By the end of May 1945, more enemy prisoners were sitting out the Second World War in Texas than any state in the Union. One out of every ten German, Italian and Japanese captives shipped to the United States for safekeeping wound up somewhere between the Red River and the Rio Grande.
For reasons of cost as well as security, U.S. officials decided in the months after Pearl Harbor to hold all Axis prisoners of war on American soil. A network of hurriedly constructed camps soon reached every corner of the country giving 44 of the 48 states at least one POW facility. But Texas, with 33 camps that accommodated 45,000 involuntary “guests,” led the pack.
The largest Lone Star installation was located near Mexia, where Germans taken in North Africa began to arrive by the trainload in early 1943. Although the destination of these survivors of Rommel’s Afrika Korps was a military secret, their sudden appearance in Central Texas did not go unnoticed. The sight of hundreds of downcast Nazis naturally attracted the attention of curious locals, who could spot a strange face in town a block away.
