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Please add profiles of those who were born, lived or died in Caddo Parish, Louisiana.
Official Website
In 1838, Caddo Parish was created by territory taken from Natchitoches Parish; the legislature named it for the indigenous Caddo Indians who had lived in the area. Most were forced out during Indian Removal in the 1830s.
The parish was initially a center of cotton plantations, developed by planters along the waterways and worked by thousands of enslaved black laborers. Shreveport, the parish seat, became a center of government, trade and law.
An armory was constructed in Shreveport before the Civil War. This city served as the state capital after Union forces had seized Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Locals have referred to the armory as "Fort Humbug".
After the Civil War, and particularly after Reconstruction, whites in the parish used violence and intimidation against blacks to suppress Republican voting and re-establish white supremacy. The parishes in northwest Louisiana had a high rate of violence and lynchings. From 1877 through the early 20th century, there were 48 lynchings of blacks in Caddo Parish; this was the second-highest total in the state after Lafourche Parish.
In 1920 the Daughters of the Confederacy, who were memorializing the Civil War, designated the armory as "Fort Turnball". During World War II, the government used it as a mobilization site for men who had been drafted and recruited.
In the early twentieth century, the oil industry developed here, with a concentration of related businesses in Shreveport. Numerous oil wells were constructed across southern Arkansas and northern Louisiana.
Adjacent Counties & Parishes
- Miller County, Arkansas
- Lafayette County, Arkansas
- Bossier Parish
- Red River Parish
- DeSoto Parish
- Panola County, Texas
- Harrison County, Texas
- Marion County, Texas
- Cass County, Texas
Cities, Towns & Communities
- Belcher
- Bethany (part)
- Blanchard
- Conn
- Dixie
- Forbing
- Gilliam
- Greenwood
- Hosston
- Ida
- Keithville
- Lakeview
- Mooringsport
- Oil City
- Rodessa
- Shreveport (Parish Seat)
- Vivian
- Zylks
Cemeteries
Links
Red River National Wildlife Refuge (part)
USS Caddo Parish - LST-515
National Register of Historic Places
Louisiana Genealogy & History Network
