DUANE
Duane's take
The official marker's the word on this one, and here's how Duane tells it. Seventeen miles west, six miles north of where you're sitting right now — or close enough to it — there was a camp. Not much to look at, probably.
No grand garrison, no gilded gate. Just a post on the edge of everything, holding a line that stretched from the Red River all the way down to the Rio Grande. They called it Camp Salmon, C.S.A.
Now while the big war was burning somewhere to the east — the kind of war that makes newspapers and monuments and songs — the men of the Texas Frontier Regiment were out here doing a different kind of work. The marker puts it plainly, and I'll let those words breathe for a second: short of food, short of supplies, short of ammunition, short of horses, troubled with Indians, and sharing few of the glories of the war at the cost of many lives. That's not a boast.
That's a reckoning. The camp was named for Captain John Salmon — frontier Indian fighter and post commander. That's a title you earn out here, not in some academy.
The whole chain of posts was laid out so that each one sat roughly a day's horseback ride from the next, a human thread stitched across the frontier so nothing could slip through unseen. Later the camp was renamed Camp McCord, but it started as Salmon's. Back the other direction, Texas was pulling hard for the Confederacy.
When the vote came, it went over three to one for secession. Ninety thousand troops went out from Texas — noted, the marker says, for mobility and heroic daring — and they fought on every battlefront. Texas was the storehouse of the South.
An important source of supply, a gateway to foreign trade through Mexico. The stakes were as high as stakes get. And so the frontier couldn't be left to fend for itself.
Behind the posts, patrols of State Rangers were moving. Organized militia. Citizens' posses scouting out from what the marker calls family forts — neighbors banding together, doing what neighbors on the edge of a continent do when everything is uncertain.
Two thousand miles. That's the length of frontier and coastline that Texans were defending. From 1861 to 1865, that line held.
Camp Salmon, renamed and nearly forgotten, was one link in that chain. The men who kept it didn't get the songs. But seventeen miles west and six miles north, they kept the line.
What the marker says
Guarding the frontier during the Civil War, this camp was located 17 mi. west, 6 mi. north. Established as part of a chain of posts a day's horseback ride apart stretching from Red River to Rio Grande. Occupied by Texas Frontier Regiment. Named for Capt. John Salmon, frontier Indian fighter and post commander. Later renamed Camp McCord. Short of food, supplies, ammunition, horses, troubled with Indians, and sharing few of the glories of the war at the cost of many lives, these men served to protect the Texas frontier. TEXAS CIVIL WAR FRONTIER DEFENSE 1861-1865: Texas made an all-out effort for the Confederacy after voting over 3 to 1 for secession. 90,000 troops, noted for mobility and heroic daring, fought on every battlefront. An important source of supply and gateway to foreign trade thru Mexico, Texas was the storehouse of the South. Camp Salmon and other posts on this line were backed by patrols of State Rangers, organized militia, and citizens' posses scouting from nearby "family forts." This was part of a 2000 mile frontier and coastline successfully defended by Texans.