Camp Wadsworth

Camp Wadsworth was a World War I-era training facility for the United States Army. Located near Spartanburg, South Carolina, the post was in operation from its opening in July 1917 until it was inactivated in March 1919, following the Armistice that ended the war.

As the United States began to expand the United States Army in preparation for entry into World War I, the United States Department of War planned to enlarge the peacetime Regular Army through a combination of mobilizing units of the National Guard and drafting men into the wartime National Army. This plan called for the creation of 32 new mobilization and training centers, evenly split between the National Army and the National Guard. Each post was to be responsible for organizing and training a complete army division. The National Army camps were equipped with heated barracks and other facilities, while the plan called for National Guard camps, which were needed sooner because National Guard members could be available for training more quickly than draftees, to consist primarily of tents and a small number of temporary structures. As a result of these construction requirements, the War Department intended for most National Guard training sites to be located in the southern United States, where milder winters and warmer temperatures were more prevalent than in the north.

Many cities and towns lobbied to have one of the wartime encampments located nearby, anticipating the temporary economic boom such a facility might bring to the local area. The city leaders of Sapratnburg were among those who vied for one of these training facilities; their lobbying and marketing efforts were successful, and Newton D. Baker, the Secretary of War, and Leonard Wood, the commander of the Army's eastern Department, approved Spartanburg for a National Guard camp in May 1917, after having made personal inspection tours of the area.

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