In the distance stand the adobe remnants of the Fort Union Arsenal, an ordnance depot that stored and issued the weapons and ammunition needed for all Army operations throughout the Southwest for 30 years. Army practice kept these large quantities of gunpowder and bullets far from the troops and heavy traffic at the Post. A small crew of skilled soldiers and civilians tested new weapons that arrived overland from large federal depots in the East, repaired broken guns, loaded munitions, built ammunition boxes from pine boards, and made leather slings, belts, and harness. These armories were crucial to the frontier Army’s ability to fight in the Southwest. Arsenal workers served under a separate command distinct from the Post and the Quartermaster Depot and lived apart, and friction sometimes arose among the three Fort Union departments, as when Captain William Shoemaker refused to let his men help haul drinking water for the general needs of the Post, insisting on keeping his depot as separate and distinct from the other departments as possible.