Did a job at Camp Clinton POW camp

When I lived in Clinton (1975 -1979) I lived up the road on Springridge near the interstate. We would ride our bikes out to the former POW camp, back then it still had a scale model of the Mississippi river from the Corps of Engineers. So now it's a running course for MC?

Ha I thought so... most of that is from a freind of mine MIke Allard and his brother David. We went to school together at CHS. Mike was and is a big military buff (civil and world wars) and it was his family that took me along to qualify for thier garrands. I also shot Mikes Ruger Mini 14 back in the day, and thier fathers Astro parabellum that Dave just sold not long ago. Good folks!

That's cool, wish they had preserved one of the POW camps in Miss, there were good many of them. Is the little race track still out there? They raced Karts and Supermoto motorcycles there a few years ago.

bubbat wrote:That's cool, wish they had preserved one of the POW camps in Miss, there were good many of them. Is the little race track still out there? They raced Karts and Supermoto motorcycles there a few years ago.

My son did xcountry last year, so yeah.. the gocart track the airport.. golf..all still there.

bubbat wrote:That's cool, wish they had preserved one of the POW camps in Miss, there were good many of them. Is the little race track still out there? They raced Karts and Supermoto motorcycles there a few years ago.

The last time I was down on US49 just north of the coast, we used to take a back road
to avoid traffic from an unmarked cut off that lead to an I10 on ramp and it ran through
the nearly vanished community of Woolmarket and there was, I BELIEVE, remnants of
an old POW camp and even traces of the auxiliary USAF emergency field for Keesler AFB
as well.

I don't know what the full complement of POWs was exactly, but I know that all the higher-ups of the Nazi Afrika Korps were interned at Clinton. I think the highest-ranking one was Rommel's second-in-command, either a major general or lieutenant general.

There were quite a few small satellite camps as well. There was even a small one here in Brookhaven on N. Jackson St.

My daughter ran cross-country there this past fall. It is a cool place, even though most everything is gone. You can still see the foundations of many of the buildings. As Scharfschütze said, the Corps had a river model there for a while, built with POW labor. Also check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Clinton.

Afrika Korps commander Hans-Jürgen von Arnim was there. I read stories of where he had his own transportation and would go into town to watch movies. Interesting day and time. I've heard some of the POWs returned to Clinton, after the war for a reunion.

Interesting history...

There were lots of POW camps in Mississippi during WWII Lots of the prisoners were used by famers to replace the farmer workers that had join the army, my mother said they had 10-12 that worked for my grandfather on the farm and even had 2 that worked in the house cooking and cleaning.


•Belzoni, Humphreys County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Brookhaven, Lincoln County, MS (branch camp under Clinton, MS)
•Clarksdale, Coahoma County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Clinton (Camp), Clinton, Hinds County, MS (base camp)
•Como (Camp), Como, Panola County, MS (base camp)
•Drew, Sunflower County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Elkas, Washington County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Foster General Hospital, Jackson, Rankin and Hinds Counties, MS
•Greenville, Washington County, MS (branch camp under Clinton, MS)
•Greenville Army Air Base, Washington County, MS (branch camp under Clinton, MS)
•Greenwood, Leflore County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Greenwood Army Air Base, Leflore County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Gulfport Naval Training Center, Harrison County, MS (branch camp under Shelby, MS)
•Indianola, Sunflower County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Lake Washington, Washington County, MS
•Leland, Washington County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•McCain (Camp Henry P.), Elliott, Grenada and Montgomery Counties, MS (base camp), National Guard
•Merigold, Bolivar County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Picayune, Pearl River County, MS (branch camp under Shelby, MS)
•Richton, Perry County, MS (branch camp under Shelby, MS)
•Rosedale, Bolivar County, MS (branch camp under McCain, MS)
•Saucier, Harrison County, MS (branch camp under Shelby, MS)
•Shelby (Camp), Hattiesburg, Forrest and Lamar Counties, MS (base camp)
•Van Dorn (Camp), Centreville, Amite and Wilkinson Counties, MS

Camp McCain and Shelby had POW camps in Alabama too.

The scale model of the Mississippi is still out there, you just have to walk through some crappy looking stuff to get to it. It's a neat place to poke your head around, but fairly dangerous with crumbling buildings and metal scraps everywhere.

Also, there's a nice mountain bike trail back there that shares some of the MC trails; it's great for riding, running, or just taking the dog out for a walk!

I remember taking a field trip in 5th or 6th grade to see the river
models both at the Clinton experiment station and then over to
Vicksburg to see the other one, all done these days no doubt
with computer modeling and the techs don't get to play with
their toys so much!!

45flattop wrote:

bubbat wrote:That's cool, wish they had preserved one of the POW camps in Miss, there were good many of them. Is the little race track still out there? They raced Karts and Supermoto motorcycles there a few years ago.

The last time I was down on US49 just north of the coast, we used to take a back road
to avoid traffic from an unmarked cut off that lead to an I10 on ramp and it ran through
the nearly vanished community of Woolmarket and there was, I BELIEVE, remnants of
an old POW camp and even traces of the auxiliary USAF emergency field for Keesler AFB
as well.

That POW camp is still there. There are 4 or 5 concrete cells still in the ground. It is south of the Bigfoot Horse camp. I have some pics of it somewhere. I'll try and find them.

Off subject a bit...but reading the sign... looks like MC has a dang good cross country tradition

I didn't know Clinton had a pow camp.

I read in a CL article YEARS ago that the POWs snuck out one Halloween and painted swastikas on the road...and snuck back in to the barracks.

Swastikas are crosses dating back to the Bronze Age, Nazi Swastikas were mirror images of those crosses, pointing clockwise instead of counterclockwise like most of the crosses but some of the crosses did point clockwise. It was used in by the Chinese,Romans, Vikings, even American Indians long before it became a Nazi symbol. Was used by early pilots as good luck charms. Some U.S. Army and National Guard units used swastikas on their unit patches up until the 1930's
Your right Nazis and skinheads tainted what they really are.