The Rapid Rise and Fall of Army Supply Base Norfolk, Part 2

Maryland Ave and Army Supply Base Norfolk, 1920.  This is now Hampton
Boulevard and Norfolk International Terminals. 

As part of the 1918 cease-fire, the Germans handed over hundreds of
artillery guns to the Allies.  While Congress debated how to partition
the American portion of the cache, the Army stashed the weapons at
Army Supply Base Norfolk.

When the war ended in November 1918, the Army Supply Base became surplus after only a few months of war use. Within a year, the Army made plans to unload the property to the City of Norfolk. The City was seeking to improve its standing with international shippers by creating a proper international terminal. Before the Army officially handed the base over, though, it hosted two major events.

The first was the arrival of USS Naiwa (ID #3512). This short-lived transport vessel arrived in Hampton Roads in 1919 with hundreds of artillery pieces that the Germans handed over to the Allies as part of the November 1918 cease-fire agreement. Upon hearing about the captured guns, several dozen American politicians demanded that their town, city, and/or Congressional district receive part of the loot as war trophies. You can read about that occurrence in a previous post on USS Naiwa. While the Secretary of War and Congress worked out the details, the Army unloaded Naiwa and placed the guns in an open field at the Army Supply Base. 

The Army prepares to ship the German guns out across
the  country. 

The second event brought the fallout of World War I to the shores of Hampton Roads. One of the dramatic stories of the Great War is the Czechoslovak Legion. Made up of Czech and Slovakian nationalists, this unit fought alongside the Russian Army and against the forces of the Austro-Hungarian Empire during the war. Their collective hope was an independent homeland in the Bohemia region of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Russians, however, surrendered in 1917, which was followed by a civil war between the "Red" and "White" factions of Russian society. Now trapped in Russia, the Western powers attempted to get the Legion out of the country. After a legendary fight across Siberia, the Legion made it to Vladivostok. There, the USS Mount Vernon (AP-22) picked up the Czech portion of the Legion, with the intention of taking them back to Western Europe.

Unfortunately, Mount Vernon broke down just off the coast of Virginia and made port in Norfolk. While pulling into Norfolk, the legionnaires got a good look at the Navy's new base and remarked to each other in awe about the number of warships. While workers repaired the ship, the U.S. Army made Supply Base Norfolk available to the legionnaires as a temporary home. The unit was very popular in the United States, as the soldiers symbolized the fight against both imperial oppression (i.e. the Austro-Hungarian Empire) and Communist oppression (i.e. the fight against Bolshevik soldiers after the 1917 surrender). Thousands of Czech expatriates came to Norfolk to visit the Legion and provided them with food, money, and other comforts of home.

The mayor of Norfolk joins with Czech expatriates from New York City in welcoming the Czech soldiers
to Norfolk at Army Supply Base Norfolk.

A Czech soldier met up with his brother, who had already immigrated to America.

The Rapid Rise and Fall of Army Supply Base Norfolk, Part 1

Artist's conception of Army Supply Base Norfolk

Since this is a blog about local U.S. Naval history, we would not normally write about a U.S. Army installation. However, in the case of Army Supply Base Norfolk, the facility was so tied to the creation of Naval Operating Base Hampton Roads in 1918 that it would difficult to separate the two.

An unknown artist drew this
interpretation of workers laying
concrete pilings at the Supply Base

When the United States declared war on Germany in 1917, the infrastructure to launch and support a major expeditionary force from the United States to Europe did not exist. The Navy needed a major shore installation for its "Second-to-None" fleet expansion that began in 1916. To accomplish this goal, the Navy started Naval Operating Base Hampton Roads at Sewell's Point. 

1919 map of Norfolk showing NOB Hampton Roads
and Army Supply Base Norfolk

For its part, the Army needed facilities to support the American Expeditionary Force (the main U.S. Army outfit in France) and began building a series of supply bases in major American ports on the East Coast. These bases would collect war supplies shipped in by rail and then load them on Navy or Army transport vessels, which then took them to the front lines.

The Army intelligently located these depots near the Navy's warships. This way, transport vessels would not have to go far to pick up their armed escorts to shepherd them across the U-boat-infested Atlantic Ocean. Thus, the Army began building Army Supply Base Norfolk right on the Elizabeth River, just a mile south of Naval Operating Base Hampton Roads.

The Army awarded the construction contract to the Porter Brothers Company out of Spokane, Washington. Construction began in late 1917 and the contractors finished two modern concrete piers with warehouses by mid-1918. The contractors also constructed a small headquarters and a hospital. With the Virginian Railroad servicing the base, the ships immediately began using the new facility to ship war supplies across the Atlantic.

Pier 1, Army Supply Base Norfolk, with two transports ready to take supplies overseas.

U.S. Battleships in Hampton Roads, 1918: A Four Scene Storyboard

Included in the museum's collection are these four postcards shown below.  The postcards show a U.S. battle fleet at anchor in Hampton Roads, seen from the perfectly manicured grass of Fortress Monroe. The artist drew all four postcards from the same vantage point.  The fleet is depicted during four different times of the day: noon, afternoon, midnight, and early morning.  At first glance, the images look the same.  This would imply its publisher, the Asheville Postcard Company, was lazy and simply touched up one image.  There are, however, subtle differences.  Ships move in and out of the harbor, implying four unique drawings. 

Acknowledging the fact that the battleships are painted in a wartime (slate grey) paint scheme, the ships anchored in the harbor suggests the postcard's year is 1918.  During that year, the Navy mobilized and deployed to Hampton Roads.  Context clues give us some indication which specific ships the author was painting.  The battleship in the middle (in front of the lighthouse) is believed to be USS Wyoming (BB-32).  Other ships in the picture appear to be an older type of armored cruiser (a Pennsylvania-class armored cruiser).  Three "pre-dreadnought" battleships, such as USS New Jersey (BB-16) are also included in the images. Several  of these "Great White Fleet"-era warships, like New Jersey,  were utilized for convoy escort, training, and harbor defense duty.  If this is the case, this would not be the "U.S. Battleship Fleet" noted by the cards.  Rather, it would likely be a reserve squadron or one attached to the Naval Overseas Transport Service.

Norfolk's Short Lived "Spoils of War" Ship

The museum recently received this rotary camera picture of the ship's company on the freighter USS Naiwa (ID #3512) while at Naval Operating Base Hampton Roads in March 1919. A close look at the picture of the fifty-eight man company reveals that the commanding officer took the unusual step of  bringing his wife and two children along with him. The photo was taken by Taylor's Studio, a Norfolk-based rotary camera business.


USS Naiwa, 1918

This picture is rare in the respect that Naiwa had an active service career in the Navy for only six months, and very little is known about her and her company.The Navy accepted the freighter from a Baltimore shipyard just a week before Armistice Day (November 11, 1918) and ordered her to La Pallice/La Rochelle, France. However, a few hours after leaving Baltimore, she suffered a critical steering problem and was forced into Hampton Roads for repairs at Norfolk Naval Shipyard.  Once the shipyard fixed Naiwa, she resumed her original orders for La Rochelle.  Before heading out for France, Taylor's Studio was at the base, snapping several images of Naiwa and other Navy ships and their companies.

Since the ship did not leave Hampton Roads until March 1919, the trip to France and back to Hampton Roads was uneventful.The ship's cargo, however, was destined to cause a major ruckus.  Under the terms of the armistice agreement signed between the Germans and the Allies, the Germans were to hand over all their artillery and weapons of war. As part of its share of the spoils, the U.S. Army received 4,000 guns, howitzers, and trench mortars, along with fifty fighter planes and several hundred machine-guns. When word of this cache reached the United States, many politicians wanted to have these weapons for victory monuments in their hometowns. Several Congressmen immediately introduced bills earmarking a certain number of guns for their districts.Additionally, the U.S. Army wanted to reserve several hundred weapons to parade around the country as a recruiting tool and to raise money for the Fifth Liberty Loan drive.

It is not clear how many guns Naiwa brought back, though one source says she brought back over 7,000 tons worth of guns and ordnance (for reference, one artillery gun was about one ton). Other ships that participated in this project usually had anywhere between 70 to 250 artillery guns and an unknown number of artillery shells and small arms.The issue of fair and equitable distribution of the spoils was not settled for a year, when Congress passed a bill setting up quotas for each state.