Military police escort guards, called MPEGs, undergo training at Fort Custer in 1943. Fort Custer itself would hold some 5,000 German prisoners during the second world war. The MPEGs trained at the fort would serve in the United States and abroad. A Sept. 12, 1943, article in the Enquirer and News described the nine-week training as intense. "The MPEG, although his training period has been relatively short, has been intensively trained in the art of war."