The present unit was activated 15 September 1942 at Camp Maxey, a new post in northeast Texas. The camp was little more than half built and the whine of machinery and clatter of hammers filled the air as the cadre received their colors and unit standards.

War was then at an ebb tide for the Allies. German shock troops were inching forward in Stalingrad street by street. Rommel's horde was hammering at El Alamein. Our mighty carrier Wasp was sinking in the waters of the Solomon Islands. America's first offensive operation was encountering bitter resistance from newly reinforced Japanese on Guadalcanal.

Time was short, but training was thorough and tough. Recruits, all with sore arms and some with tags still on their new uniforms, streamed into Camp Maxey during October, November and December -- 15000 of them. On Texas plains where dust and mud abounded side by side, they learned soldiering from the bottom up. They learned to drill, to hike, to shoot, to hit the ground, to dig in, to bracket the enemy with big guns, to read maps, to build bridges and tank traps, to lay wire and mines. They learned to keep guns firing, men healthy, vehicles rolling, rations coming, radios transmitting, and water pure. Pistols, carbines, rifles, tommy-guns, BARs, machine guns, mortars, bazookas, 105s, 155s – they learned them all. They operated as squads, then as sections, and platoons and companies, then as battalions, regiments, and infantry-artillery combat teams. In the CPs clerks discovered the intricacies of army procedure, the "channels", the importance of serving their fellow soldiers.