of the Atlantic bound for Ireland. On 1 June 1942, the original 107th Engineer Combat Battalion was redesignated the 2nd Battalion, 112th Engineer Regiment; on 19 August 1943, at Saunton Sands near Camp Braunton, England, the 2nd Battalion, 112th Engineers was redesignated as the 254th Engineer Combat Battalion. The division boarded 13 freight trains and 25 passenger trains at Fort Devens near Boston on 9 April 1942 and arrived five days later in Oakland, California. Portions of the unit were then transported by bus to Pier 7 in San Francisco, where they boarded the U.S. Army ferry for Angel Island in San Francisco Bay, which was utilized by the Army as Fort McDowell. The remainder were housed at Fort Ord near Monterey, California, at the Dog Track Pavilion in Emeryville and at the Cow Palace, where the men slept uncomfortably in stadium chairs and in horse stalls. On 22 April 1942, just before the division boarded ships in San Francisco bound for Australia, they received about 3,000 additional soldiers, most of whom had just finished basic training, to fill in their incomplete ranks. The division was still missing about 1,800 men. The division had to make do with whatever equipment was found in depots near San Francisco. Not even its firearms allocation was complete; it could not obtain any compact M1 carbine rifles meant for officers and support forces, forcing the division to arm them with the regular infantry's longer, heavier yet more powerful M1 Garand. They traded in their World War I-era horse-drawn artillery pieces for new 105mm M101 howitzers, though they received scant training on the new guns. After eight days waiting for transit, the division returned to San Francisco and boarded a convoy of seven Matson Line ships, including the S.S. Lurline and USS Hugh L. Scott at Pier 42. The convoy (SF 43) was escorted by the cruiser USS Indianapolis and two corvettes. Four days out of San Francisco, the Lurline ship's crew discovered the division's mascot, a dog named Vicksburg. She was named for the town she was born in and the location of the final major campaign of the American Civil War. (Vicksburg was killed in a road accident in Southport, Australia on 8 October 1942). A monument to the dog still exists at the former entrance to Camp Cable. Taking a southerly route to avoid the Japanese Navy, they arrived in southern Australia