Brigadier General James Creel Marshall (15 October 1897 – 19 July 1977) was a United States Army Corps of Engineers officer who was initially in charge of the Manhattan Project to build an atomic bomb during World War II.

A member of the June 1918 class of the United States Military Academy at West Point that graduated early due to World War I, Marshall saw service on the Mexican border.

In November 1943 he became Assistant Chief of Staff (G-4) of the United States Army Services of Supply (USASOS) in the Southwest Pacific Area, serving in Australia, New Guinea and the Philippines.

He later joined Koppers, building a coal loading facility in Turkey, and worked on mining projects in Africa.

From 20 June to 30 August 1919, he toured the battlefields of World War I, visiting Britain, France, Belgium and Germany, before returning to Camp A.

On 4 August 1923 he took charge of the Engineer Office of the 3rd New York District, located in Fort Hancock, New Jersey.

[7] Marshall attended the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, from 11 September 1939 to 3 February 1940.

[8] At Binghamton and Syracuse was responsible for a number of major projects, including ammunition and explosive plants, and the construction of the Rome Air Depot.

[2] On 18 June 1942 Marshall was called to Washington to take over the reorganised atomic bomb project, then known as the DSM (Laboratory Development of Substitute Materials).

[9] Marshall read the 13 June 1942 report from Vannevar Bush and James Conant and recalled that: I spent the night without sleep trying to figure out what this was all about.

At the moment among other construction projects in the Syracuse district, I had one for a TNT plant in Pennsylvania estimated to cost one hundred twenty eight million dollars.

[10] In a report to Colonel Leslie Groves, the head of the Construction Branch in the Office of the Chief of Engineers, on 11 August 1942, Marshall called for the creation a new district without territorial limits to administer the DSM project.

[13] By September, Bush was expressing dissatisfaction with slow progress and the lack of the highest priority for the project, going to the United States Secretary of War, Henry L. Stimson, and then directly to the President, Franklin D.

[17] Major General Wilhelm D. Styer, the Chief of Staff of the Army Service Forces, decided that Marshall would be replaced by Nichols.

[21] He was posted to Camp Sutton, North Carolina, as commander of the Engineer Replacement Training Center there until 26 November 1943.

He eventually tired of commuting to New York City, and took a job with Koppers, building a coal loading facility in Turkey.

His four-year term was marred by a change of government in the state in 1963, and his final years saw a series of clashes with the new governor, Karl F. Rolvaag, and his attorney-general Walter Mondale.

His contributions included the addition of an ambulance squad to the fire department and the construction of an indoor ice skating rink.