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Last week, retired Lt. Col. Arthur J. Gregg posed for a group photo with founding members of the Black Engineer of the Year Awards (BEYA) military leadership committee during the Fort Gregg-Adams Redesignation Ceremony. According to the Defense Visual Information Distribution Service, more than 1,000 people were present for the event on April 27.
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The BEYA Stars & Stripes veterans included Dennis L. Via, a retired general who last served as the 18th commanding general of the United States Army; William E. "Kip" Ward, a retired general who served as the inaugural commander of United States Africa Command, and Johnnie E. Wilson, a retired general who served as commanding general of the Army Materiel Command.
Active duty officers in attendance during the Fort Gregg-Adams Redesignation Ceremony included Gen. Charles R. Hamilton, commanding general of Army Materiel Command; and Maj. Gen. Mark T. Simerly, commanding general of the Combined Arms Support Command and Fort Lee.
In March, the Army announced in a press release that Fort Lee would become Fort Gregg-Adams during a redesignation ceremony on April 27, honoring two Black officers who excelled in the sustainment field and made significant marks in U.S. Army history. The Fort Gregg-Adams logo is now used to represent the installation formerly known as Fort Lee.
Lt. Gen. Arthur J. Gregg rose from the rank of private to three-star general during his military logistics career, which began just after WWII and spanned nearly 36 years. Gregg, now 94, will be the only living person in modern Army history to have an installation named after him.
Lt. Col. Charity Adams was the first Black officer in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps – later known as the Women's Army Corps – in World War II and led the first predominately Black WAC unit to serve overseas: the storied 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion.
The post is one of nine Army installations being redesignated by Defense Department-endorsed recommendations from the Congressional Naming Commission to remove the names, symbols, displays, monuments, and paraphernalia commemorating the Confederate States of America or those who voluntarily served under the C.S.A. Congress directed the formation of the Naming Commission in the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act and charged it with providing these recommendations.
The Commission issued its three-part report to Congress in the summer of 2022. Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III accepted all the Commission's recommendations that September. Then, on January 5, 2023, William A. LaPlante, the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment, directed all Department of Defense organizations to implement those recommendations.