Until August 2, the Division’s recruits were broken into the military regiment as individuals, undergoing the customary physical conditioning and indoctrination preliminaries. But on that day a seventeen-week basic training program was launched, aimed at simultaneous training of individuals and small units. The Division’s GI’s were introduced to a fate that met millions of the nation’s new soldiers. There were road marches, they scrambled over obstacle courses, hit the dirt, learned about first aid and military courtesy, the dual-business end of a rifle – bullets and bayonet; they scanned maps and took azimuths; they hiked, patrolled and drilled, both close-order and extended; they heard military sounds-in-the-night and how to muffle them; they matched shelter-halves to pitch their tents, then striking the canvas to roll their packs again, there was calisthenics, squad problems and company problems, all this and much more made up the fast-flying transitional period from rookies to basically trained soldiers and teams.
July 23,1942, the Division was passed from control of the VII Corps to direct control of the Third U.S. Army, then commanded by Lt. Gen. Walter Krueger. The change was occasioned by departure of the VII Corps for maneuvers. When the maneuvering 2nd Infantry Division selected a cadre for the 102nd Infantry Division, a month of further training was necessary before the cadre could join its new division. It was thus transferred to the 95th Division to receive this training.
At Camp Swift the distinctive 9-V insignia was adopted, replacing the 1934 denoting the Division’s initially Oklahoma and Kansas constituency. The new insignia was designed by Lt. Col. Leland B. Kuhre, first World War II commander of the 32Oth Engineer Battalion, when members of the Division staff were assembled at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas before activation. It was approved by the War Department in August. In color and design, the insignia was especially appropriate, the red-white-and blue symbolizing the national character of the Division which represented virtually every state; the Arabic "9" artillery red, inter twined with a white Roman five for V-for-Victory, and both on an elliptical background of infantry blue.
After moving 70 miles to historic Ft Sam Houston training continued. Movement to the Leon Springs Military Reservation presented at first a round-trip hike of eighteen miles with full field packs. Later, troops were transported out in trucks, returning to the main post by foot after completing the two-week training stretch. Camp Bullis was the military reservation’s base camp. Camps Cibolo, Sheel, Stahl, Panther Springs and Wilderness were built or prepared to accommodate the various units; Cibolo for the infantry, Sheel, Stahl and Panther Springs for field artillery and Wilderness for the 320th fighting Engineer Battalion and the 320th Medical Battalion. Training included village fighting in mock villages constructed by the engineer battalion. "Branntown" was a North African type village named for the Division’s then chief of staff "Kuhreville", a German type, was named for the first commander of the engineer battalion and the designer of the Division shoulder patch. Troops were introduced to the bangalore torpedo and flame-thrower as training shifted to the assault of fortification facsimiles which served as the only targets until the Division fought at Metz less than two years later.
For one March training specialty, river crossing exercises, the Division was diverted from Leon Springs to the Guadalupe River at Seguin. Here, again, the Division’s top utility soldiers, the men of the 320th Engineer Battalion, mainly sponsored the exercises, first demonstrating a crossing and then cooperating with the infantry units in subsequent crossings under simulated tactical conditions. Meanwhile the combined unit training was predicated largely on regimental combat team exercises, a series of eight being held in accordance with Army Ground Force directives.
A series of "D" problems through most of May marked the next advance in training, a transition between the practice of training and the application of maneuvers. Involving all units, the "D" problems were the Division’s first sham battles and "dummy scrimmages. Umpired by officers of the VII Corps, the minor maneuvers posed conditions similar to those which were to be experienced in the soon-to-come Louisiana exercises.
The tank-and-truck-torn maneuver ground loomed ahead in Louisiana. During the period June 18 through June 24 the Division moved along the Old Spanish Trail by motor and rail to a bivouac area northeast of the village of Many in western Louisiana, near the Sabine River which forms most of the Texas-Louisiana border. A series of four "flag" exercises began June 28 and ended July 7, the purpose of the problems being to afford the division commander additional time to improve the teamwork of the Division before the test of competitive maneuvers. As troops acclimated themselves, it was apparent early that Louisiana weather, terrain and insects would offer more formidable opposition than any of the maneuvering and opposing divisions. Proving ground for most World War II divisions and lesser units, the Louisiana maneuver area was living up to its reputation as a "grill ground" to test both the tactics and stamina of the Division.
A broad variety of tactical situations were staged between the Red and Sabine Rivers, the latter being crossed by the 95th Division — a training forerunner of what was to come in the European Theater.