DUANE
Duane's take
Now, I'm gonna tell this one just the way the official marker tells it — so settle in, because this story earns its keep. Out here in Castro County, about three miles west of where you're sitting right now, there's a piece of ground that carries more history than you might expect from open Panhandle flatland. During World War II, this was the location of the Hereford Military Reservation and Reception Center — a prisoner of war camp, plain and simple.
Approximately seven thousand Italian soldiers were imprisoned there over nearly three years of operation. Seven thousand men, a long way from home, in the middle of the Texas High Plains. Now, that's a number worth sitting with for a moment.
And here's where the story turns in a direction you might not see coming. Those men didn't just wait out the war behind wire. They worked on area farms.
They contributed to the life of the surrounding communities. And some of them — some of them picked up brushes and painted religious murals inside St. Mary's Catholic Church over in Umbarger, twenty-five miles to the northeast.
Murals that are still there. That's a lasting thing, friends. That's not nothing.
Through that work, through that labor and that art, many of those soldiers built genuine friendships — with local residents, and with the American troops stationed at the camp alongside them. In the middle of a world war, something human managed to take root. When it was all over, the camp came down.
Buildings disappeared. Time did what time does. But one structure survived.
The chapel — constructed by the prisoners themselves — is the only building still standing at the site. They built it with their own hands, and it outlasted everything else. Make of that what you will.
What the marker says
(3 mi. W) Near this site during World War II the Hereford Military Reservation and Reception Center, a prisoner of war camp, was established. During nearly three years of operation, approximately 7000 Italian soldiers were imprisoned. Through their work on area farms and such projects as the painting of religious murals in St. Mary's Catholic Church at Umbarger (25 mi. NE), many of the soldiers made lasting friendships with local residents and with American troops at the camp. The center's chapel, constructed by the prisoners, is the only building remaining at the site. (1982)