Shelby Mules, 100 years ago
The below images are from the Mississippi Armed Forces Museum, depicting Doughboys of the newly formed National Army’s 38th “Cyclone” Infantry Division preparing at Camp Shelby outside of Hattiesburg for overseas service in WWI. The photos give a window into the equipment, men and animals of an ammunition train, a vital service which kept the Army fighting longer than 30 minutes.
Field marching order, note the M1917 Enfield
Pup tents and Army mules
Note the pioneer tools
As anyone familiar with the training area around Shelby should know, the roads there was good practice to those rutted muddy paths on the Western Front.
The 17-page scrapbook was donated to the museum in 1990 by TD White of Purvis, MS, and sadly the names of the men and mules in it are lost to history.