Cherokee County C.S.A.

In 1860 Cherokee County had 3,250 enslaved people, and 29 percent of its white families held slaves. The Rusk shops were part of a statewide network: the Confederate Field Transportation Bureau ran shops in Rusk and six other Texas towns, and by February 1864 the whole system could turn out 190 wagons, 6 ambulances, 900 sets of harness and 360 saddles a month. Beyond the two iron foundries and the gun factory, the Handbook counts two Confederate training camps, a prisoner of war camp and a large commissary depot in the county.

What the plaque says

Cherokee County C.S.A. Civil War manufacturing, supply and military center. Field Transportation Bureau shop made and repaired wagons, saddles, harnesses. Gun factory produced "Mississippi rifles" and pistols. Two iron works cast plows, skillets, pots, irons. Salt works provided a scarce item. Confederate commissary stored sugar and military supplies. Texas conscript district office directed drafting activity. Additional military activities included Union prisoner confine and two camps, one a camp of instruction for raw recruits. C.S.A. Men and Units Two thousand men from Cherokee County were in the Confederate Service, including Brigadier General Joseph L. Hogg who died in Mississippi in 1862. Companies organized were: Co. A, 2nd Texas Cavalry Co. C, 3rd Texas Cavalry Co. K, 4th Texas Cavalry Co. F, 7th Texas Cavalry Co. I, 10th Texas Cavalry Co. B, 17th Texas Cavalry Cos. F and I, 35th Texas Cavalry Co. B, 28th Texas Cavalry, Dismounted Cos. A and D, Border's Cavalry Co. K, 1st Texas Partisan Rangers Co. E, 7th Texas Infantry Cos. A, C,K 18th Texas Infantry (1963)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Caddo Mounds State Historic Site — 14 mi
  Three earthen mounds of an ancestral Caddo village and ceremonial center on the old El Camino Real, settled about A.D. 800 and still sacred to Caddo people, with a grass house and visitor center.
• Texas State Railroad Excursion Train — 25 mi
  A round trip of about 25 miles of track between the Palestine and Rusk depots through the Piney Woods, on a line built by prison labor and reopened as a tourist railroad in 1976.

More markers nearby

• Cherokee County — steps away
• Bachelor Girl's Library Club — steps away
• The Rusk Cherokeean — steps away
• Rusk Footbridge — steps away