County of Camp: Kay County
Location of Camp: W. South Ave., US-60 Frontage Rd., N. of Tonkawa
Date Marker Erected: July 4, 2002
Marker Erected by: Tonkawa Historical Society
"TONKAWA - Evelyn Coyle wanted to make sure history would not be forgotten.
"More than a half-century ago, Tonkawa was home to 3,000 German prisoners of war.
"After their surrender in May 1943, German soldiers of Gen. Erwin Rommel's Afrika Corps were sent to hastily constructed prisoner of war camps in Oklahoma and throughout the South.
"On July 4, citizens in Tonkawa officially will dedicate their site with a historical marker located at what once was the camp entrance just off U.S. 60.
'"It isn't that we are trying to memorialize the Germans at all," said Coyle, a member of the local historical society and former mayor. "Our heritage is it was a prisoner of war camp. It's history."
"Tonkawa was one of eight "permanent" prisoner of war camps in Oklahoma, said Bill Corbett, history professor at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah.
"Other permanent prisoner of war camps in Oklahoma were in Alva , McAlester , Fort Reno , Fort Sill in Lawton , Camp Gruber near Muskogee , Stringtown and Pryor , Corbett said.
"Coyle said she realized the site needed to be marked after talking to the parents of a Tonkawa junior high school student who had to write a report about a World War II topic. She suggested that he write about the local prisoner of war camp.
'"They looked at me and their eyes got wide. They said, 'What are you talking about?'"
"The Tonkawa camp was built in the last three months of 1942. The U.S. Army took control in January 1943, Corbett said. Prison camps were designed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers but built by private contractors, he said.
"Coyle said the Tonkawa camp was built to accommodate 3,000 prisoners, but averaged about 2,500 a day. The first prisoners arrived in August 1943.
"The German prisoners captured in Africa were shipped to the United States, then taken by train to designated camps nationwide. Coyle said that when the prisoners arrived in Tonkawa, they were marched two miles from the train station to the camp.
"Local residents peeked out their windows and watched the prisoners march by, she said.
"Corbett said between 40 and 80 civilians were employed at the camp, mostly clerical workers. The camp, a mile north of Tonkawa, was home to 500 U.S. Army troops.
"The government took title to 640 acres of land in Kay County and used the southeast quarter of the section, or 160 acres, for the camp.
"It contained 180 wooden structures, including a hospital, barracks to accommodate 1,000 men, latrines and shower rooms, a base theater for the American soldiers, a base fire station, warehouses, recreation hall and commissary for the prisoners and quarters for U.S. officers and nurses.
"Coyle said there were eight escapes from the Tonkawa camp, but each prisoner was either recaptured or returned on his own.
"Corbett said there were probably about 80 escapes total from all Oklahoma camps. Each time, the prisoner was either recaptured or returned on his own. Escapees returned because they had nowhere to go, he said.
"Corbett said one former prisoner told him, "What would be the point in escaping, because what would we escape to?"
"That is one reason camps were built in rural, sparsely populated states like Oklahoma, he said. The bulk of prisoner of war camps in the U.S. were in the Southeast and Southwest, he said.
"The government wanted them in states that normally had mild winters to save on heating and construction costs, Corbett said. They also built camps in the South because the prisoners could be forced to work on farms, he said.
"While American men were at war, German prisoners supplemented the agricultural labor force, he said.
"In addition to Oklahoma's eight permanent camps, there were at least two dozen work camps where prisoners were housed temporarily while on work details, Corbett said.
"National Guard armories and high school gymnasiums frequently were converted to temporary quarters while prisoners worked on area farms and ranches, he said.
"In Haskell, for example, an armory became a temporary prison camp while German soldiers picked crops from bottom land on the Arkansas River, he said. The Griffin Food Company in Muskogee used prisoners of war to work in its vegetable fields, he said.
'"They (prisoners of war) picked a lot of cotton in southern Oklahoma," he said.
"Prisoners were paid 80 cents a day. Noncommissioned officers didn't have to work, but most of the German prisoners in Oklahoma were the lowest-ranked enlisted men, Corbett said. Some noncommissioned officers volunteered to work, he said.
'"The hard-core Nazis were shipped to Alva," he said.
"Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, many German veterans of war returned to Oklahoma and visited the places they were imprisoned, he said.
'"They were well-treated and well-fed here," Corbett said. "Like one former prisoner of war told me, 'sitting in Oklahoma was better than sitting at the Russian front.'
'"They were very complimentary of their experiences here in Oklahoma and how they were treated by the civilian population."
"Tonkawa was the site where the only German prisoner of war was murdered in Oklahoma. Cpl. Johannes Kunze was beaten to death in November 1943 by other prisoners who thought he was giving information to U.S. Army Intelligence, Corbett said.
"Five prisoners were arrested, prosecuted and then hanged at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. No German soldiers testified against them, Corbett said.
"Today, all that is left of the original Tonkawa camp that closed in 1945 is part of the water tower, the officers' club, an ammo building and some brick chimneys, Corbett said.
"Artifacts and photographs from the camp are displayed at the McCarter Museum of Tonkawa History." ~ The Oklahoman, by ED GODFREY, June 24, 2002