Troops Take Field To Save New York.

New York Times 100 years ago today, August 11, 1912:

Contending Forces Sleep Under Arms in Nearby Camps, Ignorant of Each Other's Proximity.

MANHATTAN SOLDIERS LATE

Men Soon Will Be Scattered Over Southern Connecticut in Most Extensive Manoeuvres Yet Planned.

Special to The New York Times.

    STRATFORD, Conn., Aug. 10.— The 20,000 regular army soldiers and the National Guardsmen from New York, New Jersey, and the New England States which are to participate in the most extensive manoeuvres ever held in this country began assembling in southern Connecticut to-day, and to-night more than 10,000 soldiers of the two armies have reached their camps. and the other 10,000 will have arrived at their positions some time tomorrow morning.
    The joint forces have been divided into two armies, one of which, the Red Army, under Brig. Gen. Roderick A. Smith, U.S.A., will attack, while the other, the Blue Army, under Brig. Gen. Adelbert L. Mills. U.S.A., will undertake the defense of Manhattan in the struggle that is now impending.
    In both armies are New Yorkers, the enemy numbering among its soldiers the Seventh, Twelfth, and Seventy-first Regiments of Infantry, while among the troops whose duty it will be to prevent the capture and sacking of the metropolis are the Fourteenth, Forty-seventh, and Twenty-third Regiments of Infantry from Brooklyn and the First New York Cavalry, which includes Squadron A of Manhattan and Squadron C of Brooklyn.
    The positions of the contending forces have been kept secret by the officers in charge of the joint manoeuvres, and tonight there are encamped within a few miles of each other Blue and Red troops, each ignorant of the proximity of the other.
    It seriously interferes with the plans of the War Department to make public the locations of the various camps, but no confidence is betrayed when it is announced that at various times to-day the troops were seen in the vicinity of Flirt Hill, Comstock Knoll, Naugatuck Junction, and Devil's Den, all of which places figure in the military maps of the present manoeuvres.

Delay Getting into Camp.
    All the troops were expected to be in camp by sundown this evening, but numerous delays were occasioned, and it was dark before the Now Yorkers, who are of "the enemy" began to arrive, and it was midnight before they were settled in the big camp that had been set aside for the brigade into which they have been organized under Brig. Gen. George R. Dyer of the New York National Guard.
    Not a single camp in the present war is situated on or near a State road. Instead, the army officers who selected the positions chose them in the most inaccessible places imaginable, their purpose being to make as difficult as possible the problems which the troops will be called upon to solve, the smaller problems that are to be undertaken Monday being followed by bigger ones day by day, the whole culminating in the great problem that will call into action every man of both armies, on the outcome of which will depend the theoretical fate of New York.
    The 20,000 men in the organisations soon will be scattered all over the southern part of Connecticut to show how thoroughly the regular does his work, the army officers who have placed them in position has succeeded in hiding practically all of them, except the few on duty with the headquarters and division staffs, in a thickly populated section of the country where it is almost impossible to find them without using up several hours' hunting for them.
    Take, for instance, the Seventh Regiment of New York. By the man who knows the camp can be reached in less than five minutes' walk from a certain station on the New Haven Railroad, yet so splendidly hidden is the camp that it is not visible until you are right on top of it, so to speak.
    This afternoon Capt. Meyers of the Seventh Regiment arrived from New York by automobile. He got within a hundred yards of the camp site and then lost his way. He was still looking for it when a native came along, and when Capt. Meyers asked where his outfit was going to "hang out" the native burst into a loud laugh and pointed to "right over yonder." The place he indicated was so close that the officer, had he known it could have thrown a stone into the middle of it.
    Nearby the Seventh are the other three New York regiments which are to take part in the effort to destroy New York, and they are even more secluded, so far as the traveler is concerned, than is the Seventh. Not far away from the cluster of camps is the headquarters of Gen. Dyer.

Only the Aviators Can See.
    As for the loyal troops from Brooklyn their camps are pitched where only the man in the aeroplane can see them all at the same time. All are distant from the main roads, and if a Brooklynite comes a-visiting soldier friends he had better arrange for a two-day stay, for it is a safe wager that it will take him all of one day to find his man, and if he does it in time he will be lucky.
    Squadron A., the crack horse command of Manhattan, got in early this morning, and the troopers proceeded to their rendezvous in a shady and hard-to-get-to place not far from the banks of the Housatonic, and within easy riding distance of the suspiciously named spot called Flirt Hill. Squadron C. of Brooklyn is in the same locality as Squadron A.
    On the hillsides somewhere not far distant from Derby, Danbury, and Milford are the field artillery organizations. All of the New Jersey and Connecticut infantry men are on the defensive side of the Housatonic, where hidden away from the glances of the curious they await the arrival of the other "loyal" troops from Massachusetts, Vermont, and Maine, which are due early to-morrow.
    It is certain, if weather conditions are good, that thousands of visitors, will journey to the war zone to-morrow in hope of seeing the troops. It will be impossible for anybody to see all of the troops, and the visitors will be lucky if they get a view of a whole brigade. For the benefit of those sightseers it can be announced that some of the fighters of both armies may be viewed to-morrow in the vicinity of Milford, Stratford, Huntington, Longhill, Tyler City, Woodbridge, Redding, Naugatuck Junction, and other places in the particular section of Connecticut in which those towns are situated.
    The one place in the whole military plan that is easy to get to is the headquarters of Gen. Bliss, the chief umpire, near Stratford. There, on the $400 a week camp ground, are all the assistant umpires from the regular army, the chief Provost Marshal and his aids, the army aeroplane hangars, the camp of the officer aviators, the headquarters of Major Gen. John F. O'Ryan. commanding the National Guard of New York; those of Adjt. Gen. William Verbeck of New York and his staff, and the quarters that have been reserved for Gov. Dix and the members of his staff, who are expected to arrive to-morrow afternoon. During the latter part of the week Secretary of War Stimson, Major Gen. Wood. Chief of the General Staff, and possibly President Taft will find tent accommodations awaiting them there also.
    All of the aeroplane work will begin and end at the headquarters of Gen Bliss. Two machines, one a Burgess-Wright and the other a Curtiss, have been assembled, and the aviators are ready to start work at sun-up to-morrow morning. Another Burgess-Wright machine from Marblehead, Mass., is on the way.
    In addition to the regular army machines. a fourth machine will be added to the aviation equipment to-morrow. This machine will be operated by Sergt. Beckwith Havens of the First Signal Company of Manhattan, and it will be the first time that the National Guard has figured in actual military aviation work in this country. The army fliers, all of whom are here, are Capt. Hennessy and Lieuts. Milling, Kirtland, and Kennedy. The regular army Signal Corps wireless detachment is also attached to Gen. Bliss's headquarters, with Lieut. Benjamin D. Fouldis in charge.
    Lieut. Fouldis is one of the army's best-known aviators and was Orville Wright's passenger in the first cross-country flight with a passenger ever made in an aeroplane. Major Samuel Reber of Governors Island is in command of all the Signal Corps activities.

Provost Marshal a Busy Man.
    Col. John Hull, Chief Provost Marshal in charge of that work in both armies, is at present one of the hardest-worked men in the field. With his aid, it is his pleasant duty to rent the camp sites and water springs, buy the Kitchen wood when the Quartermaster's supply runs out, appease irate farmers when their potato beds are trampled upon, see that everybody behaves all the time as nearly as possible, to try to be at three or four different places at the same time, and when anything is damaged to see the victim and try to arrange the most favorable terms of settlement from a governmental standpoint.
    In other words, Col. Hull is the military real estate authority and Chief of Police. Under him are Col. Adelbert Cronkhite, Chief Provost Marshal for the Red Army, and Major A. B. Shattuck, Chief Provost Marshal for the Blues.
Other well-known "policemen" seen in the war zone were Major "Joe" Wheeler, son of the famous little General of the civil and Spanish wars; Capt. J. J. Mays of Governors Island, and Major John Scarritt of Fort Wadsworth. N. Y.
    Col. Cronkhite, Major Wheeler, and Major Scarritt were named as a committee of three to negotiate the renting of a certain spring this afternoon. The spring is a big one, and has furnished water for the countryside for generations. Until this war its water was as free us the air. But now it is all changed, and despite pleas of Col. Cronkhite and Major Wheeler the Government had to agree to pay $20 for the privilege of using it.
    For the purposes of assessing damages later, Major Scarritt made some inquiries this afternoon to ascertain what the Government would be up against in the event that any of the soldiers strayed from the beaten paths and landed in truck fields or flower beds. Major Scarritt found that the average valuation of a potato patch was $100 an acre, an acre of corn from $75 to $150, and an acre of beets or onions from $150 to $250. It is said that a special order will be issued in the next few hours forbidding any soldier to go within a mile of a beet or onion field.
    Col. Cornells Vanderbilt of Gen. O'Ryan's staff is expected to reach camp this morning to remain on duty until the war is ended. The military committees of the New York Senate and Assembly are also expected early next week. Tomorrow the soldiers get their camps in order. Monday the war begins in earnest.