Over the course of World War II, more than 200 thousand military personnel trained at Camp Fannin, located between Tyler and Winona, before seeing combat on the front lines in both Europe and the Pacific. Today, little evidence remains of what was once a sprawling, 14 thousand acre complex dedicated to the training of infantry replacements.

The UT Health North campus currently occupies less than half of the footprint of the U.S. Army’s Infantry Replacement Training Center at Camp Fannin, which operated between 1943 and 1946.

A permanent memorial plaza was constructed along U.S. Highway 271 in 2004 to not only honor the veterans who trained at Camp Fannin, but also include all who served in WWII.

“It is one of a very few national memorials designed and constructed that recognizes all five branches of service that were active in WWII,” according to the Camp Fannin Association.

By the time Camp Fannin opened in May 1943, the Allies were gaining momentum in the war. Here, recruits underwent basic training, undergoing physical training, equipment training, as well as weapons and tactical instruction, including small arms, artillery, and tank gunnery.

“During its peak operation, as many as 35 thousand to 40 thousand men were trained every four months to replace troops killed, wounded, or recalled from the war’s battlefronts,” according to the Texas Historical Commission.

With these soldiers coming from every corner of the country, the impact on the local economy was significant. In the 1940s, Tyler’s population was only about 28 thousand people. Camp Fannin employed about three thousand civilians and spurred new businesses catering to the military, according to records held at the Smith County Historical Society.

“Camp Fannin helped to win World War II, and opened an emerging East Texas to a broader society,” wrote Gordon J. Neilson in ‘Camp Fannin, Texas: A Historical Perspective.’

Soldiers were allowed to spend their free time and their pay at businesses in town.

Tyler would quickly become invested in the activities happening six miles outside the city limits.

“The bells all over Tyler rang to announce the successful Normandy invasion,” Geoffrey Willbanks wrote in the ‘Chronicles of Smith County, Texas,’ a periodical of the Smith County Historical Society. The late Smith County historian Mary Jane McNamara remembered “the paper boys shouting ‘Extra! Extra! The Allies Land in Normandy!’”

Many of the camp’s earliest trainees served in the infantry during Operation Overlord, including the D-Day landings in northern France.

More than 20 of these soldiers died during the Battle of Normandy between June 6 and August 30 of 1944. After years of research, the Camp Fannin Association compiled a comprehensive list of its trainees who later died in uniform. Those killed during the Battle of Normandy include the following:

• Pvt. Ernest E. Baker
• Col. Martin D. Barndollar, a fmr. Commanding Officer of Camp Fannin
• Pvt. Lonnie Lester Bien
• Pvt. Carl Joseph Bohnhoff, Sr.
• PFC Kenneth S. Bullard, Sr.
• Pvt. Bobbie Butler
• PFC Sylvan Chargo
• Pvt. Kenneth F. Clapp
• SSgt. Larry Wayne Curry
• Pvt. Walter L. Foltz
• Pvt. Floyd A. Fhanestock
• Pvt. John M. Hollingsworth
• Pvt. Arlie L. Hopkins
• Sgt. Julian W. Jarvis
• PFC Joseph Ralph Lauria
• Pvt. Thomas W. Luce
• Pvt. Ignatius N. Sacco
• Pvt. Andrew Jackson Speese III
• Pvt. Ferdinand R. Swann
• Cpl. Robert R. Taylor
• PFC William T. Veil

Only a week after the D-Day invasion began, Camp Fannin’s commanding officer, Maj. General Russell P. Hartle, addressed a crowd of Tyler residents who had gathered to watch the annual Infantry Day Parade on June 15, 1944. According to Camp Fannin records, more than three thousand soldiers marched 10 miles from the camp to the courthouse square in downtown Tyler, which was lined with bleachers for spectators.

Through the course of the war, Camp Fannin also housed German Prisoners of War between 1943 and 1946.

“At the end of World War II in 1945, the camp was converted to a separation center for the discharge of soldiers,” according to an article published by the Texas State Historical Association.

A historical marker at the site shows the facility reverted to private property or the to the State of Texas by January of 1948, when a tuberculosis sanatorium was established. Today, it is known as The University of Texas at Tyler Health Science Center.

Many of the buildings used at the camp were sold in a War Assets Administration auction held in the 1947. The UT Tyler Archives show many of the structures were purchased for use by Tyler Junior College, East Texas businesses, and even as churches.

The brick smokestack behind the hospital is one of the complex’s remaining structures.

According to the Camp Fannin Association, many of the veterans who were trained in Smith County returned to the area. “Some married sweethearts they had met while stationed here. Others returned because they believed this area to be an ideal place to live and raise families.”

Since 1991, the Camp Fannin Association has organized annual reunion for alumni and their families, as well as other ceremonies and activities.

“We’ve been fortunate to preserve a lot of correspondence from the World War II veterans’ families writing to them at Camp Fannin and writing to their families back home, relating their experiences,” said organizer DM Edwards. “And it’s just really meaningful to go through that correspondence and to see the sacrifices they made for our country and for liberty and for freedom.”

In 2012, the Texas General Land Office opened the Watkins-Logan-Garrison Texas State Veterans Home on a portion of the old Camp Fannin site known as the cantonment area.

In September 2023, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers completed a years-long project on the former Camp Fannin site to identify and remove 3,798 munitions and explosives of concern were removed.

“Despite the Army’s best effort, ordnance may remain with the area or vicinity of former Camp Fannin for many years to come,” according to a U.S. Army publication.

Anyone who locates suspected munitions should contact local law enforcement.

The views expressed in this blog do not necessarily reflect the views of KLTV/KTRE-TV or Gray Television. They are solely the opinion of the author. All content © Copyright 2024 Lane Luckie