEF Division that saw combat required 10,000 draft animals (horses and mules) for artillery, ammunition, supply, and medical trains. That's a much bigger number than I ever realized.

7. The U.S. built 32 training camps for the newly conscripted troops, with barracks all designed to house 200 man companies.  In the meantime, some other part of the War Department decided in the newly configured divisions companies would have 250 men. Widespread  and unhealthy crowding (remember the Spanish flu) resulted, of course.

8.  Between the 11 November 1918 Armistice and January 1920, the ENTIRE four-million-man force that America had raised for the Great War had been demobilized except for the 130,000 officers and men who remained in the Regular Army.

I recommend United States Army Depot Brigades in World War I for any readers who find  the details of America's effort in the Great War utterly fascinating. It's also a very valuable resource for genealogical researchers and family members who wonder what those serving Doughboys, like F. Scott Fitzgerald and Irving Berlin who never quite made it over the pond, might have been up to in the War to End All  Wars. It's available in Kindle and paperback formats.

Michael Hanlon, Editor/Publisher