Gen. George and Libbie Custer Campsite

Hempstead had a large occupying force in 1865, about 4,000 Union troops by the Handbook of Texas. Custer's division included the 1st Iowa, 2nd Wisconsin, 7th Indiana, and 5th and 12th Illinois cavalry. The camp lay on a plantation that had run on about 300 enslaved workers, while the post's headquarters stood in town. Custer enforced orders against foraging and destruction of private property, which brought Texans' thanks. Dates disagree: the plaque says August to October, the Liendo entry September 1 to December 1. Libbie Custer later wrote of the Texas months in Tenting on the Plains.

What the plaque says

Gen. George and Libbie Custer Campsite Soon after the Civil War General George Armstrong Custer and his cavalry unit arrived in Texas as part of a large U.S. force sent to establish order and counter the threat posed by French-controlled Mexico. From August to October, 1865, Custer, his wife Elizabeth (Libbie), and several U.S. Cavalry units camped here on the Liendo plantation of Leonard W. Groce, heir of "Old 300" settler and cotton baron Jared Groce. The Custers enjoyed warm relations with the Groces and area Texans in part because of his insistence that federal troops treat Texans and their property with respect. Sesquicentennial of Texas Statehood 1845-1995

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Star of the Republic Museum — 17 mi
  A star-shaped museum of the Republic of Texas years, 1836 to 1846, built at Washington-on-the-Brazos after a Brenham campaign and opened on March 1, 1970.
• Washington-on-the-Brazos State Historic Site — 17 mi
  The townsite on the Brazos where delegates met in a cold, unfinished hall in March 1836 to declare Texas independent, with Independence Hall rebuilt and Anson Jones's Barrington farm worked as in 1850.
• Navasota — 20 mi
  A railroad and cotton town where the La Bahia Road crossed the Navasota River, scarred by an 1865 explosion and yellow fever, and the home ground of the songster Mance Lipscomb.
• San Felipe de Austin State Historic Site — 21 mi
  Stephen F. Austin's colonial capital on a Brazos bluff, the town of the Consultation and the first Texas newspapers, burned by its own garrison in the Runaway Scrape of 1836.

More markers nearby

• Liendo — 0.7 mi
• Groce Family Plantations — 1.8 mi
• Wyatt Chapel Community Cemetery — 2.5 mi
• Prairie View A&M University — 2.7 mi