Getting in place, for the soldiers of the 35th Engineers, meant getting themselves and their equipment to Fort Nelson before the spring thaw melted their winter road away. The soldiers became the cogs in their commander’s giant conveyor belt.
Getting in place via the conveyor subjected the men to an excruciating experience.
In a memo to General Hoge, Col. Welling described dozer operators along the route next to their parked equipment “crying violently, so great was the cold.” Upon arrival at their destination, soldiers who had made the trip in the back of cargo trucks could hardly climb out or walk. Finally in a tent and near a fire, their “blood warmed and thinned, they would become dizzy and fell asleep.”
Lt. Miletich’s exhausted, hungry and, above all, cold advance party stumbled into Fort Nelson on the afternoon of March 20th.
They were the first to arrive. Western Construction and Lumber Company of Canada had facilities at the Fort Nelson Airfield and Alex Johnston, their superintendent, arranged to feed the famished soldiers. Several weeks later they received a side of beef—courtesy of the grateful troops.
The soldiers of the 35th pulled it off. They and their equipment made it to Ft. Nelson before the thaw. But they were far from ready to make a road. As hard as the trip had been on the men, it had been even harder on their equipment.
The army rushed mechanics from Union Tractor Company in from Edmonton by air to help get the heavy equipment back in shape. One of their number, Harry Garriott, found himself shocked and “staggered by the immensity and scope of the project”.
Vehicles with flat tires and no spares sat anywhere. Many had broken axles.
The mechanics did a quick triage then sacrificed the totally unserviceable vehicles to cannibalize parts for the rest. And the brutal cold continued, forcing them to leave motors running lest the cold thicken the oil and freeze cooling systems. Antifreeze that spring in Fort Nelson was a rare and precious substance. Later in the year a Caterpillar tractor agency would be established at Fort Nelson.
But that was of no help in March.