November, 1929 THE BUILDER

American Army Lodges in the World War
The Proposed Oklahoma Lodge

By BRO. CHARLES IRWIN, Associate Editor

THERE came to my attention some years ago while reading the various
Grand Lodge Proceedings of the several Grand Jurisdictions a copy
of the Grand Lodge of Washington, 1919. In the review of the
Correspondence section, p. 66, I came upon the following paragraph:
(under Texas, 1918):

Army Lodges were favored by this Grand Lodge and the Grand Master
of Oklahoma informed that his Army Lodge might work at Camp Bowie.
Texas, assuming no responsibility for it.

This paragraph was filed for future study and investigation but the
pressure of other matters caused it to lie dormant for quite a
season.

A few years later I had occasion to attend the Christmas Services
of Lincoln Commandery, Knights Templar, Wilkinsburg, Penn., as
their speaker, and there I met Dr. Fred W. Clarke, a member of the
Grand Lodge of Oklahoma, and from him received further information
on the subject, and the name and address of Dr. Hugh Scott, who had
been instrumental in working up the petition for the Field Lodge in
1917.

In the course of time I corresponded with Brother Scott and from
him obtained a few more threads in the story. At the same time I
wrote to Wor. Bro. William M. Anderson, Grand Secretary of the
Grand Lodge of Oklahoma requesting from him copies of the petition
if possible and additional items concerning the proposed Lodge.
Bro. Anderson failed to supply me with a copy of the petition but
did give me several items of information.

From these scattered data I have reconstructed a brief and very
unsatisfactory account of the proposed Field Lodge of the Grand
Lodge of Oklahoma, to be located in Camp Bowie, Texas. The account
should be incorporated for completeness sake in the records we have
been publishing in THE BUILDER, and in fact will conclude them. The
following is a letter from Grand Secretary W. M. Anderson, of the
Grand Lodge of Oklahoma, dated July 15, 1929:

"I have been holding response to your latest communication in the
hope that we might possibly be able to locate a little additional
information concerning the army lodge which was proposed by the
Grand Jurisdiction of Oklahoma, but our records contain no
reference to it.

"Dr. Hugh Scott was to be the first Worshipful Master, but he was
transferred before the organization was consummated. There were 18
signers to the petition, which was placed in the hands of the then
Grand Master, Brother Joseph W. Morris, who made a trip down there.
Grand Master Morris informed me that he was going to grant a
dispensation, and the dispensation was made out. When the
organization failed neither the dispensation nor the petition was
returned to this office, and Grand Master Morris made no reference
to it in his annual address to the Grand Lodge.

"Dr. Scott was for some time in charge of U. S. Veterans Hospital
No. 90, at Muskogee, Oklahoma, but something like two years ago he
was transferred to another hospital in one of the suburbs of
Chicago, I believe.

"Fraternally yours,
'WM. M. ANDERSON,
"Grand Secretary."

I obtained contact with Dr. Scott at the U. S. Veterans' Hospital
at Maywood, Illinois, and requested from him a statement as to this
proposed lodge. Bro. Scott most courteously made reply, and in his
communication informed me as follows:

"An attempt was made in the Field Hospital Section of the 111th
Sanitary Train, 36th Division, at Camp Bowie, Texas, in the winter
of 1917 to organize a Military Lodge. The Field Hospital Section of
the 111th Sanitary Train was made up largely of young men from
Oklahoma. I had organized and trained these four Field Hospitals,
and had a very deep interest in their welfare. The men were all of
a very high type and a large number of them were Master Masons.
Believing that if a Military Lodge were organized and maintained in
the Field Hospital Section from Camp Bowie to France, that it would
promote the morale and a deeper interest in the welfare of the
members of the organization. After considerable correspondence with
the officials of the Grand Lodge of Oklahoma, who manifested a very
marked interest, Brother Moses Anderson, arrived at Camp Bowie, to
install the officers who had been selected. However, the
installation was delayed pending the arrival of Grand Master Joe
Morris of Oklahoma, and by the time of the arrival of Brother
Anderson and Grand Master Morris, it was my misfortune to have been
suddenly transferred from the organization to Camp Colt,
Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

"I think largely because of the fact that I was the Commanding
Officer of the four hospitals and had initiated the effort, that on
amount of my transfer interest ceased and all plans were suspended
and finally dropped, as the 36th Division was soon ordered
overseas."

To show how interested Dr. Scott was in Masonry and in its
development within the military service, I am permitted to quote
further from his interesting letter:

"After my arrival at Camp Colt, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, I
continued my Masonic activities and was the means of having a great
number of soldiers petition for the Scottish Rite Degrees at a
Consistory, the name of which I have now forgotten, but some
distance removed from Gettysburg."

Going back to the proposed Military Lodge at Camp Bookie, Texas,
Dr. Scott enlarges upon their proposed plans by stating:

"I do not now recall all the officers who had been Selected, but
remember that the Worshipful Master to be, was Dr. C. R. McDonald,
of Mannford, Oklahoma."

In another letter from W. Bro. Anderson, dated Dec. 18, 1928, he
says:

"The proposed Worshipful Master of this Army Lodge was Dr. Hugh F.
Scott, then a Colonel, who had charge of the Ambulance Corps of the
112th Ambulance Train at Camp Donavan in our State. Colonel Scott
was transferred to Philadelphia (error for Gettysburg), Pa., just
at that time and there was none to take his place as Worshipful
Master of the proposed Army Lodge and so it never materialized. The
demits that accompanied the petition for this dispensation were
returned to the brethren who had signed the petition for such a
lodge and thus it ended."

Some discrepancy is thus apparent between Bro. Scott's recollection
and Bro. Anderson's statement.

Thus through the unavoidable military orders that transferred the
proposed Master of this proposed Military Lodge Oklahoma was
deprived of sending into the Field a fine group of enthusiastic
Masons under a warrant. Nevertheless this group went across the
ocean and did their duty to "God, their country, their neighbor and
themselves."

With this brief sketch, which I am inserting in the series in order
that the record may be as complete as possible for the benefit of
later investigators into Military Masonry during the World War, I
am bringing to a close this part of the labor of the love that has
traced throughout the Union and across several continents traces of
these officially organized activities of our American Craft. I have
been exceedingly careful to make no statements based on hearsay,
but have verified every one of them prior to giving them utterance.

I wish to take this opportunity to convey to my host of Masonic
friends who occupy either official positions in the several grand
Lodges, or were identified in official positions in the several
Field Lodges, or who as members of the Field Lodges gave me
unstinted assistance in the collection of data. The past ten years
in which I have been collecting this material have widened my own
Masonic horizon and have given me an insight into the philosophy of
Masonry that could have come to me in no other manner.

The next stage of our records will cover the more informal
activities of Masons which brought about the formation of Masonic
Clubs. Some of the overseas lodges, it will be recalled, took their
rise in, or were connected with such clubs, but on the whole the
two types of organization seem to call for separate treatment. I
hope to be able to commence the new series early in the coming
year.

In uttering a closing greeting to my readers I would urge upon them
the great value, as well as pleasure, to be obtained, in the taking
up of some definite line of research, and pushing it out further
and further until definite results are achieved. It is by such
endeavor, pursued sometimes it may be through a sort of patient
drudgery, that the history of the Craft is to be preserved and put
upon permanent record.
