About the Fort Gordon, Georgia Area 

Fort Gordon

Fort Gordon (formerly known as Camp Gordon), is a United States Army Installation and the current home of the United States Army Signal Corps and Signal Center and was once the home of "The Provost Marshal General School" (Military Police). The fort is located in Richmond, Jefferson, McDuffie, and Columbia counties, Georgia. The main componment of the post is the Advanced Individual Training for Signal Corps military occupational specialites. In 1966-68 the Army's Signal Officer Candidate School (located at Fort Monmouth during World War II and the Korean conflict) graduated over 2,200 Signal officers. Fort Gordon trains more military personnel than any other training center of the U.S. Army.

Increasingly, military signals intelligence has become more visible and comprises more and more of the fort's duties.

Fort Gordon and the Signal Center is commanded by Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Foley. On July 17, 2007, Brig. Gen. Randolph Strong handed over command as he assumed a new position as Director of Architecture, Operations, Networks, and Space, in the Department of the Army’s Office of the Chief Information Officer and G6. Brig. Gen. Foley last served as Director of Architecture, Operations, Networks, and Space, in the Department of the Army’s Office of the Chief Information Officer and G6.

 History

Fort Gordon was originally called Camp Gordon in honor of John Brown Gordon, who was a major general in the Confederate army, a Georgia governor, a U.S. senator, and a businessman. On March 21, 1956, the base was renamed Fort Gordon.

 World War I Era

Before America entered world war one, Camp Gordon was a training facility of the 328th Infantry.

World War II Era

In July of 1941 the U.S. War Department approved a contract to construct facilities on a new training area in Richmond County, Georgia that had been selected several months earlier. A groundbreaking and flag-raising ceremony took place in October. In response to the attack on Pearl Harbor Colonel Herbert W. Schmidt, camp commander, moved his small staff from his temporary office in the Augusta post office building to the unfinished headquarters building at Camp Gordon on December 9, 1941 and the 4th Infantry Division began to establish operations there.

The base was home to three divisions during the war: the 4th Infantry, the 26th Infantry, and the 10th Armored. From October 1943 to January 1945 Camp Gordon served as an internment camp for foreign prisoners of war. From May 1945 until April 1946 the U.S. Army Personnel and Separation Center processed nearly 86,000 personnel for discharge from the army.

 Post World War II

From early 1946 to June 1947, the U.S. Army Disciplinary Barracks for convicted criminals was located at Camp Gordon, and the installation was scheduled for deactivation. In September 1948 the army relocated the Military Police School from Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania, to Camp Gordon, and in October 1948 a Signal Corps training center was activated.

During the 1950s through the 1970s Fort Gordon served as a basic-training facility. It also provided advanced individual training for troops. Since June 1986 Fort Gordon has housed the U.S. Signal Corps, the branch of the U.S. Army responsible for providing and maintaining information systems and communication networks. The Signal Corps training center's primary purpose is to conduct specialized instruction for all Signal Corps military and civilian personnel.

 Active-duty units and facilities

Fort Gordon's technical name is the U.S. Army Signal Center & Fort Gordon, or USASCFG. While the TRADOC school itself is the primary function, the post is home to the following active-duty tenant units:

1917 postcard of Camp Gordon in Atlanta GA the earlier post named for General Gordon

The post also hosts a joint-service command, the Gordon Regional Security Operations Center, or GRSOC. It is now known as NSA/CSS Georgia and is a SIGINT collection center for a geographic area including the Middle East. The Army's 116th MI Group works there, as do other military intelligence units from the Air Force, Navy, the Marine Corps as well as civilians from the National Security Agency (NSA).

Considered a mission partner on Fort Gordon is the Dwight D. Eisenhower Army Medical Center (DDEAMC), home of the Southeast Regional Medical Command (SERMC) as well as a dental laboratory. The facility treats active duty military and their families, as well as many of the military retiree community in the Central Savannah River Area. Under SERMC, the hospital is responsible for military hospital care from Kentucky to Puerto Rico.

Fort Gordon has approximately 30,000 military and civilian employees and currently has an estimated $1.1 billion economic impact on the Augusta-Richmond County economy.

In 1966-68 approximately 2,200 Signal Officers were trained at Fort Gordon's Signal Officer Candidate School (OCS), before all US Army branch OCSs were merged with the Infantry OCS at Fort Benning, Georgia.

During the Vietnam War, Ft. Gordon was also a training location for Military Police in the Brems Barracks region of the fort, which was also later used in the 1980s for training radioteletype operators.

Coordinates: 33°24'48"N 82°8'7"W

External links

• Fort Gordon
• WW1 account of Life at Camp Gordon"Letters from Ward B Scripture of the 328th Infantry to his Mother during WW1"
• "NSA Seeks to Pour Hundreds of Millions Into Surveillance Infrastructure," The Peacock Report, April 20, 2006
• Fort Gordon
• Dwight D. Eisenhower Army Medical Center
• CSRA Alliance for Fort Gordon - Group that sought to keep Fort Gordon open during the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure round
• U.S. Army Signal Corps OCS Association
• Fort Gordon Directorate of Morale, Welfare and Recreation
• New Georgia Encyclopedia information

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