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History

Camp Bullis, a United States Army camp, occupies 12,000 acres on Interstate Highway 10 and Harry Wurzbach Road seventeen miles northwest of San Antonio in Bexar County. Camp Bullis and Camp Stanley make up the Leon Springs Military Reservation. Camp Bullis was established in 1917 to train troops in preparation for the growing threat of war in Europe. It was named for Brig. Gen. John Lapham Bullis, who as a lieutenant led the Seminole-Negro scouts during the Indian Wars. During World War I Camp Bullis provided maneuver areas and small arms and rifle ranges for troops from Fort Sam Houston. No units were stationed at the camp. In all, more than 32,000 acres was owned and leased by the government. By 1918, $1,350,000 had been spent on cantonments and improvements in the Leon Springs Military Reservation. After the war Bullis was used as a site for demobilization. Between 1918 and 1940 the army planned and built permanent facilities at the camp. Construction of the cantonment area was begun in 1930. The old arsenal in downtown San Antonio was moved to Camp Stanley in 1931, and the use of that camp for troop training virtually ceased. In 1931 Camp Bullis received a ten-bed infirmary, an officers' mess, vehicle sheds, a landing field, a post exchange, and a swimming pool, in addition to improved firing ranges.

During the 1920s and 1930s Camp Bullis provided facilities for training the Civilian Military Training Corps, the Civilian Conservation Corps, the Reserve Officer Training Corps, and the Officer Reserve Corps. With World War II looming, Congress authorized the call-up of the National Guard, and in 1940 the Selective Service Act was passed. A reception center was established at Camp Bullis in September 1940 to process and train draftees. By December 7, 1941, expansion of Fort Sam Houston and Camp Bullis was well under way. The camp served for activation and training of infantry divisions, service schools, a reception center, a prisoner of war camp, and a test bed for tactics and organizational units. From January 1942 through November 1943 the Second, Ninety-fifth, and Eighty-eighth Infantry divisions used Camp Bullis. Smaller units continued to use the camp until 1944. After the war 500,000 soldiers were processed out through the separation centers at Fort Sam Houston and Camp Bullis.

The changing medical needs of the army during and after World War II brought major changes to Fort Sam Houston and Camp Bullis. By 1944 a school for enlisted medical technicians and a basic training course for army nurses were added. The greater portion of Fort Sam Houston became hospital wards and a convalescent center, Brooke Army Medical Center. Camp Bullis provided field training for small arms and a stretcher obstacle course to train combat medics in the handling of wounded on the battlefield. Camp Bullis was largely on stand-by status until the invasion of South Korea by North Korea in June 1950.

In 1977 an Air Force Security Police Training Site, known as Victor Base, was constructed to accommodate the Air Force Security Police Academy. The air force was subsequently the largest single user of Camp Bullis until 1987. The army began emergency deployment readiness exercises at Camp Bullis in 1973, when elements of the 101st Airborne Division from Fort Hood were air-dropped at Camp Bullis. Other exercises were conducted by the 101st and the Eighty-second Airborne in 1980 and 1981. In 1985 the 307th Medical Battalion and a French army medical unit were air-dropped on Camp Bullis. A combat assault landing strip was constructed in 1983. The First Marine Amphibious Force conducted landing operations at the strip in 1986 and 1989.

Unit training at Camp Bullis for the garrison and tenant organization of the Department of Defense has been vigorous and sometimes innovative. Commanders have taken their administrative, overhead, and garrison troops to practice "real soldiering" at Camp Bullis. Since the Vietnam War the post has undergone organizational changes. In 1990 the camp was under the operational control of the Directorate of Plans, Training, Mobilization, and Security at Fort Sam Houston.