The Texas in the Civil War Message Board - Archive

Re: Thanks that will help
In Response To: Thanks that will help *NM* ()

When I was a kid (dark ages when FDR was president) I seem to remember some sort of marker in the old Spindeltop oil field ("where oil became an industry") just south of the then Beaumont (Jefferson County) city limits. It marked the site of a Confederate camp.

My admittedly dim memory tells me the "salt dome pool" that blew in about 1901, was originally something like 20-30 feet above the surrounding marsh/prairie and the site had been chosen for a camp because of the elevation (no flooding less 'skeeters' and considered to be more healthy for the troops).

The huge outflow of oil during the boom lowered and flattened the area so that by the mid-1940s it was just another level oil soaked patch of coastal plain no higher than the rest of the local terrain, but still crammed with old, wooden, oil-soaked derricks as thick as grass. Little did the the 1860s troops know they were sitting on what would become the biggest oil strike of the 20th century some 35 years after THE WAR.

Do any of you SE Texas folks remember if the camp even had a name and if the state marker still exists?

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How can I find civil war camps in Tx
Re: How can I find civil war camps in Tx
Thanks that will help *NM*
Re: Thanks that will help
Re: How can I find civil war camps in Tx
Re: How can I find civil war camps in Tx
Re: How can I find civil war camps in Tx
Re: How can I find civil war camps in Tx
How can I find civil war camps in Tx
Re: How can I find civil war camps in Tx