Camp Claiborne

The camp was under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Eighth Service Command, and included 23,000 acres (93 km²).

The camp was mainly used for basic training and artillery practice, which included the nearby Winn District-Kisatchie Precision Bombing Range.

The 34th Infantry Division came to Claiborne for its basic training and would be the first American force sent to the European Theater of Operations (ETO).

In 1941, prior to the United States declaring war, the camp was used as part of the Louisiana Maneuvers, a 400,000-man training exercise involving two imaginary countries fighting each other.

The two armies faced each other across the Red River, over 3,400 square miles (8,800 km2) of land, part of which was in East Texas.

The St. Catherine Church, at the junction of U.S. 165 with Robinson Bridge Road, uses one of the military buildings.

The balcony, now a storage area, was used by African American troops who were segregated in worship from white soldiers who used the pews of the lower tier.

Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church in Marksville Avoyelles Parish purchased an old building from Camp Claiborne after World War II for conversion as a rectory.

Not much is left: part of a gate and a handful of scattered shells of buildings, some of which have been fenced off and sealed with sheets of metal.

Today the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is in the process of evaluating the grounds of the former camp to see how feasible it would be to remove possible unexploded ordnance.