New Plan and new route

General Hoge’s new plan and new route would absolutely get the Alaska Highway completed on time or he and his soldiers would die trying.

For more on Hoge’s Reassessment https://www.chrisdennis111.com/struggle-in-july/

On July 15, the point where the men of the 340^th Engineers needed to meet the oncoming men of the 35^th lay a very long, disheartening way east. Hoge’s progress report for July credits the 340^th with just fifteen miles of finished road. Determined to get them back on schedule, General Hoge changed the plan for his assault on Yukon—and changed the route of the Alaska Highway.

Hoge’s regiments built to what they called “Pioneer Road” standards; but, on July 15, the general ordered the commander of the 340^th, to abandon those standards and push a rude,one-way trail east as fast as he could; demanded four miles a day.  Hoge ordered the 130-miles from Teslin Post through the mountains over the Continental Divide built, standards be damned, by late August. 

At the same time, he ordered the commander of the 93^rd Engineers to change the mission of his three lead companies, 600 black soldiers and their equipment. They would ferry across Nisutlin Bay and follow the 340^th east, bringing their two-track up to standard.

In June the 93^rd had built a supply road out from Carcross that intersected the planned route of the Highway at Jake’s Corner. The regiment’s commander had designated his three lead companies to build the stretch of the Alaska Highway from that intersection north along the McClintock river to Whitehorse.

In July, when Hoge filched the men of those companies to support the 340^th, he simply promoted the Carcross supply road to Alaska Highway. The Alcan would not turn north at Jake’s Corner, instead it would follow the supply road all the way back to Carcross and turn north there on a hurriedly upgraded wagon road to Whitehorse.

In mid-July the 340^th received nine additional D8 dozers, doubling their production and commenced a mad dash to the Continental Divide.

Note for those of you who know the Highway…

A year later, in 1943, the Public Roads Administration built the stretch of the Alaska Highway north from Jake’s Corner along the McClintock River to Whitehorse. The road to Carcross and on north to Whitehorse still exists, but it’s no longer part of the Alcan.