War in World War I was not just war—it was unlike anything that had come before in terms of combat tactics, weaponry, communication technology, and modes of transportation. In particular was the airplane, which meant that ground military forces no longer just looked up into the sky to watch for artillery shells. Giant mechanized birds with mounted machine guns and the ability to drop bombs directly from overhead changed the nature of combat in WWI.
Topics Related to World War I
On June 8, 1917, the first of 2,300 Germans arrived by train at Hot Springs to begin life in a World War I internment camp. Their civilian merchant ships had been docked in various American ports two months earlier when the United States entered the war. At that time, the government seized the German vessels and declared their officers and crews “alien enemies.”
On April 6, 1917, the United States entered World War I.
That summer, Major General Leonard Wood, charged with selecting sites for new military camps, visited Charlotte as part of a tour of prospective locations in North Carolina. Wood chose the Queen City as the site for Camp Greene, a 2,300-acre military training facility for the Army.