Camp Ford, Civil War historic site in Tyler, United States.

Camp Ford is a historic site in Tyler, Texas, where a Confederate prisoner-of-war camp once stood during the Civil War. Today the grounds include walking trails, informational panels, and an interpretive kiosk that explain what happened here.

Camp Ford was established in spring 1862 as a training camp for Confederate recruits and named for Col. John Salmon Ford, a Texas Ranger and state superintendent of conscripts. Union officers captured in Louisiana arrived in August 1863, and the site became the largest Confederate-run prison west of the Mississippi River. The stockade was quadrupled after the 1864 battles of Mansfield and Pleasant Hill, and the last 1,761 prisoners were exchanged on May 22, 1865.

The camp is named for Col. John Salmon Ford, a Texas Ranger and the state's superintendent of conscripts. Union prisoners held here kept diaries, and James S. McClain, captured on May 3, 1864 and held until the final exchange, sketched the camp's buildings. The site is now a public historic park owned by Smith County and managed by the Smith County Historical Society, founded in 1959.

The site sits on US Highway 271 and is open every day from sunrise to sunset at no cost. Since the panels and trails are spread across the grounds, wearing comfortable shoes makes the visit much easier.

The stockade was not built after an escape attempt but after a panic in November 1863, when 800 new prisoners arrived and a mass breakout was feared. The enclosure of about 4 acres (1.6 hectares) was later quadrupled in size after the 1864 captures at Mansfield and Pleasant Hill. No traces of the stockade remain; the site is now a park with a cabin reconstruction and interpretive signage.