It may be said, without taking undue liberties with the truth, that the newest branch of the American Army, the Motor Transport Corps, owes its existence to a Mexican bandit named Francisco Villa, sometimes called “Pancho” for short. You may have heard of him. Though the officers who wear on their collars the insignia of the wheel and the winged helmet will probably disagree with this statement, asserting that their corps is an outgrowth of the Great War, it is, nevertheless, a fact that the present huge organization, which controls all the motor-driven transport of the American Army, had its beginning in the handful of trucks, barely a score in all, which ploughed their way across the sands of Chihuahua in the wake of Pershing’s little punitive column. When Villa and his raiders swooped down upon the border settlement of Columbus on the night of March 8, 1916, there was not a single organized motor-truck unit in the army, our officers, most of them trained in the schools of Indian and Filipino warfare, insisting that no motor-driven vehicle was as sturdy and dependable as the old-time escort wagon and its four-mule team. The refusal of our staff authorities to recognize the advantages of motor transport is the more difficult to understand when it is remembered that for close on four years there had been unfolding before our eyes the countless object-lessons of civil life and of the war in Europe, every highway from the North Sea to the Alps being crowded with the motor-driven vehicles of the fighting armies. The present Motor Transport Corps may be said to have been born when, three days after the Columbus raid, General Funston, in command of the Southern Department, telegraphed to Washington for authorization to form a number of motor-truck companies for service with the punitive expedition. The War Department acted promptly. The request was immediately approved, and within three days twenty-four trucks had been purchased, a force of civilian drivers had been recruited, and the entire outfit loaded aboard special trains. As soon as the trains reached Columbus the trucks were loaded with supplies and sent across the border to overtake the expedition, which was already well into northern Mexico. Notwithstanding the total absence of anything resembling roads, despite the deep sand, the extreme heat, and the inexperience of the drivers, the trucks caught up with the column before the supplies which it had taken from the United States were exhausted. From that moment the value of motor-driven vehicles for military purposes was firmly established in the minds of American officers, even the most hidebound old Indian fighters, who disapproved of everything new on principle, being compelled to admit that the mule must give way to the motor.