Page:The history and achievements of the Fort Sheridan officers' training camps.djvu/28

 26 THE FORT SHERIDAN ASSOCIATION

and raised approximately $125,000, which, with small amounts from other sources, has constituted the Fort Sheridan Association fund which has been used for loans, for assistance to families and for general w^ork of readjustment after the w^ar, but not a cent of this fund has ever been spent for current expenses.

From the beginning of the organization, every effort was made by cor- respondence and visitation to include in the membership of the Fort Sheridan Association all the men from the First Camp as w^ell as from the Second. Pamphlets containing information with reference to the Association w^ere put in the hands of all officers at Camp Custer and Camp Grant and the Executive Manager subsequently visited these camps in order to enlist their membership. In this connection, it is interesting to state that the organization has never limited its usefulness or its help extended to members of the Association, but has, in all cases, endeavored to serve the men of the First Camp and their families regardless of w^hether they were members of the Association or not, and this has been true of hundreds of men outside the Fort Sheridan camps. It has always been the policy of the organization to extend its helpful services wherever they would accomplish the most good and not to be limited by any narrow idea of service, or any thought of its personal advantage.

During the months of February and March, 1918, the Executive Manager visited the following camps:

Camp Funston, at Fort Riley, where w^e had about 40 men — mostly captains, in some very responsible positions, who afterwards w^ent overseas with the Eighty-ninth Division; Camp Dodge, at Des Moines, where we had 130 men, all of w^hom went to France; Camp Zachary Taylor, at Louisville, w^here v/e had about 300 men; Camp Forest, at Chickamauga Park, near Chattanoga, Tenn., where we had 125 men; Camp Gordon, Atlanta, w^here we had 1 men ; Camp Wadsworth, Spartanburg, South Carolina, the camp of the New York National Guard, where we had about 1 00 first lieutenants in new regular army units; Camp Greene, Charlotte, North Carolina, where we had two Chiefs of Staff and more than 1 00 officers, all of whom went across with the Third and Fifth Divisions; Camp Lee, Petersburg, Virginia, where we had 200 officers, and Camp Meade, Annapolis, Maryland, where we had 1 officers.

The great majority of our men w^ere at Camp Grant and Camp Custer. The entire officer organization, apart from a score of Regular Army officers at both camps, came from the First Fort Sheridan Camp. Camp Custer (the Eighty-fifth Division) was organized by the Michigan- Wisconsin Regiment of the First Camp, and Camp Grant (the Eighty-sixth Division) was organized by the Illinois Regiment of the First Camp. In most cases the officers w^ere taken over intact by companies from these camps to train the new regiments, thus prolonging the friendship and acquaintances formed at Fort Sheridan throughout the period of the war. In each of these camps representatives of the Fort Sheridan Association were familiar with the work the organiza- tion could do and acted as an agent of the Association there.

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