Camp Mercedes

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker at Camp Mercedes has to say, and it's a story worth hearing. Picture the Rio Grande Valley in March of 1917. The United States has not yet entered the First World War, but the wheels are already turning.

And the man turning them here in South Texas is Maj. Gen. John J.

Pershing, who looks at the town of Mercedes and decides, right here, this is where we build. He chooses an eighty-acre stretch called the Emerson Farm tract, sitting southeast of town, and before the spring is out, a full military post rises from that South Texas soil. Construction wraps up in April of 1917, and what they've built is something to behold.

A parade ground at the center of it all, lined up on both sides by twenty-three barracks buildings and fourteen officers bungalows, every one of those bungalows looking like the last one you passed. The post strength comes in at sixteen officers, seven hundred men, and six hundred horses. That is a city of its own kind, out there on the edge of the Valley.

In May, a training cadre from the 16th Cavalry rides in under the command of Col. W. S.

Scott, getting everything ready. And then, May 17th, the first recruits arrive. Camp Mercedes is open for business, training men bound for France.

Then the Armistice comes, the fighting stops across an ocean, and the unit is demobilized. Camp Mercedes closes in 1922. Eighty acres, a parade ground, twenty-three barracks, six hundred horses, and young men headed to France.

That's what happened southeast of Mercedes, Texas, and the marker out there makes sure nobody forgets it.

What the marker says

In March 1917, prior to U.S. entry into World War I, Maj. Gen. John J. Pershing chose Mercedes as the site of a permanent camp for training personnel to serve overseas in France. Construction of Camp Mercedes on the 80-acre Emerson Farm tract southeast of town was completed in April 1917. The post centered on a parade ground lined by 23 barracks buildings and 14 look-alike officers bungalows. Post strength was 16 officers, 700 men and 600 horses. A training cadre from the 16th Cavalry under the command of Col. W.S. Scott occupied Camp Mercedes in May before the first recruits arrived May 17. After the Armistice, the unit was demobilized and Camp Mercedes closed in 1922. (2012)