Policing Venereal Disease at Fort Huachuca, 1941–1945

This article discusses the racialization of venereal disease during World War II at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, the installation with the largest number of African American troops, arguing that medical and law enforcement surveillance overlapped in venereal disease prevention efforts in ways unique to the post’s location and racial demographics. It analyzes how military and civilian agencies attempted to limit venereal disease and how Black officers and enlisted men and women responded to and influenced these policies. The U.S. Army used statistics to construct venereal disease as a racially specific problem and developed venereal disease education efforts at the post. Gendered effects of venereal disease control policy included a proposal to quarantine civilian women within the post hospital. As the army tried to maintain racial, gender, and geographic boundaries, the biomedical and carceral technologies used to police venereal disease grew more similar.