Camp Charlotte

Camp Charlotte was a Civil War-era military installation located on the Middle Concho River below its confluence with Kiowa Creek in northwestern Irion County. It was established in April 1858. The site was forty-five miles west of San Angelo at the intersection of the Butterfield Overland and El Paso mail routes. The purpose of the camp was the usual one for frontier posts-protecting against Indian depredations, especially those against the overland mail. A stockade measuring 115 by 190 feet encompassed some facilities, but the officers' quarters and guardhouse were built outside the compound. A small settlement grew up around the stage station near the fort. By the middle 1870s the post had only infantry troops, who found it difficult to police the area against Indian raids. William Garrison established a post office in the settlement in 1885, when what later became Irion County was still a part of Tom Green County. The office served the area until it was discontinued and moved to San Angelo in 1899. The site of the camp is in an isolated area of northwest Irion County west of State Highway 163. Little of the camp remained there by the 1970s except some foundations and a historical marker.