Name changes for bases are long overdue
Pending congressional approval, the updates honor many modern-day heroes worthy of recognition.
It’s never wise to bet against the Bard, although we can humbly say that his wisdom has limitations. After all, he never endured basic training at Fort Polk, jump school at Fort Benning or advanced infantry training at Fort Hood. From such life-enriching experiences, a perceptive Pvt. Billy Shakespeare might have realized that a fort by any other name would not smell as sweet.
For decades, this nation has more or less ignored the sour absurdity that a number of our most important military installations are named in honor of treasonous, slavery-supporting Confederate generals — Polk, Hood and Benning among them. The names are doubly offensive to African American soldiers.
Now, that’s about to change. Last week, a commission established by Congress in 2021 released a list of suggestions for renaming nine of the installations, thereby relegating to Civil War history the names of disloyal white men. The front gates will proudly bear the names of men and women who “embody the best of the United States Army and America.”
The suggestions from the Naming Commission, subject to congressional approval, are superb. The new names not only correct the bizarre and unseemly practice of honoring those who went to war against the United States but also introduce generations of Americans to courageous and patriotic men and women, some of whom are not well-known.
Fort Polk, for example, would become Fort Johnson, in honor of Sgt. William Henry Johnson of the legendary Harlem Hellfighters, African American soldiers forced to fight in World War I under French command because of U.S. Army bigotry. Johnson’s front-line heroics in France’s Argonne Forest earned him that nation’s Croix de Guerre and a posthumous Medal of Honor from his own country.
Fort A.P. Hill in Virginia would become Fort Walker, in honor of Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, the only woman ever awarded a Medal of Honor. A surgeon, she volunteered during much of the Civil War, because the Army refused to commission a woman as a medical officer.
Fort Pickett in Viginia would be renamed Fort Barfoot, in honor of Sgt. Van T. Barfoot, a Mississippian and part Choctaw who was awarded the Medal of Honor for his heroics during World War II. Fighting in the Italian Alps on May 23, 1944, Barfoot disabled a German tank with a bazooka, blew up an artillery cannon with a demolition charge, destroyed three machine-gun nests and captured 17 enemy soldiers. He also rescued two badly wounded comrades and led them about a mile to safety.
Fort Rucker in Alabama, named for Edmund W. Rucker, a Confederate colonel notorious for hanging loyalist Tennesseans, would be rechristened Fort Novosel. The new name honors helicopter pilot Michael J. Novosel Sr., who swooped down from the sky and rescued more than 5,500 wounded men from battlefields in Vietnam. A World War II veteran who gave up a commission in the Air Force to rejoin the Army as a warrant officer, Novosel received the Medal of Honor for his bravery.
Of special interest to Texans is Fort Hood, the sprawling Central Texas base named for John Bell Hood, a Confederate general of unquestioned bravery and deeply questioned impetuosity. Fighting to defend slavery — in Hood’s words, “the secret motor, the mainspring of the war” — his recklessness got thousands of his own men killed unnecessarily.
The Army’s largest active-duty armored installation will become Fort Cavazos, in honor of the late Richard E. Cavazos, the first Hispanic American to become a four-star general.
Cavazos grew up on the King Ranch, where his father was a longtime ranch foreman. Choosing a military career after graduating from Texas Tech University — his brother later served as president of Texas Tech and as a U.S. education secretary — he received numerous military decorations for valor in combat, including a Silver Star, a Legion of Merit and a Distinguished Service Cross for his actions in Korea, and a second Distinguished Service Cross for bravery in Vietnam. He also received five Bronze Stars and a Purple Heart.
Dispatched to Korea in 1951, Cavazos assumed leadership of the Borinqueneers, a regiment of mostly Spanish-speaking Puerto Rican soldiers. Ill-trained and beset with language difficulties, the men of the regiment were struggling; the Army was about to disband the group before the young, bilingual Texan arrived.
“He was a natural leader, as drawn to soldiers as they were to him,” Col. Thomas C. Graves wrote in a 2012 study of combat leadership. Leading by example, Cavazos helped transform the Borinqueneers into a “dedicated, capable combat force that served with distinction for the remainder of the war.”
Soldiers in Vietnam remembered Cavazos as a leader who placed himself in the thick of it alongside them. In his 2017 obituary of Cavazos, longtime military affairs reporter Sig Christenson of the San Antonio Express-News quoted Ronnie Campsey, who served in a company under Cavazos’ command during the 1967 battle of Loc Ninh.
“He knew he was safe with us, and we knew we were safe with him. He instilled confidence in everyone,” Campsey said.
During his long career, Cavazos led a brigade, a division and an Army corps. He retired in 1984 as commander of all soldiers in the continental United States.
Cavazos is one of two native Texans whose name will now grace a military installation. In Georgia, Fort Gordon, named for a Confederate general who later became head of Georgia’s Ku Klux Klan, will become Fort Eisenhower. The new name, of course, honors the supreme allied expeditionary forces commander during World War II who later became a two-term president of the United States. Dwight David Eisenhower spent the first six months of his life in Denison, Texas.
We can think of other Texans who deserve recognition. Audie Murphy, one of the most decorated American combat soldiers of World War II, comes to mind, as does Medal of
Honor recipient Roy Benavidez, a Special Forces member recognized for his bravery in Vietnam. The fact that such distinguished Americans were left off proves a point. Numerous brave men and women who honorably served their country are deserving. There was never a need to honor the treasonous.