The German prisoners were sent to Knobel sometime around 1944. There were 123 of the prisoners.
The prisoners worked for Ed Sellmeyer, Charlie West, John Brown, and Buster Alsburn. They also worked for the highway.
One guard, a boy from Oklahoma, Herman Bowlin, was part Indian. He came from Broken Arrow. He married a girl from his hometown in Oklahoma. He spent his honeymoon on Bob Hills farm.
The prisoners become good friends with the guards, although two escaped once. They were caught in a boxcar going to Texarkana, riding a freight train and they were brought back to the camp. They could speak English only very little.
They were really nice people, but they were not allowed to go to town or even to a movie. Most of them wouldn't run oof if they had the chance.
After the war was over, the prisoners were sent back to Germany. After staying over there for a year, they still wanted to stay over here.
In charge there was a Lieutenant Ward and a couple of Captains. During the war none of the prisoners died.
Ben Stormes was brought here when he was just a small boy and has lived here all his life. Ben Stormes worked with 2 prisoners. The prisoners helped to unload rice. One of the prisoners had black shining pair of boots. The prisoner was very proud of the boots. He even wore them out in the mud. He refused to pull them off. No one could bother them.
There was a man who guarded the prison around the seperator, which seperated the rice. Unfortunately, a guard laid down his gun and one of the prisoners got it and wanted to escape. The gun was given back to the guard.
Many people thought that the prisoners were not good workers, but they were not lazy men. They worked hard in bundling the rice. When they saw a mouse under the stocks, they would stick the pitch fork in them and watch them die.
Two prisoners escaped from the camp. There were mainly guards around Knobel, hardly any captians. There was one, a captain or maybe a general.
The prisoners communications were limited because they could not speak english. If they wanted a person, they would just motion to a person and tell him things.
Among the people who were in there were also some Italians. No one could harm the prisoners. The guards would not let anyone near them.
No person was allowed inside the camp along with the prisoners. The prison camp did not have a name. In fact Ben Stormes can not even remember people calling it the Knobel Prison Camp: but that is what it would go by.
One red-headed prisoner was always singing and happy. The prisoners had an interpeter who would translate for people. The prisoners had a recreation center. Ben Stormes lives in that same house. After the war was over they sent the prisoners back home where they originally belonged.
This is an interview with Gerald Stormes, a life time resident of Knobel, Arkansas. He was living in the town when the prison camp was started. Camp Robinson at Little Rock was in charge of the prison camp. The prisoners never got to leave to go to Knobel to see a movie or something. The commanding officer was of the military out of Camp Robinson at Little Rock. There was one successful escape, two prisoners from the camp. They were tracked with blood hounds, and one was caught and the other got away. The town people felt pretty bad about the prisoners at that time. The camp was enforced for about 6 months.
