BLISS HISTORY

El Paso del Norte, the Great Pass of the North, was an important point on the great Rio Grande River into North American territory long before Fort Bliss was established.  Native Americans inhabited the areas surrounding the spot where the Rio Grande passes through a mountain range and turns southeast from its north-to-south trace.  Spanish conquistadors who explored the New World crossed the great river at a convenient ford, following the river to establish communities in what is now New Mexico.  In 1846 the expedition of Alexander Doniphan from Fort Leavenworth, Kansas crossed the Rio Grande here, finding a thriving community where the troops could rest and re-supply before descending into Mexico during the Mexican-American War.  There was thus some strategic value to this great pass of the river. 

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ended the Mexican-American War in May 1848.   In November the War Department ordered the establishment of a post at El Paso del Norte. The first U.S. troops to arrive consisted of six companies of the 3rd Infantry Regiment. These troops established a military post known simply as "The Post Opposite El Paso." The post was closed in 1851, but reopened in 1854.  On March 8, 1854, the Army named the post in honor of Lt. Col. William Wallace Smith Bliss.  A mathematics prodigy at West Point, Bliss served as the Adjutant General to Zachary Taylor in Mexico, subsequently performing duties as Taylor’s personal secretary when Taylor became the United States President.  Bliss died of yellow fever in Pascagoula, Mississippi in July 1853 at age 38.  His remains were moved to Fort Bliss National Cemetery in 1956.  Notably, Bliss never visited Fort Bliss in his lifetime. The reestablishment of the post saw the 8th Infantry Regiment move into the community of Magoffinsville, near present-day Magoffin and Willow Streets.  The countryside was a bit different then. Grama grass grew in abundance on the mesa to the northeast, and game abounded near the garrison. The Rio Grande was fed by the many watercourses upstream.  Spring brought floods, with the river changing course almost at a whim.  The business of the soldiers in those days was to protect local citizens from Indian depredations and to maintain American authority in the local area.  Indians were on the move throughout the territory, and troops from Fort Bliss participated in many actions against them. Army officers George Pickett, James Longstreet, Richard Ewell, and J.E.B. Stuart all served at or passed through Fort Bliss.  All would serve as senior Confederate officers during the Civil War.  At the time, though, the threat to the communities came from local Indians, including the Mescalero Apaches.

Perhaps typical of action seen by Fort Bliss troops was the Dog Canyon fight in the Sacramento Mountains in February 1859. Indians had stolen cattle and mules from a ranch near San Elizario, and Lt. Henry M. Lazelle of the 8th Infantry took 30 men of the Regiment of Mounted Riflemen (today’s 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment) in pursuit. The trail led southeast, then north to Dog Canyon, some 12 miles south of Alamogordo. Part of the march was dry, the Indians having taken all the water. Cornered in the canyon, the Indians first denied the theft, and then displayed hides to prove the animals were dead.  A fight ensued, with three troopers killed and five badly wounded including Lt. Lazelle, while Indians lost at least nine dead, the rest of their number escaping.

The onset of the Civil War brought about the surrender of Fort Bliss at Magoffinsville to Confederate volunteers.  On March 31, 1861, all Texas posts, including Fort Bliss, were surrendered to the Confederacy, by order of Maj. Gen. David E. Twiggs, commander of the Department of Texas.  Lt. Col. John Baylor, commanding the 2nd Texas Mounted Rifles, arrived in late 1861 to take over the post at Magoffinsville.  Baylor used the post as a headquarters to launch an attack against Union troops stationed at Fort Fillmore, just south of present-day Mesilla, New Mexico.  Maj. Issac Lynde of Fort Fillmore made a futile attack on Baylor at Mesilla, was repelled, and then decided to march his men to Fort Stanton, 154 miles northeast. Baylor initiated a pursuit and caught up with the dehydrated Union troops at San Augustin Pass, soundly defeating the Union forces and capturing many Soldiers and much equipment. Baylor paroled the captives into New Mexico.

The post served as headquarters for Brigadier General Henry H. Sibley’s expedition into New Mexico.  Sibley intended to seize Fort Union and move on the Colorado gold fields. Sibley tried to obtain supplies for his troops in the El Paso area, but no one would accept Confederate scrip.  Sibley launched his expedition anyway, hoping to capture supplies in New Mexico. After a victory at Valverde (near Socorro, NM) Sibley lost a major engagement at Glorieta Pass, east of Santa Fe.  Sibley’s expedition fell apart, and as the troops reached Fort Bliss they burned the post at Magoffinsville and withdrew to San Antonio.  The California Column – the First California (Union) Cavalry, under Col. J. H. Carleton – reached the area on Aug. 20, 1862, and raised the Stars and Stripes over the ruined fort.

When the Civil War ended Fort Bliss was re-occupied by the U.S. Army on Oct. 16, 1865. With the post at Magoffinsville in ruins, the Army established a post initially called Camp Concordia, well away from the flood plain of the meandering Rio Grande.  The remains of this post lie just south of Interstate Highway 10 and Concordia Cemetery and are not visible today.  Two barracks were constructed, holding 200 men each, and six adobe quarters for officers were built with troop labor.

Camp Concordia, with its new buildings and tree-lined parade ground, held that name until March 23, 1869, when orders were issued restoring the name Fort Bliss. As part of a system of other forts in West Texas and New Mexico, Fort Bliss gradually lost its importance as the local Indian tribes were pacified.  In 1877, Fort Bliss was abandoned.

With the troops moved south and north, El Paso experienced problems with cattle rustling, hooliganism, and a general lawlessness in the area.  Similar circumstances existed across the Rio Grande in the Mexican village of Paso del Norte. In late 1877, residents of the community of San Elizario rose against the local government in protest of their not being allowed free access to the salt flats east of El Paso, near the Guadalupe Mountains.  The uprising killed 12 people and saw the surrender of a company of Texas Rangers, the only time in history that Texas Rangers have surrendered.  Ultimately, Colonel Edward Hatch was ordered to move his 9th Cavalry Regiment from New Mexico to put down the uprising.  The arrival of well-trained and armed Buffalo Soldiers convinced the leaders of the uprising that all was lost, and the uprising faded away.

The result of this was the establishment once again of an Army post in El Paso. Elements of the 9th Cavalry and the 15th Infantry arrived in El Paso on Jan. 1, 1878. They found the old Concordia post in ruins, and rented quarters in town, south and east of the original site on Coons Ranch.  They used the Public Square (now San Jacinto Plaza) as a parade ground.

With Concordia useless, a board of officers selected a site for a new Fort Bliss and settled on land at the west edge of town on a bluff overlooking the Rio Grande. The property was bought from heirs of local miller Simeon Hart on Feb. 4, 1879, and construction began in September. The new post, near the site of old Hart’s Mill, was occupied the following year. Fort Bliss was back in business, at the fifth site in its history.

It was to be a permanent location, but encroachment by the town and the railroads caused problems at the post.  On Feb. 17, 1881, Congress gave its approval for the Rio Grande and El Paso Railroad Company (an affiliate of Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe) to lay tracks across the parade ground.  The Army considered closing Fort Bliss once again, moving the troops to Fort Selden near what is now Radium Springs, NM.  Instead, the city fathers of El Paso offered a tract on land northeast of the city called La Noria  (meaning the well) Mesa.  Captain George Ruhlen of the Army Quartermaster Department designed a post that sat on the edge of an escarpment overlooking a large ravine.  Between 1892 and 1893, officers’ quarters and barracks were built according to his plan.  New construction included an administrative building, mess hall, two barracks for enlisted men, a power plant on the east side of the main parade ground, 14 two-story quarters for officers, three two-story quarters for noncommissioned officers, supply buildings, a guardhouse and a horse corral.

On October 27, 1893, the post was occupied by a battalion of the 18th Infantry, led by Captain William H. McLaughlin. Col. Henry M. Lazelle (the same Lazelle from the  1859 Dog Canyon fight) was the 18th Infantry’s commander, but he was on sick leave in Minnesota at the time; thus Capt. McLaughlin had the distinction of being the first commander actually present at the new site of Fort Bliss. Most of these buildings are still in use today. But the post was not always active. During the Spanish-American War in 1898, the infantry moved out, leaving the post for several months in the hands of one lieutenant, a chaplain, a doctor and five troopers of a transient cavalry unit.

Thereafter, however, the post expanded. During the early 1900’s the Army constructed more buildings and facilities, including a large set of quarters for the commanding officer and new roads and approaches. In 1911, a major ceremony at Fort Bliss marked the coming admission of New Mexico and Arizona to statehood.

In 1911, Fort Bliss gained new importance as a major installation on the border with Mexico.  With the overthrow in 1910 of General Porfirio Diaz, the dictator of Mexico, Mexican revolutionaries went to war with Mexican federal troops and each other.  In May 1911, forces under the command of the revolutionary leader Pancho Villa seized the city of Juárez.  In this action American citizens across the border were wounded by stray bullets, and there was some damage to American property.  The unrest at the United States border caused President William Howard Taft to deploy cavalry and infantry units to border patrol duties.  The Mexican revolution deepened and became progressively bloodier.  After several disastrous losses to rival factions, a weakened Pancho Villa decided to attack the 13th Cavalry Regiment at Columbus, NM.  On March 9, 1916, Villa launched an early morning attack on the unsuspecting Army garrison and the small town.  Eighteen soldiers and civilians were killed and parts of the town burned; Villa lost between 90 and 190 of his raiders.

Gen. John J. Pershing, commanding the El Paso Military District at Fort Bliss, was ordered to take the field against Villa. Six days after the raid, Pershing led his forces across the border, and for 11 months pursued Villa and his band. A number of his lieutenants were killed in surprise engagements in the rugged vastness of northern Mexico, but Villa never was caught. The expedition ended in February of 1917.

Fort Bliss after this period became a cavalry post, with the 7th and 8th Cavalry Regiments stationed on the post along with 82nd Field Artillery Battalion (Horse), 8th Mounted Engineers, and other support troops.  Several officers served on Fort Bliss who would later become Army chiefs of staff.  They include Hugh L. Scott, Peyton C. March, John J. Pershing and John Leonard Hines.

Fort Bliss continued to have a border patrol mission during World War I.  Immediately after this war, Pancho Villa made an attempt to seize the city of Juárez once more in June 1919.  This time, Brigadier General James Irwin ordered the 2nd Cavalry Brigade across the river to drive Villa out.  The 82nd Field Artillery fired missions on Villista concentrations, and the 24th Infantry Regiment guarded the bridges across the river.  This was the final action against Villa, who subsequently retired and was assassinated in 1923.  The commander of the Mexican Federal garrison in Juárez dutifully lodged a formal protest against the presence of US troops in Mexico, even though that presence likely saved him from a Villista firing squad.

The concentration of cavalry troops led to the formation of the 1st Cavalry Division on Fort Bliss in 1921.  Only the division headquarters and the 2nd Brigade were stationed at Fort Bliss.  The 1st Brigade of the Division was at Fort Huachuca, AZ.

Fort Bliss thus became a key center for border defense and control. New construction was ordered, including four airplane hangars on the original “Biggs Field” on the main post. In 1926, the field was relocated and later grew into Biggs Air Force Base. It was named after local World War I flyer James “Buster” Biggs, who was killed in France. Another major piece of construction during the post war years was William Beaumont General Hospital, one of the finest military hospitals in the Southwest.

Despite the presence of planes, artillery and engineers, Fort Bliss remained primarily a cavalry post. The horse still played an important role in the Army, but its time was becoming more and more limited.

As the Second World War approached, Fort Bliss saw a new combat arm arrive.  In September 1940, the 202nd Coast Artillery Regiment (Antiaircraft) of the Illinois Army National Guard arrived from Chicago, debarking at the Plainport Siding next to Fort Bliss and establishing a tent camp near the cavalry remount station.  Very quickly four other antiaircraft regiments arrived to train for deployment prior to the United States’ entry into World War II.  With its wide open areas and good weather, Fort Bliss became one of seven antiaircraft training installations.  The 1st Cavalry Division was dismounted and left to serve in the Southwest Pacific Theater of the war, not to return until many years later.  Ultimately, Fort Bliss became the center of antiaircraft training for the Army.  The war also brought another change to Fort Bliss. In March of 1943, the first detachment of personnel of the Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps (later known as the Women’s Army Corps) arrived at El Paso.

The testing of the first atomic weapon was accomplished in 1945 far to the north of the post on White Sands Proving Ground.  As the war came to an end, the Army brought many captured German rocket scientists to Fort Bliss to conduct Operation Paperclip.  This program envisioned the development of guided missiles based on the German V-2 rocket.  In November 1945, the Anti-aircraft Replacement Training Center was inactivated but a new unit came into being – the 1st Anti-aircraft Guided Missile Battalion, the first of its kind in the U.S. Army. From these beginnings, the post grew into a premier guided missile range.  The Nike Ajax missile was fielded at Fort Bliss, a revolutionary development in air defense.  Rather than firing a gun barrage against attacking aircraft, the Army now had the capability to fire one missile that could track and destroy an aerial target.   From 1946 until 1965 the post expanded to over one million acres to accommodate missile live fire exercises.  With the establishment of the Army Air Defense Command, air defense missiles were deployed all over the United States to defend vital installations and industries against a possible air attack.  Fort Bliss was the one place in the United States where units could visit to conduct annual live missile firing exercises.  Fort Bliss hosted the later development of the Nike Hercules, the Hawk, the Patriot, and other air defense missiles.  When the Army concluded in 1968 that a separate air defense artillery branch was needed, Fort Bliss became its home.  Through 2005, Fort Bliss formed the Air Defense Artillery Center of Excellence and was ultimately the home to all US-based Patriot brigades.  In 1972, the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment was based at Fort Bliss, with access to wide training areas and modern ranges.  Fort Bliss has served as a major mobilization center for Operation DESERT STORM and Operation IRAQI FREEDOM.

The Base Realignment and Closure announcement made in 2005 has changed the course of Fort Bliss history.  As this is being written, the Air Defense Artillery Center and School is moving to Fort Sill, Oklahoma to join the Field Artillery branch in establishing the Fires Center of Excellence.  Given the severe limitations on missile live firings at Fort Sill, Fort Bliss will still provide missile firing ranges for years to come.  The German Air Defense School and the Marine Corps air defense training establishment will remain at Fort Bliss for now. 

Fort Bliss will also become the home of the 1st Armored Division.  Currently, four brigade combat teams are organizing at the post, with brand new facilities on what was once Biggs Army Airfield.  The division will plant its flag here in late 2011.  Further, the Army has established the Future Force Integration Directorate on Fort Bliss where it will test technological advances in war fighting.  Joint Task Force – North resides on Fort Bliss, with its vital homeland security missions.  Yet to arrive are a sustainment brigade and a combat aviation brigade. 

Just as El Paso has blossomed into a major international city because of its location on the Rio Grande, with colorful Old Mexico across the river, Fort Bliss remains a key training installation. As one of the major installations in the United States under its parent headquarters, the U.S. Army Forces Command, Fort Bliss continues to add to its colorful history as well as its military importance.