Camp County

Camp County's first election, held in 1874, settled the county seat and chose the first officials on one ballot. Pittsburg took 500 votes, Leesburg 228 and Center Point 69, the Handbook of Texas reports. Most winners were Republicans, and the Handbook says their votes came almost entirely from Black voters, while the candidates themselves were generally White. Democrats had regained control by 1876. The 1880 census, the county's first, counted 3,085 White and 2,845 Black residents. A courthouse of brick made in Pittsburg went up on a lot William Pitts donated.

What the plaque says

Camp County Formed from Upshur County. Created April 6, 1874; organized June 20, 1874. Named in honor of John Lafayette Camp (1828-1891), soldier, lawyer, statesman, member of the Constitutional Convention, 1866; state senator in 1874. Pittsburg, the county seat.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Lake Bob Sandlin State Park — 8.2 mi
  A 1987 state park on a 9,000-acre reservoir, where a Republic of Texas stockade called Fort Sherman stood in 1838 and the Caddo lived from A.D. 800 to 1860, now with fishing piers, trails and cabins.
• Daingerfield State Park — 16 mi
  A pine-and-hardwood park built in 1935-39 by a white and a Black Civilian Conservation Corps company, with a dammed lake, Bass Lodge and a 2.4-mile loop trail around the water.

More markers nearby

• Colonel John L. Camp — steps away
• Pitts Family Cemetery — 3.0 mi
• Pittsburg — 3.0 mi
• Site of First Carnegie Library in Texas — 3.1 mi