Prisoner of War Camp Chapel

The War Department announced the camp on June 30, 1942, and building began late that July under the Army Corps of Engineers, at an estimated cost of $2 million. It became the second-largest prisoner of war camp built in the country, with about 750 American personnel. Late in 1945 skilled prisoners built the thirteen-foot-square chapel for five comrades who died in the camp. After the camp was declared surplus on February 1, 1946, only the chapel and a sixty-five-foot water tower were left. Sixteen former prisoners came back when its restoration began in 1988.

What the plaque says

Prisoner of War Camp Chapel (3 mi. W) Near this site during World War II the Hereford Military Reservation and Reception Center, a prisoner of war camp, was established. During nearly three years of operation, approximately 7000 Italian soldiers were imprisoned. Through their work on area farms and such projects as the painting of religious murals in St. Mary's Catholic Church at Umbarger (25 mi. NE), many of the soldiers made lasting friendships with local residents and with American troops at the camp. The center's chapel, constructed by the prisoners, is the only building remaining at the site. (1982)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Deaf Smith County Historical Museum — 5.6 mi
  Hereford's county museum in an early Catholic school: the Windmill City's pioneers, a half-dugout and caboose outside, and work by the Italian prisoners held south of town in the war.
• Buffalo Lake National Wildlife Refuge — 19 mi
  A 1938 Depression-era lake on Tierra Blanca Creek that has gone dry, now 7,664 acres of shortgrass, cottonwood canyon and a prairie dog town on the High Plains south of Umbarger.
• Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum — 30 mi
  The Panhandle's great collection, some two million objects behind a 1933 Art Deco hall carved with cattle brands, closed to the public since March 2025 over fire-safety violations.

More markers nearby

• Prisoner of War Camp Chapel — 5.1 mi
• Pioneer Windmill — 5.3 mi
• Deaf Smith County — 5.5 mi
• Town Without a Toothache — 5.5 mi