U.S. Camel Corps

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The U.S. Camel Corps was a mid-nineteenth century experiment by the United States Army in using camels as pack animals in the Southwest United States.

While the camels proved to be well-suited to travel through the region, their unpleasant disposition and habit of frightening horses is believed to be responsible for their failure to be adopted as a mode of transportation in the United States.

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[edit] Origin

The idea of using camels for military transport in the US dated back to 1836, when second lieutenant George H. Crossman began pressuring the United States Department of War to use camels in campaigns against Native Americans in Florida. It was not until after the Mexican War (1846–1848) that the idea was taken seriously.

Newly-appointed Secretary of War Jefferson Davis found the Army to be in need of a solution to its transportation problems in the western US. The rough terrain and dry climate was seen as being too rough on the horses and mules used by the Army, and camels provided a possible solution.

On, March 3, 1855, the US Congress appropriated $30,000 for the project. Major Henry C. Wayne, a promoter of the idea, was assigned to procure the camels. On June 4, 1855, Wayne departed New York City on board USS Supply, under the command of then-Lieutenant David Dixon Porter.

The ship crossed the Atlantic Ocean, and purchased camels at ports in North Africa (sources differ as to exactly where). On April 29, 1856, Supply arrived at Indianola, Texas, with thirty-three camels and five drivers.(8/2:58/92117)

[edit] Use in the southwest

After allowing the animals a few weeks to recuperate from their sea voyage, they were taken to Camp Verde.

Reports from initial tests were largely positive. The camels proved to be exceedingly strong, and were able to move quickly across terrain that horses found problematic. Their legendary ability to go without water proved valuable on an 1857 survey mission from Fort Defiance to the Colorado River. The survey team and their camels continued on into California where they were stationed at the Benicia Arsenal.

While camels were suited to the job of transport in the American Southwest, the experiment still failed. Much of this was due to the less desirable qualities of the camels. Their stubbornness and aggressiveness made them unpopular among soldiers, and they frightened horses.

[edit] End of the experiment

With the arrival of the American Civil War, the Camel Corps was mostly forgotten. Many of the camels were sold to private owners, others escaped into the desert. These feral camels continued to be sighted through the early 1900s, with the last reported sighting in 1941 near Douglas, Texas.

Hi Jolly (Hadji Ali), a Syrian camel driver who took part in the experiment, lived out his life in the US. He died in 1902 and is buried in Quartzsite, Arizona. His grave is marked by a pyramid-shaped monument topped with a small metal camel.

Some of the camels were purchased by Frank Laumeister, a veteran of the corps, and taken to the new Colony of British Columbia in 1859-1860 where they were engaged in freighting on the Douglas Road, Old Cariboo Road and other gold-rush era routes there. Between the region's rocky trails and roads and the mutual hostility between camels and mules, the experiment was a failure and the camels were set out to pasture, with the last sighting of a wild camel in British Columbia was in the 1930s. Their presence in local history is reflected in the name of the Camelsfoot Range near Lillooet, and in a local basin called "the Camoo".

[edit] External links

[edit] Further reading

  • Faulk, Odie B. The U.S. Camel Corps: an army experiment, Oxford University Press, New York, NY, 1976
  • Fowler, Harlan D. Camels to California; a chapter in western transportation, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1950
  • Froman, Robert. "The Red Ghost," American Heritage, XII (April 1961), pp. 35-37 and 94-98
  • Lesley, Lewis Burt (ed.). Uncle Sam's Camels: the journal of May Humphreys Stacey supplemented by the report of Edward Fitzgerald Beale, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 1929
  • Yancey, Diane. Camels for Uncle Sam, Hendrick-Long Publishing Co., Dallas, TX, 1995
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