Texas Almanac, 2004-2005 Page: 23
672 p. : col. ill., maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this book.
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History
The Environment
The environment that awaited
army families varied greatly. In let-
ters to her family, Helen Chapman,
wife of the first quartermaster of
Fort Brown, described houses in
Brownsville and neighboring Mata-
moros as being shaded by pome-
granates, lemons, oranges, figs and
oleanders, with mesquite, acacia
and ebony trees growing wild. She
assured her mother, "You must
remember there are other posts far
worse and that he might have been
ordered to Santa Fe, Oregon or Cali-
fornia." Alice K. Grierson (le
Forts Croghan (Bumrnet), Martin 1885) with her husb
Scott (Fredericksburg), Graham lowed her husband fr
(west of Hillsboro) and Bliss (El for more than 20 yea
1st Lt. William Davis,
Paso) won praise from army wives spring 1885. Photos
for their pleasantness and beauty.
Winters at forts Duncan (Eagle
Pass) and McIntosh (Laredo) were mild, but summers
were blistering, with the temperature sometimes hitting
107 degrees in the shade. Ringgold Barracks (Rio
Grande City) was also miserably hot, while Fort Davis
was mild and pleasant in summer. At Fort Concho in
1868, hail beat down every tent, stampeded the horses
and left two inches of ice covering the parade ground.
The post surgeon at Fort McKavett (near Menard)
reported that the area's animal life included gray
wolves, coyotes, bears, deer, jackrabbits and wild
horses, along with rattlesnakes, cottonmouths, tarantulas
and centipedes. Frontier families learned to shake out
bedding before "hitting the sack." Fleas often caused
more distress than snakes, however, for which fort resi-
dents used the old frontier remedy of putting a tin of
water under each leg of the bed before retiring.
Housing
At the forts, families found a great diversity of hous-
ing. At times they were greeted with tents, in which they
lived until other housing was built.
Picket houses were often used as a transition
between tents and permanent structures. Picket con-
struction involved digging a rectangular ditch one to two
feet deep along the perimeter of the building. A large
post was upended in the trench at each corner of the
house. Smaller wooden posts were set upright between
them, with their lower ends in the trench (rather than
horizontal, as in a traditional log house). Wood salvaged
from packing crates was fashioned into window and
door frames, and spaces between the logs were chinked
with wood chips, mud and lime. Roofs of canvas and
straw were anchored to wooden frames laid across the
tops of the walls.
Since the picket houses were intended only as tem-
porary housing, they were rarely maintained. However,
they were commonly used well past the time when they
should have been replaced. As the green logs dried, they
shrank and the chinking fell out, allowing rain and snow
to pour through the cracks.
At Fort Richardson in 1871, housing was so scarce
that officer Robert G. Carter fitted together a complex offt) lived at both Fort Concho (1875-1882) and Fort Davis (1882-
and, Col. Benjamin H. Grierson of the 10th U.S. Cavalry. Alice fol-
om one western frontier post to another, in Texas and New Mexico,
rs. Helen Fuller Davis (right) was Grierson's niece and the wife of
Jr. She and her husband called Fort Davis home from fall 1884 to
courtesy of Fort Davis National Historical Site.
tents at the east end of officer's row for himself and his
bride. A norther arrived in November 1872 while his
wife was giving birth to their first child; soldiers had to
hold down the guy ropes and picket pins to keep the tent
from blowing away.
After the Civil War, forts Richardson, Lancaster,
McKavett, and probably Fort Griffin used Turnley Porta-
ble Cottages while awaiting permanent buildings.
Invented by Quartermaster Parmenas Taylor Turnley,
this early day manufactured housing could be trans-
ported on army wagons and erected in about four hours
by three men. The structures came in two sizes: small,
which could house two officers, and large, for use as
barracks, hospital or storehouse; both had canvas roofs
and came complete with locks, keys, sashes and blinds.
Commanding officers' quarters had up to six rooms,
porches front and back, and a kitchen, which was often
separate from the house because of the threat of fire.
Other officers' families commonly were allowed two
rooms plus a kitchen; single officers had one room each.
Forts were usually laid out with a central parade
ground, with officers' quarters along one side and
enlisted men's barracks on the other. Married enlisted
men's and laundresses' tents, jacales, or picket houses
were usually stuck away in the least desirable area of the
fort, commonly called "Suds Row" or "Sudsville," and
other structures, such as the commissary, hospital, bak-
ery, powder magazine, carpenter's shed, smithy and sta-
bles were scattered around the post.
Food
Foods available to men and their families were as
variable as the housing. Alice Grierson, whose husband,
Col. Benjamin H. Grierson, was the commanding officer
at Fort Concho and Fort Davis, lamented the lack of
fresh eggs, milk and vegetables, while Helen Chapman
at Fort Brown spoke glowingly of her varied diet of
"game, beef, vegetables, tea, butter and good bread." In
mid-winter one year, she bought radishes, cabbages, car-
rots, lettuce and green peas from local farmers. Up river
at Ringgold Barracks, supply boats couldn't operate on
the Rio Grande when the river was low, so military fam-
ilies had to make do with the commissary's moldy flour
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Alvarez, Elizabeth Cruce. Texas Almanac, 2004-2005, book, 2004; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth162511/m1/23/: accessed April 23, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.