Second Armored Division, U. S. Army

The plaque stops in 1945. The division came back to Fort Hood in 1946 to retrain, served in West Germany from 1951 to 1957, and spent most of the Cold War here. Of the 25,000 troops Fort Hood sent to the Gulf in 1990 and 1991, about 17,000 came from the 2nd Armored and the 1st Cavalry. The division was deactivated for a time, then revived in December 1992 when the 5th Infantry Division was redesignated. On December 15, 1995, it became the 4th Infantry Division (Mechanized), headquartered at Fort Hood.

What the plaque says

Second Armored Division, U. S. Army Gen. Patton's "Hell on Wheels," the 2nd Armored Division, United States Army Formed to meet 20th century challenges, this force includes Battery A, 1st Battalion, 3rd Field Artillery, which has been in service since 1778. That battery and other veteran units have found new capabilities in this age of mechanized combat involving lightning mobility and massive firepower. In 1940, as German panzers overran France, the United States Congress created the 1st and 2nd American Armored Divisions. The 2nd was organized July 15, 1940, at Fort Benning, Ga., by Gen. Charles L. Scott, and received its "Hell on Wheels" name in 1941 from Gen. George S. Patton, Jr. First U.S. armored force in combat in World War II, "Hell on Wheels" landed in North Africa on Nov. 8, 1942. It won great victories at Safi and Casablanca, in the assault on Sicily, the 1944 Normandy invasion, the Battle of the Bulge, and other campaigns. Along 11,702 miles of combat advance, the 2nd won 7 French Croix de Guerres, 19 Distinguished Unit citations, and was first foreign division ever given the Fourragere of Belgium. The 2nd provided Honor Guard for President Harry S. Truman at the Potsdam peace conference. Since 1945 Fort Hood has been 2nd's permanent base. (1975)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mother Neff State Park — 21 mi
  A Leon River park that grew from six acres Isabella Neff left the state in her 1921 will, where Civilian Conservation Corps Company 817 built a stone tower, a pavilion and roads in the 1930s.
• Temple Railroad and Heritage Museum — 24 mi
  The Santa Fe depot of 1911 in a railroad town that began in 1880 as a construction camp, now a museum with locomotives and cars parked beside the active rail yard.
• Hancock Springs Park — 26 mi
  Lampasas's city park on Sulphur Creek, with a spring-fed swimming pool that holds about 69 degrees all year, the walls of the old bathhouse and a golf course.

More markers nearby

• Lt. Gen. Andrew Davis Bruce — 1.3 mi
• The 1st Cavalry Division — 1.4 mi
• Oveta Culp Hobby and the Women's Army Corps — 1.5 mi
• The Hiram B. Reynolds Property — 1.6 mi