*]
MISSISSIPPI
A Guide to the Magnolia State
MISSISSIPPI
A GUIDE TO THE MAGNOLIA STATE
Complied and Written by the Federal Writers Project
of the Works Progress Administration
AMERICAN GUIDE SERIES
ILLUSTRATED
Sponsored by the Mississippi Advertising Commission
THE VIKING PRESS - NEW YORK
MCMXXXVIII
FIRST PUBLISHED IN MAY 1938
COPYRIGHT 1938 BY MISSISSIPPI ADVERTISING COMMISSION
PRINTED IN U.S.A. BY THE STRATFORD PRESS
55
All rights are reserved, including the rights to reproduce this book
or parts thereof in any form.
Foreword
HERE is a book which takes us vividly into the South in the first period
of its greatness and brings us by natural steps up to the contemporary scene
where a new South is in the making. To the visitor Mississippi offers mod
ern methods of agriculture in the northern Delta region, a playground on
the Gulf Coast, and some of the finest examples of old plantation archi
tecture in Natchez and its other historic towns. This Guide, with its charm,
its occasional irony, and its comprehensiveness, could have been written
only from self-knowledge and from a knowledge of modern America. It
is the modest yet proud statement of their accomplishments by the people
of this Gulf State.
This volume is one of the American Guide Series, which, when com
plete, will cover the forty-eight States and several hundred communities, as
well as Alaska, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii. With each new volume that
leaves the press a new trait is added to the portrait of America today.
Administrator
Preface
MISSISSIPPI: A Guide to the Magnolia State, goes beyond the limits of
a conventional guidebook, first, in its attempt to picture and explain con
temporary Mississippi by presenting its people, culture, physiography,
politics, folkways, economics, and industry in relation to the historical
past ; and, second, in its narrative detailed description of points of interest.
The extensive research involved in preparing the present volume brought
out the fact that Mississippi s development holds incidents, hitherto un
told, as dramatic and colorful as those of many an imaginative story.
Though primarily a guidebook, it will serve also as a springboard from
which those interested in research may plunge into the almost undisturbed
waters of Mississippiana.
Main emphasis has been placed upon the typical and average people of
the State, rather than the exceptional elements. Thus, the two essays on
folkways deal almost wholly with the Mississippi farmer the whites of
the Central and Tennessee Hills, the Negroes of the Delta. It is this great
agricultural majority, comprising more than four-fifths of the State s popu
lation, that has had no place in portrayals of Mississippi life by William
Faulkner at one extreme and by Stark Young at the other.
Difficulties encountered were many; first-hand information, often by
word of mouth, required checking, and source material was not always
reliable. Preparation of tours, at a time when the State is engaged in an
extensive road-building program, necessitated frequent alterations. Occa
sional inaccuracies, it is hoped, will be reported and corrected in subse
quent editions.
For valuable assistance in preparing the book, grateful acknowledgment
is due a number of persons and organizations. Particularly helpful have
been the officials of the State governmental departments, city chambers of
commerce, the State University and State College, Mississippi State Col
lege for Women, and members of the American Institute of Architects.
Among the individuals whose aid should receive appreciative mention are
Miss Bessie Cary Lemly, Harris Dickson, Dr. William Clifford Morse,
Moreau B. Chambers, and Beverly Martin. A special word of thanks is
due Thomas Garner James, who gave valuable information and advice in
connection with the section whose title is The State in the Making.
ERI DOUGLASS, State Director
GENE HOLCOMB, State Editor
WORKS PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION
HARRY L. HOPKINS, Administrator
ELLEN S. WOODWARD, Assistant Administrator
HENRY G. ALSBERG, Director of Federal Writers Project
Contents
FOREWORD, By Harry L. Hopkins, Administrator
PREFACE, By the State Director and State Editor v
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xi
LIST OF MAPS xv
NOTATIONS ON THE USE OF THE BOOK xvii
GENERAL INFORMATION xix
CALENDAR OF EVENTS
/. Mississippi: The General Background
MISSISSIPPI PAST AND PRESENT
What Is Mississippi ? 3
White Folkways 8
Negro Folkways 22
BEFORE THE WHITE MAN CAME
Natural Setting 31
Archeology and Indians 45
THE STATE IN THE MAKING
An Outline of Four Centuries 60
Transportation 79
Agriculture 92
Industry and Commerce 106
Religion 112
Education Hg
The Press 12 8
THE CREATIVE EFFORT
Arts and Letters 134
Architecture 142
Music
Vlll CONTENTS
//. Main Street and Courthouse Square
(CITY AND TOWN DESCRIPTIONS AND CITY TOURS)
Biloxi 165
Columbus 179
Greenwood 189
Gulf port 194
Holly Springs 200
Jackson 208
Laurel 222
Meridian 227
Natchez 233
Oxford 254
Tupelo 261
Vicksburg 266
///. Tours
TOUR 1 (Mobile, Ala.)-Biloxi-Gulfport-
(New Orleans, La.), [u.s. 90] 285
IA Gulfport to Ship Island 303
2 (Livingston, Ala.) -Meridian-} ackson-
Vicksburg-( Monroe, La.), [u.s. 80] 304
3 (Memphis, Tenn.)-Clarksdale-Vicksburg-
Natchez-( Baton Rouge, La.), [u.s. 61]
Section a. Tennessee Line to Vicksburg 315
Section b. Vicksburg to Louisiana Line 324
3 A Clarksdale-Greenville-Rolling Fork. [STATE i] 346
3B Woodville-Fort Adams, Fort Adams Road 358
4 (Jackson, Tenn.)-Corinth-Tupelo-Columbus-
Meridian-Waynesboro- (Mobile, Ala.), [u.s. 45] 361
4 A Shannon-West Point-Macon. [STATE 23, STATE 25] 373
4B Shuqualak-Meridian. [STATE 39] 377
CONTENTS ix
5 (Memphis, Tenn.)-Grenada-Jackson-Brookhaven-
McComb-(New Orleans, La.), [u.s. 51]
Section a. Tennessee Line to Jackson 380
Section b. Jackson to Louisiana Line 391
6 (Tuscaloosa, Ala.)-Columbus-Winona-Greenwood-
Greenville-(Lake Village, Ark.), [u.s. 82] 397
7 Clarksdale-Indianola-Yazoo City-Jackson
Hattiesburg-Gulfport. [U.S. 49, U.S. 49W}
Section a. Clarksdale to Jackson 406
Section b. Jackson to Gulfport 414
7A Tutwiler-Greenwood-Lexington-
Pickens. [u.s. 49E, STATE 12] 420
8 (Livingston, Ala.)-Meridian-Laurel-Hattiesburg-
Picayune-Santa Rosa-(New Orleans, La.), [u.s. 11} 423
9 (Hamilton, Ala.) -Tupelo-New Albany-
Holly Springs- (Memphis, Tenn.). [u.s. 78] 434
10 (Florence, Ala.)-Iuka-Corinth-Walnut-
Slayden- (Memphis, Tenn.). [u.s. 72} 441
1 1 Waynesboro-Laurel-Brookhaven-
Washington-(Ferraday, La.), [u.s. 84] 447
12 (Bolivar, Tenn.)-Pontotoc-Bay Springs-Laurel-
Lucedale-( Mobile, Ala.). [STATE 15] 456
12A Springville-Calhoun City-Ackerman. [STATE 9] 471
13 Junction with STATE 63-Hattiesburg-Columbia-
McComb-Woodville. [STATE 24] 475
14 (Winfield, Ala.)-Amory-Tupelo-Oxford-
Clarksdale. [STATE 6] 484
1 5 Waynesboro-Leakesville-Lucedale-
Moss Point. [STATE 63] 490
1 6 Vaiden-Kosciusko-Carthage-Raleigh-
Junction with U.S. 84. [STATE 35] 493
17 (Pickwick, Tenn.)-Iuka-Fulton-Amory-
Junction with u.s. 45. [STATE 25] 500
CHRONOLOGY 509
BIBLIOGRAPHY 523
INDEX 531
Illustrations
MISSISSIPPI RIVER FROM NATCHEZ BLUFFS PAGE 4-5
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
GATHERING FOR A POLITICAL RALLY 9
Photograph by Eudora Welty
A COUNTRY CHURCH 12
Photograph by W . Lincoln Highton
SHANTYBOAT LIFE 16
Photograph by Eudora Welty
MAMMY GLASPER 23
Photograph by Willa Johnson
HOLT COLLIER 25
Photograph by Willa Johnson
MAGNOLIA GRANDIFLORA: THE STATE FLOWER 32
Photograph by E. E. Johnson
YUCCA PLANT, OR "SPANISH BAYONET" 41
Photograph by W. Lincoln Highton
PORTER S FLEET PASSING THE CONFEDERATE BATTERIES AT
VICKSBURG 72
Photograph from Brady Print Collection, Library of Congress
TOWBOAT ON THE MISSISSIPPI 80
Photograph by Colquitt Clark
IN THE 1830*5 86
Photograph from Illinois Central Railroad
IN THE 1930*5 87
Photograph from Gulf, Mobile, and Northern Railroad
COTTON BOLL 93
Photograph by Willa Johnson
EN ROUTE TO COTTON HOUSE 102
Photograph from Mississippi Agricultural Extension Service
LYCEUM BUILDING, "OLE Miss," UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI,
OXFORD 126
Photograph by J. R. Cofield
A "DOG-TROT" CABIN 143
Photograph by Gene Holcomb
MCGAHEY HOUSE, A BLACK PRAIRIE HOME, COLUMBUS 145
Photograph by E. E. Johnson
DUNLEITH, NATCHEZ 147
Photograph by Mary Ethel Dismukes
THE BRIARS, NATCHEZ 148
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
Xll ILLUSTRATIONS
MELROSE, NEAR NATCHEZ 150
Photograph by R. I. Bostwick
STAIRWAY AT COTTAGE GARDEN, NATCHEZ 154
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
OYSTER FLEET, BILOXI 167
Photograph by Anthony V. Ragusin
BENACHI AVENUE, BILOXI 171
Photograph by W. A. Russell
LIGHTHOUSE, BILOXI 174
Photograph by Gene Holcomb
A SOUTHERN PLANTER HOME, BILOXI 177
Photograph from Pictorial Archives of Early American Architecture
Library of Congress
CLOCK TOWER, MISSISSIPPI STATE COLLEGE FOR WOMEN,
COLUMBUS 183
Photograph by O. N. Pruitt
WOODWARD HOUSE, COLUMBUS 188
Photograph by O. N. Pruitt
LOADING BALES OF COTTON, GULFPORT 195
Photograph by Ed Lips comb
MUNICIPAL GARDEN AND Civic CENTER, JACKSON 210
Photograph by H. R. Hiatt
NEW CAPITOL, JACKSON 212
Photograph by H. R. Hiatt
OLD CAPITOL, JACKSON 215
Photograph by H. R. Hiatt
MANSHIP HOME, JACKSON 219
Photograph by Gene Holcomb
GOVERNOR S MANSION, JACKSON 221
Photograph by H. R. Hiatt
PULPWOOD READY FOR PROCESSING, LAUREL 224
Photograph by W. Lincoln Highton
ART MUSEUM AND LIBRARY, LAUREL 226
Photograph by W. Lincoln Highton
TEXTILE MILL, MERIDIAN 229
Photograph by James A. Butters
CONTI HOUSE, NATCHEZ 242
Photograph by Mary Ethel Dismukes
CONNELLY S TAVERN, NATCHEZ 245
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
ARLINGTON, NATCHEZ 251
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
ILLUSTRATIONS Xlll
HOME OF WILLIAM FAULKNER, OXFORD 257
Photograph by Willa Johnson
MISSISSIPPI MONUMENT, VICKSBURG NATIONAL MILITARY PARK 270
Photograph from National Park Service
WARREN COUNTY COURTHOUSE, VICKSBURG 274
Photograph by James A. Butters
McNuTT HOME, VICKSBURG 278
Photograph by James A. Butters
BOAT BUILDING, PASCAGOULA 288
Photograph by Anthony V. Ragusin
OLD SPANISH FORT, PASCAGOULA 289
Photograph from Mississippi Advertising Commission
BEAUVOIR, HOME OF JEFFERSON DAVIS, NEAR BILOXI 293
Photograph by W . Lincoln Highton
PIRATE S HOUSE, WAVELAND 301
Photograph from Pictorial Archives of Early American Architecture
Library of Congress
HIGHWAY THROUGH LOESS BLUFFS TO VICKSBURG 314
Photograph by W. A. Russell
RUINS OF WINDSOR, NEAR PORT GIBSON 329
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
THE BURR OAKS, JEFFERSON COLLEGE CAMPUS, WASHINGTON 334
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
D EVEREUX, NEAR NATCHEZ 337
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
LINDEN, NEAR NATCHEZ 339
Photograph by Earl M. Norman
TAKING COTTON TO THE GIN 347
Photograph from Rose Seed Company, Clarksdale
MOONLIGHT ON LAKE WASHINGTON, ELKLAND 355
Photograph by Willa Johnson
TAKING THE QUEEN BEE 376
Photograph by Ed Lips comb
THE COUNTY AGENT VISITS 387
Photograph from U. S. Department of Agriculture
TOMBIGBEE RIVER BRIDGE, COLUMBUS 398
Photograph by O. N. Pruitt
TWIN TOWERS, MISSISSIPPI STATE COLLEGE, STARKVILLE 399
Photograph by J. M. Pruitt
MALMAISON, NORTH CARROLLTON 404
Photograph from National Park Service
XIV ILLUSTRATIONS
CULTIVATING A FIELD OF YOUNG COTTON 411
Photograph from Case Tractor Company
LONGLEAF PINES 415
Photograph by W. Lincoln Highton
SECOND-GROWTH PINES 424
Photograph by W. Lincoln Highton
GATHERING PECANS 430
Photograph by Gene Holcomb
A CABIN IN THE COTTON 445
Photograph by W. Lincoln Highton
A ONE-MULE-POWER CANE PRESS 449
Photograph by Eudora Welty
COVERED GRAVES IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD 451
Photograph by W. Lincoln Highton
A HARDWOOD SAWMILL 457
Photograph by W. Lincoln Highton
CHOCTAW HANDICRAFT, INDIAN AGENCY, PHILADELPHIA 465
Photograph by Willa Johnson
"MISSISSIPPI CHOCTAW" 466
Photograph by A. C. Hector
A YOUNG CHOCTAW 467
Photograph by A. C. Hector
BUILDING A TERRACE TO CONTROL EROSION 489
Photograph from U. S. Department of Agriculture
LONGLEAF PINE TAPPED FOR TURPENTINE 491
Photograph by W . Lincoln Highton
THE CARDER 501
Photograph by Mary Ethel Dismukes
BOY, BROOM, AND BUTTERBEANS 504
Photograph by W . Lincoln Highton
Maps
MISSISSIPPI (Large Map of State) Back Pocket
KEY TO MISSISSIPPI TOURS Front End Page
GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS, MINERAL DEPOSITS, AND
TIMBER RESOURCES Page 36
RECREATION AREAS 44
THE INDIANS IN MISSISSIPPI 48
TERRITORIAL ACQUISITIONS: 1801-1832 62
MISSISSIPPI IN 1817 68
COUNTIES OF MISSISSIPPI 78
TRANSPORTATION 83
AGRICULTURAL RESOURCES 97
BILOXI Reverse Side, State Map
COLUMBUS Page 180-1
HOLLY SPRINGS 202
JACKSON Reverse Side, State Map
NATCHEZ Page 234-5
VICKSBURG 268
THE VICKSBURG CAMPAIGN 273
VICKSBURG NATIONAL MILITARY PARK 276
Notations on the Use of the Book
General Information contains practical information on the State as a
whole. Specific information is given at the beginning of each city and tour
description.
The Essay Section is designed to give a reasonably comprehensive sur
vey of the State in its various aspects. Limitations of space forbid detailed
treatments, but many persons, places, and events mentioned in the essays
are discussed at some length in the city and tour descriptions. A classified
bibliography is included in the book.
Cities and Towns. Twelve cities are given separate treatment in the sec
tion Main Street and Courthouse Square. Each of these cities represents
some phase of the cultural, economic, historical, or political life of the
State, or some one of its geographic divisions. At the end of each descrip
tion is a list of the important nearby points of interest with cross-references
to the tours on which these places are described.
Maps are provided for six of the cities. Points of interest are numbered
in the descriptions to correspond with numbers on the maps. Conditions
of admission vary from time to time ; those given in this book are for Feb
ruary 1938. "(Open)" means "open at all reasonable hours, free of
charge."
Tours. Each tour is a description of towns and points of interest along
a highway bearing a single Federal or State number. Cross-references are
given for descriptions of cities in Main Street and Courthouse Square. For
convenience in identifying inter-State routes, the names of the nearest out-
of-State cities of importance are placed within parentheses in the tour
headings.
Included in the main route description are the descriptions of minor
routes branching from the main route; these are printed in smaller type.
All main route descriptions are written North to South and East to
West but can be followed quite as easily in the reverse directions. The
names of railroads paralleling highways are noted in the tour headings;
thus railroad travelers can use the route descriptions quite as easily as can
motorists.
Mileages are cumulative, beginning at the northernmost or easternmost
points on the main highways. Where long routes have been divided into
xviii NOTATIONS ON THE USE OF THE BOOK
sections, mileages have been started afresh at the beginning of each sec
tion. Mileages on side routes are counted from the junctions with the
main routes. All mileages are necessarily relative; minor reroutings of
roads and individual driving habits such as manner of rounding curves
and of passing other cars will produce variations between the listed mile
ages and those shown on speedometers.
Mississippi is engaged (1938) in an extensive program of highway de
velopment, which involves some highway rerouting in order to eliminate
curves and to take advantage of better subsoil for roadbeds. For this rea
son some of the tour routings and mileages of February 1938 will be inac
curate within a year; if difficulty is experienced in finding points of
interest, travelers should make inquiries locally.
Those who have already selected the routes they wish to follow should
consult the tour key-map and the tour table of contents to find the descrip
tions they want; those who want to find the descriptions of, or routes
leading to, specific towns and points of interest should consult the index.
General Information
Railroads: Illinois Central System (Illinois Central, Gulf & Ship Island,
Yazoo & Mississippi Valley) ; Southern Railway System (New Orleans &
Northeastern, Southern, Alabama & Great Southern); Mobile & Ohio;
Gulf, Mobile & Northern; St. Louis-San Francisco (Frisco) ; Mississippi
Central; Columbus & Greenville. Lines of the 1C System run N. and S.,
E. and W. The GM&N and the M&O run N. and S. The Southern System
runs diagonally across the State from Alabama to Louisiana. Other lines
form connections with the trunk lines.
Highways: Network of paved roads and many roads in process of paving.
No border inspection.
Bus Lines: Tri-State Transit; Teche-Greyhound and affiliated lines; Mag
nolia ; Dixie Coaches ; Oliver Coach Lines ; Delta Transportation Co. ;
Varnado; White Eagle; Bracy; Dunlap; Dixie Greyhound; Gulf Trans
port Co.
Waterways: Inland Waterways Corporation; Mississippi Valley Barge
Lines; New Orleans & Vicksburg Packet Co.; Valley Line. Steam ferry
service at Dundee, Friar Point, Greenville, Vicksburg, and Natchez. Port
of Gulfport on the Gulf of Mexico.
Airlines: Chicago & Southern (New Orleans to Chicago) stops at Jackson.
Delta Line (Charleston to Dallas) stops at Jackson and Meridian.
Traffic Regulations: No parking on bridges or roadways; speed limit on
highways 50 m.p.h., 10 m.p.h. when passing schools and churches, in
cities 20-30 m.p.h. No racing or shooting on highways, no sirens, cutouts
must be muffled within certain limits. School busses not to be passed when
halted.
Accommodations: In cities most hostelries built or renovated since 1928,
ample facilities. Jackson crowded during conventions and State Fair Week
in October, Natchez during spring Pilgrimage, and Gulf Coast during
winter and summer seasons. In the rural sections tourist camps, new for
the most part since new concrete highways have been constructed, are at
strategic points near towns. Camping facilities in national forests and
State parks.
XX GENERAL INFORMATION
Climate and Equipment: In summer, which comes early and lingers late,
light clothing is necessary, though nights in Delta and Coastal Plain will
be cool in early summer and latter part of August. Topcoat usually suffi
cient in winter, with coatless Christmas not uncommon. For the hiker,
hunter, swimmer, or picknicker, equipment may be obtained near most
recreational centers.
Fish and Game Laws: Game fish, bass, trout, crappie, pike, and sunfish
may be taken at any season. Limit of 25 of any species per day; bass not
under 10 in. ; sunfish not under 5 in. Illegal to sell game fish or to take by
explosives, chemicals, or to handgrab. Non-resident annual license, $5.25;
lo-day license, $1.50; 3-day license, $1.25; obtained at sheriff s office or
from State game wardens.
Hunting Regulations: Open season for squirrels, Oct. i to Dec. 31; opos
sum, Oct. i to Jan. 31; rabbits (gun) Nov. 20 to Jan. 31, without gun,
all year; fox, open year round, may be taken with hounds only. Deer,
closed in most counties, limited in others (obtain bulletin from State com
mission) ; bear, closed; quail, Dec. 10 to Feb. 22; turkey, April i to
April 20, closed in northern Supreme Court district; ducks, geese, and
brant, Nov. 27 to Dec. 26; rails (except coot), Sept. i to Nov. 30; wood
cock, Dec. i to Dec. 31 ; coot and snipe, Nov. 27 to Dec. 26; doves, Sept.
15 to Oct. i and Nov. 20 to Jan. 15. No open season on wood-duck, buf-
flehead duck, ruddy duck, snow geese, and swan. Licenses: Non-resident
$25.25 (State), $10.25 (county). Federal "duck stamp" for taking migra
tory waterfowl, $i. License issued by county wardens and sheriffs. Duck
stamps at post office. Limits: Bag limit: Quail, 12; ducks, 10 in aggregate
of all kinds; geese and brant, 5 in aggregate; rails, 15 in aggregate;
woodcock, 4; coot, 25; snipe, 15; doves, 15; squirrels, 8; rabbits, 10.
One deer (buck) and one turkey (gobbler) per season. General Laws:
Unlawful to procure license under assumed name, false address, or to
lend, transfer, or borrow and use license. Tags and badges must be dis
played conspicuously on clothing.
Recreational Areas: Leaf River Forest, off US 49 near Brooklyn; Biloxi
Forest, SE. of Saucier on US 49 ; Chickasawhay Forest, local road between
Richton and Waynesboro ; Homochitto Forest, off US 84 on Forest Service
road near Meadville; Bienville Forest, 18 m. SW. of the town of Forest,
State 35; Holly Springs Forest; Delta Purchase Unit, between Rolling
Fork and Yazoo City.
State Parks: LeRoy Percy State Park, 4 m. W. of Hollandale, US 61 ;
Tombigbee Park, jy 2 m. E. of Tupelo, US 78 ; Clarkco Park, near Quit-
GENERAL INFORMATION xxi
man in Clarke County ; Legion State Park, l/ 2 m. E. of Louisville, State 1 5 ;
Tishomingo Park, 3 m. SE. of Tishomingo, 2 m. off State 25 on local
road; Holmes County Park, 3 m. S. of Durant, US 51 ; Spring Lake Park,
7 m. S. of Holly Springs, State 7 ; Roosevelt Park, 3 m. SW. of Morton,
US 80; Percy Quin Park, near McComb. State parks cover a total of
8,565 acres.
Precautions for Tourist: Avoid unmarked springs. Mosquitoes in Coastal
Meadow and in Delta regions, except in municipalities; campers should
take netting. Poisonous Plants, Reptiles, Dangerous Animals, Insects: Rat
tlesnakes, moccasins, coral snakes. Poisonous plants include the ivies and
other vines. Berries should not be eaten unless true identity is known.
Mosquitoes, black widow spiders generally distributed. Few bear, wildcats,
bobcats in dense canebrakes in south and west Mississippi. Alligators in
few Delta lakes and in swamplands of south Mississippi.
General Tourist Service: Traffic regulations bulletin from State highway
department information service; general laws from Secretary of State, in
formation service; fish and game laws from game and fish commission;
chambers of commerce and hotels furnish general information ; Mississippi
Advertising Commission, Jackson.
<<<<<< ^ <<<<
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Calendar of Events
("nfd" means no fixed date)
Jan. nfd
nfd
Gulf Coast Opening of winter tourist season
Statewide Field trials
Feb. 2nd wk. prior Lent Biloxi Mardi Gras
nfd Biloxi Golf Tournaments
nfd Gulfport Annual Fox Hunters Meet
nfd Holly Springs U. S. Field Trials
March nfd
nfd
nfd
nfd
nfd
nfd
nfd
April ist wk.
nfd
nfd
26
Biloxi Golf tournaments
Jackson Southern intercollegiate basket
ball tournaments
Brooklyn S. Miss. Gun & Dog Club field
trials
Gulf Coast Azalea Trail and Spring Festival
Vicksburg Historical Tours
Holly Springs Garden Pilgrimage
Natchez Pilgrimage to old estates
Natchez
Laurel
Pearl River
Co.
Statewide
May 8 Statewide
ist Sat. & Sun. Eggville
2nd & 3rd Suns. Dennis
June ist wk. Hattiesburg
2nd wk. Jackson
nfd Gulf Coast
nfd Allison s
Wells
nfd Wiggins
nfd Gulfport
July 10 days preceding
the 4th Biloxi
4 Biloxi
nfd Gulfport
Pilgrimage to old estates
Garden Club Festival
Tung tree trail tours
Memorial Services (Confederate)
Emancipation Day (Negro)
Sacred Harp Singing
Foot Washing Services
S. Miss. Singing Convention
Miss. Championship Tennis
tourney
Opening of summer tourist
season
Bridge Tournament
Pickle Festival
Southern Marble Tournament
Summer Sports Carnival
Regatta
Gulfport Yacht Club Regatta
XXIV
Aug.
nfd
nfd
nfd
nfd
nfd
CALENDAR OF EVENTS
Gulfport Mackerel Rodeo
Lake Patrons Union
Philadelphia Neshoba County Fair
Pass Christian Tarpon Rodeo
Mound Bayou Founders Day
Sun. preceding the
1 5th
Last Sun.
nfd
nfd
Sept. nfd
nfd
Oct.
2nd wk.
Jackson
nfd
Tupelo
nfd
Jackson
ist wk.
Meridian
14-15
Meridian
nfd
Rosedale
Nov. nfd
Dec. wk. preceding
Christmas
Biloxi Blessing of Shrimp Fleet
Gulfside Negro Song Fest
Jackson Water Pageant
Water Valley Watermelon Festival
Clarksdale Delta Staple Cotton Festival
Utica Insti
tute Negro Farmers Conference
Miss. State Fair
Northeast Miss.-Ala. Fair
Horse Show
Miss. Fair and Dairy Show
Pilgrimage to Sam Dale s Grave
Rose Show
Statewide Fall flower shows
Hattiesburg Handel s "Messiah" (oratorio)
There are numerous local events that will be found under individual city treat
ments.
PART
Mississippi Past and Present
JL JL
What Is Mississippi?
WERE a person to ask, "What is Mississippi?" he undoubtedly
would be told, "It is a farming State where nearly everyone
who may vote votes the Democratic ticket," or "It is a place where half
the population is Negro and the remainder is Anglo-Saxon," or, more
vaguely, "That is where everybody grows cotton on land which only a
few of them own." And these answers, in themselves, would be correct,
though their connotations would be wrong. For while the white people
of Mississippi are mostly Democrats, Anglo-Saxons, and farmers, they
are not one big family of Democratic and Anglo-Saxon farmers. Rather,
Mississippi is a large community of people whose culture is made different
by the very land that affords them a common bond. The people of the
Black Prairie Belt, for instance, are as different culturally from the people
of the Piney Woods as are the Deltans from the people of the Tennessee
River Hills. Yet for the most part they all farm for a living, vote the
Democratic ticket, and trace their ancestry back to the British Isles.
For this reason, to see Mississippi as it really is, one must understand
it as composed of eight distinct geographical units, each with its own
sectional background, and each but a part of the whole. To do this gives a
perspective which resolves the seeming paradox presented by the writings
of Mississippi s two best known interpreters, Stark Young and William
Faulkner. Each author simply pictures the section that has conditioned him,
and nothing more.
The most clearly defined of the eight sections are the Delta and the
Coast. David Cohn has said that the Delta "begins in the lobby of the
Peabody Hotel at Memphis and ends on Catfish Row in Vicksburg," and
this is possibly more exact than to say that it is a leaf-shaped plain
lying in the northwestern part of the State, with its greatest length 200
miles and its greatest width 85 miles. For the native Mississippian
long has accepted as fact that the Delta is more than a distinct geograph
ical unit it is also a way of life. The word "Delta" connotes for him
persons charmingly lacking in provincialism, rather than wide flat fields
<i\
flp
-
MISSISSIPPI RIVER
steaming with fertility and squat plantation towns that are all alike.
Settled on land as unstable as it is productive, and eternally concerned
with two variables and one constant, the planter here has evolved an
active yet irresponsible way of life. The variable factors are high water
and the price of cotton; the constant is the Negro. In character with all
people who are possessed of broad acres and easy labor, the Delta is
politically conservative and economically diverse.
Antithetic to the Delta s hectic activity and periodic tension is the lazy
halcyon atmosphere of the Coast. Here, where the soil is too sandy to
lend itself to intensive agriculture, worry and tautness are vanquished
-:
;
U
FROM NATCHEZ BLUFFS
by a conspiracy of summer breezes, winter greenery, blue waters, and for
eign gayety. Since the War between the States, the ingenious natives
have lent their talents to the conspiracy, and today the Coast is recognized
first and last as a pleasure resort.
Between the Delta and the Coast are three other sections. The loamy
brown hills that stretch southward from Vicksburg through Natchez to
Woodville are, next to the Coast, the oldest settled portion of the State.
Here, in the "Natchez District," rich bluffs and bottomlands once pro
duced crops of virgin luxuriance; and these crops, product of slave and
earth, once enabled men and women to build a civilization that could not
6 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
be disregarded. It is this former plantation civilization, with its ease
and plenty, its white-columned mansions, formal manners, and gracious
kindly people, that Stark Young has depicted. And it is here that the
somewhat faded tapestry of landed culture, classic manors, bric-a-brac,
and leisured ladies and gentlemen remains to charm and fascinate, like
pages in a storybook.
Not so sharply denned topographically, but easily distinguishable as
an economic unit, is the trucking, fruit growing, and nut growing area
lying east of the bluffs, where the tomato and cabbage industries at
Crystal Springs and Hazelhurst are tangible proofs of this section s
use of soil too thin for cotton. This section is each year" the scene of a
dramatic battle with the elements, a race for the profits to be gained
from reaching eastern markets ahead of the Texas truck farmers. In years
when the prize is won, this trucking section is the wealthiest in the State.
Yet, in contrast to most Mississippians, the people here have excellent
memories ; they remember the years when the prize was lost, and are care
ful in their economy.
Again not so sharply defined geographically, and gradually becoming
less defined economically, are the Piney Woods, lying east of the truck
ing section and north of the Coast. This is a rather haphazard and ir
regular triangle, whose scenery of stumps, "ghost" lumber towns, and
hastily reforested areas tells its saga. Strong men and women have been
reared here, but the earth has been neither fecund enough to facilitate
their getting away from it nor sterile enough to drive them away. Until
lumbering built a few fair-sized towns out of the wilderness, it was a
pioneer country; and now that the forests have been ravished, and the
cheaply built mill houses are rotting, as the unused mill machinery rusts
about them, it is pioneer country once more. Like all pioneers, the Piney
Woods people are economically poor, politically unpredictable, and in a
constant state of economic transition. Evidences of recent change are the
new textile mills at Hattiesburg, Laurel, and Picayune, the new tung tree
orchards to the south, and the De Soto National Forest in the center of
the area.
The five sections so far described compose the southern and western
portions of the State. In the extreme northeastern corner, between the
Tombigbee and Tennessee Rivers, is the wedge-shaped group of uplands
known locally as the Tennessee Hills. Here, living in as "old English"
a style as their upland cousins of the Georgia and Carolina Piedmont,
is a group of hill-born and hill-bred farmers who are fiercely independ
ent, and who insistently retain the early Anglo-Saxon and Scotch-Irish
WHAT IS MISSISSIPPI? 7
characteristics that their great-grandparents brought to the section.
Housed in compact "dog-trot" homes perched on steep hillsides, these
people, like those of the Piney Woods, have always been the yeomen
the non-slave owners of the State, possessed of an inherited distrust of
the planter and of the aristocratic system that great plantations breed.
This attitude is important because these hillfolk, when joined with those
of the Piney Woods, determine the political fortunes of the State.
Just west of the Tennessee Hills is the Black Prairie, a comparatively
treeless and rolling plateau that was once a small replica of the Natchez
District and is now spotted with silos and cheese factories, cotton mills,
dairy barns, and condenseries. The Prairie has never had to bother with
the Piney Woods problem of clearing timber and stumps from the fields :
neither has it had to contend with the hill country s nemesis of erosion
nor the Delta s problem of drainage. Because of these natural advantages,
it not only won cultural distinction before the War between the States,
but since the war it has kept approximately a generation ahead of the
rest of the State. The Prairie farmer, like all good farmers, loves his land,
but he is not afraid of the machine. Meat packing plants, garment fac
tories, dairy products enterprises, and the Tennessee Valley Authority
came first to the Prairie.
West of the Prairie and east of the Delta is the low-hill, small-farming
section known as the Central Hills, the largest section of the State. This
broken series of clay hills evidences more clearly than any other region the
misfortunes that descended on Mississippi after the War between the States.
When the war completely upset the economy upon which ante-bellum
prosperity had been based, it not only destroyed surplus capital but also
fixed on the State the share-cropping and credit system the enemy of
diversification and the chain that binds the tenant to the merchant-banker
and to poverty. The merchant-banker has continuously demanded that
cotton, and cotton alone, be grown to repay his financial advances. Yet, re
peated sowing of this basic crop on clay hillsides caused sheet erosion.
Great red gullies have consumed the fertility of the land, until today
an occasional ante-bellum mansion teetering crazily on the edge of a
5o-foot precipice offers mute evidence of the decay Faulkner has seen fit to
depict in his novels. Lacking the virility of new blood and the impetus of
new industry, portions of the Central Hills have degenerated. Cotton here
no longer has the kingly power to pull white-columned mansions out of
the earth, for the earth has too often felt the plow.
These eight family-like sections grouped together form the great neigh
borhood called Mississippi, a neighborhood where the birthright of know-
8 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
ing the drive of the plow in a puissant earth binds the sections more closely
than geographical boundaries, a neighborhood of earth-rooted individuals
who know and understand one another, and who collectively face an in
dustrial revolution with hoes grasped tightly in their clay-stained hands.
White Folkways
A farmer people with a mental background of furrowed hot fields and
a hope for rain, we Mississippi white folk are both dependent on and
modified by the sporadic blessings of forces that we cannot control. Like
the well water we drink, we are bosomed by the earth that conditions us.
We think as our land thinks, and those who understand our simple psy
chology and accept our way as being complete rather than clever find us
tolerant but not susceptible, easy to amuse but hard to convince. Our faith
is in God, next year s crop, and the Democratic Party.
This leads, not to gaunt hookworm-infested character, but to independ
ence and paradox. Dependent on the land, we have a basic quality of mind
that is as obstinate as the mules we plow, yet our notions take tall erratic
flights and are as unpredictable as the ways of a spring-born calf. Born
with an inherent regard for the Constitution, we prefer our own interpre
tations to those of others. Fervent prohibitionists, our preference is for
"ho -made corn." We read the cotton quotations as a daily ritual, but the
small cryptic figures we read have little to do with when we sell. That,
like the choice of candidate for our vote, depends on the notions we take.
One year in five is for us a "good year," but our business is done and our
households are run on the simple acceptance that next year will be "good."
This adjective is not a judgment by moral scales, but by cotton scales, and
it does not imply we merely have raised a lot of cotton, but that while
doing so, Texas cotton either has been rained-under or burnt-out, thus
making prices high. If we should swap a good library for a second-rate
stump speech and not ask for boot, it would be thoroughly in tune with
our hearts. For deep within each of us lies politics. It is our football, base
ball, and tennis rolled into one. We enjoy it; we will hitch up and drive
GATHERING FOR A POLITICAL RALLY
for miles in order to hear and applaud the vitriolic phrases of a candidate
we have already reckoned we ll vote against. Popular belief to the con
trary, our greatest fear is not the boll weevil but Republican tariffs. Our
greatest worry is the weather. To paraphrase as the weather goes, so goes
Mississippi s year.
For us calendars are bits of advertisements that the storekeeper mails
out about the time taxes are due. They are usually of oblong dimensions,
with brightly colored Biblical pictures at the top and small neat pads of
black numerals at the bottom. They are pretty and tasteful and fit to tack
up in our bedrooms; but, beyond that and the fact that our very hopeful
imaginations may see in the receipt of one an indication of extended
credit, they have little to do with our year. For, eating hog jowls and
black-eyed peas on New Year s Day notwithstanding, our year neither
begins with the first day of January nor ends with the last night of De
cember. Our year begins with planting-time and ends with the gathering-
in. Between these two extremes comes the hoeing-and-chopping season and
a spell of laying-by. In all, this covers a period of about seven months
from March, when the snowy white blooms of the cottonwood tree tell us
10 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
not only to put our cottonseed in the ground, but, more happily, to resume
our charging at the store, until sometime in September, when we pick, gin,
and bale the soft white bolls we have raised, and are told in a way less
subtle than by the receipt of a calendar to stop our charging at the store.
Yet it is enough. It is a "year," and for us complete. Come the tenth of
the month following, and we will have weighed it, tagged it, and laid it
quietly aside as having been simply "good" or "bad."
The remaining months, those falling in autumn and winter, have for us
a peculiar nature. Like "Dog Days" and "Indian Summer," they are in
tangible spells, the lapse between an ending and beginning. We think of
them as a stretch of daylights and darks, marred perhaps by the hibernat
ing habit of -our credit, but otherwise nice. We ingeniously while them
away by selling our cotton, paying a small amount on our charge account,
a smaller one on our mortgage; by attending barbecues, neighborhood
parties, protracted meetings, and county fairs. If we are young but of
likely age, we ignore the charge account and forget the mortgage in order
to build a house and get married.
Should our convictions prove false, however, and the year isn t one
which warrants the epitaph "good," then these months aren t even a nice
run of daylights and darks. They are a complete lapse of time. We hunt
and fish and, sometimes, chop the wood while our wives milk the cows
and gather eggs. But mostly, we just piddle about, studying the wind and
sky and earth watching for signs that bewilder our agricultural colleges
but prove the grace which nourishes our faith in next year s crop.
These signs are physical but not scientific. They have to do with the
soil and the elements, and they tell us not only when to plant, but also
how our planting will probably turn out. Most of them are superstitions,
but they work.
The first and basic sign is the "twelve-day idea." This, in reality, is a
series of signs, a sort of preview of the coming year, and is based on the
idea that each of the first 12 days of January represents and holds the
chief characteristic of the correspondingly numbered month. Carried to its
logical conclusion, it becomes rather complicated, something one should
grow up with to understand fully. For instance: If the second day of Janu
ary is cloudless but cold, we note the fact, and, turning to the second
month, February, we mark it "Dry and Cold." Then, by some strange,
hybrid faculty born of experience and deduction, we know a late spring
will follow so we curb our spirits and refuse early planting. In like man
ner, if the fifth day of January is rainy, we expect a rainy May, and visions
of more grass than corn in June sets us to sharpening our hoes. Other and
WHITE FOLKWAYS II
more simple signs of what we are about to receive are: Moonlight during
Christmas means light crops; darkness, heavy crops. If the wind is from
the south on the 22nd day of March, the year will be dry. Each day it
thunders in February should be carefully marked on the calendar so that
the garden may be covered up on the corresponding days in April, for it
will surely frost those days. If there are three frosts, rain will follow. But,
happily, winter is over when the fig tree leafs; we may get ourselves ready
to plant.
Early vegetables cabbage plants, greens, spinach, and onion sets go
into the ground during the freak spell called "January Thaw." This is a
short stretch of mild, warm days when ant larvae move up near the soil s
surface to tell us the earth is good and just moist enough. For the next
planting Saint Valentine s Day is preferred, but, since it is potatoes, a root
vegetable, we are to plant, we who are wise will wait until the moon is
right leaf vegetables do better when planted in the light of the moon,
root vegetables when planted in the dark phase. Good Friday is a holy day
and will bring good fortune to beans and early vegetables if they are
planted before the night sets in. For the planting of our staple crop there
is but one sign we can trust, "Plant cotton when the cottonwood blooms."
Such signs, plus the nationally known Ground-hog Day, pertain to the
seasons, to planting, and to the months in general. They tell us, for in
stance, that May will be a rainy month, but not the days it will rain. Yet,
once the newly planted seeds have transformed themselves into young and
tender shoots, it is imperative that we know the specific days. We cannot
stop the rain, prevent the frost, or end the too-dry spell, but, once fore
warned of their immediate approach, we can prepare to a degree our fields,
our gardens, our piles of fertilizer, our stacks of hay, and thus be able to
drop the self-explanatory phrase "bad year" into our creditor s lap with
out a quirk of conscience. So we need and have a few very specific signs
quick, flashing bits of handwriting on the earth and in the sky:
If the sun sets behind a bank of clouds on Sunday, it will rain before
Wednesday; if it sets in the same obscurity on Wednesday, rain will fall
before Sunday. In either case, one does well to have his fertilizer stacked
before quitting for the night. A red sunset, like a rainbow in the morning,
brings wind rather than rain, while a rainbow in the late afternoon or a
streaked sunset brings fair and dry weather respectively. When smoke
hangs flat and the swallows fly low, it is about to cloud up; so just before
rainfall we stop off our plowing and leave the field. This is not to escape
getting wet, but to lessen the danger of being struck by the lightning that
will be drawn by the eyes of our horse or mule. If smoke and birds fly high,
A COUNTRY CHURCH
however, or if the lightning shifts to the south, we may go ahead with our
plowing; fair weather is in the offing. A halo around the sun brings an
immediate change of weather, and one should remember that a morning
shower, like an old person s dance, never lasts long. Three months after
the first strident laugh of the katydid, frost will fall, and we may call our
hogs in to fatten. Winter isn t yet at hand a long spell of lazy warm
weather called Indian Summer will follow the frost but a cold snap is in
WHITE FOLKWAYS 13
the making, and that will bring hog-killing time. Curing hams, making
sausages, grinding hogshead cheese; eating backbone and spare-ribs and
chit lings!
Hogs we can raise ourselves, so hog meat, in one form or another, is
our staple dish. We eat it fresh in winter, cured in spring, and salted in
summer ; we use the fat as a base for cooking vegetables. These vegetables
are chiefly turnip greens, collards, cabbages, beans, and peas. In the fall
and winter the weekday meal is cooked on a large, black, wood-burning
kitchen stove and served hot twice a day. In farming time, when everyone
is either too hurried or too tired to have a conscious sense of taste, it is
cooked in the gray obscurity of early morning and placed in deep, wide
"warmers" attached to the stove. At dinner (noon) and supper it is served
and eaten cold.
On Sunday, however, or when company comes, the meal becomes a
feast. The housewife, forewarned of approaching company by the crow
ing of a rooster in the yard, makes lavish preparation she "puts the big
pot in the little pot and fries the skillet." In addition to baked ham and
fried ham, there is chicken with the meaty joints fried and the lean joints
made palatable by thick strips of juicy white dumplings, three or four
kinds of vegetables, biscuits, corn bread, several varieties of cake, and a
pie or two. These are all placed on the table at one time, with the meat
dishes at the end. The housewife "won t sit just yet," but the family and
company will. They sit down together, eagerly, expectantly awaiting the
saying of the blessing. While the dishes are passed from one person to
another, with each helping himself, the housewife hovers near, watching,
ready to replenish a platter by a hurried trip to the kitchen. If one should
be accidentally slighted, it is said that his nose has been bridged. The per
son taking the last biscuit is obligated to kiss the cook. If the hostess is the
sort to insist on one s eating heartily, she will make a good stepmother.
The house may be a two-room frame cabin, but most probably an in
crease in family size will have caused it to be expanded into a four- or five-
room construction with a porch across front and rear, a chimney on each
side, and the dog-trot enclosed. It sits facing the road from the edge of a
field that stretches and rolls until the lineated shade of a dark, warm forest
joins it abruptly to the sky. To the rear and to one side is the garden. If
the children are home, the front yard, creeping unsodded from beneath
the porch, is naked and clean. If the children are grown and have moved
to places of their own, verbena, old maids, phlox, and four-o clocks, crowd
each other for space. This is due more to a taste for cleanliness than for
beauty. Our housewives haven t the time to be always sweeping the yard,
14 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
so they just plant flowers and "let em have it." If the house is in the
Delta, and is not the house of a planter, it will not have a yard at all;
cotton will grow to within a few feet of porch and eaves.
The wife is the key to the house. Her domestic life gravitates between
the bedroom, the kitchen, the chicken-yard, and sometimes the field. She
bears the children with the aid of a midwife and nurses them herself. She
readies-up the house, cooks the family meals, and gathers the eggs. In ad
dition she knows and administers the folksy remedies that have been in
the family for generations.
Some of the remedies were taken originally from the Indian, some were
contributed by the Negro, but the majority of them have the earthy taste
of old England, Ireland, and Scotland. For instance:
A ball of camphor gum tied about the neck and resting on the chest will
cure neuralgia. To ease a sick head, drink a cup of hot catnip tea ; to check
nausea or constant vomiting, beat peach-tree leaves, cover with water, then
drink slowly. A piece of horse-radish well chewed is good for hoarseness ;
and a small bag of tea placed on the eye will cure a cold. To stop the flow
of blood, saturate the wound with turpentine and castor oil. When cows
feed on fresh grass in May, their butter is good for chapped hands. Since
rheumatism includes every misery from a crick in the neck to a strained
knee, a preventive is better than a cure ; so carry an Irish potato in a pocket
or a buckeye near the chest and never be troubled with it in any form.
The housewife is not too busy, however, to accompany the family to
town on Saturday, and there walk about, looking at the show windows and
greeting friends ; or to prepare a shoe box of food to be auctioned to the
highest bidder at the box supper given at the church to raise money for a
new piano ; or to run up to a neighbor s house, where a group of women
folks are "quilting a piece for Sara Adams," who is to be married just as
soon as crops are gathered and John has the time to tend to such a thing.
She does all of these things, then joins the family in its simple but in
tensely homey socials. And, come a Saturday, she will prepare and give a
"to-do" of her own one at the house and for all the family together.
The "to-do" will probably be a neighborhood party an ingathering of
families from down the road, from over the bottom, from just across the
field a piece. It is purely social, with no labor, no "pounding presents"
attached. Death and distance are the party s only limitations. At dark the
families, from Grandpa down, begin to arrive on trucks, in wagons, in
cars, horseback, and on foot. Two hours after dark, 50 or more men,
women, young folks, and children are mingling in and about the house.
Warm cordiality and equal acceptance set the tone. The old folks gravitate
WHITE FOLKWAYS 15
to the porch and to the yard, talking crops and politics, or snitching a wink
or two of sleep. The children play in the hallway, or if they are "poor-
mouthers," worry their mothers until sleep gets the best of them. Then
they are deposited on pallets strewn over the floor of a reserved back
room.
The young folks move restlessly in and out of the "front room," which
contains a piano or a foot-pumped organ, the storekeeper s calendar, and
the biggest feather bed and prettiest hand-tufted bedspread in the house.
Here we are direct and natural in our association, with none of the legen
dary timidity in our manner. We sit on the bed, on the cane-bottom chairs,
in the windows. One or two of the boys will have had a snort or two of
corn, and our antics increase with the stuffiness of the room. Courting cou
ples wander outside under the trees, up and down the road, or just sit
alone somewhere, content to be together and to listen to dismembered
phrases that escape from mingled conversation and drift independently
out to them: "I m not even about to do it ...,""... he plenty lit a
shuck . . . ," "out yonder, I d say . . . ," ". . . it s the pure D truth . . . ,"
"... I ain t studyin you ...," ... slow poke . . ." distinctly folksy
phrases that are never burdened with the letter "r."
Music is continual. A third of the persons present are natural musicians
and have brought their instruments: French harp, Jew s harp, fiddle, saxo
phone, guitar, accordion. Many of the girls have had piano at the consoli
dated school. They play popular pieces and well-loved hymns and folk
ballads which tell a legend and end with a moral "The Blue Eyed Boy"
"who has broken every vow"; "That Waxford Girl," who was "an expert
girl with dark and rolling eyes"; "Kinnie Wagner," who shot the sheriff,
kissed the prettiest girl in town, and left "to live a life of sin." Those who
do not play either sing or don t sing as the notion strikes them.
The water bucket, sitting on a back-porch shelf with its bright metal
dipper beside it, is popular and the boys take turns at the nearby well
bringing up bucketfuls fresh from the earth. Fried chicken, boiled ham,
banana cake, and "ho -made" pickles are waiting in the kitchen. Shortly
after midnight the guests begin to leave, going by families according to
the distance they have to travel and their mode of getting there. By three
o clock they are gone.
There was a time in the past when our social life was tied up with
work, such as house-raising, logrolling, and hog-killing. But today we
have more time and economy, and our socials move on larger planes. We
hold county fairs and attend barbecues, all-day singings, and religious
services. These are, in turn, manifestations of the soil, of politics, of re-
* -MP
SHANTYBOAT LIFE
ligion; and, being for us dramatically personal, each one is knit closely
with the other.
Many of our counties own commodious, centrally located, fenced-in
spaces called fair grounds where yearly exhibitions are held. These grounds
are lined with exhibition booths, livestock barns, a grandstand, a race
track with an athletic field in the center, and a roomy administration
building. The annual exhibition is, ostensibly, a competition for prizes in
turnips, pumpkins, heifers, cakes, hogs, and other rural pulchritude, but,
actually, it is our Victorian excuse for importing a street carnival. The
carnival, loudly ballyhooed with bright but startling pictures, offers a mid
way with rides as ingeniously contrived as they are various in form: free
vaudeville acts, side shows, fireworks, and other pulse-throbbing activities
that cause a momentary forgetfulness of furrowed hot fields. Other coun
ties extend the scope beyond their geographical boundaries and hold
straight-out carnivals, with the section s money-crop cotton, watermelons,
strawberries reigning as king. Yet the motive is always the same; a crop
has been made, and in one grand outburst our pent-up emotions splash
the countryside.
WHITE FOLKWAYS 17
Such self-expression sometimes takes unique form. In Neshoba County,
the custom of permitting anyone who has a predilection for hearing the
sound of his own voice to attend the fair and make a speech has metamor
phosed the fair into a political jamboree. Here our candidates for political
office toss their hats into the ring. From especially built platforms they
loudly point with pride and view with alarm. They are for the land, the
farmer, and lower taxes. Emphatically, they are against whoever is in office.
Crowded below them, we listen and heckle and cheer and drink soda pop.
The candidate tells us we are the "backbone of the State," and we know
that it is true, not because we are possessed of certain endowed virtues,
but because we are a majority and have the vote.
But politics is too dear to the hearts of all of us to be localized. Once a
campaign for election is launched, it becomes the recreation of all the
counties, towns, communities, clubs, and individuals within the State. It is
a summer pageant of speakings in a setting of open-air barbecues. A bar
becue with speaking will be announced to take place at a certain locality,
on a certain day; and though scarcely 20 families comprise the neighbor
hood, when the time arrives, hundreds, even thousands will be gathered
for the occasion. The speaking continues through the day, the principal or
"main speaker" alone talking four hours or more. Because we stand on
our land and will brook no foolishness concerning it, his speech will have
to do with personalities, not platforms ; and we will score him, not on his
intelligence, but on his ability to string invective adjectives without a
break. A candidate once called his opponent "a willful, obstinate, unsav
ory, obnoxious, pusillanimous, pestilential, pernicious, and perversable
liar" without pausing for breath, and even his enemies removed their hats.
As we listen to a speaker, we crowd about a narrow table of incredible
length and select a piece of brown, damp meat. The meat is juicy, with a
pungent, peppery odor, and eats well with a slice of thick white bread.
With these clutched, one in one hand and one in the other, we join a
group of friends to munch, talk, and listen. Nearby, more barbecue is
being prepared in ancient style. A trench, two, four, or six feet in length,
has been dug and a slow-burning oak or hickory fire started on its bottom.
Suspended over but held close to the smoldering flame on slender saplings
are carcasses of lamb and goat. About these stand a few women and an
old man, the women to look and give advice, the man to baste with rich
red seasoning by means of swabs attached to long, lean sticks. The odor
from the peppery, hot sauce, and the woody smoke from charred coals per
meate the grounds and whet our appetites. Leaving our friends and mo
mentarily forgetting the speaker, we ease back to the table for more.
l8 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
These barbecues with speakings make the line between our social activi
ties and our politics a thin one, but even it is more discernible than the
one separating our social from our religious activities. For, with us, these
last two blend at the edges, with one passing smoothly, almost unnotice-
ably, into the other. It is transition through a common denominator, and
the common denominator is song.
Through the long Central Hills, in the black northeast Prairie, in the
Piney Woods, the Tennessee Hills, and, lately, in the newly developed
"white spots" of the Delta, we sing not as individuals but as communi
ties, counties, and districts. And we do not sing a mere song or two; we
bring our lunch and pallets for our babies and sing all day.
The feat is not a simple one. The Sacred Harp s 500 pages contain no
newfangled song with a harmony that can be faked. It holds to the ancient
"shape-notes," the "fa, sol, la" songs brought down from Elizabethan
England and written in four parts, on separate staffs, with each part carry
ing to a degree a melodic pattern of its own. This is complex ; it calls for
technique and a training for tone. As any "leader" worth his salt will de
clare, a tone-ignorant person can ruin a singing any day.
To avoid such a calamity, each county has its "school." The school is a
"leader," or singing master who goes from community to community, like
an old-time Methodist circuit-rider, teaching the youngsters to "pitch," to
know "tone lengths" and "tone shapes" the circle, triangle, square, etc.
During the process, he also teaches the songs adapted to each "occasion":
"Invitation," ("Ye Who Are Weary"); "Glorification," ("Glory for
Me!" or "We Praise Thee O God!"); and "Funerals," ("Just Beyond
the River").
When a novice has learned such fundamentals, he is eligible for mem
bership in the County Singing Convention and permitted to join in the
"singings" with all the vibrant volume his lungs can muster. Perhaps he
later will prove worthy of becoming a "leader" himself or, less important,
a duly elected officer of the District (sectional) Singing Association, of
which his county convention is a member. One never can be certain about
a singer not beyond the fact that he will be at the singing, singing lustily
and religiously, like the rest of us.
The singing is at the "church-house," a small, white "shotgun" structure
placed just off the road in the sun-speckled shade of a grove. It is sched
uled to begin at nine sharp in the morning, but time is a negligible quantity
to people who put seeds into the ground and wait for them to grow; at
ten o clock we are still arriving, in cars, in school busses, in wagons, and
a few in "Hoover carts" an ingeniously contrived two-wheel, automobile-
WHITE FOLKWAYS 19
tired lolly brought into prominence by the depression. We have on our
Sunday clothes, with here and there an unobtrusive patch, but only the
district s politician will wear a coat.
Inside the church, the leader faces us from the pulpit. He is a lean,
Cassius-like fellow with the voice of an angel. With ancient ritual he di
rects us through eighteenth century singing-school procedure; he speaks
of "lesson" and "class," not of song and choir.
"The lesson," he announces, "will commence on Number six-three."
We watch him peer closely at his book, and listen breathlessly as he
softly sets the pitch. Then his hand sweeps to right, to center, to left, and
we proclaim the tune he has pitched. We go through the tune together
soprano, alto, tenor, and bass singing the syllables, "fa, sol, la ... ," call
ing to life notes that told the stern but virginal Elizabeth how the tune
should go. With the tune pitched at last, the leader adjusts his glasses and
looks about. "The words," he demands; and we sing the words:
"Brethren, we have met to worship and to adore the Lord, our
God "
As the singing continues, leader after leader is called upon. Each is a
good leader and will tolerate no dragging, yet a point of courtesy and
common-sense democracy demands that when his turn is finished he must
give way to another. All who can lead must have a chance to lead. A cas
ual coming and going among the class (congregation) is evident. But it,
too, is informal and does not affect the charged feeling in the little church-
house. The songs are burning and familiar. They are the life we live. As
the hands of our leaders wave us through the deep rhythm of the spirit
uals, we feel our emotions in songs. We sing to please ourselves, and the
deep organic surge keeps our voices together.
At noon, however, the Sacred Harp is laid momentarily aside, and we
go outside for dinner on the grounds. Mules, tied nearby and sensing neg
lect, bray long and deep. Dust, kicked up by thudding heels, rises to make
breathing difficult and to intensify the heat. Yet no one notices, for baskets
of food have been brought forth and their contents spread in long, shady
rows beneath the trees. A stout, middle-aged lady with a hand for such
things faces the milling, conversing crowd, gathers up the folds of her
apron and carefully wipes her hands.
"You folks can come on now," she says. "You men folks take some of
everything and eat all you want."
After a time, a leader gathers a group about him within the church. He
pitches a tune and asks for the words; and "Come Ye Faithful . . ." rolls
beckoning out into the grove, fetching us in. A new song is selected.
20 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
"I don t like it drug out," the leader cautions. "I like it pert, like you
did before you ate."
His arm sweeps down, sweeps us back into the archaic splendor of
choral music. The songs move from lesson to lesson ; the leadership swings
from the seasoned old fellows to the young and obviously frightened tyro.
But the tune never wavers, the rhythm does not drag. All that remains is
movement and sound, with the latter still unabatedly prominent. We have
found a grace of heart and, for the moment, a joyous way of living.
Yet it must end. As the sun drops blood-red behind the grove, the old
est leader comes forward and pitches a tune. "The words," he demands,
and in the waning light we give him the words:
"God be with you till we meet again. ..."
This expression of emotion in song is a fitting prelude to our religion,
which possesses an ethical foundation revealed in everyday living, and an
emotional background brought forward at yearly "meetings." In other
places these meetings are called "revivals," but we are more realistic. If we
are Methodist, we refer to our meeting as the "camp-meeting," a term de
rived from the fact that in days not long ago the people literally camped
about the meeting ground. Today this custom is rare, yet at McHenry in
Stone County it survives in a camp that was constructed sometime in the
early iSoo s. If we are Baptist, we say "protracted meeting." In either
case, we mean what the name implies, a series of religious services for a
number of days. The number usually extends through ten or fourteen,
with a preaching in the afternoon, supper on the ground, and another
preaching at night. Each service begins with lukewarm singing, rises on
the rhetorical prowess of the preacher, and ends with a zealousness that
borders on the "shout." The meeting is more a dramatic display of move
ment and sound than a solemn, sublimated worship.
The preacher, whether our pastor or an itinerant evangelist, understands
our preference for feeling rather than for knowing, and he builds his
sermons on the fact. He does not preach against sin. He preaches against
sins, and he names them: drinking, gambling, fornication, card-playing,
dancing, and stealing. One by one he holds them up for our inspection.
With charged words he sweeps us into homes these sins have visited and
shows us the wreckage they have wrought. The scene fascinates with its
horror; we sit tense and expectant, as if awaiting the onrush of doom. A
little girl, immunized by innocence of the outside world, gets to her feet
and strolls along the grassy aisle. A baby, lying on a pallet at its mother s
feet, begins to fret. But we are spellbound and do not notice. Without
WHITE FOLKWAYS 21
sympathy or attention the mother takes her child into her Jap and soothes
it with milk from a well-filled breast.
The preacher talks on, giving us unstintingly of his best. Then, sud
denly, he changes his approach. Tangibles are exchanged for things Jess
tangible, yet, for us, more obvious. The Lord and Salvation replace hell s-
fire-and-damnation. Condemnation is forsaken for hope. His voice is soft
and consoling; his roots seem in the earth rather than in Heaven. He
speaks of things which we who are dependent on sources beyond our con
trol can understand. He speaks of hope and faith and things to come. The
earth is not ours, and if we should doubt, we need only to look to the
clean, unsodded plot flanking the church-house. Here sunlight by day and
moonlight by night glide down cold white marble headstones and are ab
sorbed in dark, oval-shaped mounds; and here we gather once a year to
hold Memorial Services for our fathers, who came from over the moun
tains and down into the wilderness with just such a zealous preacher lead
ing them. We came out of the land and we will return to the land, and,
the preacher s voice drones on, we will be contented there. The landlord
will furnish as liberally as we want, and the crops will be always good.
It is a promise, as cool as rain after a long dry spell; and somehow we
know that it is true. Someone, usually a man, assures us that it is true:
"Amen. Amen," he says. Sometimes a woman cries out, then gets to her
feet and cries out again. But before our emotions reach the breaking
point, the preacher more often breaks off, disconnects the current. He an
nounces a hymn, which we sing with more bewilderment than enthusiasm ;
then with a prayer he dismisses us.
It is a nerve-wracking interlude, an electrical charge in an even flow of
life. But it purges our soul and refreshes our song. Somehow it gives us
the thing we need. For soon taxes will be due, the landlord will have to
be seen, and furnishing for another "year" will have to be arranged. In no
time at all, we will be noting the first 12 days in January, marking the sort
of weather the new year will bring. We will be readying ourselves for
planting ; and when the cycle of the crops swings in again, our simple way
of living will follow closely in the rhythm of its wake.
Negro Folkways
Different from the Louisiana folk Negro in speech and from the east
coast Negro in heritage, the Mississippi folk Negro stands alone, a pris
matic personality. Those who know him well enough to understand some
thing of his psychology, his character, and his needs, and like him well
enough to accept his deficiencies, find him to be wise but credulous a
superstitious paradox. He seems to see all things, hear all things, believe
all things. But ask him a question and he will have neither seen, heard,
nor believed. He counsels with himself and walks his way alone.
When he does talk, however, the Negro achieves a natural vigor of
speech that few writers obtain. With a severely limited vocabulary and
an innocence of grammatical niceties, he resourcefully gathers all the
color of a scene and in simple words drives home his meaning with
sledge-hammer force. This was illustrated when a Governor visited the
State Penitentiary at Parchman and interviewed some of the long-term
convicts. His conversation with one of them, a Negro, as reported by the
newspapers, ran as follows:
Governor: "What are you here for, boy?"
Prisoner: "I was shootin craps, cap n, an killed a nigger."
Governor: "Why did you kill him?"
Prisoner: "I made my point, suh, and he wouldn t recognize it."
The Mississippi folk Negro neither lays up monetary treasures nor in
vests in things of tangible value. He spends money for medical and legal
advice, a virtue that undoubtedly would bring him praise but for the fact
that he has never been known to take anyone s advice about anything.
The remaining portion of his crop money goes to the dentist, the burial
association, and to places of entertainment. In the distant future he hopes
to be buried in style ; for the present he may be satisfied with a gold tooth
one on a plate and in front, that he can take out, look at, then put back
for others to see.
Yet, his greatest joys, getting religion and being baptized, are free. For
him religion is something more than a code of conduct with doctrinal
points on righteous living. Like his song, it is the released stream of his
-
m
MAMMY GLASPER
pent-up emotions, the channel through which he floats to higher ground.
Also, like his song, it is unconcious art, primarily sensuous and shot
through with voodooism. For weeks prior to the annual "protracted meet-
24 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
ing," he fasts and prays and works himself into a state of feeling that will
make the church services highly exhilarating and weirdly African. For
this reason his religious leader is more an emotional expert than a prac
tical theologian. He moans, groans, and injects various other psychological
stimuli which he does not understand himself. His manner is always un
hurried and unctuously subtle, and his power among his people is absolute.
Such a leader was Cindy Mitchell, an old woman of Leflore County. So
great was her hold on her followers that they said she was "sanctified"
and they called her the Good Shepherd. Cindy always closed her services
with a dance, during which she would sit in a corner and sing, "It ain t
no sin t dance so long as yu don t cross yo feet!" They say, she once an
nounced that on a certain day she would walk on the waters of the Yalo-
busha River. She secretly laid some planks on uprights, just below the
muddy surface of the stream. But on the appointed day, her slowly moving
feet discovered that the planks had been removed. Horrified at the
thought of drowning, but confident of her power, she turned slowly to
face the crowd. "I ain t goin to walk," she declared. "Th Lawd Himsef
done said, Don t do it, Cindy, not befo folks that ain t got th faith of a
mustard seed. " The charge filled the throng with religious zeal, and
several of the doubtful brothers themselves became "sanctified" in the
services that followed.
The protracted meeting has its "mo nahs bench," "fasting and praying,"
"comin through" experiences, meeting of "candidates," the "right of
fellowship," and, as the climax, "baptizing." In the preliminary service,
before the preacher takes charge, there is singing, tapping of feet, and
swaying of bodies until the congregation gets happy. Then the preacher
rises, slowly comes forward to the pulpit, and begins his sermon. The
opened Book lies before him, but he scarcely notices it. His message comes
from the soil and from the racial peculiarities of his people. When his
throat becomes dry and tired from his exhortations, he sits down to rest.
The singing is started again.
Since the preacher has worked his best, the singing at this time is done
in earnest. The best men singers gather in a corner and the leader intones
a phrase of some song. The phrase is repeated over and over with other
men singers joining in. The song rises slowly and steadily, increasing in
volume and tempo, until the urge of its weird harmony and spiritual up
lift forces hands to clap rhythmically with the steady cadence of a drum.
Soon a woman leaps out into the aisle. She is "moved by the spirit"
she cries, and slowly, rigidly, she begins "the shout," or if it is a Holiness
meeting, the "Holy Dance." It is shuffling, intricate; her heels thud on
HOLT COLLIER
the floor. Other women become moved. With arms held stiff and bent at
the elbow and hands hanging limp from the wrist, they slowly, jerkily,
circle the church, forming a tight chain with their bodies.
26 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
"Shout the praise o God!" someone demands, and even the sinners
join in the singing. They sing lustily, with all reason subordinated to
sound. The ring of shouters moves faster and faster, yet the feet keep the
step; the rhythm is not broken. When the strain reaches the breaking
point the leader raises his hand. The song is hushed. The circling chain
halts, breaks apart. The shouters go back to their seats. They are breathing
hard and are wet with sweat.
In the pause that follows, the preacher comes forward and begins to
talk. Perhaps it is a continuation of his sermon; perhaps it is something
entirely new. No one knows and no one cares. His voice has taken on the
strange hollow quality of the hand-clapping and seems to float above his
listeners. No matter what he says, someone sitting in the Amen Corner
nods his head and shouts, "Amen!" This response is not a privilege, but a
duty. Now and then someone jumps to his feet and "professes." He has
seen the light, he shouts, and is now "turned." To distinguish him when
the time comes for "experiences," a member places a piece of white cloth
on his sleeve.
Near the end of the meeting the "candidates" must face the officers and
members and relate their "experiences." The experience is the visionary
journey he had made while on the road to salvation and must resemble
the experiences of a professed member, else the candidate will not be
acceptable to full membership. As these spiritual journeys are recounted,
in the rich metaphor and Biblical phraseology of the "saved," the re
sponses of the audience rise to the pitch of religious ecstasy.
The meeting ends in a great baptizing usually held early in the morn
ing or on Sunday afternoon. Dressed in white gowns and caps, the candi
dates who have been accepted into membership are led out by two deacons
into the water of some creek or pond, the preacher preceding them. The
congregation gathers on the bank and sings, "Let s Go Down to the
Jordan." The minister puts his hand on a candidate s head and says, "I
baptize thee." As the new member goes quickly under the water and rises
hysterically happy, everyone breaks into a shout "Praise th Lord! Praise
God!" Another sinner has been washed of his sins.
In many small Delta towns on Saturday white folks make it a habit
to attend to business early and get off the streets. For "Saddy" is the
Negro s day. He arrives in wagons, in trucks, in automobiles, and on foot.
By noon he literally overruns the town. If he is a day laborer, he has
his pay day cash to spend. If he is a farmer, he has his rations to draw.
In either case, he has news to exchange and the hand of every other Negro
in town to shake. He is a busy man, and one not of his race is apt to be
NEGRO FOLKWAYS 27
stepped on, sat on, or have his passage along the walk blocked for hours.
The Negro does not do these things intentionally, he simply cannot see
a white person on Saturday unless that person owes him something.
In preparation for his day in town, his mode of dress, like a majority
of his ways, is governed by the psychology of the occasion. If he is a town
Negro, the thought of impressing the many country girls with his position
is overwhelming, and he dons the best his wardrobe has to offer. If he is
a country Negro he thinks of the talk he is to have with his furnisher and,
wisely saving his best or Sunday-suit for the day its name implies, wears
overalls or some other work garment. The women make efforts to improve
their appearance. Some wear neat gingham or calico dresses. Others, par
ticularly those who are unmarried, imitate the latest styles. This practice
often leads to the rather ludicrous spectacle of a young and highly rouged
Negro woman struggling through the crowd with the pale blue train of
an evening gown trailing behind her.
The standard rations the furnishing men allow the tenant Negro are a
peck of corn meal, three pounds of salt meat, two pounds of sugar, one
pound of coffee, one gallon of black molasses, and one plug of either
"Red Coon," "Brown Mule," "Dixie Land," or "Wild Goose" chewing
tobacco. This collection is supposed to last him one week, but unless an
eye is kept on him, he will eat it all before Saturday.
"Ole Mosser give me a pound o meat.
I et it all on Monday;
Den I et is lasses all de week,
An buttermilk for Sunday."
On the other hand, if he is working for wages and "eating himself," he
can live a surprisingly long time on three soda crackers, a can of sardines,
and a nickel s worth of cheese.
When ill, the rural Negro has his peculiar methods. He discards all the
stored-up information he has gathered by frequent trips to the doctor. The
remedies he wants come from custom, not from science. At these times he
calls a powerful root doctor or hoodoo woman to diagnose his case for
him. If the trouble be insanity, boils, or constipation, the verdict invariably
is that a secret enemy has "fixed" him and nothing in the world but a
powerful "toby" or "jack" (charm) can dispel this conjuration. The old
woman provides the "toby" for a price. The materials she uses in it and
the way she puts it together do not follow any ancient formula, but de
pend almost entirely upon some momentary whim. The lining of a chick
en s gizzard, powdered blue glass, pine resin, a rooster s spur, ashes, rusty
28 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
nails tied in a bracelet around the foot, asafetida and alum are considered
good, but the victim s own hair baked in a cake and fed to him is best.
Perhaps the "papa toby" of them all, one which is sure to possess the vir
tue or vice necessary to drive away the hoodoo, is the ever useful piece of
red flannel thrust inside of a hollowed-out pecan hull.
Should the diagnosis show that the illness is not due to the conjuring
power of an enemy, other remedies are available. Some of these nostrums
came originally from the Indian, some from the folk medicine of England,
and many can be traced through voodooism to Africa. For toothache,
smoke and buttermilk, or a red pepper mixed with biscuit dough, are good
remedies. For sore throat, a piece of string is tied about the topmost lock
of the sufferer s hair. For getting rid of a sty, the patient should stand at
some cross-road and recite, "Sty, Sty, come off my eye; light on the next
one passing by."
Cough syrup made of mullein leaves, sugar, and vinegar is perhaps a bit
more reasonable. Another cough medicine is tar and honey. Red clay,
softened with vinegar, is bound over bruises to remove soreness. Poultices
of elm bark are used to reduce inflammation. Sulphur and molasses and
sassafras tea are standard remedies for improving and thinning the blood
in the early spring.
When gelatin capsules cannot be had, "slippery elm" is used. The inner
bark of the elm tree is cut into strips and soaked in water until it becomes
a slippery substance. The medicine quinine or calomel or some mixture
in a "dough pill" is rolled up in this mass and given to the patient on
the theory that the medicine will not taste bad and will go down "slick."
One of the oldest treatments in the Delta country for chills and fever is
the administering of water in which the bark of the red oak tree has been
soaked. Mutton suet and beef tallow are used for rubbing the chest and
throat in case of a cold. Another treatment for colds is soaking a stocking
in kerosene and sleeping with it tied around the throat.
After receiving such treatments, if the patient is sufficiently resistive, he
survives. If not, he dies. Among the Negroes in Mississippi, death is gen
erally conceded to be the work of nature, not voodooism. The figure of
Death occurs frequently in their songs:
"Oh Death he is a little man,
And he goes from do to do "...
Should a man die suddenly, and die "hard," that is, with attendant de
lirium, death will be attributed to the hostility of a spirit, which may have
taken him for violating any one of several taboos. An axe or a hoe may
NEGRO FOLKWAYS 29
have been brought into the house and then carried out again through some
door other than the one by which it entered. His clock, which has not run
for some time, may have struck unexpectedly. Perhaps a rat nibbled the
household linen or someone s clothes, or a star fell suddenly. It may have
been that he had unwittingly cut a window in his house after it had been
finished and he had lived in it, or that his rooster crowed soon after sun
down. Whatever the cause, death sometimes brings a slight compensation.
If someone else in the house is sick at the time, that person s health imme
diately improves.
The moment death comes, the mirrors and pictures in the room are care
fully turned to the wall, else they will tarnish and hold a lasting picture
of the corpse. The news then goes forth, "Old Tom is dead," and from
miles around Negroes who never before have heard of Old Tom come to
gether in his cabin. Old Tom is up on his dues to the lodge and to the
burial association, so his funeral is a great occasion. In death Old Tom
realizes his most ardent desire, that of being buried "in style" and the
survivors have a social gathering.
None of his kinsmen dares assist in the preparation of his body for bur
ial, but it is washed and the grave clothes are put on. A coin is put on
each eye and a dish of salt is placed on his chest. The salt, it is said, keeps
him from "purging" (swelling), while the money closes his eyes.
Then his hair is combed out (a woman s hair is never plaited, for the
devil will send his blackbirds to unplait it and they will be heard at work
inside the coffin even after it has been placed in the ground), and with his
feet shoeless, he lies ready for the wake. During the wake his body is
never left alone, nor is the floor swept. "Neighbors," who may live miles
away and have never seen him before, sit with him, and food is served and
songs are sung.
If he was an unimportant Negro, the wake lasts only three days; but if
he was important, as was the Reverend Frank Cook, it goes on and on.
Cook, a Baptist minister, was the popular pastor of four churches: Pleas
ant Green Church in Natchez, St. Stephen s in Vidalia, Louisiana, a church
in New Orleans, and a church in Ohio. He died in Natchez, October 22,
1922. The wake began that night and lasted until Wednesday, the 25th,
when his body was taken to New Orleans where another wake was held,
lasting until Saturday the 29th. On Sunday his body, having been brought
to Natchez, was carried to Vidalia and placed in Young s Chapel, his
mother s church, where the parson preached over him night and day until
Tuesday the 3ist. Nine days after his death, his family was compelled by
law to bury him.
30 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
At the cemetery, the Negro in Mississippi observes various omens. If a
horse neighs or lies down during the service, or if the casket slips while it
is being lowered into the grave, it is a sure sign that someone present soon
will follow. To leave the grave before it is filled, or to be the first to go
away from the graveyard is another pointed invitation to death. At the
close of the service everyone throws a handful of dirt upon the box as a
tribute of respect to the dead. A person never points at the grave, for fear
his finger will rot off or his mother s teeth will drop out.
In some sections of Mississippi after a funeral, all cups, pans, and buck
ets are emptied, food being thrown out to the west, because the spirit will
remain on the premises if encouraged by free access to food and water. It
is bad luck to call a coffin pretty, and if a pregnant woman looks into a
grave she will never feel the baby. The dead person can rest assured that
his clothes and cup and saucer will never be used by anyone else. The cups
and saucers are broken and the pieces are placed on his grave together with
bottles of medicine used in his last sickness, while his garments hang un
used, since no one wishes to feel the ghost of the owner tugging at them.
The Mississippi folk Negro today is a genial mass of remarkable quali
ties. He seems carefree and shrewd and does not bother himself with the
problems the white man has to solve. The tariff and currency do not inter
est him in the least. He has his standard, silver, and he wants no other
kind. As for the so-called Negro Question that, too, is just another prob
lem he has left for the white man to cope with. Seated in the white man s
wagon, and subtly letting the white man worry with the reins, the Negro
assures himself a share of all things good. Once a landlord was asked if
the Negro really had a soul. "If he hasn t," the landlord replied, "it s the
first thing that a white man ever had that a Negro didn t share if he stayed
with him long enough."
>>>>>>
Natural Setting
Geography and Topography
Taking its name from the majestic river that forms the greater portion
of its western boundary, Mississippi is bounded on the north by Tennessee,
on the east by Alabama, and at the northeast corner by the Tennessee
River. To outline a part of the southern boundary, Louisiana extends east
ward like the toe of a boot as far as the Pearl River, which flows south
ward to form the southern portion of the western boundary. The remain
der of the southern boundary is the Mississippi Sound, a shallow body of
water lying north of a chain of low, sandy keys that act as a buffer against
the deeper waters of the Gulf of Mexico. The coast line, including the
irregularities and the islands, is 202 miles long, but the distance between
its extremities, as the crow flies, is only 88 miles.
The area between these boundaries covers 46,865 square miles, of which
503 are water surface. The extreme width is 180 miles; the extreme length
is 330 miles. The State is thirty-first in size among the forty-eight, and
ranks twenty-third in population. In 1930 the population was 2,009,821
of which 50.2 percent was Negro. Of the white population, 99.3 percent
was native born. The Negro population is concentrated largely in cotton -
growing sections the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta and the Black Prairie.
Contrary to popular impressions about the topographical character of
Mississippi, the only portions of a flat swampy nature are the Yazoo-
Mississippi Delta and the river bottoms. The surface in general is hilly,
reaching a maximum elevation of 780 feet in the northeast corner and
slowly descending to form a panorama of rolling hills, which merge into
the tidal meadows of the Gulf Coast. From a physiographic point of view,
this surface is broken into ten regions that conform quite closely to the
geological structure of the State.
The alluvial plain a basin lying between the Mississippi River and the
Yazoo River in the northwestern part of the State and colloquially called
the Delta is the most pronounced surface feature. Stretching north for
MAGNOLIA GRANDIFLORA: THE STATE FLOWER
NATURAL SETTING 33
approximately 200 miles from the juncture of the two rivers, and averag
ing about 65 miles in width, this immense area contains some of the rich
est land in the world. Nearly all of it is bottomland, produced and fed
through countless eons by the inundations of the Mississippi River and re-
cl aimed for usage by a system of powerful levees that hold the floods in
check. The alluvial deposits have been found to be 35 feet deep in many
places. Dark, mellow, sandy loam occurs near the streams, while a black
sticky clay called "buckshot" obtains in the lower parts away from the
drainage courses. Versatility of this "Delta" soil makes the area one of the
most productive on earth.
Skirting the eastern margin of the Delta is a range of rugged precipitous
hills known as the Bluff Hills, or, scientifically, the Loess Hills. All
streams flow through these hills in narrow gorges whose sides in many
places are vertical walls. This region of hills varies in width from five to
fifteen miles and follows the eastward curve of the border of the Delta
from above the Tennessee State Line southward, hugging the east bank of
the Mississippi River from Vicksburg as far as the Louisiana Line. The
soil of this district is brown loam underlain by a yellowish calcareous silt.
This loess, peculiarly formed by mechanical action rather than by chemical
disintegration, is in reality rock dust blown here after one great glacier,
then another, had overridden the country north of the Ohio and Missouri
Rivers. For this reason the Bluff Hills contain little or no rock, a fact which
greatly amazed the early New England settlers upon their arrival in the
region. The loess, varying in thickness from thirty to ninety feet, is ex
ceedingly rich in plant food, and yet is cut so deeply by stream erosion that
it is almost impossible of cultivation.
The rugged Tennessee River Hills in the northeastern part of the State
have an average altitude of some 650 feet, rising to 780 feet at their high
est point. The streams flow through narrow deep ravines in short swift
courses to the Tennessee and Tombigbee Rivers. The hills are of pebbly,
red, sandy loam, while the loam of the river bottoms is rich, black, and
sandy. Toward the south and west the slopes are less precipitous and the
creeks flow more slowly toward the various streams. Geologically, the an
cient Paleozoic era is represented in these hills by both the Pennsylvanian
and Devonian systems, and it is here that the oldest geological formations
in the State are found.
Sweeping in a crescent around the western border of the Tennessee
River Hills from Corinth through Macon is a low-lying belt of prairie land
that is different in almost every respect from the hill country. Its surface
consists of smooth, rolling, almost treeless earth covered with grass the
34 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
greater part of the year. The soil is black, calcareous, clay loam, furnish
ing an exceedingly fertile farming district. The Black Prairie lies at a con
siderably lower level than do the eastern hills ; the greatest altitude in the
northern part is about 400 feet, and the surface slopes southward to a
level of approximately 179 feet.
The wedge-shaped Pontotoc Ridge extends for about 150 miles along
the western border of the Black Prairie. These hills enter the State in the
northeast corner and move southward to form a point just north of Acker-
man. The soil is rich sandy loam which, before erosion set in, grew a
diversity of crops.
The Flatwoods, a narrow band of flat, poorly-drained land, sweeps in an
open crescent around the western and southern margin of the Black Prai
rie and Pontotoc Ridge. The soil is uniformly gray sticky clay that retains
water tenaciously. It is difficult to cultivate and generally unproductive.
The North Central Hills embrace all that portion of north central Mis
sissippi lying between the Flatwoods on the east and the Bluffs overlooking
the Delta on the west. The characteristic soil of this area is a fertile yel
lowish-brown loam containing much silt and clay. It varies in thickness
from two to fifteen feet, is fertile and adapted to raising various crops.
Directly south of the North Central Hills is the Jackson Prairie Belt, a
district of rolling land interspersed with numerous small prairies. It reaches
across the State from the bluffs of the Mississippi to the Alabama State
line, a narrow strip with an extreme width of 40 miles. Its black calcare
ous soil forms another expanse of fine fertile farmlands.
The entire southern half of Mississippi, south of the Jackson Prairie to
within a few miles of the coast, is known as the longleaf pine belt or,
more simply, the Piney Woods. The soil here is a red and yellow sandy
loam that is fairly productive. The area at one time was covered with long-
leaf yellow pine, large tracts of which remain in spite of ruthless cutting.
Between the longleaf pine hills and the Gulf of Mexico is a low lying
region from five to fifteen miles in width called the Coastal Plain Mead
ows. The surface is level and gently rolling but broken in spots by depres
sions. Because of the generally low altitude of this region the streams flow
toward the Gulf with only moderate force and become sluggish toward the
coast. The soil is gray and sandy in the higher portions, but in the low
swampy meadows where water usually stands, it becomes black and peat-
like.
Mississippi is drained by a multitude of rivers, picturesque in name and
setting. The Pontotoc Ridge forms a divide separating the Mississippi
river system from the Alabama river system to the east. The Tallahatchie,
NATURAL SETTING 35
Yalobusha, Yocona, Coldwatcr, Big Flower, Little Flower, and Skuna carry
the waters of the western slope through the Yazoo into the Mississippi at
Vicksburg. The Tennessee and Tombigbee drain the northeastern portion of
the State, the latter through Alabama into Mobile Bay, and the former by
curving northward into the Ohio. In the southeast the Leaf and Chickasa-
whay form the Pascagoula that empties into Pascagoula Bay, while the
Escatawpa flows into the bay from the east. In the southwest, the Big
Black and the Homochitto run into the Mississippi. In the south and cen
tral part, the Pearl, with its tributaries the Yokahockany, the Strong, and
the Bogue Chitto, empties into the Gulf.
Climate
Mississippi enjoys a relatively agreeable climate. The average mean tem
perature over a 48-year period has been 64.6 degrees. This varies in sum
mer and winter respectively between 81 and 48 degrees. The average frost-
free season is approximately 250 days in southern Mississippi, over 200
days in central Mississippi, and drops below 200 days only in the extreme
northern part of the State. The first frost usually occurs in November,
with the last occurring near the middle of March. The annual rainfall
ranges between 60 inches on the Coast to 49 inches in the north, with the
average annual precipitation approximately 54 inches. This rainfall is
evenly distributed throughout the State and is generally lightest during the
months of September, October, and November. This almost sub-tropical
climate not only makes for pleasant living, but assures approximately a
nine-month growing season.
Geologic History
The oldest rocks, those represented by the Canadian Shield about Hud
son Bay, the Piedmont district in the East, and the Rocky Mountain district
in the West, have no surface representation in Mississippi whatsoever.
Much of Mississippi s ancient geologic history lies beneath younger beds
of the Coastal Plain deposits, which begin with the Cretaceous of the
Mesozoic, or third, geologic era. Surface rocks in the northeastern part of
the State, however, do go back to the Devonian and Pennsylvanian periods
of the Paleozoic, or second, geologic era, which ended nearly two hundred
million years ago.
These Paleozoic sedimentary beds accumulated in the old Appalachian
trough, mostly from fragmental material derived from Appalachian land,
MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
GEOLOGICAL FORMATIONS
MINERAL DEPOSITS AND
TIMBER RESOURCES
A TALIOZOIC FOIMATION
Conto.ns depoi.tj of l.mestone.
chert, tr.poli twrounng siltco. o-
pholl.c l.mutont 0<X) sondjtont.
M
the region where the Piedmont Plateau and Atlantic Coastal Plains now
are. Some of the deposits were derived from the limy shells and tests of
marine plants and animals.
NATURAL SETTING 37
During the first two epochs of the Devonian period practically no sedi
ments were swept into the Mississippi part of this ancient interior sea, so
that fairly pure limy material from the shells of marine animals was
ground up and cemented in the form of New Scotland and Island Hill
limestones. Later, the sea became muddy and sufficiently shallow to permit
vegetable matter to grow and accumulate, along with the fine sediments,
to form the black carbonaceous shales of the Whetstone Branch formations.
During the earliest part of the Mississippian epoch (first in the Penn-
sylvanian period) the condition of the sea was again such that the limy
tests, or shells, of marine animals accumulated along with some fine clays
to form the impure clayey Carmack and luka limestones. Some of the ma
terial deposited at this time became, on alteration, the flints and cherts
of these limestones. Untold ages later the limy material of the surface
limestones was dissolved and carried away by ground waters, thus setting
free the chert detritus which forms such a conspicuous surface material
today.
In the late Mississippian, the sea again transgressed the land of this
region, reached its maximum extension, and then retreated. The sea
worked over the weathered surface rock and deposited residual material
in the form of sand and mud, which on consolidation became sandstone
and shale. During the maximum extension the sea received little sediment,
so that the limy tests of its dead animals were ground up by the waves and
cemented into limestone. On retreating, the sea again worked over the sur
face materials and deposited them to form later sandstone and shales.
Although represented only beneath the surface in Mississippi, Pennsyl-
vanian (epoch following the Mississippian) beds farther to the north,
show that the Paleozoic sea withdrew from the Appalachian trough, except
for brief invasions when a few thin layers of limestone accumulated.
Rather, this part of the continent stood about at sea level so that swamps
spread far and wide over the area. In and about these swamps vegetation
grew luxuriantly and accumulated in these waters where it was compacted
and preserved in the form of coal, forming the great Appalachian coal
fields. Some of these plants were trees that grew to be several feet in diam
eter and more than 100 feet in height, but that have since declined until
today they are represented by the prostrate and weakly club mosses and
ground pines.
Throughout most of the Permian, latest period of the Paleozoic era,
the newly accumulated sediments that had been collecting for millions
of years were subjected to a side thrust from the southeast Atlantic
side which slowly forced them into an enormous series of upfolds, the
38 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
Appalachian mountains stretching from Canada into Georgia, Alabama,
and Mississippi.
Throughout the first of the next geologic era, the Mesozoic, no known
sediments were accumulating in Mississippi. For more than a million years,
it is estimated, the newly formed high Appalachian Mountains of Missis
sippi, as well as farther north, were being worn down by stream erosion
until, in the Cretaceous period (latest of the Mesozoic era), they had been
reduced to a plain upon which the earliest Cretaceous sediments were de
posited. Consequently much of Mississippi s Appalachian history, like
most of its Paleozoic beds, lies buried beneath Coastal Plain deposits. And
consequently, too, these old rocks lie at the surface only along the valley
of the Tennessee River and along the lower stretches of the tributary val
leys of this river.
As the Cretaceous sea of the Mesozoic era was advancing on this old
planed surface, the Tuscaloosa sands, gravels, and clays were being laid
down upon it as fluvial deposits. When eventually the sea did reach Mis
sissippi, sand, gravel, and clay deposition gave way to a calcareous sand
deposition that formed the green sand marls of the Tombigbee member
of the Eutaw series, as it is called in Mississippi and Alabama. Huge oyster,
clam, and cephalopod shells in these sands show how thrivingly the shell
fish forms grew in this sea.
Eventually the Eutaw sea became clearer and passed quietly into the
Selma sea, which, besides some mud and a little sand, received the great
deposits of limy material that form the Selma chalk. Like its predecessor,
the Selma sea teemed with large cephalopod and oyster life. Most famous
of all, perhaps, were the giant sea-lizards (Mosossaurs) that swam these
waters, parts of whose skeletons are found in many Selma chalk exposures
in the famous Black Prairie belt.
The alternately clear and muddy Selma sea gave way at length to the more
turbulent Ripley sea in which clay and sand were deposited as well as limy
sand or marl. The Ripley sea withdrew near the close of the Mesozoic era.
When the sea did come back in the Cenozoic, or most recent, geologic
era, it was filled with modern life. In the northern part of the State the
Clayton sea teemed with a large gastropod (Turritella mortoni) whose
shell bore a spire three or four inches in height. The limy material of these
and other shells accumulated by itself or mixed with sand and clay to form
either limestone or marl. Later, here and farther south, nearly pure clay
accumulated, probably under deltaic conditions, to form the Porters Creek
clay (Grim).
Near the beginning of Cenozoic times, the marine waters of the Gulf, it
NATURAL SETTING 39
seems, extended northward. Deposits indicate a series of oscillations
between marine and swampy conditions. Where Jackson now is, this
early sea was rich with shell fish life, for sandy material within the present
city limits is filled with fossil forms of shells. Somewhat later the huge
whale-like Zeuglodons, 70 to 80 feet in length, swam the borders of the
waters then stretching far to the east from the site of the present bluffs of
the Mississippi River. Vertebrae in the clays of this sea measure 8 to 10
inches in diameter and 14 to 16 inches in length. In the region around
Vicksburg the formations are abundantly filled with marine shells.
During the Pliocene epoch (immediately preceding the Pleistocene, or
glacial epoch) beds, mostly of sand and gravel, were deposited under such
different environmental conditions that their origin is the subject of con
troversy. Gulfward, these sediments seem to have been deposited in shal
low marine waters; landward, in estuaries; and still farther inland, along
stream courses. Accordingly, they lap over a series of older and older beds
away from the Gulf.
During Pleistocene times, when one great glacier after another overrode
much of the North American Continent north of the Ohio and Missouri
Rivers, very different conditions obtained in Mississippi. Along the broad
flat terrace plains of the Gulf border, loam, sand, and clay were being de
posited; along the successively lower and lower terraces of the stream
courses, loam, clay, sand, and gravel were deposited as flood plain mate
rial while each of these terraces in turn served as the stream s flood plain.
Still farther north along the east bluff of the Mississippi River, in fact
forming the bluff itself, an intermediate material was being deposited by
the wind. This material, picked up from the flood plain of the river, had
been deposited by the flood waters issuing from the glacier itself far to
the north.
In recent times, deposition within the borders of the State is confined
largely to flood plains of the streams, especially that of the Mississippi
River. This is the material of the so-called Mississippi Delta, which is not
deltaic material at all, but rather flood plain deposits.
Except for the partly cemented limy deposits that form the Selma chalk
and for the cementation of a few minor beds, practically the whole Coastal
Plain beds still remain in the unconsolidated state of deposition.
Mineral Resources
The Paleozoic rocks of Tishomingo County contain sandstone suitable
for building purposes; pure silica suitable for scouring material; and frag-
40 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
mental material that can be used as coarse aggregate in concrete. They also
contain limestones useful, when crushed, for agricultural purposes. Near
the State line and in Alabama they contain considerable quantities of as-
phaltic material.
The Mesozoic beds contain an abundance of sand and gravel suitable
for concrete and for road material; high grade clays for pottery ware;
green sands that are valuable as plant food; chalk that may be ground
for agricultural lime and for cement purposes; and marl that forms rich
soils. More recently discovered deposits are the bentonite beds a form of
volcanic dust that is valuable as a bleaching clay and for the treating of
which a $350,000 plant has been erected at Jackson.
The Cenozoic (or Recent) group contains clays that will make brick
for building purposes ; beds of lignite that will serve as fuel when higher
grade coals are exhausted, or that experimentation may show to be valu
able for other purposes; beds of bauxite that will be valuable when the
higher grade aluminum ores are exhausted; and beds of carbonate iron
ores that are being mined for paint pigment ; but above all a lens of clay
in the Holly Springs sand that is utilized in excellent pottery ware.
In addition are green sands, limy marls, and limestones that make rich
soils on weathering; limestones that may be used for cement purposes
where the overburden is not prohibitive; and bentonitic bleaching clays
that rank first in the United States; gravels that make excellent gravel
roads and coarse aggregate for concrete ; loess that yields an extremely rich
soil ; and flood plain deposits of the so-called Mississippi River Delta that
constitute the rich alluvial empire of Mississippi and other States.
One of the last and one of the most important thus far of Mississippi s
mineral resources is the gas produced in the Jackson Gas Field (not to
mention the well-nigh exhausted Amory Gas Field) which, in 1932, 1933,
and 1934, produced more than nine billion cubic feet each year; in 1935
to the value of $2,171,000.
Plant and Animal Life
In the period between March and November Mississippi s countryside
is bright with flowers. Green Virginia creeper, white and yellow dwarf
dandelions, black-eyed-susans with dark brown centers and dull gold pet
als, purple wood violets and wisteria, papaw, buckeye, cinnamon fern, and
tiny pink and white Cherokee roses catch the sun from open fields or
gleam in the shade of heavy forest. In fall, the dying foliage of deciduous
trees on the northern hills presents what is perhaps Mississippi s most
,v
YUCCA PLANT, OR "SPANISH BAYONET
42 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
spectacular natural scene. In winter the brown sedge grass along the Coast
and the brown cotton stalks in the Delta appear first gold then purple in
the setting sun.
On the uplands, along stream bottoms and on moist slopes, heavy for
ests of post and white oak, hickory, honey locust, poplar, maple, sycamore,
and magnolia tower above huckleberry, hazelnut, and mountain laurel. In
the lowlands of the Delta, stream banks are heavy with willow, bald cy
press, tupelo, black gum, and sweet gum. The Piney Woods of southern
Mississippi stay green the year around with tall, long-leafed pine, while
giant live oaks and gray Spanish moss keep the Gulf Coast area in almost
perpetual shade.
Animals were abundant in Mississippi when white men first began to
settle here. The bison, bear, wildcat, wolf, and cougar were roaming in the
wilderness. Muskrat and beaver lodges were common and mink and otter
were plentiful. The bison and the bear were the first to go ; then the indis
criminate slaughtering of beaver and otter by trappers annihilated these
fur-bearing animals. The modern hunter occasionally kills a deer or trails
a fox, but even these are scarce except in some portions of the State.
However, the threatened shortage of these and other animals is being
remedied through the work of the Fish and Game Commission. The
cotton-tail rabbit, fox and gray squirrel, raccoon and opossum are the
modern sportsman s chief game.
Approximately all kinds of fresh-water fish are found in Mississippi s
lakes and streams. The most important of these from the sportsman s point
of view are the black bass, the speckled trout, the buffalo, carp, shovel-bill
cat, channel cat and mud cat, bream, and perch. In the Gulf Coast area,
where the fisherman can cast his line in a different stream each day in the
year, there are in addition to the ones named the red fish, sheepshead, mul
let, croaker, and drum.
It is also on the coast that birds gather in greatest number throughout
the year. As far as is known no large nesting colonies of gulls, terns, or
brown pelicans exist here, but these birds do rear their young close by in
Louisiana and Alabama and feed commonly in the Mississippi Sound. Al
though more numerous during the winter, such species as the brown peli
can, the black skimmer (locally known as the shearwater), the royal tern,
and Caspian tern, and the laughing gull, occur in varying numbers
throughout the spring and summer. The least tern, the smallest of this
group, nests in small colonies on stretches of sandy beach, but departs for
its winter home in Central and South America in late September, not to be
seen again until the following April. The more northern gulls the her-
NATURAL SETTING 43
ring gull, the ring- billed gull, and Bonaparte s gull occur in flocks of
varying size during the winter months. Shore birds, represented by approx
imately 35 species of sandpiper and plover, are a characteristic feature of
the open beaches. One of the most interesting of this group is the Cuban
snowy plover, limited in its distribution to the Gulf Coast from Florida to
Texas. This plover is found only on the open beaches. Its light plumage
blends so perfectly with the sand that it can easily be overlooked.
Sea birds often are of more interest on the coast than the smaller land
birds, but the spring and fall migrations of the latter are fascinating. Ap
parently little effort is involved in making the flight across the Gulf of
Mexico. Such small migrants as warblers, sparrows, and thrushes go inland
many miles during good weather, before taking shelter in suitable stretches
of wood or underbrush. Because of this habit, many species that commonly
nest farther north are almost unknown on the coast, and there are days
when only the characteristic breeding birds are observed. There are inter
vals, however, when inclement weather makes a long flight hazardous and
uncertain, and at such times stretches of woods bordering the water will
teem with small birds awaiting a favorable chance to continue their jour
ney. Observation has shown that migration in the spring is materially re
tarded by northwest winds, and in the fall by storms from the southeast.
In the salt marshes are found the Louisiana clapper rail and Howell s
seaside sparrow (both limited in their range to a narrow stretch of the
coast), the least bittern, and many species of heron. Among the latter
group is the stately egret, a bird once almost exterminated by plume hunt
ers but now regaining its former numbers through adequate protection.
The State s chief game birds, the partridge and the migratory duck, are
also being restored through the protection of adequate game laws. Until
recently the partridge was plentiful in the open fields in all sections of
Mississippi, but the hunters have driven them to the protection of woods
and thickets.
Much of the State, especially the southern half, is covered by pine tim
ber, and here can be found such representative birds of the open woods as
pine warbler, the brown-headed nuthatch, Bachman s sparrow, considered
by many the finest songster in the South, and the red-cockaded wood
pecker. The last is unique among the woodpeckers in that it smears the
opening to its nest cavity with pitch dug from the solid wood of a living
pine, frequently making the nest conspicuous for some distance.
The bottom lands and hillsides of northern and central Mississippi,
where undergrowth is thick, support a distinctly larger population of birds,
and without exception they are species rarely if ever found in the pine
44
MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
NATURAL SETTING 45
woods. Here throughout the summer are some of the most vividly plu-
maged of the State s smaller birds the prothonotary and hooded warblers,
and the indigo bunting, as well as the drab-colored and little known
Swainson s warbler. In the larger stretches of timbered swamp, wild tur
keys survive in fair numbers, and rumor suggests the presence of the
ivory-billed woodpecker, a bird considered almost extinct and, if present,
the rarest species in the State. The slightly smaller but almost as impres
sive pileated woodpecker is fairly plentiful, and while wary and difficult
to approach is not an uncommon sight in the hardwood timber forests.
In the Delta, the dickcissel, the painted bunting, the bronzed grackle
and, rarely, the cowbird build their nests. The painted bunting, a surpris
ing yet harmonious combination of green, blue, yellow, and red, fortu
nately can be seen without undue difficulty throughout the summer.
Archeology and Indians
Archeology
Though lack of evidence has made it impossible to establish a basis for
a chronology of prehistoric sites, and there is no evidence that any of the
Folsom people lived in Mississippi, the State is rich in aboriginal remains
in the form of mounds and village sites. The mounds a part of the
mound builder complex that extended up the entire Mississippi Valley and
eastward along the Ohio are composed of earth and vary in size from
scarcely perceptible swellings of the ground to great hillocks 50 to 60 feet
high with crowns one-fifth of an acre in extent. Nanih Waiya, the sacred
mound of the Choctaw, has a base 218 feet by 140 feet and is 22 feet in
height (see Tour 12). The giant, only partly artificial, Selsertown Mound
is a rectangular pyramid about 600 feet long and 400 feet broad, covering
nearly 6 acres of ground ( see Tour 3, Sec. b).
The triple demands of custom, occasion, and need dictated the Indian s
purpose in building these mounds. Those situated along the Mississippi
River (erected on hills and bluffs) were used for signal towers and dwell-
46 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
ing sites. There is a theory also that the tallest of these were artificial
islands upon which the Indians climbed for refuge when the Mississippi
and its lower tributaries overflowed. In this same section, at Phillip in Le-
flore County, long irregular embankments parallel the Tallahatchie River
with the ends abutting on the banks of small bayous. These earth walls, ac
cording to Dr. Calvin S. Brown (archeologist of the Mississippi State
Geological Survey), probably were used for fortifications. Farther south,
one-half mile from the union of Lake George and Sunflower River, in the
historic country of the Yazoo, lies a great fortified village site. Surrounded
by an earth wall, 25 mounds here cluster about the central or main mound,
which rises 55 or 60 feet to command a view of the whole fortification.
The main mound is approximately square, with a base covering one and
three-fourths acres and a summit area of one-fifth of an acre. This impres
sive group, known as Mound Place, is a work of such magnificence that
archeologists maintain it should be surveyed, mapped, and preserved for
future generations.
(The above-mentioned mounds are only several of the outstanding; for
additional data and locations, see Tour 3, Tour 4, Tour 12, and Side
Tour 3 A.)
Within recent years, Dr. Brown and Moreau Chambers (curator of State
archives and State field archeologist) have done much to bring the life of
the primitive Indian to light. Many implements and objects of polished
stone and chipped flint have been found. Of these implements the grooved
ones are called axes, and the smooth or ungrooved ones, celts. Stone hoes,
spades, mortars, pestles, bowls, cups, plates, nails, troughs, and other agri
cultural and domestic utensils are additional evidence of the aborigines
progress. The best collections are the exhibits in the New Capitol, Jackson ;
the Butler collection of Yazoo County ; the Chapman collection, Columbus ;
the Ticer and the Brown collections, Oxford ; and the Barringer collection,
Monroe, Louisiana.
The term discoidal stone is applied to a large variety of circular stones.
Some of them are concave on both faces, some are convex, some are flat on
one side, and others are variously modified. They are popularly called
chunkey, or chunky, stones because of the game in which they were used
by the Indians. Other artifacts of this class are canoe-shaped boatstones,
spuds, heads, banner stones, and animal representations with faces and fig
ures. These are found in the museums and private collections previously
named and in the Clark collection at Clarksdale.
The pipe or calumet was of great ceremonial importance to the Indian.
It was smoked at the ratification of treaties, at marriages, at declarations of
ARCHEOLOGY AND INDIANS 47
war, and at other important social and political events. These pipes varied
in size, shape, and workmanship, and were made of fragile clay unadorned,
of pottery, of sandstone, limestone, and other stone. Among the most elab
orate pipes found in Mississippi is one unearthed in Jefferson County, the
bowl of which is decorated with a seated human figure 5.4 inches high.
The figure is holding a pipe in his hands, his chin resting upon the bowl
just below the rim. A stone pipe, remarkable in design and carving, found
in Yazoo County, shows a naked savage seated with hands resting on
knees and legs folded under the body. Two steatite pipes with figures
carved on the stems, one from Natchez and one from Jefferson County,
are now in the University of Pennsylvania collection. In the Millsaps Col
lege collection at Jackson is a more recent pipe made in the form of a tom
ahawk.
An abundance of shells, both marine and fresh-water, were available to
the Indian of Mississippi. Along the coast and the large rivers, shell
mounds or refuse heaps accumulated. Shell was a favorite material for the
manufacture of beads. In the early Colonial days shell money was used in
trade with the Indians; the beads were both circular and fist shaped. The
circular type can be seen in the Butler collection, now in the museum at the
New Capitol. In the Clark collection at Clarksdale are many of the flat
type that were uncovered in a mound in Coahoma County.
The Indians used bone, tooth, stag horn, tortoise shell, and other hard
animal parts in manufacturing implements and ornaments. Projectile points
and piercing implements were often made of bone and stag horn and many
of these have been preserved, a number of them in the collection at the
Capitol.
With the possible exception of the pipes, the pottery shows the art of
the Mississippi Indians at its best. The Davies collection and the State col
lection display the finest examples.
Indians
In 1699, when D Iberville planted his colony on the Gulf coast and be
gan to push slowly up the winding rivers, the territory now Mississippi
was the center of an Indian population conservatively estimated at 25,000
to 30,000. Of these the three largest groups were the Chickasaw, the
Natchez, and the Choctaw tribes, each a member of the great Muskhogean
linguistic family, yet characteristically different. The Chickasaw, who pre
ferred war to farming and whose territory extended northward through
western Tennessee and into Kentucky, had their principal villages along
4 8
MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
THE INDIANS
IN MISSISSIPPI
Federal Writers Project 1937
LEGEND
X Battles
Mounds
i Schools
i Churches
El Hospitals
Earthworks
Treaties
Q Colonies
@ Monuments
-iH.Natche2 Trace
Stone Heaps - Boundaries
ARCHEOLOGY AND INDIANS 49
the Pontotoc Ridge in what are now Pontotoc, Chickasaw, and Lee Coun
ties. The Natchez lived on the lower Mississippi in what is now Adams
County, and the Choctaw, largest of all Mississippi tribes, occupied the
southern half of the State, plus an adjacent part of Alabama (see Indian
Map). Dr. John R. Swanton, foremost authority on the southwestern In
dians, says that the Choctaw seem to have enjoyed an enviable position.
They loved war less than truth and truth less than oratory, and were slow
in all things save horticulture and diplomacy. Like the meek, they were
slowly inheriting the earth because their neighbors could not compete with
them economically.
Three smaller and less important members of the Muskhogean family,
the Chakchiuma, the Ibitoupa, and the Taposa, dwelt on the upper Yazoo
River, unhappily between the Chickasaw and Choctaw, two traditional ene
mies ; while the Pascagoula and the Acolopissa, both of whom are believed
to have been closely related to the Choctaw, lived on the Pascagoula and
Pearl Rivers respectively. On the lower Yazoo, in the west central part of
the State, were the Tunica, Yazoo, Koroa, Tiou, and Grigra tribes, for
merly considered a separate stock but now united by ethnologists with the
Chitimacha of Grand Lake and Bayou Teche, Louisiana, and the Atakapa
between Vermillion Bayou and Galveston, Texas. The great Siouan or
Dakotan family, later to play an important part in the wmning of the
West, was represented in Mississippi by the Biloxi, a small tribe dwelling
on the Gulf coast, and the Ofo, called Ofogoula or Dog People by the
French, who lived to the north on the Yazoo. In 1699 the Biloxi, who
called themselves Teneka Haya or First People, met Iberville and helped
him establish the earliest permanent settlement of the colony of Louisiana
near the city that now bears their name.
These tribes seem to have belonged to a broad-headed people of a light
mahogany complexion and with black hair and eyes. The men, with per
haps the Choctaw excepted, were remarkable examples of physical perfec
tion. Claiborne, early Mississippi historian, says of them, "They were tall,
well developed, active, with classic features and intellectual expressions;
they were grave, haughty, deliberate and always self-possessed." The
Natchez, according to Charlevoix and Dumont, stood six feet or more in
height, and Gayarre adds, "There was not a man among them who was
either overloaded with flesh, or almost completely deprived of this neces
sary appendage to the body." The average height among the Choctaw was
about five feet six inches. But, undoubtedly, the Choctaw custom of flatten
ing their heads by securing bags of sand to the soft skulls of infant male
children partly accounts for this disparity in height.
50 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
Neither the ethnologists nor the early chroniclers agree concerning the
women. But considering the state of degradation in which they were kept
and the hard labor to which they were subjected, it is not surprising that
the Indian maidens, however small and beautifully formed, with sparkling
eyes and long black hair, lost their charm while young and were deteri
orated utterly by middle age.
From an economic point of view all the tribes were basically the same.
All of them had once been forced by economic necessity to live along the
Gulf coast, but an acquired knowledge of planting enabled many to move
inland. Here they established settlements behind earth-wall fortifications
or, in the bayou-ribbed western section of the State, near tall artificial
mounds. In the winter they hunted; in spring and summer they planted
their fields and fished. After winter hunting trips, which sometimes carried
them to Ohio and the Carolinas, they returned to their settlements in the
spring to plant their fields. Fish, small game animals, roots, berries, and
the like served for food until the early corn was ripe; then the early corn
carried them until July or August when late or flour corn was ready to
eat. From then until autumn the products of the field, supplemented by
small game and fish, rendered life comparatively easy. This was a season
of relaxation and plenty during which most of the ceremonies took place,
particularly those of a social nature, and much of the manufacturing was
done; baskets, textiles, wooden and horn objects, pipes, and other articles
were produced both for home consumption and trade. In late November
the Indians once more scattered to hunt until planting time. On the coast
the Pascagoula and Biloxi, who benefited by the spring run of fish,
stopped their hunting early to establish themselves near fish weirs until
planting time.
The Natchez and other tribes built compact, fort-like villages, with the
huts facing a central square. In the squares of the Chakchiuma stood tall
poles on which they hung scalps, beads, bones, and other articles, some of
which made a queer whistling sound in the wind. This sound, their proph
ets said, was a voice telling them a Choctaw or Chickasaw was killing a
Chakchiuma so a party would go on the warpath, kill the first Choctaw
or Chickasaw they met, and hang his scalp on the pole. They then waited
for another passage of the wind.
The Chickasaw built long one-street towns that were in reality a series
of distinct villages. One of these, Long Town, was composed of seven vil
lages strung along a ridge. Red Grass was fortified with pickets, and was
the scene of young D Artaguiette s defeat when he came down from Can
ada to join Bienville in 1736 (see Tour 12). It was also the impregnability
ARCHEOLOGY AND INDIANS 51
of these unfriendly Chickasaw towns that stood between the French of
Louisiana and the French of the Ohio and prevented them from uniting in
a solid front against the westward-moving English settlers.
The Choctaw built their barrier towns compact like those of the lesser
tribes. But their inland settlements, where they carried on their farming,
resembled extensive plantations with the cabins a gunshot distance from
each other.
Indian cabins were made of rough-hewn posts chinked with mud, bark,
and, in the lowlands, Spanish moss. The roofs were of cypress or pine
bark, or of intermingled grass and reeds. These roofs were so skilfully
woven they lasted 20 years without leaking. A hole usually was left in the
top of the cabin to let out the smoke (fires being built in the center of the
cabins), but there were no windows and only one door, an opening about
three or four feet high and two feet wide. Inside the cabins the walls were
lined with cane beds that were covered with bison skins and used during
the day as tables and chairs.
Land was cleared for planting by burning the underbrush and smaller
growth, while the trees were girdled and left to die. For implements the
Indians used a stone, a crude hoe made of a large shell or the shoulder
blade of a bison, and a stick to make holes for planting the seed. The
Choctaw, who took their farming seriously and who often had to supply
their enemy, the Chickasaw, with corn, erected small booths near their
farms and stationed young people in them to drive away the crows. But
even the Choctaw were forced to labor by hand, for the Indians had no
domesticated animals to toil for them.
The staple crop was corn, with beans, pumpkins, melons, and, some
times, sunflowers planted with it. Tobacco was raised as a luxury for the
men only. Tom-ful-la (tafula) or "big hominy" was the standard dish.
Another dish, bota kapusi or "cold meal," was a favorite because of its
sustaining qualities in times of war and famine. This parched corn flour
would keep without spoiling as long as it was dry, and a man could travel
a week on a quart of it. For smoking, the men mixed their tobacco weed
with the dried leaf of either the aromatic sumac or the sweetgum, thus giv
ing it a mellow, and, some chroniclers say, delightful flavor.
In prehistoric times the most important game animal was the deer, but
later the bison attained greater importance. (The bison is supposed to have
been driven out of Mississippi by a great drought in the early 1700*5, but
the Biloxi, more given to romance, declared that it was not a drought but
the Most Ancient of Rabbits, who drove them angrily out of his realm.)
The Choctaw considered the ribs and liver of a bear a luxury, but among
52 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
the tribes in general this animal was hunted more for the seasoning qual
ity of its fat than for its flesh. Venison and turkey meat were stewed with
bear oil and served with corn cakes and a beverage of acidulate honey and
water ; or a slice of venison, a slice of turkey, and a slice of bear meat were
placed on a stick and barbecued in a position which forced the bear fat to
drip over the turkey and venison, giving them a high seasoning. Gayarre,
a French historian, rapt in his appreciation of culinary art, muses over the
fact that the Natchez "never could be persuaded to eat of the skilfully
made dishes of the French because they were afraid of the ingredients
which entered into their composition. They never ate salads or anything
raw or uncooked except ripe fruits, and they never could relish wine."
Their relish for brandy, however, was keen and they looked down on the
French for mixing it with water. Herring and sturgeon (both now extinct
on the coast), alligators, crawfish, and shellfish also were eaten.
Unindustrialized and left free to eat according to the promptings of
their stomachs, the Indians had no fixed hours for meals. They ate when
they pleased and never together. The only exception to this was when a
feast was given. The men then ate by messes, out of a bowl set in the cen
ter of the group and with a wooden or horn spoon passed from one to the
other. The women and children, sitting apart, followed the same pro
cedure.
Deer were stalked by single hunters, and bears were sought out in their
dens, driven to the open by means of fire, and killed as they tried to es
cape. (Aware of the need of conservation, long before the white men
came the Indians established areas in which the bears were allowed to
breed unmolested.) Characteristically, the Chickasaw left the small game
to the boys, and even the boys would not hunt the beaver. Animals so
easily killed were not worthy of a warrior, they said. Fish were caught by
hooks, shot with arrows, or speared (often at night with the help of fire).
In dry seasons pools left by thin, vapid streams were dragged for fish with
nets, or else the fish were stupefied by means of buck-eye, devil s shoe
string, or other poisonous plants.
Clothing was made principally of deer and porcupine skins and con
sisted of a breechcloth for the man and a short skirt for the woman. When
traveling they wore moccasins and leggings for protection against briars
and bushes. Skins, particularly those of the porcupine, were embroidered
with considerable art, the drawings being somewhat Gothic in character,
and dyed solid colors "of which they liked best the white, the yellow, the
red, and the black; their taste being to use them in alternate strips."
(Gayarre.) Cloaks were made of wild-goose or other bird feathers woven
ARCHEOLOGY AND INDIANS $3
into patterns, or, for women particularly, of mulberry bark woven in a
down-weaving loom. During very severe weather the tribes in the north
ern part of the State wore robes of bear or bison skins; but in summer
they, like the men and women of the more southerly tribes, went half-
naked and barefooted. Except when in mourning, the women quite uni
formly wore their hair long, sometimes plaited but more often loose.
Men s styles differed with the tribes. The Natchez, for instance, shaved
their heads, friar-like, leaving a long, twisted tuft of hair to dangle from
the crown down over their left shoulder. To this small feathers were at
tached. Ornaments were worn in profusion by both sexes and paint was a
necessity. Garters, belts, and head bands were woven of bison or opossum
hair and ornamented with beads. Shell, bone, and copper beads were used
as ear and nose ornaments. From earliest times the Choctaw and Chickasaw
made annual raids west of the Mississippi and brought back bars of silver
and copper, which they fashioned into ornaments.
The Indian woman about to become a mother retired into the woods
alone and in a few hours returned with her child and resumed her work.
Immediately after birth the child was carried to a stream and washed, then
taken to the hut and placed in a cradle. This cradle was usually two and
one-half feet long, eight or nine inches wide, and six inches high. Unlike
the modern cradle, its rocking motion was forward and backward like our
rocking chairs. Being light, the cradle was placed on the mother s bed at
night. If the child were a Choctaw boy, Adair tells us, ". . . part of the
cradle where the head reposes was fashioned like a brick-mould." This was
to help flatten the child s head. But whatever the tribe or sex Indian chil
dren received constant attention, being allowed to suckle as often and as
long as they pleased, and having their bodies rubbed with oil each day.
The oil rendered the limbs more flexible and prevented the bites of flies
and mosquitoes.
With the exception of the Choctaw who feared water, the children of
both sexes when three years old were taken each morning, summer and
winter, to a nearby stream to bathe. At this time of life they were im
pressed with the inviolable rule that quarrels and fights would not be tol
erated the penalty for transgression being the shame of having to live
for a certain time in utter seclusion. As no Indian, young or old, could
endure humiliation, the fear of such disgrace made them so cautious of
trespassing on another s rights that the few "penal laws" existing within
the tribes seldom had to be enforced.
Male children were taught to hunt and to fight, female children to pre
pare the food, make the clothing, weave the baskets, mold the pottery, and
54 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
tend the fields. The boys on reaching their twelfth year were committed
to the charge of the oldest men or the Ancients of their respective families,
the eldest brother of the mother being preferable among the Choctaw.
Under the Ancient s tuition they learned the moral precepts that were to
regulate their lives. They also learned to run, jump, wrestle, and practice
with the bow. For target practice a bunch of grass about the size of the
fist was attached to a stick and shot at, or small animals, such as squirrels
and rabbits, were hunted. The boy who proved the most skilful marksman
received the preeminent distinction of being styled "Young Warrior." The
one next in skill was called "Apprentice Warrior." (It is interesting to
note that, similar to a theory growing among educators today, whippings
or blows of any kind never were given the Indian boy as corrective meas
ures. Appeals to his pride or shame were resorted to.) The Ancients,
whose decisions were supreme, received implicit obedience, and because of
this influence the elderly male members of every family were paid the
most profound respect.
This marked respect did not extend, however, to the women. "In all
assemblies, either public or private, even in the privacy of the family cir
cle, the youngest boy had precedence over the oldest woman" a circum
stance that seems to have produced a docile and timid temperament in the
woman. A quarrel between husband and wife would have been regarded
as scandalous.
Yet, according to our standards of morality, the unmarried women were
extremely profligate. With the Choctaw again excepted, there was a loose
ness of relations between sexes before marriage that struck the early chron
iclers as especially interesting. When a scarcity of food made it necessary
for the officers and soldiers of Fort Maurepas to find quarters with the
Biloxi and Pascagoula tribes, Penicaut naively remarked that it was "an
arrangement which Indian maidens and French soldiers enjoyed alike."
In the estimation of the Natchez this profligacy was a merit. ". . . all their
women," Gayarre quotes from an unnamed source, "while single, were
allowed to sell their favors ; and she who acquired the wealthiest marriage
portion by this traffic, was looked upon as having the most attraction, and
as being far superior to all the females of her tribe." Marriage, however,
transformed these professed courtesans into so many Lucretias, both hus
band and wife becoming patterns of fidelity.
As suggested, the standard was reversed by the Choctaw. Among Clai-
borne s notes is this observation: Marriage took place early; seduction be
fore marriage rare ; adultery more common ; divorce frequent.
Marriages were never contracted without the consent of the older mem-
ARCHEOLOGY AND INDIANS 55
bers of both families nor were the young people forced into alliances
against their will. (Elopement is found in legend only and always with a
tragic ending.) But there was an inviolable rule that no man could marry
into his own ikas or clan. When these clans were established is not known,
but every tribe in Mississippi was divided into from three to ten of them
with regulations for their perpetuation. "The regulations by which the
clans were perpetuated amongst the nations were, first, that no man could
marry into his own clan; second, that every child belongs to his or her
mother s clan. Among the Choctaw there are two great divisions, each of
which is subdivided into four clans; and no man can marry into any of
the four clans belonging to his division." (Gallatin: 1830.) The restric
tion among the other tribes, however, did not extend beyond the clan to
which the man belonged.
A Choctaw warrior applied to the maternal uncle of the girl, and they
agreed on the price which also was paid to the uncle. Then, on an ap
pointed day, the groom appeared at a designated place to loiter until noon.
At that time the bride left the lodge of her parents and, eluding her gath
ered friends, ran into the adjacent woods. The female friends of the
groom immediately gave chase and, if she were anxious for the match,
caught her easily and brought her back among the groom s friends. But
the groom then would have disappeared. The bride sat down and the
friends of both sides threw little presents into her lap, while female relatives
tied beads in her hair. When this ceremony was over she was conducted to
a hut adjoining that of her parents and here the groom sought her that
night. At sunrise they were man and wife.
The Chickasaw warrior who had been accepted painted his face and
went to the house of the bride s parents, where she met him at the door.
Inside, among parents and relatives, the youth presented her with a piece
of venison and she gave him an ear of corn. Then he repaired to her bed
for the night. But the Natchez, in their Athenian-like way, had a more
formal ceremony. When a marriage was to take place among them the two
families met at the house of the groom and the young couple stood before
the oldest man to hear the duties they were about to assume. After the
vows strangely like Christian promises were taken, the husband es
corted his wife to his bed, saying, "Here is our bed; keep it undefiled."
Polygamy was tolerated by the Choctaw and the Natchez. In each tribe,
however, a marriage endured only according to the inclination of the par
ties concerned. Either could dissolve it at pleasure. When this occurred,
as it often did, the children went with the mother, and the father no
longer had control over them.
56 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
Curiously, the most powerful and populous tribe, the Choctaw, was also
the most peaceful and democratic. Their chiefs attained their position
through merit alone and then were hardly more than counselors. The war
like Chickasaw, who never numbered more than 5,000 warriors, were con
trolled by a form of military aristocracy, while the power of the Biloxi
and Ofo chiefs varied, some being very feeble. The Natchez, perhaps at
once the most civilized and the most barbaric tribe in the South, set up an
absolute monarchy, their chief claiming descent on the female side from
the sun.
The Great Sun of the Natchez, whose person was sacred and mandates
absolute, lived a retired life in the "great village" on St. Catherine s Creek
(Adams County). His house, the dimensions of which were all about 30
feet, stood on a mound fronting the village square. The door faced the
east, so that the Great Sun might greet the first morning beams of his ce
lestial brother with a prolonged howl and three puffs of his calumet, then
wave his hand from east to west, to show the sun its daily path. The mother
of the Great Sun bore the title of Woman Chief, and though she did not
meddle in the government she held the power of life and death and was
paid great honor. The royal family and members of the nobility were for
bidden to marry among their equals, a prohibition that proved revolting
to the pride of many. It was the offensiveness of this law that led a female
Sun (Princess) to propose marriage through her mother to Du Pratz, a
nobleman, hoping to bring about a revolution in the social system of her
nation. Another female Sun was called the Proud because, rebelling
against this law, she refused to sell her favors to any save the nobility.
Like the Peruvians the Natchez had two languages, one reserved for the
"stinkards," or lower classes, the other for the nobles and the women.
Both languages were very rich yet there was no similarity between them.
The women spoke the language of the nobles with an affected pronuncia
tion totally different from that of the men. The French, who seem to have
associated more with the women than with the men, took the women s
pronunciation thus provoking the rebuke to one of them from a Sun:
"Since thou hast the pretension to be a man, why dost thou lisp like a
woman?"
A majority of the tribes believed in a Supreme Being or Great Spirit of
the Universe but they had no particular notion of his character and, with
the exception of the Natchez, no set form of worship. The Natchez, dif
ferent in religion as in everything else, worshipped the sun. The sun, they
believed, was a male spirit who had molded the first man. Their ideas of
woman s creation were indefinite. One legend is that a short time after the
ARCHEOLOGY AND INDIANS 57
first man was made, he was taken with a violent fit of sneezing and some
thing in the shape of a woman, as big as his thumb, bolted from his nose.
On falling to the ground it began to dance around and around, growing
larger and larger until at last it grew into the actual size and shape of a
woman. That evil spirits abounded, they were well aware. They tried to
placate them by fasting and praying. When the Natchez wanted rain or
fair weather, they fasted. But in either case the Great Sun abstained for
nine days from meat and fish, living on nothing but a little boiled corn.
During this time he also took particular care not to communicate in any
way with his wives.
The temple of the great village, where the Great Sun resided, was near
St. Catherine s Creek on a mound said to be eight feet high. The door of
the temple, like the door of the chief s house, faced the east. In the largest
room was an altar six feet long, two feet wide, and four feet high, and on
it a reed basket containing the bones of the preceding Great Sun. It was
here before the sacred fire that the Great Sun, who was also high priest by
virtue of his kinship to the sun, officiated. Only those of royal blood, or
such visitors as the Sun considered sufficiently distinguished, could enter
this room. The stinkards were not permitted to enter any part of the tem
ple. In the smaller room were sundry small objects which the Indians seem
never to have explained to the white men. On the roof of the temple sat
three wooden birds twice the size of a goose, with their feathers painted
white and sprinkled with red. These birds faced east toward the rising sun.
Like all people who place credence in spirits the Indians were super
stitious. They believed in witches and ghosts and were afraid to travel
alone at night. So, quite naturally, they had, as a privileged caste, the rain
maker and the medicine man. The medicine man interpreted dreams,
charmed away spells, and healed the sick; the rain maker in periods of
protracted drought saved the crops and the water supply by bringing rain.
The method of the medicine man in curing a patient was to roll him in a
blanket and, bending over him, suck the painful spot. If sucking, knead
ing, pounding, and growling did no good and the patient grew worse and
died, the doctor declared that some malicious witch had interfered to de
feat his purpose. The relatives of the dead man then would formally
demand the witch be pointed out, and after several days of apparent
thought the doctor would indicate some old, decrepit woman who, with
out formality, would be put to death.
The rainmaker enjoyed the privilege of being paid in advance. He al
ways gave the Indians to understand that spirits did no business on credit,
and, as he was never called on until the crops were burning and the supply
58 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
of water was exhausted, the Indians were rarely in a position to haggle
over terms. Yet if he failed and he sometimes did he did not attribute
his failure to witchcraft as did the doctor, but said that he himself was to
blame. He was na-koo-a (angry), he explained, and the credulous Indians
then desperate, would beg to know what could be done to restore his good
humor. But he, still posing as too angry to talk, would seclude himself and
wait until the signs of a change in weather appeared. When the signs ap
peared he suddenly would come out into the village square and tell the
Indians that if they doubled his fee the rain would come. They, glad to
propitiate his anger, brought even more than he demanded, and soon the
rain came as he had promised.
The Choctaw separated the flesh from the bones of their deceased and
preserved them, at first in a mortuary, then in a mound constructed for
this purpose. The Chickasaw buried their dead in the earth, often under
the flooring of the lodge itself. The body of a Biloxi or Pascagoula was
placed in a coffin made of reeds and left until nothing but dried bones
remained; these then were transferred to a wicker coffer and put away in
small temples. When a Natchez chieftain died hundreds of people were
sacrificed to pay him honor, these being considered meat and victuals for
the deceased.
Pitched battles between tribes were seldom fought. Warfare with them
consisted mostly in ambuscades and surprises. But even so prudent a type
of battle failed to ward off devastating defeats. A well-aimed blow cun
ningly delivered often all but annihilated a nation, at which time the na
tion applied through ambassadors to a neutral nation for protection. If the
protection were granted, they abandoned their own territory and merged
with the nation that had become a sort of foster parent to them. And this
was the fate of all the Mississippi tribes but two, the Choctaw and the
Chickasaw.
The most progressive of the tribes was the first to go. The French cov
eted Natchez lands and demanded from them the site of their principal
village, White Apple. For this reason the tribe agreed upon a general mas
sacre of the French. The butchery began in November 1729, and 250 vic
tims fell the first day. French forces under Le Seur soon retaliated, how
ever, and in January 1730, surprised the Natchez village, liberated the
captives, losing but two of their own men. This was followed by another
victory in February that scattered the Natchez tribe. Some fled westward
and some were sold as slaves, the Great Sun among them, and the Natchez
tribe no longer existed.
The Tunicas were defeated in 1763, and in 1817 the entire tribe emi-
ARCHEOLOGY AND INDIANS 59
grated to Louisiana where they intermarried with both the French and the
Negro. The Yazoo, like the Natchez, were practically annihilated by the
French, following an Indian massacre in 1729. The Biloxi, Pascagoula,
and some of the Six Town Choctaw, who had a strong attachment for the
French, followed them into Louisiana about 1764. The Chakchiuma were
practically exterminated by the combined forces of Choctaw and Chicka-
saw tribes, who had grown weary of the former tribe s continued thieving.
The few Chakchiuma who remained merged with the Chickasaw Nation in
1836.
From 1776, when English rule was challenged by the North American
Colonies, the history of the Chickasaw and Choctaw tribes is one of stead
ily giving way before advancing white settlement and steadily increasing
friction. The end was the removal of the Indians to the West between
1832 and 1834.
In 1 80 1 treaties between the United States and the Chickasaw Nation
gave the Government the right-of-way on the Natchez Trace, and in 1805
the Choctaw surrendered their south Mississippi lands. This act was the
beginning of the end. A little more than a quarter of a century later
neither the Chickasaw nor the Choctaw held any possessions east of the
Mississippi River. The year 1820 saw the Treaty of Doak s Stand; the
Treaty of Washington came in 1826; and in 1830 the Choctaw chieftains
signed the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek. This treaty removed all but a
small portion of this nation to what is now Oklahoma. On October 20,
1832, the Treaty of Pontotoc was signed between the Chickasaw Nation
and the United States. By this treaty the Chickasaw ceded all their pos
sessions in Mississippi and east of the Mississippi River and allowed
themselves to be moved to Oklahoma. It is to be noted, however, that in
Oklahoma the Chickasaw and the Choctaw formed well-defined and stable
governments. The descendants of the 3,000 Choctaw of pure blood who
refused to leave Mississippi still till the soil of their ancestors (see
Tour 12).
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The State in the Makin
An Outline of Four Centuries
Nearly a century before the Mayflower anchored at Plymouth Rock in
1620, Mississippi s history began. Spanish treasure ships linking the
western hemisphere to the dynastic empire of Charles V made the Carib
bean and the Gulf of Mexico a Spanish Main.
In 1528 Panfilo de Narvaez, armed with a grant from Charles V, landed
in Florida. Before the year was out the leader of the expedition his ships
scattered and his following reduced vanished into a Gulf storm; there
were few survivors. The expedition of Nunez Beltran Guzman two years
later fared little better. Guzman failed to discover the fabulous "seven cit
ies of Cibola," said to lie far north of Mexico City. But rumors of vast
treasures and wonderful people tempted the monk, Marcos de Niza, in
1 5 39 ; and Estevan, his Negro scout, actually sighted a formidable pueblo
of the Zuni.
In the next year, Mendoza, Viceroy of Mexico, sent Francisco Vasquez
de Coronado, with a strong force of soldiers and friendly Indians, to take
possession of the northern land, and, more particularly, of its portable
riches. Coronado found little he could carry away, and spent himself in
searching farther to the north, or northeast even to the valley of the
Platte River for Quivera, where he hoped to find a rich city. He found
merely a pastoral Indian village. Bitterly disappointed, Coronado, in 1541,
turned southward, apparently by the route that was to become the Santa Fe
Trail.
Roaming in the interior at the same time, in a vain search for gold, was
another Spanish expedition, headed by De Soto. In the summer of 1541
the Coronado and De Soto parties seemed to be within a few days march
of each other ; and Coronado, suspecting this, sent a messenger to find De
Soto. But he was unsuccessful.
De Soto comes more directly into Mississippi history. Of all the ex
plorers of that period, he, probably, was the only one to enter the region
now within the State.
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 6l
Hernando (Fernando) de Soto, of gentle birth but needy, had accom
panied Pizarro to Peru in 1531. Together, they had plundered the rich
empire of the Incas. A few years later, De Soto, now a gentleman of re
nown and possessed of vast wealth, appeared at the Spanish court "with
the retinue of a nobleman." When he asked for permission to undertake
the conquest of Florida at his own expense, King Charles V readily acqui
esced, commissioning him also as Governor of Cuba, and captain-general
of any provinces he might conquer.
After wandering through the wilds of what are now the States of Flor
ida, Georgia, and Alabama, he entered Mississippi in 1540. Somewhere
below the site of Memphis, Tennessee, he discovered the Mississippi River
in May 1541. After veering westward, De Soto, dejected and near death,
returned to the river; and upon its banks he died, May 21, 1542. His body
was buried in the waters that were to give him immortality, close to the
present site of Natchez.
After De Soto, the primeval country was not disturbed until the iyth
century. In 1673, Father Marquette and the trader Joliet, inspired by the
ambition of Louis XIV, descended the Mississippi River from the mouth
of the Wisconsin River to a point below the mouth of the Arkansas River
"from the latitude of 42 to 34" as Marquette s own narrative has it.
Their voyage prepared the way for Robert Cavelier, Sieur de la Salle, who
in 1682 followed the course of the Mississippi to its mouth and, in a
sweeping gesture, claimed the whole valley for France. In rapid succes
sion, Hennepin, Cadillac, and Tonti, among others, made further explora
tions on the river.
It was Pierre le Moyne, Sieur d Iberville, however, who founded the
first permanent white colony in the lower Mississippi Valley. Iberville,
having urged upon the French court the importance of taking possession
of La Salle s "Louisiana" and of finding an entrance to the Mississippi
from the sea, left Brest on October 24, 1698, with a commission from
Louis XIV to occupy Louisiana. Accompanying him were nearly 200 colo
nists, with whose aid in 1699 he established Fort de Maurepas at what is
now Ocean Springs. This settlement (see Tour I) was the seat of govern
ment for a territory that extended eastward to present-day Pittsburg and
westward to the present Yellowstone National Park.
Before La Salle s explorations had established France s claims to the
Mississippi Valley, however, this region had been included in the so-called
Carolina Grant made in 1629-30 to Sir Robert Heath by Kirn; Charles I
of England. In 1633 it was included in the Charles II grant to Clarendon,
Carteret, and others. Eventually a London physician, Coxe, put forth pre
62
MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
TERRITORIAL ACQUISITIONS
1801-1832
Federal Writers Project
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 63
tensions to the mouth of the Mississippi, which two English vessels \vcrc
sent to explore. But in September 1699, Jean Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de
Hicnville, brother of Sicur d lberville, encountered one of these English
ships about fifty miles from the mouth of the Mississippi. Assured that
this was not the Mississippi but a dependency of Canada belonging to the
French, the English commander left the river and the early colonization
of the region to the French. The point where this encounter occurred has
since been known as English Turn.
In 1702, England having declared war on France, the French King gave
orders to Iberville to build a fort on the Mobile River and to remove the
Fort Maurepas colony thence. Thus, in case of trouble with the English
who were moving westward from the Carolinas, the French settlers would
be near their Spanish friends at Fort Pensacola. The seat of government
was removed eighteen leagues up the river to the new fort, named Louis de
la Mobile, and the first white family arrived there in May 1702. In 1711
the settlement of Mobile was inundated, causing the removal of colonists
to the present Mobile.
Biloxi, however, was not abandoned. From this settlement Iberville
and Bienville penetrated the surrounding country, establishing trading
posts and forts, among which was Fort Rosalie founded on the bluffs
of Natchez in 1716. In 1704 twenty or more young women destined for
marriage with the colonists landed at Mobile and Ship Island Fort
Maurepas port and outer bulwark. This was the first of several shipments
of "Casket Girls," French orphans and peasants who came voluntarily
to the New World as prospective wives for the settlers. Each girl brought
with her a small "dot" and a chest containing a trousseau provided by
the government.
On September 14, 1712, Louisiana was temporarily assigned by Louis
XIV to a great French merchant and financier, Anthony Crozat, Marquis
de Chatel. It has been said that "Never in the history of the world was
such a magnificent domain, even temporarily, placed in the sole keeping
of one man." For a term of 15 years Crozat was granted a monopoly of
the trade of Louisiana. To assist and abet his agents, the troops in the
colony were placed at his disposal. All the shipping in the colony was
his, on condition that it be replaced at the end of his term. Yet "Crozat
never came to Louisiana"; and it must not be thought that Louisiana was
a populous territory when turned over to Crozat. There were a few
settlements on the Kaskaskia, \Vahash, and Illinois Rivers, but the total
number of Europeans in the whole territory was only 380.
Though Crozat was in commercial control, Bienville was Acting Gov
64 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
ernor until March 1717. Approving the site of the New Orleans as the
most favorable location for a great commercial center, he agitated for
the removal of the capital to that point, though other influences favored
Fort Rosalie. The opinion of Bienville prevailed; the village of New
Orleans was laid out in 1717 or 1718, and in 1723 the seat of govern
ment was moved to the new location.
Despairing of making his Louisiana monopoly profitable, Crozat relin
quished his charter to the King in August 1717. In that same year John
Law, Scotch adventurer and financier living in France, originated his
famous "Mississippi Scheme" to resuscitate French finances, then at low
ebb because of the wars of Louis XIV. Louisiana was believed to abound
in precious metals, and Law held that by developing the province money
would flow into France. In 1717 the Compagnie des Indes Occidentals,
commonly known as the Mississippi Company, with Law as its director,
was chartered and its shares were eagerly bought by the public. For the
exclusive privilege of developing Louisiana, the company was obligated
to introduce within 25 years 6,000 white colonists and 3,000 Negro
slaves. As a result, in 1718 grants for settlement were made on the Yazoo
River, on Bay St Louis, Pascagoula Bay, and at Natchez. In 1720 three
hundred colonists settled at Natchez; and in the following year the same
number, destined for the lands of Mme. de Chaumont, a court favorite,
arrived at Pascagoula. In 1722 a company of Germans, settlers on John
Law s grant on the Arkansas River, descended the river to a point near
New Orleans, where they made a settlement.
In 1718 Law persuaded the Duke of Orleans, regent of France, to
charter a national bank, which became the Banque Royale, with Law as
director-general. When in 1719 the Compagnie des Indes absorbed the
French East India Company, it marketed a large issue of shares which
sold at enormous premiums. The Banque Royale, the National Bank,
to keep pace with the astounding inflation of the company s stock, flooded
the country with paper money. As the stock rose, paper currency to the
face value of 2,700,000,000 livres went into circulation. But the expected
flow of wealth from Louisiana into France did not materialize.
The French Government became more and more involved in the diffi
culties of the trading company, while Law gained increasing power over
State finances. He controlled the mint, and his companies became the
receivers-general of France. In March 1720 the Compagnie des Indes
was merged with the national bank. A month later John Law, as its
head, became comptroller-general of finances. Public confidence began to
waver; shrewd financiers began to send their gold to Brussels and
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 65
London. A run on the bank caused the government to issue an edict
deflating both bank and company stock. Law sought to stave off disaster
by forbidding the export of gold and silver, and by making the hoarding
of metallic currency a crime. But in July 1720, his great financial empire
crumbled. The bank was compelled to stop payment, and Law fled from
France. He died in Vienna in 1729.
With the collapse of the "Mississippi Bubble," followed by a devastat
ing storm in the summer of 1723, began a series of troubles that eventu
ally retarded the Louisiana colony. In 1726, Bienville was recalled to
France and Perier, a harsh uncompromising character who lacked Bien-
ville s tact in dealing with the Indians, became commander-general of
Louisiana. The pressure of the colonists on the Natchez Indians led to
the massacre of the French garrison at Fort Rosalie on November 29,
1729. In retaliation, Perier virtually exterminated the Natchez tribe. In
1732, King George II of England extended British claims westward from
the Carolina Colonies to the Mississippi River, including a part of Missis
sippi in the proprietary charter of Georgia. With British support, the
warlike Chickasaw tribe blocked French expansion into northern Missis
sippi; and in a series of wars against the French under the reinstated
Bienville, this tribe successfully checked the rising fortunes of the colony.
The repulse of the French at Ackia in 1736 was the turning point.
The intrigue of the British with the Chickasaw against the French
was but one phase of the contest between France and Great Britain for
sovereignty over the far-flung territory from the mouth of the St. Lau
rence to the Gulf of Mexico. In 1762, foreseeing defeat in her struggle
with England, France ceded to Spain, New Orleans and all of the Lou
isiana territory west of the Mississippi; and the following year the Treaty
of Paris awarded to England all of France s territory east of the Mississippi
and north of a little above Baton Rouge, Louisiana. George III thereupon
supplanted Louis XV as the ruler of the valley.
The English genius for colonization, which had marked the develop
ment of the Atlantic seaboard, was demonstrated also in the settlement
of the rich agricultural lands around Natchez. Fort Rosalie under Gov
ernor George Johnstone was rebuilt and renamed Panmure. Land grants
to retired English army and navy officers, such as the Amos Ogden
Mandamus on the Homochitto River (see Tour 3, Sec. b), were the spur
to a migration of Protestants, land-loving settlers who contrasted greatly
with the Catholic remnants of the French period. When the Thirteen
Colonies revolted on the seaboard in 1776, British West Florida (includ
ing the Natchez District) remained loyal to the Crown. Its remoteness
66 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
from the center of action made it a haven for fleeing Royalists; but
anxious not to be involved in the conflict, the Natchez District gave a
promise of neutrality to James Willing, the representative sent by the
American Continental Congress. Willing, however, quickly lost the col
onists respect by stealing sections of their lands and a shipment of
supplies.
Spain, taking advantage of British preoccupation with the revolution,
re-established its authority in the Gulf country in 1779. Moving up the
river, Spanish troops took over Natchez in 1781. But Spanish rule in the
Natchez country defeated its own end. Purposely mild to attract emi
grants from the new Republic of the United States, it eventually was
overthrown by the increasing pro-American sentiment. Protestantism,
served by such zealous preachers as Richard Curtis, Samuel Swayze, and
Adam Cloud, gained on Catholicism despite the rigid Spanish laws re
garding religion.
Although British West Florida had extended north to 32 28 , by
the second Treaty of Paris in 1783, England recognized United States
claims south to the 3ist parallel. This Spain refused to do. For a period
of years, therefore, sovereignty to the land between 31 and 32 28
was under dispute, Spain claiming it by right of conquest and the United
States by right of treaty. To complicate matters further, the State of
Georgia also claimed the region by her charter of 1732, even going so
far as to organize it into the County of Bourbon in 1785 and to sell it
in the notorious "Yazoo Fraud" of 1795. By the treaty of Madrid in
1795 the dispute between the United States and Spain was theoretically
settled in favor of the former. But the Spanish took their time in evacu
ating Natchez; Andrew Ellicott, a Quaker surveyor appointed to run
the line of demarcation, was kept waiting a year on this account. When
American troops arrived in 1798, the Spanish at last evacuated their posts,
and the American flag was officially raised. By act of Congress on April
7, 1798, the Mississippi Territory was created, and the century of Old
World dominance had ended. Natchez became the first Territorial capital ;
but on February i, 1802, the seat of government was removed six miles
east to the town of Washington.
But though the shackles of Europe had fallen from the Territory, it
had still to consolidate its position. The labyrinthian complications of
disputed sovereignties to the region had been but a surface sign of deeper
conflicts which lay inherent in the people who composed its population.
On the Gulf Coast were descendants of French settlers; around Natchez
was a small but influential group of Englishmen whose allegiance to
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 67
the Republic was grudging; new settlers, with antecedents in the older
Colonies, were independence incarnate. These people, not yet knit into
the fabric of American life and economically remote from the seaboard,
were divided by old allegiances and easily swayed by the power of a
personality. Their only bond was a common hatred of Spain, a hatred
intensified when that country, in July 1802, forbade any land grants to
American citizens, and in October of the same year closed the port of
New Orleans to American goods. Neither the opening of the port in
March 1803 nor the Louisiana Purchase a month later, diminished the
settlers common opposition to Spain. When crises arose, the unity of
the Territory was maintained not by allegiance to the United States but
by an intense distrust of foreigners that acted as a nucleus for policy
formation.
Following consummation of the Louisiana Purchase in April 1803,
the opening of the Mississippi River, and the cession of western lands by
the State of Georgia, a land boom swept Mississippi. On March 3, 1803,
Congress passed a measure providing for a survey of the Territory; the
surveyor-general s office was established at Washington, Mississippi, with
Isaac Briggs as the first incumbent ; and, following the traditional national
urge for land, people began to pour into Mississippi from the eastern areas,
including New England.
An example of anti-Spanish sentiment was the response to Aaron Burr s
expedition in 1806. Presented to the residents as a scheme to occupy Span
ish territory and perhaps create a new state in the Southwest, Burr s plans
were blocked only by the duplicity of James Wilkinson and an alignment
of national politics that found President Jefferson taking the role of Burr s
chief accuser. However, when Burr surrendered to Mississippi authorities
in January 1807, and was awaiting trial at Washington, the Territorial cap
ital, leaders of the community vied with one another for the honor of en
tertaining him as their guest.
Following the cession of Louisiana in 1803, Spain held the Baton Rouge
and Manchac districts, lying between New Orleans and the Natchez dis
trict, and also the coast region, formerly under the government of Mobile.
All this territory was formerly French Louisiana, and the American Gov
ernment was making claims to it as a part of the French concession. The
Kemper brothers, who then were living near Pinckncyvillc, initiated
the first open and organized rebellion against Spanish authority. The
Kcmper movement, the plot to capture Mobile, and the operations of
Aaron Burr were all connected, and all hastened the actual annexation of
the territory to the United States. The Kempers raised the flag of revolu-
68
MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
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"jT*^! 6>*wmio\ / /^ w \ ,
MISSISSIPPI IN 1817
The Year of Statehood
Federal Writers Project
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 69
tion in the Baton Rouge district. The United States claimed that under the
French title the Sabine River was the western boundary of its territory,
and that beyond this stream began the Spanish province of Texas. The
Spanish claimed a line east of the Sabine, at the Arroyo Hondo, halfway
between Natchitoches and Adeas. In October 1805 small detachments of
Spanish troops crossed the Sabine and occupied the Arroyo Hondo line.
Under orders from Washington, American troops advanced, and the Span
ish retired beyond the Sabine. But late in the summer of 1806, Spanish
troops again advanced east of the Sabine. In October General Wilkinson
effected a truce, and the Spanish retired beyond the Sabine "pending the
negotiations between the United States and Spain." But some time passed
and there was still no agreement. The continued occupation of the Baton
Rouge district by Spanish authorities was becoming more and more un
bearable to the American settler. Throughout much of 1809, border war
fare was waged. In the summer of 1810, settlers meetings at Baton Rouge
proposed the adoption of a constitutional government. The Spanish gover
nor sent to Pensacola for reinforcements. The American party gathered its
forces and on September 23, 1810, attacked and captured the Spanish fort
at St. Francisville. The town of Baton Rouge surrendered, the Spanish
troops and civil authorities being allowed to retire to Pensacola.
An American convention immediately assembled, and proclaimed "the
Territory of West Florida a free and independent State." A constitution
was adopted and a government organized under the name of "the Free
State of Florida." On October n, 1810, the convention applied to the
United States for admission as a State into the Union. On October 27,
President Madison issued a proclamation empowering Governor Claiborne
of the "Territory of New Orleans" to take possession of West Florida.
The territory south of Mississippi Territory eastward to Perdido River had
been conveyed to the United States as a part of the Louisiana Purchase.
Governor Claiborne was instructed that if military forces were needed to
establish his jurisdiction in that area they would be supplied. Accompanied
by military, the Governor went to Baton Rouge, and by proclamation de
clared West Florida the "Territory of Orleans." Mobile, not included in
this territory, was held by the Spanish until the War of 1812. During that
war British alliance with northern Indian tribes under Tecumseh was out-
maneuvered by the friendly Choctaw chieftain, Pushmataha. The Creek up
risings brought active service for the Mississippi Militia over a considerable
period. The first engagement was the battle at Burnt Corn (then in Missis
sippi, now in Alabama) on July 17, 1813; and on August 30 a massacre
at Fort Mimms shocked the country. Immediately Andrew Jackson organ-
70 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
ized a company of Tennessee volunteers to avenge the outrage and wage a
campaign against the Creek Nation. Fighting with Jackson against the
Creeks was the youthful Sam Houston. In 1814 a British fleet overwhelmed
a small American force off Bay St. Louis in the last naval engagement of
the war; but this defeat was avenged by the victory of New Orleans, in
which Mississippi troops played a prominent part.
The same spirit of independence that had shaken off European claims
to the territory was manifested in the quarrel between the people and their
appointed Territorial governors, the conflict being especially pronounced
during the Sargent administration. By 1810 the Territory was clamoring
for statehood; and in 1817 the western portion was admitted to the Union
by act of Congress on December 10, as the State of Mississippi.
During the Territorial period, when political unity was being achieved, a
cotton boom had given the people a basis for economic unity. The high
price of cotton and the low price of land drew from the older South (the
Piedmont principally) the "Great Migration" that was to complete the set
tlement of Mississippi and annex it to the cotton kingdom.
The changes wrought by this influx of new people between 1817 and
1832 are politically enshrined in the State constitutions of these years. The
first constitution was written by George Poindexter, an exceptionally bril
liant lawyer who represented the Whigs of the State, and was a reflection
of the conservative if not actually aristocratic character of the Natchez dis
trict planters. The convention adopting this constitution assembled July 7,
1817, at the Methodist meeting house in Washington (see Tour 3, Sec. b).
Cowles Mead, a Virginian who had migrated from Georgia, proposed that
the new State be called Washington. His proposal received 17 votes, as
against 23 for the name of Mississippi. By 1832 the State contained many
small farmers, Jacksonian Democrats steeped in Jacksonian principles ; and
the constitution adopted in that year was in many respects the most demo
cratic State constitution of the time. It even provided for an elective
judiciary.
The feverish pressure of the immigrants who followed the westward
moving cotton boom drove the Indians out of Mississippi. The treaty of
Doak s Stand in 1820 opened 5,500,000 acres of Choctaw land to white
settlement, and resulted in an immediate influx of population. By 1829,
however, only about one-third of the tract had been sold to settlers or spec
ulators; it was claimed that the Indians possessed the "fat of the land." As
only about half the land of the State was open to white settlers, many de
manded that the Indians yield all their territory and move westward. By
the treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek in 1830, the Choctaw Nation ceded to
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 71
the United States "the entire country they own and possess east of the Mis
sissippi River; and they agree to move beyond the Mississippi River as
early as practicable." In 1832 the Chickasaw ceded their lands in northern
Mississippi. These accessions not only rounded out the State geograph
ically, but were evidences of the peculiar nature of the early cotton
economy, which made free and easily cultivated land a prerequisite to
wealth. One tangible evidence of this wealth was the opening of the
State University at Oxford in 1848. Significantly, Oxford was one of the
towns that sprang into being almost in the center of the newly acquired
lands.
Loyal to King Cotton, Mississippians justified their expansionist senti
ments by chivalric military and oratorical exploits in the struggle for
Texas independence and admission to the Union. This struggle was cli
maxed by the War with Mexico in 1846. Robert J. Walker and Henry S.
Foote, orators, John A. Quitman and Jefferson Davis, soldiers, were the
leading expansionists of the period. These men more than any others kept
the slave States on an equality with the North in the race for possession of
a continent.
When the election of 1860 forced the issue between union and seces
sion, economic interests molded the political alignments in Mississippi.
The older and wealthy families, loath to trust their fortunes to an untried
government, were for the Union, and so were the poorer people or yeo
manry. The great middle class, however, was for secession. By their num
bers, ability, and reckless courage, they swept the Whigs and yeomen with
them into withdrawal from the Union. On January 9, 1861, they made
Mississippi the second State of the Confederacy.
The fact that Jefferson Davis, a resident of Mississippi, was President
of the Confederacy drew the State particularly close to the new govern
ment. Lingering doubts as to the righteousness of the southern cause were
lost in the roar of cannon that followed the capture of Fort Sumter. The
State threw its resources into the war magnificently ; at Manassas five regi
ments of Mississipians participated as units of the Army of Virginia.
During the first year of war, activity in Mississippi was chiefly of a
preparatory sort. But the year 1862 brought the war closer home. Union
forces concentrated on two primary objectives in the State: Vicksburg and
with it, control of the Mississippi River, and the isolation of Mississippi
troops from arms and supplies. In April the first military invasion of the
State began. After the Federal victory at Shiloh, General Hal leek led 100,-
ooo troops against Corinth, and made northeastern Mississippi a battle
ground for the remainder of the year. Hard fighting took place at Corinth,
PORTER S FLEET PASSING THE CONFEDERATE BATTERIES AT VICKSBURG
luka, and Holly Springs, with General Grant moving stubbornly south
ward toward Vicksburg. This prolonged campaign against Vicksburg and
the dogged defense of the city were the most important military maneu
vers in the State (see Vicksburg, Holly Springs, Tours 2, 3, 4, and 17).
After the fall of the city on July 4, 1863, the greater part of the Con
federate field forces were transferred to other States, with only cavalry
under Generals Stephen D. Lee and Nathan B. Forrest remaining to pro
tect the people from raids and to hamper General Sherman in his march
across the State. The devastation brought by this march was summed up by
Sherman himself: "The wholesale destruction is terrible to contemplate."
The disruption of normal habits of life caused by the armies in Missis
sippi is reflected in the hurried and frequent changes of capitals during the
war from Jackson to Enterprise to Meridian, back to Jackson, back to
Meridian, thence to Columbus, to Macon, and finally back again to Jack
son.
In the four years of war, Mississippi contributed approximately 80,000
men to the Confederate armies, including 5 major generals and 29 briga
dier generals. Of the 80,000, fewer than 20,000 were "present or accounted
for" on April 2, 1865. The supplies of food and arms provided by the
State cannot be estimated. It is significant that the 80,000 Mississippi en
listments were greater than the State s total number of white males be-
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 73
tween the ages of 18 and 45 cited in the 1860 census. Such an amazing
contribution of a State s man-power to war has had few equals in modern
tunes. When hostilities ceased, Mississippi was a ruin.
After the fall of the Confederacy, Governor Charles Clark called a spe
cial session of the legislature to meet in Jackson on May 18, 1865. But the
legislature had no more than assembled when word came that General Os-
band, commander of a brigade of Negro troops, had received orders for
the members arrest. The legislature hastily adjourned. General Osband s
arrest of Governor Clark on a charge of high treason ushered in the dis
order of the Reconstruction Period. This period was so shameful and con
fused that, for Mississippians, the term "ante bellum" assumed by contrast
a halcyon significance that not even the war had given it, and one that
clung to it long after the term had lost meaning for the North.
Judge William L. Sharkey, an old-line Whig appointed Provisional
Governor by President Johnson, called an election for a constitutional con
vention, the first to meet in the South under the President s reconstruction
policy. The convention, meeting in August, 1865, was composed of 70
Whigs and 18 Democrats, as compared with the 84 Democrats and 25
Whigs of the Secession Convention. The Constitution of Mississippi was
amended to abolish slavery. At the general election called by the conven
tion, General Benjamin G. Humphreys, a Whig and Union man who had
served in the Army of Virginia, was selected as Governor. He was in
augurated in October 1865.
A special session of the legislature held in 1866-67 refused to ratify the
1 3th and i4th Amendments to the United States Constitution. The Na
tional Congress retaliated in March 1867 by placing Mississippi in the
Fourth Military District, under the command of Major General E. O. C.
Ord, whose use of Negro troops was especially repugnant to Mississip
pians. In 1868, General Alva C. Gillem, commander of the military sub-
district of Mississippi, called a constitutional convention. At that time, 60,-
167 Negro and 46,636 white males were registered as voters. This "Black
and Tan" convention submitted a constitution to the people in June, but it
was defeated and General Humphreys was returned to the Governor s
chair. General Irwin McDowell (who had replaced Ord) issued a military
order for the removal of Humphreys from the executive offices and man
sion, and began a regime in which all civil government was ended. In
1869 all persons who had been associated with the Confederacy were dis
qualified as officeholders and their places filled with Negroes, "carpetbag
gers," and "scalawags."
When President Grant ordered the constitution, with certain objection-
74 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
able features omitted, to be resubmitted to the people in November 1869,
the faction of the Republican Party headed by James L. Alcorn, a former
Whig and the faction s candidate for Governor, rode into power with the
ratification of the constitution. In February 1870, Mississippi was readmit
ted to the Union as a State.
Governor Alcorn s troubles with a legislature containing 35 Negroes
were emphasized when the panic of 1873 caused further distress in the
State. In the gubernatorial campaign of that year, Adelbert V. Ames, with
solid Negro support, defeated Alcorn in an election that marked the cli
max of Negro rule. Out of 152 seats in the legislature, 64 were held by
Negroes and 24 by "carpetbaggers"; the Lieutenant Governor, the Secre
taries of State, Immigration, and Agriculture, and the Superintendent of
Education as well as nearly all local officeholders, were Negroes. In char
acter with any political movement that suddenly raises a submerged class to
power, the Ames administration was marked by extravagance and corrup
tion. It intensified the post-war hardships of Mississippi to an almost
unbearable degree.
In the exceptionally bitter campaign of 1875, one in which acts of ter
rorism were committed by both parties, a coalition party of Democrats and
Whigs under the leadership of L. Q. C. Lamar (then a Congressman, later
a member of the Cabinet, and eventually a Justice of the United States Su
preme Court), James Z. George (later Chief Justice of Mississippi and
United States Senator), Edward C. Walthall (who succeeded Lamar as
United States Senator, and was in turn succeeded by William V. Sullivan)
and John M. Stone (later Governor), aided by Alcorn s white Republicans,
defeated the Ames administration in 62 out of 74 counties. The first act of
the new legislature was to investigate the State officials. The impeached
Negro Superintendent of Education was first to resign. The Negro Lieuten
ant Governor was convicted on an impeachment charge in March 1876 and
removed from office. Under fire of impeachment charges, Governor Ames
resigned March 29, and was succeeded in office by the President of the
Senate, John M. Stone.
The Constitution of 1890 gave white supremacy the force of legal sanc
tion by restricting Negro suffrage under a system of apportionment of rep
resentatives in counties heavily populated by whites, and by an educational
clause later used as a model in other southern States. Since 1875 only
the Democratic Party has held political power in Mississippi.
For many years poignant memories of the war and Reconstruction
Period influenced the political thoughts of Mississippi voters. Until 1890
they held loyally to their former Confederate leaders as post-war political
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 75
captains. But with white supremacy safely entrenched by the constitution
of 1890, political alignments reflected the diverse interests and sympathies
of Mississippi classes. Within the party a split developed between the
older, once-great leaders and the younger, newly empowered masses a
split that echoed the early nineteenth century break between Whigs and
Democrats. This schism also reflected the changed economic position of
the once wealthy planters. Deprived of their mainstay of Negro labor,
with capital gone, and unused to farm work, many of them moved from
their plantations into the county seats, where they lived precariously from
rents and sales of their land.
The smaller farmer, a man schooled in hatred both of the class above
him and of the Negro who threatened competition with him, took over
piecemeal the former plantations. Aided by the new tool of a political
election primary, the members of this group broke up the closed circle of
planter leadership by elevating their "Great White Chief," James K.
Vardaman, to the governorship in 1904. Since that time the small farmer
class has constituted the politically potent majority of the electorate.
The legislature of 1900 provided appropriations for the building of a
new State capitol. This structure was completed in 1903 at a cost of more
than a million dollars, and here inaugural ceremonies for Governor Varda
man were held.
With Vardaman the old order changed. Legislation of the period of
1904-25 is indicative of a growing social consciousness. Bills were passed
providing for the establishment of county agricultural high schools for
whites (1908) and a State normal college (1910); for regulation of
child labor (1912); for the consolidation of rural schools (1916); for
the establishment of an illiteracy commission (1916), a State commission
of education (1924), and a State library commission (1926). Though
broadening its concepts of the highest good of the people as a whole,
Mississippi remained rooted in conservatism. In 1904 the "Jim Crow"
Law was passed; in 1908 the importation and sale of intoxicating liquor
were prohibited; and in 1926 the teaching of evolution in State schools
was forbidden.
President Wilson s declaration of war upon Germany was ratified by the
State on April 6, 1917. At Payne Field, Clay County, in May 1918, one
of the earliest aviation schools of the war was established, and here ap
proximately 1,500 men received instruction during the course of the war.
To Camp Shelby, established in 1917 in Forrest County, came recruits
from every part of the United States; one of the chief mobilization cen
ters for all branches of the Army, Camp Shelby at its peak of activity
j6 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
had 60,000 soldiers in training. At the close of the war, the records
showed that Mississippi had provided approximately 66,000 men to the
United States Army and Navy, and had contributed nearly $80,000,000
in Liberty Loans.
The most disastrous flood recorded in the history of the Mississippi
River swept the Delta in April 1927, taking a heavy toll in lives and
property. For years, since the ante-bellum settlements of the Lake Wash
ington region and the post-war opening of the land north of this area,
flood control had been first in charge of individuals, then under authority
of county and district levee boards. After the 1927 flood, the National Con
gress accepted the problem as a matter of national concern; and on May
5, 1928, the Flood Control Act, launched in the lower house of Congress
by William Whittington of Washington County, Mississippi, was passed.
This act removed the burden of flood control from the people and placed
it under the direction of the Corps of Engineers of the United States
Army, appropriating $325,000,000 to be expended in the work. The
Army engineers established a laboratory for scientific study of the Missis
sippi River and its currents (see Tour 2), then began to heighten and
strengthen levees, dig cut-offs, and build reservoirs. In 1936 an additional
$272,000,000 was added to the sum remaining under the 1928 act. The
success of the control measures was proved in 1937 when the great crest
sent down the Mississippi by the Ohio River s history-making flood was
held in bounds, leaving the Delta unharmed.
Though Mississippi is still one of the most predominantly agricultural
States in the Union, there are indications that its one-sided preoccupa
tions with cotton farming is changing. Some of the evidences of change
are more than a century old; others are so recent that they have not yet
been assayed. The first major break was the development of a large-scale
lumber and timber-product industry in southern Mississippi s Piney Woods.
Coming with the building of railroads through the forests (a project for
which Captain William Hardy was largely responsible) at the turn of the
century, this industry set a new pattern of livelihood. The small stock-
raisers and one-horse cotton farmers became sawmill hands, and the largest
yeomanry section of the State was raised to a position of economic power.
But with the exhaustion of its virgin timber reserves, the Piney Woods
region is faced with the problem of returning either to small-crop cotton
farming or to such things as cattle and fruit raising, and the making of
pulpwood products (see INDUSTRY and COMMERCE).
Another break in the habitual "one-crop" way of life came with the
march of the boll weevil across the State in 1909. The dismay caused by
AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES 77
this pest prompted a movement for agricultural diversification, which was
accelerated in 1931 by the crisis in cotton prices. This diversification
brought the tomato and cabbage raising industry to the trucking section,
and the dairying plants to the Black Prairie. Greatly reenforced by the
campaign of soil conservation, this movement has resulted in many other
agricultural activities to supplement cotton growing (see AGRICUL
TURE).
After the World War, falling land values, due to low cotton prices and
exhaustion of the Piney Woods timber, had a disastrous effect upon the
revenues of the State. In the late 1920*5 and early 1930*5, the budget could
not be balanced. Governor Theodore G. Bilbo made several attempts to
provide additional tax revenues, but a hostile legislature blocked each
measure. When, in January 1932, Sennett M. Conner took office as Gov
ernor, pledged to the passage of a sales tax, the deficit amounted to
$13,486,760. On May i, the sales tax bill, providing a two percent tax
on all purchases, became a law; and before the end of 1935 the deficit
had been wiped out, with the State s treasury showing a cash balance of
more than $1,200,000. During the first two years of operation, the tax cost
the average citizen approximately ten cents a month, though it increased
the State s income approximately 25 percent.
The legislature of 1932 also provided for the reduction of the property
tax levy by empowering the Governor, upon recommendations of the State
auditor, State treasurer, and chairman of the tax commission, to cut the
levy as much as 50 percent whenever the State s financial condition justi
fied such action. Continuing its policy of lifting the tax burden from home
owners, the legislature of 1934 exempted from State taxes homesteads
valued up to $1,000, and provided for personal property exemptions. In
1935 the homestead exemption was raised to $2,500. Approximately 90
percent of the State s home owners are exempt from State property taxes
(1938). At the head of the State Tax Commission is Alfred H. Stone,
president of the National Association of Tax Administrators.
During the last decade Mississippi has witnessed a development that
may prove more potent than either lumber or the boll weevil in shifting
the State s economic interests to activities other than cotton. The Ten
nessee Valley Authority, established by Congress in 1934, supplemented
the earlier electric transmission systems in the State. These lines and
the opening of a natural gas field at Jackson in 1930 provide two of
the links that had been missing in the chain of industrial development. In
a State that heretofore has failed to process its raw materials, the coming
of low-cost power and fuel may well initiate an industrial revolution.
MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
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COUNTIES OF MISSISSIPPI
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TRANSPORTATION 79
In 1936 Hugh L. White was elected Governor on a pledge "to balance
agriculture with industry." Under his leadership, the legislature of that
year authorized municipalities to issue bonds for the purpose of erecting
plant buildings for industrial enterprises, and to exempt from ad valorem
taxation for five years certain classes of industrial enterprise. Under this
program, Mississippi is undergoing an industrial development that, meas
ured by statistics, is remarkable. If these signs can be taken as auguries of
the future, Mississippi s agrarian way of life may soon be fundamentally
altered.
Transportation
The story of Mississippi s social and economic development can be out
lined in its history of transportation.
Except for the marches of Hernando De Soto in 154041, travel in the
exploration period was by water. Along the Coast, in the sixteenth century,
conquistador es sailed in search of gold. In the seventeenth century, after
France had won the Great Lakes and Quebec was built, French priests and
royageurs paddled their canoes in a great arc around the English seaboard
colonies and pushed toward the center of the continent. La Salle, Tonti,
and Fathers Davion and Montigny descended the Mississippi to its mouth.
In 1699 D Iberville and Bienville planted the first permanent colony at
old Biloxi.
In like manner, the early settlements either hugged the coast line Pas-
cagoula, Pass Christian, and Bay St. Louis or, gravitated upstream to
the better land, the river banks. Natchez developed on the Mississippi
River upstream from New Orleans. On the Pearl, Simon Favre made his
settlement well up the river and, later, John Ford (see Tour 13) settled
upstream from him. On the Pascagoula, the voyageurs who intended to
farm left the lower harbor to hunters and fishermen and moved above the
marsh. Of the river settlements, however, those on the Mississippi were
more numerous, more important, and wealthier.
Although they were overshadowed by the Mississippi, the State s other
TOWBOAT ON THE MISSISSIPPI
streams experienced a like development. An 1825 map revealing the
Natchez district well established, with an organized county government,
also indicates settlements on the Pearl and the Pascagoula. From Ford s
on the Pearl, the settlements moved up the valley to Columbia (second
capital of the State), then to Monticello (home of two governors in the
1830 $), and at last to Jackson, the State capital. Pearlington, built on
hummocks of solid land where the Pearl meets the Gulf, was the trading
post for cotton and lumber shipped down by flatboat. On the fan-shaped
section drained by the Pascagoula tributaries were Augusta and Win
chester.
The map of 1825 shows settlements along the Tombigbee River, en
tirely separate and over 200 miles from Natchez. The Tombigbee rises in
north Mississippi, one fork in the foothills of the Tennessee and the other
on the slopes east of Pontotoc Ridge. From the junction of the forks,
near Amory, the river was formerly navigable to Mobile. Thus Cotton Gin
Port, Plymouth, West Port, Columbus, and Aberdeen developed much as
the Mississippi River settlements.
Roughly, from the iy8o s to 1900, life on the Mississippi was a suc
cession of growth, decline, and renewed growth. First was the transition
from canoes to clumsy, raft-like cargo boats, overbalancing traffic upstream
from New Orleans with that coming down from the Ohio. The river
routes to Natchez from the eastern States were the Ohio and the Ten-
TRANSPORTATION 8l
nessee joined to the Mississippi. From Pittsburg on the Ohio and Fort
Chissel at the headwaters of the Tennessee, the pioneers floated down
stream toward New Orleans. After 1781, when the Spanish took over
Natchez, its interests for a decade were associated with New Orleans;
during the 1790*5, however, the upper country became more important to
its development. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 started the great mi
gration; and as the lands along the Ohio filled with settlers, more of
them came down the Mississippi. The flatboats they used were heavy forts
set on barges which carried them with their provisions and livestock.
In 1798 the force of American penetration into the Natchez district
was sufficient to drive out the Spaniards. At approximately the same time,
the planters shifted from tobacco to cotton. The resulting pressure of im
migration and traffic was increased greatly; cotton demanded an outlet
to a world market, and the Mississippi served as the connecting link from
Natchez, just as it became the trade route between that city and the upper
valley. The combined pressure of people and goods required the opening
of the port of New Orleans, and influenced the purchase of the Louisiana
Territory from France in 1803 (see OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES).
Until 1811 keelboats and broadhorns brought the produce downstream.
Then a new phase of traffic began, when the New Orleans, built by Fulton,
became the first steamboat to navigate the river. The New Orleans made
the trip despite the earthquakes which in places reversed the current of
the Mississippi. The Comet and the Vesuvius followed, and steam domina
tion became an actuality when Henry Shreve s Washington, in 1817, made
the trip from New Orleans to Louisville in 25 days. The lines of the
Washington foretold the familiar Mississippi River type of boat double
decks, with high-pressure engines raised to allow a shallow broad hull.
The introduction of steam brought to a close the career of the profes
sional flatboatman, whose responsibility it was to get the pioneer and his
family past shoal water and snags, Indians and outlaws. The dangers and
the rough work of manning the sweeps demanded a rough man, one who
could in a moment become "a combination of rubber ball, wildcat, and a
shrieking maniac." He was a "ring-tailed roarer"; like his legendary hero,
Mike Fink, he could "outrun, outhop, outjump, throw down, drag out,
and lick any man in the country" (see VICKSBURG).
As the splendid, embellished steamer overshadowed the rough flatboat,
so the gambler with ruffled shirt, gaudy vest, Paris boots, and easy man
ner overshadowed the flatboatman. The gamblers, unlike the pilots (who
were a race apart), were part and tradition of a steamer s life. Captains
were superstitious about leaving a wharf without one of them on board.
82 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
In their heyday, from 1835 to the War between the States, nearly 1,000
gamblers worked the big boats between St. Louis and New Orleans.
The commerce that made the gambler possible hints at the luxury the
steamers afforded. The cotton planter, with his agent or factor in New
Orleans and almost unlimited credit, had money or credit for gambling,
and the steamers catered to his taste. On his frequent trips down the river
to New Orleans, he was offered the best of food, a library, a bar, a news
paper printed on board, and a gaming room.
As the speed and service of the steamers improved, the river grew in
importance. Grand Gulf at the mouth of the Big Black tributary, Vicks-
burg at the mouth of the Yazoo, and the inland shipping points, on the
sluggish streams that cut the Delta s swamps and backed into the hills,
were growing towns. Leota Landing brought the boats close to beautiful
Lake Washington (see Side Tour 3A), and from Greenville to the lake
there stand ante-bellum homes marking the settlement of the oldest sec
tion of the Delta. Yazoo City and Greenwood (originally Williams Land
ing) on the Yazoo, Grenada on the Yalobusha, and old Wyatt at the head
of navigation on the Tallahatchie, were the far inland towns serviced by
boats from the Mississippi. Across the swampy and thickly forested Delta,
steamboats could at high water leave the Mississippi at Yazoo Pass and
float across the submerged bottoms to the Coldwater. There they could
swing down the Tallahatchie to its confluence with the Yalobusha. From
that point they would follow the Yazoo past Greenwood and Yazoo City,
meeting the Mississippi again at Vicksburg.
Coasting trade was a characteristic of river transportation just before
the war. The fast, errand-running steamer, which could stop anywhere
along the bank at any time to deliver a fan, a doll, a bottle of New
Orleans bourbon, or a keg of nails, supplanted the slow "storeboat" of
flatboat days, and aided greatly in making New Orleans the shopping
center of the lower valley. A less obvious result of the errand-running
steamer was the stifling of local trade. Only Natchez and Vicksburg were
able to rise permanently above the village status, because they were con
venient way stations. The other towns along the river either caved into the
stream, like one-half of Grand Gulf, or were pushed inland by a changing
whim of the current, like the other half of Grand Gulf; they were de
serted, to rot in the sun. Riverbank dwellers who were neither planters
nor customers became woodcutters to feed the smoke-belching steamers.
The rivers were the first travel routes because they were the easier paths
to follow. Only a few Indian paths and buffalo trails, seldom more than
a foot or two wide, were cut through the wilderness ; and these had to fol-
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84 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
low the ridges almost slavishly to escape the water-choked bogs in the
stream bottoms.
At the time of the great migration of flatboats on the Mississippi,
and until the use of steam, roughly the period 1800-20, the State s roads
suddenly became important and were rapidly developed. Their importance
lay in furnishing the only route for boatmen to return to the Ohio and
Tennessee. The flatboats never came back ; they could not, with their bulk,
be poled against the current; and once downstream they usually were
scrapped and sold as lumber. This created a demand for a road over which
the boatmen could return from New Orleans to the Tennessee River. The
first and most famous of these roads was the Natchez Trace, developed
from an Indian trail which followed the watershed from Natchez north
eastward between the Big Black and the Pearl to the foothills of the
Pontotoc Ridge. There it left the divide and struck more eastwardly across
the Tombigbee, meeting the Tennessee near Muscle Shoals.
The Trace ran through the wilderness and the country of the Choctaw
and Chickasaw, two powerful Indian tribes. In 1801 Gen. James Wilkin
son, commander at Fort Adams (see Side Tour 3B), made treaties with
these tribes. They granted the United States the right to lay out a wagon
road "between the settlements of Mero district in ... Tennessee, and those
of Natchez in the Mississippi Territory." The work of widening the trail
was done by United States soldiers. The treaties, however, permitted the
Indians to retain the inns and "necessary ferries over the watercourses
crossed by the said road." Described as a post road, it was placed under
the direction of the Post Office Department and given an appropriation for
improvement in 1806. It was to be the making of the Southwest. Mail
carriers, traders, boatmen, and supercargoes from New Orleans followed it
north ; an increasing stream of settlers afoot and on horseback traveled on
it south to the new Eldorado of the lower Mississippi Valley.
Truth and imagination are inextricably interwoven in the story of the
Trace. It was for 300 miles a wilderness road, yet all who passed that way
carried with them much or all of their fortune. Approaching, the horse
men bore the "stake" to set them up in the new Territory; returning, they
carried the proceeds of cotton and other sales. To fasten on this stream
of wealth came the outlaws who formerly infested the river: the Harpes,
Mason, Hare, and the Murrell gang. Together they branded the early
nineteenth century as the "outlaw years," and until 1835 they made the
Trace as dark and bloody as Daniel Boone and his followers had found
Kentucky.
The Harpes were the first. Shunned as abnormal by other outlaws, they
TRANSPORTATION 85
became the scourge of the frontier from the Cumberland to the Missis
sippi. The head of "Big" Harpc, severed from his body by vigilantes, left
his name upon the spot where it was fastened in a tree near the junction
of the Cumberland and the Ohio.
Mason, a supercriminal, physically brave but morally weak, was the
soldier turned outlaw. His robbery of Colonel Baker in 1801, his first on
the Trace, gave the victim s name to Baker s Creek west of Jackson (see
Tour 2). Two years later Mason was tomahawked by two of his former
followers, and his head, "rolled in blue clay to prevent putrefaction," was
carried to Natchez for the reward. But even in death he was to end the
career of "Little" Harpe, one of the two who had tomahawked him.
Harpe, long in hiding after his brother s death, was recognized as he
tried to claim the reward. He escaped with his companion, but was re
captured at old Greenville, on the Trace 20 miles north of Natchez, and
there hanged (see Tour 3, Sec. b).
Joseph Thompson Hare, the hoodlum, was among the first who shrewdly
saw the possibilities of banditry on the Trace. The Trace made him
rich, but moody. In its wilderness he went to pieces, saw visions, was
captured, and hanged.
Murrell was the last. In him the passion of the others rose high enough
to envisage empire. He was a student of crime, not a bandit. But the
Trace no longer crossed a wilderness when he was caught and convicted of
the crime of stealing Negroes. With him the dread of wilderness and its
major outlaws ended.
But there were other roads. From Natchez they spread like rays from
the sun. South to New Orleans the Trace travelers could follow two paths,
besides El Camino Real (Sp., King s Highway), to Fort Adams: one
through Woodville, the other cutting across country southeast through
Liberty. Eastward from Natchez the Three-Chopped Way, so called be
cause it was blazed with three notches cut in the trail-marking trees, ran
to Fort St. Stephens on the lower Tombigbee and to Fort Stoddert in
Georgia. It was the first road to bridge the eastern and western parts of
the Mississippi Territory, and one of the earliest roads in the Southwest,
having been opened prior to 1807. Cutting across a myriad of streams, it
broke the rule of roads "riding the ridges" by having "causeways across all
boggy guts and branches." From Natchez it passed through Monticello
and Winchester. Later, along its side or nearby, grew Mcadville, Mount
Carmel, and Ellisville.
From the Natchez Trace, branch trails led to the river towns of Bruins-
burg, Warrenton, and Walnut Hills (later Vicksburg). From the region
IN THE 1830 S
of what is now Pontotoc, an old Indian path led southeast past Lochinvar
(see Tour 12) and along the divide west of Cotton Gin Port to Waverly
on the Tombigbee (see Tour 4). It was probably along this path that De
Soto marched across the prairie.
In 1810 the United States opened a road from Cotton Gin Port to Col
bert s Ferry on the Tennessee just below Muscle Shoals. This road, named
Games Trace for the surveyor who negotiated for it with the Indians,
rivals the Natchez Trace for historical interest. From Fort St. Stephens,
the Federal Government engaged in a bitter struggle for Indian trade
against the Spanish posts at Mobile and Pensacola, but it was harassed by
the duties and delayed shipments of supplies for which the Spanish
revenue authorities at Mobile were responsible. To offset these handicaps
supplies were shipped from Pittsburg down the Ohio and up the Ten
nessee to the shoals, across the divide to Cotton Gin Port on the Tom
bigbee, and down to Fort St. Stephens. The wagon road from Colbert s
Ferry to Cotton Gin Port thus became an important artery of travel and
trade.
Another road of importance was the old Jackson Military Road, au-
I
IN THE 1930 S
thorized by Congress in 1816, and completed in 1820. Andrew Jackson s
troubles in his Creek campaign with the canebrakes and marshes of south
Mississippi, and his fight with the British at New Orleans in 1815, were
probably the compelling forces behind the road s construction. Built from
Muscle Shoals for military purposes, it ran through Columbus southwest,
penetrated the uninhabited Piney Woods, passed close to Columbia, and
ended at Lake Pontchartrain. The road permitted a shorter route between
Nashville and New Orleans than the Natchez Trace. The first telegraph
line and the first stage line between these cities came into operation along
this road.
Between the Natchez Trace and the Jackson Military Road about 1820
grew a well-traveled trail known as the Robinson Road, crossing the Tom-
bigbee at Columbus, and running through Indian country past what is
now Louisville to Doak s Stand, joining the Natchez Trace near the Choctaw
Agency. As early as 1823 the Federal Government appropriated consider
able sums to improve it, as did the Mississippi Legislature in 1824. Al
though its terminus was some ten miles north of the capital at Jackson,
the Robinson Road was for a number of years the only direct route from
Jackson to the populous settlements along the Tombigbee.
From the same Tombigbee settlements other roads were to develop. As
88 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
Memphis grew in importance, the old trail joining Cotton Gin Port to
Pontotoc was made to connect with it through Lafayette Springs, across the
Tallahatchie near the head of navigation, and on through Holly Springs.
A trail led west from Pontotoc (probably along the divide between the
Yocona and the Yalobusha) to the Delta, near what is now Charleston,
and through the Delta s swamps and lakes by a marvelously circuitous
route to the Mississippi in what has become Bolivar County. It was known
as Indian Charlie s Trace.
These roads began as feeders to the river settlements and, in the early
period of the nineteenth century, were subsidiary to river transportation. But
their gradual extension was evidence of a growth away from the streams.
With the first mail carried over the Natchez Trace (about 1796), the inte
rior began to assume importance ; and with the successive Indian cessions of
1820, 1830, and 1832 (themselves evidences of pressure of white popula
tion in the interior), the State was rounded out. No longer were the set
tlements strung solely along the streams.
The story of the railroads is similar. Constructed as feeders to the
river, by the 1830*5 they experienced a vigorous extensive growth. Like
the roads, they made possible the development of the great stretches of
territory between and apart from the watercourses.
Of the plantation settlements in southwestern Mississippi in the 1830*5,
only Woodville lacked a creek on which cotton could be floated to
the river. In 1831 the Mississippi Legislature chartered a company to
build a railroad from Woodville south to the Mississippi River at St.
Francisville, Louisiana. The company thus formed was the first in the
State, the second in the Mississippi Valley, and the fifth in the United
States (see Tour 3, Sec. b). Beginning with this railroad, Mississippi
became a testing ground for early American railroad experiments. The
first major proposal was the "Mississippi Railroad," discussed at a meet
ing in Natchez in 1834. It was designed to connect Natchez with Jack
son, and, eventually, to extend to the Tennessee. At approximately the
same time the Vicksburg Commercial R.R. and Banking Company received
a charter to build from Vicksburg to Jackson, and in 1836 the Mississippi
and Alabama Company was permitted to build from Jackson east through
Brandon to the Tombigbee in Alabama.
In 1837 a survey would have shown work actually under way on the
Woodville and St. Francisville, Natchez-Jackson, Grand Gulf and Port
Gibson, and Vicksburg and Jackson lines. Proposals were made for lines
connecting New Orleans and Liberty, Grand Gulf and Jackson, Pontotoc
and Aberdeen (in the Tombigbee area), Jackson and Mobile, and New
TRANSPORTATION 89
Orleans and Nashville. Only the last one of these proposed lines would
have threatened competition with the river, and that, significantly, was
the only one to meet serious opposition.
But though the proposed lines were, with the one exception, no more
than adjuncts to transportation on the Mississippi, the State by 1837 was
changing. Mississippi s first constitution that could be called "democratic"
had been adopted in 1832. The internal improvement act of 1839 pro
vided for a loan of $5,000,000 for a port on the Mississippi Sound and a
railroad connecting it with Jackson. Natchez, in short, was having to fight
for its position of importance.
In breaking away from the river, however, the interior settlers over
reached themselves. The early 1830*5 were flush times coming just as
the Indian cessions opened up a vast new territory. Most of the proposed
railroads, with the help of a sympathetic State administration, established
their own banks. From 1836 to 1838 the number of the State s banks
increased from five to 24, and the nominal capital from $12,000,000 to
$62,000,000. Of the increased capitalization, however, only $19,000,000
represented tangible value. All the banks issued paper money in pro
fusion, using the notes to finance the railroads. When Jackson s specie
circular precipitated the crash in 1837, the collapse of the banks meant
the end of railroad building.
The 1840 $ saw a continued aftermath of the speculation. In the
scandal of the wrecked Union and Planters Banks, with everyone owing
everyone else and no prospect of the debts being paid, and with slave
owners fleeing to Texas from the debtors law, construction work was
impossible. The golden age of the steamboat, too, then in full sway
on the river, was no encouragement to competitive builders.
Nevertheless, by 1850, the railroads had made the final break with the
river; for that year saw the completion of the New Orleans, Jackson &
Great Northern, a railroad between New Orleans and Canton which
equaled that of any in the United States. This line was joined at Canton
by the Mississippi Central to give a through route to Jackson, Tennessee.
From Grenada another line, the Mississippi & Tennessee, extended to
Memphis. A through railroad east and west, the Southern, connected
Vicksburg, Jackson, and Meridian. The Mobile & Ohio, running from
Mobile through Meridian and up the Black Prairie belt to Corinth, was
completed in 1861. Through Corinth east and west ran the Memphis &
Charleston. The only other railroads were the early river feeders which
had survived the 1837 crash: the Woodville & St. Francisville (then
known as the West Feliciana), and the Grand Gulf & Port Gibson. All
90 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
these roads, except the two last named, had been aided in their con
struction by loans from the State and by land grants from the Federal
Government, in return for which they contracted to carry Government
mails and freight at reduced rates.
When Union armies came to Mississippi in 1862, the railroad prop
erties were the first to be wrecked. Major battles were fought around
the junctions of Corinth, Meridian, Jackson, and Vicksburg. The line
from Grenada to Memphis did not carry a through train from 1862
to 1866. The Mississippi Central was torn apart and its southern partner,
the New Orleans, Jackson & Great Northern, badly damaged. The Mobile
& Ohio was wrecked near Meridian and almost destroyed north of
Okolona as far as Corinth. None of these roads, however, was as abused
as the Southern, from Vicksburg to Meridian, which bore the brunt
of the campaigns against Vicksburg, and later was almost wholly de
stroyed by General Sherman.
Surviving the havoc that struck the railroads, the river steamboats
enjoyed their final prosperity. When the Robert E. Lee raced the Natchez,
with a deckhand sitting on the safety valve, it set a record that has
yet to be equaled by a river boat. But coasting trade found no basis in
post-war civilization, and the long-distance cargoes came to an end with
the revival of railroad building in the i88o s. The showboats held on
for a while, but they depended on the isolation, rather than the activity
of the old river towns.
When the Reconstruction period came to an end, the railroad builders
(among them many northerners) recovered their enthusiasm. Mileage
increased from 1,127 in 1880 to 2,366 in 1889. In 1869 the Mobile
& New Orleans (now the Louisville & Nashville) was laid along the
coast where boat travel had been undisputed since 1699, and in 1883
one of the early river-feeder railroads, the Grand Gulf & Port Gibson,
was torn up and abandoned. Also in 1883, R. T. Wilson was building
a railroad from New Orleans to Memphis which paralleled the Mississippi.
Other important roads built in the i88o s were to connect Yazoo City
with Jackson, Meridian with New Orleans (cutting across the Piney
Woods), and Natchez with Jackson. Since 1885 the only major roads
which have not been extensions of the lines already named, have been
the Gulf & Ship Island from Jackson to Gulfport, and the Gulf, Mobile
& Northern from Mobile to Laurel and up the west center of the State
through Pontotoc both of them giving outlets for the Piney Woods.
The total trackage of 24 lines in the State today is 4,142 miles.
The effect of railroad building in Mississippi, as in other States, was
TRANSPORTATION 91
a redistribution of population. The list of river and other settlements
which missed the rights of way is a directory of ghost towns.
The development of highways in Mississippi is the story of the transi
tion from the winding trails of the first quarter of the nineteenth century
to the thoroughfares of today. The twisting wagon and ox-cart paths
along the ridges were to continue in use until the coming of the auto
mobile required new roads. The change has been made largely since 1910.
The first law authorizing the issuance of bonds for highway con
struction was passed in 1912, an act setting up special road districts with
local service primarily in mind. The bonds were voted by local tax
payers, as liens on local property, and the road locations were selected
largely to serve those who paid for them. The result was not to straighten
the old roads, but in many cases to make the route even longer.
It was not until 1916 that the thoughts of the more progressive inter
ests crystallized in the passage of the Federal Aid Road Act. In the
same year the legislature formed the Mississippi Highway Department
(appropriating $6,500 for maintenance for a two-year period) the chief
duty of which was distribution of Federal Aid funds and supervision of
the work done. In 1918 the legislature continued its appropriation and
recognized the abolition of county lines in developing a State highway
system. In 1919 the first set of standard bridges was worked out by
the department with the aid of the Federal Bureau of Public Roads.
Although the legislature in 1920 appropriated $100,000 for the high
way department and changed it from a three-member appointive board
to an eight-member elective commission and in 1922 levied the first gaso
line tax, no system of highways was indicated until the passage of the
Stansel Act in 1930, which specified 6,000 miles of roads without, how
ever, providing State funds for construction. Federal Aid funds, Emergency
and National Recovery grants allotted to the State under the Roosevelt
Administration were the only moneys available for paving.
Up to February 29, 1936, however, relief funds amounting to $6,000,000
have been put under contract for grading, draining, bridge building and
grade-crossing elimination. In addition, nearly, 300 miles of roads have
been relocated. In this four-year period a daily average of 4,894 people
have been employed on the State s highways.
Mississippi s first planned program for highway building was drawn
in January 19^6, with provision for the expenditure of $42,500,000,
of which $23,000,000 represented notes issued by the State, and the
remainder Federal allocations. The sum was marked for a system of
primary and secondary roads to touch each of the State s 82 counties.
92 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
Given priority in paving are three east-west, and three north-south routes.
The transportation picture today includes water, rail, highway, and
air. The World War s congestion of freight and passenger trains compelled
the return to river traffic. In 1917 the Inland Waterways Corporation was
formed by the Federal Government, to operate (with a subsidy) the
Federal Barge Lines. Flatboats and palatial stern wheelers on the Missis
sippi have given way to slow but powerful oil-burning towboats push
ing half-mile-long strings of barges around the river bends, a single tow
holding as much freight as several trainloads. With the Government
maintaining the channel, private barge lines have followed.
The subsidies and channel upkeep provided by the Federal Govern
ment is matching the earlier grants made to the railroads. Terminal docks
are located at Natchez, Vicksburg, and Greenville; the last-named is one
of the largest and most modern in the South. Steam ferry service is avail
able at Friar Point, Dundee, Greenville, Vicksburg, and Natchez. Ocean
steamers dock in the deep-water harbors at Gulfport and Pascagoula.
Busses operate daily on more than 3,000 miles of road within the
State, and with the completion of the new paving program further devel
opment of passenger and freight lines can be expected. Regular service
is maintained by 57 motortrucking companies.
The State is now served by two air lines, one operating daily between
Chicago and New Orleans, the other between Charleston, South Carolina,
and Dallas, Texas. Both lines stop regularly at Jackson, and at other cities
by appointment. Mississippi has 25 landing fields, 13 of them equipped
for night flying.
Agriculture
Agriculture in Mississippi began to develop with the period of British
rule. Previously, the French, with several large grants of land near Natchez
and on the Yazoo River, had made several attempts to raise tobacco and
indigo. But there is no indication that anything was exported except articles
procured through trade with Indians. The landholders were, for the most
COTTON BOLL
94 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
part, men of rank in France who contented themselves with sending
slaves and destitute peasants to improve their American estates. Without
pride of ownership or the continued interest of their supporters to spur
them, the immigrants were unable to develop the land.
The English colonists, however, settled along the rich virgin bluffs
around Natchez and engaged in subsistence farming. They grew Indian
corn, wheat, oats, rice, potatoes, cotton, flax, tobacco, and indigo. To
bacco and indigo were their export crops. For their own needs they also
raised stock and tended orchards. They grew their own herb medicines;
tanned their own leather and worked it into saddles and shoes ; grew flax
for thread and wove it into linen. Rice was their most important article of
diet. Their cotton, the black, or naked-seed, variety, though unprolific and
susceptible to rot, was distinguished by its fine soft staple. They picked
the lint from the seed by hand or with small roller gins, and spun and
wove it at home, using indigo and wild plants for dyes.
With the beginning of Spanish rule in West Florida, in 1781, tobacco
became the staple export crop of the Natchez District. Some tobacco was
under cultivation, but with the Spanish offer to buy all that could be
grown (to encourage colonization) the plantings were greatly increased.
The leaves were packed in hogsheads by the larger planters and in "car-
rets" by the smaller growers; the "carret" took shape from a pile of
leaves compressed and dried under a tightly wrapped cloth, then wrapped
with rope made of the inner bark of the basswood or linden tree. The
barrels often were hauled to Natchez by shafts attached directly to the
heads, thus functioning as both carriers and wheels. To convey the to
bacco to the King s warehouses in New Orleans, several planters would
unite and build a flatboat, which one of the number would accompany to
deliver the tobacco and if it passed inspection to receive the proceeds.
He returned home by land, generally on foot. The payment was made in
written acknowledgment, or bon, which the governor or commandant at
Natchez redeemed with cash. This procedure obviated the labor and risk
of packing specie several hundred miles.
The certainty of this tobacco trade encouraged the planters to make
large investments in slaves, but the entrance of the Kentucky product
into the market, and the forced indifference of the Spanish Government
as its imperial ambitions were stifled in Europe, ended the enterprise and
consequently bankrupted many planters.
Until the failure of the tobacco industry, indigo had been of slight im
portance. Then for a brief interlude between the end of tobacco culture
and the rise of cotton culture, the making of indigo dye became the colo-
AGRICULTURE 95
nists most profitable pursuit. The plant, called InJigofera thictoria, is said
to have been introduced from India. It flourished luxuriantly, and, except
for the tender care required by young plants, was cultivated with great
ease.
At maturity indigo stood about three feet in height. Before going to
seed, it was cut with a reap hook, tied in bundles, and thrown into steep
ing vats built of heavy planks above the ground. The steeping vats drained
into other vats, called beaters, in which the liquid was churned. The sun
supplied the heat to hasten the fermentation and decay. When the grain
or coloring matter separated and settled to the bottom, it was shoveled
with wooden scoops into draining boxes lined with canvas, dried in molds,
cut into cubes, seasoned, and packed for shipping. The deeply colored
product was the most valued, though a light blue shade called "floton"
was produced in large quantities. The price for indigo in the latter part
of the eighteenth century ranged from $1.50 to $2.00 a pound and the
production per man amounted to about 150 pounds. The whole task
of raising and processing it, however, was arduous and unpleasant work.
The plant when growing was infested by swarms of grasshoppers, which
sometimes killed the whole crop, and the odor arising from the putrid
weed thrown from the vats was almost unbearable. The drainings into
nearby streams from these refuse accumulations killed the fish, and the
entire process of cultivation and manufacturing produced myriads of flies.
By 1797 Whitney s gin had given new life to the cotton industry, and the
enthusiasm for indigo disappeared.
All that happened in Mississippi s agricultural history before 1800,
however, was but a prelude to the history of the cotton kingdom. From
1800 until well into the twentieth century, the story of Mississippi s
agriculture has been the story of cotton.
Cotton culture was fixed in Mississippi as the result of three technolog
ical developments: the perfection of spinning machines in the last half of
the eighteenth century; the perfection of a cotton gin whidi made easier
the arduous process of separating cotton lint from the seed; and the im
provement of species through selection and standardization.
The first recorded improvement in species was the introduction of
Mexican seed cotton in 1806. One version of the story concerns a Mexican
trader who was in the habit of stopping at a plantation near the town of
Rodney (then called Petit Gulf). On one of his visits he brought with
him a small package of cottonseed. Amazing results followed the planting
of this seed, totally unlike the black type then grown in Mississippi. The
yield was extraordinarily large and the bolls did not rot. The fame of the
96 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
new variety, called Petit Gulf for the plantation on which it was first grown,
spread immediately.
A more colorful version of the introduction is that Walter Burling of
Natchez, envoy to Mexico, was secretly presented the seed stuffed into
dolls by the Mexican viceroy, as it was then against Spanish law for the
seed to be exported.
With the introduction of the Petit Gulf variety the "great cotton era"
began. An indication of the way men were absorbed with the culture of
this one plant is given in the fact that between 1794 (the year Whitney
patented his gin) and 1804, the value of the United States cotton crop
jumped from $150,000 to $8,000,000. This tremendous boom in cotton
lifted Mississippians from the frontiersmen class almost overnight. Possi
bly never since has such a transition occurred so rapidly.
Land was plentiful, so no attempt was made at intensive culture through
fertilization. Nor was the land even cleared, except for the underbrush;
trees were girdled and left to rot and fall. But iron was dear, dearer than
either land or slave, so plows and cultivating instruments were of the
crudest types. Between 1806 and the coming of the boll weevil almost
100 years later, careful cultivation was unnecessary. Cotton grew easily and
profits mounted. The high price of the staple (except for the panic years,
1837 an d in the 1890*5), the cheapness of land and labor, the extreme
hardiness of the plant, and the ease with which it could be cultivated, all
combined to establish cotton on the throne which survived even the War
between the States.
The spinning mills of England not only set the market prices for cotton
but also largely influenced the variety grown. Because longer fibers made
possible a finer thread and cloth, a premium was placed on long staple.
This caused a constant, if haphazard, experimentation to breed varieties
that would combine high yields with long staple, yet be adaptable to local
climate and soil. The Mexican type introduced in 1806 subsequently be
came the parent stock for numberless varieties and the source of much im
provement through cross-breeding with the older black-seed species.
Ranking of the varieties of cotton developed before 1860 would be im
possible without qualifying their merits according to local climatic and
soil demands, but it is true that many, if not the majority, of the most
famous varieties were bred first in Mississippi. Belle Creole, Jethro,
Parker, and Petit Gulf, all Mississippi-bred stock, were as well known in
the lower Mississippi Valley as the points of favorite race horses or
steamboats.
The business of cotton involved many factors peculiar to itself and
AGRICULTURE
AGRICULTURAL
RESOURCES
Mississippi
Advertising
Commission
1937
ASTATt AGRICULTURAL fXOIMtNT STATIONS
V FEDERAL
^MILKCONDENSERIES
CHEESE PLANTS
VEGETABLE PACKING- CANNING
+5PMNG STOCK SHOW Cl BCD IT
98 MISSISSIPPI! THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
wholly unlike other agricultural or mercantile enterprises. The peculiar re
lations between land, labor, plant investment, and financial backing, as
they applied to the cotton industry, established a separate economy that has
yet to be integrated properly with the general economic system. The terms
of this problem are now understood though its solution rests with the future.
Good cotton land in Mississippi was, except for brief intervals, rela
tively cheap and plentiful. Plant investment was almost unnecessary, since
the cultivation of cotton required no machinery. But financial backing was
necessary because the planter usually began as a debtor. The transfer of
cotton from planter to mill owner was complicated by the peculiarities
of foreign exchange, sometimes delaying receipt of the proceeds of the
sale as long as a year after the crop had been put in the ground. Rising
with the steady hum of English mill machinery, however, the cotton market
was so certain and so good before 1860 that the usual relation of planter
and money lender was reversed. It was not a case of the planter pleading
for money, but the lender begging that the planter accept his loans. With
the exception of the panic year of 1837, it is doubtful whether a single
planter between Memphis and New Orleans ever had to submit to credit
restrictions.
This made labor the only factor that was at a premium in the cultivation
of cotton. It was the relative pressure of labor costs that determined the
current attitude toward slavery. Sentiment for slavery rose with the acces
sion of new groups of planters to the land and fell as the new landowners
improved their economic status. In the 1820*5, when the cotton land
around Natchez was well taken up and the planter had accumulated means
to hire labor, there began a strong movement to return the slaves to Africa.
But in 1830 and 1832, when new cotton lands were opened and people
moved in with the debts of their first few years of operation impending,
the feeling for African colonization died.
The War between the States, followed by ten years of miserable con
fusion, left an indelible mark upon the social and economic life of Missis
sippi. The work of two generations in building a civilization on cotton was
destroyed. In 1875 Mississippi once more started from scratch, but this
time on a different footing. Here was the landowner, with all his capital,
equipment, and resources exhausted, sunk under a burden of debt; the
fertile cotton land alone was his, but he had no money to pay for labor to
produce the crops. No longer was the money-lender importuning him to
accept loans. And here was labor, the Negro: free under the law, but un
employed and unorganized to produce on his own; destitute, and often
starving. One thing the landowner former master and the jobless ex-
AGR1CULTI 99
slave held in common; that was the knowledge of how to cultivate and
handle cotton. And the world price of cotton was high.
All these circumstances led naturally to an arrangement whereby the
labor undertook to work the land for the privilege of living on it and
sharing in its product, while the landowner supervised the labor and
marketed the cotton. This marked the beginning of a modern form of
economic slavery, the tenant-credit system.
With the planter and the laborer under the yoke of the tenant-credit sys
tem, the merchant entered the cotton business in the guise of banker, and
his store replaced the plantation as the center of post-war economy. He
advanced credit on future cotton the only asset of either landlord or
tenant; lending on risky security, his interest rate was high. Unlike the
ante-bellum money-lender, the merchant was in a position to dictate to
the planter. His dictation, naturally, was to grow cotton. So, with post-war
cotton prices and the demands of the merchant-creditor looming before
him, the dazed and penniless planter abandoned diversification for the
one-crop system. Hastened destruction of his land, through soil erosion,
was a natural consequence (see Tour 5, Sec. a).
The geography of cotton culture before the war saw first southwestern
Mississippi marked off and tilled, then the Pearl and the Tombigbee River
Valleys. As long as farming was confined to the fairly level second bottom
lands of these valleys, erosion was not a serious problem. However, after
the land boom of the 1830*5, and with railroads to help solve the problem
of transportation, new cotton farmers moved into the hills and basins of
northern and central Mississippi, and erosion was aggravated to an extent
which few economic historians have realized (see HOLLY SPRINGS).
Thus the first State geologist, Eugene Hilgard, writing of the country
around Oxford in the 1850*5, noticed that: "Even the present generation
is rife with complaints about the exhaustion of the soils in a region
which, thirty years ago, had but just received the first scratch of the
plowshare. In some parts of the State, the deserted homesteads and fields
of broomsedge, lone groves of peach and China trees by the roadside, amid
a young growth of forest trees, might well remind the traveller of the
descriptions given of the aspect of Europe after the Thirty VetfS* War."
Another 75 years saw the full extent of this soil tragedy.
Later, hill-country plantations washed into gullies and forced the opening
of the last section in the State to cotton. This was the swampy flood plain.
colloquially called the Delta, which, except for the Lake Washington dis
trict, had not been settled because of its almost annual submersion and the
constant menace of malaria. But despite yellow fever, malaria, hiirh water.
100 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
lack of capital, and the inertia bred by the hot Mississippi sun, post-war
planters contrived to move from the eroded hills to the steaming, rich
bottom lands.
In the Delta, a land as fertile as the valley of the Nile, two problems
had to be solved: first, the clearing and draining of the land; and second,
the protection of the plantation against overflows. Indeed, had it not been
for the heavy burdens of flood control and drainage, Delta planters of the
1890*5 might again have reached the heights attained by the ante-bellum
Natchez planters. Clearing the land was a Herculean task lightened some
what by the building of railroads in the middle of the i88o s.
With the land cleared, the cotton planters fight was not against over
flow alone. The need of improvement in variety was still insistent. Cotton
breeding toward long-staple varieties continued after the war, with John
Griffin, of Greenville, a half -century ahead of geneticists in proving the
soundness of the back-cross method. The Griffin variety, the result of se
lective breeding from 1857 until the end of the century, combined the
hardiness of the green-seed upland plant with the long staple of sea-island
cotton.
But, unhappily, the long staple was a late-maturing variety. The length
of the staple required a proportionately long maturation period, and this
meant a correspondingly long period for the ravages of the boll weevil.
When the insect entered Mississippi, disaster resulted to the varieties of
cotton which had been developed by 1909.
The crisis brought by the weevil made marked changes in the farming
of certain Mississippi areas. The narrow section that extends south
of Jackson, between the Piney Woods and Natchez Bluffs, abandoned
cotton as a major crop and turned to truck farming. The more pro
gressive of the farmers in 1876 had realized the suitability of this section s
thin topsoil for raising vegetables, and in that year shipped a carload of
tomatoes to the northern market. Thus the disaster that struck a majority
of Mississipi s farms caused one small section to break from the non-rotat
ing, cash-crop system and turn to diversification. Today, the vegetables
beans, tomatoes and cabbage especially from this section compete suc
cessfully with those from the trucking area of Texas, and when the market
is favorable the farmers of this section are the most prosperous in the
State.
The Prairie section of the State was too fertile to abandon cotton but
efforts were made to supplement it with legumes and other cover crops.
Planting in summer and winter, the farmers here annually harvest four
cuttings of alfalfa hay of one ton each per acre. As a result, the dairy
AGRICULTURE IOI
produce industry has increased until the Prairie is the State s leading sec
tion in condenseries, creameries, and cheese plants. These plants give the
farmer a biweekly cash market for his farm byproducts, but they have
not weaned him from his first love, cotton.
The truck- farming and the Prairie sections include only 12 or so of
Mississippi s 82 counties. The remainder of the State stuck to cotton and
prepared to fight the boll weevil. The campaign against the weevil meant
the end of unscientific, slipshod cotton farming. The objective of breeders
was to combine an early-maturing plant with a long staple, and the task
called for expert breeding knowledge. It is a tribute to Mississippians that
they have developed several acceptable varieties, including the Delfos,
Missdel, Stoneville, and Delta and Pine Land.
In the cotton crisis since the World War the weevil has been only one
of the disturbing factors. The social and economic plight of the increasing
number of tenant farmers and the aggravated problem of soil erosion have
assumed proportions that engage the attention and resources of the Na
tional Government.
By converting the fever-infested swamps of the Delta into productive
fertile fields, a few of the planters escaped the curse of erosicn. But
neither they nor the majority who remained to farm the eroding hillsides
could free themselves from the tenant-credit system, with its imposition of
the one-crop method of farming. As a result of this system approximately
five-sixths of the State s agricultural lands are reclassed as "doubtful," and
a steadily increasing number of its people are hopelessly sinking into debt.
According to the 1930 census 47 out of every 100 persons in Mississippi
were tenants. This proportion exceeded by 25 percent that of any other
State and amounted to five times that of the average for the United States.
Only Texas, in the total number of its tenant population, exceeded Missis
sippi. Significantly, Texas is also the only State that produces more cotton.
In 1880, only five years after the Reconstruction period had ended, the
ratio of owners to tenants on Mississippi farms was approximately six to
four. By 1920 the ratio had shifted to something like three to seven. In
1930 the census recorded 312,663 farms in the State, and of these 225,617,
or more than seven in ten, were operated by tenants. In ten of the most
densely populated cotton counties, about 94 percent of the farm population
were tenants.
Bad crop years and low prices, a combination that few individual land
owners can master, concentrated, through the channels of unpaid mortgages
and loans, great tracts of land under the control of corporations banks,
insurance companies, and mercantile houses. In other instances, individual
EN ROUTE TO COTTON HOUSE
owners sought additional capital by forming companies and selling stock
to urban capitalists. This brought to the plantations involved the absentee
landlord system. Many of the absentee landlords live within the State, but
a majority of the corporations are either out-of-State or foreign concerns.
AGRICULTURE 103
To operate their holdings these absentee landlords employ managers, often
the former owner of the property. The managers, to encourage high pro
duction yields at low production costs, receive part of their pay in bonuses
or commissions on profits made. Like the tenant, they share with the
owners a part of the risk of each crop.
Panther Burn, a 12,411 -acre plantation in Sharkey County owned by
McGee & Co., Leland, is typical of the plantations owned by Mississippi
companies. On the plantation approximately 2,000 Negro tenants live in
tree-shaded, four-room, frame houses. For their use there are a brick
church, a school, and two stores. The houses, scattered over the plantation,
are not provided with modern conveniences or sanitation (see Tour 3,
Sec. a).
The Delta and Pine Land Co. plantation near Scott is owned by a syn
dicate of British mill owners and has total assets of approximately
$5,000,000. Embracing 38,000 acres, the plantation is divided into n
units, each under a unit manager and the whole under a general manager.
The labor is performed by about 3,300 Negro sharecroppers, representing
1,000 families. In 1936 approximately 11,700 acres were planted in cot
ton; on these were averaged 638 pounds of premium grade lint cotton per
acre 15,000 bales in all for which was received a maximum price of
13.25 cents per pound. (The average United States cotton farmer raised
187 pounds per acre and received an average of about 11.9 cents per
pound.) These croppers also raised 950 pounds of cottonseed per acre,
getting $40 a ton for it against a United States average of 600 pounds per
acre at $32 per ton. The plantation s gross earnings, exclusive of the share
croppers share, were $879,000. After deducting gross expenses, taxes,
bond interests, and bonuses, the net earnings were $153,000. Under the
Agricultural Adjustment Administration the plantation received $68,000
from the Government; the plantation paid the Government $105,000
income taxes. For their share the tenant families received an average of
$525 ($205 in credit during season and $320 in cash at end of season).
When neither production nor price is as good as that of 1936 and the
tenant is left with a deficit, the Delta and Pine Land management, like
a majority of Mississippi plantation managements, writes it off and clears
the debt (see Tour 3, Sec. a).
The problem of tenancy is neither confined to the Delta nor is it re
stricted to the Negro. The number of white families who were unable to
find a secure place in the expanding culture and were consequently forced
to accept the system has increased steadily. In 1900 only 21.9 percent of
the tenant farms were operated by white men, whereas by 1930 this figure
104 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
had risen to 29 percent. In this same generation in which the number of
white tenant farmers increased, the number of Negro tenant farmers de
creased by 5.6 percent. During the five depression years after 1930, the
number of Negro tenants decreased so greatly that it more than offset the
increase among white tenants, allowing for the first time a decrease in
tenancy as a whole. Thus, with the trend of tenancy increasing among
white people and decreasing among the Negroes, the problems of agricul
tural Mississippi are found to be fundamentally economic, without respect
to race.
These 225,617 Mississippi tenant families, both white and Negro,
are divided into three classes: first, Renters, who hire land for a fixed
amount to be paid either in crop values or in cash; second, Share-
tenants, who furnish their own equipment and work animals, and agree
to pay a fixed percent of the cash crop (cotton) as rental; and, third,
Sharecroppers, who pay a larger percent of the crop, and in turn are fur
nished the land, implements, animals, fertilizer, house, fuel, and food.
The first group, few in number, are removed from the cast of subservient
tenancy by their relative independence. The second and third groups are
the dependent workers. The share-tenants, supplying much of their equip
ment, pay the landowner one- fourth or one-third of the crop. The share
croppers, supplying almost nothing but their labor, usually pay one-half of
the crop. Both groups, however, must pay out of their own share for all
that is supplied them in the way of seed, fertilizer, and food. Of these two
groups, approximately 60 percent were croppers, or specifically, 135,293
of the 225,617 tenant families, in 1930, were in the lowest category of
dependence.
From the beginning of the development of cotton, labor costs have been
more subject to control than the costs of land, equipment, seed, taxes, and
interest. That this traditional cheap labor is now provided by the tenants
is proved by their standards of living. Submerged by practically every
other force in the economy of cotton, they are reduced to the level of bare
existence. The size of the tenant family bears no relevancy to the shelter
provided; it is up to them to crowd somehow into the traditional three-
or four-room house on the tenancy. And though land is both productive
and abundant, their diet is probably the meagerest and least balanced
among any large group in America. Food crops mature during the same
season as cotton, making it virtually impossible under the one cash-crop
system to raise subsistence crops. Indeed, the growing of household prod
uce is not encouraged by landlords, whose viewpoint must reflect the
wishes of financial backers. The final decision in the matter, as on the
AGRICULTURE 105
question of acreage to be planted or the amount of fertilizer to be used
(theoretically the prerogative of the landowner), also rests with the men
who advance money for the crop. Obviously, the diet of the tenants is
largely limited to dried and canned goods from commissaries and local
stores. This food and other necessities, obtained on credit during the crop
season, is called "furnishings." It must be paid for out of the tenant s
share of the crop at harvest time.
From this interdependence of tenant and landowner, our stock of folk
lore has been enriched by tales of unreliability and shiftlessness on the part
of the tenants, and of fancy prices at the commissary, exorbitant interest,
and careless accounts on the part of the landlords. But the case against the
tenant-credit system cannot be rested on the improvidence of the tenants
any more than it can be vindicated by the personal indictment of landlords.
Under the drive of the merchant-bankers, the landlords could hardly act
otherwise. The tenants are under a similar compulsion. That bad economic
and social habits have developed on the part of both is evidence of a
pernicious system.
These social and economic problems of the submerged portion of our
agricultural population accompany another major factor. That is the de
pletion of soil fertility. For 139 years, from the time Whitney invented his
gin until the establishment of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration
in 1933, cotton held a monopoly on the land. Mississippi has never pro
duced a surplus of human and livestock food, and it rarely produced even
a sufficiency. This continual planting of one land-deteriorating crop lasted
until the eroded and exhausted lands became barren or were washed from
under the plow. To meet the situation, the Federal Government provided
a system of bounties for sustaining the farmer if he should abandon his
single cash-crop plan and try to restore the fertility of his land with
legumes and cover crops that would bring no immediate cash. Conserva
tion unics, with headquarters at Meridian, were established to check
erosion in the various soil areas of the State. These units have demon
strated erosion control and the refertilization of the land by cropping
systems, terracing, proper land usage, and reforestation.
The work of soil conservation is still in the experimental stage, and the
Agricultural Adjustment Administration is no more. But the Agricultural
Census of 1935 shows results (see Agricultural Map). From being just
a cotton grower the average Mississippi farmer has added to his skills the
practices of animal husbandry, food and feed production, home garden inc.
horticulture, and silviculture. He increased his food and feed crop acreage
in corn and hay particularly by 63 percent, pasture acreage 27 per-
106 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
cent, number of cattle 66 percent, and number of swine 26 percent. He
decreased his cotton acreage by 36 percent. In 1936, on the reduced
acreage, he produced 1,910,661 bales of cotton the third largest crop
in Mississippi s history. In addition he received more than $10,600,000
from the Government for his efforts.
These three years, which have seen the one-crop method of farming
uprooted, have given to Mississippi agriculture added wealth and security
in the form of cash, improved land, and better diets. But whether or not
the farmer has been sufficiently braced to resist the traditional "cash crop"
after governmental bounties are withdrawn is problematical. He will still
have to finance his operations, and his only source for doing this is still
the familiar product of war and reconstruction. The merchant-banker
remains.
<Hf
Industry and Commerce
Until 1920 Mississippi s industrial development was due more to sporadic
reactions of an agricultural people against low-price years than to any sys
tematic foresight. When the price of cotton was low the Mississippian
talked and dreamed of basing his livelihood on something less erratic ; but,
when prices rose, if there had been any industrial beginning made it was
forgotten in the rush to market. The result was continued dependence on
cotton, only slightly relieved by the income from the State s sole industry
lumber. In the 1920*5, however, a few public leaders took cognizance of
this precarious position. After making an inventory of the State s re
sources and potentialities and considering trends outside Mississippi, they
evolved a plan for industrial advancement. And, in 1936, an industrial act
passed by the Mississippi legislature more or less officially opened for de
velopment one of industry s last frontiers.
The State s editors and writers referred to this act as a declaration of
independence, since it was Mississippi s first determined break from re
liance on cotton. To the average citizen it meant the end of blind loyalty
and destruction of the illusion that cotton still possessed royal power. In
INDUSTRY AND COMMERCE 107
reality, the act was a recognition of the fact that soil erosion, timber ex
ploitation, and continued Joss of world markets had almost entirely re
moved the traditional sources of income cotton and lumber and that,
without stabilized industries to counterbalance the losses, Mississippi s
economic system had broken down.
Mississippi had reached the peak of the ante-bellum speculative era in
1840. Then the Natchez district was enjoying the cultural advantages of a
second generation of wealth ; the Piney Woods had been settled since the
1820 $; and the Central Hills were being developed by men made reckless
by the fact that they had much to gain and little to lose. A State bank at
Jackson, the capital, was helping to finance planters by means of a
$5,250,000 bond issue, raised in the interests of cotton but not in
cident to industrial development. There were few industries ; such as there
were fell into the category either of "home manufactories" tanneries,
charcoal kilns, grist mills (or cotton processing plants), gins and cotton
seed mills. These latter, few in number, were mostly in the Natchez district
and had been established by planters for the purpose of facilitating the
handling of cotton rather than as an approach to industrial development.
The charcoal kilns were operated by men of the non-slaveholding class
who lived among the pines of south Mississippi. Small individual operators
were scattered throughout the Piney Woods section. They used the crudest
and cheapest methods and, as little capital was involved, the individual
output was small. Conical mounds covered with pine needles and earth
and left open at the top were used as kilns. Each kiln could contain enough
pine slabs or blocks to make several hundred pounds of charcoal. New
Orleans was the chief market for the product; though Mobile and the
towns along the Coast used it for cooking and heating purposes, and here
also the masters of sailing vessels purchased a supply. *
A Mississippian, John Ross, in 1801 made the first written suggestion
that valuable oil could be pressed from the cottonseed, but it was not until
1834, at Natchez, that the first mill was erected. Just north of Natchez at
Washington, Eleazer Carver had begun in 1807 the manufacture of cotton
gins. Still, when Mississippi reached its first "industrial peak" in 1840,
the number of persons engaged in manufacture was only 5,060. Two years
later the State repudiated its banking bonds and, by 1850, the number of
industrial employees had slumped to 3,154. Before there could be any re
covery, the War between the States began, and for the following four
years even cotton was forgotten.
The war and resulting industrial stagnation affected Mississippi griev
ously. So great was the depression in all industry that Governor Alcorn
108 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
estimated a 62 percent loss in home manufactures between 1860 and
1870. To encourage development, money invested in manufactures was
exempted from taxation. Probably as a result of this exemption the Missis
sippi Cotton Mills, the largest textile mill in the State, was established at
Wesson in 1871, and soon had 30,000 spindles in operation, consuming
10,000 bales of cotton annually.
The depressed price of cotton in the late 1870 $ brought to the people
generally their first realization that agriculture in the State should be sup
plemented by industry. When, in the i88o s, the price continued to hover
around seven and eight cents a pound, the State adopted a definite pro
gram for industrial development. In 1882 Governor Robert Lowry told
the legislature that "the president or manager of a successful factory
among us, ought to be more highly appreciated and honored by us than
any public functionary in the land. Whatever legislation can be accom
plished in his behalf shall have my cordial approval and support." As a
result the legislature passed "an act to encourage the establishment of fac
tories in this State and to exempt them from taxation." The period of
exemption was to extend ten years beyond the time the factory was com
pleted and in operation. To help carry out the purposes of the act a Com
mission of Immigration was appointed, and a Handbook of Facts for
Immigrants was prepared for distribution in Northern and Eastern manu
facturing centers.
The handbook, timed to take advantage of the southward trend of tex
tile industries, stated that Mississippi offered abundant water power, cheap
fuel, and inexpensive labor. Mills operating at Columbus, Wesson, Enter
prise, Natchez, Corinth, "and other points" were listed as having operated
at a profit. Unfortunately, however, the statement concerning water power
and cheap fuel was erroneous; Mississippi had no coal supplies or fall
lines, and no power lines had yet been strung. Hence, during the period
from 18801890 the State s population increased many times faster than
the number of manufacturing plants.
But, though the attempt to establish manufacturing plants failed be
cause of the lack of natural and artificial power, industry in another form
began. The lumber industry, developed in southern Mississippi, was des
tined to become for a generation the only rival of cotton in the State s eco
nomic system.
With the exhaustion of the timber supply in Michigan and the Great
Lakes region the lumber industry, seeking new forests to conquer, moved
southward. Prior to this, Mississippi s lumber industry had been confined
to a few small units that operated along the banks of the Pearl and Pas-
INDUSTRY AND COMMERCE 109
cagoula Rivers. But these operations, like those of the charcoal industry,
had no great amount of capital behind them. The output scarcely did more
than suggest to out-of-State capitalists the potential wealth of Mississippi s
pine forests.
The rise of the lumber industry began in earnest along the Illinois Cen
tral R.R., which cut through the southwestern section of the pine zone.
Here, west of the Pearl River, the Enochs Lumber Company purchased at
a small price great tracts of virgin timber and built a mill at Fernwood,
near McComb. From the mill, log roads penetrated the forest for miles in
each direction. The White Lumber Company, another pioneer concern,
established a mill at Columbia, and, operating westward toward Liberty,
built the Liberty-White R.R. as a branch from the Illinois Central line.
But even these first large mills did little more than scratch the surface;
the greater forests Jay east of Pearl River.
In 1 88 1 the Southern R.R. pushed northeastward from New Orleans
into Mississippi, across Pearl River and through the Piney Woods,
penetrating the heart of almost untouched forests. With the laying of this
trackage, large lumbering interests gradually acquired extensive holdings
east of the Pearl River. Mills sprang up all along the line; Hattiesburg,
Laurel, and other towns were founded. Then, in 1902, the Gulf & Ship
Island R.R. was built, cutting from the north downward through the heart
of the forests and ending at Gulfport, the new deep water port. With the
harbor as an outlet and the two trunk lines connected with small log roads,
the Piney Woods entered a period of lumbering that is equalled in Missis
sippi history only by the early flush times of cotton speculation. In 1900
this industry had 844 establishments employing 9,676 persons; in 1925
it reached the maximum production of 3,127,678,000 feet, with an em
ployment by 917 establishments of 39,075 persons. This number repre
sented more than two-thirds of all labor employed in industry.
In the late 1920*5, however, the lumber industry began to decline. The
larger mills, having cut practically all accessible timber, began to move
their machinery from the State, leaving the clean-up operations to small
concerns. In 1931 there were only 468 establishments left, with a decline
in employment to 12,388 persons. In 1933 only 792,031,000 feet were
cut. The Piney Woods inhabitant whose grandfather was a small cattle
raiser, and whose father had been a small time sheepman, was no longer
a sawmill hand.
Paralleling the decline of the lumber industry, other factors were at
work forcing a change in the State s economy. Soil erosion had eaten the
vitality from great tracts of land, making it impossible to raise more than
110 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
a mere subsistence on the cotton farms. Foreign competition had gradually
narrowed the cotton market until either the price of cotton had to be
"pegged" by the Government or the farmer took a loss on what he had
raised. With enforced control of acreage and the increasing use of farm
machinery had come a large displacement of former cotton hands and
tenants. The number of unemployed cotton workers and unemployed saw
mill laborers forced recognition of the fact that, with lumbering as the
sole industry and cotton as the one cash crop, Mississippi could no longer
maintain a standard of living anywhere nearly commensurate with its pos
sibilities. The State had to reorganize its economic system or else remain,
paradoxically, well-endowed as compared with the other States with the
prerequisites for a high standard of living, but ranking near the bottom
in actual wealth and income.
Much was done during the 1930*5 to close this gap between potential
ities and accomplishments, but agricultural diversification, reforestation,
and the establishment of new industries take time and effort. The dairy
cattle industry is directly dependent on the development of creameries,
cheese plants, and condenseries which, in turn, require capital and experi
ence in the dairy products business if they are to compete in national
markets. Profits from poultry and swine are conditional upon the improve
ment of flocks and herds, possible only with capital and expert animal
husbandry. Production crops, other than cotton, are hampered by lack of
marketing facilities, but the building of cold storage plants, the develop
ment of effective marketing associations, the employment of skilled tech
nique in growing perishable and specialty crops all these take capital.
Unfortunately, the State s wealth had eroded with its lands.
While Mississippians were posing this problem of need for but dearth
of capital, industry in the Nation as a whole had been on the move. The
cost factors of production and distribution that formerly had kept industry
tied to certain key sections were being altered by the extension of power
transmission systems and natural gas lines. The tendency was toward de
centralization with an increasing emphasis on regional marketing. Consid
ering the possibilities of high speed, low cost transportation in relation to
the increasingly larger share played by taxation and labor in manufactur
ing, industrialists in the North and in the East glanced southward for an
answer to their growing restlessness.
Certain technological advance also warranted major shifts in particular
types of industry. New processes in the manufacture of paper make slash
pine available as raw material for Kraft and even newsprint papers. Pro
cessing plants can be brought directly to the farm, where modern diver-
INDUSTRY AND COMMERCE III
sified agriculture provides various raw materials, some of them new to
industry: the soybean, the sweet potato, wood pulp, and tung oil for use
respectively in the making of plastics, starch, synthetic fibres, and paint
and varnish.
The 1925-30 crisis in Mississippi s economic life coincided with this in
creasing change in the distribution of the Nation s industries. Linking the
two in a new State economy was accomplished by the opening of natural
gas fields near Jackson and the development of high transmission electric
power systems. Rates were offered through two privately owned companies
and the Tennessee Valley Authority that were as low as, if not lower than,
those in any other part of the country. These new sources of fuel and
power, and the unusually even distribution of the population, made Missis
sippi attractive to industries seeking decentralization.
From 1931 to 1936 new incorporated capital in the State averaged over
$400,000,000 a year, approximately 27 times greater than the annual
average for the five-year period 1921-1926. Between the Federal business
census of 1933 and that of 1935, the number of industrial establishments
increased by 390. In the average percentage of increases in these same
years (figured by the number of manufacturing establishments, number of
wage earners, amount of wages paid, and value of manufactured products)
Mississippi was second in the United States. The value of manufactured
products in Mississippi was 67.6% higher in 1935 than in 1933; the num
ber of industrial workers increased 32.8% ; the amount of wages 46
and the volume of retail sales 27%.
During 1936 heavy construction in Mississippi increased 333% as
compared with the national average increase of 71%; commercial car
sales increased 69% while the national average was 25%; and farm in
come 24% as compared with the national average of i
At Laurel a company manufacturing synthetic wall board realized
the possibility of developing timber products plants other than sawmills.
The first paper mill in the South to make bleached Kraft paper from pine
was built on the Coast ; and to demonstrate proper methods in raising pine
trees, a slash pine nursery was established at Brooklyn. A new processing
plant at Jackson to develop the bentonite deposits of Smith County is per
haps a beginning in exploiting the State s virtually untapped mineral
supply.
With the virgin pines lost to southern Mississippi, the lower section of
the Piney Woods has turned to raising tung nuts; and here one of the
largest tung-nut crushing mills has been established (see Tour 8).
This industry, as well as the long established turpentine and resin indus-
112 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
try in this section, finds an excellent market among paint and varnish
manufacturers.
In the Prairie and Central Hills, more than 300 milk-utilizing plants
and the mid-South s largest poultry packing plant have been built to offer
a home market for the farmer s products. Over the State a score or more
new garment factories have been opened, mostly branch plants of national
concerns, planned to use the surplus rural labor made available by de
creased farm operations (see TUPELO, MERIDIAN; Tours 4, 5 and 12).
As an added incentive to out-of-State capital and experienced manage
ment, the legislature passed the Industrial Act in 1936. This act, aimed to
help "balance agriculture with industry," recognized the State s limited
capital and authorized the municipalities to issue bonds for the purpose of
erecting plants for industrial enterprises, and exempted from ad valorem
taxation for five years certain classes of industries. An Industrial Commis
sion was formed, charged with the responsibility of examining both the
industries and the communities that expected to take advantage of the new
act. An advertising fund was granted and an advertising commission
created.
Thus Mississippi, for the first time in its history, has a planned pro
gram for industrial development. Under the "balance agriculture with
industry" plan, Mississippi communities can offer land and factory build
ings, together with tax exemption for a period of five years, in return for
the ability and business experience of the incoming industrialists.
yy W VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
Religion
Unlike the older Atlantic States, Mississippi was not opened to settle
ment by Europeans seeking economic and religious freedom. It was opened
by agents of his Christian Majesty, the King of France, seeking new
sources of revenue and by Roman Catholic priests seeking converts. The
Cross traveled with the Fleur de Lis; and when La Salle came down the
Mississippi to plant the King s banner in the Lower Valley, Father Zeno-
bius Membre was with him to officiate at the celebration of mass. This
RELIGION 113
first mass was said near Fort Adams in 1682. In the 17 years that fol
lowed, the religious order tightened its hold. St. Valier, Roman Catholic
Bishop of Quebec, acting on orders from Rome, sent Fathers Montigny,
St. Cosme, and Davion into the territory to establish missions. Fathers
Montigny and St. Cosme settled among the Natchez tribe, while Father
Davion established himself on the lower Yazoo River among the Tunica.
When d Iberville s colony pushed in from Ship Island to the mainland
in 1699 and established Fort Maurepas, the first permanent white settle
ment in the Mississippi Valley, Father Davion was able to leave his work
in charge of Indian converts and pay the settlement a visit. This first col
ony was the nucleus for other settlements in the region ; and each band of
explorers, soldiers, and settlers that went out from it was accompanied by
a priest. Father Richard celebrated mass at the establishing of Krebs Fort
(see Tour 1), and Father Senat was burned by the Chickasaw after D Ar-
taguiette s defeat south of Pontotoc (see Tour 12).
For nearly a century the territory remained almost entirely Catholic. But
as a result of intrigue and of the Seven Year s War, ending in 1763, France
lost her New World possessions, and Mississippi, as a British possession,
came to be dominated by Anglo-Saxons. These new settlers from the east
ern States were of Tory caste, accustomed to a certain amount of ease, cul
ture, and gracious living; and though they were politically conservative,
they believed emphatically in the separation of Church and State. With the
same determination that left their mark on the State s agriculture, they
drove the wedge of Protestantism into the almost solidly Catholic society.
In 1779, however, British rule gave way to Spanish rule, and once more
Roman Catholicism became the official religion of the territory. Spain had
two objectives in the lower Mississippi Valley: to develop the territory
and to keep it Roman Catholic. By lenient civil Jaws the first was magni
ficently accomplished. But, ironically, the means to this accomplishment
defeated the second purpose. For the lenient laws that aided so greatly in
the development of the territory also drew more and more Anglo-Saxon
Protestants from the older States ; and these Protestants, finding a common
cause in their opposition to Spain s rigid religious laws, united in a con
spiracy of sorts against the government. Prohibited from organizing
churches of their own, they held secret meetings in their homes and in the
sylvan gloom of moss-draped forests. Under such militant preachers as
Richard Curtis, Tobias Gibson, and Adam Cloud (Baptist, Methodist, and
Episcopalian, respectively) Mississippi once more made the transition from
Roman Catholicism to Protestantism. The first Baptist church in Missis
sippi was organized in 1791 ; and when the territory was annexed to the
114 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
United States in 1798, not only had this church superseded the authority
of the Roman Catholic Church, but the framework of other sects had been
laid. The first Methodist church was organized in the town of Washing
ton in 1799. The first Presbyterian church, after some previous preaching
in Jefferson County, was organized in 1804. In 1798 Samuel Swayze, a
Congregationalist minister from New Jersey, built the first Protestant
Church edifice in the State (see Tour 3, Sec. b).
The admission of Mississippi into the Union in 1817 was the beginning
of the so-called "great migration" from the older States. Second sons of
aristocratic Tidewater families, coolly determined Scotch- Irish farmers,
restless adventurers, and dissatisfied backwoodsmen poured down from the
mountains into the newly acquired lands. And with this sweep of settlers
into the State, religious doctrines, like political philosophies and styles of
architecture, were transplanted from one section of the country to the
other. The Episcopal Church flourished first along the Mississippi River,
where rich bottomlands drew wealthy planters and slave owners. Later this
sect, which generally identified itself with the settlers who held to the Tory
ideology in the civilization they were shaping, moved northward into the
upper river country and into the Lake Washington and Lake Lee regions
of the Delta. In the Lake Washington area, Bishop Otey built St. John s
Episcopal Church near Glen Allan in 1844 (see Side Tour 3 A), and with
this as a focal point the doctrine of Episcopal faith spread throughout the
lower portion of the Delta.
After organizing their first church in 1804, the Presbyterians in Missis
sippi were reenforced by Scotch-Irish families who migrated from the
Carolinas to settle in the Natchez district. So quickly did they grow in num
bers that the Mississippi Presbytery, under the jurisdiction of the Presby
tery of Kentucky, was formed in 1816. Thirteen years later this sect
founded Oakland College (see Tour 3, Sec. b), thus leading the other de
nominations in inaugurating religious education in Mississippi. Growing
out of its efforts to Christianize the Chickasaw Indians, the Cumberland
Presbyterian Church of Tennessee gained a foothold in northern Missis
sippi as early as 1820. When the Chickasaw ceded their lands to the United
States in 1832, the Scotch Covenanters were among the first to settle here.
The Missionary Baptist Church, so called to distinguish it from the
Primitive Baptist, had a particularly strong appeal among the independent
farmers who settled in the Piney Woods of southern Mississippi. They
also established missions among the Indians of northern Mississippi, and,
like the Presbyterians, after the cession of Indian lands to the Government,
they had a foothold in this section. The Primitive Baptist churches were
RELIGION 115
established by settlers who kept close to the elemental in their way of life.
This denomination was strongest along the Tennessee River.
In number of members, the Methodist Church came next to the Baptist.
Spreading from their first church organization at Washington in 1799,
and given great impetus by the eccentric evangelist, Lorenzo Dow, who es
tablished a church at Kingston in 1803 (see Tour 3, Sec. b) and then con
ducted a series of "camp meetings" in the territory, the Methodists distrib
uted their churches throughout the State.
In the years between the end of Spanish rule and 1837, the Roman Cath
olics in Mississippi had become almost destitute of spiritual attention. The
number of priests had slowly decreased until in 1837 there were only two.
In that year, however, Pope Gregory XVI established a new diocese to
embrace the entire State, and made Natchez its cathedral city. New priests
were sent from Europe to administer to the Irish Catholics at Paulding
and Bassfield, and to Catholic families along the Coast. On the Coast, the
work of this denomination among the Negroes has been outstanding;
at Bay St. Louis is the first seminary in America to train Negro boys for
the priesthood. Other schools for Negroes were established at Biloxi and
Jackson. The Natchez Diocese, since erection, has founded 24 schools and
t\vo orphanages.
The first Christian (sometimes called Campbellite) church was estab
lished in 1838 near Jackson. Several years later this denomination founded
Newton College, near Woodville, an institution that had a large enroll
ment until the outbreak of the War between the States. The last denomi
nation to organize a church in Mississippi s ante-bellum period was the
Lutheran. This sect was introduced into the State by settlers from South
Carolina, who settled near Sallis in 1840 and, in 1846, established here the
New Hope Congregation Church.
These early churches fitted neatly into the early Mississippian s way of
life. Not only did they give him an opportunity for formal worship but
they offered him a means for emotional expression. The evangelistic spirit
of these churches was a part of the so-called "southern temperament."
They were also a part of the frontiersman s life, and as such were admin
istered by men who were themselves pioneers. These divines, circuit riders,
missionaries, itinerant evangelists, and camp-meeting crusaders understood
the art of living life "in the raw." As A. P. Hudson points out in his
Humor of the Old Deep South, they also were men with a considerable na
tive sense of humor, otherwise they would have gone the way of Mr. Da
vidson in Rain. The famous Lorenzo Dow, who sat on the steps of his
cabin in a canebrake watching his "star set in the west," and who once
Il6 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
thought "it was a gone case" with him when Indians grabbed his bridle
reins somewhere on the old Natchez Trace, is typical. Dow, a New Eng-
lander by birth, ranged up and down the Atlantic seaboard in a determined
effort to convert to Protestantism all the inhabitants of that vast region.
His activity in Mississippi centered about the Natchez country, where, un
daunted by rebuffs, he made up in zeal and resourcefulness what he lacked
in education. Speaking on the subject "Judgment Day" at one of his "re
vivals," and wishing to give effectiveness to the sermon, he arranged with
a little Negro boy to climb to the top of a tall pine tree and at a specified
point in the sermon to blow vociferously on a horn. His plans went off
without a hitch and the audience was frightened even beyond his expecta
tions. But, recovering and seeing through his hoax, the audience became
indignant and prepared to break up the meeting. Dow, however, was ready
for them. Impressively continuing his sermon, he said, "And now, Breth
ren, if a little Negro boy blowing on a tin horn in the top of a pine tree
can make you feel so, how will you feel when the last day really comes?"
And there was the Reverend Mr. Foster, who once hid in the mud of a
bog, "playing mud turtle so well that [he] even fooled the Indians."
When slavery became a national issue, Mississippi Protestant churches,
like those of other southern States, endeavored to reconcile slavery with
Christianity. Both Methodist and Baptist denominations split with their
national organizations in the 1840 $, and formed organizations of their
own. But notwithstanding this split, by 1860 these two denominations
were the acknowledged religious leaders in the State. Unlike their closest
rival, the Presbyterian, they appealed not to the Tory element but to the
large class of small independent farmers.
After the War between the States, Mississippi s religious life was af
fected by three distinct influences: the organization of Negro churches, the
spread of church-supported schools and colleges, and the rise of towns in
social and economic importance. These influences were direct results of the
breakdown of the plantation system. Previously, Negroes had been forbid
den by law to organize churches of their own; instead, they had wor
shipped from especially constructed balconies in the churches of their mas
ters or (presumably) they had not worshipped at all. With freedom, how
ever, they were permitted to worship when and how they pleased. One of
their first acts was to organize churches of their own. These churches were
at first under the supervision of white churches, but later they were organ
ized into independent units, such as the African Methodist Episcopal Con
ference and the Colored Baptist Association. In the Negro as in the white
churches, the Methodist and Baptist denominations attracted the greatest
RELIGION 117
number of members. Similar in dogma and concept to white religious or
ganizations, the Negro sects have retained an emotional quality in their
services peculiarly their own.
Reconstruction transferred social and economic power from the farms
to the towns. The store usurped the prestige of the plantation; and with
the growth of towns in population and importance, membership in urban
churches increased. After the iSyo s the church treasuries began to fill
so rapidly that the denominations were able to execute many of the social
reforms they had advocated. Missionaries, of the type once sent by the
older States to establish and maintain churches in Mississippi, now were
sent by Mississippi churches to perform a similar heroic task in foreign
lands. Before 1865 an occasional church-supported school had been
founded in Mississippi, but most of these were in fact preparatory acad
emies; Mississippians to be educated in the professions went out of the
State to school. After 1865, however, when few of the "upper class" had
the means to send their children East and when the "common man" had
risen to a status of comparative economic security, the church stepped into
the field of education. Between 1865 and 1891, the State s religious de
nominations founded 123 educational institutions. Though some of these
institutions held college rating, the majority were planned simply to fill
the need of a public school system. When such a system was inaugurated
by the State, a majority of the denominational schools disappeared.
One other effect of the rise of towns on religion in Mississippi was the
comparatively large influx of Jewish people. Woodville, Meridian, Green
ville, Vicksburg, Jackson, and Natchez acquired well-defined Jewish pop
ulations. The State s first synagogue was founded at Woodville in 1866.
Today, the Protestant church is perhaps the greatest social force in
Mississippi life. Public spirited, though deep rooted in conservatism, the
minister is often a greater force in molding public opinion in a community
than is the editor of the local newspaper. Controversial subjects such as
political philosophies, prohibition, child labor, wage-labor laws, and the
Ku Klux Klan often are aired in the pulpits. Like his predecessors, the
circuit rider and the itinerant evangelist of frontier days, the minister is
versatile; he can enliven any occasion with an exhortation or an anecdote,
and he is at home on public platforms and at barbecues. The congrega
tions as a whole share his orthodoxy. They support his suggested enter
prises, share his conservative social theories, and enjoy the zest of de
nominational competition. Occasionally, church bodies meet in assembly
to draft resolutions on matters of general moral concern. Occasionally,
they focus their denunciations upon local evils of social, economic, and
Il8 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
industrial life. It is significant, however, that such resolutions have lost
much of the force that they once exerted.
Individualism in urban churches has been somewhat sacrificed to or
ganization. Taking their cue from the efficiency of modern business con
cerns, the churches maintain building committees, finance committees, and
recreational committees. Church buildings, equipped with recreation
rooms, dining rooms, and kitchens are indicative of their efforts to regain
the place in the community s social life that they unwittingly let slip to the
schools.
Rural churches, though greatly drained by the urban churches absorp
tion of their vitality in the form of members, wealth, and ministerial
material, have retained much of their warmth and simplicity. Throughout
rural Mississippi many sects still hold all-day singings, box suppers, and
"protracted meetings." They also continue to practice "churching," or
striking the name of an erring member from the rolls. Here the church is
still the center of community life. And here, too, modern skepticism is
lacking. Belief in God is accepted with the same unquestioning faith as
are the revolutions of the sun and the cycle of the crops.
H^
Education
The first attempts to establish schools before Territorial days were made
shortly after 1772 by the English Protestant settlers the Congregational-
ists and Baptists near Natchez and the Methodists of Vicksburg and
vicinity. These attempts were crushed temporarily by the authorities of the
second Spanish period (1779-98). Of necessity and desire the planters
hired private tutors for their children or sent them to Eastern or European
colleges.
The first act of incorporation for any purpose passed by the Territorial
legislature was that of May 13, 1802, establishing Jefferson College.
This college, still in operation as Jefferson Military Academy, at Wash
ington six miles from Natchez, began active work in 1811. Supported
at first by private donations, the proceeds of a lottery, and student fees,
EDUCATION 119
it later received land-grant assistance. One year before the incorporation
of Jefferson College, the Reverend David Ker, a Scotchman, opened at
Natchez the first public school for girls. Eight academies were incor
porated in the Mississippi Territory, six of which were within the present
limits of the State of Mississippi.
Of the pioneer academies established in the new State the earliest of
note was the Elizabeth Female Academy near Washington (see Tour 3,
Sec. b). The school opened in November 1818, was granted its charter
February 1819, and operated under the auspices of the Methodist Church
until it finally closed about 1843. Edward Mayes, in History of Education
in Mississippi, says it achieved "the dignity of a college in fact, although
not in name." If this statement is true, it was the first chartered college
in the United States to confer degrees upon women.
Hampstead Academy (shown in some records Hamstead), incorporated
in 1826 after the middle section of Choctaw lands had been opened to
settlement, was established at Mount Salus, now Clinton. Begun as a
private venture and for a while under the control of the Clinton Pres
bytery, in 1850 it was taken over by the Baptist Church under the name
of Mississippi College. It is now (1937) one of Mississippi s leading
liberal arts colleges.
A third pioneer school of note was Oakland College near Rodney
Landing, begun in 1830 as a Presbyterian institution to educate a native min
istry in the Southwest. In 1871 it was purchased by the State and dedicated
to the higher education of Negro men. In 1878 it was reorganized as the
Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College, the only State-owned insti
tution of higher education for Negroes in Mississippi. The Agricultural
Land Scrip Fund, established by an act of Congress in 1862, made
possible this reorganization. In 1902 the college was made coeducational
(1936-37 enrollment, 434).
Many of the best schools and colleges in the State cither were estab
lished under the direction of the Protestant churches or have received
aid from them. Prior to the War between the States, 158 special charters
were granted by the legislature to institutions of learning, and during the
period from the close of the war until 1891 there were 123 more. Fourteen
of these were organized by the Baptist Church within a period of ten years.
These numbers do not include the institutions under the general laws of the
State, nor those content to operate without charters. They were called
by all names academies, high schools, colleges, universities; but nearly
all claimed to give sound instruction in the classics, higher mathematics,
philosophy, the natural sciences, and modern languages.
120 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
Although many of these schools were really of little better than high
school standing and lasted only a short time, they served well a State
with a small and greatly scattered population. Especially popular were
the female colleges where, in the absence of public schools in their
communities, the daughters of the planters could board. From the early
Protestant church schools have developed many of the leading present-
day schools and colleges. The first Roman Catholic schools were in con
nection with the Indian missions. There are now (1937) parochial schools
and private academies in many of the cities, ten of approved high school
rank.
Acts of Congress of 1803 and 1805 reserved for school purposes the
sixteenth section of each township in Mississippi. Under these acts there
should be now a vast amount of income available for educational pur
poses, but by mismanagement, sale, leasing for 99 years at small rates,
or out-and-out loss, the greater part of the fund has been dissipated,
and most of the sixteenth section schools remain a myth. One notable
exception is Franklin Academy, established at Columbus in 1821, which,
although a part of the city school system, still benefits from its sixteenth
section income. It has been in operation continuously since its beginning,
and was by 24 years the first free school established in the State.
Although since 1803 schools in the State were established or aided by
sixteenth sections donated by Congress, and, since 1821, to a small extent
by the Literary Fund established in that year by the legislature, no serious
consideration seems to have been given to a general system of common
schools until 1843. ^ n tnat 7 ear ^ was made a campaign issue by A. G.
Brown, candidate for the office of Governor. In 1846 Brown, as Governor,
succeeded in securing the passage of an act to establish a general system
of schools. But the schools that grew out of this act had no uniformity
since they differed as the counties differed in wealth and efficiency of
management. Not until 1870 was a uniform system of public education
organized in Mississippi. Each county in the State and each city of 5,000
population (later including those of 1,000) was made a district in which
free public schools were to be maintained for at least four months of
the year under the supervision of a board of school directors. Under
this system there existed in each county many one- or two-teacher schools.
Before the War between the States there were no public schools for
Negroes. According to Garner in his Reconstruction in Mississippi:
With the occupation of the state by the Federal Armies, the work of teaching
the Negroes began. The first schools established for this purpose were at
Corinth shortly after the occupation of that territory by the Union troops in
1862. The American Missionary Association, the Freedman s Aid Society, and
EDUCATION 121
the Society of Friends had established schools about Vicksburg before the close
of the war. Upon the organization of the Freedman s Bureau, a more sys
tematized and comprehensive plan of Negro education was undertaken. Joseph
Warren, chaplain of a Negro regiment, was appointed superintendent of freed-
men s schools for the state at large. These schools were under military super
vision, and benevolent associations supplied them with books and, in many cases,
furnished clothing to the students.
In 1865 there were 30 Negro schools; by 1869 there were 81 with
105 teachers, 40 of whom were Negroes.
During the period of reconstruction an elaborate and expensive system
of education, to include both white and Negro children, was formu
lated after the plans of the eastern States. State normal schools for
Negroes were established at Holly Springs and at Tougaloo, near Jack
son, and were liberally supported by the legislature. (These have been
discontinued since 1903, leaving no State-owned schools for the train
ing of Negro teachers. ) To the impoverished taxpayers, this reconstruction
legislation was a great burden. Yet, as Garner continues, "when the
reconstructionists surrendered the government to the democracy, in 1876,
the public school system which they had fathered had become firmly
established, its efficiency increased, and its administration made somewhat
less expensive than at first." The Democrats made provisions for con
tinuing the system and guaranteed an annual five-month term instead
of the former one of four months.
Until 1885 all the public schools manifested a low degree of vitality.
Free education for white and Negro alike was openly combated because
of the excessive taxation imposed upon the war-impoverished people,
but the retrenchments made by the legislature of 1886 made the issue
a little more popular. The 15 years preceding 1900 brought a gradual
growth and improvement in the State school system.
The period from 1900 to 1930 was one of decided progress. A bill
passed in 1910, providing for the consolidation of rural schools with
transportation at public expense, brought about a vast improvement in
educational advantages for the children scattered on farms and in small
villages. Before that date the cities and towns had the only public high
schools in the State. In that year began the development of county agri
cultural high schools. In the following decade 50 such schools were
organized, so distributed as to cover almost the entire State. In the rural
areas they brought a deeper interest in education and a demand that
high school facilities be within the reach of every girl and boy in Missis
sippi. The outcome has been that many of the consolidated schools have
become of accredited high school standing, and the majority of the rural
children can live at home and yet have facilities equal to those offered
122 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
the children in the State s most progressive cities and towns. With the
accrediting of these consolidated schools many of the agricultural high
schools have been absorbed into the county program of education.
The report of August 1937 shows a total of 20 agricultural high
schools for white children, all approved by the State Accrediting Com
mission and 7 of the group accredited by the Southern Association of
Colleges and Secondary Schools. Ten of these are separate schools while
10 are connected with State-supported junior colleges. There are three
agricultural high schools for Negroes, one approved and two on pro
bation. The number of consolidated schools of high school rank for
white children is approximately 850, all with free transportation; for
Negro children there are 40, half of which have free transportation.
Of the 510 approved four-year high schools for white children, 77 are
accredited by the Southern Association. There are 54 approved high
schools for Negroes, two of which are accredited by the Southern Asso
ciation: the high school departments of Southern Christian Institute and
Tougaloo College.
Since the passage, in 1917, of the Federal Vocational Education Act,
commonly referred to as the Smith-Hughes Act after its co-authors, 593
departments of vocational training have been established in Mississippi
schools. Under this act funds are available to any public school approved
by the State Board of Education and willing to match Smith-Hughes
funds. During the term 1936-37 the following number of high schools
received vocational aid: agricultural, 172 white, 87 Negro; home eco
nomics, 197 white, 37 Negro; industrial and trade, 85 white, 15 Negro.
In response to the need for an extended secondary school program,
the present n State-supported junior colleges were established between
the years 1922 and 1929. Their 1936-37 enrollment was 3,243. They
are fairly evenly distributed over the State, are coeducational, have
nominal fees, and all but one have agricultural high school departments.
There are eight other white junior colleges in the State, five of which
are church-supported schools for girls. Hillman College in Clinton,
Mississippi Synodical College in Holly Springs, and All Saints College
in Vicksburg are under the respective jurisdiction of the Baptist, Pres
byterian, and Episcopal Churches. Whitworth College, Brookhaven, and
Grenada College, Grenada, are Methodist schools. The combined en
rollment of these church schools for 1936-37 was 571. There are three
privately controlled white schools of junior college rank. Clark Memorial
College, Newton, and Wood Junior College, Mathiston, are coeduca
tional, with respective enrollments of 81 and 125. Gulf Park College,
EDUCATION 123
Gulf port, is a private school for girls, with an enrollment of 254 (1937).
There are three accredited Negro schools of junior college rank: Mary
Holmes Seminary, West Point, Okolona Industrial School, Okolona, and
Southern Christian Institute, Edwards. These are under the respective
jurisdictions of the Northern Presbyterian, Episcopal, and Christian
Churches.
Special schools have been provided for special groups. In 1847, the
Institute for the Blind and, in 1854, the Institute for the Deaf and Dumb
were established at Jackson. The Industrial and Training School, for
"the care and training of children under 18 years of age, found to be
destitute, abandoned, or delinquent," was established in 1916 at Colum
bia. This was followed in 1920 by the School for the Feeble Minded, at
Ellisville. Negroes are admitted to the Institute for the Deaf and Dumb
and the School for the Feeble Minded. These four schools are State-
supported.
The first attempts to educate the Indians were made by missionaries,
incidental to their efforts to Christianize them. The Elliot Mission,
established in 1818 in what is now Grenada County, and the Mayhew
Mission, an outgrowth of this some 70 miles east, continued until the
Indian removal (1830), at which time many of the teachers and priests
followed their charges to their new homes in the West. Prior to the
War between the States and through the Reconstruction Period no effort
was made toward the education or training of those Indians who re
mained in Mississippi. An act was passed in 1882 that provided schools
for the Indian children in the eastern part of the State where the number
warranted a school. Indian education was taken over from the State by
the U. S. Government in 1918 through its Indian agency at Philadelphia,
Mississippi. Of the seven day-schools under Government sponsorship,
the one at Tucker is typical (see Tour 12).
There are about 150 full-blooded Chinese children of school age in
the Delta, where live most of the Chinese in the State. Since these
children are prohibited by law from attending the white public schools,
they, for the most part, are taught privately in small groups, each family
paying a part of the cost, or are sent out of the State, even to China,
for their education. In a few of the towns where there are only one or
two children they are given special permission to attend the local schools ;
in many places they attend the Negro schools. All children of mixed
Chinese and Negro blood must attend the Negro schools. The only public
school for the Chinese is at Greenville, a one-room frame structure where
about 25 children are taught by an American teacher who belongs to
124 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
the regular city school faculty. The work in this school extends through
the eighth grade. In 1937 the Chinese Mission school, with an enroll
ment of about 35, was opened at Cleveland under the sponsorship of
the Baptist Church. Full-blooded Chinese from all parts of the Delta
attend. There are boarding facilities for those from a distance. The cur
riculum is that of other public schools supplemented by courses in
Chinese language and literature.
The educational advantages of the Negroes have not kept pace with
those of the white children. Of the 3,753 public Negro schools, only
2,313 are in publicly owned buildings. While many of these are modern
and adequately equipped, the 1,440 other Negro schools in the State
are in churches, lodge buildings, garages, tenant houses, old stores, and
similar buildings. The greatest stimulus toward the betterment of this
condition has been the Julius Rosenwald Fund, of which, since 1919,
half a million dollars have been spent in building and equipping Negro
schoolhouses in Mississippi. Since 1932 funds have not been available
for building purposes but may be secured by school libraries for the
purchase of books. Many of the Negro schools in the rural sections
are still one- and two-teacher schools, often poorly equipped. The school
term for rural schools for Negroes averages five months; that in the
city schools for Negroes varies from eight to nine months. The salaries
for teachers in the Negro rural schools vary from $18.00 to $50.00 per
month, with an average of $25.00. In the Negro city schools the average
salary is about $35.00.
Each county Negro school has its separate Negro board of directors.
In each city school system there is one board, composed of white men
and women, over all schools for both white and Negro alike. The city
superintendent of schools, in every case a white man, is also super
intendent of the city Negro schools. In many of these schools work
of a relatively high standard is done, especially in the vocational courses.
Since 60 percent of all Negroes in public schools are in the first three
grades and only about five percent of the public high school enrollment
are Negroes, many schools of high school rank or above have been or
ganized under private management or under the jurisdiction of some
church. Besides the church schools already named, there are four others
which are supported by Negro churches: Mississippi Industrial College,
Holly Springs, Natchez College, Natchez, Saints Industrial Institute,
Lexington, and Campbell College, Jackson. These are under the respec
tive jurisdictions of the Methodist, Baptist, Sanctified, and African
Methodist Churches.
EDUCATION 125
The three independently controlled Negro schools Utica Institute,
Prentiss Normal and Industrial Institute, and Piney Woods School,
founded in 1903, 1907 and 1910 respectively are supported by volun
tary contributions and money earned by their traveling groups of singers.
All three are boarding schools of accredited high school rank. The Piney
Woods School, with the best industrial plant, not only has more singers
on tour than any other Negro school as many as 14 quartets have been
on tour at one time but is the only school with a department for the
blind. Prentiss Industrial Institute is the only Negro school in the State
founded and headed by native Mississippi Negroes. Utica Institute is out
standing for its singing of Negro spirituals, and its quintet has the dis
tinction of having sung in Europe. Perhaps the school s most interesting
accomplishment is its promulgation of the annual Negro Farmers Con
ference, the object of which is to encourage Negro farmers to become land
owners.
There are three senior colleges for Negroes in addition to the State-
owned Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College. Tougaloo College,
at Tougaloo, seven miles north of Jackson, was founded in 1869 by the
American Missionary Association of the Congregational Church. It is the
only senior college for Negroes in Mississippi approved by the Southern
Association. Its students have contributed to an anthology called The
Brown Thrush, the first intercollegiate anthology compiled by Negro stu
dents. Among these contributors is Jonathan Brooks, whose poetry has ap
peared in national periodicals. In its music department more attention is
paid to the classics than to spirituals. It is one of the few colleges in the
State offering pipe organ instruction. Rust College, Holly Springs, organ
ized in 1870 and supported by the Northern Methodist Church, is noted
for its music, especially its traveling groups of singers who supplement the
school funds by their concerts. Jackson College, organized at Natchez in
1877 under the auspices of the Baptist Church, was moved to Jackson in
1884. Besides courses in the liberal arts it offers teacher training and
music. As in all the Negro colleges of the State, singing plays a large part
in its activities.
Five of the ten senior colleges for white students in Mississippi are
State-supported; five are church schools. The oldest of the former group
is the University of Mississippi, Oxford (1936-37 enrollment, 1,361).
Edward Mayes, in History of Education in Mississippi, says:
The university . . . was, in fact, founded by the Congress of the United States,
by the acts of March 3, 1815, and February 20, 1819. The former act, that
which provided for the survey of the boundary line fixed by the treaty with the
Creek Indians, donated 36 sections of the public lands for the use of a seminary
LYCEUM BUILDING, "OLE MISS," STATE UNIVERSITY, OXFORD
of learning in the (then) Mississippi Territory. When the State was organized
in 1817, all of the Creek lands were left within the Alabama Territory, and the
fact led to the act of 1819. By this act a similar quantity of land in lieu of the
Creek lands was granted and the title vested in the State, in trust, for the support
of a seminary of learning therein.
A vast amount of these lands was sold or leased and the money invested
in stock of the Planters Bank. Since 1880 the State has paid to the univer
sity, biennially, a sum approximating $65,000, which represents interest
EDUCATION 127
at six percent on this money lost in the failure of the bank in 1840. The
same year (1840) the legislature voted to use the remaining income from
seminary lands for the establishment of the university. Its charter was
granted in 1844; in 1846, William Nicholl, an Englishman, was elected
supervising architect for the proposed buildings, the first of which was
the Lyceum, now used for administrative purposes and classrooms; the
university was opened in the fall of 1848. Exercises were suspended from
1861 until late 1865 because of the War between the States. The property,
though occupied sometimes by the Confederates, sometimes by the Fed
erals, was preserved intact. Begun as a liberal arts college, with a law de
partment added in 1885, it now offers the usual university courses.
Mississippi State College, Starkville (1936-37 enrollment, 1,933),
owes its origin to the Agricultural Land Scrip Fund established by an act
of Congress in 1862. It was chartered as Mississippi Agricultural and
Mechanical College in 1878 and shared this fund equally with Alcorn
Agricultural and Mechanical College for Negroes. Begun purely as an
agricultural and mechanical college in response to the request of the farm
ers of the State for scientific training for their sons, the college expanded
later. Courses in the liberal arts, schools of science, education, business,
aviation, and pre-medicine, a graduate school, and an agricultural exten
sion department were added. In 1930 the institution was made coeduca
tional; in 1932 its name was changed.
Mississippi State College for Women, Columbus (1936-37 enrollment,
952), opened in 1885 as the Mississippi Industrial Institute and College,
the first State-supported institution for the higher education of women in
the United States. Incorporated in 1884, it was the successor to the Colum
bus Female Institute begun in 1848. Although emphasis was placed on
the industrial courses, music and fine arts were included in its first curric
ulum. It offers courses in the liberal arts, secretarial training, library
science, dramatics, music and art, and has unusually good departments of
physical education and teacher training.
Mississippi State Teachers College, Hattiesburg (1936-37 enrollment,
859), was incorporated as the Mississippi Normal College by legislative
act of 1910, and opened two years later. In 1922 the legislature authorized
the granting of the degree of Bachelor of Science, and in 1934, the degree
of Bachelor of Music. The name was changed in 1924. Delta State Teach
ers College, Cleveland (1936-37 enrollment, 367), was established by
legislative act of 1924, and opened the following year. It now confers the
degree of Bachelor of Science in Education, and has added courses in
music and art. Its choral work is not surpassed in the State.
128 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
Of the church-supported senior colleges, the oldest is Mississippi Col
lege (1936-37 enrollment, 395), a liberal arts college for men. Women
are admitted to the junior and senior classes by special arrangement. (This
college was among the pioneer academies.) Millsaps College, Jackson
(193637 enrollment, 415), established in 1892 under the auspices of
the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, is a coeducational liberal arts col
lege with emphasis upon training for the Methodist ministry. An endow
ment of $50,000 was donated by Major R. W. Millsaps with the provision
that the Church raise an equal sum.
Blue Mountain College, Blue Mountain (1936-37 enrollment, 301),
established in 1873 by General M. P. Lowrey as a private school for girls,
is the oldest senior college for women in the State. In 1920 the Mississippi
Baptist Convention assumed control of the school. Especial emphasis is
placed on the departments of speech arts, fine arts, and music. Belhaven Col
lege, Jackson (1936-37 enrollment, 257), established as a private school for
girls in 1894, came under the control of the Mississippi Presbytery in
1911. Its art and music departments are outstanding. Mississippi Woman s
College, Hattiesburg (1936-37 enrollment, 176), under the management
of the Baptist Church, was established in 1911 on a site presented to the
Baptist Convention by W.S.F. Tatum. Since 1926 it has been an accred
ited senior college with an excellent music department.
The Press
In the late summer of 1798, Winthrop Sargent arrived in the 8 2 -year-
old town of Natchez to assume the duties of Governor of the newly
created Mississippi Territory. A few days later he summed up one of the
Territory s greatest difficulties in a letter to the Secretary of State. "We
have no printing offices in this country [and] we are remote from all
others," he wrote. "A small traveling press, sufficient for half a sheet of
post paper, which would give four pages, would be a blessing to the peo
ple of the territory, and I would myself contrive to manage it." The reason
for this lack of printing facilities, the Governor might have added, was
THE PRESS 129
that this eastern portion of the lower Mississippi Valley had been under
Spanish rule for the previous 20 years, and only one printing press had
been allowed in all the valley. That one was at New Orleans and was for
government use only. Not even handbills could be posted in the Natchez
District without official permission.
In compliance with the Governor s request, Lieutenant Andrew Mars-
chalk was ordered to pack the little hand-press with which he had been
experimenting while on duty at Walnut Hills (Vicksburg), and to proceed
to Natchez. There Marschalk set up his press, put aside the poems he had
been printing, and began the more practical work of publishing the
laws of the Mississippi Territory. This piece of work gave him consider
able prestige. Apparently it also injected printer s ink into his blood, for
in 1802 he resigned from the Army, founded a newspaper, and began
what was to become the more exciting career of journalism. Before he died
in 1837 he had fought several duels, been fined for contempt of court
(which he "fully intended to contempt"), and served as Mississippi s first
public printer. He is remembered as "the father of journalism in
Mississippi."
The paternity of Mississippi s press, however, falls to Marschalk be
cause of the importance of his paper rather than for its priority. Before
the first issue of his Mississippi Herald, on July 26, 1802, two other pub
lications, the Mississippi Gazette in August 1800, and the Intelligencer in
1 80 1, had appeared. Moreover, the Gazette, published by Benjamin Stokes
on the little press bought from Marschalk, was a success. But the Herald
soon eclipsed these two papers both in power and in circulation. By its edi
torial policy it struck the tone of Mississippi journalism for three-quarters
of the century to come. Marschalk subordinated news stories to editorials,
then highly seasoned his editorials with personal abuse. His paper became
a rabid political sheet; and this was the character of the newspapers that
followed.
In 1808 Mississippi had four newspapers, all in Natchez. But soon
thereafter Marschalk moved to the town of Washington to establish the
Washington Republican, and in 1812 the Woodville Republican was
founded. This latter paper is the oldest in the State among those still pub
lished. In its files are details of the Napoleonic Wars, national political
campaigns, and slavery laws. Except for the year 1831, however, the files
offer little local news. In that year an anonymous citizen wrote to the
paper, pointing out the advantages offered the country by the new means
of transportation "called railroads." The letter, signed "Publius," was
printed by the Republican, and followed by an editorial. The results were
130 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
a meeting of Woodville citizens, the appointment of a committee, and
the construction of a railroad. This railroad was the Woodville & West
Feliciana, fifth railroad to be chartered in the United States (see Tour
3, Sec. b).
With Natchez, Woodville, and Washington editors paving the way, and
with a great influx of people into the State from the Carolinas, Virginia,
Georgia, Kentucky, and Tennessee, other newspapers were born. Like the
seat of government, they began gradually to shift from the river country
towards the interior. When the government at last found a permanent
location and Jackson became the political storm center of the State, two
new but important papers were founded here. These were the Pearl River
Gazette and the State Register, both established in 1823.
These early Mississippi newspapers vied with one another for the
lucrative printing contracts awarded by the State, as almost the only means
of financial survival. In January 1820, Richard C. Langdon, of the Missis
sippi Republican, was given the contract, with Marschalk s old title of
public printer. But in February he was called before the State House of
Representatives, charged with contempt in publishing "two pieces highly
inflammatory on the members thereof, and calculated to disturb the cool
ness and deliberation of this body." Langdon was defended by Jefferson
Davis brother, Joseph, but he was dismissed from his office by a vote of
17 to 10.
Advertising agencies were unknown in these early days ; if an editor de
sired out-of-town advertisements, he had to secure the business himself.
Advertising space, commonly used to promote snuff, beverages, tobacco,
and patent medicines, was generally sold at a price of $30 a year for a
"square." At the end of the first year the advertiser often forgot to pay
for the renewal of his announcement ; yet, like his free subscription to the
paper, it would continue indefinitely. As the number of squares sold by
the paper increased, the size of the paper became larger. A few journals
grew so large and bulky that their square-filled sheets could hardly be
handled conveniently. These papers were referred to by their less fortunate
rivals as "our bed quilt contemporaries."
Mississippians have ever been fond of politics, and in the fever of the
so-called "flush times" of the 1830*5 their appetite for it seemed insatiable.
Every citizen carried a political theory in his pocket, exhibiting it on every
occasion. The professions of law and politics were one, not two. This fitted
neatly into the individualistic policies of opinionated editors. Almost every
paper, with the exception of the well-edited literary weekly, Ariel, was a
political organ. One-third of each issue was devoted to the virtues of its
THE PRESS 131
editor s political views; much of the remaining two-thirds consisted of
invective against the vices of the opposition.
The Natchez, edited by James H. Cook, was a power in the Whig Party.
Opposing it was the Statesman, vociferously pro-Democratic and edited by
such men as J. F. H. Claiborne and Robert J. Walker. The Polk-Clay
Presidential campaign of 1844 brought forth almost as large a crop of
newspapers as had the campaign of Andrew Jackson. Typical of these was
Harry of the West, established in Grenada by J. J. Choate in 1844, but
sold in 1846 and renamed after its title no longer represented the upper
most question of the day. During this period Alexander McClung, "the
Black Knight of the South," established the True Issue, one of the most
ably edited newspapers in the Southwest. McClung s editorials on the
National Bank issue and the tariff were justly famous; Seargent S. Prentiss
is said to have used numerous extracts from them in his political cam
paigns. But by December 17, 1844, the Mississippi Democrat of Carrollton
(see Tour 6) was speaking of the "carriage already built and sent to bring
the Whig president-elect to Washington." With Polk elected, a great
many of the papers, exhausted by their prodigious efforts, collapsed.
The trenchant editorials plus the keen rivalry natural to extremely
partisan papers made it necessary for the editors to be expert pugilists and
duelists as well as journalists. An editor made no assertion that he could
not defend with fists or firearms. In Vicksburg the Whig, a daily paper
published from 1840 to 1860, and the Tri-Weekly Sentinel, owned by
W. W. Green and James Hagen, had a particularly bloody history. On one
occasion Hagen engaged McCardle, then editor of the Whig, in a duel.
McCardle was wounded, but recovered and lived to see Hagen shot down
in a street fight by Daniel Adams, a Jackson citizen whom Hagen had
offended in an editorial. The four editors who succeeded Hagen on the
Sentinel also met violent deaths. The paper discontinued publication in
1857.
The sentiment for secession united the newspapers of the State in
common denunciation of the Unionists. But the war that shortly followed
dealt them a staggering blow. Machinery and paper were almost impos
sible to obtain, and the able-bodied printers left their presses to shoulder
rifles. The calamity was climaxed when Federal troops, marching through
the State, destroyed both presses and type. Sometimes the type was dumped
into a river or a well; in the case of the Jackson Mississippi. it w.is
strewn through the streets. But a few papers still managed to survive. The
Evening Citizen, the first afternoon paper to be published in Vicksburg,
continued operation not only through the first years of war but throughout
132 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
the siege. Its final edition, issued July 4, 1863, was printed on wallpaper
because the supply of news-print was entirely exhausted. As this last issue
went to press, the victorious Federal Army marched into the city, and one
blue-clad trooper entered the plant and added the item: "Vicksburg has
this day surrendered to General Grant."
With the coming of peace, many new papers were founded and a few
of the old revived. In the latter group was the Eastern Clarion, established
at Paulding in the 1830 $, then moved to Meridian, and again at the close
of the war to Jackson. Here it became the Clarion and later the Daily
Clarion-Ledger, one of Mississippi s largest present-day newspapers. These
older papers, of which the Clarion was typical, were defiant of the recon
struction policy and suffered tremendously because of their views. The new
papers, usually managed by northerners recently moved into the State,
supported the Government s policy and grew rich from State printing
contracts. Practically all national advertising went to the Republican press.
The Pilot, published by Kimball, Raymond & Company of Jackson, was
perhaps the most powerful in the newer group. On one occasion an irate
Democrat, A. J. Frantz, went to Jackson intending to avenge his party by
killing the paper s editor. The editor, however, discreetly hid himself, and
the spectators who had gathered to see the fight were disappointed. They
branded the Republican editor as a coward, and hoisting Frantz to their
shoulders they proclaimed him the "first man to win a victory over the
Yankees since the war." The bloodless outcome of this event, however,
was not typical, and a score or more of editors were killed in Vicksburg
during the Reconstruction Period.
In 1866 the older newspaper publishers organized a press association
as a retaliative measure. Republicans were barred from it, and until
the withdrawal of Federal troops it remained the "Democratic Press Asso
ciation of Mississippi." After the troops withdrew, Republican papers dis
appeared entirely, and the Democratic papers turned their editorials from
abuse of northerners to work for State reform. Public opinion shaped
by the papers caused a committee to be appointed in 1881 to investigate
charges of brutality to convicts leased by the State as laborers to private
enterprises. This investigation led to changes in the penal system adopted
by the Constitutional Convention of 1890. Other causes espoused by the
newspapers of the post-Reconstruction Period were the fight against mob
legislation and the advocacy of local option in liquor traffic.
At the turn of the century, the weekly papers reigned supreme. There was
at least one to every county, and they were judged entirely by the quality
of their editorials. At the end of 1910, however, the dailies began to enjoy
THE PRESS 133
the advantages of national press services and by enlarged circulation to
encroach upon the weeklies. Mississippi journalism subsequently under
went a change. For the first time in the State s newspaper history, opinion
began to be subordinated to news.
If Marschalk, "the father of Mississippi journalism," were able to
enumerate his posterity today he would find himself blessed with 130
publications, 20 of which are dailies and the remainder weeklies. The
dailies, he would discover, have exchanged vitriolic editorials and front
page advertisements of "Pure Old Brandy" for "spot news" dispatches
and syndicated columns of contemporary eastern papers. The dailies have
replaced their outmoded machinery with linotypes and rotary presses, and
have become members of one or more of the large press services. The
weeklies have been arbitrarily assigned the task of printing local news and
guiding the people in trade and politics. In a way, they have become
virtual chambers of commerce for the smaller towns. They help to develop
local industry by publicity and stock-selling campaigns, and to promote
community spirit. Yet their intimate contact with the town s life and their
provincial enthusiasm have retained for them an importance that cannot
be over-emphasized. Organs of the village citizens and county farmers, the
weeklies represent the bulk of Mississippi s population. They fight their
subscribers political battles, mold opinions into well-defined issues, and
at the same time keep alive an interest in the social doings of Mr. and Mrs.
Jones.
The Creative Effort
Arts and Letters
Since a people s artistic expression, and what they choose from the art
of others, is determined largely by their way of life, it is best for under
standing to look first at the Mississippian, then at his creative efforts. A
brief survey of his traditions and environment will reveal the Missis
sippian s capacity for enjoyment, his humors, and his philosophy; and it is
these, going beyond externals, that strike the notes of his character as it
is revealed in the records he has left.
Of the two million individuals who are now Mississippians, slightly
more than half are Negroes. The remainder, to an extent greater than in
any other State, are native-born descendants of English, Scotch, and Irish
stock. The minority peoples French, Spanish, and Indian did not in
fuse their blood in any appreciable quantity, neither did they leave any
indelible impression on Mississippi tradition, custom, or temperament.
With the possible exception of southwest Mississippi s architectural tradi
tion, established by the Spanish from the West Indies, there is little
Indian, French, or Spanish art influence evident in the present culture.
French settlement along the coast left traces of the mother tongue and
established the Catholic religion, but this influence is slight compared with
the British and Negro heritage of the State as a whole.
The Negro, bringing with him to Mississippi remnants of his African
tribal culture, was placed in the position of a slave performing the heavy
manual labor on which a civilization rested. Generally he dwelt apart from
white associations, lived in the field and in segregated cabins. He received
no schooling in languages or indigenous art forms. If he showed origi
nality, he sometimes was allowed to express himself in wood and iron
working carving stair rails, cabinets, and mantels for his white master s
home but, generally, as long as he performed his menial task of cultivat
ing the fields he was left to his own devices. The simpler beliefs of
Protestant Christianity were taught him and were learned readily by him;
but these were assimilated in his own way. Hence his emotions and in-
ARTS AND LETTERS 135
hcrent sense of rhythm found expression in song, the only external ex
pression, other than the handicrafts, that could surmount his paucity of
tools.
This handicap, twisted by changing circumstances into almost completely
economic form, has lingered with the Negro. Since emancipation, the
Negro has been too occupied with economic problems and too busy assimi
lating the culture of the society about him to have the time for creative
expression. That he is still deeply imaginative is evidenced by his song,
anecdotes, and cabin gardens. But even these, like his religion, emotions,
and physical appearance, have become subjects for the white artist. Instead
of expressing himself creatively, the Negro has been placed in the position
of being an almost inexhaustible reservoir of material for the creative
efforts of others. The young Syrian sculptor, Leon Koury of Greenville,
first won recognition for his modeling of a Negro s head, and has since
devoted much of his time to portraiture of Negro subjects. The painter,
John McCrady, has found his best material in the Negro. His painting,
Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, recognized as his greatest work to date, inter
prets the Negro s idea of death and ascension to heaven.
The culture of white Mississippians has been more complex, composed
of Scotch, Irish, and English influences, with the last predominating.
There has always been a close relationship between the Englishman s life
and his creative efforts. This makes it possible, to a degree, to explain the
white Mississippian s external expressions in connection with his more or
less material existence. His financial status, the amount of leisure he has
had, and his purpose in life have greatly influenced his creative efforts, if
not his temperament.
There were three migrations of English, Scotch, and Irish stock to
Mississippi. The first was the migration of Tory families to the Natchez
country during and immediately following the American Revolution. The
second was the migration from the Piedmont of the Carolinas and Vir
ginia into the Mississippi hills and Piney Woods regions immediately
after the War of 1812. The third was the "flush times" migration that
brought settlers from all classes of the older South, and even from the
East and North, into Indian lands opened by the treaty of 1832.
These three groups, though all of one racial stock, came with different
backgrounds and purposes. The Tories were comparatively wealthy and by
habit were accustomed to a certain amount of ease and gracious living.
Their ideal was the English country squire. They placed emphasis on
permanency, family background, and conservatism in arts and politics.
They built homes that would endure, filled the homes with accepted
136 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
objets d art, planted formal gardens, and wherever possible preserved in
detail the code they had brought with them. Fortunately for their con
tinued peace of mind the cotton culture supported them in their accepted
way of life. It gave them money to spend and a plantation to rule. It
enabled them to buy Negro slaves, hire private tutors for their children,
buy harps and pianos for their music rooms, and engage itinerant painters
to do the family portraits. Unfortunately, it shielded them from emotional
crises and left them contented to express themselves as patrons of art and
literature rather than as painters and writers.
The hill people were in many ways quite different from the Tory group.
They did not come to Mississippi to reestablish an empire. Instead, they
came from King s Mountain to escape a world that was too much for
them. Preferring the alternative of independent isolation, they purposely
forsook hope of wealth and leisure to hide themselves in the hilly retreats
of northeastern Mississippi or in the great stretches of the Piney Woods.
Here, scattered on small farms with their trading centers hardly more than
crossroad stores, these people retained with remarkable purity their tradi
tions. Folk songs and stories were their literature, and because they had
no financial means with which to supply their domestic needs, their artistic
urge found expression in such utilitarian handicrafts as quilt-making and
woodwork.
The people who came to Mississippi on the crest of the "flush times"
had purposes more nearly like what are considered "American" today.
They moved to Mississippi in order "to get ahead." They meant to begin
a tradition, not to continue one. Temperamentally, they were not contem
plative or contented men ; rather they were men of action, fired by hope of
gain and believing that all things were within their grasp. This belief in
progress held in temporary abeyance their desire for leisure.
But if they had some of the so-called failings attributed to Americans,
they also had, to an exceptional degree, American strength. They were
plungers, men with initiative, pioneers, fighters. They cared little for tradi
tion but demanded that each man prove his worth. They acknowledged no
upper class and were more willing to trust their own opinions than accept
the standards of others. To them external expression was utilitarian even
more than it was to the Piney Woods farmer, for it was propaganda, a
means to an end. They had no wish to seek an escape. Even life s
amenities, it would seem from the houses they built, were sought not so
much for their intrinsic value as for the fact that the amenities would be
tangible proof that they had "arrived."
Of the three groups, Tory, yeoman, and speculator, placed temporarily
ARTS AND LETTERS 137
on Mississippi s frontier stage of civilization, the yeoman remained on the
frontier, while the other two groups rose for a brief period, then were
plunged into the frontier once more by the devastations of the War be
tween the States. Even in the twentieth century the Mississippi environ
ment is, by and large, agrarian in character. It is here that the Industrial
Revolution is said to be finding its last frontier. This agrarian character of
the State and the people illustrates itself in Mississippi s literature.
The chief characteristic of the ante-bellum literati was their manner of
taking literature in their stride. It was for them but one facet of exceed
ingly busy lives; and as such it held the positivism of the frontier rather
than the somewhat negative protest and escape elements of more settled
contemporary New England. Their literature, taken with light good-humor,
was divided into five classes: lyrics dashed off by hearty, well-read men;
travel books and journals that shrewdly caught the significant details of
the country; reminiscences and lusty anecdotes, whose humor was akin
to the spaciousness of a frontier; the oratory of men of action; and the
histories and diaries of men stirred enough to feel that their own and
their contemporaries debates needed preservation.
Lyric poetry was too delicate a medium to receive more than a passing
glance, and this from the Tory element alone. Unfortunately, the Tory
poets were neither strong enough nor good enough to create a literature
of their own. In the same manner as that in which other members of
their class became patrons rather than producers of art, the poetically
inclined preferred losing themselves in the lyrical expressions of classic
Greece and Rome, and of Elizabethan England.
It was in tale-telling and oratory that the Mississippian s interest in
literature was centered. Even semi-historical and social analyses were tied
together by stories. For instance, the first book of the type of humor
that later reached its peak in Mark Twain was written by A. B. Long-
street, a Georgian who came to Mississippi in 1848 to assume the chan
cellorship of the new State university. In his Georgia Scenes Longstreet
set the pattern later followed by Joseph G. Baldwin s Flush Times of
Alabama and Mississippi, Joseph B. Cobb s Mississippi Scenes, Henry
Clay Lewis s The Swamp Doctor s Adventures in the Southwest, and
T. W. Caskey s Seventy Years in Dixie. These books are histories and
social analyses that find common ground in their vast anecdotal humor.
They are as full of stories as a local politician s campaign speech or a
country minister s sermon.
Unfortunately, the greatest stories of the ante-bellum period have been
preserved only by word of mouth. A few, however, found their way into
138 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
the magazine, The Spirit of the Times, and have since been seined out
for the contemporary reader in Arthur Palmer Hudson s Humor of the
Old Deep South. Yet as excellent as some of these stories are, they are
insignificant compared to those that never have been put on paper.
The stories always were tied to known persons or events. In place of
being "Pat" and "Mike" the characters were Cousin Ephie or "Old Man"
McWillie, and were about the bear fight last spring in that canebrake
just south of Sandy Hill. They were intended for a close-knit audience
who could appreciate, because they knew, all the humor inherent in the
personalities and occasions exaggerated by the stories. These tales were
later penalized because of their dated and localized character, but they
nevertheless had, for their time, the unmistakable stamp of living lit
erature.
It has been said that the Mississippian would much prefer "hearing
a book" to reading it. They always have preferred speaking to writing.
In oratory, "the literature of action," Mississippi has the sustained excel
lence that began with Pushmataha (the Choctaw chieftain who matched
words with the great Tecumseh and won), and continued through a
century to another chieftain, James K. Vardaman, the "Great White
Chief" of the so-called common man. Orators ranged from the great
Whig, George Poindexter, to Mississippi s first great political ranter,
Franklin Plummer. With these came a score or more of matchless
orators, men who made themselves and their audiences drunk with the
wine of eloquence. Perhaps no other State has sent as many able and
fluent speakers to the National Congress. The dynamic force of Robert
J. Walker, the sonorous apostrophes of Seargent S. Prentiss, Henry S.
Foote, Albert G. Brown, and Jefferson Davis, the quiet, human dignity
of L. Q. C. Lamar, Edward Cary Walthall, James Z. George, and John
Sharp Williams, as well as the barbed humor of "Private John Allen,"
have distinguished the Congresses of which they were members. The
most polished orator of them all, Alexander K. McClung, never reached
Congress; and two others, James L. Alcorn and William L. Sharkey,
elected to the United States Senate, were refused seats because of recon
struction policies.
The reason for this superlative oratory is contained in the training
arid background of the orators. The conflicting legal claims to land
during the "flush times" attracted to the State some of the Nation s
ablest lawyers. They had their fortunes to make, everything to gain and
nothing to lose. They were schooled in and anxious for debates ; forcible
in argument; reckless and brilliant. For them it was but a short and
ARTS AND LETTERS 139
natural step from swaying juries in courtroom battles over the ownership
of land to swaying constituents in contests for office. For the lawyer,
oratory was the escalator that could lift a political candidate to higher
ground.
The orator was necessarily dramatist, philosopher, author, and speaker
rolled into one. Yet the greatest of the speeches, as the greatest of the
anecdotes, have never been reduced to writing. Nor can they be. The
speaker was in rapport with an audience whose emotional response, denied
outlet in other forms of art, lifted him to constantly greater heights. A
frenzied enthusiasm, partaking of mob spirit, rose in a continuous inter
play of complementing appreciation between orator and listeners. There
has seldom been such an example of the moving power of speech.
Yet some of the force of the ante-bellum debates can be gained from
the accounts of participants in the contests who, retiring from the actual
field of battle, carried on the fight in their memoirs. Examples are the
journal of Andrew Ellicott, the memoirs of General James Wilkinson,
and the histories of J. F. H. Claiborne, Mississippi s Herodotus.
Ante-bellum Mississippiana is seldom prosaic. A part of its vividness
is due to the contagion of the material. The travel books, first written by
visitors, are absorbing narratives of life in a strange country. The
Travels of William Bartram; the notebooks of John Pope, Fortescue
Cuming, Christian Schultz, and Francis Baily; descriptions, ornithological
and otherwise, of Alexander Wilson and John James Audubon; the
journal of Lorenzo Dow; the autobiography of Gideon Lincecum; the
retrospect of Miss Harriet Martineau; and the journeys of Frederick Law
Olmsted are fascinating accounts of early days on the great river and
in the heart of the cotton kingdom.
Consequently, when native Mississippians turned to chronicling the
events of their State s history or to describing the life they saw about
them, they did not need to pad their stories to make them dramatic.
John W. Monette s masterful History of the Discovery and Settlement
of the Mississippi Valley was among the first accounts of the early eight
eenth century colonization of the lower valley by the French. Standard
source books for the early nineteenth century drama of cotton culture
are Joseph Holt Ingraham s The Southwest by a Yankee, W. H. Sparks
The Memories of Fifty Years; and Reuben Davis Recollections of
Mississippi and Mississippians, which gives clear brief summaries of
outstanding Mississippi personalities.
Henry Stuart Foote s Bench and Bar of the South and Southwest, an
informal legal history, written by one of the greatest criminal lawyers
140 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
in the State, is indispensable in a reconstruction of the life and spirit
of the time.
Even the most scholarly historians, inclined to a stately rotund style,
often relieved their pedantic conclusions by flashes of bright humor or
lapses into violent personal opinion that made them almost poetic. The
zestful joie de vivre of the chroniclers can not escape notice.
The almost complete absence of introspective literature shows the
influence of an extremely hearty and gregarious life. Miss Sherwood
Bonner of Holly Springs, looking at Mississippians in retrospect, told
her friend, Mr. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, that "they had the immense
dignity of those who live in inherited homes, with the simplicity of
manner that comes of an assured social position. They were handsome,
healthy, full of physical force as all people must be who ride horseback
and do not lie awake at night to wonder why they were born." Her
description gives an excellent basis for understanding the literature they
produced. Instead of distilling their experiences into a more individualized
art, Mississippians have been ballad-makers.
The War between the States, in place of making an essential break
in their literary tradition, only gave fresh incidents from which tale
tellers could fashion their anecdotes. There is no Mississippian of the
present generation who has not been reared on stories of the fighting.
And there are few Mississippians who, having heard the tales, have not
wondered how it was possible that the Confederacy lost.
However, after 1865, unless the world-troubled souls could express
themselves in speech, they were hard put to it to make a living at literature.
Hence, Mississippi since the War between the States has had her share of
emigre writers. Miss Bonner herself was one of these, though she re
gretted the necessity of leaving what she always considered her home.
Mississippiana continued to be her special province, and Suwanee River
Tales is an interesting revelation of where her heart lay.
In the same period with Miss Bonner was Irwin Russell, the genius
whose work was cut short by his death in New Orleans in 1879 when
he was but 26 years old. As the first Southern writer to master Negro
dialect in verse, Russell has won national recognition with his long poem
"Christmas Night in the Quarters." His influence has endured in the
work of Joel Chandler Harris, and in a more subtle way in all present-
day Mississippi literature. He was the first Mississippi writer of rank
to keep his art free from propaganda. He labored for no cause in his
portrayal of Mississippi Negro life. He sang instead of sermonizing; and
the charm and catholicity of art is patent in all that he has done.
ARTS AND LETTERS 141
Russell, as an individual artist, is one of a handful of Mississippi
writers who have been able to break with the powerful tradition of
raconteur prose and unspeculative verse. S. Newton Berryhill, the "back
woods poet," introduced unusual themes into his verse, but even such
a poem as "My Castle" is marred by his weakness for rhyme.
Among contemporaries, Stark Young, William Faulkner, and William
Alexander Percy stand out. But, for the average Mississippian, Harris
Dickson s Old Reliable Tales, The Story of King Cotton, and his tales
of the Mississippi are more satisfying than the highly subjective work
of Young and Faulkner. In the same way, the poems of David Guyton
or such a good rouser as Walter N. Malone s "Opportunity" are more
widely read than the poetry of Percy.
In Young and Faulkner, Mississippi can boast of outstanding exponents
of both the romantic and realistic schools of regional literature. Born
near each other, reared in the same town (though at slightly different
periods), these two artists have drawn accurate pictures of Southern
life: one, the most charming; the other, the most revolting. It is again
an indication of the wide field covered by Mississippi material that these
two men can both work in it without contradiction.
Young s novels are less novels than descriptive essays of Mississippi
life hung on the convenient framework of the McGehee family and its
"cudns" (cousins). He has not stuck exclusively to the ante-bellum period;
both River House and The Torches Flare are as modern in time and as
penetrating in analysis as his essays in defense of agrarianism. Because
Mr. Young has taken his stand on the near perfection of life as expressed
in the ante-bellum period, Heaven Trees and So Red the Rose are more
representative of his work than the two novels first named.
It is unfortunate that hill-born William Faulkner is most widely known
for a novel, Sanctuary. Even though it is a part of the "Jefferson" set,
Sanctuary is different from such books as The Sound and the Fury,
As I Lay Dying, Light in August, and Absalom, Absalom, An aviator
himself, Faulkner occasionally deserts "Jefferson" in his short stories
and in such a novel as Pylon, but this desertion can itself be traced
to his boyhood and to watching the flight of eagles from an Oxford
hill. There is little of the emigre about Faulkner even though his most
enthusiastic audience may be international. When the "Jefferson" sai:a is
completed and if the short stories of the "Snopeses" are ever fused in
a novel America may see its finest bit of regional interpretation.
There is much about William Alexander Percy that is in the best
Mississippi literary tradition. He is a lawyer, and literature is an absorb-
142 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
ing but not a paying interest with him. Almost his whole work is lyric
poetry; and he finds his metier in the fifteenth instead of in the present
century. No typical Mississippi singer, however, could have produced such
thoughtful work as Percy s Sappho in Levkas and Enzio s Kingdom. Nor
in their best nostalgic moments could the traditional Mississippi lyricists
have written so fine a piece as Percy s "Home" which, in its implications,
is as persuasive an interpretation of the Delta as any of Stark Young s
pronouncements.
Young, Faulkner, and Percy have won an established audience. A
younger group, now fighting for recognition, is obviously more difficult
to appraise: Robert Rylee, David Cohn, and James Street. Street is a news
paperman and was brought up hearing priceless old Mississippi stories;
his Look Away is the result. Cohn seems to be in the tradition of the
Mississippi analyzers and debaters. His God Shakes Creation is a fine
piece of analysis of Mississippi Delta society. His Picking America s
Pockets does the same thing in writing that Mississippi s cotton statesmen
have done in speeches in the halls of Congress. Robert Rylee has shown
exceptional promise in his Deep Dark River and St. George of Weldon.
Deep Dark River s "Mose Southwick" is a Negro character worthy of
a permanent place in Southern literature. In St. George of Weldon
Mr. Rylee limns the man overlooked in the contemporary labelling of
all Mississippians as either planters or tenants. He finds in the Delta
of all places a bourgeois family; and his description of this family
may influence a literature which, for the sake of truth, needs to put
less emphasis on the two poles of society.
Architecture
Just as transportation lines form the skeleton of the social organism,
so architecture reveals its character. In Mississippi s homes the student
may recreate the pattern of the State s everyday existence; and enough
remains of its early architecture to evoke a period of romance that has
had few equals. French voyageur, English Tory, Spanish Don, and South-
A "DOG-TROT" CABIN
ern planter have crossed the great stage of the State, and each has left
the color of his drama in his architecture.
The French were the first to settle. On the Coast, a locale rich in lore,
their impress remains in the thick squat masonry and solid shipshape
timbers of the old fort on Krebs Lake at Pascagoula, built by Sieur
Joseph de la Point in 1718, before the founding of New Orleans.
Following the French, in 1763 Great Britain took over the empire
west of the Alleghanies ; into the Natchez region English colonists pushed
even while the Atlantic seaboard was cutting its bonds with the mother
country. No structure like the Krebs Fort remains as a monument to
English settlement. Instead, the English built log cabins and rough-hewn
blockhouses indistinguishable in type from those in the eastern half
of the Continent.
But if the English left little that was distinctive, the dandified ideas
of the Spanish, brought in with the last score years of the eighteenth
century, made a profound impression. Swinging up from the Coast as
far as the Natchez bluffs, the Dons left as distinct and as civilized an
architecture as could be wrung from the wilderness. It is recognizable
144 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
in the pleasantly-canted roof, the strong concentration of ornament, and
the flair for flamboyant, if rare, color of the type known as "Spanish
Provincial."
At the close of the eighteenth century Virginia and Carolina emigrants
pushed into the region about and to the south of Natchez. The effect
of this mixture of Old World and New was a fusion of significance. The
grand staircases, spacious rooms, and haughty colonnades of the new
comers combined admirably with the delicate spindling work and fluid
lines of their predecessors to produce homes in the "Grand Manner."
The Americans who came after the Spanish, settled themselves on the
Natchez bluffs and, separated by wooded ravines, built homes of a type
close to the Grand Manner yet distinctively rural. They made use of the
same motives, but their adaptation of it was rangy, more open. Fronted
by long single or double recessed galleries, the roof forming a transverse
ridge, the homes were one-story, story-and-a-half, or two-story; and their
simple, unflaunted dignity marked them for what their name implies,
the "Southern Planter."
At a later date the Mississippi "hill-billy" made his home north and
east of the Natchez country. One to every ridge, the houses were of logs
(later clapboarded) with a wide wind-swept hall, known as the "dog
trot," running through the center, and with the cook house in the rear.
As the people became wealthier and more prosperous, they closed in
the center hall, often decoratively, and added long front porches. The
dog-trot houses were so natural and traditional to these pioneers who
had migrated from Tennessee, the Piedmont of Georgia, and the Caro-
linas, they constitute a contribution to American architectural types. A
log cabin was an indivisible unit; in order to expand, another had to
be built. That the hill-billy should lay his two cabins parallel and roof
the open space between to make a hallway was natural. To keep the
cook shack separate was dictated by fire hazard and the desire to keep
the heat from the living room time and saving steps for his wife were
no part of the frontiersman s considerations. To sheathe the logs with
clapboards was the first evidence of the end of the frontier. To wall
in the dog-trot and add a porch was the last.
North of the hill-billy country, in the Central Hills and especially in
the Black Prairie region during the "flush times" of the 1830 $, a Greek
Revival type of home was introduced, known locally as the "Black Belt"
from the geographic region that produced it. The Black Belt home,
contrasted with the house of the Grand Manner type, placed emphasis
on sheer refinement of ornament and attenuation of proportions a trait
McGAHEY HOUSE, A BLACK PRAIRIE HOME, COLUMBUS
apparently common to all architectural cycles toward their wane. The
Shields home at Macon best expresses the characteristics of this form,
though many examples may be found between Macon and Aberdeen, and,
less concentrated, in the Northern Hills. The Georgia emigrants who built
this type were evidently remembering their native models.
A number of ante-bellum homes were "imported," a term derived
from having either the builder or the architect from England, France,
Scotland, or Germany. Lochinvar at Pontotoc is typical, but the best
examples are in Madison County, around Canton. The Delta, too, has
many imported homes in this sense of the term, distinguishable by rubbed
brick forms and asymmetrical planning, considered a sin in earlier times.
The Delta, last settled, was peopled by luxury-loving Kentuckians and
Carolinians who built from designs more often seen in the Ohio Valley.
The character, tastes, and economy of early Mississippians left their
effect also upon church architecture. Along the Coast, in the Natchez
district, and, following the flush times of the 1830*5, in Holly Springs,
Oxford, and Columbus, the wealthy planter and professional class built
many churches with slave labor. Constructed usually of home-burned brick,
the churches were, as a rule, Gothic Revival in design, with tall spires
and stained glass windows. St. Mary s Cathedral, Natchez, completed in
146 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
1851, the Christian Church, Columbus, and the Episcopal Church, Holly
Springs, built in 1858, are examples. The windows often were imported
and unmatched. Interiors expressed good taste and a touch of luxury in
open beams, delicate hand-carved decorations, and solid comfortable pews.
More often than not a gallery extended across the front of the audito
rium for the use of slaves who were prevented by law from having a
church of their own.
But as the dog-trot type of house of the Piney Woods and Central
Hills differed from the planter s mansions so did the plain and straight
forward churches of these sections differ from those of the older and
wealthier districts. These churches were, and to a large extent are, of
a type colloquially called "shotgun." Comparatively small, oblong or
box-like shells, they had frame side walls and V-shaped, split-shingle
roofs. Without porches or an approach of any kind other than simple
wood steps, they had single entrances front and rear. Windows were of
plain unstained glass. The interiors offered the plainness of open rafters,
unpainted walls and floors, and pine pews the latter as stern and temper
ate as the people who worshipped in them. Hundreds of these churches
dot the rural sections today, but the Toxish Baptist Church is a good
example of their simple box-like construction.
What is more important to the layman than architectural types, how
ever, is the life that determined them. This story must, of course, remain
conjectural, but nothing could be more intriguing than to speculate upon
its varied development. An examination of the timbers in the attic of
the fort at Pascagoula reveals them to be so remarkably like the ribs of a
ship that it is not farfetched to ascribe them to French ship carpenters.
Indeed, the crews of the vessels loading on the Coast were the only
artisans, their passengers being unskilled, or else preoccupied in a fruit
less search for wealth. A building with walls as thick as the fort was
needed for protection from Indians, not from the elements. Oyster shells,
limitless in number, and the misty swaying drapery of Spanish moss were
obvious and happy materials. The moss made an ideal binding element
for the cement, such masonry improving with age and becoming rock-
like with the passage of centuries. The life that could be wrung from
the sterile sand of the Coast was as plain and as austere as the fort s
outline. The lot of the French colonists was, if romantic, not luxurious.
This much the fort makes plain.
As intimated, Spanish influence was strong in southwest Mississippi
architecture. The Spaniard, though a pioneer, did not abandon his tra
ditions. His was the first in Mississippi to warrant the name of a civilized
V ,
iSp**^
ffl
I
DUNLEITH, NATCHEZ
society. Before him, the path along the river was nameless; after him,
it had become El Camino Real The King s Highway and the change
was indicative of what he brought. His materials were the same the
French and English had access to logs from the forest or timber from
dismantled flatboats but in his particular use of them he displayed a
Castilian taste that is expressed in works of art such as Ellicott s Inn
at Natchez. Balance, refinement, and grace are revealed in the slope
of the roofs, and in the toothpick colonnettes and ironwork of the slender
galleries.
The Castilian s taste lingered after him. The styles of three national
ities the Georgian style, traveling southwest with the planter, and the
Creole mixture of French and Spanish coming up from New Orleans
met at Natchez. The search for a type or fusion of types that would be
best adapted to the region led for a time into several blind alleys. The
Regency, an in-between style that originated in England under George,
Prince of Wales (1810-20), left Vancourt and the back portion of
Hope Villa among its few examples. More significant was the Greek
Revival. Started in England at the end of the eighteenth century, this
style, now closely associated with ante-bellum plantation architecture, was
THE BRIARS, NATCHEZ
spontaneously accepted in this country by the Southerner because of his
wealth, his wide travel, and his classic, country-gentleman tastes. The
revival in the South was a facile thing. The Mississippian created his
own architecture; his slave labor was unskilled, his models no more than
pictures or memories; his real pattern was the Spanish. The result was
the fusion of styles found at Natchez, predominantly Georgian in char
acter, with columns and pediments relieved by the sloping roofs and
galleries that broke across the classic fronts. In Concord, the former home
of the Spanish governors at Natchez, which burned in 1901, this fusion
probably reached its finest expression. The great columns that gave dis
tinction to the building sprang from the earth itself. The lower story
was extended to the face of the upper verandah, whose slender balustrade
and smaller piazza posts were deeply recessed under the eaves of the
light roof. The effect was Spanish West Indian as much as Greek. Though
Dunleith at Natchez is the best remaining example of the adaptation of
the classic order to planter comfort, Arlington and Auburn are better
compositions and are truer to Natchez in their grandiose conception.
The Southern Planter type of home, while not as impressive as that
of the Grand Manner, was more representative. Its use of the classic
formula was as easy and as unconventional as the planter s life. The
gallery was the prominent feature, as well it might have been when most
ARCHITECTURE 149
of the owner s life was spent cither on horseback or on his porch. Though
the proportions were generous, they did not overawe. The stranger stop
ping by must have felt he was not so much "calling" as "visiting." In
the Natchez area the best remaining Planter example is The Briars. On
the Coast the best example is Beauvoir. Beauvoir shows the West Indian
influence in the balanced arrangement of the pavilions at each side of, and
entirely separate from, the big house. Also West Indian was the custom
of devoting the ground floor to the service quarters and using the breezy
main or second floor, reached by a number of exterior stairways, as the
center of domestic life.
The materials for construction and the kind of workman available
resulted in a crudity of detail in contrast to the conception of the exterior
design. Though there were notable exceptions in the interiors of some
of the Grand Manner homes at Natchez the spiral stairway at Auburn,
for instance the detail that could not be imported was often unfinished.
The scattered faced brick found in the homes may have come as ballast
in the one-sided export cotton trade; but where wealth was not sufficient
to import brick, the builders fired their own. Around Liberty, axe and
adze marks on foundation timbers and sills hewn from the forest are
visible in many sturdy homes. Beams were fastened with wooden pegs
or with home-forged, wrought-iron nails. Heart yellow pine, though
stout, was not easily worked another reason for the lack of finish in
the interiors.
The Black Prairie and the Central Hills show the Georgian free from
Spanish influences. The slender proportions characteristic of these homes
may be explained partly by the fact that they were frame, not brick;
the builders saw no necessity for having too thick a column as support
for the light roof. The homes were two-story; the planter wanted his
second story to be as much shaded as the lower story; yet to have a
thirty-foot column with the Grecian-prescribed three-foot diameter would
have been an absurdity. The result was the beautifully slender column
which distinguishes the Black Belt portico. This break from Grecian sim
plicity was carried further in the ornament, especially in the bric-a-brac
that later was strung between the columns just under the roof line. This
was feminine, the planter evidently considering a woman s taste impor
tant, and the architects have concurred in his judgment.
Adding to the undeniable charm of many of the Delta ante-bellum
homes were the piers on which they rested, dictated by the necessity of
letting the periodic flood run free beneath their floors. The first of these
homes on stilts were unsightly, but for a people to whom beauty was
MELROSE, NEAR NATCHEZ
a necessity, there soon evolved such combinations as Longwood and
Swiftwater.
To look upon all ante-bellum homes in Mississippi, therefore, as
alike in a type loosely called Southern Colonial, is to destroy half the
charm. The nuances reactions to sectional and climatic restrictions, in
herited customs and variations of pioneer life provided great individu
ality within the type. (At Vicksburg, for instance, homes had to be
built despite the inhospitable looking bluffs. On these promontories, the
houses naturally and correctly assumed features less warm, more military,
more disciplined.) The crudity of interior detail, the lack of compactness,
and the wasted space, as compared with the architecture of other States,
mean little; the Mississippian of the period was a generous outdoor
man with plenty of land and servants. The classic, white-columned house
pleasingly fulfilled its function always the chief criterion of what is
good.
The architecture developed since the War between the States, however,
reflects only too well Mississippi s social and economic adjustments. Out
ARCHITECTURE 151
of the war and reconstruction arose a merchant-banker society that sup
planted the leadership of the planter. There was a transposition of social
and economic prestige from rural districts to urban centers, and with
the transposition were lost the qualities that had nourished individuality
in design. The urban dweller does not possess the remoteness of broad
acres and wooded groves; he lives in a comparatively crowded space;
his tastes are conventionalized; his land is measured in lineal feet; and
his servants are paid each Saturday at noon. To fit this new locale of
conveniences, customs, and tastes, the builders adopted new methods and,
recently, new materials. Unfortunately, the result is often neither dis
tinctive nor, by comparison with Natchez, especially noteworthy.
The story of the plantation s decline and continued dependence is held
fast in the planter s contemporary architecture. Impoverished and faced
with the immediate task of reconstruction, the landowner was left at
first with little time in which to build. When he finally had gained the
time, he was no longer the dictator of his tastes, for under the new
system capital was not on the farm but in the towns. Within a decade
rural construction reached the level of barren necessity.
The influence of urban merchant-bankers on rural building, through
the power of extended credit, has reduced what was once the "big
house" on the farm to a questionably comfortable frame dwelling of
indefinite plan and parentage. Tenant houses, by their number, catch the
eye, but they hardly warrant architectural description. They are Delta, or
Piney Woods, or "southern shacks" local color in architecture. In the
Tennessee Hills, in the Central Hills, and in the Piney Woods, the poorer
homes with their mud-wattle chimneys, sagging roofs, and vertical
weather-boarding are as bare and stark as the poverty they represent; the
bright corrugated tin roofs covering weather-beaten walls of barns repre
sent a false economy. Many of the richer homes are uncertain in design
and lacking in taste.
With the exception of Natchez, Vicksburg, Columbus, and Holly
Springs, the towns, submerged both socially and economically before
the war, gained from the Reconstruction Period an importance that was
in direct ratio to the rural districts decline. And, again as in the rural
districts, the change developed an architecture that almost defies classi
fication. As if hastily discarding traditional rags for costumes that better
expressed their new station in life, the towns followed the North into a
building boom that has lasted from the i88o s to the present (1938).
Paradoxically, the late economic depression rather than the boom proved
an architectural blessing.
152 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
The period between 1880 and 1914 belonged to a generation of newly
empowered urban persons who expressed themselves, not in the simpler
classic styles adhered to by the planter, but in elaborate display. Volume
was preferred to refinement of detail; and an exterior trim of jigsaw
decorations matched a gaudy interior that has come to characterize the
period. (This exhibitionism sometimes resulted in houses vaguely reminis
cent of the grandiose homes of the 1850 $ Longwood at Natchez and
the Walter place at Holly Springs). Contractors and carpenters, as much
without benefit of architectural advice as had been the slaves, reproduced
in their busy practice the styles made popular in the North by the boom
of 1873. The Victorian Gothic, the Romanesque, and the American ver
sion of the Queen Anne were architectural types accepted as representa
tive of wealth. In the cities these three types marked the better-class
residential section. In the smaller towns, where the wealthier families usually
occupied the first tree-shaded block north of the business district, the
preference was for the local carpenter s version of Victorian Gothic. Such
homespun variations sacrificed convenience for false splendor, and in
a determination to achieve volume obliterated the lines that originally
gave the design a name. The houses were of frame construction and,
usually, two stones in height. With their elaborate gingerbread trim
mings, bulging bay windows, and pointed turrets they remain to mark
the home of the banker or merchant in a majority of Mississippi towns
today. The Rowan home, with its unstudied massiveness, its twenty-three
rooms, and its gingerbread exterior treatment, is an example (see Tour 5,
Sec. b). The elder types remain as criteria of good taste, and to these
models latter-day designers return for inspiration.
The abandonment of tradition for massiveness found expression in
the building of the New Capitol at Jackson in 1903. Designed by
Theodore C. Link in the manner of the National Capitol and built of
gray sandstone and marble, it faces the business district from ten land
scaped acres (see JACKSON).
The rise of the lumber industry, the establishment of railroad shops,
and the building of a few cotton mills gave to the Piney Woods, to
Meridian, and to Stonewall what were perhaps the first grouped, stand
ardized houses for the working class. These houses, small frame buildings
one-story high, were erected by the company and grouped close to the
commissary a barnlike frame structure raised from the ground and
fronted with a narrow shed porch. Lean-to porches extend across the
front and rear of the houses, and thin bisecting partitions divide the
interiors into four rooms of equal size. At Quitman, once the site of the
ARCHITECTURE 153
State s largest sawmill, and D Lo, a typical sawmill ghost town, are
examples of grouped, company-owned houses.
At Laurel and at Electric Mills, however, the lumber industry placed
emphasis upon housing almost from the start. Here the policy of en
couraging home ownership and individuality of taste has resulted in
the white millworkers building neat cottages suited to the size and
needs of their families. These low-priced cottages have enhanced in a
modest way Mississippi s architectural and social scene, and have supplied
an example of economical housing reform.
The World War and its aftermath of inflation brought to an end
the merchant-banker era of exaggerated architectural design. Rural peo
ple, attracted by urban prosperity, migrated from farm to town, swelling
the population and creating demands that the urban centers, with pre
war physical equipment, were not able to meet. A decade of unrest, the
1920 $ brought along a fundamental alteration in Mississippi s urban
architecture. A variety of types appeared. French Provincial, Dutch Co
lonial, and the half-timbered manor house of Elizabethan England,
subject, as always, to the contractor s conception, became the popular
types. These houses, the homes of business and professional families,
were developed, remote from the business districts, in new residential
areas called subdivisions. The Florida version of the Spanish style was
adopted by a few builders on the Coast during the boom of 1925-27,
but in Mississippi as a whole, this style is too conspicuously incongruous
for popularity.
When the business and professional families deserted the residential
area traditionally allotted to them, skilled laborers and white-collar work
ers moved in. Here, between the "best family" section left untouched
since pre-war days and the traditional outer fringe of Negro houses, the
skilled laborers and middlemen built their bungalows. These bungalows,
constituting the majority of urban dwellings in Mississippi today, vary in
material wood, stucco, or brick but they do not vary essentially
in design. They are squat, low-roof houses of from four to six rooms.
Sitting close to the earth, half protected by the shade of chinabcrry trees,
they indicate the workingman s somewhat raised standard of living ; but
their low ceilings, thin walls, and lack of basements show no regard either
for the Mississippi climate or its traditions.
The greatest architectural change of the 1920 $, however, was the
advent of the skyscraper. Prior to the war the demands for office space
had been comparatively light. The second and third floors of thick-
walled, brick structures with cornices, built for the purpose of housing
STAIRWAY AT COTTAGE GARDEN, NATCHEZ
retail establishments on the ground floor, had been partitioned into a
number of offices. But post-war prosperity and the subsequent migration
to urban centers increased the need for more modern buildings. Archi
tectural advice was sought a procedure as new to Mississippi as were
ARCHITECTURE 155
the resultant buildings and for the first time skyscraper methods of
construction were employed in commercial buildings.
At Jackson, the Tower Building (reputedly the tallest reenforced con
crete building in the South: 18 stories high with a penthouse and a
two-story tower) and, at Meridian, the Threefoot Building are the State s
best examples of set-back design. C. H. Lindsley was architect for both
buildings. Wyatt C. Hedrick, employing the same type of construction in
designing the Lamar Life Insurance Building, Jackson, adorned it with
Gothic motifs and a decorative treatment of the top. The thin rectangular
New Merchants Bank Building, Jackson, emphasizes its 17 stories by
a perpendicular treatment.
With modern designs in commercial building came also for the first
time engineering methods for industrial building. The best examples of
these are the buildings of the Reliance Manufacturing Company, Colum
bia, the Pioneer Hosiery Mill, Hattiesburg, and Meridian Garment
Factory, Meridian.
In this period higher standards were gained in institutional and re
ligious architecture. The 78 buildings of the Mississippi Insane Hospital
are grouped with village-like informality on spreading, landscaped acres.
The buildings, not over two stories in height, are designed in the manner
of Colonial Williamsburg. The exterior walls are of red brick with
white trim, and the roofs of the larger buildings are crowned with white
cupolas. N. W. Overstreet and A. H. Town were the architects. At
Laurel, the Presbyterian Church, designed by Rathbone DeBuys, consists
of two buildings joined by a tower. The architecture of the church proper
is based upon twelfth century English Gothic precedent; the other build
ing, the church school, is Collegiate Gothic in type.
As indicated, the depression proved an architectural advantage to Mis
sissippi. Prior to the Government s policy of extending financial aid to
builders through housing agencies, a majority of Mississippi s buildings
were constructed without architectural advice or planning. They were not
only of indefinite design but ill-fitted to the owner s needs. But the
Government, wielding the power of extended credit more intelligently
than the merchant-banker, demanded that engineering principles be ap
plied. Each applicant for a building loan was required to have the plans
of his building approved by a competent staff of architects. Fortunately,
the architects accepted from the beginning the hitherto ignored fact that,
tradition notwithstanding, the urban Missisippian does not live out of
doors; he lives and works indoors, and he has need for compactness and
156 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
modern conveniences. This simple acceptance of fact is the outstanding
characteristic of recent building trends.
Supervision of planning and construction brought to the State tangible
evidences of two recently developed schools in architecture. The Howie
home, Meridian, is typical of the school which follows traditional designs,
with stress on Colonial types. The home is smaller than those of classic
conception in the past, but the size does not remove the classical stamp.
One story in height, with seven rooms, it is carefully detailed with a
finely proportioned entrance and well-spaced windows. The exterior is
of wood siding, while the interior has wood-paneled wainscoting, with
wallpaper above that reproduces nicely an early pattern. The design of
the R. F. Reed home, Tupelo, replaces the architectural doctrine of "bal
anced symmetry" with that of "utility." Built for comfortable living,
it is of a flat-roof design with sun and recreational decks. The exterior
walls are white reenforced concrete with steel frame and metal casement
windows.
The Government, in addition to aiding in the building of dwelling
houses, has placed a new Federal building, modern in design, in every
town of importance, and has aided financially in the construction of
municipal buildings. The Jones County jail and New Albany city hall,
the latter designed as a monolithic concrete structure by E. L. Malvaney,
are examples of municipal buildings, while the Meridian post office,
designed by Frank Fort, is perhaps the State s outstanding Federal build
ing. Modern in design, with fluted pilasters and no cornices, the post
office building is noted for its mass and proportion rather than for
its detail.
These modern buildings are both too new and too few to do more
than hint that Mississippi is entering upon a new era of building that
may equal if not surpass the classic period of ante-bellum days. In the
meanwhile, its architecture remains a confused picture of classic man
sions, vertical weatherboarded houses, tenant shacks, bungalows, vol
uminous gingerbread displays, and thick-walled two- and three-story
commercial buildings. The integrated character of life in the ante-bellum
period, reflected in an architecture of spaciousness and dignity, is lacking.
Music
If Mississippi is judged by its singing folk, rather than by the number
of its symphony orchestras, truly it can be called a musical State. The
Negro folk, traditionally musical, comprise more than half of Mississippi s
population. The white folk, for the most part, are descendants of those
early settlers who, in their westward trek, stopped in the hills of north
east Mississippi or in the Piney Woods. Living on and close to the soil,
they have retained the lore, customs, and songs of their Anglo-Saxon
ancestors.
The songs of the Negro fall into three groups spirituals, work songs,
and social songs. The spirituals are America s most distinctive and artistic
contribution to folk music. Expressing strong emotions and simple faith,
they have a beauty, power, and sincerity that are irresistible. Such songs
as "Jesus the Man I m Lookin For," "Judgment Day is Rollin Round,"
"Angels All Waitin for Me," and "They Crucified My Lawd" show the
religious fervor of the Negro spiritual. These and many others may be
heard in their purest and most impressive form in the Negro churches,
especially the rural ones. The white visitor who comes in a spirit of
sympathetic interest is welcome, and if especially interested in folk music
he will find authentic expression here. The school choruses have won inter
national recognition for their interpretation of the spirituals (see EDU
CATION).
In the second group of songs are those of the levee, the railroad, the
river, and the field, best of which possibly are the cotton-picking songs.
The work songs are improvised, growing out of one phrase or line, with
the repeated whack of the hoe or the stroke of hammer or pick setting
the rhythm. An old Negro, asked to repeat a song, said, "I ain t got no
rcg lar words, I jes say what my mind tells me." For this reason and
because the Negro s intonations as well as the words vary with his feel
ings, his songs are difficult to reproduce in written form. The following
improvisation heard in a cotton field near Columbia is a good example
of the field song:
Old voice singing bass:
I know it was th blood
High soprano in another part of field:
I know it was th blood
158 MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
Thirty or more voices together:
I know it was th blood,
I know it was th blood,
I know it was th blood for me.
Second Stanza
Young tenor :One day when I was lost,
Young soprano : One day when I was lost,
All: One day when I was lost,
He died upon the cross,
I know it was th blood for me.
Each solo singer held his last note until it was picked up by the next
singer or group of singers. The workers continued for half an hour sing
ing variations of this song as they picked the cotton.
The social songs of the Negro run the gamut of his social activities
and range from the coarse song of the roustabout to the sentimental
message of the lover. This group includes nursery songs, play, dance, and
animal songs, as well as the "blues" and more sophisticated jazz-band
and swing tunes. One of the most popular of the animal songs and one
rich in personification is about "de co tin frog:"
De frog went a co tin, he did ride. Uh-huh! Uh-huh!
De frog went a co tin, he did ride.
Wid a sword an a pistol by his side. Uh-huh! Uh-huh!
Contrasting with the gayety and homeliness of this song is a long line
of melancholy "blues" developed from the "Memphis Blues" and the
"St. Louis Blues." Because of the increasing influence of the city upon
the Negro and the resulting departure from the simple life, the number
of social songs has increased with a proportionate decrease in the number
of spirituals and work songs. Present-day conditions are not conducive
to creation of the latter the laundry is fast supplanting the wash tub
under the trees, and the modern white mother objects to having her
baby sung to sleep with such a typical Negro lullaby as the following:
Don t talk. Go to sleep!
Eyes shet and don t you peep!
Keep still, or he jes moans:
"Raw Head and Bloody Bones!"
The most characteristic musical expression of Mississippi white folk is
in their group singing of hymns, many of which are from the "Sacred
Harp," a hymnal published in 1844. From shortly after spring planting
until cotton-picking time, regular "singings" are held, reaching a height
in midsummer (see WHITE FOLKWAYS). Besides hymns, these folk
sing the English, Scotch, and Irish ballads of their ancestors, often in
modified form, and songs of American origin cowboy and Western
songs, Civil War songs, ballads of outlaws and "bad men," and those
MUSIC 159
inspired by local events such as the Casey Jones tragedy. Equally as
popular as the community singings are the "sociables," at which Old
Fiddlers Contests are held, and singing games are played by old and
young (see Tour 17).
Although there is no State supervisor of music, there is music in the
schools, and the larger cities have full-time supervisors of public school
music. In the spring of 1926 the State High School Accrediting Com
mission ruled that credits be granted for high school piano and violin,
and for public school music, which might include sight singing, ear
training, theory of music, rhythm band, and music appreciation. Since
1935 members of high school bands and orchestras have received these
credits. All licenses to teach music are issued and all credits approved
by the State Board of Music Examiners, a group appointed by the State
Superintendent of Education from among members of the various college
faculties. Spring field meets and band contests have brought about a vast
improvement in school music by provoking a greater interest in it.
The Federation of Music Clubs holds an annual contest in voice, violin,
piano, organ, choral music, hymn singing, and memory. Organized in
1916, the federation has a membership approximating 3,000, with 33
senior and 70 junior groups. Scattered in towns over the State and in
many of the colleges, these federated clubs serve as a great musical
stimulus.
Mississippi colleges, especially those for girls, have from earliest times
included music in their courses of study. Records of Elizabeth Female
Academy in 1840 mention "the performance of a very fine class in music."
A report on the Female Institute of Holly Springs shows "two pianos
purchased in 1838," and "yearly tuition for Piano or Guitar $50, Harp
$60." Old yearbooks of Hillman College, organized in 1853, give a
curriculum with music included. Whitworth College, established in 1858,
always has placed emphasis on music; its spring concerts once were so
widely attended that special trains were run to accommodate the crowds.
The burning of Amite Female Academy by the Federals caused the de
struction at ^he same time of its 13 highly prized pianos pianos trans
ported with great effort and cost through the wilderness to Liberty.
In Natchez are substantial reminders that there was music of the high
est type in ante-bellum Mississippi. The violin presented by Ole Bull,
the famous Norwegian violinist, to his young friend, Gustave Joseph
Bahin, when Bull played in Natchez in 1851, is treasured by the Bahin
family. The piano played when Jenny Lind sang in Natchez the same
year is at Richmond. Other famous musical instruments in Natchez are
l6o MISSISSIPPI: THE GENERAL BACKGROUND
the silver-stringed Palyel-Wolf e piano at Windy Hill Manor ; the century-
old spinet at Arlington; the harp at Rosalie; the harpischord at Hope
Farm; the piano at Longwood, which legend says was the first grand
piano brought into Mississippi; the quaint square piano at Clover Nook,
which was played at the Lafayette ball.
Today in the colleges for women are found most of the State s out
standing music departments. Mississippi State College for Women, or
ganized in 1885 with music as a part of its first curriculum, has continually
played an important part in the development of the higher type of music
in Mississippi. It is the only college in the State with membership in
the National Association of Schools of Music; its music department is
the only one housed in a music hall built especially for and dedicated to
this art. Here in 1904 Paderewski gave his first concert in Mississippi,
and was the first artist of international fame since the War between the
States to appear in concert on a Mississippi college campus. This concert
was made possible by Weenonah Poindexter, the young director of the
department, who signed the $1,000 contract, equal in amount to her
yearly salary. An extra $1,000 from the proceeds of the concert was the
beginning of a fund creating for the college an artist series which has
brought to it many of the world s best musicians.
Although the University of Mississippi had no regular music depart
ment until 1930, its Glee Club has been active since 1900, and the new
department gives promise of being one of major importance. State Teach
ers College, with an excellent music department, is best known for its
Vesper Choir, which sang before the National Federation of Music
Clubs in Philadelphia in 1935, and the Louisiana Federation in 1936.
The Mississippi Woman s College has received special recognition for
its choral and chamber music. Belhaven College, Jackson, places especial
emphasis on music. Each of the above colleges confers the degree of
Bachelor of Music. Delta State Teachers College and Blue Mountain Col
lege have active choral groups and offer courses in piano, voice, and
violin. Mississippi State College has no music department, but has an
excellent military band.
The following are among the musicians born in Mississippi who have
received national recognition: Chalmers Clifton, Jackson, is State Director
of New York s Federal Music Project under the Works Progress Adminis
tration, and teaches conducting at Columbia University; William Grant
Still, Woodville, is best known for his Afro- American Symphony (1930),
an idealization of his heritage, the spiritual, and for his Symphony in G
Minor "Song of a New Race," which was performed by the Philadelphia
MUSIC 161
Symphony Orchestra in December 1937; A. Lehman Engle, Jackson, a
pianist, composer, and critic, directs the Madrigal Singers, one of the most
popular of the New York WPA music groups ; Walter Chapman, Clarks-
dale, is a pianist, composer, and teacher; Creighton Allen, Macon, is a
pianist and composer. Although born in Alabama, the Negro composer,
William C. Handy, nationally known as the "granddaddy of the blues,"
lived in Clarksdale for a number of years. He has said that his chief in
spiration for the "blues" that made Beale Street famous came from his
experiences in Mississippi. Mississippi s own pioneer in jazz, Bud Scott,
born in Natchez, has attained more than State-wide fame. His orchestra,
which may be heard at the Pilgrimage Balls, has played for three Presi
dents McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt, and Taft.
No hotel or cafe in the State employs a full-time orchestra, except on
the Coast during an unusually good season. The largest night clubs are
along the Gulf Coast, and many of these operate only during summer
tourist season. Their orchestras are imported through the American Music
Association, as proprietors find that the big-name orchestras draw the
crowds and local orchestras lack popular appeal. Though there is little
demand for orchestral musicians, there is an active chapter of the Musi
cians Union, which regulates wages and insists that none but union
members be employed locally. Their chief competition is from college
orchestras, which, with the exception of the one from University of
Mississippi, are non-union and can afford to play for lower wages than
professional musicians.
The greatest single impetus toward more and better music in the
State (1937) is coming from the Federal Music Project under the direc
tion of Jerome Sage. With few unemployed symphony orchestra musicians
in the State, the program is largely one of musical education. Approxi
mately 20,000 persons are receiving musical training either in quartets,
choruses, piano and violin classes, small orchestras, or listening groups.
The music appreciation classes, brought to the children of the rural
homes where radios have been made possible by the rural electrification
program, have created a new listening group with vast musical potenti
alities.
<<<<<<<<<<<<&&gt;>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
PART II
Main Street
and Courthouse Square
>vvyvv>vvvv>vvvv>y >< yyvyyyyyyyyyyyyy y
Railroad Stations: L. & N. Station, Reynoir and Railroad Sts., for Louisville &
Nashville R.R.
Bus Station: 204 E. Beach Blvd. for Greyhound Bus Lines.
Airport: Municipal, W. Howard and Glennan Aves. No scheduled service.
Local Busses: Busses hourly to Gulf port and Pass Christian, fare 25^. Half-hour
schedule to all parts of the city, fare 5$.
Taxis: Fare lotf within city.
Accommodations: Seven hotels; rooming houses; cottages; tourist cabins.
Information Service: Chamber of Commerce, Kennedy Hotel, Reynoir St.
Motion Picture Houses: One.
Swimming: Municipal pier, free; beach front, free.
Golf: Country Club, Pass Christian Rd., reasonable greens fee.
Riding: White House Stables, $1.50 per hr.; Edgewater Gulf Stables, $1.50 per hr.
Boating and Fishing: Yacht Club and hotel piers; gasoline boats chartered, $15 a
day up; sailboats (skipper included) $i per hr. up.
Annual Events: Summer Sports Carnival, 10 days preceding July 4; Regatta, July 4;
Blessing of Fleet, Sunday preceding Aug. 1 5 ; Mardi Gras, for two weeks prior to
Lent; golf tournaments, Feb. and March.
BILOXI * (22 alt., 14,850 pop.), the first permanent white settlement
in the Mississippi Valley, holds within its narrow streets and aged, pro
vincial houses the charm of an Old World village that has turned to
fishing and the entertainment of tourists. Confined to the low ridge of
a narrow, finger-like peninsula, the city stretches long and lean between
the Mississippi Sound on the south and the Bay of Biloxi on the
north. Howard Avenue is its backbone. Lined with one- and two-story
business structures, whose stuccoed exterior walls have mellowed to a
soft cream color that is in keeping with the atmosphere of the narrow
street, this main artery fuses the modernity of Beach Boulevard facing
the sound with the age-heavy, older section along the bay. Here, in
markets and drug and department stores, the native, a fisherman or boat-
builder of proud Castilian and venturesome Gallic antecedents, meets the
stranger with that subtle acceptance of fact peculiar to Old World peoples.
South of Howard Avenue and connected with it by narrow lane-like
streets, where giant live-oaks arch their branches over the roadways, is
the beach front. Developed primarily as a recreational center, Beach
Boulevard (a part of US 90) stretches for approximately six miles between
the sound, with its stepped concrete sea wall, artificial beaches, and
lean, wooden piers, and a line of resort hotels, summer cottages, and
amusement parks. The tone is bright sunshine on blue-green water,
* A map of Biloxi is on the back of the State map, in pocket at end of book.
l66 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
white sands, and tall green longleaf pines. The atmosphere is the gayety
of people out for a holiday. Here and there among the modern cottages
of frame and stucco, or bordering the wide green lawn of a hotel, which
rises high above oak, pine, and camphor trees to catch the breeze that
is always blowing, are planter type houses homes left from days when
ante-bellum planters came to the Coast to escape the heat and fever
of their inland plantations. To the passerby these houses are often little
more than glimpses of white through great boxwood hedges. Raised
high off the ground, with broad wind-swept galleries and wide cool
halls, they express both an appreciation of the climate and a sense of
tradition. Surrounded by green lawns, solid hedges, and well-designed
gardens of camellia japonicas, poinsettias, crapemyrtles, and azaleas, they
give to the beach front the sense of permanence that saves it from
garishness.
North of Howard Avenue the older section of the city spreads hap
hazardly to the shore line of the bay. This greater portion of Biloxi has
remained under the influence of the natives for three centuries, and
now, time-worn, graying, and slightly dingy, it holds an exotic impress
that fascinates. Contrasted with the bright white and green of the beach
front, its tone is the quiet serenity of sunlight and shade. Tidy, steep-
roofed cottages with brick or stucco side walls aged to a deep russet
or cream sit behind low picket fences in the almost eternal shade of
great oak trees. Streets perpetuate their birthright in their names
Benachi, Lameuse, Cuevas, Reynoir. Many of them paved with finely
crushed oyster shells, they stretch through the shade as soft and gray
as the Spanish moss overhead; others are as bright and white with sun
light as patches of snow that native children read about but never see.
Here, too, the force of the breeze that blows continuously against the
beach front is broken, leaving the pungent odors of a well-seasoned
cuisine unruffled and the dark green surface of the bay unmoved.
On the "Point" at the eastern end of Howard Avenue is a clearly
defined section, strange in a State whose white population is 99 percent
Anglo-Saxon. Grouped about the Wesley house, and within a stone s
throw of a packing or canning plant, live the southern European peoples
brought to Biloxi as laborers in the fishing industry. The cabin-like
houses inhabited by these Poles, Austrians, Czechoslovakians, and Yugo
slavs were built as temporary structures in 1925, but they have never
been replaced or improved. Many of them rest on stilts at the water s
edge. Yet the new fisherfolk, with strange customs and heavy accents,
have imparted to the section a romantic atmosphere that almost hides
its poverty.
Northeast, between Howard Avenue and the bay, is the Negro sec
tion. Although Biloxi has the largest foreign-born population (3.3
percent) in the State, it has the lowest percentage of urban Negro
population. The majority of Biloxi s 2,445 Negroes (16.5 percent of
the population), do manual labor on boats and in factories, though
many find work as domestic servants and a few maintain themselves
independently either by fishing or by farming small plots of truck. The
OYSTER FLEET, BILOXI
number of them who are home owners is unusually large for Mississippi.
Also unusual, in the State but not for the Coast, is the fact that a majority
of them are members of the Roman Catholic Church. After the War
between the States the white Roman Catholics of Biloxi did good social
and religious work among the Negroes of their community. For years
the Negro Catholics worshipped with the whites, some even holding pews.
l68 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
But in 1914 a frame structure of Gothic design, Our Mother of Sorrows
Church, was built for them. Three years later the church established a
school for Negro children. This school is operated independently of
the Negro school maintained by the city. In 1933 a ninth grade was
added to the school, and each year thereafter another grade until 1937
when the first class graduated from the i2th grade.
Biloxi, as a resort city, makes playing its business. The amusement
calendar is divided by the winter and summer tourist seasons. The prin
cipal winter tourist sport is golf, with tournaments in February and
March. The Biloxi Tourist Club, however, sponsors horseshoe, croquet,
and roque tournaments for winter visitors, and in cooperation with the
chamber of commerce promotes dances, oyster-bakes, boat trips, com
munity sings and concerts, bridge tournaments, and picnics. The winter
night club season a changing number of establishments with changing
names are scattered along the beach front is from before Christmas to
Lent.
The summer season is gayer, with swimming, boating, and racing.
The Biloxi yacht race course is one of the most difficult in the South, and
the annual regatta in July is rated second only to Newport in events
of its kind. Each Sunday afternoon from the middle of April to Labor
Day catboats and fisher-class sloops race for trophies awarded by the
Biloxi Yacht Club. Each September winning skippers in the fisher-class
eliminations race in the Lipton Cup series against ten other Gulf clubs.
Fishing boat owners often supplement their incomes by carrying visitors
to the outlying islands.
The residents, however, play almost as much as the tourists. A social
study made of the fisherfolk in 1934 revealed their overwhelming prefer
ence for dancing as a recreation. Their dance halls, separate from the
hotel pavilions, are numerous toward the Point. Charity dances are given
occasionally for unfortunate persons or families, the use of the hall
being donated by the management. Admission to these halls is usually
billed: "Gentlemen 25^, Ladies free." Free dances with free beer mark
the summer political campaign. On occasions, such as a marriage cere
mony, even the Slavonians forego the conservative habits that have won
for them the proprietorship of a majority of the seafood packing plants.
The celebration, consisting chiefly of dancing and feasting, often lasts
a week. Of like expansiveness is the celebration staged when a young
Slavonian achieves some success such as completing his college course or
receiving a political appointment. At this time his father endeavors to
have even the mayor at the celebration.
In addition to the regular mercantile and service businesses cater
ing to the needs of both a static and transient population, Biloxi has
approximately 20 canning factories for seafoods and an equal number
of plants for the shipping of raw oysters. More than 2,000 boatmen are
engaged in catching fish for the factories and more than 3,000 persons
are employed inside. The approximately 800 boats engaged in the fishing
end of the seafood industry are divided almost equally between the
shrimp and oyster fleets. In many instances, however, boats are oystering
BILOXI 169
at one season and shrimping at another (oyster season is from November
to April; shrimp season from August 15 to June 15). The greater
number of these boats are owned by individuals and are classed as
"independents" to distinguish them from "factory boats."
Within this general oyster and shrimp packing industry not an incon
siderable section is devoted to the handling of fish. The fish, however,
are shipped fresh since none of the canning plants is devoted to packing
them. Speckled sea trout, mullet, croaker, redfish (channel bass), drum,
catfish, and pompano are shipped in considerable quantities. The fishing
is done by individual boats, usually around the outlying islands or in
the Louisiana marshes. Most of the fish are caught by seining, but large
numbers are taken at certain periods of the year by pole and line.
Like all new and expanding industries, commercial fishing in Biloxi
has had its drama of conflict ; and this drama has been heightened by the
lawless certainly unmoral character of the early fishers. The Old World
fishermen, starting with a single net in this land which had promised
them individual fortunes, were not a folk to be squeamish about tactics.
This saga of unchecked competition ended only when a few strong and
ruthless men brought stability out of noisome war.
Things other than competitive strife belong to the Biloxi fishermen,
however. Their saga is distinguished also by the color which the Gulf
and its tree-hidden coast shed on peoples who cast their nets in its waters.
In keeping with their traditions, they follow the Old World custom
of blessing their fleet before it puts out for the deep-sea fishing
grounds each year. In a quiet cove of the bay, beneath the white cross
that commemorates the landing of the French in 1699, the fishermen
anchor their boats on the Sunday preceding each August 15 and pray
for a successful season. In this cathedral of nature, mass is held with all
the solemn dignity and splendor of the rituals of the Roman Catholic
Church. After mass, the priest steps from boat to boat, blessing the occu
pants. Each boat is manned by from two to five men who that day will
put out to sea to work from dawn to dusk, and at night drop anchor
wherever fishing is left off.
Weeks and months out among the oyster reefs and shrimp "strikes"
have given them something of the romance compounded of unforgettable
scenes; they have felt the quiet, thickly-moving Gulf, and have watched
the horizon of long, low rollers washing at stringy islands, where dead
stumps of conquered cypress mark a point that was land; they know
the constant sound of wind in sails, and the taste of salt; and they have
come home again to beach their schooners on bars that are white against
the gray and green of moss-hung oaks.
Growing directly out of the fishing and seafood industry is the trade
of shipbuilding. The Biloxi lugger (a power-propelled boat from 30 to
46 feet in length) represents the experience of generations in building
boats suitable for coastal waters. Nearly all the shrimp and oyster boats
operating out of Biloxi, as well as many of the luggers used in Louisiana,
are Biloxi-built. Each boat averages approximately $3,000 in value. Many
of the fisher-class sloops (a standard 6-meter sloop of shallow draft built
iyO MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
for both racing and pleasure) used in the Sunday races are Biloxi-built,
while the Biloxi catboat has attained more than local fame. The larger of
the catboats, 21 feet long with a lo-foot beam and a sail of 30 feet at
its peak, are considered the fastest boats in their class on the Coast.
In addition to building, the Biloxi yards service and repair work and
pleasure boats. A majority of the shipuilding factories are "backyard"
factories long open-sided sheds between the rear of a fisherman s cot
tage and the bay. The owner is often a skilled ship carpenter who engages
in the shrimp and oyster business during part of the year and builds
boats when the dull season sets in. Many of the concerns are family
affairs, though the volume of production is considerable.
But perhaps all this is but the fulfillment of what the Biloxi (Ind.,
first people) knew would some day come to pass. Legendary with these
Indians who once passed their time in the shade of the oaks on the
shore of the bay that bears their name was the tale of white, godlike
giants who, centuries before, had left their mounds as burial places on
this shore and moved to the East. They were to remain in the East for
a time, when they were to return to their mounds and to the shore where
one had only to eat the fish and oysters and drink from Biloxi s healing
springs to find contentment.
And the gods did "return," in 1682, when La Salle took possession
of the Mississippi River in the name of the King of France, and 17
years later, when Pierre le Moyne, Sieur d Iberville, dropped anchor at
Ship Island (see Side Tour 1A) and, after a preliminary exploration of
the coast, decided on the Bay of Biloxi as the place for his settlement.
A boulder and a cross mark the approximate spot where the company
of Frenchmen first stepped from their boats to the mainland.
From this first landing of Iberville, when Biloxi became the capital
of a region including what is now Yellowstone Park, to the removal
of the seat of government to New Orleans in 1723, the history of Biloxi
is the history of the lower Mississippi River Valley. To Fort Maurepas,
built on the eastern shore of the bay, came, in addition to the Biloxi,
members of the Pascagoula, Pensacola, Chickasaw, and Choctaw tribes,
rubbing their faces with white earth to honor Iberville and his brothers.
Hardy voyageurs from Canada paddled down the Mississippi to settle
in the newly opened province, bringing the strain of weathered frontier
blood necessary for the founding of a permanent settlement. Chevalier
Henry de Tonti and Fathers Davion and Montigny were among the
more distinguished of the visitors who came from the river; and here
Sauvolle, Tonti, and many knights of St. Louis lie buried where they
died in the first years of the i8th century. Sauvolle, brother of Iberville,
was stricken with yellow fever in August of 1701, and Tonti followed
to the grave in 1704.
In 1702, because of a destructive fire, the administrative center of the
colony was moved to Mobile Bay, and Dauphine Island became the
harbor. In 1717, however, a typical Gulf hurricane choked the Dauphine
harbor with sand, and Ship Island became again the principal anchorage
Mfc
BENACHI AVENUE, BILOXI
IJ2 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
for vessels from France. A fort was built on the island to protect the
pass.
In 1719 headquarters were moved from Mobile back to Old Biloxi, and
two years later across the bay to Fort Louis at New Biloxi, which remained
the administrative center of the colony until Bienville procured its removal
to New Orleans in 1723. But even after New Orleans had been established,
ships from France continued to touch first at Ship Island.
The progress of the colony during the first score of years after 1699
was characterized by an entire neglect of agricultural pursuits, and hard
ships from famine and disease. The scum of France, convicts and adven
turers of both sexes, was shipped as colonists, usually against their will.
The occasional supplies from France, Santo Domingo, and Vera Cruz
were so inadequate that the troops were quartered upon the Indian tribes.
In 1718, after Crozat, the French banker, had failed in his grandiose
schemes to strengthen the colony, the even more grandiose schemer, John
Law, first great promoter of modern times, adopted the policy of making
considerable concessions of land to wealthy and powerful personages who
could introduce a specified number of settlers on the lands. Under this
scheme, Negroes, Swiss, and Germans were brought to the colony; the
Negroes as slaves, the Swiss and Germans as settlers. Exasperated by
hunger, many of these immigrants rebelled in 1723 and attempted to
reach the English settlements in the Carolinas. The hardy French Canadi
ans survived, in many cases taking Indian wives.
France at last realized her mistake, and in order to "make a solid
establishment," authorized a bishop to select the right sort of girls to
become wives and establish homes. The bishop selected 80 girls who,
though poor, were well reared and educated. Each was provided with a
marriage outfit. They were put in charge of Sisters Gertrude, Louise, and
Bergers, on board the ship La Saline, and landed at Ship Island, January
5, 1721. This was the third shipment of "Casket Girls." The last was
sent to New Orleans, February 1728.
When the seat of government was moved to New Orleans in 1723,
Biloxi slipped from the spotlight to spend a century in being shuttled
back and forth like a pawn in the great chess game played by the Old
World kings on the table of the New. In 1763 the Gulf Coast country,
including Biloxi, was ceded to Great Britain. Sometime between 1779
and 1781 it passed under Spanish rule. In 1810 Biloxi was a passive
participant in the rebellion which ousted the Spaniards; and in 1811
its first Justice of the Peace, Jacques L Adner, took his commission from
the emissary of the Government of the United States.
It was in the 1840*5 that Biloxi, like Pass Christian (see Tour 1),
first became a favored summer watering place. In 1846 the editor of
the Louisville (Ky.) Journal wrote to his wife from Biloxi a poem,
entitled "To One Afar," in which was set forth the beauties of the sea
breeze and bright flowers, the mocking bird s notes, the orange trees,
and the blue waves of the Sound. This is among the first of the plethora
of literary compliments paid to Biloxi, and foreshadowed the development
of the town as a resort.
BILOXI 173
Biloxi was incorporated as a town of Hancock County February 8,
1838, and reincorporated in 1850 and 1856. After Harrison County was
formed it was incorporated as a town of Harrison County in 1859, then
reincorporated in 1865 and 1867. In 1896 it was incorporated as a city.
Twenty-two years later (1918) it adopted the commission form of gov
ernment.
The War between the States left Biloxi comparatively unharmed. Ship
Island was taken, lost, and retaken by the Union forces, and the main
land was harassed by patrol boats from Fort Massachusetts, but no major
engagements were fought near the town. Biloxians ran the blockade for
food and supplies, giving basis for the anecdotes that preserve much of
the war history of the town.
Yellow fever swept Biloxi in 1853, 78 and 97. The epidemic of
1878 claimed 600 cases and 45 deaths out of a population of 2,000.
One of the victims was the son of Jefferson Davis, the President of the
Confederacy.
From the 1870*5 through the 1890*5 the social life of the village was
centered at the seashore camp grounds of the Mississippi Methodists,
where bonfires, built in sand boxes elevated on posts, furnished the light
for night services.
For many years there were no roads on the beach front, the residents
using sail and rowboats for getting about; and dependence on the water
early led to the boatbuilding and racing for which Biloxi is noted. Biloxi-
built boats competed with boats from Pascagoula, Ocean Springs, Pass
Christian, and Mississippi City, for trophies donated by the Howards
(founders of the Louisiana Letter) , who made their home in Biloxi).
After the war, however, the opening and paving of streets with crushed
oyster shells was a major development. One erratic mayor, opposed by
property owners, opened a beach road in front of their places on a day
when he knew they would be in New Orleans ; he also put a road through
a cemetery at night, moving the graves to a new location. It is thought
by some that he moved only the headstones, and that the bodies are still
beneath the road.
In the 1890*5 the Montross Hotel (now the Riviera) on the corner
of Beach and Lameuse Streets was the popular hotel. Reservations had
to be made early in the season, as the people of wealth and fashion from
Memphis, Chicago, Minneapolis, ana other places gathered here. Ac
commodations, however, were poor, though full dress dinners and ele
gant card parties were held, enlivened by Negro cakewalks and spirituals.
This period fixed Biloxi s reputation as a resort town, and the ensu
ing prosperity caused Biloxians to forget that Northerners were "Yankees."
The 1890*5 found the first winter tourists coming into this part of the
Deep South.
The real growth of Biloxi after the War between the States, however,
was the direct result of development of the seafood packing business.
The New Orleans & Mobile Railroad (now the Louisville & Nashville),
built in 1869, gave the packers a needed outlet to northern markets.
Oysters first were packed in ice and shipped in the shell; later they were
LIGHTHOUSE, BILOXI
BILOXI 175
opened and shipped in tubs. The first oyster packing plant, on Back Bay
at Reynoir Street, was established in 1872. The canning of shrimp was
pioneered in Biloxi in 1883 by Lopez, Elmer, and Gorenflo, seniors, names
still prominent in the industry. Largely because of the fresh oyster and
shrimp business the population of Biloxi jumped from 954 in 1870 to
5,467 in 1900. From 1900 to 1925 the developing factories imported
seasonal labor from Baltimore, the majority of which was Polish. The
slums on the Point in Biloxi are the camp houses constructed for these
seasonal laborers. Since 1925 Acadian French from Louisiana and former
sawmill hands from the dying lumber towns of southern Mississippi have
furnished the necessary labor.
Tour 20 m.
E. from Main St. on Howard Are.
1. MEMORIAL BRIDGE, E. end of Howard Ave., extending across
the south end of the Bay of Biloxi in a low graceful span, connects Biloxi
with Ocean Springs. Of concrete construction, it has a double-lane drive
and is brilliantly lighted. A draw toward the Ocean Springs end opens
for the Back Bay shrimp and oyster fleets. When the bridge was com
pleted in 1930 at a cost of $880,000 it was said to be one of the largest
World War memorials in the United States.
Retrace Howard Ave. L. on Myrtle St.: L. on 1st St.
2. UNITED STATES COAST GUARD AIR BASE, E. end of ist St.
(open), is designed to become one of the key units of Coast Guard aviation
in southern waters. A hangar, 160 x 100 feet, connected with a concrete
apron and a wooden ramp, houses six planes, including a huge ambulance
plane equipped for landing on rough seas. These planes, cooperating with
the Coast Guard boats at Gulf port, aid ships in distress, rescue injured
fishermen, and prevent smuggling.
Retrace 1st St.; L. on Myrtle St.; R. on Beach Bird.
3. The CANNING AND PACKING PLANTS, Beach Blvd. (L) be
tween Myrtle and Cedar Sts. (open), are built out over the water to facili
tate the unloading of boats and the disposal of refuse. The plants employ
men, women, and children to pick the shrimp, which have been packed in
ice for several days to make them brittle enough to handle. The picking
tables are long troughs down which the shrimp baskets are rolled. The
pickers, standing on each side of the table, remove the head and scales
Ij6 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
from the shrimp with a single dexterous twist. Buckets of alum water
into which the pickers dip their hands neutralize the shrimp secretions.
Payment for picking is made by weight, the wage running not quite one
cent a pound. The average skilled picker earns $1.50 a day, with a few
making as high as $2.50. Whistles let the pickers know when a day s sup
ply of shrimp has been brought in, and the pickers work as long as they
care to, or until the supply is exhausted. The average picking room is the
scene of much conversation and occasionally a hair-pulling combat, when
someone tries to edge another out of the weighing line. While the picking
of shrimp is a fairly easy process requiring no tools, oyster shucking is a
skilful operation, and the proficiency attained by some of the workers is
amazing. Frequent shucking contests are held, with rivalry running high
between contestants.
At the south end of the packing plants piers, one of the two most
prominent of the ceremonies involved in the blessing of the fleet is held.
The boats blessed here, in contrast to the French-manned boats at the Iber-
ville Cross ceremony, are manned by Slavonians. An altar is improvised on
the pier, and the shrimp boats pack so closely around that the priest can
step from one to another in administering his blessing.
The WESLEY HOUSE, NW. corner Beach Blvd. and Cedar St. (open),
is the two-story, cream frame community house and recreational center of
the Point Cadet fishing settlement. Grouped about it are the box-like
houses built prior to 1925 for housing transient Baltimore Poles during
the packing season.
4. RED BRICK HOUSE WITH SLAVE QUARTERS, 947 Beach
Blvd. (private), is an example of ante-bellum architecture. An outside
stairway and finely executed entrance doorway are architectural features of
the bright red brick structure. The story is that the stairway and plain green
shutters are mute traces of the result of a French tax levied on inside stairs
and latticed blinds. If so, the house was built before 1763, during the
period of French dominion. In the rear, the slave quarters retain their
original character, with a raised hearth and Dutch oven.
5. The JOHN H. KELLER HOME, NE. corner Beach Blvd. and
Bellman St. (private), typifies the ante-bellum homes designed especially
for this climate. Built of wide boards, painted white, its second or main
floor is set high off the ground, over a dark, cool brick ground floor. A
double flight of steps curves from the ground to the main floor.
6. CHURCH OF THE REDEEMER, NW. corner Beach Blvd. and
Bellman St., a brown, ivy-covered, heavily buttressed structure of Gothic
design, was built in 1890. The four windows placed in it are memorials
to the family of Jefferson Davis. They are considered to be among the
most beautiful memorial windows in the South. At the rear of the church
is the old Episcopal Church that Davis attended. The pew used by the
Davis family has been moved to the newer church, marked with a silver
plate and draped with a Confederate flag.
In the SW. corner of the churchyard is the RING IN THE OAK, a
curious open ring in the limb of a large live oak, perpetuating one of the
most charming of the Gulf Coast Indian legends. An Indian maiden fell
A SOUTHERN PLANTER HOME, BILOXI
in love with the son of an enemy chieftain. The maiden s father, who was
chief of the Biloxi tribe, refused the suit of the young brave, and pointing
to the oak tree, said, "No, the young fawn can never be the light of your
wigwam until a ring grows in yonder oak!" That night a terrific storm
twisted the tender branches of the young oak into a distinct ring, a ring
that with the years has grown firmly into the tree.
7. COMMUNITY HOUSE AND PARK, Beach Blvd. (R) between
Nixon and Elmer Sts., is the center for tourist entertainment. South of
Beach Boulevard and opposite Deer Island is the community house bath
ing pier. Between the pier and the beach drive is a children s playground.
In the yard of the community house are the IBERVILLE CANNON, three
corroded iron cannon dredged from the bottom of Back Bay and alleged
to be from one of Iberville s ships.
R. from Beach Blvd. on Lameuse St.; L. on Water St.
8. The SPANISH HOUSE, 206 W. Water St. (private), was built
by a Spanish army captain about 1790, and is the sole relic of the
period of Spanish rule in Biloxi (1780-1810). The house is severely
simple, with a steep roof stepped squarely in military fashion. The
original brick walls are covered with stucco and the house is divided into
apartments.
9. The FRENCH HOUSE, SE. corner Water and Magnolia Sts. (open
by permission), is thought to have been built between 1750 and 1800.
It is a tiny one-story cottage, lost in a profusion of azaleas and palms.
The rambling additions are of a hybrid type of architecture, but the
iron-railed porch and grille work are characteristically French.
R. from Water St. on Magnolia St.; R. on Howard Ave.; R. on
Delauney St.; R. on Beach Blvd.
Ij8 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
10. MAGNOLIA HOTEL, NW. corner Beach Blvd. and Magnolia
St., was built in 1846 and is still operating. The main part, a large
square broad-gabled house facing the beach, is separated from the rear
portion by a long open passage and surrounded by porches with round
wooden rails. This represents the type of summer hostelry inland South
erners preferred before the War between the States.
R. from Beach Blvd. on Benachi Ave.
BENACHI AVENUE, overarched with oaks, is a favorite vista for
photographers, the moss-draped trees forming an archway nearly two-fifths
of a mile long.
R. from Benachi Ave. on Howard Ave.; L. on Caillavet St.; R. on
Division St.; L. on Oak St.; L. on E. Bay View Ave.
11. BACK BAY BOATBUILDING FACTORIES (R), E. Bay View
Ave. (open by permission), are unpainted frame buildings strung along
the avenue. The process of boatbuilding from the initial steps to the
finishing touches can be observed here.
12. BACK BAY FISHERIES (R), E. Bay View Ave., are a hodge
podge of shrimp- and oyster-packing and canning houses which extend
to Iberville Bridge. The damp rank odor of fish pervades this entire
section.
R. from E. Bay View Ave. on Caillavet St.
13. IBERVILLE BRIDGE, across Back Bay, is a concrete span 3,400
feet long, built in 1926 at a cost of $350,000. At the exit of the
bridge (R) are visible the IBERVILLE CROSS AND BOULDER, com
memorating the landing of Iberville. It is here that the ceremony of
blessing the fleet takes place on Sunday preceding August 15.
Retrace Caillavet St.; R. on W. Bay View Ave.; R. on a narrow
sandy road.
14. NAVAL RESERVE PARK was established by the Government to
preserve the trees for making knees for wooden ships. Now owned by
the city, the park is noteworthy for its vistas of the bay seen through
moss-draped oaks. Public pier, ZOO (open 9-5), and picnic tables are
maintained by the city.
Retrace the sandy road; R. on W. Bay View Ave.; R. on Naval
Reserve Rd.; R. on Pass Christian Rd.
15. UNITED STATES VETERANS FACILITY (open Pri. 1-5),
occupies a tract of 700 acres with frontage on Back Bay. Its buildings
of whitewashed brick designed in the Colonial tradition are attractively
grouped in a setting of oaks, pines, magnolias, and shrubs. The institution
was opened in 1933 and is designed to accommodate 4,000 beds. The
main building, five stories in height, is one of the largest single buildings
in the State.
Retrace Pass Christian Rd.; R. on Porter St.
1 6. BILOXI LIGHTHOUSE, Porter St. and Beach Blvd. (open),
65 feet in height and mounted through the center by a revolving stair
case and ladder, was built in 1848. Near the beginning of the War
between the States, when Ship Island was taken, a Biloxi citizen climbed
the tower, removed the lens and buried it. When the war was over, the
COLUMBUS 179
lens was dug up and returned to the tower, the nicks being the only
indication of its stay underground. When Lincoln was assassinated, Biloxi
demonstrated its sorrow by painting the tower of the lighthouse black.
Shortly afterward, however, the Government had it painted white, its
present color.
R. from Porter St. on Beach Blvd.
17. BILOXI CEMETERY, Beach Blvd. (open), marks the early set
tlement of Biloxi. One section of the cemetery has graves so old that
all inscriptions on the headstones have been effaced. Originally owned
by the Fayards, the cemetery was given by them to the city, which, in
turn, gave away the lots without charge. Probably unique among ceme
teries of the world is the custom frequently used here of shading the
graves with canopies of Spanish moss draped on bars a few feet above
the headstones. On All Saints Day decorations ranging from handsome
hothouse plants to paper flowers are placed on the graves. The poor
decorate the graves of their dead with shells arranged in geometric
designs. The growing of flowers for All Saints Day, and the making of
paper flowers, are considerable industries on and near the Coast.
1 8. SEASHORE CAMP GROUNDS, Beach Blvd. (R), are the sum
mer camping grounds for Methodists. The camp was established in 1871,
with the tabernacle in the center and a semicircle of frame summer cot
tages. Between religious services the cottages are occupied by members
of the congregation, and rented to the public between periodic camp
meetings.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Southern Memorial Park, 4.9 m., Beauvoir, .5. .5 m., Edgewater Gulf Skeet Range
and Golf Course, 8.5 m., Gulf Coast Military Academy, 8.5 m., (see Tour 1);
Harbor (see GULFPORT); Ship Island, 12 m. (see Side Tour lA).
yvyyyyyyyyyyvvvvvv >< VVVVVyVVV
Railroad Stations: 6th St. and 8th Ave. S. for Mobile & Ohio R.R.; 2ist St.
and 2nd Ave. S. for Frisco R.R.; i3th St. and Main St. for Columbus & Greenville
R.R. and Southern Ry.
Bus Station: Union Bus Station, 5th St. and 3rd Ave. S. for Tri-State Transit
Co., Dixie Greyhound Lines, Dixies Coaches, and Magnolia Motor Lines.
Taxis: Intra-city ice 1 per person.
Traffic Regulations: Speed limit 30 mph. Turns in either direction at intersections
except where lights direct otherwise. Limited parking.
i8o
MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
KEY
1. Christian Church
2. Old Franklin Academy
3. Stephen D. Lee Home
4. F. M. Leigh Home
5. Alexander B. Meek Home
6. J. H. Kennebrew Home
7. J. M. Billups Home
8. Mississippi State College for
Women
9. Charles McLaren Home
(Humphries Home)
10. Jesse P. Woodward Home
11. Columbus Marble Plant
12. Friendship Cemetery
13. Rosedale
14. Owen s Greenhouse and
Nursery
COLUMBUS
181
COLUMBUS
Federal Writers Project 1937
nnnncaanan
nan
182 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Accommodations: Two hotels; tourist camps.
Information Service: Chamber of Commerce, City Hall, NW. cor. Main and 6th Sts.
Motion Picture Houses: Three.
Athletics: Y.M.C.A., 6th St. and 2nd Ave. N.; Magnolia Bowl, 3rd Ave. N. bet.
5th and 6th Sts.
Swimming: Y.M.C.A. ; Luxapalila Swimming Beach, i m. NE.
Golf: Country Club, 2 m. N. on Military Road, moderate greens fee.
Annual Events : Memorial Service, Decoration Day, April 26.
COLUMBUS (250 alt., 10,743 PP-)> sprawling leisurely along the
banks of Tombigbee and Luxapalila Rivers, is a city in which there is
room to breathe. A comfortable old-tree shaded town, the streets are
broad, the sidewalks wide, lawns are spacious, and houses are set apart
in a manner characteristic of the lavish ante-bellum period in which they
were built. It is the junction of the Old South with the New, with gracious
lines of Georgian porticos forming a belt of mellowed beauty about a
modern business district, where 2oth century facades and white Doric
columns stand side by side.
The same leisurely atmosphere of spaciousness is carried into "North-
side," the Negro section of town. Here approximately 45 percent of
Columbus s population lives in low-roofed, red frame houses that are
festooned with wistaria and shaded by umbrella chinaberry trees and tall,
brightly colored sunflowers. A majority of the Negro men find work
with white families rather than with industries, or are delivery boys,
taxi drivers, and filling station helpers. The Negro women who work
are employed almost entirely as domestic servants. In their section of
town they have their own stores, cafes, hotels, and recreational center.
In 1540 De Soto entered the State at a point eight miles above the
present site of Columbus, and two centuries later Bienville, on his way
to attack the Chickasaw Nation, passed beneath the Tombigbee bluffs;
but it was not until 1817 that the white man came to the spot where the
Tombigbee joins the Luxapalila and built a trading post. In that year
Thomas Thomas opened a store and shortly afterward Spirus Roach built
a tavern. Because Roach was gray and bent and wizened, he reminded
the Indians, who came to buy his whisky, of an opossum, so they called
the settlement Possum Town. In 1821, however, the Virginia and Caro
lina bluebloods, who had followed Thomas and Roach to grow cotton
in the fertile prairie soil, expressed their distaste for Indian humor and
renamed the community Columbus.
Sitting on the banks of the Tombigbee, the only artery of commerce from
northeast Mississippi to the Gulf, and bordered by undulating prairies,
the new trading post grew from settlement to village and from village
to town, until just prior to the War between the States it was well estab
lished as a cultural center of the Black Prairie a section referred to by
slaves as "de rich folk s Ian ."
From its beginning Columbus welcomed education. Situated on one
of the early land grants set aside for schools, the town was a pioneer
in the establishment of public institutions of learning. In 1821 Gideon
CLOCK TOWER, STATE COLLEGE FOR WOMEN, COLUMBUS
Lincccum founded Franklin Academy, the first free school in the State.
In 1847 Columbus Female Institute was organized, a private academy
which, 38 years later, reorganized under the name Industrial Institute
and College, became the first State-supported college for women in the
United States. In 1920 the name again was changed to Mississippi State
184 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
College for Women. Today the city and education are synonymous. Even
the property in the downtown district comes within the i6th section
belonging to the State as part of the original land grant reserved for
schools. Business establishments here must lease this land from Mississippi.
However, ante-bellum Columbus was not "at home" to the more
blatant aspects of progress. When the Mobile & Ohio R.R. tried to secure
a right-of-way through the town, permission was refused. A railroad was
unsightly, it would mar the landscape and bring undesirable people, the
citizens said. And not until 1861 did they capitulate, with a few die-hards
even then continuing to plant their cotton along the railroad tracks,
forcing the company to erect fences to protect the rails.
During the War between the States the Confederate Government
maintained a large arsenal in the town, and when Jackson fell into the
hands of Federals the seat of State government was moved here immedi
ately. The Christian church was hastily converted into a Senate chamber
and the courthouse next door was prepared to receive the lower house
in time for the legislative session of 1863. Politicians thronged the lobby
of the Gilmer Hotel and President Davis was a guest in the Whitfield
(now Billups) home. It is still told in Columbus that one night,
while Davis slept, the townspeople gathered beneath a window of his
room to serenade him, and that upon being awakened by the voices and
the guitars, Davis, with his long night shirt trailing beneath his dressing
gown, appeared on the little balcony opening off his room and delivered
an address.
In the years since the War between the States three new railroads have
obtained rights-of-way through the city, and, as old settlers had suspected,
a new people, with an outsider s idea of progress, followed in their wake.
Today the city ships cotton, hay, cattle, and hardwood lumber; it has
large floral, brick, and marble industries, and is the center of a rapidly
developing dairy industry.
But the aristocrats have bred their kind. The old Columbus still sur
rounds a 20th-century business district and sets the tempo that gives
the city its tone of leisurely unconcern.
N. -from Main St. on 6th St.
i. CHRISTIAN CHURCH, NW. corner 6th St. and 2nd Ave. N.,
next to the courthouse is the small Gothic Revival church that housed
the refugee Legislature of 1863.
COLUMBUS 185
L. from 2nd Ave. N. on 5th St.
2. OLD FRANKLIN ACADEMY, NE. corner 3 rd Ave. N. and 5 th
St., the first free school in the State, chartered in 1821, is a part of the
Columbus public school system; the old academy building houses a gram
mar school. The three-story red brick structure with white wood trim
is an example of ante-bellum Gothic Revival adapted to institutional pur
poses. A stone marker on the campus tells briefly the history of Franklin
Academy.
R. from 5th St. on 3rd Ave. N.; L. on 7th St.
3. The STEPHEN D. LEE HOME, occupying a block on yth St. (R)
between 3rd and 4th Aves. N. (open schooldays 9-4; Sept. to ]une),
was willed to the city on the death of its owner, Stephen D. Lee, and
is now a part of the Lee High School. Built in 1844 by Col. Thomas
Blewett, it is a square two-story brick building, with a covered porch
extending across the front. Iron grille work, said to have been cast in
New Orleans and suggestive of French influence, is used for railing and
columns on the porch. Iron animals on the campus formerly occupied a
prominent place in the Lee garden.
Stephen D. Lee, born in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1833, was
graduated from West Point in 1854 and was first lieutenant and regi
mental quartermaster of the 4th United States Artillery when he resigned
in 1861 to join the Confederate forces. He was one of two officers sent
by General Beauregard to demand the surrender of Fort Sumter, and,
upon refusal, it was he who ordered the nearest battery to fire upon the
fort. In the spring of 1862 he was promoted to lieutenant-colonel. After
gaining distinction at Seven Pines and in the Seven Days Battles against
General McClellan s forces, he was given command of the 4th Virginia
cavalry. When it became necessary to reinforce the army defending Vicks
burg, he was promoted to brigadier-general and assigned to duty in the
West. After the fall of Vicksburg he became lieutenant-general and was
given command of the Department of Mississippi, Alabama, East Louis
iana, and West Tennessee. When Hood became commander of the army
of Georgia, Lee took command of Hood s corps. He saw hard fighting
around Atlanta and his last campaign was in North Carolina, where he
was paroled with Johnston s army. In 1865 he married Regina Harrison,
of Columbus, where he made his home. He was a member of the State
Senate of 1878 and a delegate to the Constitutional Convention of 1890.
He was the first president of the Agricultural and Mechanical College
(now Mississippi State), serving from 1880 to 1899, when he resigned
to become a member of the newly created Vicksburg National Park Asso
ciation. General Lee was a president of the Mississippi Historical Society,
a member of the Board of Trustees of the Department of A i\ hives and
History, and the author of several papers on the War between the States.
When he died in 1908, he was national commander of the United Con
federate Veterans of America.
4. The F. M. LEIGH HOME, 824 N. yth St. (private), built in
1841, stands on a hill overlooking the vales and dells of the highlands.
Large Doric columns support a porch that extends around two sides of
186 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
the building. Inside are antique gilded mirrors, sofas, chairs and tables
of rosewood, mahogany, and cherry, and family portraits in massive
frames. The flower garden at the southern end of a winding walk is
landscaped with formal beds, each bordered by a low brick curb. Scattered
about the yard toward the back are three outhouses and the old brick
kitchen relics of the slave era.
Retrace 7th St.; L. on 6th Ave. N.
5. The ALEXANDER B. MEEK HOME, SE. corner 6th Ave. N. and
8th St. (private), was built in 1854 by William R. Cannon, who came
from South Carolina to Lowndes Co. in 1830, and settled on a prairie
plantation 12 miles from Columbus. Later, desiring to bring his children
into town for education, he built this home. It is of the ante-bellum
Classical Revival style, with the characteristic columns, entrance portico,
and graceful lines. Plans were drawn for it by a Mr. Lull, who built
many other Columbus houses of that period. An artist was brought from
New York to paint the family portraits that remain on the walls. The
library shelves were filled with books, many dating to the early i8th
century. Chinaware was imported from Europe and glassware from Bo
hemia. When complete the house was an excellent example of the homes
wealthy planters of the Black Prairie were building before the War be
tween the States.
6. The J. H. KENNEBREW HOME, SW. corner 6th Ave. N. and 9th
St. (private), is designed in the Greek Revival style modeled after a
Doric temple. It is simple, stately, unadorned. All the timber used in
the house was cut from the forest by slaves, and only the heart of each
tree was used. Each column a single tree trunk is hand carved.
R. -from 6th Ave. N. on 9th St.
7. The J. M. BILLUPS HOME, SE. corner 9th St. and 3rd Ave. N.
(private), where Jefferson Davis was once a guest, built by Gov. James
Whitfield about 1854 and modeled after Thomas Jefferson s "Monticello,"
has an octagonal hall, with doors opening on all sides. Connecting the
first- and second-story halls is a broad winding stairway, the newel posts
and railings made of solid Mississippi walnut. A similar stair leads from
the second story to the observatory. When Major Billups purchased the
home from Governor Whitfield, he had the observatory removed, and the
resemblance of the home to Monticello became less apparent. All brick
used in the construction of the home was made by slave labor.
L. from 9th St. on 2nd Ave. S.
8. MISSISSIPPI STATE COLLEGE FOR WOMEN, 2nd Ave. S. (R)
bet. nth and i5th Sts., holds membership in the Association of Amer
ican Colleges and its graduates are eligible for full membership in the
American Association of University Women.
As a pioneer in the field of education, and the first State-supported
school in America to offer higher education exclusively to women, the
college has many of the characteristics of the pioneer warmth, vigor,
and ruggedness and, like all pioneers, has accumulated its traditions.
There is the "wedding" of the Freshman and Junior classes, the Magnolia
COLUMBUS 187
Chain carried by the Seniors at commencement, and the Zouave and
Singlestick drills performed on class day.
Main Dormitory, the oldest building on the campus was built in 1860,
and like the Old Chapel adjoining, has ivy-covered brick walls. In the
tower is the clock that has continuously marked the hours for more than
half a century. The newer buildings are modern variations of Southern
Colonial style, with stone Corinthian columns, broad galleries, and por
ticos. The last to be built (1930) is the JOHN CLAYTON / VI \T
LIBRARY (open weekdays 8 a.m.-9 p.m.), which houses 50,000 volumes,
including government documents received by the library as an official
depository. Here, also, is the Belle Kearney collection of curios. The
college places emphasis on its Physical Education Department. It offers
courses in aesthetic and acrobatic dancing. The swimming pool, occupying
the lower floor of the gymnasium, is the largest indoor pool in the State.
The campus has the appearance of a well-kept Southern garden, shaded
with a variety of indigenous trees, and planted in japonicas, hydrangeas,
gardenias, and Japanese magnolias. A network ot walks leads to a
drinking fountain and sundial.
Retrace 2nd Are. S.; L. on 2nd St.
9. The CHARLES McLAREN HOME (HUMPHRIES HOME), 514
S. 2nd St. (private), built several years prior to the War between the
States, is of stately proportions and exquisite detail. The lot upon which
it stands occupies a block bordering the Tombigbee River. The building
is of Georgian Colonial style, with massive stone Corinthian columns
upholding the roof of the double porch across the front. Two lions,
symbolic guards of the mansion, crouch on the cheek blocks of the
steps; two greyhounds, emblems of fidelity, stretch full-length on stone
slabs facing the walk.
10. The JESSE P. WOODWARD HOME, NE. corner 2nd St. and
5th Ave. S. (private), is one of the State s best examples of the Southern
Planter type of architecture. Built early in the 1850*5 by Col. W. C.
Richards, the house has been restored with its original lines carefully
preserved. A double flight of steps, graced by delicately wrought iron
railings, dominates the entrance. The brick ground floor is occupied by
study and service rooms; the family living quarters are above on the first
floor. The outer walls are covered with white clapboards, and brick
chimneys flank the ends. The grounds are informally landscaped with
boxwood hedges and magnolias.
L. from 2nd St. on 7th Are. S.: R. on 4tb St.
11. The COLUMBUS MARBLE PLANT, 4 th St. (R) between 7 th
and 8th Aves. S. (open weekdays 8-4; tours), reputed to be the largest
plant of its kind in the South, occupies a low-roofed, corrugated tin
building covering an entire block. Here marble, brought from Georgia
and Alabama, is cut into building blocks, slabs, and headstones
12. FRIENDSHIP CEMETERY, long known as Odd Fellows Ceme
tery, 4th St. (R) facing i3th Ave. S., is situated on land purchased by the
Odd Fellows in 1849 for recreational purposes. During the War between
the States the 18 acres were converted into a cemetery. The first burials
rags
WOODWARD HOUSE, COLUMBUS
were of soldiers who fell at Shiloh. Under the magnolias are the graves
of about 100 Federal and 1,500 Confederate soldiers, whose names were
recorded in a book since lost. Now all graves are "unknown," and so
marked on the more than 1,000 headstones set up by the War Depart
ment in 1931. In one corner of the cemetery is a faded red brick vault
the grave of William Cocke, Revolutionary War veteran, legislator of
Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Mississippi.
Memorial Day had its origin in this cemetery on April 26, 1866.
The ladies of Columbus met and marched in procession to the burial
ground, where they cleared and decorated with flowers the graves of
both Confederate and Union soldiers. This act inspired Francis Miles
Finch s poem, "The Blue and the Gray." April 26, not the nationally rec
ognized May 30, is still Decoration Day in Mississippi.
L. from 4th St. on 13th Ave. S.; R. on 9th St.
13. ROSED ALE, 9th St. (L) between i3th Ave. and city limits
(private), is the oldest brick house in Columbus. Built by Dr. Topp
in 1855, it was planned by architects and decorators from New Orleans.
It is a square two-story brick building surmounted by a cupola, and sug
gests Italian villa architecture in its general appearance. Outside walls
are covered with gray stucco. A covered porch runs across the front.
Full-length arched windows are used throughout. Interior walls and ceil-
GREENWOOD 189
ings are elaborately decorated with ornamental plaster. Holly trees in the
yard were planted by Dr. Topp at the time the house was erected.
14. OWEN S GREENHOUSE AND NURSERY, foot of 9th St., is
said to be the largest of its kind in the South.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Bclmont, 9 m., Waverly, 7J m., Site of Old Plymouth, 9-5 m. (See Tour 4).
Stover Apiary, 15 m. (see Side Tour 4 A).
Railroad Stations: Carrollton Ave. for Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. ; S. end
Howard St. for Columbus & Greenville R.R.
Bus Station: Union Bus Station, Wciner Hotel, 219 Carrollton Ave. for Tri-State
Transit Co., Dixie Greyhound Lines.
Airport: Greenwood Airport, 2.1 m. S. off US 49E, taxi fare 50?, time 8 min.
No scheduled service.
Taxis: Fare io within city.
Accommodations: Five hotels.
Motion Picture Houses: Two.
Su imming: Country Club, Humphreys Highway; Municipal Pool, High School
campus, Cotton St., nominal charge.
Golf: Country Club, Humphreys Highway, reasonable greens fee.
Tennis: Country Club, Humphreys Highway, High School campus, Cotton St.
GREENWOOD (143 alt., 11,123 PP-)> tne neart f wnat is reputed
to be the greatest long staple cotton growing area in the world, is an
enlarged edition of the little towns and villages that dot the Yazoo-
Mississippi Delta. Completely surrounded by cotton fields, and centered
about its gins, compresses and warehouses, the growing, ginning, and
marketing of cotton keep up the pulse of its social and industrial life.
Cotton built the gins and compresses and the pretentious mansions on
the Boulevard. The fickleness of cotton crops and prices sets the stand
ard that accustoms the city to taking its pleasures while it may.
In character with a Delta town, a river cuts the center of Greenwood.
On the south bank of the green and shadowy Yazoo lies the business
district; on the north bank are residences typical of Delta architecture,
with tall, stilt-like foundations for protection against the constant menace
of flood waters, and screened front porches against ever present mos-
190 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
quitoes. These homes, as well as the more pretentious mansions that line
the broad street called Boulevard, represent the "good" years of the
planters and merchants. Many of these homes follow the familiar colonial
pattern, but interspersed with them are pastel Spanish villas and English
manor houses, incongruous against the flat delta landscape. This section
of Greenwood, formerly a part of the vast plantation of Sen. J. Z.
George, was not opened up until 1915. Before that time a majority of
the Deltans who now have residences here preferred living on their own
plantations or small farms.
Surrounding the business and white residential section of Greenwood
is the typically Mississippi fringe of Negro quarters. The fringe is divided
into sections, each with its name and its particular group of persons.
"Gritney," occupying 30 acres near the compresses, is the largest and
oldest. Here the more economically well-to-do Negroes live, a majority
owning their homes. "Ram-Cat Alley" furnishes Greenwood s best cooks.
"G. P. Town" lies south of the railroad tracks; "Baptist Town" is to
the east, where Negro Baptists live close to their church; "Buckeye Quar
ters," in west Greenwood, gets its name from the oil mill that employs
a great many of the men as unskilled laborers; in north Greenwood,
"Burkhalter s Alley" is a small but favorite district. On West Church
and Williamson Streets, where approximately 20 or more houses are
located in a white district, is "New Town." Negroes compose 48.4 percent
of Greenwood s population. The men do menial labor at the gins, ware
houses, oil mills, and other industries. During cotton chopping season
and cotton picking time approximately 1,500 Negroes are transported
daily from Greenwood to the outlying plantations. The women are
domestic servants.
In 1834 John Williams came to the lush swamp near the confluence
of the Yazoo and Yalobusha Rivers and built a river landing on 162
acres bought from the Government at $1.25 an acre. Immediately planters
began to bring their cotton to his landing to be shipped down the Yazoo
to New Orleans. Among their number was the Choctaw chieftain Green
wood Leflore, who brought his baled cotton here from Malmaison (see
Tour 6) until one day Leflore discovered that Williams let his cotton
lie unprotected from the weather, and the two men quarreled. In retali
ation, the Indian built his own warehouse and landing at a point three
miles north on the Yazoo and called it Point Leflore. But the rivalry
between the landings was not as great as Leflore had expected. By 1844
Williams Landing had grown into the semblance of a village and was
incorporated, ironically enough, as Greenwood, the given name of the
Indian chieftain. Slowly Greenwood, with its town hall, post office, 3
saloons and 17 combination grocery stores and grog shops, absorbed the
trade of Point Leflore, and with its steady flow of river trade flourished
as a trading center during the ante-bellum period. Its prosperity, how
ever, was flaunted in lavish living on outlying plantations rather than
in the town itself, for at that time the planters preferred living among
their fields of cotton.
The War between the States paralyzed the cotton industry. Gunboats
GREENWOOD 191
supplanted barges on the river and the railroad tracks were destroyed.
l:\cn throughout reconstruction much of the rich, black Delta lands lay
fallow because there were no means of transporting such crops as were
grown.
With the coming of the railroads in the i88o s, Greenwood declined
as a river town but had a renascence in rails and locomotives. The Yazoo
& Mississippi connected the town with the main freight line of the
Illinois Central System, and the Columbus & Greenville connected it
with eastern and western traffic. This gave the city, despite its inland
location, another outlet to the ports of the world.
Greenwood handles more than 200,000 bales of cotton each year. Be
cause it is a staple market, prices here arc such that often cotton raised
in neighboring States is brought to Greenwood for sale. In the city
are 56 firms of cotton shippers, exporters, buyers, factors, and several
cotton cooperative associations. The cotton is handled on the factor system,
which originated after the War between the States when the planters were
too poor to finance the making of a crop. The factor, a merchant-banker
who advances money to the planter and takes a lien on his crop, has
the cotton tagged and shipped to him in Greenwood. The theoretical
advantages of this system most often pointed to are that the factor can
secure cheaper storage and insurance rates and that his leased wires to
New Orleans and New York give him the advantage of knowing the
erratic quotas of the large export markets and thus offer the planter
a better opportunity to secure a higher price for his cotton.
The activity of cotton is in two fever-pitch stages, the first, when the
planter is preparing his spring planting, the second, when the crop is
picked and ready for market. From December until March, Greenwood
is absorbed in handling the planter s crop production loan. For whether
the planter owns 200 or 2,000 acres, he has a ritual to follow before
he may actually put the seeds into his ground. He must get a waiver on
his mortgage and record it in the chancery clerk s office. He must make
out a budget, work and rework it until it is approved by the lien holder
(factor), the mortgagees, and all parties concerned. His certificates must
be signed by the county agent, his abstracts must be made by reputable
authorities. Repeated inspection is made of his plantation by land exam
iners of the various mortgages. All this activity naturally involves end
less waiting on street corners and in outer offices, yet the planter takes
it good-naturedly. A majority of the men with whom he does business
are his friends, and conferences usually end as social occasions. When,
at last, after having signed away practically every earthly possession in
cluding radio and automobile, and after specifying the exact number of
acres to be planted in cotton, the amount of seed and the kind of ferti
lizer to be used, the number of bales of hay the mules will eat, the
gallons of gas the tractor will consume, and how many pairs of shoes
the children will need, the annual ordeal of the crop production loan is
over. The planter will receive the money in monthly installments, duly
witnessed and countersigned.
The marketing season, usually from the latter part of August through
192 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Christmas, keeps Greenwood tensely holding its breath until the price of
cotton is somewhat stabilized. For with the price, the whole economic
and social life of the town is inextricably bound. Everyone from the
tenant Negro to the land-owning planter feels the repercussion of a
"good" or "bad" year.
Wagons and trucks piled high with cotton crowd the streets leading
to the gins. At the gins they are driven on large scales that weigh the
cotton before it is unloaded. The modern gin operates on the "saw"
principle of the Whitney gin, but is a far cry from the original model.
The whole process of ginning has been perfected to expedite labor.
Suction pipes, which have the appearance of enlarged stove-pipes, draw
the cotton from the wagon. An elevator system from the suction pipe
to the second story of the gin transports the cotton to shoots leading to
the gin saws. These saws pull the cotton apart, separating it from the
seeds. The lint is removed by air blasts, going into a condenser where it
receives a final beating and cleaning, and where it becomes glorified,
snowy-white drifts. The final process is confining these drifts into sturdy
jute bagging and binding it with metal bands. The seed is delivered by
conveyor back to the planter, or, when sold directly to the ginnner, is
sent to the seed house.
The baled cotton goes from the gin to the compress where Negro
handlers unload and pitch it to another set of Negroes, who "bust" the
bands with a band breaker and throw it into the press. The Negroes
work rhythmically, singing and shouting at one another. The compress
runs by steam and each time the plunger goes up with a bale the press
gives a snort and lets out a puff of white vapor, making the scene noisy
and exciting.
Cotton oil mills handle the cottonseed, turning it into vegetable oil,
which, refined, and mixed with compound lard, is the basis for many
cooking preparations. It is also used extensively in the manufacture of
soap. The oil mills run continuously day and night for a period of about
eight months. This continuous operation is necessary, because cotton
"meat," as the seed is called, must never be allowed to cool while in the
process of cooking. The meats are properly toasted; then the oil is ex
tracted, trickling out of the press in a clear, golden stream, deliciously
odorous. The hull of the seed is shaped into seed cakes, then ground into
cottonseed meal, which makes fertilizer and cattle food that is valuable as
a fattener and milk-producer.
POINTS OF INTEREST
i. The COURTHOUSE, squared by River Road, Cotton, Market, and
Fulton Sts. with main entrance on Market St., is a large concrete struc
ture of neo-Classic design. Rising above the principal fagade is a clock
tower topped with a small cupola. Below the clock is the belfry where
chimes sound every quarter hour. The chimes are pitched to duplicate
the tones of the Westminster chimes in London. On the hour, they peal
forth the air to which has been set these words:
GREENWOOD 193
"Lord through this hour
Be Thou our Guide
So by Thy power
No foot shall slide."
The chimes were a gift to the County by Mrs. Lizzie George Hender
son as a memorial to her husband, an early Leflore County physician, who
was much respected by his neighbors and patients.
2. The TERRY HOME, 305 West Market St. (open weekdays 9-5),
is the oldest house in Greenwood. It was built before the War between
the States. The house is occupied by Mrs. Cora Terry, granddaughter
of the Choctaw chieftain, Greenwood Leflore, and is equipped with
furniture and appointments from the chieftain s home, Malmaison (see
Tour 6). Other Leflore heirlooms here are the belt and sword presented
the chieftain by President Andrew Jackson, a silver peace medal given
him by Pushmataha who had received it from Thomas Jefferson, a
pamphlet containing the history of the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek,
monogrammed china from Paris, Bohemian glass wine and brandy
sets, three large volumes on Indian tribes of North America presented to
Leflore by the United States Government, the red leather Leflore family
Bible, a certificate of payment from the Mississippi General Land Office
signed by President Martin Van Buren, and several invitations addressed
to and sent from the Leflores.
3. SUPREME INSTRUMENTS CORPORATION PLANT, 414-416
Howard St. (open weekdays 8-4, tours), manufactures radio testing ap
pliances. The company has the patent on a special testing instrument
and, as the only plant allowed to manufacture the instrument, has devel
oped a world trade.
4. PLANTERS OIL MILL GIN, East Greenwood (not open to pub
lic), is one of several plants that separates cotton lint from the seed,
then bales the lint.
5. FEDERAL COMPRESS AND WAREHOUSE, East Greenwood
(not open to public), compresses the bales of cotton delivered by the
gins and stores it for shipping.
6. BUCKEYE COTTON OIL MILL, W. River Front (not open to
public), extracts the oil from the cottonseed, making cottonseed oil, hulls,
meal, and cakes.
7. STAPLE COOPERATIVE ASSOCIATION WAREHOUSE, Mar
ket St. (open weekdays 9-5; tours), grades, stores, and markets cotton
for association members.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Malmaison, 28.2 m. (see Tour 6); Site of Fort Pemberton, 3.2 m.; Wreck of
Star of the West, 2.4 m. (see Side Tour 7 A).
rt
Railroad Stations: Union Station, 27th Ave., for Gulf & Ship Island R.R. and Louis
ville & Nashville R.R.
Bus Station: 1400-24^ Ave. for Tri-State, Teche-Greyhound lines.
Airport: Municipal Airport, 1 m. from City Hall, bus fare 5$, taxi fare 10$; time
5 min. No scheduled service.
Taxis: 10^ upward.
City Bus: mo-3Oth Ave., fare 5$ in city limits; hourly trips to Biloxi and Pass
Christian.
Traffic Regulations: Speed limit 20 mph. within business district; 30 mph. other
districts. Limited parking only on certain side of designated streets. See signs.
Accommodations: Six hotels; tourist camps.
Radio Station : WGCM ( 1 2 1 o kc. ) .
Motion Picture Houses: Two.
Swimming: Municipal pier and bathing pavilion, West Beach; Markham Pool,
23rd Ave.; Small Craft Harbor.
Golf: Great Southern course, East Beach, 15 min. drive from town, or 10$ bus fare.
Tennis: City Park, West Beach; Great Southern Hotel courts; Second St. court,
I400-2nd St.; High School campus, 2oth Ave. and i5th St.
Riding: Edgewater Gulf Hotel Stables, $1.50 per hr.
Fishing: Deep-sea and fresh-water fishing boats and guides for hire at hotels.
Annual Events: Annual Fox Hunters Meet, Feb., affiliated with Southern and
National Associations; Southern Marble Tournament, June; Gulfport Yacht Club
Regatta, July; Mackerel Rodeo, July; City Tennis Tournaments, July, Municipal
Tennis Courts, City Park.
GULFPORT (19 alt., 12,547 pop.), fronting the Gulf of Mexico and
flanked by a line of historic towns of narrow streets and old landmarks,
is a planned city, with no antecedents earlier than those of the 2oth cen
tury. Conceived by the Gulf & Ship Island Company as a model of
unobstructed expansiveness, the old live-oaks and indigenous shrubs
that characterize the Coast, were sacrificed to an atmosphere of wide, airy
streets and narrow, formally planted parkways. The streets, paralleling
the white concrete sea wall with arrow-like straightness, allow no infor
malities or small outcroppings of individuality to mar their directness.
The avenues, running at right angles to the streets, are bordered by
stiff, imported palms and are as orderly and patterned as an engineer s
dream.
Overlooking the Gulf, the city has greater length than depth, with
its length centered by its harbor and business district. Beginning at the
harbor between 22nd and 3ist Avenues, the business district bears the
marks of two booms. The buildings of the first boom (1900-08) are
of white brick, two and three stories high, with commodious, high-
ceilinged interiors and dated cornices. Among them, emphasizing their
LOADING DALES OF COTTON, GULFPORT
outmoded appearance, tower apartments and hotels constructed dur
ing the boom of 1925-26. These newer buildings are of cream faced
brick or stucco, with a suggestion of Spanish architecture in their pastel
walls and bright tile roofs.
Extending from the business district east and west, and separated
from the sea wall by narrow, neutral strips of grass and sand, is Bc.uh
Boulevard. Along this broad street overlooking the Gulf was developed
a residential section during the early boom; later it was made a part
of US 90, the main artery of the Coast. The houses, all on the north
side facing the water, express the same spirit as the earlier business
houses in that they are roomy frame structures with elaborate trimmings
and many wind-swept galleries.
Northward from the boulevard is the residential section developed
during the excitement of the second boom. A majority of the dwellings
are compact bungalows, though a few in the subdivisions show the influ
ence of Spanish design.
1 ringing the sandy ridge further northward is the Negro section.
Though there are here many aspects of the average urban Mississippi
oes district three- and four-room houses, bare yards, and small
garden patches this section is above the average, with many of the
homes owned by the occupants. A higher percentage of Gulfport Negroes
arc said to own their homes than in any other town in the State. These
homes, often given undue emphasis by the drab backdrop of unkempt
196 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
rental houses, are set on well-shaded and well-planted lawns. The Negroes
of Gulf port comprise 25.2 percent of the population and are, for the
most part, employed as stevedores or are fishermen. The stevedores re
ceive union wages and thus are able to maintain a standard of living
somewhat higher than that of the fishermen, who, equipped with nets,
seines, and rowboats, usually bring into the local markets a catch suffi
cient only for simple needs. The Gulfport school system maintains an
accredited high school for Negro children. After graduation, a fair num
ber of the male children are sent out of the State to college. But unlike
the Negroes of Natchez, only a small percentage of this educated group
ever return to Gulfport as self-appointed missionaries to their race.
The beginning of Gulfport can be dated exactly at May 3, 1887. On
that day a committee of the Board of Directors of the Gulf & Ship
Island Company, an organization formed for the purpose of building a
railroad as an outlet for the Piney Woods, and headed by Judge W. H.
Hardy, accepted a civil engineer s report as to the best location for the
contemplated railroad s terminal harbor on the Mississippi Coast. By
1891 the railroad was completed to Saucier, 20 miles north. Then the
Union Investment Company, which held the building contract, fell into
legal difficulties and Federal court proceedings brought construction to
a standstill.
Immediately after this, however, Capt. J. T. Jones of New York saw
the potentialities in the railroad and undertook its completion. By 1902
the entire stock of the Gulf & Ship Island R.R. had passed into his
hands and within a few months the town of Gulfport became a city
of 5,000 population. But the achievement found its obstacles. Yellow
fever was an acute problem. Each summer brought a few cases of the
plague to the Coast and with these the dreaded quarantine law. Immedi
ately upon the development of a case all withdrawal from the city was
banned; railroads were required to transfer incoming passengers, and
freight and mail were fumigated before being allowed to proceed. These
restrictions served to isolate Gulfport, along with other Coast towns,
from the outside world during certain seasons of the year and, conse
quently, to check its growth. At this time all incoming vessels were
inspected at the Government quarantine on Ship Island (see Side Tour
1A). By 1902, however, the cause of yellow fever was at last determined
and the disease brought under control. In that year the personnel of
the station was withdrawn from Ship Island and the inspection service
established at Gulfport, the seat of Harrison, second county in the United
States to have a Board of Health.
The original plan of the Gulf & Ship Island R.R. was to extend the
tracks across the 1 2-mile channel to Ship Island. This plan proved im
practicable, and instead of carrying it out, improvements were made on
the Gulfport harbor, which was opened in 1902. With its completion, the
road, built through a sparsely settled section as an outlet for lumber ship
ments, brought a transformation to the southern part of the State. In
1911 Gulfport shipped more yellow pine than any other port in the
world.
GULFPORT 197
Into this ready-made city, in the pre-war boom, poured a population
from many countries. A dozen languages could be heard in a morning s
stroll, and court proceedings were carried on largely through inter
preters. These folk were mostly seamen lured from their ships by high
wages. When the lumber shipments decreased and wages became less
attractive, they returned to the sea. But their comparatively short stay put
a cosmopolitan mark upon the character of the town. There was no
tradition by which to gauge values, and during this period Gulfport s
social and political history is a story of churches ana schools fighting
against saloons and lawlessness. But due to a few events the unpro
voked killing of a Greek on a prominent corner, a mass Christmas night
attack upon the small police force public sentiment crystallized against
the wide-open character of the town.
Shipping and lumbering brought stevedore companies and subsidiary
industries, such as foundries, machine shops, ship chandlers, and build
ing trades, to the city. But in 1906 a terrific tropical storm swept the
Piney Woods and brought the shocking realization that, figuratively, the
city had all its eggs in one basket. Approximately a fourth of the stand
ing timber in south Mississippi was blown down, and by the financial
repercussion every bank in Gulfport was tossed to the verge of insol
vency. Recovering from the catastrophe, a move was made to develop
truck gardening and to interest tourist trade.
The need for other props to the city s commercial life was made
compelling by the exigencies of the World War. With lumber shipments
practically at a standstill in the early years of the war, Gulfport business
men cast about for new sources of income. The result was the spon
soring of the Mississippi Centennial Exposition in 1917, partly to cele
brate the looth anniversary of the State s admission to the Union, but
more to establish the Gulf Coast as a permanent exposition site for
Mississippi products and industries, with a view of developing eventu
ally the millions of acres of idle land in the State. Before the exposition
could be held, the United States entered the World War, and the build
ings and grounds were taken over by the Federal Government for use
as a naval training school.
In 1925 the Illinois Central System purchased the Gulf & Ship Island
R.R., launching a real estate boom that continued through that year and
much of 1926. With the collapse of the boom, Gulfport faced a crucial
situation. The timber of the Piney Woods had been cut and never again
would there be lumber shipments from Gulfport like those of the earlier
period. But *he years had brought a civic consciousness that united the
citizens in a community drive to keep the city alive. Cotton, the State s
oldest and largest industry, was sought as a new means for industrial
growth; warehouses, compresses, and a yarn spinning mill now con
verted into a shirt factory were built. The climax to this development
was the completion of a million-dollar pier and warehouse that gave
the city shipping facilities unexcelled by any port on the Gulf.
In the fall of 19^ the Gulfport longshoremen, participating in the
nation-wide strike of the International Longshoremen s Association, struck
198 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
for higher wages and union recognition. Their efforts were nullified, how
ever, through the failure of New Orleans longshoremen to make an effec
tive tie-up with them. After a month public sentiment and the city officials
turned against the strikers, as a result of which the strike failed. The long
shoremen now (1938) receive union wages.
The tourist trade as a business has gained recognition in Gulfport.
Recreation at a seacoast playground naturally centers on bathing, sailing,
and fishing. Stretching before Gulfport and paralleling it, Cat and Ship
Islands, two of a series of islands, cut off from the Gulf a wide body of
tranquil water known as the Mississippi Sound. About these islands and
through the Sound sweep schools of game fish speckled sea trout, Span
ish mackerel, king mackerel, bonito, cavalla, and the king of all sporting
fish, the silver tarpon. Here, between May and November, is the salt
water fishermen s choice. Within an hour s ride of Gulfport the fresh
water fisherman can make his casts in a new stream every morning for
a month, and in these streams fishing for bass, striped bass, channel
bass, crappie, bream, and perch is good every day in the year.
Tour j.o m.
S. from 13th St. on 30th Ave.
i. The HARBOR AND SHIP CANAL, fronting the city between 30th
and 26th Aves., is a kaleidoscopic picture of deep blue water, broken now
and then by the gleam of a high- leaping mullet or trout. The voices of
Negro longshoremen mingle with the rattle of winches as cotton bales
are swung into the holds of cargo boats; rocking skiffs scurry from the
wake of tugs laboriously docking freighters from Liverpool, Stockholm,
Peiping, and Bordeaux. Here and there Negro children perch precar
iously on a ship s spar, each with pole and fishing line, and winging
over all are great, gray pelicans and screaming white sea gulls. The
ship channel is marked by beacons for its seven-mile length. At its
northern end it becomes a U-shaped turning basin for large ships; its
east and west sides are flanked by piers. In the northwestern corner of
the U of the basin is a seafood packing plant and, adjoining it, a small
municipally-owned wharf; curving southward to form the west prong
of the U is the newest pier, constructed with PWA aid. This reenforced
slab rests on mammoth concrete and creosoted wood pilings and covers
more than five acres on the ground floor. From Bay St. Louis to Biloxi
Back Bay, this pier is visible as a long low smudge jutting seawarc
GULFPORT 199
From the pier itself, southward through the channel separating Cat and
Ship Islands, is a view of the squat funnels of in- and out-bound
freighters.
R. from 30th Ave. on W. Beach Blvd.; R. on 31st Ave.
2. The LUTHERAN CHURCH, 3ist Ave. (L) facing i 3 th St., for
merly the first Presbyterian Church, is a small, gray, frame structure of
modified Gothic architecture, built in the early 1900 $. A bronze plate
marks the pew in which President Woodrow Wilson sat at the time of
his visit in 1913.
R. from 31st Ave. on 13th St.
3. The HARDY MONUMENT, intersection of i3th St. and 25th
Ave., is a bronze bust erected to the memory of Judge W. H. Hardy,
who planned the city of Gulfport. The bust is the work of Leo Tolstoy,
Jr., and was cast in the Philadelphia Art Studios of Bureau Brothers. It
was given to Gulfport and southern Mississippi by Lamar Hardy, lawyer
of New York City and son of Captain Hardy.
R. from 13th St. on 25th Ave.; L. on E. Beach Blvd.
4. The SMALL CRAFT HARBOR, E. Beach Blvd. between 2 5 th and
2Oth Aves., is a basin 1,225 ^ ee ^ wide, 1,500 feet long, and 10 feet deep,
and is formed by the extension of 2oth Ave., approximately 2,750 feet
into the Gulf. The concrete extension, 40 feet wide, has a foundation
of earth dredged out to form the basin and is protected on the east side
by a reenforced concrete concave-type of wall that throws the waves
back upon themselves. On the south end of a westward angle to the
extension is a wide oblong concrete fill that serves as a protection to the
basin and as a foundation for the Municipal Clubhouse and Yacht Club.
Jutting into the basin from the extension are four creosoted piling docks,
each 450 feet long and lined with slips for boats. On the south side of
the clubhouse are the bathing pier and beach. The site was given to the
city by the heirs of Captain Jones; construction was completed in 1937
with PWA aid at a cost of $350,000.
5. UNITED STATES VETERANS FACILITY NO. 74, E. Beach
Blvd. (L) between Oak St. and city limits, is one of the largest under
the Veterans Administration. Situated on grounds comprising 2,000 feet
of beach front, the buildings follow the governmental type of hospital
structures: rectangular, two-story brick and stucco, barrack- like utility
buildings. Facing the Boulevard, and more ornate than the other build
ings, is the administration building of Spanish Mission architecture. The
walls are sand-colored stucco on steel laths, with heavy framework con
struction. The health records established by Harrison County and by the
naval training station, which occupied the grounds during the World
War, drew the attention of Federal officials to the desirability of this
section for a veterans hospital. At the close of the war, the grounds
were turned over to the Public Health Service for the establishment of
a hospital. When the hospitalization of World War soldiers passed under
the present board, the buildings and grounds were sold to the Govern
ment. Since then, Congress has made large appropriations for additional
buildings and equipment, until the hospital has a capacity of 600 beds.
200 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
The hospital operates its own laundry, bakery, and heating plant, and
receives its water supply from an artesian well.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Paradise Point, 3.9 m., St. Mark s Chapel, 3J m., Gulf Park College, 3.2 m.,
Gulf Coast Military Academy, 4-9 m. (see Tour 1); Ship Island, 12 m. (see
Side Tour lA).
-0-
HoIIy Springs
Railroad Stations: 959 E. Van Dorn Ave. for Illinois Central R.R.; end of E. Van
Dorn Ave. for St. Louis & San Francisco (Frisco) R.R.
Bus Station: Stafford Cafe, cor. Memphis St. and Van Dorn Ave. for Dixie-Grey
hound Lines, Tri-State Transit Co.
Taxis: 25$ per person within city.
Accommodations: One hotel; tourist rooms.
Information Service: Hotel; filling stations.
Motion Picture Houses: Two.
Swimming: Experiment Station, 1 m. N. on State 7; Spring Lake State Park, 8 mi.
S. on State 7.
Golf: Experiment Station, 1 m. N. on State 7.
Annual Events: Field Trials, Amateur and Professional, U. S. Field Trial Course,
10 m. SW. on Chulahoma Road, ist wk. in February; Holly Springs Garden Pil
grimage in spring.
HOLLY SPRINGS (602 alt., 2,271 pop.), with its lovely old homes
and business houses, its immense trees and boxwood hedges, gives evi
dence of the early culture brought to north central Mississippi by the
turbulent but romantic times of the 1830*5. Its heart is a courthouse
square, shady, informal, with a four-faced clock in the typically Mississippi
courthouse tower. Set back from the square along oak-shaded streets are
homes of Georgian Colonial and Greek Revival architecture, their faded
grandeur eloquent expression of a culture that sprang into being, flowered,
and died with one generation.
The trading center for a wide farming district, Holly Springs is the
headquarters for a soil conservation unit and the shipping point for
cotton, dairying products, and clay deposits. More than one-half of the
population are native born white persons while approximately 48 percent
HOLLY SPRINGS 2OI
are Negroes. The latter, as proud as the white persons of their ancestral
connection with the town, are almost entirely unskilled laborers or domes
tic servants.
Situated near the top of a ridge along which an Indian trail once led
from the Mississippi River to the tribal seat of the Chickasaw Nation,
Indians stopped here to drink the waters of the great spring that bubbled
up in the midst of a grove of holly trees. They called the place Suava-
tooky or watering place, and according to legend their young chieftain
Onoho with his love, a princess of a rival tribe, drowned themselves here
to avoid separation. In 1832 the Chickasaw Nation ceded their lands to
the United States Government, and the territory was opened to white
men.
The influx of white settlers was a part of the great land and cotton
fever that pulled men westward during the two decades before the war.
Second sons of Tidewater families, they came with the eagerness and spirit
of adventure that characterized the Forty-niners and grew almost as
wealthy planting cotton as the miners did panning gold. They bought
land recklessly, worked it a year or two, then bought more. They sent to
Virginia and the Carolinas for additional slaves to work the expanding
and fabulously fertile tracts of land.
William Randolph, a descendant of Virginia s famed John Randolph.
was not the first white man to settle at the springs, but it is he who is
credited with founding the town in 1835. An indication of the settle
ment s feverish growth is its incorporation as a town in 1837. In 1838
the Holly Springs and Mississippi River Turnpike Company was chartered.
Three years after the building of the railroad, Holly Springs was a minia
ture of the older Tidewater cities. Lawyers outnumbered the other pro
fessions, as squabbles over land grants raged and as the need for deeds
and abstracts grew. In March 1838, one year after Holly Springs became
a town, there were fourteen law offices, six doctor s offices, two banks,
nine dry goods stores, five grocery stores, five churches, three hotels, and
several private schools. Unlike other Mississippi towns, it scarcely knew
a frontier life. In place of log cabins these second sons built mansions
that rivalled one another in elaborate treatment and grand proportions.
Yet these homes, while expressions of their builders, did not reveal the
individuality of the homes built by the Natchez planters; instead, they
re-echoed the Tidewater spirit influenced by the grandiose manner of the
period in which they were built.
Although land and cotton remained the backbone of the town, whose
population jumped from 1,117 * n J 84O to 5,000 in 1861, other industries
were established. Most notable of these was the iron foundry that
furnished iron for the Mississippi Central Railroad (now a part of the
Illinois Central System), for the Moresque Building in New Orleans,
fences for the gardens of Holly Springs, and cannon for the Con
federacy.
During the War between the States, the town suffered 61 raids, the
most devastating conducted by the Confederate General, Van Horn. This
was in 1862. Generals Grant and Sherman were launching a convergent
2O2
MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
HOLLY SPRINGS 203
attack upon Vicksburg, and Grant had moved his base of supplies from
Memphis to Holly Springs. With Grant on his way to meet Sherman
before Vicksburg, Van Dorn burst in upon the town unexpectedly,
wrecked Grant s winter stores, and took the town for the Confederacy.
The effect of this raid was to delay for a year the fall of Vicksburg (see
VICKSBURG).
Hardly had the town recovered from war and reconstruction when it
was struck by the yellow fever epidemic of 1878, which reduced the
population by about half. At the time the epidemic broke out in border
ing counties there was not a single case in Holly Springs, and authorities,
believing the germ could not live in a high dry altitude, threw open the
doors of the highest town in the State to fever refugees. Within a few
months 2,000 fever victims were dead.
Neither war nor pestilence drained the vitality of the town so steadily
and permanently as did the rapid erosion of the land. Behind the decline
of Holly Springs as a wealthy agrarian center was the slump of the sec
tion s basic industry, cotton cultivation. Year after year, planters squeezed
the fertility from one tract of land, then discarded it to repeat the opera
tion on another, until at last the virgin strength of the land was gone.
With the topsoil washed away, great gaping red gullies ate cancerously
through the plantations, and the second generation of planters forsook
the land for the professions. They became lawyers, doctors, ministers, and
tradesmen, but their power was gone with their wealth.
Concerted efforts are being made to prevent further erosion. The conser
vation headquarters for northern Mississippi are set up in Holly Springs,
home of Congressman Wall Doxey, who is much interested in this work.
Also, a comeback to industrial prominence is being attempted in other fields ;
dairying is slowly taking the place of cotton growing, and clay deposits
in the vicinity are being commercialized. But in spite of this new trend,
it is the faded tapestry of ante-bellum grandeur that gives Holly Springs
its tone today.
KEY TO HOLLY SPRINGS MAP
1. Methodist Church u. Coxe-Dean House
2. Christ Church (Episcopal) 12. Bonner-Belk Home
3. Strickland Place 13. Rust College
4. The Freeman Place 14. Presbyterian Church
5. Gray Gables 15. Craft-Daniel Home
6. The Watson Building 16. The Crump Home
7. The "College Annex" 17. Featherstone-Buchanan House
8. The Rufus Jones House 18. The Polk Place
9. Clapp-Fant Place 19. Walter s Place
10. The McGowan-Crawford 20. Mason-Tucker Home
Home 21. Waite-Bowers Place
204 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Tour i-.im.
E. from Courthouse Square on Van Dorn Ave.
1. The METHODIST CHURCH, SE. corner Van Dorn Ave. and
Spring St., was completed in 1849. Except for the wooden spire and
front entrance added in the iSyo s, the structure is of brick covered with
time-grayed stucco. After the courthouse was burned by the Federals,
court sessions were held in its basement.
2. CHRIST CHURCH (EPISCOPAL), NW. corner Van Dorn Ave.
and Randolph St., was built in 1858. Of Gothic Revival architecture, the
edifice is constructed of brick covered with cream-colored stucco. The
auditorium has delicate open beams and windows of stained glass. Facing
the pulpit across the auditorium is a slave gallery. The lot was presented
to the church by the county police.
3. The WILLIAM STRICKLAND PLACE, 800 Van Dorn Ave. (open
during Pilgrimage), is lovely but not well preserved. The date, 1828,
found on one of its beams, is cited as proof that it was the first two-story
house in this section. Among the old furnishings is a hand-carved rose
wood tester bed built to accommodate nine persons. Jefferson Davis often
visited here, and it is said that when Van Dorn recaptured the town from
the Federals, the owners of the home hid a Northern officer within its
walls to repay him for having earlier prevented Federal authorities from
making a hospital of the house.
L. from Van Dorn Ave. on Walthall St.; R. on E. College Ave.
4. The G. R. FREEMAN PLACE, 810 E. College Ave. (open during
Pilgrimage), a small vine-covered frame cottage, was the home of Gen.
Edward Cary Walthall, Mississippi s great conservative and perhaps Holly
Springs most distinguished citizen. Soldier, statesman, and patriot, Wal
thall (183198) was a corporation lawyer of the Tory tradition. Believ
ing implicitly in the Constitution and defying political experiment, he
was a great stabilizing force during the period of reconstruction, when
civilization in the South reached the breaking point. He never sought
political office and seldom spoke in political campaigns, yet he was U. S.
Senator for four terms. Paying tribute to his memory in the U. S. House
of Representatives, John Sharp Williams spoke of him as the "last of a
long line of Mississippians of historic type and fame." Walthall is buried
in the Holly Springs cemetery. The house is owned by the artist, Kate
Freeman Clark.
5. GRAY GABLES, 871 E. College Ave. (open during Pilgrimage),
is a twin-gable, two-story structure of stucco-covered brick. The interior
is characterized by a delicate spiral stairway with hand-carved woodwork
that repeats the decorative motif of the ceiling design. Openings are of
stained Venetian glass. The house was built in 1830.
HOLLY SPRINGS 205
Retrace E. College Are.
6. The WATSON BUILDING, 601 E. College Ave., home of the
jurist, Judge J. W. C. Watson, was built in the early 1850*5. In it Eliza
beth D. Watson, his daughter, established the Maury Institute, a school
for girls. Later the school was made the Presbyterian College, and it is
now a unit of the Mississippi Synodical College, a junior college estab
lished in 1883. Anna Robinson Watson, stepdaughter of Judge Watson,
was poet laureate of the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
R. from E. College Ave. on Randolph St.
7. The "COLLEGE ANNEX," SE. corner E. Falconer Ave. and
Randolph St., was the town house of Maj. Dabney Hull. Once, during the
War between the States, Hull s nephew, Capt. Edward H. Crump, had
tied his horse at the gate and was sitting on the veranda when he heard
the cry, "The Yankees are coming!" Mrs. Hull called, "Quick, Ed, bring
the horse into the parlor!" This the young soldier did, escaping the
Northern troops while his horse pawed the parlor. The house is a part
of the Mississippi Synodical College.
R. from Randolph St. on E. Falconer Ave.
8. The RUFUS JONES HOUSE, 800 E. Falconer Ave. (private),
built in 1857, is a handsome two-story frame structure of Greek Revival
design. The entrance opens into a square, richly-decorated reception hall,
flanked by rooms on three sides. The furniture and fixtures express the
fineness of the homes of this period.
L. from E. Falconer Ave. on Walt hall St.; R. on Salem Ave.
9. The CLAPP-FANT PLACE, 221 Salem Ave. (Private), was built of
slave-made brick in the early 1840 $ and is probably the State s finest
example of Georgian Colonial architecture outside of Natchez. Judge
J. W. Clapp was so careful in the building of the house that he would
tear down half a wall, if necessary, to take out a faulty brick ; to prevent
moisture he had charcoal placed between the outside walls. The interior
is distinguished by a circular staircase, an oval dining room, white marble
mantels, hand-carved cornices, and light grey rosettes centered in the
ceiling. During a Northern raid Judge Clapp escaped capture by hiding
in one of the hollow Corinthian columns supporting the roof of the
front veranda. After the war Gen. A. M. West, who was twice nominated
for the presidency of the United States, became the owner of the house.
10. The McGOWAN-CRAWFORD HOME, 222 Salem Ave. (open
during Pilgrimage), is a brick mansion containing parquetry floors, fine
interior cornices, and a spiral stairway with a niche for statuary. It was
built in the "grand manner" by Alfred Brooks as a gift to his daughter
in 1858.
11. The COXE-DEAN HOME, 330 Salem Ave. (open during Pil-
grimage), designed in the manner of a Swiss chalet, was built in 1859
by William Henry Coxe. Through the house runs a 5O-foot central hall
with a stairway ornamented with elaborate woodwork. Materials for the
house were brought from abroad. The house has etched glass windows,
silver door knobs, and well preserved marble mantels. Its bathroom had
a solid lead tub and a marble lavatory. The tub, when removed, had to
206 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
be taken out in sections. Situated on a 12 -acre lot, the house is sur
rounded by numerous shade trees and magnolias; forming the entrance
to the grounds are three massive iron gates. General Grant had his head
quarters here when he occupied the town during the War between the
States, and on its stairway three Confederate soldiers are said to have been
shot as they made a dash for liberty.
12. The BONNER-BELK HOME, 411 Salem Ave. (open during Pil
grimage), is a commodious Gothic Revival mansion built in 1858 by
Dr. Charles Bonner. On spacious grounds, the house is notable for its
ornamental windows and wrought-iron work. The outside walls are of
four-brick and the inside walls are of three-brick thickness. The furniture
in one of the front bedrooms was brought from France; the woodwork
is hand-carved. Dr. Bonner s oldest daughter, Sherwood (1849-83), a
first writer of Southern dialect stories, was born here. During the War
between the States the place was occupied by General Ord.
Retrace Salem Ave.; R. on Randolph St.; L. on Rust Ave.
13. RUST COLLEGE, NE. corner Rust Ave. and N. Memphis St.,
has been one of the leading liberal arts Negro colleges of Mississippi
since it was founded by the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1868. The
property value is $125,000; its equipment is valued at $15,000. The
school is supported by the Board of Education of the M. E. Church and
the Woman s Home Missionary Society of the same church. With an en
rollment of 177 students (1937), the school has an exceptionally good
science department and is listed by the University Senate, an accrediting
agent of the Methodist Episcopal Church. One of the oldest Negro
schools in the State, Rust has given the Negroes of Mississippi many of
their outstanding religious and educational leaders.
Tour 2-
i.ym
S. from Courthouse Square on S. Memphis St.
14. PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, NW. corner S. Memphis St. and
Gholson Ave., is a Gothic Revival structure with stained glass windows,
of Isle de Fleur design, imported from Europe in 1858. Two lovely spiral
stairways lead to the second floor auditorium, and paralleling these "white
folks stairs" are narrow flights leading to a slave gallery. Though not
quite finished at the beginning of the War between the States, the con
gregation was preparing to dedicate the church when the Federal army
arrived in 1861 and used the lower floor for a stable.
HOLLY SPRINGS 2OJ
R. from S. Memphis St. on Gholson Arc.
15. The CRAFT-DANIEL HOME, SW. corner S. Memphis St. and
Gholson Ave. (private), is one of the Holly Springs homes remaining in
the hands of the original family. A two-story stucco house similar in de
sign to Mount Vernon, it is occupied by the fifth generation.
1 6. The E. H. CRUMP HOME, 140 Gholson Ave. (of en during Pil
grimage), one of the earliest homes of this section, was built entirely of
hand-hewn timber. Of Southern Colonial style, the one-story house is well
preserved and has the original wallpaper and furnishings. The house is
thought to have been built in 1830 by Samuel McCorkle, first land com
missioner to the Indians and first banker in the county. This is the birth
place of E. H. Crump, Memphis political leader.
L. from Gbolson Ave. on Craft St.
17. The FEATHERSTONE-BUCHANAN HOUSE, 290 Craft St.
(open during Pilgrimage), was built in 1834 by Alexander McEwen. A
white, two-story, clapboard structure, the house is of the Planter type of
architecture ; the ground floor or basement contains the living room, din
ing room, and servants quarters; the second floor is given to bedrooms,
the back ones of which are raised above hall level. The original pegs are
in all the doors.
1 8. The POLK PLACE, 300 Craft St. (open during Pilgrimage), joins
the Featherstone home by an oval driveway and is similar to it in color,
style of architecture, and floor plan. The house was built in the 1830*5
by Gen. Thomas Polk, brother of the "Fighting Bishop," Leonidas Polk,
and kinsman of President Polk.
R. from Craft St. on W . Chulaboma Ave.
19. The WALTER PLACE, 331 W. Chulahoma Ave. (open during
Pilgrimage), was begun by Col. Harvey W. Walter in 1854. This two-
story brick house is a fine example of the more luxurious homes of the
1850*5. The central motif of the facade is in the form of a Corinthian
portico flanked by two battlemented octagonal corner towers. The broad,
high central hall leads to a grand double staircase. On the east side of
the lower floor is a large parlor containing unusually large pieces of
furniture. In 1862 Mrs. U. S. Grant awaited her husband here, and it is
told that when General Van Dorn raided the town she appealed to him
to protect the privacy of her room and thus saved her husband s papers
In return for the courtesy, when Grant retook the town, he gave an order
that no Federal soldier could go within a block of the place unwittingly
making the house a rendezvous for Confederates passing through the
town.
Retrace W. Chulahoma Ave.; R. on Crjft St.
20. The MASON-TUCKER HOME, 601 Craft St. (private), is an
example of the early affluence of Holly Springs. It is a fusion of the
Georgian and Gothic Revival types, with a wide front gallery. Of espcvial
interest are its double parlors, spiral e, iron hearth in the living
room, and iron grille work.
Retrace Craft St.; R. on Elder Ave.; L. on S. Market St.; R. on Ghol-
\re.: L. on Spring St.
208 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
21. The WAITE-BOWERS PLACE, NW. corner Spring St. and
Gholson Ave., is a log house remodeled into a frame residence. Two
log rooms are hidden within the house, built more than 100 years ago by
Judge Godentia White, the first probate clerk of this county.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Galena, 12.1 m., Goodman Home, 8.3 m., Austin Moore Home, 8.4 m., Martha
Gardner Home, 8.3 m. (see Tour 9)-
Railroad Stations: Union Station, 301 E. Capitol St., for Illinois Central System,
Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R., Alabama & Vicksburg R.R., and Gulf & Ship
Island R.R. ; E. Pearl St. for Gulf, Mobile & Northern R.R.
Bus Stations: Central Motor Coach Depot, 117 E. Pearl St., for Tri-State Transit
Co., Varnado Bus Lines, and Thomas Bus Lines; Union Bus Depot, 118 N. Lamar
St., for Greyhound, Dixie-Greyhound, Teche-Greyhound, and Oliver Bus Lines.
Airport: Municipal Airport, Woodrow Wilson Ave., bet. Rozelle St. and Sunset
Drive, for Delta Airlines and Chicago & Southern Airlines, taxi fare 2O<, time
10 min.
Street Busses: Fare 5^.
Taxis: Fare 10$ per person first zone, 20^ per person second zone. Cabs 25$.
Traffic Regulations: Speed limit 20 mph. business district, 30 mph. other districts.
No left turn at designated intersections; limited parking, i hr. between 8 a.m. and
6 p.m., all-night parking prohibited.
Street Arrangement: Capitol St. divides N. and S. portions of city, Parish St. divides
E. and W. portions.
Accommodations: Five hotels; tourist camps; boarding and rooming houses.
Information Service: Chamber of Commerce, Lamar Life Ins. Bldg. ; hotels.
Radio Stations: WJDX (1270 kc.) ; WTJS (1310 kc.).
Theaters and Motion Picture Houses: City Auditorium, S. Congress St.; occasional
road shows. Six motion picture houses.
Athletics: Y.M.C.A., 303 E. Pearl St.; Y.W.C.A., 117 N. West St.; Livingston
Park, 2918 W. Capitol St.; Millsaps College, N. West St.; professional baseball,
Cotton States" League, State Fairgrounds, end E. Amite St.
Swimming: Livingston Park; Y.M.C.A. ; Crystal Pool, 2 m. E. out High St. near
Pearl River.
Tennis: Y.W.C.A. ; Armory, near Fairgrounds; Millsaps College; Belhaven Col
lege, Belhaven St.; Livingston Park; Portwood Tennis courts, 515 N. West St.
Golf: Jackson Country Club, 4 m. from Union Station, W. Capitol St. (US 80), 18
holes, greens fee $1.10; Municipal Course, Livingston Park, 18 holes, greens fee
44^. Weather permits year-round playing.
JACKSON 209
Robert M. Stockett Riding Academy, cast end Mississippi St. ; minimum
charge $i.
C.lub: 5 m. from city, US 51, minimum charge $1.15, April i-Nov. i, Sun.
and Wed.
Annual Events: Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association Basketball Tournament,
(.ity Auditorium, Mar.; Music Festival, City Schools, City Auditorium, no set date;
the Follies, Junior Auxiliary benefit for underprivileged children, City Auditorium,
Spring; May Day Festival, City Schools, Fafrgrounds; Mississippi Championship
Tennis Tournament, Livingston Park, second Tues. in June; Red Cross Water
Pageant, Livingston Park, Aug.; Mississippi State Fair, Oct.; Junior Auxiliary Style
Show, Edwards Hotel, Oct.; Horse Show, sponsored by Girl Scouts, Oct.; Feast of
Carols, Dec.
JACKSON * (294 alt., 48,282 pop.), spreading along a high bluff, with
the Pearl River forming its eastern boundary, is Mississippi s largest city
and its capital. Viewed from an upper story window of an office building
it is an unconsolidated city of breadth and space. Nowhere is there an
over-concentration. On the south, well-spaced civic buildings surround
a block-Jong flower garden. Near the center, the Governor s mansion,
occupying an entire block, looks out upon the business district from a
lawn that is wide and shaded with trees. The business district, confined
almost exclusively to Capitol Street and characterized by modern facades,
is unbegrimed and fresh. To the north and west are the residential dis
tricts. The northern section contains a few examples of ante-bellum archi
tecture ; the western area is a heterogeneous group of bungalows and Eng
lish cottages. Strung along the railroad tracks northwest of the business
district are the "heavy" industries, lumber, oil, and cotton. Forming con
centric ellipses around the north, west, and south edges of the city are the
new subdivisions. Planted along the neutral grounds and in the city parks
are more than 7,000 crapemyrtle trees, Jackson s loveliest natural attraction.
In character with its position as a capital, a majority of Jackson s white
population find employment in governmental service, either national,
State, or county. Yet commercial and industrial employment does not lag
far behind, for with cheap fuel and transportation facilities Jackson s
growth is not based on government alone. Lumber, cottonseed oil, and
textile factories have brought to it industrial solidity.
Approximately 40 percent of the population are the Negroes who fur
nish the bulk of the city s unskilled labor. A majority of their families
live in the northwest section, in three- and four-room frame houses.
Crowded together, these houses are in clean-swept yards; a few have gar
den patches at the rear. More familiar than the garden, however, is the
clothes line upon which hangs the week s washing of some white family.
For Jackson has not yet abandoned its washerwomen in preference to laun-
dric-N, and many Negro women, who often are employed as cooks and
nursemaids, take in washing on the side.
Yet not all of the city s Negroes are unskilled laborers; many of the
State s leading Negro lawyers, doctors, and educators live here. With
homes on the opposite side of the city, these professional men maintain
a standard of living superior to their humbler neighbors, who mow lawns,
* A map of Jackson is on the back of the State map in pocket at end of book.
MUNICIPAL GARDEN AND CIVIC CENTER, JACKSON
work gardens, or do manual labor for the industrial plants. They own sub
stantially built homes, make themselves a part of the city s economic life,
and follow the sophisticated trends of the white population.
Founded and platted as the seat of government, and for 116 years the
funnel through which all the turbulent events of the State s history have
poured, Jackson has a background which is, in turn, murky with political
intrigues and bright with historic associations. Its position as the demo
cratic heart of the State accounts for its tone and prestige ; the skyscrapers
spaced along Capitol Street and the new outlying subdivisions are evi
dences of its rapid expansion on the surge of an industrial and govern
mental boom. For Jackson is the crossroads to which all Mississippians
gravitate ; and in a State that is predominantly rural, it alone has the met
ropolitan touch.
Jackson had its beginning as Le Fleur s Bluff, the trading post of Louis
Le Fleur, adventurous French-Canadian who had his cabin at what is now
the intersection of South State and Silas Brown Streets. When the Treaty
of Doak s Stand expanded Mississippi by breaking the bounds of the
Natchez District in 1820, the legislature decided that the capital city should
be located near the center of the State rather than at Columbia or Wash
ington. From Columbia, the temporary capital, a three-member commission
composed of General Thomas Hinds, hero of Andrew Jackson s coast cam-
JACKSON 211
p.iign against the British, William Lattimore, and James Patton made
their way up the Pearl River to select a suitable location. Le Fleur s Bluff,
with its extensive fertile flat to the east and rich prairie to the west, plus
its strategic location with regard to river transportation, was the commis
sion s choice. In 1821, three days after Thanksgiving, the legislature ap
pointed Peter Van Dorn to work with Hinds and Lattimore in laying out
the city, assisted by Abraham DeFrance, superintendent of public build
ings at Washington, D. C.
The first statehouse was completed in 1821. It was a two-story building
with outside dimensions of 30 by 40 feet, and was constructed of brick,
clay, and limestone found in the vicinity. Shutters on each window, up
stairs and down, added the i9th century modern touch, and large chim
neys flanked each end. The first session of the legislature convened here
in January 1822.
The name of the newly created city was changed to Jackson in honor
of Andrew Jackson, then the idol of Mississippi and later President of the
United States. The area around the city became Hinds County, named for
the chief of the capital commission who had been Old Hickory s asso
ciate in military campaigns in the South. The new statehouse was erected
at the approximate center of the town site, which embraced two adjoining
half sections of land deeded for the purpose, and which had been laid out
on the checkerboard plan in accordance with Thomas Jefferson s sugges
tion to Territorial Governor Claiborne 17 years before. Each square desig
nated for building purposes was alternated with a square reserved as a
park or green. Evidence of this plan remains in downtown Jackson and on
College Green, which extends east of the New Capitol. The original boun
daries were the bluffs on the east, and South, West, and High Streets, the
town including College Green, Court Green, and Capitol Green. Among
the first settlers was Lieutenant Governor Dickson, who was appointed
postmaster soon after his arrival. In 1823, 100 lots were offered for sale.
Records of early Jackson were burned during the War between the
States, but it is known that there was agitation for removal of the state-
house. In 1829 the Senate passed a bill authorizing the removal to Clinton,
but the measure was defeated by a tie vote in the House. In the next year
the House voted 18 to 17 to move the capital to Port Gibson, but imme
diately reconsidered. The following day they voted 20 to 16 to move it to
Vkksburg, but still no action was taken. Then, to avoid the question for a
number of years, the constitution of 1832 designated Jackson as the capi
tal until 1850, when the legislature should name a permanent seat of gov
ernment. By 1850 Jackson was well established and the legislature made
r.o change.
The Old Capitol, though incomplete, was occupied in 1839, and the
following year Andrei Jackson addressed the legislature here. Five years
later, Henry Clay was entertained under its roof. In half a dozen more
years a convention was called here to consider Clay s last compromise, that
of 1850; and in January is6i. the building was the scene of the Secession
Convention that severed Mississippi from the Union.
During the TS^o s and early 1840*8 much of the groundwork for the
NEW CAPITOL, JACKSON
city s future prosperity was laid, even though this was a period when the
State s currency was rapidly depreciating from the flush times that pre
ceded the 1837 crash. A railroad linking Vicksburg to Jackson was begun
in 1836. In 1837 the Jackson & Natchez R.R. laid its first track. Through
this Jackson became, just prior to the war, the junction of two through
railroads, the New Orleans, Jackson & Great Northern connecting with
the Mississippi Central to give a route from New Orleans to Jackson, Ten
nessee, and the Southern, which completed the road east and west from
Vicksburg to Meridian.
Early newspapers printed in Jackson were the Pearl River Gazette, pub
lished by G. B. Crutcher; the State Register, edited by Peter Isler; two
political papers, the Flag of Our Nation and the Reformer; the State
Rights Banner; the Mississippian, at one time the most influential paper
in the State, published by Henry Foote and moved to Jackson from Vicks
burg and Clinton; and the Eastern Clarion, organized at old Paulding in
1837, purchased by Col. J. J. Shannon in 1862, moved to Meridian untiJ
after the war, and then to Jackson where it is known now as the Daily
Clarion-Ledger.
As the capital and as a railroad center Jackson played an important part
in Mississippi s military history during the War between the States. After
JACKSON 213
the Ordinance of Secession in 1861, the city remained the Confederate
capital of Mississippi until just before it was besieged in 1863, when,
under pressure of war, it lost its place as a seat of government until the
spring of 1865. The siege of Jackson was closely connected with the cam
paign and siege of Vicksburg. When Vicksburg was attacked, Gen. Joseph
E. Johnston collected troops at Jackson and moved them against the Fed
erals across the Big Black River. But his campaign was halted when Vicks
burg surrendered, July 4, and he was forced to retire to his entrenchments
and base at Jackson. On July 9 General Sherman, marching across the
State, reached the Confederate entrenchments. There was a spirited two-
day engagement during which the Federals were repulsed, with a loss of
about 500 men and three battle flags. Under continuous bombardment
Johnston evacuated the city on the night of July 16, moving on toward
Meridian, and Sherman took possession. It was then that Jackson s records
were destroyed, for the city was gutted by fire and became known by the
dismal sobriquet of Chimneyville. The governor s mansion, built in 1842
and occupied by Sherman, and a few private homes were saved from the
general destruction. In Sherman s report to Grant on July 18 he stated:
"We have made fine progress today in the work of destruction. Jackson
will no longer be a point of danger. The land is devastated for thirty miles
around."
Though retarded by the war and the fact that it kept a city government
of carpetbaggers long after the State as a whole had restored white su
premacy, Jackson s growth continued during Reconstruction. In 1869 Tou-
galoo College for Negroes, seven miles north, was founded by the Amer
ican Missionary Union of the Congregational Church of New York City,
aided by Mississippi; in 1884 Jackson College for Negroes, founded in
1877, was moved here from Natchez; in 1898 Campbell College, also for
Negroes, was moved to Jackson from Vicksburg. The leaders of the Negro
race developed by these schools helped Jackson to forgive the "Black and
Tan" Constitutional Convention of 1868 under "Buzzard" Eggleston, and
the use of troops to drive Governor Humphreys from the executive Oi
and mansion in that same year. In 1887 Jackson sponsored the Kermis
Ball lasting three days, staged by a group of Jackson women to raise-
money for a monument to the Confederate dead. The monument, one of
the handsomest in the South, was unveiled on the Old Capitol grounds in
June 1891. In 1884 Jackson was the scene of Jefferson Davis s last public
appearance. He spoke at the Old Capitol in response to an invitation of
the legislature; and in 1890 Mississippi s greatest convention met at Jack
son to draw ip the present State Constitution.
Railroads continued to radiate from Jackson. In 1882 a line was com
pleted from Jackson to Natchez; in 1885 a line to Yazoo City; then fol
lowed at intervals the Gulf & Ship Island, the New Orleans o\: Great
Northern down the Pearl River valley, and the Gulf, Mobile & Northern,
running northeast. The Gulf & Ship Island meant the beginning of south
Mississippi s lumber boom.
Completion of the railroads and the end of the troubled days of recon
struction gave the city opportunity for new growth. In the first five years
214 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
after 1900, Jackson nearly doubled its population and tripled its busi
ness, having a population in 1905 estimated at 15,000. In 1903 the mag
nificent New Capitol was completed. Millsaps College, opened by Major
Reuben W. Millsaps in 1892, has become one of the State s leading insti
tutions for higher education.
The latest period of the city s development began with the opening of
the Jackson natural gas field in the i93o s. With cheap fuel for factories,
and excellent transportation facilities, Jackson began to draw industries
other than governmental. Starting almost with the crash of 1929 and con
tinuing through the depression, it grew faster than any major city in the
United States, with the possible exception of Los Angeles. The estimated
population in 1937 was 60,000.
It is impossible to separate Jackson s history as a city from its history as
capital of the State. In a governmental sense, all that has happened in Mis
sissippi since 1822 has centered in Jackson; and today, government, in
cluding Federal, State, county, and city branches, is its biggest business.
S. from Capitol St. on S. Congress St.; L. on E. Pascagoula St.
1. HINDS COUNTY COURTHOUSE, E. Pascagoula St. (R) bet
S. Congress and S. President Sts., is a million-dollar four-story stone
structure of distinctly modern design, occupying the entire square south
of the municipal flower garden. It was erected in 1930, C. H. Lindsley
architect.
2. CITY HALL, E. Pascagoula and S. President Sts., a dignified classic
Revival structure of gray stucco over brick, was erected in 1854, probably
by A. J. Herod. The square it occupies was originally the city s muster-
ground and market place. By an agreement the top floor is reserved for
certain of the city s lodges. During the war the hall was converted into a
hospital. Janus-like, the front and rear facades are similar; but the build
ing is two stories on one side, three on the other. The narrow front lawn
is shaded by oak trees. The back entrance faces the municipal flower gar
den. The structure is in an excellent state of preservation, and houses ali
municipal offices under Jackson s commission form of government, adoptee
in 1912.
L. jrom E. Pascagoula St. on S. State St.
3. The OLD CAPITOL, State St., facing Capitol St., is the city s most
historic building. The architecture of the Capitol, designed in the style of
OLD CAPITOL, JACKSON
the Classical Revival, exemplifies the taste for classic form developed by
Jefferson and his contemporaries during the early days of the Republic.
Its design is based upon the abstract qualities of the classic ensemble the
temple and rotunda. Symmetrical in plan, the simple rectangular mass of
2l6 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
the structure is broken by the graceful lines of a pedimented central pa
vilion, two smaller pavilions at each end, and a gleaming silver dome.
The central pavilion is in the form of an Ionic colonnade, rising two stor
ies above a high arcaded base. The dome is topped with a large circular
lantern. The somber, gray stone walls of the exterior are somewhat re
lieved by the accented courses of the rusticated first story and the heavy
lines of the classic cornice.
Within, two long halls branch from the central rotunda. Directly oppo
site the vestibule is a semicircular stairway which dates only from 1916,
and in the center of the rotunda is a statue of Jefferson Davis that for
merly stood on the grounds. This statue is lighted from the lantern of the
elaborately decorated dome 50 feet above. Originally the second and third
ftoors of the north wings were one, and housed the assembly and gallery.
The third floor, however, has been extended and both floors divided into
offices. The old rostrum and its beautifully decorated windows are yet visi
ble. Directly above the entrance on the second floor are the offices once
occupied by the governors.
In February 1833 the legislature appropriated $95,000 for the con
struction of the statehouse. It was not finished until 1842 and only after
the total cost had reached $400,000. Much of the construction work was
done by slave labor. Brick in the massive walls were burned in nearby
kilns, and the longleaf yellow pine lumber was sawed from the then
virgin forests of Simpson and Smith Counties and transported to Jackson
by ox teams. Copper used in covering the dome, still in perfect preserva
tion, was brought by ox team from New Orleans. By 1865 repair was
necessary and in 1903 the place was abandoned as unsafe, not to be used
again until 1916, when it was put into its present state of repair.
A major portion of Mississippi s early history has centered in the Old
Capitol. Andrew Jackson in 1840 and Henry Clay in 1844 visited Missis
sippi and addressed the legislature within its walls. Jefferson Davis, tri
umphantly returning from the Mexican War at the head of his regiment
in 1847, addressed a multitude from the second floor balcony. The Ordi
nance of Secession, which made Mississippi the second Confederate State,
was enacted in the house chamber in 1861. An Irish comedian then
playing in Jackson, Harry McCarthy, was inspired to write three verses of
the "Bonnie Blue Flag," battle song of the Confederacy, and the flag was
unfurled in the Secession Convention as a symbol of Mississippi s inde
pendence. Governor Clark was arrested in the executive offices in 1865
and taken to the Federal prison at Fort Pulaski. Governor Humphreys was
ejected from the executive offices in 1868 to mark the beginning of the
carpetbag reign. Governor Adelbert Ames, last of the carpetbag governors,
threatened with impeachment by the legislature, resigned in 1876. In 1884
Jefferson Davis made his last public appearance here in an address to the
State legislature. The building is used to house departments of State gov
ernment, including those of Education, Insurance, Health, and Agriculture.
On the grounds south of the building is the Confederate Monument
unveiled by Jefferson Davis Hayes, grandson of Jefferson Davis, the only
JACKSON 217
President of the Confederate States of America, in 1891 during the second
Confederate Veterans Reunion.
L. jrnni \. State St. on Atmte St.
4. The JUDGE BRAME HOME, NW. cor. Amite and N. President
Sts. (private), marks the center of Jackson s earliest residential section.
The exact date of erection is unknown, but the house was standing in 1836
and at that time was occupied by Silas Judd. For many years it was owned
by Judge Lex Brame. It is a one-story Georgian Colonial structure, pleas
ing in its extreme simplicity and lack of distracting ornamentation. Dor
mer windows front and back, fluted classic columns supporting the roof of
a square portico, and full-length windows are in keeping with its architec
tural style. Inside the house is a trap-door, which, though its significance
is unknown, gives color to its story. During the early days of Jackson,
State politicians used the house as a rendezvous, and it has been suggested
that the secret door was for their convenience.
5. The J. L. POWER HOME, 411 Amite St. (private), a wide, low-
roofed frame structure, was built nearly a century ago within the original
checkerboard plan of Jackson. The long gallery and ornamental grilles
are original, but extensive improvements have been made within recent
years. Jefferson Davis, a friend of Col. J. L. Power, was a frequent visitor.
During the first gathering of the United Confederate Veterans in Jackson
in 1891, all Confederate generals were entertained here.
R. from Amite St. on N. Congress St.; L. on Mississippi St.
6. The NEW CAPITOL, fronting on Mississippi St. (R), bet. N. Pres
ident and N. West Sts., is the product of a new century, a place of power
and utility rather than of tradition. Constructed of Bedford stone and
similar in design to the National Capitol, it stands with formal dignity on
a high terrace. The symmetrical building, four stories in height, is sur
mounted by a high central dome and lantern. The lantern is topped with
a copper eagle, covered with gold leaf. The eagle stands eight feet high
and has a wingspread of 15 feet.
Inside, a large central rotunda opens upward to the ceiling of the dome.
Around the rotunda are built the wings which comprise the second, third,
and fourth floors. On the first floor are the Museum, Hall of Fame, and
the Archives. The Supreme Court occupies the east wing of the second
floor, the State Library the west. On the third floor are the Senate and
House Chambers and the Governor s suite.
On February 21, 1900, an act of the legislature authorized the creation
of a Statehouse Commission to supervise the building of a new Capitol,
which was to be built on the old penitentiary grounds, at a cost or not
more than $1,000,000. Fourteen architectural plans were submitted. That
of Theodore Link was finally adopted and a contract for $833,179
awarded. The Illinois Central R.R. laid a track at its own expense from
its lines to the site to save the State time and money. The building was
dedicated and opened for use on June s, 1903.
The penitentiary, which had occupied the grounds, was built in 1840,
and during the war was used as a munitions factory until Sherman s occu-
218 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
pation of the city. It is said that part of the penitentiary s walls, too diffi
cult to demolish, are buried under the man-made hill from which the
Capitol now rises.
The DEPARTMENT OF ARCHIVES AND HISTORY AND STATE
MUSEUM, on the ground floor (open weekdays 9-5), is one of the first
State-supported historical departments in the United States. Since its estab
lishment in 1902, it has assisted actively in creating 15 State departments
of history, and has originated the idea of a State hall of fame, adopted by
other States. The Hall of Fame is a collection of portraits, assembled
without cost to the State, and valued at $5,000,000. Many prominent
Mississipians are represented there. Two of the most valuable portraits
of the collection are the original paintings of Gov. George Poindexter by
Benjamin West, and of David Holmes by Gilbert Stuart. The Manuscript
Collection of the department includes the archives from 1678 to the pres
ent. The department s translations of European provincial archives are a
standard source for the early history of this section. The museum has a
fine collection of historical flags and a notable Indian display. Dr. Dunbar
Rowland was the first director. Upon his death in December 1937, Dr.
Wm. D. McCain was appointed to the office.
R. from Mississippi St. on N. West St.
7. GREENWOOD CEMETERY, N. West St. (L) bet. George and
Davis Sts., is Jackson s first burial ground, and one of the few cemeteries
in the South where both white and Negro dead are buried. One of the
earliest graves is that of Gov. A. M. Scott who died in 1833. Perhaps the
most famous monument is that at the grave of George Poindexter, Whig
Senator. An interesting tomb is that of John R. Lynch, Negro Secretary of
State during the carpetbag regime. Two Confederate brigadier-generals,
four Confederate colonels, and more than 100 Confederate soldiers are
buried in the cemetery.
8. The CHAS. H. MANSHIP HOME, NE. cor. N. West and For
tification Sts. (private), has both architectural beauty and historical sig
nificance. Built in 1857, the one-story gray frame house preserves with
accuracy the characteristics of Southern Colonial architecture. Beneath a
steeply-pitched gable roof are seven spacious rooms, separated by a wide
hall. A gallery runs the length of the house and iron balustrades are de
signed with a grapevine motif. Fortifications thrown up by the Confed
erate army extended across this lawn. On the front lawn is a Fire Bell,
which originally belonged to Jackson s first fire company. The bell, similar
to the Liberty Bell, is half-silver and was the only bell in the city to escape
being melted and molded into cannon balls during the war. Instead, it was
rung for curfew, fires, funerals, and news of battles. In 1888 it was pre
sented to Mr. Manship, the last survivor of the volunteer firemen. Begin
ning with news of the Armistice, Nov. u, 1918, the bell, removed from
the Manship lawn to the Old Capitol, was rung continuously for 24 hours.
FORTIFICATION STREET, extending east and west through the
northern portion of Jackson, derives its name from the fact that Confed
erate fortifications were built along its course. Crossing the yard of the
Manship home, following Congress Street south, the lines turned into
It
J*1*N
MANSHIP HOME, JACKSON
what is now Fortification Street, and extended west between the Raymond
and Clinton roads.
9. MILLSAPS COLLEGE, N. West St. (R) bet. Marshall St. and
Woodrow Wilson Ave., is a fully-accredited, four-year, liberal arts college
for men and women under the control of the Methodist Episcopal Church,
South. The first senior college in the State approved by the Association of
American Universities, it has a student body of 415 and was opened in
1892.
R. from N. West St. on Woodrow Wilson Ave.; R. on N. State St.;
L. on Belhaven St.; R. on Peachtree St.
10. BELHAVEN COLLEGE, NE. cor. Peachtree and Pinehurst Sts., is
a fully-accredited, four-year, liberal arts college for women. It was founded
as a private school in 1894 by Dr. L. T. Fitzhugh. Since 1911 it has been
under the auspices of the Presbyterian Church.
Retrace Peachtree and Belhaven Sts.; L. on N. State St.
n. MISSISSIPPI INSTITUTE FOR THE BLIND, N. State St. (R)
bet. Manship and Fortification Sts., was founded in 1847 through the in
fluence of James Champlain, blind philanthropist of Sharon, Mississippi,
and became a State institution by legislative act, March 2, 1848. The
school s purpose is to train blind children and those with defective sight,
between the ages of 6 and 21, who can not be educated in public schools.
12. The MUNICIPAL CLUBHOUSE ART GALLERY, 839 N. State
St. (open weekdays 8-6), houses a permanent collection owned by the
220 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Mississippi Art Association and offers special loan exhibits monthly. The
building was a gift of Thomas Gale in 1927. Among the Mississippi
painters represented are Marie Hull, William Woodward, William Hol-
lingsworth, Bettie McArthur, Bessie Gary Lemly, and Karl Wolfe. Karl
Wolfe and John McCrady are Mississippi s foremost contemporary painters.
13. The NUGENT-SHANDS HOME, 607 N. State St. (private), ex
emplifies the Southern ante-bellum architecture. The wide entrance porch
is supported by Classic columns; double doors, outlined in side lights and
with a transom of colored glass, lead into a wide hall. Noticeable features
of the exterior are the three small balconies on the front, executed in deli
cately wrought iron. A wing at the left has its own porch and entrance,
with railings on the upper porch similar to those of the front balcony. In
side, the house follows the Colonial plan of arrangement, with large rooms
divided by a central hall both upstairs and down. It is furnished with an
tique furniture, some of which was brought by Colonel and Mrs. Nugent
from Alabama in the 1 8 30*5. The original home on this site was badly
damaged by fire and this house, a practically new structure, was built to
encase the remnants of the old. The original flooring is still in place under
the present covering of hardwood.
L. from N. State St. on Amite St.
14. BOWMAN HOTEL SITE, Amite St. (L) bet. N. State St. and
North St., is now occupied by the Standard Oil Building. A five-story
brick building, formerly the Eagle Hotel, it was the gathering place of the
State s ante-bellum politicians. In 1855 Col. Alexander McClung, the
Black Knight of the South, fulfilled the prophecy of his own melancholy
"Invocation to Death" by committing suicide here, supposedly because of
adverse public opinion resulting from the death of a youth in one of Mc-
Clung s many duels. The hotel was burned by Federal troops in 1863.
15. MISSISSIPPI STATE FAIRGROUNDS, end of Amite St., is the
place where Mississippi s largest fair is held in October of each year.
Retrace Amite St.; L. on N. State St.; R. on Capitol St.
1 6. SITE OF FIRST STATEHOUSE, NE. cor. Capitol and President
Sts., is marked by a tablet on the side of the Baptist Bookstore building.
17. The GOVERNOR S MANSION, Capitol St. (R) bet. N. Congress
and N. West Sts. is situated amid a grove of trees at Jackson s busiest cor
ner. The design of the building was intended to "avoid a profusion of
ornaments and adhere to republican simplicity as best comporting with the
dignity of the State." Appropriation of funds for the mansion was made
in 1833, but construction was not begun until later, and the building was
not completed until 1842. Its first occupant was Governor Tucker, al
though it is claimed that Governor McNutt occupied it temporarily during
construction. The long list of governors it housed has given it personality,
and the admirable arrangement of the lower floor makes it well suited for
the occasional receptions that are highlights of Jackson s political society.
In 1908 the building was repaired under the supervision of William Hud,
and a new wing added on its center axis. As it stands today, however, it
is almost indistinguishable from the original structure designed by Wil
liam Nichols.
GOVERNOR S MANSION, JACKSON
JR. from Capitol St. on N. Parish St.
PARISH STREET is the spinal cord of the Negro business district.
Though a great many Negroes patronize the cheaper stores maintained by
white owners, a large part of their trading is done in their own section.
On Saturday nights this street, swarming with shoppers and pleasure seek
ers, has a carnival atmosphere. The shingles of Jackson s Negro lawyers
and doctors compete with lodge signs such as "The Sons and Daughters
of the I Will Arise Society." Gallery space is reserved for Negroes at the
civic auditorium for all public performances, but the number who attend
is negligible; the Negro s social life, for the most part, is confined to the
picture shows, dance halls, and pool rooms on or near this street.
Retrace N. Parish St.; R. on Capitol St.; L. on S. Gal latin; R. on
Hooker St.; L. on Terry Rd.; L. on Porter St.
18. BATTLEFIELD PARK (R), formerly known as Winter Woods,
includes 5.5 acres of natural woods in which tall oaks and slender pines
predominate. Here nature has been left almost undisturbed since the days
when Confederate troops abandoned their fortifications on this site. Parts
of the trenches remain, and several cannon are on the ground. The woods
form a children s playground maintained by the city.
Retrace Porter St.; R. on Terry Rd.; L. on Poindexter St.; L. on
Lynch St.
19. CAMPBELL COLLEGE, W. end of Lynch St., is one of the two
Negro schools in the State supported by Negroes. The school, composed
222 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
of two brick buildings three stories in height and several frame buildings,
including the residence of the president, is affiliated with the African
Methodist Episcopal Church. It has a high school department and offers a
four-year college course leading to the Bachelor of Science degree. Con
nected with the school on the west are 36 acres which are farmed by stu
dents to help pay their tuition fee. The guiding hand behind the school is
the native Mississippi Negro, Bishop S. L. Greene of the African Meth
odist Episcopal Church. The school, founded in 1885, has an enrollment
of approximately 417 students.
Retrace Lynch St.; L. on S. G Matin St.; L. on W. Capitol St.
20. The DEAF AND DUMB INSTITUTE, Capitol St. (R) bet. S.
Green Ave. and Magnolia St., was erected in 1904 and is training 275
boys and girls of both races to overcome their handicaps. The State s first
deaf and dumb institute was established in 1854, but its buildings were
destroyed during the war.
21. LIVINGSTON PARK, 2918 Capitol St., comprises 79 acres of
landscaped rolling park on which are a municipal i8-hole golf course, an
artificial lake, tennis courts, pavilion, and a zoo. The lake, used for swim
ming during the summer months, is chlorinated twice daily. The 200 and
bird sanctuary are the outgrowth of a pet animal collection begun by the
Jackson Fire Department.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Insane Hospital, 7.9 m., Lakewood Cemetery, 12.2 m., Mississippi College, 14.9 m.,
Hillman College, 1 5 m., Rankin County Natural Gas Fields, 2 m. (see Tour 2) ;
Radio Station, 7.4 m., Tougaloo College, 8.9 m. (see Tour 3, Sec. a).
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< <#> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Railroad Stations: Maple and Oak Sts. for New Orleans & Northeastern R.R.; Cen
tral Ave. and Walters Ave. for Gulf, Mobile & Northern R.R. ; Central Ave. and
Commerce St. for Gulf & Ship Island R.R.
Bus Station: Central Ave. and Commerce St. for Teche-Greyhound, Tri-State Transit
Co., Gulf Transport Co.
Local Busses: Fare 5^.
Taxis: Intra-city rates io#.
Information Service: Chamber of Commerce, Civic Center, Ellisville Blvd.
Accommodations: Two hotels, tourist camps.
Radio Station: WAML (1310 kc.).
Motion Picture Houses: Three.
LAUREL 223
Athletics: Baseball Park, Beacon and Royal Sts.; Civic Center, Ellisville Blvd.
Swimming: Municipal Pool, Daphne Park, 6th St. and loth Ave., adm. 25^ and
15^; Freeman s Amusement Park, Washington Road.
Tennis: Daphne Park; Y.M.C.A.
Golf: Laurel Country Club, i m. W. on US 84, reasonable greens fee.
Annual Events : Garden Club Festival, April.
LAUREL (243 alt., 18,017 pop.), seat of Jones County and situated on
the northeastern edge of the vast yellow pine forests of southeastern Mis
sissippi, is a new city. When Newt Knight and his followers were organiz
ing a "Free State of Jones" and waging a private battle against Confeder
ate troops in the i86o s, the site of Laurel was a gallberry flat separating
two grassy ridges. Hence its story is not, like that of many Mississippi
towns, richly flavored with the essence of the ante-bellum South, but re
veals in a few fast-moving chapters a swift transition from forest through
lumber camp to a stable industrial city in the course of fifty years.
Laurel dates from 1881, when the Southern Railroad, pushing north
eastward, laid its course directly through the heart of Mississippi s great
belt of virgin pine timber. In that year two sawmill men, Kamper and
Louin, followed the tracks to a point which they considered the center of
the forest. Here they built a sawmill and a railroad station, which they
named for the flowering laurel shrubs, so abundant among the pines, and
so soon exterminated because they were poisonous to livestock. Kamper
and Louin had but one purpose, to cut as much timber as possible to keep
their mill supplied. The settlement, therefore, became a typical Piney
Woods lumber camp, rowdy in character and forlorn in appearance. The
pines about the camp were considered a menace in windy weather, so they,
too, were cut down, leaving the few cabins and mill in the midst of a half-
mile strip of gaunt, girdled trees and stumps.
When, in 1891, the sawmill passed into the possession of the Eastman-
Gardiner Lumber Company a new regime began. Laurel was transformed
from the spirited child of the Piney Woods into a pampered ward of east
ern capital. The first earnings of the mill were used to build a school, and
mill hands were encouraged to buy property and build permanent homes.
Soon a row of neat frame houses with picket fences and gardened lawns
replaced the box-car cabins. Tough-fibered lumberjacks, whose previous ex
perience with music had been bawdy songs around the campfire or a hymn
sunt: lustily in church on Sunday, made down payments on pianos for their
children s music lessons. And, as if to retract the injustice to the flowering
shrub for which the town was named, the first garden club in the State was
organized. When Laurel was incorporated, only the crooked narrow down
town streets that followed the cowpaths of the first-comers bore resem
blance to the mill camp from which it had sprung.
Yet it was not until the Gulf & Ship Island R.R. was completed through
Hatticsburg to Jackson, with a branch line to Laurel, and the opening of the
harbor at Gulf port in 1902 that the town s real prosperity began. The East
man-Gardiner Co. grew wealthy, and spent part of its money in playing
godfather to the town it had fostered. Asphalt streets were laid among the
pines; squares were developed into parks; and schools and churches re-
PULPWOOD READY FOR PROCESSING, LAUREL
fleeted the lavish expenditure of money, the latter in Gothic architecture,
stained glass windows, and ivy-covered brick walls. In character with the
fact that the early mill hands had spent their first pay checks for second
hand pianos, the first and only art museum in the State was established.
Continuing the development of the cultural side of Laurel to the large
percent of the population who were employed as unskilled laborers by the
mills, white families fostered a movement for an adequate school for Ne
gro children. Prof. J. E. Johnson, educational leader of his race and prin
cipal of Prentiss Normal and Industrial Institute, was brought to Laurel to
help Sandy T. Gavins, then leading Negro teacher at Laurel, in directing
the work for founding the school. The drive resulted not only in the Oak
Park Vocational School, which is one of the best Negro high schools in the
State, but later in a $35,000 grammar school building for Negroes. Both
schools are now a part of the city school system. As part of this program,
The Leader, founded in 1897, continues to be one of the State s two news
papers carrying a column on Negro activities.
While other lumber towns despoiled themselves by cutting all the tim
ber, Laurel created a permanent community. As the timber that fed its
mills was cut, the mill hands were urged to buy the cutover land and, with
homesteads of their own, to farm in their off time. So with this two-way
means of livelihood for its citizens, the city developed a stability which
not even the crash of the yellow pine industry in the late 1920 $ could
shatter. After the World War, when other towns of the Piney Woods sec-
LAURI-L 225
tion reached the nadir of their fortunes, the same foresight which had
made the mill hands buy farms prompted the development of industries to
Like the sawmills place. A reforestation program was inaugurated to off
set the former profligate tree cutting, and a balanced industrial program
was given serious trial. Laurel is apparently on its way to a happy mean
between the land and the machine. Its cultural side has developed with its
industrial side, and this pattern of 2oth century culture impressed upon it
by its foster parents is its dominant feature.
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. The MASONITE PLANT, NE. cor. S. 4th Ave. and Johnson St.
(open weekdays 8-4; tours), is the largest single manufacturing plant in
Mississippi, and the only plant of its kind in the United States. The plant
buys second growth pine as small as two inches in diameter, chews it into
small chips, then explodes the chips into fibre from which the Masonite
process fashions a trade-marked fibre board. This board has more than 300
uses, ranging from panel ceilings to children s toys; from concrete forms
to radio cabinets ; and is exported to more than 30 foreign countries.
2. The SWEET POTATO STARCH PLANT, end of S. 4th Ave.
(open weekdays 8-4; tours), manufacturing starch to supplement that pro
duced by the cereal starch industry, is the only plant of its kind in the
country, and it annually supplies a domestic market with 420,000
pounds of starch. The factory, which is in an abandoned sawmill, began
operation in 1934 as a result of a FERA project to assist the people of
south Mississippi. In that year, $150,000 was allotted for the construction,
equipment, and operation, on a commercial scale, of a plant that would
provide not only emergency relief work but a market for sweet potatoes
the farmers produce. The Laurel plant, with a capacity of 200,000 bushels
and 2,000,000 pounds of starch per loo-day season, has been deeded to
the Mississippi Agricultural Experiment Station, and leased to a self-help
cooperative organization of farmers, at least 51 percent of whom are be
ing rehabilitated. The plant pays the farmer a minimum of 20 cents a
bushel for culls, at the same time competing adequately with imported
white potato starch.
3. The MAYHEW CANNING PLANT, Commerce St. bet. 6th and
ytri Aves. (open weekdays 8-t: tours), encourages diversified farming on
the cutover timber lands. Corn, beans, and cucumbers are packed here, en
abling the farmer to grow at least three profitable crops from his land each
year.
4. The LAUREN ROGERS LIBRARY and MUSEUM OF ART, 5 th
Ave. and yth St. (open weekdays 10-^: SM. 7-9 p. in.; Sun. 3-6), grew
out of the Eastman Memorial Foundation, established by Lauren Chase
Eastman, lumberman of Eastman-Gardiner Co., in memory of his grand
son, Lauren Rogers. It houses the State s only art museum. The building is
of Southern Colonial architecture with a broad front portico having slen
der, coupled columns. The iron grille work, gates, and railings are the
work of Samuel Yellin of Philadelphia. The paintings in the gallery are
ART MUSEUM AND LIBRARY, LAUREL
by such artists as Reynolds, Rousseau, Constable, Inness, Millet, and Whis
tler. Exhibits in the museum include a collection of baskets from all parts
of the world; statuary by Anna Hyatt, Herman McNeil, Jeanette Scudder,
and Ary Bitter; Chinese, Japanese, and Persian pottery; English, Ameri-
MERIDIAN 227
can, and Flemish tapestries ; and antique furniture of different periods. In
addition to the Memorial Library the building houses the circulating li
brary of the Laurel Library Association.
5. The CITY PARK, bet. yth and loth Sts. and 8th and icth Aves., is
the beauty spot of Laurel. It is landscaped and has an attractive artificial
lake with mimosa bushes along the shore.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Bogue Homo Indian Reservation, 72.7 m. (see Tour 8); Big Creek Baptist
Church, 72.6 m.; Buffalo Hill, 72.6 m.; Laurel Country Club, 2.6 m. (see Tour
11).
Railroad Stations: Union Station, Front St. and i9th Ave., for Mobile & Ohio R.R.,
Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R., and Southern R.R.; 22nd Ave. and D St., for
Gulf, Mobile & Northern R.R.
Bus Station: Union Station, 2306 6th St., for Tri-State Transit Co., Teche-Grey-
hound, Magnolia Motor, and Capital Motor Lines.
Local Busses: Intra-city, 5^ per person.
Taxis: Intra-city, lotf per person.
Airport: Key Field, 2 m. SW. of city on US n, for Delta Airlines, taxi fare 15^,
time 10 min.
Traffic Regulations: Speed limit 30 mph. Turns may be made in either direction at
intersections of all streets except where lights direct otherwise. Parking limitations
marked in yellow on pavement.
Street order and numbering: Streets run east and west, avenues north and south.
Front (3rd) St. parallel to and north of railroad starts numbering at 100.
Information Service: Chamber of Commerce, Threefoot Building, NW. cor. 22nd
Ave. and 6th St.
Accommodations: Four hotels; five tourist camps.
Radio Station: WCOC (880 kc.).
Motion Picture Houses: Three.
Golf: Northwood Country Club, Magnolia Drive, 2 m. N., moderate greens fee;
Meridian Country Club, 4.5 m. N. on Poplar Springs Drive, moderate greens fee.
Swimming: Municipal Pool, Highland Park, 38th Ave. and i6th St.
Tennis: Municipal courts, Highland Park.
Riding: Massey Academy, Highland Park.
Annual Events: Mississippi Fair and Dairy Show, first wk. in Oct.; Confederate
Memorial Day, April 26th at courthouse and Rose Hill Cemetery; Intercollegiate
Athletic Association Event, Stadium, Magnolia Drive, Thanksgiving Day.
228 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
MERIDIAN (341 alt., 31,954 pop.)> Mississippi s second largest city, lies
among the most southerly of the Appalachian foothills, a region char
acterized by heavy forests and outcroppings of buff-colored limestone. In
harmony with the surrounding hills, native rock is used for building
material, and elms and live-oaks like giant grenadiers line the walks. Yet
it is a railroad and industrial town, and as such has its shops and districts
where the poorer workmen live.
Laid out with singular lack of design, Meridian, viewed from the air, is
like a vast spider web with a multitude of streets intersecting at curious
angles and coming to abrupt endings. Cutting through the web near its
center are numerous railroad tracks, dividing the business section from
the industrial district. At the heart of the web is the city s most salient
piece of architecture, the Threefoot Building. The only skyscraper in
Meridian, this building rises 17 stories, its brightly decorated tower
dwarfing the buildings dotted below. The southern and eastern boundaries
of the city are arched by the humped ridges of the foothills, known locally
as Mount Barton. This is Meridian s playground, with stone and log
cabins, lodges, and fishing camps stuck along the rugged slopes. Between
the mountain and the city proper are the mill districts, Southside and
Tuxedo, where a great part of the city s laboring class lives in two- and
three-room rented houses. The wealth of the city s merchant class expresses
itself in attractive residential suburbs fringing north Meridian. Every
architectural style is being tried here, with the English cottage and manor
house of native limestone the most conspicuous. The rugged topography
of this section lends itself to both sunken and rock gardens, and the
charming effects created with stone and flora are noteworthy.
In 1831 Richard McLemore migrated from South Carolina to clear a
plantation on the present site of Meridian. Soon he was offering free land
to settlers who he thought would make desirable neighbors. In 1854,
when Mississippi s pre-war railroad building was nearing its climax, plans
were made for the Vicksburg & Montgomery R.R. (Alabama & Vicks-
burg) to cross the Mobile & Ohio line. The former was to cross the State
east and west, the latter to follow close to the eastern boundary from
north to south; their junction was to be on McLemore s plantation. Mc
Lemore sold his plantation to L. A. Ragsdale and J. T. Ball, pioneer rail
road men, and they immediately built the one-room, red and yellow
"union station." But it was not until 1861, one year after Meridian had
been incorporated as a town, that the Vicksburg & Montgomery train ar
rived from Vicksburg.
Other railroads became interested in the junction which, though small,
quickly assumed the air of an important railroad center. But this attitude
of suddenly acquired importance made the future city s first year extremely
difficult. The farmers who lived on the plantation before the railroads
were built pridefully considered themselves the junction s first citizens;
the families who came in with the railroads boasted that they were build
ing the town, and, with the pride of achievement, assumed the rank of
leaders. The contest between farmer and mechanic was intensified when
one of the two city fathers, believing the word "meridian" to be synon-
TEXTILE MILL, MERIDIAN
ymous with junction, determined on that name for the village, while the
other, supported by the farmer families, chose "Sowashee" (Ind., mad
r/ver), name of the nearby creek. Each morning the first would nail up the
sign "Meridian," and each night the second would tear it down to make way
for his own "Sowashee." Instead of compromising, the two fathers selected
different plans for laying out the city streets. One day one of them would
drive stakes in line with his plan. The next day the other would pull up
his rival s stakes and drive some of his own. It was a struggle that has
affected the city to this day. For even though the continued development
of the railroads and the consequent influx of railroad workers overruled
contrary opinion and left "Meridian" on the union station permanently,
the confused plans for laying out the city have given Meridian the appear
ance of having been formed by some giant who playfully gathered up a
handful of triangles and dropped them at the junction of two railroads.
Railroads with their noisy shops, and trains with their screaming
whistles and their engines puffing steam and smoke, changed the quiet
plantation life in Meridian to one of excitement. Government mail con
tracts, the lifeblood of the early railroads, were awarded to the trains that
could make the fastest time, and were determined by racing these trains
from one terminal to another. In 1883 the Louisville Nashville s crack
train left Cincinnati on the dot with the Queen & Crescent, both bound
for New Orleans. Excitement ran high, especially at Meridian where the
Queen & Crescent changed engines. The latter train steamed into New
Orleans eight hours ahead of its rival and established the fastest time
then on record. A few years later the Meridian shops despatched a special
train to Lumberton to carry a physician on an emergency call. This train
covered the 112 miles between Meridian and Lumberton in exactly 112
minutes, and set a new record. Once a month Meridian s railroad men
230 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
went to the banks of Sowashee Creek to enjoy a beer party and poker
game. But the pride of the shops was the old wrecker car that had been
reconditioned as a sort of restaurant and bar and was presided over by a
Negro named "Bob," the best cook in east Mississippi. The wrecker held
open house each day in the week and when the higher officials visited
Meridian it was to the wrecker they went to order one of "Black Bob s"
specials.
When the War between the States began, Meridian, with a population
of about 100, was made a Confederate military camp and division head
quarters. Troops were stationed here and arsenals and cantonments were
built. In 1863 the State records were moved here for safekeeping, and for
one month the town was the State s capital. In February 1864, General
Sherman s troops, marching across the State from Jackson, entered the
town. Several days later Sherman made his official report: "For five days,
10,000 men worked hard with a will in that work of destruction with axes,
crowbars, sledges, clawbars, and fire, and I have no hesitation in pro
nouncing the work well done. Meridian ... no longer exists."
Rebuilt after the war, Meridian, as a railroad center, grew rapidly, be
coming a magnet that attracted a rabble of adventurers who came into
the State seeking to share in the spoils of radical reconstruction. In 1871
a riot prominent in Mississippi s reconstruction history took place when
one of several Negroes on trial for urging mob violence shot the presiding
judge. A party of whites who were interested in the trial immediately
formed a mob, killed between 25 and 30 Negroes, and burned a Negro
school. This riot was followed by a yellow fever epidemic in 1878, which
almost depopulated the town, and in 1906 a cyclone struck the city with
considerable damage to life and property.
But Meridian survived these disasters and again achieved prominence
as a railroad center. By the end of the century, however, manufacturing
was competing with railroading for first place. A cotton mill established
late in 1890 was the initial effort. In 1913 the commission form of gov
ernment was adopted, and under the guidance of a mayor and two com
missioners 90 industrial plants, including a large shirt and garment
factory and three hosiery mills, have been established. These industries
have done much to modify the city s railroad tone and have brought into
it a new type of labor, the farm boy and girl. Drawn from the farms and
villages of the environs by the attractions of city life these young people
have been swallowed up by the factory system. A few commute daily
from their homes to the factory, but the majority find cheap lodgings in
the city s Southside. To the Negroes, who make up 35 percent of Meri
dian s population, fall the jobs requiring unskilled labor. They are used
especially in sawmills, cottonseed oil mills, and gins, where strength and
hardiness are requisite. As in most southern cities, the servant class is ex
clusively Negro, and, though Meridian is well dotted with Negro districts
composed of one- and two-room rented cabins with tiny dirt plot yards, a
few white people maintain servants quarters in the rear of their homes for
their cooks, nurses, or chauffeurs.
Not until recent years did agriculture attempt to regain the prestige it
MERIDIAN 231
early lost to railroading and manufacturing. With the encouragement of
diversified farming, stock, and poultry raising in the surrounding country,
Meridian has gained recognition as an important market for vegetables,
fruit, poultry, and livestock. With a view to building up the livestock in
dustry of the county, the Meridian Union Stockyards were established in
1935. This plant occupies 14 acres of a triangle bounded by the tracks of
the Southern, Mobile & Ohio, Illinois Central, and Gulf, Mobile &
Northern railroads, and its buildings and pens accommodate approximately
5,000 head of stock. This is the State s largest stockyard.
Second to agriculture in importance is the lumber industry. Given a
fresh impetus by the maturity of second growth stands of timber, six
large and numerous small lumber mills operate full time, cutting pine tim
ber. One company, the only hardwood mill in the city, cuts a daily average
of 35,000 feet of gum, oak, poplar, ash, hickory, and magnolia.
Tour-iom.
N. from the World War Monument on 23rd Ave.
1. SCOTTISH RITE CATHEDRAL, NW. corner 23rd Ave. and nth
St., is based upon the design of the Temple of Isis at Philae, Egypt. The
two-story structure is built of brick and concrete, faced with native Bowling
Green limestone and ornamented with polychrome terra cotta. The sym
bols on the terra cotta decorations of the facade, as well as the obelisks, are
typically Egyptian ; on each side of the long flight of steps leading to the
entrance are buttresses with a Sphinx and obelisk on each, the four sides
of the obelisk being cut with Egyptian characters. The two massive round
columns surmounting the steps are conspicuous for their bell-shaped capi
tals as well as for their monumental proportions. The interior contains
banquet hall, ballroom, pool room, library, offices, assembly room, organ
room, and kitchen. Striking and colorful Egyptian designs cover the walls
of the foyer.
R. from 23rd Are. on llth St.; R. on 18th A
2. McLEMORE HOUSE, 1009 i8th Ave. (private), is built around
the original log home of Richard McLemore, the town s first settler. The
present house is a mixed style of architecture and the original design of
the McLemore house, built in 1837, has been obliterated. The site, how
ever, is interesting as a landmark of the town s birthplace.
R. from 18th Ave. on 4th St.
3. The SOULE STEAM FEED WORKS, NE. corner 4 th St. and i 9 th
232 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Ave. (open by permission), is a machine shop and foundry with interna
tional distribution. Organized in 1893, it manufactures sawmill and oil
well machinery, and forges cast and wrought iron and brass products.
L. from 4th St. on 22nd Ave.
4. MERIDIAN GARMENT FACTORY, 22nd Ave. S. between B and
C Sts. (open weekdays 8-4; tours), is a square, two-story building of con
crete and structural steel. The outside walls are broken by 11,500 window
lights framed by projected steel sashes. The central hall is reached by five
entrances, each with fire-latch doors. The interior columns and floors are
of hardwood. The first floor is divided into offices, laundry, and shipping
department; on the second floor are cutting, sewing, and first-aid rooms.
Employing between 500 and 600 operators, this factory produces approx
imately 900 dozen shirts a day.
5. HAMM LUMBER MILL, 22nd Ave. S. (open weekdays 9-5; tours),
began operation in 1917 to plane and process hardwood timber. Cutting
hardwood exclusively, it has a daily capacity of 40,000 feet, and employs
approximately 60 persons.
Retrace 22nd Ave.; L. on A St.
6. MERIDIAN GRAIN ELEVATOR PLANT, A St. between Rubush
and Grand Aves. (open weekdays 8-4; guides), is the only milling plant
in the State using the de-germinator method of manufacturing grits and
cream meal, and the only one requiring a health certificate semiannually
from its employees. Surrounded by a forest of elevators, 22 of which are
used in making grits, this plant can mill 300 bushels of corn per hour.
Because of the uniformity required in the grain, the corn used is shipped
in from the Corn Belt. In general, the season for making meal starts in
January and extends through September; for grits, the season is from
September through May.
L. from A St. on Rubush Ave.; R. on B St.; R. on 31st Ave.
7. SWIFT & COMPANY OIL MILL, 3ist Ave. at railroad tracks,
(open by permission), is housed in two adjoining buildings, each con
structed of sheet iron and two stories high. The company manufactures
cottonseed oil with its byproducts, hulls, meal, and cotton linters.
8. The J. H. GARY HOUSE, 905 3ist Ave. (private), in a somber set
ting of magnolia trees, is a white, two-story frame house with a broad
gallery and classic columns. Similar columns uphold a porte-cochere at
one side. The single story ell, which extends to the rear, was the head
quarters of Gen. Leonidas Polk, Commander of the Confederate troops
stationed in Meridian.
Retrace 31st Ave.; R. on 7th St.
9. In ROSE HILL CEMETERY, 7 th St. and 4 oth Ave., is GYPSY
QUEEN S GRAVE. In a concrete vault armored with steel, is the burial
place of the wife of Emil Mitchell, King of all gypsies in the United
States. The Queen, Kelly Mitchell, who died in 1915 in Lititia, Ala.,
was buried here in her Romany dress strung with gold coins dating back to
1750. Until the King s remarriage gypsies from all parts of the country
made periodic pilgrimages here.
Retrace 7th St.; L. on 38th Ave.; L. on 16 St.
NATCHEZ 233
10. The ARBORETUM, Highland Park, intersection of i6th St. and
38th Ave. (R), displays native shrubs, ferns, and wild flowers in a natural
setting.
R. from 16th St. on the Asylum Road, graveled, to 20th St.
11. The EAST MISSISSIPPI INSANE HOSPITAL, entrance L. (visit
ing hours 9:50-4:30 daily), was constructed in 1882. The buildings, half
hidden in a great grove of trees and reached by a circular drive, are
grouped about the administration building, which is constructed of brick,
four stories high, and designed in the form of an E. The majority of the
smaller buildings also are of brick and have more the appearance of large
gingerbread style houses than of institutional designs. The landscaped
grounds are one of the showplaces of Meridian. The hospital, with land,
buildings, and equipment, is valued at $814,457. There are approximately
850 patients at the institution; the average yearly cost per patient is about
$258.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
U. S. Horticultural Experiment Station, 3-5 m. (see Tour 4) ; Grave of Sam Dale,
pioneer scout and soldier, 19.2 m. (see Side Tour 4B).
Railroad Stations: Broadway, near river, for Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R.; Union
Station, 212 Washington St., for Mississippi Central R.R., Missouri Pacific R.R., and
Natchez & Southern R.R.
Bus Stations: Union Station, 515 Main St., for Teche-Greyhound, Tri-State Transit
Co., and Interurban Transportation, Inc.; Missouri Pacific Branch Office and Bus
Station, 107 N. Commerce St., for Bobs Bus Line and Parsons Bus Line.
Ferry: The Royal Route. Landing on Silver St. and Mississippi River. Fare lotf per
person, 50^ and up for car and driver depending on weight of car.
Airport: One mile east of city limits on Liberty Rd., taxi fare 50^, time 15 min.
No scheduled service.
Ta.\is: Fare 15^ per passenger within city limits.
Traffic Regulations: Speed limit 15 mph. East and west traffic has right-of-way. All
turns on green lights on congested streets. See signs on less important streets. One
hour parking in business section. All night parking prohibited.
Street Arrangement: Main St. divides the city into N. and S. sections.
Accommodations: Four hotels; boarding houses; tourist homes and rooming places.
Rates higher during Pilgrimage Weeks.
Information Sen-ice: Garden Club Headquarters at Ellicott s Inn, 215 N. Canal St.;
Natchez Association of Commerce, 403 Franklin St.; Natchez Democrat, 106-108
S. Pearl St.; all filling stations and hotels.
2 34
MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
NATCHEZ
235
NATCHEZ
Federal Writers Projea 1937
236 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Motion Picture Houses: Three.
Swimming: Carpenter School, No. 2; Elks Pool; Crystal Pool, Washington Rd.,
5 m. E. ; Beverly Beach, 10 m. S. on Lower Woodville Rd.; Cool Coosa, 12 m.
across Mississippi River in Lake St. John, La.
Tennis: Duncan Memorial Park, eastern limits of city i block N. from Homochitto
St. ; high school athletic field, Homochitto St. ; Cathedral grounds, S. Union St.
Golf : Duncan Memorial Park, all year-round playing reasonable greens fee.
Skeet Club: On US 61, i m. N., April ist to Nov. ist, Sundays.
Annual Events: Pilgrimages to old estates, in March, ist wk. in April; American
Legion Fall Fair, held on Broadway, facing the Mississippi River, no definite date.
NATCHEZ (202 alt., 13,422 pop.), overlooking the Mississippi River
from a series of lofty, alluvial bluffs, conscientiously presents its age in the
appearance of its low-roofed, time-worn buildings and in what its people
say and do. It is one of the earliest white settlements in the State, and was
at one time the center of ante-bellum culture. Its people, its buildings, its
aged trees, and its general Old South atmosphere conspire to keep these
facts evident. Beginning with three narrow parks that overlook the docks
and river front, the city proper spreads fanwise, with the Confederate
Memorial Park as its center. The streets are slightly rolling, with restored
or carefully preserved mansions rising unexpectedly from the midst of
dilapidated, heavy-timbered houses whose flush fronts and steep roofs
KEY TO PRECEDING MAP OF NATCHEZ
1. Adams County Courthouse 23. Magnolia Vale
2. Parish House of San Salvador 24. Wigwam
3. Mercer House 25. The Towers
4. Lawyers Row 26. Cottage Garden
5. Governor Holmes or Conti 27. Airlie
House 28. Protestant Orphanage
6. Old Spanish House 29. Melmont or Sans Souci
7. Britton Home 30. King s Tavern
8. First Presbyterian Church 31. St. Mary s Cathedral
9. Memorial Hall 32. St. Joseph s Academy
10. Old Commercial Bank Building 33. Trinity Episcopal Church
11. Banker s Home 34. Ravenna
12. Metcalfe House 35. Greenleaves
13. Esplanade 36. The Elms
14. Rosalie 37. Arlington
15. Site of Fort Rosalie 38. Dunleith
16. Natchez-under-the-Hill 39. Routh Cemetery
17. Buntura Home 40. Hope Farm
1 8. Marschalk s Printing Office 41. Auburn
19. Connelly s Tavern 42. Hospital Hill
20. Choctaw 43. Home of Don Estevan Minor
21. Stanton Hall 44. The Briars
22. First Lumber Mill 45. Richmond
NATCHEZ 237
speak definitely of days past but not dead. Surreys and two-wheeled dump
carts driven by white-haired Negroes are seen on the streets.
So deeply has the patina of the past been impressed on Natchez that it
is the modern rather than the aged that stand out as anomalies. The down
town district, with the Gothic spire of St. Mary s Cathedral rising above
the low skyline, and the historic courthouse hemmed in by stucco and
brick, or yellowish frame structures, is definitely dated. Here is a marked
conflict between careful preservation and decay. Standing flush with the
sidewalk are structures whose uncompromising severity tie them to the
Spanish period. Interspersed among these ill-preserved buildings, which
often are occupied by Negroes, are modern one- and two-story structures
that house up-to-date business firms.
The residential districts, emerging with uncertain plan from the down
town area and somewhat softened by the shadows of Spanish moss and
magnolias, are marked by restoration rather than by change. Homes that
are little more than ruins stand proudly beside mansions whose beauty
and lines have been carefully cherished and preserved. Varying features of
architecture indicate the survival of French and Spanish influence, while
many of the houses were remodeled in the early iSoo s to conform with
the classic order dictated by the Greek Revival. Sprinkled among these
homes are modern bungalows and cottages; but the sprinkling is so light
it produces little discord between the old and the new.
Aloof from the city and yet a part of it are its industries. The cotton
mill runs only spasmodically. The cottonseed oil mill is one of the city s
oldest industries. Here are also a box factory and the oldest sawmill in
the State. With the shirt factory excepted these industries draw their
labor from the 53.3 percent of the population that are Negroes. The tex
tile labor class is not well defined, but is a transitory group of white peo
ple who come in from and return to the outlying plantations as the routine
of farm, or factory, becomes monotonous.
Natchez is still the trade center for its district and an important shipping
point for cotton and for beef cattle. It is from this trade that a majority
of its white population derive their income. Many of the older families
are still large landholders and, like their grandfathers, live in town on
incomes from their plantation operations. As in any plantation town,
Saturday is trade day in Natchez, and fall, cotton picking time, is the busy
season for growers, ginners, buyers, merchants, and bankers.
The wealth, the rich background, and the intelligence of the Natchez
Negro leaders have made Natchez the Negro cultural center of the State.
Among them are leading Negro physicians, several outstanding ministers,
and a musician who presents "Heaven Bound," a production with a
chorus of fifty voices, each year to a large white audience. The African
Methodist Episcopal Church includes cultural and intellectual activities in
its religious program, and the Negro Baptists support Natchez College, a
coeducational four-year institution with a high school department. The
Negroes of Natchez, unlike the Negroes in other Mississippi towns, trade
almost exclusively at stores owned by members of their own race. This
has created a comparatively wealthy business and professional class, fam-
238 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
ilies who send their children out of the State for education. Neither the
Negroes residential nor business districts are well denned but are scattered
about the city in the midst of other residential and business districts. St.
Catherine Street, however, may be said to be the focal point. Here, inter
spersed among the houses left from Spanish days, are many of the com
mercial and business establishments, and a majority of the churches. It is
also to this street that Negroes from out of town gravitate.
The history of Natchez is the variegated story of a frontier town, raw
and polished, crude and elegant: a town that absorbed the best and the
worst of Mississippi River pioneer days. It has been ruled by the Natchez
Indians, France, Spain, England, the Confederacy, and the United States.
The town was settled as part of the French colonization development after
Iberville landed on the Mississippi Gulf Coast in 1699. Land grants were
made as early as 1702, but it was 1716 before Bienville built and gar
risoned Fort Rosalie, named in honor of the Duchess of Pontchartrain.
Two years later 1 5 laborers opened the first plantation at Natchez a farm
on St. Catherine s Creek. The settlement prospered, with ships plying to
the Gulf Coast colony and back, carrying tobacco, pelts, and bear s grease
in exchange for staple supplies.
In November 1729, the Natchez Indians (who inhabited the region and
whose name is commemorated in the name of the city) attacked the fort
and massacred the garrison and settlers. The following year the French
colonists of the Gulf area retaliated by exterminating the Natchez Indians.
Then they attacked the more warlike Chickasaw and were defeated. This
defeat ended the French scheme of uniting the French of the Ohio Valley
with the French of the lower Mississippi Valley, thus forming a line of
defense against the westward-moving English.
After the French and Indian War, Natchez became a part of the region
east of the Mississippi River which France ceded to Great Britain in 1763.
The British settlers who followed were hardy veterans of the Colonial
wars and established permanent homes on large tracts of land granted by
the English king.
Natchez, as an English possession, was in reality a fourteenth colony of
Great Britain. However, its people remained neutral during the Revolu
tionary War, indifferent to the struggle on the Atlantic seaboard a thou
sand miles away. It was this isolation that enabled Galvez, Spanish
Governor of New Orleans, to take Natchez in 1779 in the name of the
King of Spain. During the first year of Spanish occupancy, British veterans
made an abortive attempt to retake Natchez.
Under the ambitious Dons the town began to prosper again. The
Spaniards who occupied Natchez between 1779-98 were efficient and fair.
They loved punctilio and all the trappings of lavish living, and they intro
duced a rigid caste system which prevails to a certain extent today. Until
their coming few buildings stood on the bluffs, the settlement having
grown up along the water front. So the town, much as it is today, was
laid out in a square by Collel, a Spanish engineer. Choice streets were
reserved for the residences of Spanish grandees and a church called San
Salvador stood on a broad esplanade extending across the front of the
NATCHEZ 239
city overlooking the river. But of all their magnificent buildings erected
during this period not more than 20 remain.
By the treaty of Madrid, 1795, parallel 31 was agreed upon as the
boundary between the newly formed United States and Spain s possessions,
with free navigation of the Mississippi guaranteed by the Spaniards who
still owned New Orleans. In 1797 Andrew Ellicott, a Pennsylvania sur
veyor, arrived in Natchez to run the new boundary line, and unofficially
raised the American flag. But another year passed before Spain could be
forced to evacuate this rich territory according to the terms of the treaty.
On March 30, 1798, however, the last Spanish soldier withdrew, leaving
the fort to Maj. Isaac Guion, who officially raised the American flag. In
that same year, the Territory of Mississippi was organized and Natchez
was made the capital.
The opening of the Mississippi River started the turbulent flatboat era
that lasted until the steamboat brought it to an end. Down the river came
the flatboatmen, swearing, drinking, fighting; bringing on their clumsy
rafts, tobacco, grains, fruits, pelts, molasses, hams, butter, flour, and
whisky. Many of them stopped at Natchez to sell their goods and their
boats; most of them continued to New Orleans; but all returned through
Natchez, since it was too difficult to return to the upper country by water.
Banding together for protection against prowling savages and murderous
outlaws, they returned home, carrying their money in money belts or in
saddlebags. They followed the 55o-mile road to Nashville, a road that was
a mere trace or bridle path. This road became famous as the Natchez
Trace (see TRANSPORTATION).
A frontier city, capital of a rich territory, Natchez soon grew important
as a supply depot and the gathering place for the intellectuals of the
Southwest. It became an opulent, suave, and aristocratic community, main
taining a social and political prestige that influenced the entire Mississippi
Valley.
Men of all degrees of wealth and intelligence were drawn to this new
region where land was cheap and fortunes were quickly made. Hundreds
of families drifted down the river from the upper valleys in fleets of flat-
boats. These pioneers came to a rich and fertile country that had a mild
climate featured by a growing season nine months long. They tried raising
indigo but the refuse accumulations, with the poisonous drainage from
them, made it unhealthful. They tried raising tobacco and found it un
profitable. After the invention of Whitney s cotton gin in 1793, they
turned to growing cotton. Slave labor, together with natural advantages,
enabled them to create in a remarkably short time a system of great planta
tions and luxurious living. The Mississippi Gazette, first newspaper in the
State, began publication in 1800. On April 9, 1803, Natchez was incor
porated as an American city. In 1810, when the population of Natchez was
9,000 persons, it was estimated that the aggregate cotton sales exceeded
$700,000.
Increasing prosperity made it necessary to establish an overland line of
communication with the East. Hitherto, the Mississippi River had been the
one route of travel. In 1801 the Treaty of dickasaw Bluffs was made
240 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
with the Chickasaw Indians whereby the Indians agreed to permit immi
grants, the United States mail, and soldiers to pass through their lands.
The immediate effect of this agreement was a sudden growth in the pop
ulation of Natchez and the lower Mississippi Valley. Droves of settlers
toiled down the Natchez Trace from the Atlantic seaboard, bringing new
blood, new ideas, and new wealth in money and slaves.
In 1802, however, Natchez lost much of its prestige when the Terri
torial Assembly ordered the seat of government moved from Natchez to
Washington, a small, gay, wealthy, inland city situated about six miles to
the east.
Because of the growing importance of Natchez as an entrance to the
West, Aaron Burr and Harman Blennerhassett selected it as the base from
which to operate their mysterious colonization scheme. The plan was
broken up when both were arrested, charged with treason.
During the War of 1812 the city was threatened frequently by Indians
who lived in the wilderness east of the river. All able-bodied men be
came soldiers, and when the Battle of New Orleans was fought in 1815,
the Natchez Rifles was present. One historian related that nearly all the
male citizens of Natchez took part in the battle.
In 1817 the Mississippi Territory was organized as a State. The conven
tion met at Washington and decided to move the seat of government from
Washington to Columbia, then to a more central location at Le Fleur s
Bluff (see JACKSON). From this time on, the political eminence of
Natchez declined.
The booming steamboat era, however, had just begun with the arrival
of the New Orleans, first steamboat to stop at Natchez, and within a
few years the city recovered its prominence by becoming one of the great
cotton ports of the world. In this period fabulous fortunes were made by
cotton planters, and Natchez reached a pinnacle of wealth and culture with
liberal, open-handed living prevailing. Planters spent their money building
distinctive homes and accumulating libraries and art collections (see
ARCHITECTURE). They speculated in land, slaves, cotton, and credit.
While much in their lives was gracious, their code demanded exaggerated
standards of honor. Duels were fought frequently on the sandbar across
the river.
At the outbreak of the War between the States Natchez was still a rich
agricultural center. It furnished many soldiers to the Confederate cause,
most prominent of whom was Maj.-Gen. William T. Martin. Natchez was
bombarded by the U. S. S. Essex in July 1863, and occupied by Ransom s
brigade. Civil government was suspended from November 1863 to August
9, 1865. The war destroyed the fortunes, slaves were freed, and the eco
nomic and social structures were overturned completely. Natchez has never
regained the river trade that once had helped to make it rich, one of the
queen cities of the lower Mississippi.
For three generations the population increased little. The changes made
were material improvements that blend with rather than destroy the still
cherished past. In 1881 telephone lines were installed, and five years later
Judge Thomas Reber built a street railroad from the ferry landing on
NATCHEZ 241
Main and St. Catherine Streets to the "Forks-of-the-Road." The Judge also
installed the first electric light plant, in 1886, to furnish lights for a
casino. In the same year, the Adams Manufacturing Company plant was
built to manufacture cottonseed oil.
Natchez does not boast of its material progress, but prefers to keep its
industries in the background. Yet the income from the sale of its manu
factured products amounted to $2,121,755 m I 935-
The old Spanish portion of Natchez can be seen either on foot or by
car. It was centered around an esplanade that faced the river. Many other
interesting examples of Spanish architecture survive here and there in all
parts of the city.
Tour i-
W. from Pearl St. on Market St.
1. The ADAMS COUNTY COURTHOUSE, Market St. (L), stands
in the exact center of Natchez as it was laid out by the Spaniards. Erected
in 1819, and constructed of soft cream stucco-covered brick, it has three
porticos with large fluted columns. In its vaults are stored records dating
back to 1780, compiled in Spanish, French, and English. Its rectangular
grounds are the site of the old Spanish market and, presumably, the
Church of San Salvador.
2. The PARISH HOUSE OF SAN SALVADOR, 311 Market St.
(private), is a three-story frame structure erected by order of the King of
Spain in 1786. It was first occupied in 1788 by four Irish priests, brought
to Natchez to instruct the English-speaking population in the Roman
Catholic religion. Though the house is gray and dilapidated, evidence of
its beauty can be seen in its simple, hand-carved doorway and woodwork,
and in its severe, plain lines.
L. from Market St. on S. Wall St.
3. The MERCER HOUSE, NW. corner S. Wall and State Sts.
(prh-Me). is a two-story Georgian Colonial structure built in 1818 and
distinguished by dormer windows, spacious floor plan, and a fanlight filled
with early, imperfect glass. Constructed of gray .stuccoed brick, the lower
front portico is supported by arches and the upper by slender columns.
On the north side of the house is a garden enclosed by a well -patterned
hand-wrought iron fence. Andrew Jackson, on his way to take part in the
unveiling of his equestrian statue in New Orleans in January 1840, stayed
CONTI HOUSE, NATCHEZ
in this home. He was joined by Gen. Thomas Hinds and other veterans of
the Battle of New Orleans, and from the porch addressed a throng of ad
mirers gathered in the courthouse yard.
4. LAWYERS ROW, SW. corner S. Wall and State Sts., is a low
L-shaped stuccoed brick building with two adjacent wings extending for
approximately half a block from the corner. The wings are broken into
small, bin- like offices whose front entrances stand flush with the street.
The rear entrances open into a court. Erected by the Spaniards before
1796, it is thought that the building was used first as a commissary for the
old fort. After Mississippi became a territory the bins, converted into
offices, were occupied by bachelor lawyers. Because many of these young
men were later famous the building became known as Lawyers Row.
5. CONTI HOUSE, 207 S. Wall St. (open daily 10-4; adm. 25$), is
a rectangular, two-story stuccoed brick house, built prior to 1788. Of
Spanish Provincial architecture it stands flush with the street, with Spanish
slate steps and no eaves to break the line of wall or roof. Two green-
shuttered windows and a central door open on the sidewalk. A two-story
service wing extending to rear with four slave rooms upstairs and down
forms a setting for an old-fashioned garden. First used as a home by
Don Lewis Favre, surgeon of the King s galleys, the house was from
1825-35 the home of David Holmes, last Territorial and first State Gov
ernor of Mississippi.
6. The OLD SPANISH HOUSE, NW. corner S. Wall and Washing
ton Sts. (private), is a good example of the average home of the Spanish
NATCHEZ 243
Dominion. Brick and stucco trimmed in green, it is two stories high, with
dormer windows, outside stairways, and a kitchen attached by a wooden
hyphen. At the rear of the kitchen are the slave quarters, a two-story, rec
tangular structure built of cedar joined with wooden pegs. The house was
built in 1796 or earlier.
L. from S. Wall St. on Washington St.; L. on S. Pearl St.
7. The BRITTON HOME, NW. corner S. Pearl and Washington Sts.
(opvn by appointment), erected in 1858, is an imposing two-story brick
house with Corinthian columns and a classic two-story portico. Wrought-
iron railings enclose each gallery. The house was struck by a shell during
the bombardment of Natchez in 1863.
8. FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, NE. corner S. Pearl and State
Sts., was designed by Levi Weeks of Boston and built in 1829. This sim
ple, cream, stuccoed brick building has a classic portico with large Tuscan
columns and pedimented headings over the doors. The interior is plain,
with slave galleries, enclosed with handmade banisters, on both sides of
the auditorium. Small wooden doors open into the cushioned box pews.
9. MEMORIAL HALL, 111-115 S. Pearl St. (open daily 10-5), flanked
on each side by small landscaped grounds and protected by an iron fence
eight feet high, is a stuccoed brick structure of modified Spanish archi
tecture. Built in 1852 for public meeting purposes, it was first called In
stitute Hall. It is two stories in height, with recessed columns made in the
masonry. The main floor is at street level. The entrance opens into a cen
tral hallway from which twin stairways rise to the second floor auditorium.
After the World War, memorial tablets were placed on each side of the
entrance and the name of the building was changed to Memorial Hall.
Here balls and other social affairs of importance are held each year. The
right wing houses the FISK MEMORIAL LIBRARY, separate entrance
(open weekdays 8-4).
L. from S. Pearl Sf. on Main St.
10. The OLD COMMERCIAL BANK BUILDING, 206 Main St.,
was erected about 1809. It is of brick construction and has a stuccoed front
with four graceful Ionic columns supporting a classic pediment. John
Hampton White of New Jersey was the architect. Until the founding of
this bank all currency used in Natchez was Spanish "hard money" and
cotton gin receipts. The bank issued notes but none of them is known
to exist.
L. from Main St. on S. Canal St.
11. BANKER S HOME, 107 S. Canal St. (open by permission), at
tached to the Commercial Bank, was built in 1809 as the home of the
bank s president. Set in the remains of a garden, the house is of stucco
and brick construction and two stories in height. In front is a small portico
with two slender fluted columns; a deck to the portico is enclosed with an
iron railing. In the garden is a walk of Spanish flagstones brought to
America in sailing ships as ballast. The custom of having the banker s
home as part of the bank itself is said to have been a heritage from the
Spanish regime.
R. from S. Canal St. on Washington St. ; L. on S. Broad h
244 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
12. The JAMES METCALFE HOUSE, facing the river at SE. corner
S. Broadway and Washington Sts. (open during Pilgrimage), is a raised
brick building with a portico. Built about 1849 by Peter Little, pioneer
lumberman in Mississippi, this home is well preserved and contains many
of its original furnishings. The story is that Peter Little grew tired of his
wife s continually entertaining preachers in his home, and erected this
house and deeded it to a church on condition that entertaining in his home
cease.
13. The ESPLANADE, extending along the bluff in front of the James
Metcalfe House, was the parade ground attached to Fort Rosalie. It affords
a view of the river and the remains of the old river town, Natchez-under-
the-Hill.
14. ROSALIE, foot of S. Broadway (open daily 10-4; adm. 250),
is a square red brick home of the late Georgian (or Post-Colonial) type;
its two-story, pedimented portico has four white Tuscan columns. Double
doors, with fanlight transoms and side lights, are at each gallery. The
windows are five feet wide, their huge wooden shutters held in place by
slender wrought-iron hinges 26 inches long. The rooms are 21 feet square
with i4-foot ceilings and mantels seven feet high. Double parlors contain
hand-carved rosewood furniture. A stairway rises from a recessed hall.
The house was built by Peter Little in the early iSoo s and stands partly
on the site of old Fort Rosalie, scene of the Indian massacre in 1729.
Brick for this home was burned on the place by slaves. The house was
used in 1863 as Union headquarters and later General Grant and his
family spent several days in it.
15. The SITE OF FORT ROSALIE, an elevation directly back of
Rosalie, is marked by a tall iron pole.
Retrace S. Broadway ; L. on Silver St.
1 6. At the foot of Silver St. and below the Natchez bluffs, lies a strip
of land called THE BATTURE. This is the only remnant of dissolute
Natchez-under-the-Hill, known throughout the Mississippi Valley during
flatboat days and the steamboat era. This colorful, ribald old river port
with its brothels and gambling dens and its heterogeneous population of
flatboatmen, Negroes, Indians, bandits, pirates, scented quadroons, cour
tesans, and gamblers held sway for many years. There were times when
flatboats were tied to its banks 14 deep in a stretch two miles long. Ships
from Liverpool and other foreign ports came to its wharfs. All that re
mains is a single desolate street and a few moldy buildings; year by year
the river eats away the soft, reckless land.
The ferry line at the Batture that operates between Natchez and Vidalia,
La., has maintained service since 1797.
Retrace Silver St.; L. on S. Broadway St.
17. The BUNTURA HOME, 107 S. Broadway St. (private), midway
between State and Main Sts. and facing the river, is a two-story, L-shaped
house built in 1832. The galleries on its narrow front are ornamented with
delicate lace ironwork. The ell faces on a courtyard garden with an old
cistern in the center. A vaulted driveway through the rear of the house
permitted the passage of vehicles into the courtyard.
HM
CONNELLY S TAVERN, NATCHEZ
R. from N. Broadway St. on Franklin St. ; L. on N. Wall St.
iS. MARSCHALK S PRINTING OFFICE, NE. corner N. Wall and
Franklin Sts. (private), is a small two-and-a-half-story brick building
where Andrew Marschalk, an officer in the American Army during
the Revolutionary War and the pioneer of printing and publishing in
Mississippi, issued the third newspaper in the State, on July 26, 1802.
This paper, The Mississippi Herald, was in reality the first news sheet
of any stability. The Mississippi Gazette, published by Benjamin Stokes,
was established in Natchez in 1800 and was followed there in 1801
by The Mississippi Intelligencer. It was Marschalk s press that turned
out both these papers. He conducted the Herald for many years but
changed its name often. He was first territorial printer and printed the
first territorial laws. Before Marschalk came to Natchez in 1800 he had
been stationed at Walnut Hills, now Vicksburg, and while on duty there
he printed a ballad on his small press, the first piece of printing done in
Mississippi.
L. from N. Wall St. on Jefferson St. ; L. on N. Canal St.
19. CONNELLY S TAVERN or ELLICOTTS INN, SE. corner N.
Canal and Jefferson Sts. (open by permission), is on the top of a steep,
terraced hill. This old frame house, restored by the Natchez Garden Club,
V..IN built in 1795 during Spanish rule in Natchez. It stands on the old
246 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Natchez Trace and is a notable example of Spanish Provincial architecture.
Long, narrow, double galleries with slender columns overlook the Espla
nade and the river. The lower floor is brick paved. Though the ceilings
throughout are low, several rooms are vaulted. It is thought that some of
the materials used in its construction were timbers taken from dismantled
flatboats, and the vaulted rooms indicate the influence of a ship s carpenter
in the construction of the house.
In 1797 the American flag was first raised on this site by Andrew
Ellicott, sent from Washington to survey the line between the United
States and Spanish territory. Ellicott kept the flag flying a year in defiance
of Spanish objections. It was also on this hill that Maj. Isaac Guion, on
March 31, 1798, raised the American flag after the Spaniards had evac
uated the fort the night before. Tradition says that Aaron Burr and Har-
man Blennerhassett met here to plan their defense following their arrest
for treason in 1807.
Retrace N. Canal St.; R. on High St.
20. CHOCTAW, SW. corner High and N. Wall Sts. (private), was
the home of Alvarez Fisk, wealthy cotton broker and philanthropist in
the 1830*5 and 1 840*5. Though in bad condition, it is a notable example
of Greek Revival architecture. It is built of brick with a large Ionic portico.
The galleries of the portico are enclosed with a wooden railing. Unlike
many of the manor houses of its period, Choctaw rises from the street, its
first floor flush with the sidewalk. Double transverse steps lead to the
lower gallery. Steamboats tied up at the wharfs to allow passengers time
to inspect its gardens. Fisk donated land for the first school in Natchez
and erected the first school building.
21. STANTON HALL and its grounds, enclosed by a high iron fence,
occupy the entire block on High St. between N. Pearl and N. Commerce
Sts. (open daily 9-4; adm. 25$). This huge brick house, with its Corin
thian two-story portico, was built by Frederick Stanton, an Irish gentleman
who became rich as a cotton broker. It was completed in 1857 after five
years work. Some of the ceilings are 22 feet high. Mahogany doors,
carved Carrara marble mantels, heavy bronze chandeliers, and gigantic
inset mirrors were imported from Europe on a chartered ship. The east
side of the house can be opened by sliding doors into one long suite. Tre
mendous matched mirrors balance each other at front and rear of suite.
The frieze in the music hall bears names of old masters.
NATCHEZ 247
Tour 2..
N. from Main St. on N. Canal St.; L. on Madison St.; R. on Clifton St.
From the corner of Clifton and Oak Sts. is one of the best river views
in the city. To the west are the alluvial plains of Louisiana, where many
Natchez planters owned cotton lands that made them wealthy. To the
left is the canal completed by the Government in 1935 to shorten the
Mississippi River 18 miles. When this canal was dug, Army engineers
found petrified trees too large to be dredged out; they were pulled to one
side or the channel. The great, sweeping curve of the Mississippi as it
turns west above Natchez to flow east again will soon become another
river-bed lake. The canal is depositing a sand bar across the river in front
of Natchez and it is estimated that the stream eventually will be com
pletely dammed up. (The canal is expected to send the river past Natchez
on a straight course that will eliminate much of the eroding done by the
river ) .
The two points following can be reached by an unpaved street extend
ing down the bluff from the foot of Madison Street.
22. From this corner is also the best view of the FIRST LUMBER
MILL in Mississippi, situated at the foot of the cliffs. The mill was
started in 1809 by Peter Little. Its operating capacity is 40,000 feet a day.
On the Louisiana shore opposite the mill is an old sandbar where many
famous duels were fought. Here George Poindexter killed Abijah Hunt
in 1811.
23. North of the lumber mill is MAGNOLIA VALE (private), a two-
story brick and stucco house with gardens that have been a Natchez at
traction for more than 100 years. In steamboat days river travelers could
see the gardens from the decks, but often the period allowed on shore
was extended so passengers could hire a hack and drive through the gar
dens. It was built in 1831 by Andrew Brown, a Scotsman who came to
Natchez in 1821. The land had in turn belonged to Stephen Minor and
Peter Little.
R. from Clifton St. on Oak St.
24. The WIGWAM, 307 Oak St. (private), back from the street on a
lot elevated 10 or 12 feet, is enclosed by a brick wall. The walk from the
entrance is shaded by a double row of live-oak trees. In the center of the
walk is a fountain, a silent reminder of the days when the home was the
center of culture and gay social life. The date the house was built is not
known but it is shown on a map made in 1819 by Col. John Steel, first
secretary of the Mississippi Territory and later Governor. It is a story-and-
a-half, "H-shaped" frame structure to which several additions have been
made. The eaves of the projecting wings are trimmed with graceful iron
248 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
work that is given emphasis by iron columns, ornamented with four-leaf
clover designs, which support the recessed gallery. The interior is planned
with a large central hall and with spacious chambers.
L. from Oak St. on Myrtle Ave.
Myrtle Avenue was once the most elegant neighborhood in Natchez.
On it lived five governors: Vidal and Minor during Spanish sovereignty;
John Steel, George Poindexter, and Robert Williams during the time
Mississippi was a Territory. Harman Blennerhasset, Aaron Burr s co-
conspirator, also lived here.
25. THE TOWERS, 803 Myrtle Ave. (private) t in a dense grove, is
an old home pictured in Stark Young s So Red the Rose. The house, built
about 1818 by Wm. C. Chamberlain, was first called Gardenia. The
Towers is a two-story frame dwelling built on a brick foundation. It has
recessed upper and lower galleries in the center, and a square tower on
each side. At the time of Federal occupancy of Natchez during the War
between the States the house was used as headquarters by Colonel Peter
B. Hays, Union engineer in charge of fortifications. Several years ago it
was badly damaged by fire.
26. COTTAGE GARDEN, 816 Myrtle Ave. (private), is a frame
structure of Southern Planter architecture. It is one-and-one-half stories
high with a low, sloping roof extending across the front to form a long
gallery. The gallery has slender square columns. The central columns
support a pediment. Cottage Garden was erected in 1793 by Don Jose
Vidal. It stands on lands first granted him when he was acting Spanish
Governor of Natchez in 1798. The chief features of the house are its
curving mahogany stairway and a fanlighted entrance door. Huge brick
chimneys rise at each end, and there is a frame and brick gallery in the
rear. A large, underground reservoir or cistern, used to furnish water
and to cool wine and milk, is under the main part of the building.
27. AIRLIE, N. end of Myrtle Ave. (open during Pilgrimage), is a
simple frame home of Spanish Provincial design to which wings have
been added. It was built in 1793 and was once a home of Don Estevan
Minor, Civil Governor under Spain in 1798. The interior of the house
is filled with heirlooms: silver, china, paintings and furniture. The grounds
are laid out with old-fashioned flower gardens.
R. from Myrtle Ave. on Elm St.; R. on N. Union St.
28. The PROTESTANT ORPHANAGE, N. Union St. (R) between!
Oak and B Sts., is the last of three buildings bought by the "Female!
Charitable Society of Natchez." The building, erected as a country home |
in 1820, was bought from Ann Dunbar Postlewaite for $10,000. It is
a large building with long galleries across front and rear.
L. from N. Union St. on B. St.; L. on Rankin St.
29. MELMONT (SANS SOUCI), N. Rankin St. (R) between B
and Oak Sts. (open during Pilgrimage), built in 1854, is an unpreten
tious brick home having double-decked porticos with fluted columns, and
a steep-gabled roof. The brick was burned of Natchez clay, but the hard
ware and mahogany woodwork were imported. At present Melmont is
owned by descendants of John Henderson, first great commission mer-
NATCHEZ 249
chant in Natchez. Many of the Henderson heirlooms are in the house.
In 1863 this home was used as a residence for Union officers and breast
works were thrown up on its grounds.
Retrace N. Ran kin St.; R. on Jefferson St.
30. KING S TAVERN, Jefferson St. (R) between N. Rankin and N.
Union Sts. (open daily 9-5; adm. 25$), is conceded to be the oldest
house in Natchez. It abuts the sidewalk and is thought to have been a
blockhouse on the old Natchez Trace. Built of ship s timbers, its huge
sleepers and beams filled with holes and rounded pegs indicate they were
part of a flatboat. For many years the inn was the mail and stage coach
station on the Trace.
<<
Tour 3-4.7*72
E. jrom Pearl St. on Main St.; R. on S. Union St.
31. ST. MARY S CATHEDRAL, SE. corner S. Union and Main Sts.,
was built during the years 1841-51. Of Gothic Revival design, it is con
structed of red brick with a tall spire surmounted by an illuminated cross.
The altars are of Carrara marble, and behind the main altar is a copy of
Powell s picture of Christ. The bell, weighing 3,000 pounds and made
by Giovanni Lucenti, was given to St. Mary s by Prince Alex Torlonia
of Rome in 1849. The Princess Torlonia threw her wedding ring into
the molten metal as the bell was cast. The early history of Natchez was
connected closely with the Roman Catholic Church. Missionary priests,
both Capuchin and Jesuit, came and went. The edifice is now the
Cathedral for the Catholic Diocese of Mississippi, and improvements
costing more than $100,000 recently were made. The CEMETERY ad
joining the church, and now called Memorial Park, is a portion of the
old cemetery that was attached to the Spanish church of San Salvador.
Until the 1890 $ it stood in the center of town, dilapidated, with
crumbling tombs overgrown with weeds. At that time, it was decided to
level the cemetery. All remains were carefully gathered and placed in
one vault in the center of the grounds. Tombstones and markers were
placed around it, and a monument to the Confederacy was erected. It
was then that the name was changed to Memorial Park. The vault con
tains the dust of seamen, scouts, adventurers, distinguished Revolutionary
War veterans, and two of the wives of Spanish Governor Manuel Gayoso
de Lemos.
R. jrom S. Union St. on State St.
32. ST. JOSEPH S ACADEMY, NE. corner State and S. Commerce
250 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Sts., was organized in 1867 by the Sisters of Charity. In that year the
nuns purchased a large house with extensive grounds from a Dr. Chase,
Presbyterian minister, and moved their school to these quarters. Later the
other buildings were added.
L. from State St. on S. Commerce St.
33. The TRINITY EPISCOPAL CHURCH, SE. corner of S. Com
merce and Washington Sts., was erected in 1822. It is a rectangular brick
building with a gallery extending across the front. Tall Corinthian col
umns are a part of the wide portico, and two heavy shuttered doors open
into the beautiful interior. Here is a small slave gallery built over the
entrance.
L. from S. Commerce St. on Orleans St.; R. on S. Union St.
34. RAVENNA, 60 1 S. Union St. (open during Pilgrimage), is a
simple, two-story frame building erected in 1835 by William Harris.
Approached through a large iron gate, it has long, colonnaded galleries
both front and rear. The interior woodwork is carved in geometric de
signs of squares, angles, and wedges. From the back hall a graceful stair
way with mahogany hand rails curves upward. The furniture is of
rosewood.
Retrace S. Union St.; R. on Washigton St.
35. GREENLEAVES, SE. corner of Washington and S. Union Sts.
(open during Pilgrimage), is a raised, brick and frame house built before
1812. Of Greek Revival architecture, it has a narrow, classic portico with
Corinthian columns. In the rear is a detached brick kitchen erected in
the Spanish era. In the patio is a giant live-oak beneath which the
Natchez Indians are believed to have held their pow-wows. The 14 rooms
of Greenleaves are furnished as they were in the 1840 $ with carved
rosewood, gilt frame mirrors, and china said to have been painted by
Audubon.
36. THE ELMS, NE. corner Washington and S. Pine Sts. (open
during Pilgrimage), is thought to have been built by the Spanish Gov
ernor, Don Pedro Piernas, in 1785. Low ceilings, narrow window facings
with deep reveals, large chimneys, and heavy, hand-made iron hinges
indicate its Spanish origin. Galleries with slender columns extend across
the front and north sides. An iron stairway, once on the outside of the
building, is enclosed in the north hallway. A feature of the interior is
the set of old slave bells, each different in tone. Each house slave had
his own bell with its particular tone to call him to his duties. The garden
contains a lattice work eagle house and a brick archway thought to have
been part of an early Spanish mission, for the mission was usually part or
the official group of buildings in a Spanish settlement.
L. from Washington St. on St. Charles St.; R. on Main St.
37. ARLINGTON, E. end of Main St. (open during Pilgrimage),
reached through a large gate and down a long driveway, is considered
an excellent example of Greek Revival architecture. A square red brick
mansion, it has four tall, white columns supporting a classic pediment,
and a double portico. The upper gallery is enclosed with delicate ban
isters, and the lower gallery is paved with marble mosaic. Delicate fan-
ARLINGTON, NATCHEZ
lights both front and rear open into a long central hall. The interior
contains many of the original furnishings: gold brocades, carved rose
wood, large mirrors, paintings by Vernet, Sully, and Audubon, and a
library. Arlington was built by Mrs. James Surget White, daughter of
Pierre Surget, who settled in Natchez during Indian days. The architect
was James Hampton White, of New Jersey.
Retrace Main St.; L. on Arlington St.; L. on Hornochitto St.
38. DUNLEITH, Hornochitto St. (R) at S. end of Arlington St.
(open during Pilgrimage), is a stately, white-columned, Greek Revival
mansion. It is a square building with tall Greek Doric columns surrounded
by galleries enclosed with wrought-iron railings. At the rear is a kitchen
wing attached to the house, and farther hack arc brick carriage houses
and stables. Dunleith was built by Gen. Charles Dahlgren in 1847. The
grouping of the buildings is typical of the period.
$9, The ROUTH CEMETERY (L), on Hornochitto St. (not open),
is the private burial ground for the Routh family.
L. from Homochitto St. on Auburn RJ.
40. HOPE FARM, intersection of Auburn Rd. and Homochitto St.,
is a notable example of the hybrid English-Spanish style of architecture.
The rear wing, built in 1775, is one of the few architectural relics of
the English period. The front portion was built in 1790 by Carlos de
Grandpre, Spanish Governor from 1790 to 1794, and shows in its severe
252 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
lines the influence of Spanish Provincial architecture. Wooden pegs and
tongue and groove method of construction were used in building both
sections. The garden has a collection of flowering bulbs and camellia
japonica.
R. on Auburn Rd.
41. AUBURN, Auburn Rd. (R) at Park Ave. (open to public),
was built in 1812 by Judge Lyman G. Harding, first attorney general
of Mississippi Territory and of the State. Levi Weeks of Boston was
the architect. The plainness of Auburn s red brick walls is broken by
long triple hung windows with green shutters and the four heavy Ionic
columns of the two-story pedimented portico. The entrance door is im
posing, with side lights and a canopied fanlight transom. The lower
floor contains a front hall opening at right angles into a long vaulted
back hall, a drawing room, a banquet room and office, and a ladies
tea room. The outstanding feature of the interior is the spiral stairway.
A detached brick kitchen faces a courtyard in the rear. A brick carriage
house and a billiard hall are still standing. Auburn and its grounds were
deeded to the city of Natchez in 1911 by the Duncan heirs as a memorial
to Dr. Stephen Duncan, who purchased the estate in 1820. The grounds
were converted by the city into DUNCAN PARK. The park contains
swings, tennis courts, and an excellent i8-hole public golf course.
Tour 4-7/72.
E. from Wall St. on Mam St.; L. on N. Pine St.; R. on St. Catherine St.
42. HOSPITAL HILL, 70 St. Catherine St., is the site of the first
charity hospital in America. The hospital was incorporated in 1805, and
five acres of land surrounding it were deeded to the trustees by Don
Estevan Minor in 1813. The site is now occupied by the electric light
company.
43. HOME OF DON ESTEVAN MINOR, 42-44 St. Catherine St.
(private), a small, dilapidated, two-story, stuccoed brick house, retains its
severe Spanish line. Don Minor, a captain in the Spanish Army, came to
Natchez in 1783 as a subordinate under Governors Miro and Gayoso. Later,
he was Commandant at Natchez and, for a year preceding the Spanish
evacuation in 1798, Civil Governor. Minor was well liked by the Ameri
can settlers and, after the evacuation, remained at Natchez, became an
opulent planter, and died in 1815.
NATCHEZ 253
Tour -
S. from Main St. on S. Canal St.; R. on Irvine Ave. (an unpaved,
winding alley-like street).
44. THE BRIARS, W. end Irvine Ave. (open daily 9-4; adm. 50$ ),
is the best example of Southern Planter type of architecture in the
Natchez district. A white frame structure with green blinds, its sloping
roof, forming a 9O-foot gallery, is supported by slender columns. Dormer
windows light the upper floor. Three doors with fanlight transoms open
on the front gallery. The rear gallery is upheld by an arcade and has
a mahogany stairway at each end. Slave rooms are in the basement. The
Briars was built between 1812-15, an< ^ was ^ ater owned by William Burr
Howell, whose daughter, Varina, married Jefferson Davis here in 1845.
The Briars commands a view of the Mississippi River.
Retrace Irvine Ave.; R. on S. Canal St. 0.5 m. to private drive (L).
45. RICHMOND, end of long circular driveway (open daily 9-4;
adm. 25$), represents three distinct periods in architectural development.
The frame and brick central portion was built in 1786 by Juan San
Germaine, interpreter for the Spanish King. It is Spanish Provincial.
The timbers are hand-hewn, and the gutters are made of hollowed logs.
The lower or ground floors are bricked. The front, built in 1832, is Greek
Revival, with a pediment and four tall columns. The brick wing of
modified Empire design was added in 1850. Legend says that in the
Spanish regime the central portion of the house was a rendezvous for
river pirates.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Longwood, 2.9 m-, Homewood, 2.7 m., Lansdowne, 3.2 m., Monteigne, 1.5 m.,
Oakland, 1.7 m., Windy Hill Manor, 7.2 m., Monmouth, 1.4 m., Melrose, 2 m.,
D Evereux, 1.5 m., Washington, 6.5 m., Site of Elizabeth Female Academy, 8 m.,
Foster Mound, 9 m., Pine Ridge Church, 11.5 m., Mount Repose, 77.9 m., Peach-
land, 13 m. (see Tour 3, Sec. b).
Railroad Station: W. end of Jackson Ave. for Illinois Central R.R.
Bus Station: Mack s Cafe, Lamar Ave., for Tri-State Transit Co.
Taxis : io# per person within city limits.
Accommodations: One hotel.
Information Service: Service stations.
Motion Picture Houses: Two.
Swimming: University, adm., 25^.
Golf: University, greens fee 50^.
Annual Events: Spring festival on University Campus.
OXFORD (458 alt., 2,890 pop.), on a small wooded plateau overlooking
the snug valleys of the Central Hills, retains the persuasive charm and cul
ture of the Old South. Its character, like the essence of its appeal, is com
pounded of intangibles as elusive as the scent of its jasmines and as deli
cate as the humor of its town clock, the four faces of which seldom agree.
It has been the county seat of Lafayette and the site of the State university
for nearly a century, and it is these two factors, education and law, that
give to it its tone today. The white stuccoed courthouse, with its green roof
and clock cupola, centers the town. About the small grass-free courtyard,
shaded on the west by heaven trees, is a low iron fence handy for farm
ers to hitch their horses after having watered them at the nearby trough.
Facing the courthouse on four sides are the low red brick and stucco com
mercial buildings that form the business district which Oxford s leisured
trade has not outgrown. Leading from the square, shaded residence streets
climb a slight ridge or two before changing into highways or country lanes.
Cloistered behind the cedar, magnolia, and oak trees along these streets
are the homes that make Oxford today seem as it has always been, a town
dedicated to the cultural and social life revolving around the university.
Tradition is important; the current of Oxford s life is not swift but
deep. The people are not prosperous as in the days "before the war," but
they are comfortably sustained by the university and by the farmers who
come in on Saturdays to do business on the square. It is the headquarters
of the Northern District of the United States Court, and the headquarters
of the northern division of the State highway department. As yet no in
dustry has intruded upon its serenity, nor has the town felt the pain of ex
panding beyond original boundaries. In 1928 it received a silver cup for
being the cleanest and best kept town in the State.
Oxford s unskilled and domestic labor is drawn from its Negro pop
ulation, approximately 900. Negro men mow the lawns, trim the boxwood
hedges, and work the gardens of the white townspeople; their wives are
OXFORD 255
cooks, nursemaids, and washerwomen. Many of them feel the pride of be
longing, boast of lifetime service with one family, and live in quarters that
their parents and grandparents occupied before them. Others are confined
to districts fringing the town, their homes the small cabins common to
Mississippi Negro families.
In 1835 John Chisholm, John J. Craig, and John D. Martin made their
way into the territory ceded by the Chickasaw Indians and, stopping in the
section now comprising Lafayette County, set up business in a log store
they built near what is now Oxford s town square. Close on their heels
came Robert Shegog and Thomas D. Isom, the latter obtaining a position
as clerk in the store built by the former. The influx of settlers was rapid ;
stimulated by the enthusiastic descriptions of early traders, there swarmed
into the ". . . fairy land (of) park-like forests and waving native
grasses . . ." adventurers, speculators, and would-be landowners. On June
12, 1836, Chisholm, Craig, and Martin bought from Ho-kah, a Chickasaw
Indian woman, section 21, township 8, range 3 west. Ho-kah affixed her
signature to the deed by making a cross mark, and to make the deed legal
beyond doubt two other citizens certified "... that the above named Ho-
kah is able to take care of her own affairs." After securing the land, the
three traders donated 50 acres to the board of police to establish a county
seat. The following year the village was laid out and incorporated, the first
city minutes bearing the date May n, 1837. Isom, voicing the hope that
such a promising spot would catch the plum of the State university then
under consideration, suggested the name Oxford. In 1838 the inhabitants
numbered 400. There were no churches but arrangements had been made
for two; there were two hotels, six stores, and two seminaries of educa
tion. Beasconn, a contemporary writer, described it as one of the most
pleasant towns in the whole region.
The hope of Oxford s citizens was fulfilled when the State university
opened in 1848. Eight years earlier the Mississippi Legislature had passed
an act providing for the State university and, with a commission appointed
to select the site, Oxford had been chosen by a margin of one vote. The
institution under the administration of Dr. Augustus B. Longstreet, elected
president after the first session, drew some of the South s most brilliant
minds to Oxford, and until the outbreak of the War between the States, a
society of culture and gaiety flourished. An opera house was built, bringing
many famous entertainers to the town. Young men held tilting tourna
ments that resembled in their color and pageantry the jousts of Scott s ro
mances. Sober-minded scholars divided their attention between their books
and addresses to the crowds gathered on the courthouse square.
The War between the States, however, put a blight upon the gay little
town. No major battles were fought in Oxford, but it suffered from Fed
eral raids and from the necessity of helping supply troops and provisions
to the Confederacy. By August, 1861, nine companies of infantry and cav
alry had been drawn from the town and sent to Florida, Kentucky, and
Virginia. Breaking the precedent of enlisting for 12 months, three of these
companies enlisted for service "during the war." After the Battle of Shiloh
the buildings of the university were used as a hospital for the sick and
256 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
wounded. General Grant s forces occupied the town from early in Decem
ber 1862 until Christmas Day. On August 22, 1864, the court records say,
"The Public Enemy under A. J. Smith came to Oxford . . . and burned the
town, including the courthouse." In reporting the destruction the Oxford
Falcon quoted travelers as saying that Oxford was the most completely de
molished town they had seen.
Oxford, before the war, possessed new lands and a new university to
draw wealthy and brilliant persons from the older States. Oxford, after the
war, accepted more than its share of the economic problems of reconstruc
tion and the social problems of reconciliation on which to prove the lead
ership of its still brilliant but no longer wealthy citizens. For 25 years,
from the end of the war until 1890, the town furnished Mississippi and
the Nation with many influential leaders. Isom, Hill, Thompson, Lamar,
and others gained State and national recognition for their work. But since
1890, when new political ideals and leaders came into power in the State,
Oxford, like a sensitive plant, has refused to spread. There is a dreamy
lethargy about the place that even the post-war progressiveness of the uni
versity cannot penetrate. Static and preoccupied, it has remained at ease
while a native son and two of its one-time citizens have limned it for the
public. It is the "Jefferson" of William Faulkner s novels and the scene of
several of Stark Young s stories (see ARTS and LETTERS); its court
house square was the subject for John McCrady s painting, Town Square,
POINTS OF INTEREST
1. The HOME OF WILLIAM FAULKNER, 900 Garfield St. (pri
vate), was built in 1848 by Robert Shegog. It is a two-and-one-half story
clapboarded house of modified Greek Revival design. Its pedimented front
portico has slender square columns and a balcony above the entrance door
way. The house is approached by a long tree-bordered walk. Faulkner, who
still maintains his home here, has made several additions, but fundamen
tally the house remains as it was when built.
2. The SITE OF JACOB THOMPSON S HOME, Garfield St. diago
nally across from the Faulkner home, is marked by offices, carriage houses,
and a gatekeeper s lodge that escaped destruction by Union soldiers in 1864.
Thompson, Secretary of the Interior in the cabinet of President Buchanan,
built the house, a 20-room mansion, for his young wife, Kate Jones, daugh
ter of a Revolutionary soldier. Kate was so beautiful that, immediately
after their marriage, Thompson placed her in school in France instead of
taking her with him to Washington. When he finally permitted her to
join him in Washington, the Prince of Wales, then on a visit to the States,
asked her to lead a ball given in his honor. Kate s presentation at the Eng
lish Court so pleased Queen Victoria that she gave the young girl a gold
thimble set with diamonds, a gift that became part of the loot of a Federal
raider. In 1863 Thompson at the request of President Davis headed a se
cret mission to Canada, where, in cooperation with Vallandigham of Ohio,
he was to foment insurrection in the Western States, a plan of which noth
ing came.
.**
m
I?
HOME OF WILLIAM FAULKNER, OXFORD
3. The HOME OF L. Q. C. LAMAR, 616 N. i4th St. (private), is a
simple cream-colored frame cottage built prior to the War between the
States. Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar was a member of Congress, Sec
retary of the Interior in Cleveland s cabinet, and a U.S. Supreme Court
Justice. He is famous for the memorable eulogy he gave Charles Sumner.
This speech made while in Congress was a prime factor in reconciling the
North and the South (see Tour 14).
4. ST. PETER S CEMETERY, E. end of Jefferson Avc., surrounded by
a low vine-covered fence and shaded by soft evergreen trees, has been the
town s burying ground since the settlement began. Here is the grave of
Lamar, bearing the inscription "L.Q.C. Lamar, 1825-1893." By the side of
Lanur s qrave is that of Augustus Baldwin Longstreet, Lamar s father-in-
law. Longstrcct, the author of Georgia Scenes, a book that set the pattern
for Southern humor in the generation before the war, was made president
of the newly opened University of Mississippi in 1849, and was instru
mental in bringing Lamar to Oxford shortly after he himself had arrived.
Here also are the graves of Senator Sullivan, Judge Hill, and Dr. Isom.
5. DR. T. D. ISOM HOME, 1003 Jefferson Ave. (open by permis
sion), is a white clapboarded two-story Planter-type house with a wide gal
lery and six square white columns across the front. Over the entrance door
is a small frame balcony. The exact date at which the house was erected is
258 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
unknown, but it is said to have been standing in the latter part of the
1 830*5. The jig-saw brackets on the caps of the square gallery columns are
of later date. Thomas Dudley Isom was one of the earliest settlers of Ox
ford, having arrived here in his youth ; after some years of study of medi
cine in Kentucky, he returned to practice his profession. Of all Oxford s
early citizens he is perhaps the best remembered. Dr. Isom s redheaded
daughter Sarah was the only woman member of the university faculty.
Known as "Miss Sally," Sarah had a magnificent deep voice and gained in
ternational recognition as a "reader." Her reading or Poe s Raven brought
her an invitation to read in England.
6. The R. A. HILL PLACE, 419 N. Lamar St. (private), a gray two-
story structure, of modified Victorian Gothic design, with a gallery on each
floor and a bay on the right, was the home of Robert A. Hill, one of the
most influential personalities in reconciling the North and the South. Born
March 25, 1811, in Iredell County, N. C., Robert received only a few
weeks schooling each year ; further education he acquired at home with his
father s help. In 1855 he moved to Mississippi and the following year was
appointed judge of united courts of Mississippi. Two years later he was
elected probate judge, serving in this capacity until the end of the War be
tween the States, when he was apointed chancellor by Provisional Gover
nor Sharkey. Judge Hill was no politician and, opposed to secession, took
no part in the war. By sheer personal integrity he retained the confidence
of both factions, and was elected by his county as delegate to Governor
Clark s constitutional convention in May 1865 and, after this convention
was prevented from meeting, to the one called by Governor Sharkey in
August of the same year. A personal friend of President Johnson, he was
appointed judge of the Mississippi Circuit in 1866 and was the only "oper
ating" judge in the State until 1869. Judge Hill was a trustee of the Uni
versity of Mississippi and several other educational institutions. He died in
1900. The house was bought by D. I. Sultan, merchant and lumberman.
7. The OLD OPERA HOUSE, 106-108 S. Lamar St. (open), one of a
long line of attached commercial buildings, was once the center of Ox
ford s civic culture. It is a square, two-story brick structure with a flat roof,
and a balcony across the front. The second floor auditorium, unused for
years, is approached from the sidewalk by a stairway which divides the
lower floor into equal parts. For a decade before and after the War be
tween the States the country s leading singers, musicians, and lecturers ap
peared here. Because the university did not permit dancing in its halls, the
students held their balls in the opera house.
8. The LAW OFFICE OF SEN. WILLIAM V. SULLIVAN, 1013
Jackson Ave. (private), sits back from the sidewalk, a typical mid-Victorian
brick structure resembling a small cottage more than an office building.
The right side, half hidden by foliage, is softened by the dense shade of a
red magnolia. Born in Montgomery County December 18, 1857, William
V. Sullivan first attended the University of Mississippi then was gradu
ated with the first law class of Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tenn.
Admitted to the Mississippi bar, he moved to Oxford in 1878; here he be
came a member of the Board of Aldermen. Sullivan served in Congress as
OXFORD 259
Representative from March 4, 1897, to May 31, 1898, when he was ap
pointed as Senator to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Sen. Edward
C. Walthall (see HOLLY SPRINGS). Subsequently elected to the U.S.
Senate, he served until March 3, 1901. Senator Sullivan died in Oxford
March i, 1918.
Of Senator Sullivan s five children, only his daughter, Ellen Sullivan
Woodward, has followed in his footsteps. In 1925 she was elected to the
State Legislature, the second woman to serve in the House of Representa
tives. This was the beginning of a career of outstanding service to her
State in key positions: on the State Board of Development (1926-33) ; on
the State Research Commission (1930); on the State Board of Public
Welfare (1932). These activities led to her being chosen to organize and
head the Women s Division under Harry Hopkins, Administrator of the
Federal Relief Program (1933) and to become the only woman Assistant
Administrator of the Works Progress Administration (1935).
Mrs. Woodward s interest in and work for library extension service be
gan while she was in the Mississippi Legislature, and it is largely to her
credit that Mississippi has library facilities in every county of the State
From the beginning of her career, Mrs. Woodward has stood consist
ently for the principle that women should receive equal pay with men for
equal services.
9. The NEILSON HOME, nth and Fillmore Sts. (private), is one of
the best preserved ante-bellum homes in Oxford. Built in 1855 by W. S.
Neilson, this massive square house is flanked on two sides by porticos with
slender square columns two stories in height, and fine classic pediments.
The interior is planned in the form of a Maltese cross. In the yard, shaded
by cedars and magnolias, occurred an incident mentioned in So Red the
Rose: a small Negro boy who climbed into a tree to hide from Federal
raiders was shot and instantly killed.
10. The KATE SKIPWITH HOME, 508 University Ave. (private),
on a spacious lawn overlooking the street, is a peak- roofed cream frame
house. In the Skipwith art collection is a portrait of Ellen Adair Beatty,
daughter of John Adair, Governor of Kentucky 1820-24, anc ^ celebrated
Oxford beauty. Ellen was presented at many of the courts of Europe, in
cluding that of St. James.
11. HILGARD S CUT, under the University Ave. bridge, was dug by
Dr. Isom s slaves to bring the Mississippi Central R.R. through Oxford. It
was hoped that by bringing the trains past this point the passengers would
have an opportunity to see the new university. But the cut was made too
deep; when the trains passed through, the passengers saw only the bright
red clay banks. It is the deepest cut on the Illinois Central line and is
named for Dr. E. W. Milliard, an early State geolo.
12. The UNIVERSITY OF MISSISSIPPI, foot of University Ave., oc
cupies 640 acres of wooded hill lands, with the campus and the older, red
brkk, white-columned buildings half-hidden by the shade ot" great oak
trtxs. The Lyceum building, erected in 1848, is the center. Greek Revival
in style, its wide spreading wings and towering white columns set the ar-
260 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
chitectural theme of the campus. The other buildings are grouped in the
form of two great tangential circles. The east circle, swinging around a
low forested bowl of natural beauty, is formed by the older structures. The
west circle, swinging up into the more open hills, includes the latest addi
tions to the university s physical equipment. These newer buildings, erected
with the $1,600,000 appropriated by the legislature in 1929 and designed
by Frank F. Gates, are of Classical Revival design with the simple classic
details. Constructed of light red brick, two and three stories high, they
have pedimented porticos with white columns. To avoid the monotony of
a single perspective the porticos vary in design ; some are Doric, some are
Corinthian.
The founding of the university was provided by an act of the legislature
of 1840. Four years later the college was chartered and the first board of
trustees of 13 members was appointed. In another four years the four-
member faculty received the first enrollment of 80 students. These early
students, sons of planters, brought their horses and slaves to college with
them. The records indicate that the majority of them were poorly prepared
for college work. Under a wise administration, however, the university
grew in numbers and in public confidence, soon taking rank as one of the
best equipped institutions in the country.
The advent of the War between the States in 1861 seriously interrupted
the progress of the university. The students organized a company that be
came historic as the University Grays. The faculty, cancelling an order for
the world s largest telescope, resigned. The university closed its doors. In
the following four years the buildings sometimes were used by Confeder
ate and sometimes by Federal troops. After the Battle of Shiloh they were
used as a hospital for approximately 1,500 sick and wounded Confederate
soldiers, 700 of whom are buried in the little cemetery near the campus.
From the opening of the university in 1848 to the year 1870, the "close
curriculum" was in use. The university was handicapped by the tendency
to keep it as a liberal arts and law school and to relegate vocational sub
jects to the land grant colleges. There was a prescribed course of study
leading to the B. A. degree and a prescribed course of study leading to the
LL.B. degree, and the student took precisely either one or the other of
these courses. This classicalism caused the university gradually to be known
as a rich man s school, an unfortunate position for an institution in a farm
ing state. In the year 1870 the principle of the "elective" system was
adopted, but so deeply had the idea of a rich man s school embedded itself
in the minds of Mississippians that they sought to democratize the insti
tution by condemning the fraternity system in a legislative committee s re
port. In 1912 the fraternities were abolished, not to return until 1926.
Beginning with the session of 188283, women have been admitted to
the university on the same terms and conditions as men. In 1892 prepara
tory courses were discontinued and since that time the grade of educa
tional work has advanced fully one year. The enrollment has increased
from 167 to 1,361 (1936-37).
The university, in 1937, included nine divisions, ranging from the orig
inal College of Liberal Arts through the Extension Division to the Gradu-
TUPELO 26l
ate School, founded in 1927. The majority of the graduate students enter
the profession of law, with approximately 90 percent of the State s lawyers
and politicians receiving their education at "Ole Miss."
Railroad Station: Union Station, foot of Spring St., for St. Louis & San Francisco
R.R. and Mobile & Ohio R.R.
Bus Station: Courthouse Square for Tri-State Transit Co. and Greyhound Bus Lines.
Taxis: Intra-city rates lotf per person.
Airport: Municipal, 31/2 m. W. on Chestcrville Pike, taxi fare 50^, time 10 min.
No scheduled service.
Information S erv ice: Chamber of Commerce, Lyric Theater Bldg.
Accommodations: Four hotels; tourist camps.
Motion Picture Houses: Two.
Swimming: Municipal pool, N. Madison St. between Franklin and Jackson Sts.
Rates 15^ per person.
Col]: Tupelo Country Club, ll/ 2 m. NW. on US 78 (R), 9 holes, moderate greens
fee.
Annual Events: Northeast Mississippi-Alabama Fair, last of September or first of
October.
TUPELO (289 alt., 6,361 pop.) is perhaps Mississippi s best example of
what contemporary commentators call the "New South" industry rising
in the midst of agriculture and agricultural customs. It has a pattern-like
consistency of one-story, clapboard residences and two- and three-story red
brick business buildings. These business houses, with stores on the street
level and offices or factories in the upper stories, lie knotted in the angle
formed by the crossing of the Mobile & Ohio and Frisco railroad tracks.
The main residential section, emerging gradually from the business dis
trict, stretches into the slowly climbing hills north and west. A number of
the houses, rebuilt after the tornado of 1936, were constructed with the
advice of a planning commission. They are mostly white, one-story Colo
nial in type, with green roofs and shutters. Yet here and there the line of
bright new green against glistening white is broken by a deep brown roof
or a two-story home of faced brick.
South of the Union Station, which forms the angle s apex, lies another
residential section. This is a small, unpaved district of standardized four-
and five-room houses sheltering the mill folk. The houses, painted alter
nately yellow trimmed in white and white trimmed in yellow, are set in
262 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
unsodded yards behind sagging picket and wire fences. They were built by
the cotton mill and are rented to its employees. Biting off the northeast
corner of the district is the recreational ground with a diminutive baseball
diamond and grandstand. Facing South Spring Street across the ballground
is the low, one-story red brick grammar school built especially for the chil
dren of cotton mill employees. This section of Tupelo is referred to either
as "South Tupelo" or "Mill Town."
Looking down upon the residential section proper from the northern
ends of Madison and Green Streets, and fringing the town eastward into
the flat bottom land, which lies across the Mobile & Ohio tracks, is the
Negro section. The houses on the hilltops are more or less substantial five-
and six-room structures and, in a great many instances, are owned by their
occupants. Here, too, are the two Negro churches, of red brick construc
tion, with square spires and Gothic windows, and the Lee County Train
ing School, an accredited high school for Negroes. But, as if influenced by
the topography, the quality of the houses drops with the land, until those
around Park Lake and in the low flats are hardly more than shacks. It is
in the latter section, called "Shakerag," that a majority of the cooks,
nurses, and house servants of Tupelo live. A few of the Negro men of
Tupelo are professional men but the majority are unskilled laborers. The
Negroes compose 39.5 percent of Tupelo s population.
Key city to an agricultural area circling on a 2 5 -mile radius, Tupelo took
its early wealth from rich black land and, never quite breaking with the
land, invested in industry. It is a pioneer city at heart and was among the
first to practice successfully the economic philosophy that factory employees
should live on subsistence farms outside of town and commute to and from
their work. Widely publicized as the "First TV A City," it earlier achieved
distinction among Southern cities for the concrete roads approaching it. In
its courthouse were written the first drainage laws in the nation.
With those who work at the cotton mill excepted, the majority of fac
tory laborers in Tupelo are girls and young women who form a surplus
supply of labor on surrounding farms. Each morning a fleet of busses gath
ers up the workers and brings them into town; each afternoon the same
busses return the workers to their homes. The cotton mill laborers are
stable, many of them of the group who moved into the new mill houses
built for them when the mill was first opened; others are the children,
now grown, of these workers.
The region around Tupelo was a part of the land obtained from the
Chickasaw Indians by the Treaty of Pontotoc in 1832. Immediately after
the opening of the land, settlers from the eastern seaboard States moved in
and by 1848 had established themselves as well-to-do farmers. In that
year, C. C. Thompson built a store on land belonging to Judge W. R.
Harris, one of the wealthy prairie planters, and named the site Harrisburg.
Within three years two stores were built. The village continued to thrive
until 1859, when the tracks of the Mobile & Ohio R.R. were laid two
miles to the east and a gradual abandonment of Harrisburg began. The
people moved east, down from the upper slope of the ridge into the flat,
marshy bottoms, where there were no stores or dwelling houses, but a rail-
TUPELO 263
road and plenty of tupelo gum trees. By the end of the first year, the first
arrivals had built a store, a temporary railroad station, and two saloons.
These stood opposite the present freight depot, on the east side of the rail
road. Because of the nearness of a small pond lined with tupelo gum trees,
the new station was called Gum Pond. But later the first citizens wished to
honor the trees that had supplied the timber for their homes, so they
changed the name to Tupelo (Ind., lodging place).
During the War between the States General Beauregard retreated to
Tupelo after the battle of Shiloh, and encamped here during the summer
of 1862. Later General Forrest made his headquarters in the Younger
home. On July 14, 1864, the Confederate army under the command of
Stephen D. Lee paused at Tupelo to give battle to the pursuing Union
army commanded by A. J. Smith. The two armies met on the hilltop where
the village of Harrisburg had been. It was the last major battle and one
of the bloodiest fought in Mississippi. Cavalry General Forrest, whose
wounded foot forced him from horseback into a carriage, drove madly up
and down the Confederate lines, swearing at officers and giving orders
wholesale. One of the orders miscarried, and the battle was lost for the
Confederates an incident which Joe Smith, once of the Forrest cavalry,
described as "making the General so mad he stunk." But though the Con
federate troops were beaten back, the Federals retreated two days later.
Robert S. Henry, in his Story of the Confederacy, says: "General Smith was
uneasy in his mind. That night he burned Harrisburg and started on his
retreat to Memphis. He left so hurriedly that he abandoned 250 of his se
riously wounded, their wounds undressed, to be found by the Confederates
in Tupelo, a ghastly sight with open wounds fly-blown and festering. . . .
It was a strange spectacle, an army which had just won a pitched battle
drawing back from an enemy of half its own size which it had just
beaten." In the winter of 1864-65, 20,000 Confederates rested at Tupelo.
On October 6, 1866, Lee County was formed from Itawamba and Pon-
totoc Counties, and after considerable wrangling on the part of the older
towns, Tupelo was selected as the county seat, and a courthouse was built.
This raised Tupelo from the category of village to that of town, and
brought to it the adventurous young men who cut themselves off from es
tablished families in other communities, and who later forsook the land
for the machine, thus shaping Tupelo into an industrial city. Cultural
progress was manifested on September i, 1871, when, according to John
Thompson s announcement in the Tupelo Journal, "school was opened to
day in the new building near the Baptist Church with 30 pupils."
In 1875 the town was grouped around Main Street, with three brick
Store buildings, a brick bank, a courthouse, and several business houses.
The population was slightly less than 100. There were no sidewalks or
paved streets, and the large area between Main Street and the courthouse
square served the farm people in town to trade as a "hitching yard." In
wet weather the little holes caused by the restless pawing of horses hoofs
on the earth would fill with water and turn green. The hitching yard was
also the "swapping ground," where farmer met merchant and traded pro
duce for merchandise.
264 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
In 1887 the Memphis & Birmingham R.R., now the St. Louis & San
Francisco, called the Frisco, swerved slightly out of a more direct course to
cross the Mobile & Ohio tracks at Tupelo. This gave the town rail trans
portation in four directions, and enabled it to develop in a more substan
tial way. Connecting streets, now called Spring, Broadway, and Green,
were cut, and Main Street was extended. In 1890 electric lights were in
stalled and one year later a charter of incorporation was granted by the
State. Then, with electric lights, a city charter, and thousands of "bottom
acres" made available for farming by a system of 36 drainage canals (the
latter of which were the outcome of the first drainage laws passed in the
nation), the citizens financed one of the first cotton mills in the State.
The cotton mill was Tupelo s first step away from the land, but since its
establishment the growth of the city has been largely identical with the
growth of the cotton goods manufacture in the State. With money dug
from the earth rather than with "outside capital," a work-shirt factory was
built, as well as a woman s dress factory, a factory for making baby clothes,
and finally, a cottonseed products plant. Outside capital was represented in
a compress and a fertilizer factory.
Tupelo still retains its ties with the land. Cattle breeding and dairying
led to the establishment of a condensery, whose trucks return each after
noon loaded with cans of milk picked up at surrounding farms. Each
Wednesday and Thursday cattle auctions draw buyers from as far as North
Dakota.
On October n, 1933, the city entered into TVA s first contract for the
purchase of power to be generated at Wilson Dam, 75 miles northeast of
Tupelo. Initial service was inaugurated February 7, 1934. With a total
first year s saving to residential and commercial consumers amounting to
$53,000, consumption for residential users increased 114 percent and for
commercial users 77 percent.
On April 5, 1936, a violent tornado struck old Harrisburg, now a sub
division, swept through Willis Heights, another subdivision, and roared
down into the hitherto hill-protected city of Tupelo. In 33 seconds, 201
persons were killed, 1,000 injured; hosts of others wandered helplessly,
without homes, schools, or places of worship. The great oak trees lay
broken or uprooted. In less than a minute Tupelo received the most disas
trous blow ever delivered to a Mississippi town. Within six months, how
ever, Tupelo had built new homes, repaired the churches, and designed
new, modern schools.
On April 8, 1937, approximately 100 cotton mill employees struck for
higher wages, the first strike in the history of the mill. Unable to reach an
agreement with the strikers, the board of directors of the mill voted to
liquidate, throwing not only the strikers but also an additional 350 em
ployees out of work. The cotton mill workers were not organized, but
since the strike the garment workers have formed a local union.
Tupelo s history and character are epitomized in the view from the
south front of the Union Station. In autumn, the bottom lands just over
the tracks at the left are white with bolls of growing cotton; directly to
the right, South Spring Street is blocked with trailers, trucks, and wagons
TUPELO 265
piled high with dusty bales. Swarming about the bales, in and out among
the vehicles, are buyers and sellers, who pull a large handful from each
bale, hastily grade the fiber, ami. again hastily, drop the fiber to the street
to bargain with the farmer. Within a two-block area of the Union Station
the cotton is ginned, compressed, dyed, made into yarn, into thread, into
cloth, and finally into shirts, dresses, and baby clothes. Within the same
area, the seed is milled for oil, hulls, and meal.
>>>>
Tour i.zm
S. from Main St. on S. Spring St.
1. TUPELO COTTON MILL (R) S. Spring St. (open weekdays 8-4;
tours), one of the largest cotton producing units in the South, manufac
tures more than 25 miles of cloth per day. The mill operates in two build
ings, one on each side of the street. The building on the left, where the
cotton is dyed and spun into thread, is a two-story, dilapidated red brick
structure with a flat roof and many windows. Adjacent to it is a one-story
addition called the dyeing shed. The building on the right is well venti
lated, of brick, and two stories in height. In this building the thread, con
veyed by cable across the street, is respun for the looms, then woven into
cloth. In front of the building is the small, brick, bungalow-shaped office
building.
L. from S. Spring St. on Elizabeth St. across the M. & O. R.R.
2. TUPELO FISH HATCHERY (R) Elizabeth St. (open weekdays 8-4;
tours), owned and operated by the U.S. Government, is the only fish
hatchery in the State. Here in artificial pools of fresh water among green
lawns and weeping willow trees, the Government propagates fish for the
lakes and streams of the State. The well-kept grounds are Tupelo s favorite
picnicking resort. The hatchery is often called "Private" John Allen s
Hatchery, because his influence while a member of the House of Repre
sentatives helped procure it for his home town, Tupelo.
R. from Elizabeth St. on Green St.
3. TUPELO GARMENT PLANT (R) Green St. (open week,
tours), manufactures work and dress shirts in a three-story rectangular red
brick building paralleling the Frisco railroad tracks. On a lower floor of
this building, cloth, in many layers, is cut to pattern by a keen-bladed elec
tric knife; then sent to an upstairs sewing room to be stitched on machines
by women operators. Each operator performs a single operation. When
the shirt is completed it is inspected, ironed, and wrapped for shipment.
266 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
R. from Green St. on Clark St.; L. on 5". Spring St.
4. REED S MANUFACTURING PLANT, S. Spring St. (R) bet. Mag
azine and Clark Sts. (open weekdays 8-4; tours), occupies the second and
third floors of a three-story red brick building of modern design. Six hun
dred or more women operators produce women s work dresses, smocks,
and aprons.
L. from S. Spring St. on Main St.
5. MILAM MANUFACTURING PLANT, Main St. (L) bet. Broad
way and Green Sts. (open weekdays 8-4; tours), operates on the second
floor of a commercial building. This is the only factory in the State that
produces children s wear. Various garments are shipped to retail and de
partment stores, the majority being the baby aprons which this company
originated.
6. The BOULDER, parkway at intersection of Main and Church Sts., is
a granite stone commemorating De Soto s alleged march through here in
1540-41. It was placed by the Colonial Dames.
L. from Main St. on S. Church St.; R. on Carnation St.
7. CARNATION MILK PLANT (R) Carnation St. (open weekdays
8-4; tours), occupies a modern two-and-a-half -story building of white
stucco, with a tall white smokestack. The building stands on a terrace. The
plant receives approximately 17,500,000 pounds of milk from the sur
rounding farms each year and condenses it into about 30,000,000 cans of
condensed milk. The milk is poured into large vats, then passed through
copper condensers to the tin containers or cans.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
Tupelo Homestead Resettlement Project, 5.9 m. (see Tour 4); Tombigbee State
Park, 7.4 m. (see Tour 9) ! Old Walker Home, 4.2 m. (see Tour 14).
Railroad Station: Cherry St. for Illinois Central System.
Bus Station: 800 South St. for Tri-State Transit Co., Dixie Greyhound Lines, Oliver
Coach Line.
Airport: Municipal, 6 m. NE., on Vicksburg-Oak Ridge Road. No scheduled service.
Ferry Line: Mississippi River Ferry Co. between Vicksburg and Delta, La. Landing
at foot of Clay St. and Mississippi River. Fare for automobile and driver, 50^;
additional passengers, 15^ each.
Bridge Service: Mississippi River Bridge, fare for automobile with driver, $1.25;
additional passengers, 15$.
VICKSBURG 267
Taxis: ice 1 up.
Intra-city bus line: Fare 5^.
Traffic Regulations: Turns may be made in either direction at intersections of all
streets except where traffic lights direct otherwise. Right turn on red traffic light.
Downtown parking space free.
Accommodations: Three hotels; rooming and boarding houses; tourist camps.
Information Service: Chamber of Commerce, Carroll Hotel, Clay St.
R.tdio Station: WQBC (1360 kc.)
Motion Picture Houses: Four.
Athletics: Y.M.C.A. on Clay St.; City League Baseball, City Park, Drummond St.
Swimming: Mount Memorial Swimming Pool, municipal, Drummond St.
Tennis: City Park, Drummond St. (free).
Golf : National Park Golf Course, 18 holes, reasonable greens fee, Union Ave. just
outside Vicksburg National Military Park.
Parks: Vicksburg National Military Park, free guides, Administration Bldg., Pem-
berton Ave., or Contact Station, at Memorial Arch, Clay St.
Fishing: On rivers and nearby lakes.
Annual Events: Historic Tour Week, held in Spring; Annual National Assembly of
Descendants of Participants of Campaign, Siege and Defense of Vicksburg, held
in Spring.
VICKSBURG (206 alt., 22,943 pop.), Mississippi s third largest city
and major river port, is a leisurely town, rich in historic associations and
natural beauty. Sprawling over the highest of a line of bluffs and over
looking the junction of the Yazoo Canal and the Mississippi River, it is
a city of precipitous streets, natural terraces, and wooded ravines. During
the War between the States Vicksburg was called the "Gibraltar of the
Confederacy" and was the objective of the western campaigns. Since the
war, and without relinquishing the customs and traditions of a river
community, it has emerged from reconstruction and yellow fever into
the "Hill City," an inland port of the New South.
The business district, dominated by the tall, sandy-colored cupola of
the ante-bellum courthouse, parallels and climbs abruptly from the river
front, an architectural mixture of ante-bellum porticos, gingerbread orna
ments of the 1890*5 and modern steel and concrete buildings two and
three stories high. Higher among the bluffs, clinging in scattered groups
to the less precarious terraces, are the residences. Both the ante-bellum
homes, placed by right of priority on the comparatively secure terraces,
and the newer homes, built after the War between the States on streets
that often are almost sheer, have a stern, militaristic appearance.
Scattered about the city, clustered in the ravine bottoms, and facing the
river from north Washington Street, are the Negro quarters. Infrequently
these homes are solid brick houses abandoned by white persons; more
often they are two- and three-room cabins, dwarfed by the backdrop of
towering, steep-sided cliffs.
Vicksburg is the seat of a cotton county that supports gins, compresses,
and warehouses; as a start to a new industry a garment factory was built
in 1936. But as yet the city s chief business comes from the river that
shaped its destiny. Barge lines have their terminals here for the ship
ment of hardwood lumber, cotton, and cattle; the Government main-
268
MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
DuuuuuUUUULj
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VICKSBURG
Federal Writers Project 1937
tains here the river fleet and the general headquarters of flood control
work on the Mississippi and its tributaries; nearby is the United States
Waterways Experiment Station (see Tour 2). This government work re
quires skilled machinists and mechanics, technical engineers and drafts
men, while the handling of cotton, shipping, and levee building demand
hardy, unskilled labor. Because stevedoring and roustabouting are jobs
still left to the Negro, Vicksburg s Negro population is 51.9 percent
VICKSBURG 269
of the total, the third largest urban percentage in the State. Under the
leadership of Bishop Green, one of the outstanding Negro leaders of
the State, the Negroes of Vicksburg were given an impetus to social and
educational improvement. Today they have their own professional group,
a modern, well-equipped Y. M. C. A., a private school of approved
high school standing (St. Mary s), and two high schools, units of the
city school system. But "Catfish Row" along the river still exists, and
it is here that a majority of the Negroes spend their leisure hours.
The bluffs over which Vicksburg is spread are formed in part of a
peculiar loess formation, a brown dust, or more accurately, a rock flour,
blown eons ago from the Mississippi basin. The loess, caked 20 to 40
feet thick on all elevations and covered with jungle-like vegetation, often
rises in sheer precipices. This makes a wild, rugged contour that has the
appearance of distant castles, and gives to Vicksburg the air of a city
in perpetual siege. This is not inappropriate, however, for by a siege
Vicksburg is best known; and a pattern of violence following land spec
ulation and turbulent river trade stands out, like the bluffs themselves, in
the city s history.
In 1790 the Spaniards recognized the military advantages of the bluffs,
obtained a land grant from the Indians, and established an outpost here.
The following year, they built a fort on the highest hill and called it
Nogales, for the many walnut trees that grew on it. Later, the flatboatmen
and other voyagers, who sighted the point above the great bend in the
river, renamed it Walnut Hills. In 1814 the Rev. Newitt Vick, a Metho
dist minister, came from Virginia and established one of the first missions
in Mississippi in "the open woods." This was a clearing, six miles
east of the present city, denuded of its timber by the Indians who had
made the Walnut Hills their camping grounds.
Vick, evidently, was as good a business man as he was a minister. The
War of 1812 was over; cotton culture had been made highly profitable
by the introduction of slaves and the invention of the cotton gin. The
first steamboat appeared on the Mississippi River, and settlers poured
in from Virginia, the Carolinas, Kentucky, and the uplands of the East
ern Seaboard States so Vick bought another tract of land, this time a
piece that fronted the river, and planned to lay out a city. In 1819,
however, before his enterprise was well begun, he and his wife died of
yellow fever and his son-in-law, John Lane, as executor of the estate,
sold the city lots and started the town. In 1825 the people named their
sprawling village Vicksburg in Vick s honor.
True to its founder s expectation, Vicksburg became the export point
for central Mississippi and the settlement, like other frontier river towns,
expanded rapidly. Wagons, pulled by six and eight yokes of oxen, hauled
bales of cotton from a radius of 100 miles to the little inland port, where
it was stacked high on the cargo decks of river boats and shipped down
stream to New Orleans. Merchandise from Europe was tugged laboriously
upstream by churning "paddle wheelers" to be landed here, then hauled
across the hills and through the bogs to inland communities. With the
crops and water routes and slave labor to be metamorphosed into wealth
MISSISSIPPI MONUMENT, VICKSBURG NATIONAL MILITARY PARK
and culture, men of means came down the river and down the Natchez
Trace to add new energy to the thriving community.
The first settlers, full of years and prosperity, soon lost themselves in
their "segars," their families, their palatial homes, and their gardens
which stretched beyond the rugged terraces down to the river itself. But
by 1830 newcomers composed a majority of the 3,000 population. They
were second sons of families well established in Eastern States, mostly
lawyers, doctors, and professional men, alone in a frontier society with
a tendency toward a more energetic and unrestrained mode of life. They
lived well but recklessly, speculated in land, indulged in oratory, and
took the chances of surviving a duel. They lived in the hotels and office
buildings and spent their leisure hours lounging in each other s rooms,
in the bars and gambling houses, or in drilling away the hours in aristo
cratic military companies. Their day was colored by an extravagant form
of chivalry, but they opened new lands and built the town which became
famous in the golden age of the old Deep South.
Like a strenuous boy, Vicksburg suffered violently from the pangs of
eating too well and growing too fast. With trade and expansion came
speculation, embezzlement, and graft. With prosperity came lawlessness
and vice. The scum of the river gamblers gathered at the foot of the
VICKSBURG 271
Walnut Hills, and became an open menace. Wagon drivers, more often
white farmers conveying their whole crop into Vicksburg in a single
wagon, hated broadcloth coats and tall beaver hats. They wore coarse,
dingy, yellow or blue linsey-woolsey and broad-brimmed hats, and with
long rawhide whips in their hands and plenty of whisky under their
belts, they blustered and roared through the town. Flatboatmen joined
the wagoners in their blustering and the young professional gentlemen
in their gambling. These "ring-tailed roarers" from the river spent their
working hours fighting swift currents and hairpin bends, and their time
on shore swearing they could "throw down, drag out, and lick any man
in the country," and proving it. Beatings, knifings, and shootings oc
curred daily, and women appeared on the streets at the risk of insult.
On the 4th of July, 1835, a drunken gambler wandered into the
Springfield section of the city and while there insulted Captain Brun-
grad s military company. The indignant officers of the company placed
him under guard but, upon his threats of dire vengeance, released him.
That evening the company returned to the courthouse to find him heavily
armed and prepared to fight. He was seized, disarmed, and carried to the
outskirts of the town. There he was whipped, tarred and feathered, and
ordered to leave immediately. His enraged associates, encouraged by the
number and reckless character of their patrons, denounced and threatened
the citizens who had heretofore patronized them. Sentiment against the
gamblers increased and at a public meeting the citizens decided to run
the leaders of the gamblers out of town. They appointed a committtee
to serve notice on the gamblers. But when Dr. Bodley led his com
mittee down the steep incline to the river front and called out the
warning, the gamblers, barricaded in a house, answered by shooting and
killing Dr, Bodley. In retaliation the citizens lynched five of the gamblers
in the city cemetery and gave a sixth back to the river from which he
had come, setting him adrift in a small skiff with his hands pinioned
behind him.
With the gamblers under control, Vicksburg next had a "war" with
the flatboatmen. In order to collect a heavy tax from the flatboatmen, a
company of soldiers was sent down to the waterfront with instructions
either to get the tax money or, failing in that, to blast the flatboats from
the river. But the flatboatmen, tougher and braver than the gamblers,
were also shrewder. They fraternized with the soldiers, passed around
several jugs, and swapped tall stories until the soldiers forgot their
mission.
The first newspaper issued in Vicksburg was The Republican in 1825.
In 1837 the Vicksburg Tri-Weekly Sentinel began publication. But the
pattern of violence extended to the press. Within 22 years the vitupera
tions of the first five editors of the Sentinel caused their violent deaths.
When the Union was severed, Federals and Confederates alike recog
nized the strategic importance of the Mississippi River. With the South
in control of the river, Middle Western commerce would be stagnant ;
with the North in control, the Confederacy would be split in two. Be
cause its strategic position on the Walnut Hills commanded the river,
272 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Vicksburg ceased commercial activities early in the war and became
an armed camp.
In June 1862, Admiral Farragut ran the Federal gunboats up the
river to the great bend at Vicksburg. After several unsuccessful long range
bombardments he withdrew his forces. In November of the same year,
General Grant at Corinth and General Sherman at Memphis planned
a converging attack from the north. Grant s line of communication was
cut by Forrest s Cavalry and his supply depot (see HOLLY SPRINGS)
was destroyed by Van Dorn, so that he, too, was forced to withdraw.
Sherman hardly fared better. Descending the river in December with
30,000 troops, his command was hurled back with heavy losses by
Confederate shot from the bluffs in a short, decisive charge on Chickasaw
Bayou, just north of the city.
The new year, 1863, found General Grant in command of the Union
forces with orders to compel the fall of Vicksburg. With the city seem
ingly impregnable from the north and from the river, he made numerous
attempts to reach the rear of Vicksburg by a series of bayou expeditions.
But these failed and during the remainder of the winter he sought to
avoid exposing his army to the Confederate fire from the bluff, even
attempting to cut a new channel for the river across the narrow tongue
of land opposite the city. Spring floods kept the lowlands under water
and President Lincoln lent every possible assistance, but the General s
engineers could not persuade the river to change its mind.
In April, however, Grant decided to risk running the batteries. He
ordered Admiral Porter to slip his gunboats and transports past Vicks
burg by night, while he marched his army on a wide detour down the
river through Louisiana. Although the Confederates fired part of the town
to throw light on the river and the night was punctured with the bellow
ing fire of siege guns, Grant s desperate maneuver was successful. On April
30, 1863, under the protection of Porter s 80 vessels, he recrossed the
river with his army at Bruinsburg (see Tour 3, Sec b), 30 miles below
the city. Cut off from the north and forced to live off the country, his
strategy lay in clearing the territory south and east of Vicksburg and
then carrying the fight to the city itself. This he accomplished by a
series of brilliant maneuvers (see Tours 2 and 3, Sec. b), which drove
the Confederates and their general, J. C. Pemberton, into Vicksburg. A
young girl s diary aptly describes the situation: "I never hope to witness
again such a scene as our routed army. From twelve o clock until late
in the night the streets and roads were jammed with wagons, cannons,
horses, mules, stock, sheep, everything that you can imagine that apper
tains to an army, being brought hurriedly within the retrenchment.
Nothing like order prevailed, of course, and divisions, regiments and
brigades were broken and separated. . . . What is to become of all the
living things in this place, when the boats begin shelling, God only
knows."
In Vicksburg, however, the Confederate lines were reformed on the
innermost of the two parallel ridges that rim the city, and the Federals
were halted. Twice, on the i9th and 22nd of May, 1863, the encircling
VICKSBURG
273
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IURTHOUSE, VICKSBURG
wave of blue charged up the steep western rims to dash itself to pieces
against the stubborn gray line. Met with such repulses, Grant, with char
acteristic stubbornness, decided to starve the defenders into submission.
For 47 days and nights his land and water batteries hammered incessantly
VICKSBURG 275
at the city. Many residents fled to caves in the hillsides. Food became
scarce. Mule meat was a delicacy to starving inhabitants, and the soldiers
were put on rations of fat bacon and stale bread. With the ranks of his
army depleted by hunger, disease, and exposure, and with no indication
of succor in sight, General Pemberton surrendered on the 4th of July,
1863. Five days later the Confederate garrison at Port Hudson also
capitulated, and the Mississippi River was open.
The siege and aftermath or the war paralyzed the city for many years.
During the carpetbag and reconstruction era that followed, the town was
plunged into debt by mismanagement. Negroes in civil office had the
support of the State "carpetbag" government in their defiance of old laws
and the making of new ones. The white citizens differed politically and,
at first, could not unite. But in 1875 they met and as one united party
demanded the resignation of Negro officials. The Negroes refused to
resign. One Negro, named Crosby, carried the matter to Governor Ames
in Jackson and was advised by the Governor to defend his office with
bloodshed if necessary. Returning to Vicksburg, Crosby circulated hand
bills over the county, urging all Negroes to be in Vicksburg on a speci
fied Monday morning. Rumor that 1,400 armed Negroes were marching
upon the town by three different roads spread through the city. Once
more Vicksburg armed itself against attack. Streets were filled with
weeping women and terrified children. Squads of armed white men hur
ried to the three approaches. Groups of Negroes appeared on the roads,
some orderly, others disorderly. After the fight, white men claimed that
the Negroes fired first, but the records are not clear. Fifteen Negroes
and one white man were killed; 30 Negroes were taken prisoners. It
was the end of Negro and carpetbag rule in Vicksburg.
This fresh start, however, was followed by cataclysms. In 1876 the
erratic Mississippi River, which had so successfully defeated General
Grant s efforts to cut a new channel, broke through the narrow tongue
north of Vicksburg and made a new channel for itself. The city was
left high and dry and Vicksburg seemed destined to disappear as had
other towns that the "Father of Waters" sired only to abandon. How
ever, one day a little boy suggested the possibility of bringing the Yazoo
River down in front of the city through a chain of lakes where the boys
went fishing. The idea was found practical. Under Government engi
neering, the Yazoo s mouth was closed and its waters were diverted
through a canal into the old Mississippi River bed; on December 22,
1902, Vicksburg again had a river coursing along the base of its bluffs.
Thus Vicksburg achieved the distinction of being moved from a river
to a canal by an Act of Congress.
The financial depression of 1873, followed by a frenzied era of rail
road building in the i88o s, was the death knell to river trade. By the
end of the century the railroads had driven out the steamboats, and up
to 1917 there was little or no river traffic. In that year the United States
entered the World War and the Government, seeking to relieve the
terrific strain upon the railroads, subsidized a barge line to operate on
the Mississippi River. After the war, the subsidy was not withdrawn,
MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
VICKSBURG NATIONAL MILITARY PARK
Federal Writers Project 1937
" *** Main Park Roads
Approach Roads
"Follow the Arrows"
but was left to develop further river traffic. The profits made by the
Government line led to the establishment of private lines, and at present
(1937) the river is making great strides in regaining its prestige as a
transportation route.
On June 28, 1879, Congress created the Mississippi River Commis
sion to survey and improve the river channel and banks for better navi-
VICKSBURG 277
gation, to prevent floods, and to promote commerce and postal service.
By 1882 the commission had organized four operating engineer districts
with Vicksburg in the third district.
When the Mississippi River overflowed in the devastating flood of
1927, Vicksburg again became a Gibraltar, with thousands of refugees
rushing to its hills to escape the raging waters. Largely because of the
flood damage to the lower valley and the menace of the river, the head
quarters of the Mississippi River Commission were moved from St. Louis
to Vicksburg in 1930. Shortly afterward, the United States Waterways
Experiment Station, where the problem of controlling the mighty Mis
sissippi is studied in a special laboratory, was established. The river com
mission s fleet and shops, known as the "U. S. Government Fleet," are
on the river front just north of the business district.
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< <#> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tour ii.6m.
E. from Washington St. on Grove St.
1. WARREN COUNTY COURTHOUSE, Grove St. (L) between
Monroe and Cherry Sts. and extending to Jackson St., dominates Vicksburg
from one of the highest points in the city. Designed by William Weldon
and constructed by George and Thomas Weldon, who used slave labor,
the structure is of Greek Revival architecture. Four identical facades hav
ing broad galleries, upper balconies, and fluted Ionic columns extend the
full length of each side of the building. Begun in 1858, it was com
pleted in 1861. During the siege of 1863 the courthouse was struck
often by cannon balls and the original cupola was riddled by gunfire
from Admiral Farragut s gunboats. The present cupola was added at
a later date.
L. from Grove St. on Monroe St.
2. McNUTT HOME, NW. corner Monroe and First East Sts. (open
by appointment), built by Alexander McNutt, former Governor of
Mississippi (1838-42), is said to be the oldest home in Vicksburg. A
white frame house, two stories high, it has the straight, boxlike lines
and steep roof of the Colonial New England type. The house contains
a fine collection of antique furnishings, including a set of Dresden china
more than 100 years old and other pieces handed down from one gen
eration to another. In the side yard overlooking the river is the grave
of a Confederate soldier, Lieut. D. N. McGill, who died June 4, 1863,
from injuries received in the defense of Vicksburg.
McNUTT HOME, VICKSBURG
R. from Monroe St. on First East St.; L. on Adams St.
3. The MARMADUKE SHANNON HOUSE, 701 Adams St. (open
by appointment), was the home of one of Vicksburg s first crusading
editors. In this low, one-story frame house, according to Vicksburg
legend, on dark and blustery nights stalk the ghosts of the notorious
gamblers who murdered Dr. Hugh Bodley. The large dormer window
on the north and the portico with its gable roof, supported by plain
square columns, are the most noticeable features of this century-old house.
R. from Adams St. on Fayette St.; L. on Farmer St.; R. on Catherine
St.; L. on New Cemetery Road 0.5 m.; L. on Lovers Lane 0.4 m.
4. HOUGH CAVE, Lovers Lane at sign (open by appointment), is
one of the three remaining caves used by citizens of Vicksburg when seek
ing protection from gunfire and cannonball during the siege. Apparently
this cave was private (though many were communal) and was ideally
situated, well protected from fire from the Federal fleet on one side
and from the rain of bullets from land forces on the other. It was easily
accessible from a nearby road.
Retrace Lovers Lane, New Cemetery Road and Catherine St.; L. on
Farmer St.
5. BODLEY MONUMENT, intersection of Farmer and Openwood
Sts., is a plain granite slab erected by the community to the memory of
Dr. Hugh Bodley, murdered by gamblers July 5, 1835, "while defending
the morals of Vicksburg." The monument was first placed in the yard
of the old Presbyterian Church ; later it was removed to the triangle.
VICKSBURG 279
R. from Farmer St. on Main St.
6. CONSTITUTION FIRE COMPANY HOUSE, 1200 Main St.,
is a gray brick building with tall arched doors and bell tower. It was
built in 1835 for the volunteer fire company, composed of the city s
most aristocratic young gentlemen. Motorized equipment has replaced
the faithful horse, and the company is employed by the city.
R. from Main St. on Locust St.
7. CHRIST CHURCH (EPISCOPAL), NW. corner Locust and Main
Sts., is the fourth oldest church in the State. Of brick construction, with
ivy-covered walls, it is of English Gothic design. The cornerstone was laid
in April 1839 by the fighting bishop, Gen. Leonidas Polk, later killed
in the service of the Confederacy. The edifice was completed between
1842 and 1845.
8. The DUFF GREEN MANSION, SW. corner Locust and First
East Sts. (open), famed for its magnificent balls in ante-bellum days,
has been in turn a private home, a Confederate hospital, a domicile for
dependent old ladies, and (1937) a Salvation Army home. Built in the
1840 $ by Duff Green, the design of the four-story, red brick mansion,
with its exquisite iron lacework galleries, is one of the finest examples
of the Queen Anne influence that crept into Vicksburg s ante-bellum
architecture.
9. PLAIN GABLES, 805 Locust St. (private), was built in 1835 by
a brother of Dr. Hugh Bodley. The Greek Revival structure, Doric in
style, graces a high terrace surrounded by well-kept grounds in which
is an old hand-turn bucket pump. Although considerably damaged by
shell fire during the siege, the house has been completely restored. A
notable feature is the flight of steps leading up to the terrace with its
ancient iron railing and entrance gate.
Tour 2
E. from Washington St. on Grove St.
10. The MARSHALL-BRYAN HOME, 1128 Grove St. (open by
appointment), was built about 1835 by the Rev. C. K. Marshall, son-
in-law of the founder of Vicksburg. The original building consists of
four large, square rooms and a reception hall but later two other units
were added. Six graceful Ionic columns support the roof of the front
gallery and the elaborately carved front entrance is a good example of
280 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Greek Revival architecture. The house was untouched during the shelling
of the city in 1863.
Retrace Grove St.; L. on Adams St.; L. on Crawford St.
11. The LUCKETT HOME, 1116 Crawford St. (open by appoint
ment), was built in 1830. Originally, the house was a one-story struc
ture atop a small hill. Later this part became the upper portion of a
two-story building, the hillock having been dug away and a sturdy ground
floor built. This older portion now has an outside stairway from the
pavement to the upper gallery. During the bombardments in 1863 a
shell tore through the upper portion of the house. Following the sur
render of the city, officers of the Federal army were billeted in the
upstairs rooms, while their horses were stabled downstairs.
Retrace Crawford St.
12. The WILLIS-COWAN HOME, 1018 Crawford St. (open by
appointment), is on a high terrace, almost flush with the sidewalk. An
austere two-story brick house painted gray, built about 1840, it was one
of Vicksburg s most notable ante-bellum homes. During the siege, it
was lent by its owners to General Pemberton for his headquarters and
remained so until the fall of Vicksburg. It was also one of the childhooc
homes of Vicksburg s philanthropist, Mrs. Junius Ward Johnson.
13. In the METHODIST CHURCHYARD, SW. corner Crawford and
Cherry Sts., is the TOBIAS GIBSON MONUMENT. A white marble
shaft marks the grave of the Rev. Tobias Gibson, pioneer Protestant
preacher of the Walnut Hills and founder of Methodism in Mississippi.
Gibson, a South Carolinian, early caught the flame of evangelism spread
by John Charles Wesley, and at the age of 23 made his way down the
Natchez Trace to the bluffs. He found only a military outpost, evacu
ated the preceding year (1798) by the Spaniards. The minister worked
hard and his influence was keenly felt during the early days of Vicks
burg. He died in 1804 and was buried four miles south of the present
city. In 1935 he was reburied in this churchyard.
L. from Crawford St. on Cherry St.
14. The WILLIS RICHARDSON HOME, 1520 Cherry St. (open by
permission), is the most pretentious early home of the Vick family in
Vicksburg. Built in the 1830 $ of brick, it is of Greek Revival architecture.
The portico, extended around three sides of the house, has beautiful fluted
columns. The original grounds covered two city blocks.
L. from Cherry St. on Harrison St.
15. The COOK-ALLEIN HOME, 1104 Harrison St. (open by ap
pointment), was built by Col. A. J. Cook, about 1862. It is occupied by his
niece, Mrs. Thomas Allein, and her family. The house, with octagonal
brick columns, has woodwork of cypress and is constructed of brick im
ported from England. After the fall of Vicksburg, it was converted into a
Federal hospital, and the soldiers left their U. S. insignia stamped on the
floor in the living room.
Retrace Harrison St.; L. on Cherry St.; R. on Belmont St.; L. on Wash
ington St.; R. on Speed St.; R. on Oak St.
16. The KLEIN HOME, 2200 Oak St. (open by appointment), stands
VICKSBURG 28l
about 1,500 yards from the Mississippi River and when built in 1856 was
in the center of spacious grounds with lawns extending down to the river
bank. A large brick house two stories high, it is of Greek Revival archi
tecture, with an Ionic portico. On each side is a wing whose roof slopes
gently from the second-story windows. During the Siege of Vicksburg a
small cannon ball, fired from a Union gunboat, struck the front door. The
owner had it replaced and there it has remained. In mansions of this type
the first or main story was devoted almost wholly to entertainment. The
Klein home has a ballroom, banquet hall, reception hall, and, as was typical
in houses of the period, a guest room on the main floor. Family rooms
were in the second story. On the spacious lawn is a fountain of the pre
war period. Originally there was a family burial ground on the estate
directly east of the house, but the remains have been removed to Cedar
Hill Cemetery. The house is well preserved and is now an apartment
house.
L. from Oak St. on Henry St. ; R. on Levee St.
LEVEE STREET (railroad district along water front) has at one time
or another harbored all sorts and conditions of men and boats. Long be
fore the first steamboat, the New Orleans, eased around the Mississippi s
great bend in 1811, a continuous procession of Indian canoes, flatboats,
and keelboats came to the foot of the bluffs. Steamboats sometimes anchored
out four deep, and now the modern packets nose their barges away from
the wharves and out into the river. Bleak, worn, and bare, stand houses
once brimming with ribald laughter of men white and black with wine,
women, song, and sudden death.
R. from Levee St. on Clay St.
17. VICKSBURG NATIONAL MILITARY PARK, entrance E. end
of Clay St., at Memorial Arch (open; guides), was established by Act of
Congress in 1899 "to commemorate the Campaign, Siege and Defense of
Vicksburg" and "to preserve the history of the battles and operations on
the ground where they were fought." The park, consisting of 1,323.63
acres, comprises the battle area of the Siege and Defense of Vicksburg,
May 1 8 to July 4, 1863. The visitor can walk among the remains of the
Confederate army s trenches and see on the steep slopes rows of markers
indicating the positions occupied by the Federal troops in their siege
operations. Numerous places show outlines of the Federal approach
trenches, once filled with soldiers determinedly digging their way towards
the Confederate forts. The story is recorded on 898 historical tablets, 274
markers, and 230 monuments. Three equestrian statues, 19 memorials,
and more than 150 busts and relief portraits memorialize the troops and
officers who served here. Sculptors, such as H. H. Kitson, A. A. Weinman,
C. C. Mulligan, F. C. Hibbard, and F. W. Sievers, are represented.
The park consists of two systems of ridges, running in a northerly and
southerly direction, which hem in the city of Vicksburg like a crescent on
the north, east, and south sides. Connecting the main systems of ridges are
secondary ridges, at right angles to the former, with attending valleys.
Approximately 40 percent of the park area is densely wooded, while the
remainder is sparsely wooded or open ground.
282 MAIN STREET AND COURTHOUSE SQUARE
Remnants of 9 major Confederate forts, 10 Union approaches, and
many miles of breastworks, gun emplacements, and rifle pits are visible in
the park, in varying degrees of preservation. Three distinct types of Civil
War forts are preserved: the redan, or triangular fort, with its apex ex
tended toward the enemy, the lunette, or crescent shaped fort, and the
redoubt of various forms, of which the square is the most common type.
Remains of Union trenches are of two types: the parallel, or regular
trench running parallel to the enemy s lines, and the approach, or sap, an
advanced trench, running at right angles toward the enemy s forts. From
the ends of these approaches mines were dug under the Confederate forti
fications and large charges of powder were exploded in an attempt to de
stroy them. The crater formed by the explosion of a Union mine is visible
in front of the redan on the Jackson road.
At Fort Hill, at the northern end of the park, the view over Lake Cen
tennial and the Yazoo Canal shows the course of the Mississippi River in
1863 and the dangers encountered by the Union gunboats and transports
in passing the Vicksburg batteries.
The site of Fort Hill is also the original site of Fort Mt. Vigie which
constituted a part of the Spanish military post of Nogales, 1791-98. Here
also was Fort McHenry, an American military post established later to
maintain the claim of the United States to this region.
Various services to help the visitor understand the military operations
of the Siege of Vicksburg, by visiting in systematic order the various sites
of historic interest and principal memorials, are provided free by the
National Park Service. A staff of qualified historians is stationed in the
Administration Building for this purpose.
Special provision is made at Vicksburg National Military Park for
groups of students, clubs, patriotic and other organizations.
The Administration Building, Pemberton Ave. (open weekdays 9-4 :30),
is a one-story brick structure with wings extending on both sides. It was
completed in 1937. In the left wing is the HISTORICAL MUSEUM, ex
tensive in its scope. Through the medium of color charts, pictures, and
relief models, the history of this area is graphically portrayed from the
pre-human period to the rise of the New South. Literature on the park is
available here. Illustrated lectures are offered periodically by members of
the staff. Also in the left wing is a HISTORICAL REFERENCE LI
BRARY, open to the public. Members of the staff will assist visitors in
research on historical subjects.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
U. S. Waterways Experiment Station, 4.6 m. (see Tour 2) ; Eagle Lake, 17.1 m.,
Blakely, 11.7 m., Vicksburg National Cemetery, 1.9 m. (see Tour 3, Sec. a).
III
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< <$> >>>>>>>>>>>>
Tour i
(Mobile, Ala.) Biloxi Gulfport (New Orleans, La.). US oo
Alabama Line to Louisiana Line, 88 m.
Louisville & Nashville R.R. parallels route throughout.
Concrete and black-top paving two lanes wide.
Accommodations of all kinds available.
Bait, tackle, and small boats for fishing can be obtained along route. In the cities ar
rangements can be made for renting boats and equipment for deep-water fishing.
Caution: Do not attempt fishing or hunting in inland streams and bayous without
experienced guides, or deep-water fishing without experienced boat pilots. Do not
dive into the water without first ascertaining its depth. The Gulf along the Coast is
shallow, particularly at low tide, and only in the channels or passes is there suffi
cient depth for diving.
US 90 breaks in upon a section of Mississippi that combines scenic and
recreational attractions with legendary interests. Here in 88 miles of Coast
country are the color and tone of the Old World and the Old South. Be
tween Pascagoula and Bay St. Louis, US 90, called the mid-Gulf section
of the Old Spanish Trail, passes through the oldest white settlements in
the lower Mississippi River Valley. The beach front has been developed
with fine homes and hotels, and is remarkable because the vegetation, in
stead of being sea-shrunk and wind-weathered, is profuse and subtropical.
The combination of palms, pines, magnolias, oaks, Spanish bayonets, poin-
settias, crapemyrtles, and azaleas gives the region a year-around, changing
greenness.
Between Biloxi and Bay St. Louis, the highway follows the water s edge,
with the sea wall, Gulf, and outlying islands on the L., and the homes on
the R. The area between the highway and seawall, formerly a sloping
beach, has been leveled and landscaped, and many residents have built
pretentious summer pavilions here. Wooden piers, diving platforms, and
small boat landings jut into the water.
While the Coast is covered by many separate communities, there is a
geographical and spiritual unity that makes the Mississippi sobriquet, "the
Coast," understandable. It has been a resort center for years. New Orlean-
ians began coming here in the early iSoo s to escape the yellow fever
epidemics so prevalent in those days. Long before the War between the
States, wealthy planters from upper Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama
made their summer homes on the Coast because it was cooler here than on
their upland plantations. In recent years Northerners have found it an
agreeable winter resort. Freezing weather is rare and golf, fishing, and
other sports can be enjoyed practically every day.
Though the French influence survives on the Coast in peculiarities of
speech and pronunciation, its deepest impress has been on the character of
the food, which is unlike that in other parts of Mississippi. The heritage
286 TOURS
of French cuisine shows itself in highly seasoned gumbo, court-bouillon
(koo-bee-aw, a fish stew imported from the Court of France) and jumba-
laya (a potpourri of shrimp, rice, and tomatoes), made famous by the
Creole cooks of New Orleans. Hard-crusted French bread and thick, fra
grant French-drip coffee are served in almost all homes and restaurants
along the Coast. Many hotels awaken their guests by serving morning cof
fee in their rooms. The grocery stores and the fruit and vegetable stands
sell "soup bunches" which provide the base for home-cooked vegetable
soup. As a rule these bunches consist of two carrots, some celery, a quarter
of a head of cabbage, a large onion, a ripe tomato, a generous handful of
string beans and fresh peas, a turnip or two, some pods of okra, several
Irish potatoes, and a sprig of parsley all for 10 cents.
Crossing the Mississippi Line, m., 30.1 miles SW. of Mobile, Ala.,
US 90 runs about six miles from the Gulf shore (L) and parallels the
Escatawpa (Ind., dog) River, which flows a mile or two to the R.
KREOLE, 8.1 m. (118 pop.), is a clean mill town engaged in manu
facturing kraft and white paper from pine cut from the woods around it.
The mill was a pioneer in the manufacture of kraft paper from pine (see
INDUSTRY).
MOSS POINT, 11.2 m. (2,453 PP-)> at tne junction of the Escatawpa
and Pascagoula (Ind., bread people) Rivers, is surrounded by lakes that
in the i88o s and 1890*5 made it a center of the sawmilling industry of
south Mississippi and during the World War a shipbuilding base. Here is
the junction with State 63 (see Tour 15).
West of Moss Point US 90 parallels the Pascagoula River, a half-mile
to the R.
PASCAGOULA, 15 m. (15 alt, 4,339 pop.), is in reality four com
munities held together by a lotus-eating philosophy. History here becomes
an old wives tale as full of legend as of fact. About the rotting wharves
and the aged fort, the marsh grass and Spanish moss grow as they have for
centuries; and though destinies once were shaped in the shadow of the
aged oaks, the events are accepted with charming unconcern.
Shut off from the world by a barrier of sterile pine ridges and marshy
bayous, Pascagoula was left undisturbed by the American Revolution, the
creation of the Government of the United States, the political bickerings
between American and Spanish boundary commissions, and even the War
between the States. Some dates and events, however, were influential in
the town s destiny. These were the local events that tell a story of eight
flags having waved over the place since it was first used as a summer camp
ing ground by the Pascagoula Indians.
The first fort was erected in 1718, after Pascagoula Bay had been
granted to the Duchess de Chaumont, a favorite of Louis XIV. In 1763,
however, the British were given titular sovereignty, which they held until
the territory was taken by the Spanish 16 years later. Though the settlers
who poured in from the Ohio country and Orleans territories during this
time were pro- American in attitude as was made evident by border war
fare against Spanish authorities in 1809 and 1810 the fort continued to
be known as "Old Spanish Fort." In 1810 Pascagoula became a part of
TOUR I 287
the new State of West Florida (see AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTU
RIES). The following year, after the territory was taken over by the
United States, Dr. W. Flood was sent by Governor Claiborne to organize
the Parish of Pascagoula. Dr. Flood, a very learned man, had far more
trouble with the illiteracy of the populace than with insurgency, but, as
more settlers drifted into the newly acquired region and the industrial de
velopment began, illiteracy decreased rapidly and the town acquired cul
ture along with physical charm. Indicative of this culture and of the popu
larity of Pascagoula as a summering place was a three-story hotel built to
accommodate a thousand guests and serviced by a large staff of slaves. The
town also published a newspaper, the Pascagoula Democrat Star, which
was started in 1846 at Handsboro. It is characteristic of the town s neg
lect of formally recorded story that the files of this paper were burned a
few years ago.
Of great importance were the four industries that developed from natu
ral resources after the iSyo s, which were to dictate the town s future.
From the time the first yellow pine log was cut along the stream banks
and floated down the river to Pascagoula, then the best loading point on
the Coast, to the height of the business, lumbering was Pascagoula s most
spectacular industry. It was largely responsible for the increase in popula
tion between 1890 and 1906. Closely related to the lumber business and
almost as spectacular was shipbuilding. Pascagoula ships earned early fame
for their ability to stand up under long Gulf crossings to the Mexican
coast. During the World War the International Shipbuilding Yards here,
combined with U.S. Shipbuilding Yards up and down the river, gave the
town the most feverish boom it has ever known. But with the end of the
war, business slumped suddenly, leaving the hulls of unfinished schooners
half submerged" in the river to mock the town s industrial death. Boat
building, however, is still a fine art; the Pascagoula luggers are as tradi
tional as the Gloucester fishing boats. Largely through the efforts of Con
gressman W. M. Colmer, Pascagoula has been retained as a base for the
U. S. Coast Guard.
Commercial fishing has increased with the years. The native-made lug
gers bring in tons of deep-sea red snappers to be packed and shipped to
Northern markets; smaller boats bring in shrimp and oysters. Apparently
destined to be as important as the commercial fisheries is the pecan busi
ness, begun around 1900. Thousands of tons of local paper-shell pecans
are now shipped annually, while Jackson Co., where many leading vari
eties of paper-shell pecans have originated, is recognized as the home of
the paper-shells.
The SINGING RIVER (the Pascagoula), two blocks W. of the court
house and fronting the docks of a fish company, produces a mysterious
music. The singing sound, like a swarm of bees in flight, is best heard in
the hot summer months in the stillness of the early evening. Barely caught
at first, the music seems to grow nearer and louder until it sounds as
though it comes from directly underfoot. Of the varied hypothetical scien
tific explanations offered for the phenomenon none has been proved. The
music, so scientists say, may be made by a species of fish, the grating of
ar B.
BOAT BUILDING, PASCAGOULA
sand on the hard slate bottom, a current sucked past a hidden cave, or
natural gas escaping from the sand beds. Legend says the sound is con
nected with the mysterious extinction of the Pascagoula tribe of Indians.
The Pascagoula were a gentle tribe of handsome men and shapely women
with large dark eyes and small, well-shaped hands and feet. The Biloxi,
on the other hand, were a tribe calling themselves the "first people" and
extremely jealous of their position. Miona, a princess of the Biloxi tribe,
though betrothed to Otanga, a chieftain of her people, loved Olustee, a
young chieftain of the Pascagoula, and fled with him to his tribe. The
spurned and enraged Otanga led his Biloxi braves to war against Olustee
and the neighboring Pascagoula, whereupon Olustee begged his tribe to
give him up for atonement. But the Pascagoula swore they would either
save their young chieftain and his bride or perish with them. However,
when thrown into battle against terrible odds, they soon lost hope of vic
tory. Faced with the choice either of subjection to Otanga or death, they
chose suicide. With their women and children leading the way into the
river, the braves followed with joined hands, each chanting his song of
death until the last voice was hushed by the engulfing dark waters.
Right from Pascagoula on N. Pascagoula St., 0.2 m.; L. on Spring St. to cross
roads at 0.6 m.; L. on shady lane to narrower lane, 0.8 m.; R. on narrower lane
to OLD SPANISH FORT, 0.9 m. (open). Built in 1718, it stands on a low bluff
and from the land side looks like what it really is now, a farmhouse set in a
grove of pecan trees. From the lake it still appears much as it did in its early days
OLD SPANISH FORT, PASCAGOULA
. fort, even though much of its color has disappeared. The clue to the age of
the structure is best found in the attic. The walls tf oyster .shells, moss, and mor
tar masonry are 15 to 30 inches thick but arc not stouter than the wooden timbers
bracing the roof, hewn and joined by the early carpenters. The fort in late after
noon is an appropriate setting lor a Minefield Parrish sunset. Diagonally E. by the
marsh-dotted lake is the Krebs Cemetery. Some of the graves are so old that the
inscriptions on the headstones are effaced; each headstone is capped with an iron
cross.
At 15.8 m. US 90 crosses the PascagouLi River on a toll bridge (car
and driver 50$; passengers 25$: pedestrians free). On the hanks of the
.iioula are the U.S. GO1 7 1-R\ MI-\T DRY DOCKS A\l) REPAIR
290 TOURS
YARDS, 16 m. (L). At the end of the marsh road is another major
bridge, this one spanning the West Pascagoula River, 18.9 m.
GAUTIER (pron. go-chay ), 19 m. (116 pop.), named for one of its
pioneers, is on the bluff of the Pascagoula bottoms, under fine oaks that
overlook the marsh. Here was once a race track and a commodious sum
mer hotel. At a fishing camp (R) near the second bridge guides can be
obtained for reaching the Pascagoula lakes and bayous by outboard motor.
(Trip should not be made without guide.)
West of Gautier US 90 runs through flat pine barrens now being re
forested.
At 21 .5 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road at 1.4 m. is the junction with a road; R. on the latter to Fairley s
Camp, 2.7 m., at the mouth of BAYOU GRAVELINE. Here fishing for redfish,
speckled trout, sheepshead, mullet, croakers, and drum is good.
At 21.7 m. on US 90 is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road at 2. .5 m. is the junction with a sandy local road; R. on the lo
cal road 1.7 m. to the junction with a dim trail through a pine forest; R. on the
trail 0.8 m. to FARRAGUT LAKE and the SITE OF THE FARRAGUT HOME,
0.5 m., built about 1800. Here Admiral David Farragut passed his childhood, his
father being the first Justice of the Peace for Pascagoula. Tradition has it that an
orphan girl who lived with the Farraguts was jilted by young David and cursed
the land, then drowned herself in the lake below the bluff. Now, when crops fail,
the settlers remember the curse.
At 2.5 m. on US 90 is the junction with a narrow winding road.
Left on this road with one-way bridges to NELSON S CAMP, 3.4 m. Here Lake
Graveline is connected with the Gulf by small deep bayous and serves as a tre
mendous trap for seafish coming into it with the rising tide. Fishing here for red-
fish, speckled trout, sheepshead, mullet, croakers, and drum is perhaps the best on
the Coast.
At FONTAINEBLEAU, 26 m. (22 alt., 19 pop.), is the junction with
State 59.
Right on this road 10.2 m. to VANCLEAVE (98 pop.), a backwoods settlement
interesting because of the extreme age of some of the clearings along Bluff Creek.
The first settlers found the Biloxi and Pascagoula Indians here; bears and wolves
were so numerous that a century of the white man s domination has not killed all
of them. It is said that the pioneers first plowshares were made of wood
sheathed with the tough skin of the scaly garfish caught in creeks and lakes in
the wilderness.
At 16.1 m. on State 59 is the junction with a local dirt road.
Right on this road 0.3 m. is the LIVE OAK POND SCHOOL, established to
serve the children of mixed Indian, Spanish, French, and Negro bloods who live
in the forests near Vancleave. These children are living racial history, showing
the mark of every invasion into the swamps.
At 26.1 m. on US 90 is the junction with a graveled road.
Left 1 m. along this road is the largest tract of VIRGIN PINE FOREST in the
State, 3,000 acres, of which part belongs to the Government. Here is one of the
scenes of the Mid-Winter National Fox Hunt, which is held every year the latter
part of February. The drive through the forest extends to the point where the vir
gin pines go down to meet the waters of the Gulf.
TOUR I 291
West of Fontainebleau the highway is bordered with pecan groves.
At 28.8 in. is a bridge across DAVIS BAYOU, where bridge and bank
fishing for bass is good.
At 29.5 m. is a bridge across HERRING BAYOU. Here fishing for
bass and bream from the bridge or banks is fair.
OCEAN SPRINGS, 33. 3 m. (19 alt., 1,663 pop.), occupies the site of
Old Biloxi, the first European settlement in the lower Mississippi River
Valley, made by Iberville in 1699. Today (1938) it is a quiet little village
that makes its living by catering to tourists and in the pecan orchards that
surround it. It is situated on a waterfront of extraordinary beauty, facing
both the Gulf and the Bay of Biloxi on a curve between Fort Bayou and
Davis Bayou.
Here the headland (R), N. of the Louisville & Nashville R.R. bridge,
which crosses the bay, is doubtless the SITE OF FORT MAUREPAS, on
what is now a private estate. While no traces of the fort remain, cannon
balls have been dug up at the place and cannon have been brought up
from the bay in front of it. The pieces of artillery mounted in the Biloxi
Community Park (see BILOXI), designated as IBERVILLE CANNON,
were salvaged in the summer of 1893 from the shallow water near the fort
site. Tiblier and son, Biloxi fishermen, while dredging for oysters in the
bay, encountered the wreck of a submerged ship. Without diving suits
they succeeded in raising four cannon, a number of cannon balls, musket
barrels from which the stocks had rotted away, swords without scabbards,
and several iron bars. The wrecked ship was built of mahogany timbers
fastened with wooden pegs and was judged to be about 65 feet long with
a 20-foot beam. About 40 feet astern lay a smaller ship. That these boats
were part of Iberville s fleet in 1699 is legend; it is known that Iberville
found the bay much too shallow to float his larger ships. It is possible,
however, that the boats were driven into the bay by the storm of 1723, or
that they were pirate ships of a later date.
As Old Biloxi, Ocean Springs was at one time capital of the vast water
shed drained by the Mississippi River. After the seat of government was
transferred to Mobile in 1702, the settlement around Fort Maurepas made
little progress. With the exception of a few practical and experienced
French Canadians who had joined the group, its members were soldiers
and sailors who knew nothing of agriculture. They had come not to work
the land, but with the belief that the ores of rich mines, the hides of wild
buffalo, and the pearls of the Gulf would make them wealthy. The colony,
reached only after a five months sail from France, neglected by its King
and dependent on the Biloxi Indians for food, somehow managed to sur
vive. For two centuries the colonists descendants, who lived on the Ocean
Springs side of the bay, across from New Biloxi, made charcoal-burning
and fishing their chief industries. In the i88o s the first summer visitors
arrived. There is mention of a hotel built in 1835, but until 1852 Ocean
Springs people sailed across the bay to get their mail at Biloxi. Among the
many magnificent live oak trees that grow here is the RUSKIN OAK,
with a spread of 139 feet and circumference of 25 feet, on the estate
called Many Oaks. An Englishman bought the estate in 1843, and when
292 TOURS
John Ruskin visited Ocean Springs after the New Orleans Cotton Exposi
tion in 1885, the Englishman named the huge tree in Ruskin s honor.
SHEARWATER POTTERY, on east Beach, was founded in 1928 and
takes its name from a variety of sea gull found on the Mississippi Gulf
Coast. The products made here are sold throughout the United States, and
are distinctive in the originality of design and variety of glazes used. Many
of the designs are objects familiar to the Coast gulls, pelicans, fish, and
crabs. Figurines of Negroes are notable for their humor, grace, and char
acter. The pottery is owned and operated by G. W. Anderson and his
three sons.
Right from Ocean Springs on a paved road and across Fort Bayou to GULF
HILLS, 0.8 m., a $15,000,000 resort subdivision, club, and golf course, one of the
show places of the Coast. The golf course (open; greens jee $1.50), beautifully
laid out, is one of the most difficult courses in the South.
At 34-9 m. US 90 crosses the mouth of the Bay of Biloxi on the mile-
and-a-half long concrete WAR MEMORIAL BRIDGE. When this bridge
was dedicated in 1930 it replaced the last ferry crossing between Ocean
Springs and New Orleans. The view from the bridge, with Deer Island
and the east and west channels (L) lying immediately offshore and the
curving tree-lined bay shore (R) stretching to the N., is particularly good.
Fishing from the bridge for sheepshead, speckled trout, and redfish is
excellent.
US 90 enters on Howard Ave. to Main St.
BILOXI, 37.5 m. (22 alt, 14,850 pop.) (see BILOXI ).
Points of Interest. Seafood packing plants, Back Bay Bridge, old homes, and
others.
The route continues L. on Main St. to Beach Blvd. ; R. on Beach Blvd.
(US 90).
The boat trip across Mississippi Sound to Ship Island can be made from
Biloxi (see Side Tour 1A).
SOUTHERN MEMORIAL PARK, 42.4 m. (R), is one of the Coast s
newest and most beautiful cemeteries.
BEAUVOIR, 43 m. (R), facing the Gulf, was the last home of Jeffer-
son Davis, Confederate President. It is a State-supported home for Confed^
erate veterans, their wives and widows. Surrounded by a grove of live
oaks, magnolias, and cedars, Beauvoir is designed in the Mississippi
planter tradition, a full story-and-a-half set high above a raised basement,
with a wide central hall, a broad gallery on three sides, broad hip-roof,
and long floor-to-ceiling windows. The square, paneled wooden posts of
the gallery, joined by a delicate balustrade, rise in support of a simple
dentiled cornice. The main doorway with its double glassed doors and
slender side lights is approached by a graceful flight of steps, flanked by
curving handrails. It was erected 1852-54 by J. H. Brown, and was the
first beach home built in the vicinity. Brown planned the buildings him
self, brought his skilled workmen from New Orleans, and, so the story
goes, had the cypress pulled from the Louisiana swamps and carried to
!
BEAUVOIR, HOME OF JEFFERSON DAVIS, NEAR BILOXI
Lake Pontchartrain by camels. From there it was shipped to Bcauvoir by
schooner. The four original buildings are standing ; the big house is planned
with a cottage on each side and a brick kitchen at the rear. The cost of
building and maintaining the estate impoverished Brown, and for some
294 TOURS
years before the War between the States the house was vacant. Finally it
was bought by a planter named Dorsey from St. Joseph, La.
In 1877 Jefferson Davis rented from Mrs. Dorsey, an old friend of the
Davis family, the east cottage called the Pavilion, and began to write his
work, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government. In April 1878
Mrs. Davis joined him at Beauvoir, and for the next three years helped
him write in longhand the manuscript of the book. Beauvoir, during the
time the Davises lived in it, was a Southern social center. In the second
year of his stay at the house, Davis bought the estate from Mrs. Dorsey
for $5,500. Before he had finished paying her for it, Mrs. Dorsey died,
willing the estate to him. la 1889 Davis, while on a business trip to his
old plantation at Brierfield, in Warren Co., Miss., became ill and was
never able to return to Beauvoir, dying that year in New Orleans, where
he was buried. Four years later his remains were removed to Richmond, Va.
No story is more typical of post-bellum times than that of Winnie (Va-
rina Anne) Davis, Jefferson Davis s maiden daughter, who gave up her
Northern lover to remain her father s devoted and constant companion
during his declining years. Within a year after his death Winnie and her
mother moved to New York City. After again refusing to marry, Winnie
died at Narragansett Pier in 1898.
Mrs. Davis sold Beauvoir in 1903 to the Mississippi Division of the
Sons of Confederate Veterans. Until the Mississippi Legislature appropri
ated funds for the home s upkeep, the Daughters of the Confederacy main
tained Beauvoir. The home is now controlled by a board of six directors
appointed by the Governor of Mississippi, but it is still owned by the Sons
of Confederate Veterans. The original buildings have been preserved with
out alteration. Many of the furnishings used by the Davises have been dis
covered and restored to their places in the great house. Exact reproductions
of others have been obtained. The central hall and two large chambers
have been dedicated as memorials to Winnie, while on the porch of the
Pavilion is her skiff. On the front lawn near the entrance gateway is a
statue marking the grave of Winnie s little dog. Twelve dormitories, a
hospital, a chapel, and a few cottages have been erected. The number of
inmates of the home is decreasing, the majority now being widows of vet
erans. In a shaded CEMETERY, N. of the cottages, are the graves of 1,000
men who, following Jefferson Davis through war, now sleep near their
leader s home.
EDGEWATER PARK, 44.1 m. (R), surrounds the EDGEWATER
HOTEL, a great square building set in well-landscaped grounds, an im
pressive example of what Chicago capital did for the Coast during the real
estate boom of 1926.
At 4-5 m. is the junction with an unpaved road.
Right on this road to the EDGEWATER GULF SKEET RANGE and the EDGE-
WATER GULF GOLF CLUB (open; nominal fees), 1 m.
At 45.5 m. is the GREAT SOUTHERN GOLF COURSE AND
COUNTRY CLUB, one of the oldest in this section. In the clubhouse are
the studios of WGCM, a 500 watt radio station operating on a frequency
of 1,210 kilocycles.
TOUR I 295
GULF COAST MILITARY ACADEMY, 46 m., is an honor-ranking,
privately supported school for boys of high school grade.
MISSISSIPPI CITY, 46.4 m. (21 alt., 1,000 pop.), was before the War
between the States the most important settlement in Harrison Co. The
town had its beginning in 1837, when Scotch-Irish pioneers were issued a
charter to construct a railroad from northern Mississippi to the Gulf. Al
though the effort failed, it initiated Mississippi City s flush pre-war period.
In 1841 the little town lost by one legislative vote its fight to have the
University of Mississippi located within its limits. A second attempt to
build a railroad, in 1853, resulted in the construction of a number or fine
beach homes and the building of a resort hotel, which was from that time
until the 1890*5 the outstanding hotel on the Coast.
At 46.6 m. is the Coast s HAUNTED HOUSE, a particularly good ex-
ample of ante-bellum architecture adapted to the Gulf climate.
At 46.6 m. is the junction with a macadam road.
Right on this road is HANDSBORO, 1.2 m. (1,200 pop.), now as unruffled as
the waters of Bayou Bernard that outlines its northern boundary, but before the
War between the States an industrial and cultural center of the Coast. The com
munity is peopled with descendants of the English and Scotch-Irish who settled
here early in 1800. Handsboro shipped the first lumber to be exported from Har
rison Co., and late in the war Federal troops raided the town for lumber to build
their quarters on Ship Island. In 1902 the opening of the Gulf port harbor killed
the lumber trade. More than a dozen houses built between 1840 and 1850, when
Handsboro was a booming lumber town, are easily distinguished by the heavily
morticed timbers of their framework. On the north side of Bayou Bernard are two
houses, almost identical, built by Myles and Sheldon Hand about 1845. The
houses are two-and-a-half stories high, with the broad expanse of their roofs
broken by dormer windows. Broad two-story porches extend the entire length
with square columns of heavy timber more than 24 feet high. Open hallways
(now enclosed) on both floors of the houses provided a draft for Gulf breezes.
The MASONIC HALL, intersection of Cowan St. and Pass Christian road, (L)
was built before 1850. Its square box-like architecture is undistinguished, but the
building is pointed out as the place where Jefferson Davis attended lodge meet
ings.
PARADISE POINT, 47 m., was named by high-church Episcopalians
who originally used it for their family burying ground.
At 47.4 m. (L), half a block from the highway, is ST. MARK S
CHAPEL, a one-story frame Episcopal church building of fine propor
tions. Constructed in 1855, the church is celebrated because Jefferson
Davis was once a vestryman and communicant. Along the beach opposite
the chapel the blockaded Coast people during the War between the States
boiled seawatcr in wide shallow kettles to obtain salt.
At 47.7 m. (R), on Courthouse Road but visible from US 90, is the
first courthouse of Harrison Co. Built in 1841, it is now a yellow brick
apartment house.
At 47.9 m. (R), on a vacant lot, stand the trees under which John L.
Sullivan fought Paddy Ryan in 1882.
US 90 enters on E. Beach Blvd. ; R. on i5th St. ; L. on 2ist Ave. ; R. on
i-jth St.; L. on 24th Ave.; R. on i3th St.
GULFPORT, 50.9 m. (19 alt., 12,547 pop.) (see GULFPORT).
Points ni / .". . Harbor, V. S. Veteran-; Facility, Hardv Monument, and others.
296 TOURS
Here is the junction with US 49 (see Tour 7, Sec. b). A boat trip across
Mississippi Sound to Ship Island (see Side Tour I A) can be made from
Gulf port.
The route continues on i3th St.; L. on 3Oth Ave. ; R. on W. Beach
Blvd. (US 90).
Between Gulfport and Bay St. Louis the beach is lined with well-spaced
homes (R) of permanent residents. The houses for the most part are of
planter and Victorian styles, with only a few small summer bungalows.
Recreation here is simple; entire families golf, sail, swim, and fish. From
the sea wall, piers, and boats, small nets baited with meat are lowered, a
bushel basket being filled with crabs in a short time. Another diversion is
gigging or spearing flounders, flat-bodied fish that swim in to the shore
waters at night and burrow in the sand. The equipment for "floundering"
includes a spear and a torch or flambeau. On still, moonless nights the
flickering yellow light of flambeaux illuminates the dark along the water s
edge as the flounderers wade about in the shallow water spearing the
fish.
LONG BEACH, 53.4 m. (25 alt., 1,346 pop.), stretches along the
highway on the site of a former Indian village. GULP PARK COLLEGE,
54.1 m. (R), is a privately-supported junior college for girls, and the
center of the Coast activities in music, painting, and drama. On the campus
is FRIENDSHIP OAK, a live oak with a spread of 127 feet and a trunk
diameter of 13^/2 feet. Vachel Lindsay, the poet, and one-time member of
the college faculty, held classes on the platform built among the branches
of this tree. The MUNICIPAL ROSE GARDEN is four blocks R. from
the highway on Jefferson Davis Ave. On both sides of the avenue, N. of
the Louisville & Nashville R.R., are the truck farms for which Long
Beach is noted.
Between Long Beach and Pass Christian the desolate stretch of beach is
known as White Harbor. Here, before the Gulfport harbor was built, lum
ber schooners loaded in a deep basin a mile and a half offshore. Legend
is that the i8th century pirate who gave his name to PITCHER S POINT,
56.4 m. (L), pronounced a curse on this two-mile strip of land which
has been effective to the present time. White Harbor is the only visible
break in the line of continuous settlement between Biloxi and Henderson
Point.
PASS CHRISTIAN, 58.4 m. (n alt., 3,004 pop.), for all its century-
old importance as a recreation center, is in reality an unaffected commu
nity of the Old Deep South. Winter visitors furnish a livelihood to many
of the natives, who retain great pride in the town s heritage and in a so
ciety whose brilliance dates from the i8th century.
Pass Christian took its name from the channel known as Christian s
Pass, supposedly discovered by Christian L Adnier, a member of Iber-
ville s crew in 1699. Later, both the French and the Spaniards occupied
this section, and with the opening of the Mississippi Territory the set
tlement became a trading center for the back country as far N. as Black
Creek. Down the old Red Creek Road, now Menge Ave., came caravans
of ox-teams, six and eight yokes long, loaded with cotton, hides, furs,
TOUR I 297
venison, potatoes, honey, turkeys, gophers (dry-land burrowing tortoises),
and "pinders" (peanuts). A U.S. garrison was stationed at Pass Chris
tian in 1811. The Battle of Pass Christian, the last naval engagement
against a foreign foe in American waters, was fought SW. ot the town,
near Bay St. Louis during the War of 1812. During the ante-bellum pe
riod "the Pass" with its delightful climate became noted as a resort, at
tracting the sugar, cotton, and rice planters of Louisiana, Alabama, and
Mississippi, and the aristocrats of New Orleans. The first yacht club in the
South was organized here in 1849, the year in which many of the pres
ent homes were built. In the i88o s, the influx of winter tourists from the
North began.
Beach Boulevard rims the water, a narrow five-mile strip paralleling the
seawall. Along the inland side of the drive are numerous hotels, filling
stations, and antique shops built to attract tourists; they are in harmony
with the old homes and cottages along the way. The homes are set in gar
dens of roses, oleanders, azaleas, crapemyrtles, palms, and camellia japon-
icas, and are enclosed with fences laden with honeysuckle, wistaria, roses,
and trumpet vines. North of the Boulevard are the truck gardens that pro
duce okra and other vegetables destined for the making of the famous
Creole dishes of the Coast.
Three miles offshore are approximately 30 square miles of shell banks,
perpetually rebuilt by fishermen who are required by law to return a per
centage of shells taken each year. Free of mud, these banks produce small
oysters notable for their flavor. Before daybreak, in oyster season, people
miles inland can hear the engines of the oyster-boats throb their way out
to these reefs. In the evening the boats return, low in the water, their
cabins covered with piles of oyster shells. During the winter months, resi
dents and visitors are awakened each morning by the familiar cry, "Oyster
ma-an from Pass Christi-a-an," announcing the approach of the oyster
peddler.
OSSIAN HALL (private) is a white two-story frame Southern Colo
nial-type house with a wide, double-deck portico and large round columns.
Set well back in Bcechhurst facing E. Beach Blvd., the house is the scene
of the motion picture, Come Out of the Kitchen, in which Marguerite
Clark starred. The building was erected by Seth Guion in 1848.
The ADELLE McCUTHEON HOME (private > Beach Blvd..
has in its front yard the Coast s most famous camellia japonica, originally
cut from a Mt. Vernon bush and planted here by a great-granddaughter of
Martha Washington, Mrs. Frances Parke Lewis Butler.
The DIXIE WHITE HOUSE ( private), 767 E. Beach Blvd., acquired
its name in 1913 when President Woodrow Wilson visited here. The dig
nified two-story structure built in 1854 has the divided front steps char
acteristic of many houses of the period. The open ground floor is screened
with ironwork banisters; the columns are covered with ornamental plaster.
The second floor is frame, with a gallery across the front and arched win
dows extending from floor to ceiling.
The MIDDLEGATE JAPANESE GARDEN (open daily I-J; adm.
. St. Louis St. between Clarence Ave. and Pine St., is filled with
298 TOURS
plants, entirely Japanese, including flowering plum, quince, and peach
trees, giant bamboos, and Japanese magnolias. The 1 74-year-old bronze
Buddha and other Japanese figures came from Japan.
TRINITY EPISCOPAL CHURCH, NW. corner Second and Church
Sts., was built in 1849 and stands in a magnificent grove of live oaks
thickly hung with moss. The church is a small frame structure of the
Gothic type with stained windows and a modern green roof. In the same
moss-hung grove, but across the street, is the Live Oak Cemetery estab
lished simultaneously with the church.
The DOROTHY DIX HOME (private), 730 W. Beach Blvd., the
summer home of the well-known syndicate writer, stands in a large gar
den shaded by live oaks. It is a rambling story-and-a-half frame structure
with triple gables and a wide front gallery adorned with jig-saw lattice
work and a striking wooden railing. In the rear is a large rose garden.
Right at the second street beyond Miramar Hotel ; L. between Trinity Church and
the Cemetery, a macadam road leads to BAYOU PORTAGE, 2.1 m., where boat
fishing for black bass, redfish, and speckled sea trout is good (boats and bait ob
tainable at pier). At 3.6 m. is the bridge over BAYOU ACADIAN, where fish
ing is also good. At 4.4 m. is the bridge over BAYOU DELISLE (pron. d leel),
the third good fishing stream crossed. DELISLE (150 pop.), near the mouth of
Wolf River and known as Wolf Town until 1884, is one of the earliest settle
ments on the Gulf Coast. The name was changed to the present DeLisle to honor
Comte de Lisle, lieutenant to Bienville and one of the first explorers of the Mis
sissippi Coast. The land around DeLisle was first settled in 1712 by the Saucier,
Necaise, Ladnier, Dedeaux, and Moran families, who tradition says were Acadian
exiles. Until recent years the French language was spoken here exclusively, French
being used in the schools. Communal life centers about the LADY OF GOOD
HOPE CHURCH, a simple one-room frame building, containing valuable vest
ments and altar pieces from Europe. At 8 m. is the entrance to PINE HILLS, at
the head of the Bay of St. Louis, a mammoth real estate enterprise undertaken
during the boom of 1926. The pretentious hotel has long been closed, but the
i8-hole golf course (open; greens jee $1) is still in operation. Pine Hills marks
the highest elevation, 90 feet, on the coast between Pensacola, Fla., and Corpus
Christi, Tex. The largest shell Indian mound on the Mississippi Coast is on the
grounds. M 11 m. the road crosses ROTTEN BAYOU (Bayou Bienasawaugh ) ,
at Fenton. The bayou affords good fishing for bass and bream. The surrounding
land is one of the best sections for fox hunting along the Coast, and hunters often
follow the chase in automobiles. At 15.5 m. is KILN (165 pop.), named for the
immense kilns in which the original French settlers burned charcoal for a living.
Charcoal burning was soon superseded here by sawmilling, but Kiln did not come
into the limelight as a lumber town until 1912. In that year, when the mill inter
ests of the section were sold to a large eastern company, Kiln mushroomed from
a backwoods community into a town with a high school, picture show, a 5o-room
hotel, and row after row of neat mill houses. In 1930 the mill closed and Kiln
sank into near oblivion. During prohibition the territory around Kiln was the cen
ter of a moonshining industry known for the excellent quality of its whisky as far
north as Milwaukee, Wis. Strange tales of giant stills hidden under sawdust piles
and rumored connections of Kiln with Chicago s Capone gang still afford interest.
On HENDERSON POINT, 63.9 m. (L), is the entrance to the INN-
BY-THE-SEA, an interesting adaptation of the Spanish mission style to
the Mississippi Gulf Coast environment.
At 64.5 m. is the head of the two-mile-long wooden bridge across the
BAY OF ST. LOUIS. Along the shore of the bay (L) is good salt-water
TOUR I 299
bathing from the sand beach. Fishing is good from the bridge for speckled
sea trout, sheepshead, and redfish.
The Bay of St. Louis was the scene of the misnamed Battle of Pass
Christian in 1814. British Vice-Admiral Cochrane was following Andrew
Jackson from Pensacola, Fla., as Jackson was hurrying to defend New Or
leans. In an effort to delay Cochrane s fleet of 60 vessels and prevent his
forcing a passage through Mississippi Sound, Lake Borgne, and Lake Pont-
chartrain to New Orleans, the American flotilla of 5 gunboats, commanded
by Lt. Thomas Catesby Jones, waylaid the invaders. Jones had stationed
his boats in the shallow bay where the enemy s heavier ships could not
follow him. On December 14, the 5 American boats were attacked by 45
British launches and armed boats manned by 1,000 men, and, although
Lieutenant Jones showed great bravery and excellent qualities as a com
mander, within an hour every American vessel was either captured or
sunk. The casualties included 80 Americans and 300 British.
The town of BAY ST. LOUIS, 66.6 m. (21 alt., 3,724 pop.), at the
time of the battle was known as Shieldsborough, for Thomas Shields, who
obtained his grant from the Spanish Government in 1789. Bienville, how
ever, had explored the bay in 1699, naming it St. Louis for the dead and
sainted King Louis IX; and in 1720 John Law, Mississippi Bubble pro
moter, had given the land around the bay to Madame de Mezieres. But the
permanence of each of these colonization efforts was as uncertain as
French policy. The French-Canadians living about the bay intermarried
with the Indians, Spaniards, and Acadians expelled from Nova Scotia,
forming the blood strain sometimes incorrectly called Creole on the Coast.
In the shuttling sovereignties of the i8th century, these forest dwellers
around the bay ignored and were ignored by everything that smacked of
government. Yet when the British overwhelmed Lieutenant Jones in 1814,
Shieldsborough was an established summer retreat for wealthy Natchez
planters. Because land titles in this section were based on claims that in
volved 23 different types of tenure, including claims of the State of Geor
gia, some of the ablest lawyers of the profession were drawn here. By 1825
Shieldsborough, then also known as Bay St. Louis, rivalled Pearlington as
the seat of the Hancock Co. courts. The town was incorporated in 1854.
The military road that Andrew Jackson had cut through the pine woods
into Shieldsborough was bringing the town a substantial part of the back
country trade W. of the Bay St. Louis streams.
The building of the New Orleans, Mobile & Chattanooga R.R. (now
the Louisville & Nashville), completed in 1869, lent impetus to the devel
opment of the town as a summer resort. Since 1905 the growth of Bay St.
Louis has been a paradox ; the town has been a victim of progress. As long
as it was isolated by the Louisiana marshes, the Jordan River, and the bay,
it was a liberal, detached, and moneyed country community. But improved
transportation facilities have resulted in making it more of a resort and
ILN^ of a rural center.
The beach front includes a portion of the business section. Main Street
follows a high ridge, which in turn follows the sea-wall. On the beach side
of this street many of the frame buildings have entrances level with the
300 TOURS
street ; the back parts, supported by heavy pilings, stand 30 feet above the
base of the hill. Facing the Gulf from the first block W. of the Louisville
& Nashville R.R. track is the CHURCH OF OUR LADY OF THE
GULF, the center of the largest Roman Catholic parish in the State, with
3,000 communicants. The red brick structure, whose construction contin
ued from 1908 to 1926, is designed in the Italian Renaissance style. The
interior is beautifully furnished, the stained glass windows having been
imported from Germany. West of the church and also facing the Gulf is
ST. STANISLAUS COLLEGE, an accredited boys boarding school of
high school standing. The school was founded in 1854 by the Brothers of
the Sacred Heart and named for Father Louis Stanislaus Marie Buteux, the
first resident priest in the territory. Adjoining the church on the E. in a
large white building of Romanesque design, three stories high, set well
back from the beach, is the main building of ST. JOSEPH S ACADEMY,
a girls school of accredited high school rank. The Sisters of St. Joseph
are in charge of the school. At the rear of the academy, approached by an
avenue of cedars, is the SHRINE OF OUR LADY OF THE WOODS.
Honoring the Blessed Virgin, in fulfillment of a vow made for the salva
tion of the vessel on which he was returning from France, Father Buteux
erected this shrine in what was then the wilderness. The statue, made of
plaster of Paris and protected only by a small dome, has stood for more
than 60 years without damage. ST. AUGUSTINE SEMINARY, 0.2 m.
from bridge, is a Catholic school where Negro boys are trained for the
priesthood. The school has several acres of landscaped grounds and a num
ber of commodious buildings grouped about the two-story red brick ad
ministration building. It is said to have been richly endowed by a North
ern woman.
Left from Bay St. Louis on the Hancock Co. sea-wall drive is WAVELAND, 2.4
m. (15 alt., 663 pop.), the home of many New Orleans people during the hot
months from June to September. Since Waveland is closer to New Orleans than
other Gulf Coast cities, hundreds of business men come here with their families
to live in houses and apartments, commuting to New Orleans. Life in Waveland
is simple, gravitating lazily around swimming, fishing, and house parties. Imme
diately after Labor Day the people return to New Orleans with the certainty, pre
cision, and celerity of a regiment breaking camp. At 2.6 m. is the PIRATE S
HOUSE (open by appointment), built in 1802 by a New Orleans business man
who is alleged to have been the overlord of the Gulf Coast pirates. At one time,
legend says, a secret tunnel led from the house to the waterfront. Recently re
stored, the house is a perfect example of Louisiana planter type, with a brick
ground story and an outside stairway leading to the first floor. The outer walls
are covered with white stucco; square, white frame columns support the gallery,
which runs the length of the house. The three dormer windows on the front are
beautifully proportioned, and the iron grillwork forming the banisters is remi
niscent of that in the French Quarter of New Orleans.
GULFSIDE, 5.6 m. (R), is an unusual institution. The plant, which includes sev
eral hundred acres of land, a number of buildings, and a mile and a quarter of
Gulf frontage, is the only stretch of beach in Mississippi owned and controlled
by Negroes. Gulfside is essentially a summer school; the only work done during
the winter is by the pupils of the school for retarded boys, who pay their expenses
by keeping grounds and buildings in order. During the summer, classes are held
for teachers, pastors, and others, and camps are maintained for Boy Scouts and
I
PIRATE S HOUSE, WAVELAND
Girl Reserves. The work done by the summer school is recognized by the State
Departments of Education of Louisiana and Mississippi, and credits are allowed.
Religious emphasis is strong, but no stress is placed on denominational lines. At
a Song Fest, usually on the last Sunday in August, spirituals are sung by a chorus
made up of Negro church choirs and college glee clubs.
At 7.3 m. is LAKESHORE and the mouth of BAYOU CADET, where fall and
winter fishing for speckled trout is excellent.
Between Bay St. Louis and the Louisiana Line US 90 is a flat straight
stretch of road running through cut-over pine lands. That the second
growth pine is already being wellworked for turpentine is evidenced by
the many slashed trees along the road.
At 7.5 J m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to the Gulfview School, 2 J m. ; R. here on a dirt road through
pine and stump barrens, past the post office at Anslcy, .5.S m., and through two
pasture gates, at 70.9 m. to a trail fork; R. on the trail to the old / /.. 1X7 . 177(9 X
HOME, 13-2 m., once belonging to Col. J. F. H. Claiborne, Mississippi s pioneer
historian. In 1712 John B. Saucier settled here on Mulatto B.ivou, and in the
1780*5 had his title confirmed by the Spanish authorities. He built the house be
fore 1800, taking timber from the pine woods about him and firing his own brick
with the help of slaves. The house shows Spanish influence in its main floor,
propped high on open brick piers in the West Indian manner. A single flight of
steps rises to the gallery with toothpick columns, running across the front. The
hipped tin roof is broken in front by two dormers and is topped by a plain box
observatory. The rooms are large and open off a central hall.
At Jackson s Landing on Mulatto Bayou, just a mile from the house, is seen the
long circle of earthworks thrown up by Andrew Jackson in 1814 to guard the
mouth of Pearl River from British assault. Colonel Claiborne bought the house in
the 1840*5 and lived in it until 1870, writing his best books during this period.
302 TOURS
Back of the house are the ruins of the brick slave quarters. The piers that sup
port the house itself are joined with bars to form cages. In these cages the Ne
groes who were brought from Africa were kept until they had been tamed enough
to be moved into slave quarters in the rear.
Painted on the wall panels in the hall and in the front bedrooms are huge can
vases of hunting and fishing scenes done by Coulon, a i9th century artist of New
Orleans.
The estate now belongs to a New Orleans business man who has turned it into a
cattle range. Brahma bulls, half again as large as the average bull, with shaggy
humps above their shoulders, drink at the spring where the Choctaw Indians
camped. Near the spring is a mound of clam shells left by the Indians.
At 82.4 m. on US 90 is the junction with a wide graveled road.
Right on this road is the picturesque NETTIE KOCH HOME, 0.4 m. (R) (pri
vate), erected before 1820. The original part of the house, consisting of two
rooms, is constructed of logs. Lean-tos, ells, and wings that are connected to the
main house by latticed porches have been added, giving it a rambling appearance.
The kitchen floor is of timbers 30 inches wide and several inches thick, taken
from a dismantled flatboat that drifted down Pearl River. The white-washed inte
rior is furnished with old relics, some of them having been brought from Den
mark, his native country, by Dr. Koch. The house is surrounded by live oaks,
sycamores, and cedars. A red camellia japonica in the small courtyard rises higher
than the house.
At 2.2 m. on this same road is LOGTOWN (500 pop.). A sawmill here has
been in continuous operation since 1850. It stands on the bank of Pearl River,
was built with slave labor, and was worked by slaves for the first 10 years.
BOUGAHOUMA BAYOU forms the dividing line between the white residential
section and Possum Walk, the Negro residential section.
PEARLINGTON, 87.7 m. (10 alt, 318 pop.), is a town which has been
revived, the new US 90 short-cut to New Orleans having put it back on
a main road for the first time in more than a decade. It was one of the pio
neer lumbering towns in this once-important lumbering area, and later was
the terminal for a Louisiana-Mississippi automobile ferry, now discontin
ued. Many large, Spanish-moss-covered live oak trees, and some of the
largest and oldest camellia japonicas on the Mississippi Coast grow in and
around Pearlington.
At 88 m. a bridge crosses PEARL RIVER, the boundary line between
Mississippi and Louisiana, 44 miles NE. of New Orleans. Free bridges at
the Rigolets (pron. rig-lees) and Chef Menteur Passes in Louisiana; 47
miles by a toll bridge across Lake Pontchartrain in Louisiana (car and
driver $1 ; passengers 25<j;). The river was given its name by the French
because of the large pearl oysters found on the banks.
TOUR IA 303
Side Tour lA
Gulfport to Ship Island, 12 m.
Excursion boats leave yacht harbor and west pier at Gulfport twice daily during
summer season. Round-trip fare $i.
Surf bathing and other aquatic sports.
No overnight accommodations.
SHIP ISLAND, a low white sandy bar lying between the Mississippi
Sound and the Gulf of Mexico, is approximately seven miles long and
half a mile wide, its length roughly paralleling the mainland east to
west. The island has a strategic position, an excellent harbor formed by a
"V" of deep water. The place is rich in early history and legend.
Intermittently from 1699 until the late 1720 $ Ship Island was the
harbor for French exploration and settlement of the Gulf Coast from
Mobile to the mouth of the Mississippi River. Iberville delayed here three
days before he made his landing in small boats on the shore of Biloxi
Bay (see BILOXI), and later, using the island as a base, he explored
the Mississippi River for nearly 300 miles from its mouth. Even after
the capital was moved from Biloxi to Mobile, Ship Island continued to
be the port of entry for vessels from France. To Ship Island came the
first marriageable girls for the early colonists, bringing their chests, or
"casquettes" with them. In 1717 the first fort and warehouse were con
structed here near the present pass. In 1724 what was probably the first
cargo of pine lumber to be sent from the Mississippi Coast was shipped
from here.
In 1815, when the British general, Pakenham, tried to take New
Orleans, Ship Island served as the base for the British Navy. From the
island harbor the British fleet of 60 vessels sailed to what was to be
the last naval engagement in which Americans fought a foreign foe in
American waters (see Tour 1).
On the extreme western tip of the island is FORT MASSACHUSETTS,
used during the War between the States. As early as 1847 the island
was reserved for military purposes; in 1858 the War Department, car
rying out an act of Congress of 1857, authorized the building of a fort
to protect the short cut into New Orleans, Rigolets Pass, the outlet of
Lake Pontchartrain. In December 1860 work was still under way, and
the Government had ordered 48 large cannon shipped from Pittsburg.
The outbreak of the war in 1861 left the Union garrison isolated on
the island, and in May 1861 they destroyed the fort in order to prevent
its falling into Confederate hands. For three months, from July to Sep
tember 1 86 1, five companies of Confederates held the fort, having
rearmed it with eight small cannon after its "destruction." Because of
the constant threat of the Federal fleet then blockading the mouth of
304 TOURS
the Mississippi, the Confederates fired the fort and evacuated the island
on September 16. In December Gen. Benjamin Butler moved into the
damaged fort with a garrison of about 7,000 Federal soldiers, at which
time it was named Massachusetts, in honor of Butler s home State, and
partly rebuilt. As the war dragged on, the island was used as a prison
for captured Confederates, some 4,000 of whom were held here in the
course of the war years. A number of youths from a military school in
Alabama, sent as prisoners, died and were buried in the sands. Sub
sequent washings of the sands have exposed a number of their skeletons.
From the time of the withdrawal of the Federal garrison in 1875
until the purchase of the old fort in 1935 by the Gulf port American
Legion, the western end of the island was a desert, visited occasionally
by boatloads of sightseers. The Federal encampment on the island had
denuded its western half of protecting timber; rainstorms have washed
away the ground in front of the fort.
Beyond the fort is the SHIP ISLAND LIGHTHOUSE, built in 1879
and maintained by the U. S. Government.
The present QUARANTINE STATION, 4 m. E. of the lighthouse,
is an outgrowth of the station established in 1878, when the flourishing
trade that sprang up between the Mississippi Coast and Cuba and Vera
Cruz brought yellow fever into the country. Here all incoming vessels
were inspected and fumigated. About 1886 the city of Biloxi vigorously
protested that the proximity of the quarantine station was dangerous to
the city, and as a result the station was removed to Chandeleur Island.
Mississippi authorities then moved into the buildings left on Ship Island
and established a quarantine station of their own. For a while incoming
vessels had to be fumigated twice, once by Federal and once by State
authorities. This situation continued until the storm of 1893 blew both
stations away. The next year the present station on Ship Island was con
structed by the Federal Government, and was active until yellow fever
was definitely brought under control. The buildings are maintained in
good condition for any emergency campaign against a contagious disease.
Surf bathing and boating are enjoyed on the outer beach of the island,
where boats and swimming paraphernalia are for rent.
Tour 2
(Livingston, Ala.) Meridian Jackson Vicksburg (Monroe, La.). US 80.
Alabama Line to Louisiana Line, 157.7 m.
Alabama & Great Southern R.R. parallels route between the Alabama Line and
Meridian, Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. between Meridian and Vicksburg.
TOUR 2 305
Concrete roadbed two lanes wide, well marked.
Accommodations of all kinds.
US 80 runs across the center of the State through Mississippi s three
largest cities. It dips from the red clay hills on the east through the
central prairie to climb again into the brown loam hills at Vicksburg.
The only large stream crossed is the Pearl River at Jackson. The scene
alternates between field and forest. Settlements are older in the western
section. Meridian was insignificant at the outbreak of the War between
the States; Jackson was small though the State capital; while Vicksburg
was an important port on the Mississippi River. US 80 and US n (see
Tour 8) are united through Meridian.
At m. US So crosses the Mississippi Line 21 miles W. of Livingston,
Ala., and winds through red clay hills, pine and hardwood forests, and
gully-threatened fields with unpainted houses.
KEWANEE, 1.8 m. (150 pop.), is a sawmill and farm country hamlet,
celebrated chiefly because it was the home of Chief Pushmataha. Pushma-
taha was the Choctaw who, by blocking Tecumseh s scheme for uniting
the Indians, saved the Southern whites from annihilation. He was a
friend of Andrew Jackson, and is buried in the Congressional Cemetery
at Washington (see ARCHEOLOGY AND INDIANS).
Left from Kewanee on a sand and clay road is WHYNOT, 8.3 m. (34 pop.), a
backwoods farming settlement gradually acquiring improved roads and new fan-
gled ideas from Meridian. "Why not?" is the native s retort to the visitor s query
of how the community got its name.
TOOMSUBA (Ind., rolling horse) , 6 m. (292 alt., 350 pop.), on
the creek of the same name, had an active Ku Klux Klan unit during
reconstruction days. The cut through which the road passes at 10.1 m.
shows the red clay texture of the hilly soil and explains the poor land
scape.
At 76.5 m. US 80 follows B St. to 26th Ave.
MERIDIAN, 79.-? m. (341 alt., 31,954 pop.) (see MERIDIAN).
Points of Interest: Industrial plants, Gypsy Queen s Grave, Arboretum, and others.
At Meridian are the junctions with US 45 (see Tour 4), US n
(see Tour 8), and State 39 (see Side Tour 4B).
The route continues on 26th Ave.; L. on 6th St.; R. on 5th St.
(US 80).
West of Meridian US 80 winds through hills.
CHUNKY, 33.8 m. (312 alt., 268 pop.), is a sawmill town that takes
its name from Chunky Creek, on which it is situated. Chunky is the
Anglicized pronunciation of the name the Choctaw Indians gave to
one of their games. It was the southernmost Choctaw town visited by
Tecumseh in 1811 when he tried to unite all Indian tribes against the
whites.
HICKORY, 39.7 m. (322 alt., 736 pop.), another sawmill town, was
named for Andrew Jackson, "Old Hickory," whose military road passed
through the village. Jackson is supposed to have camped overnight in
1815 with his army on the banks of Pottoxchitto Creek just S. of the town.
306 TOURS
NEWTON, 49.1 m. (412 alt., 2,011 pop.), the seat of Newton Co.,
is the largest town in the county. A trading center for the farmers of a
wide area, it has a compact, modern business district and wide residen
tial streets, shaded with live oaks. Here is CLARKE MEMORIAL COL
LEGE, a private school of junior college rating, with modern brick
buildings. In the Doolittle family cemetery is a CONFEDERATE CEM
ETERY with approximately 100 graves.
At Newton is the junction with State 15 (see Tour 12).
Between Newton and Lake the hills gradually flatten to gently rolling
swells, and the intense redness of the clay soil is modified to a light
lemon yellow, with fewer pine woods and more truck farms visible.
At 59-1 m. is LAKE (452 alt., 375 pop.).
Right from Lake on an unmarked graveled road to the PATRONS UNION
CAMP GROUND, 2.2 m (R). The Lake Patrons Union, an outgrowth of the
National Grange, has held annual sessions in August since its organization in
1874. The first meeting was called under a rude brush arbor, but after two assem
blies had been held, the arbor was superseded by a pavilion built to seat a thou
sand people. The granges of Newton, Scott, Lauderdale, Neshoba, Jasper, Smith,
Leake, and adjoining counties elect the directors. The August programs of the
union are varied. There are reports of committees on agriculture, horticulture,
education, and other subjects embracing almost every topic of interest to the peo
ple of the State, and the sessions have many distinguished visitors. The daily
attendance has varied from 2,000 to 6,000.
Since 1893 for several weeks prior to the August meetings, Teachers Normal
Institutes have been held on the union property, with well-known educators
serving as instructors.
On this same road is CONEHATTA, 8.8 m. (152 pop.). The CONEHATTA
DAY SCHOOL FOR INDIANS, under the supervision of the Government agent
at Philadelphia, is the center of an Indian community of one-mule farms typical
of the communities in this "Indian country" of Mississippi. The settlement
is made up almost entirely of Choctaw, descendants of the Indians who made this
their home after the signing of the Dancing Rabbit Treaty in 1830. A number
of the Conehatta women and girls supplement the inadequate family income by
making and selling baskets of dyed split cane. The Conehatta baskets are perhaps
the most attractive in the State. Few tribal rites are practiced, the majority of the
Indians being either Catholics, Baptists, Methodists, or Presbyterians. An out
standing feature of early Indian life that is retained is the bright-colored dress of
the women. The men dress much as do the neighboring white farmers, but they
are easily distinguished by their long hair and dusky color. The school is carry
ing on the Americanization process: although the girls are taught basket weaving
and bead work along with their domestic science and basic subjects, Indian ball
has been replaced with top spinning, marble shooting, and basketball. The In
dians are shy and reticent.
At 62.7 m. US 80 enters the eastern end of the BIENVILLE NA
TIONAL FOREST. This forest, established in 1934, covers an area of
382,820 acres in Scott, Smith, and Jasper Counties; in shape it is an
irregular, squat L, extending W. approximately 20 miles from this point,
and N. and S. more than 35 miles. The forest has not yet attained im
pressive height, but the shortleaf pine is restocking naturally and quickly.
FOREST, 68 m. (481 alt., 2,176 pop.), is the seat of Scott Co.
and the headquarters of the Bienville Forest supervisor. The town is so
named because of the dense pine growth which once covered the site.
TOUR 2 307
Here is the junction with State 35 (see Tour 16).
MORTON, 79-4 m. (463 alt., 955 pop.), is the home of one of
the largest sawmills between Newton and Jackson, and the shipping
station for bentonite dug from a mine 18 miles SW.
Left from Morton on an unmarked graveled road to forks, 1.7 m.
1. Right here to the ROOSEVELT STATE PARK, 2.2 m., named for President
Franklin D. Roosevelt. It is on the western edge of the Bienville Forest in n
494-acre tract of natural forest and flower growth. The park includes several
springs that have a combined capacity of around 3,000 gallons of water per day.
There are rustic, overnight cabins, a clubhouse, a native stone lodge, and bath
houses. A dam creates a i25-acre lake stocked with fish and used also for swim
ming. Foot trails for hiking and bridle paths for horseback, as well as camping
and picnicking facilities, are available.
2. Left here on a graveled road, keeping R. at every fork for 14.9 m.; L. to
BENTONITE MINE, 15.2 m. (open by permission from office, 8:30 to 5 week
days), utilizing the largest bentonite deposit in the State. The stratum averages
three feet in thickness and underlies 100 acres. Because of its nearness to the sur
face the mine has the appearance of a great opened pit. In 1934 the State Geolog
ical Survey made a detailed examination of the field, which had been noted three
years earlier, and in 1936 the Attapulgus Clay Co. began development of the
mineral. The product is a grayish, clay-like mineral, or group of minerals, con
sisting of hydro aluminum silicates and alkalies. Bentonite mined here is shipped
to Jackson where it is processed in the Filtrol plant (see Tour 5, Sec. b).
At 80.7 US 80 crosses the western boundary of the Bienville National
Forest.
PELAHATCHIE (Ind., hurricane creek}, 89. m. (409 alt., 1,599 PP-)>
is named for the creek it borders.
Between Pelahatchie and Brandon the highway runs past fine stands
of pine and hardwood trees.
At 99.1 m. (L) is the CAPT. JAMES L. McCASKILL HOME
(private), one of the few ante-bellum homes left in this section. A long
one-story house with square columns, it was built in 1830 and was
originally an inn and stagecoach stop. Because it was occupied by a
Northern family during the War between the States, it escaped the fate
of other homes in the vicinity. General Sherman made his headquarters
here.
BRANDON, 99-6 m. (484 alt., 692 pop.), is an old town, rebuilt
since its destruction during the War between the States. It is said that
Brandon has produced more State governors, senators, and representa
tives of distinction than any other town its size in Mississippi. The town
was named for Gerard Brandon, who served as Governor of the State
from 1825 to 1831. The A. /. McLAURIN HOME (prh-Me) was at
different times the home of two governors, Lowry and McLaurin. It
stands 100 yds. S. of US 80 at the W. end of town on a spacious lawn
shaded by cedars. The house is of frame construction, painted white, and
has a two-story colonnaded portico rising in front. By the door in the
living room there was for many years a dark stain. Here, during the
war, a Northern officer was slain as he answered a call at the door. In
the attic is a charred spot, marking the attempted burning of the house
308 TOURS
by a young slave girl trying to escape. At PURNELL SPRINGS both
Confederate and Union soldiers camped during the war.
US 80, W. of Brandon, slopes gradually downward toward the Pearl
River bottoms.
At 1093 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to the new MISSISSIPPI HOSPITAL FOR THE INSANE,
5.6 m. (L), a $5,000,000 plant including 78 buildings. It is the handsomest and
best equipped of Mississippi s eleemosynary institutions. The hospital plant covers
3,300 acres and was completed in 1935. In appearance it is more of a village than
an institution, with roads passing fruit and pecan orchards and well-spaced buildings
(none more than two stories high) of the Colonial Williamsburg type of archi
tecture. In reality there are two plants, one for white patients and the other for
Negroes, but no distinction is evident in the type of buildings, and all patients
receive similar care. Each race has its own chapel. Because of the space available
the patients of each race are segregated according to their types of disease. All
non-violent patients march to a central dining room for meals served cafeteria
style; most of the food is produced on the institution s farm, which is worked by
patients. Treatment includes hydrotherapy, physio-therapy, and occupational
therapy; one of the most successful aids for the women has proved to be a well-
equipped beauty parlor. The landscaping, like the buildings, is free from institu
tional aspects. There are an artificial lake and several miles of shrubbery-lined
walks and drives. The site was once the Rankin Co. Penal Farm.
Between Brandon and Jackson the highway is bordered with small
but neat truck farms. Back of the truck farms (R) but not visible from
the highway is the RANKIN COUNTY NATURAL GAS FIELD, a
recently exploited source of much potential wealth.
At 110.1 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to the KNOX GLASS MANUFACTURING COMPANY,
1.9 m. (R), (visited by permission), the only plant of its kind in the State. Here
bottles of all shapes and sizes are manufactured for distribution to all parts of the
United States. The plant is a modern building with recreational facilities pro
vided for its employees.
At 110.6 m. is the junction (L) with US 49 (see Tour 7), which
joins US 80 to cross a levee running through the second bottoms of
the Pearl River and over the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, 111.5 m. The
river limits Jackson on the E. From the bridge are visible the few sky
scrapers of which Mississippi can boast.
At 111.5 m. US 80 follows E. Silas Brown St. over bridge; R. on
S. State St. ; L. on South St. to S. Gallatin St.
JACKSON, 112.7 m. (294 alt., 48,282 pop.) (see JACKSON).
Points of Interest. Old Capitol, New Capitol, Livingston Park and Zoo, Hinds
County Courthouse, Millsaps College, Belhaven College, Battlefield Park, and
others.
At Jackson is the junction with US 51 (see Tour 5), and US 49 (see
Tour 7).
The route continues on S. Gallatin St.; L. on W. Capitol St. (US 80).
On US 80, Jackson, as it does on all the highways running through it,
marks an end and a beginning. Over the section between Jackson and
Vicksburg was fought one of the bitterest and most decisive series of
battles in the War between the States. Over this ground the Confederates
TOUR 2 309
were gradually pushed by Grant to the earthwork defenses of Vicks-
burg, the last link binding the two halves of the Confederacy.
US 80 crosses the bridge over the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. at
the western city limits of Jackson. At 117.4 m. (R) is the entrance to
the JACKSON COUNTRY CLUB ($1.10 greens fee), of which the
i8-hole course is the scene of Mississippi s major tournaments. At
119J m. (R) is the CRISMORLAND ROSE GARDEN, a lovely country
garden and nursery typical of the showy suburban places that contrast
with the small truck farms along the road.
At 779J is the entrance to LAKEWOOD CEMETERY, in appearance
more a park than a cemetery because bronze tablets set flush with the
carpeting grass take the place of grave monuments. The cemetery, opened
in 1927, occupies a 2Oo-acre tract, 35 acres of which are developed. A
pleasing conceit is a heart-shaped lake, divided by the graveled drive.
The highway W. of the cemetery is bordered with small truck farms,
separated by hedges of honeysuckle and Cherokee roses, with an oc
casional clump of cedars denoting an older settlement.
At 121. 3 m. (L) is the CLINTON CEMETERY, marking the eastern
limits of CLINTON (324 alt., 912 pop.), a small college town. Long
before Mississippi became a State, Clinton was an Indian agency, known
as Mount Dexter. About 1823 Walter Leake, formerly a Mississippi
Territorial judge, who later became the third Governor of the State,
bought land here and later erected a home called Mount Salus. The
white settlement that grew up around his home was called Mount Salus.
The first land office and the first post office in the State were in this place.
The land office was established to dispose of lands acquired in 1820
from the Choctaw Indians by the Treaty of Doak s Stand. The post
office was Governor Leake s "little letter-box." The spring waters at
Mount Salus and the town s situation on the Natchez Trace made it
popular as an early health resort. State roads to Vicksburg and Jackson
were opened in 1820 and 1826.
In the fall of 1828 the citizens of Mount Salus changed the name
of the village to Clinton in honor of De Witt Clinton, then Governor
of New York. In the same year the town narrowly missed selection as
the county seat, the honor falling to Raymond, and in the next year
missed by one vote being selected as the State capital. The deciding vote
was cast by Maj. John R. Peyton of Raymond, Clinton s rival town.
The Clinton & Vicksburg R.R. (see TRANSPORTATION), the sec
ond oldest in the State, was incorporated in 1831. In 1835 the citizens
had to organize hastily against a threatened raid of Murrell s desperadoes.
In 1834 a Masonic lodge was organized, becoming the parent lodge to
those of both Jackson and Vicksburg. Grant and Sherman each estab
lished headquarters here. Sherman pillaged, but there was little burning,
and the two colleges were left unharmed. Immediately after the War
between the States Clinton was shipping 20,000 bales of cotton a year,
handling more than any market between Vicksburg and Meridian. In
1875 occurred the Clinton race riot, one of the bloodiest of the Recon-
TOURS
struction upheavals, in which white citizens rising against Negro su
premacy gained the ascendancy, with the assistance of volunteer groups
of armed men from Jackson and Vicksburg. The number of Negroes
killed has been estimated at 50.
At 122 m. (L) is the entrance to MISSISSIPPI COLLEGE, the Bap
tist school that has made Clinton a seat of learning since 1826. Next to
Jefferson College it is the oldest school for boys in the State. It was
founded as Hampstead (incorporated as Hamstead) Academy in 1826,
but the year after its name was changed by an act of the Legislature to
Mississippi Academy, and in 1830 to Mississippi College. The founders
in changing the name hoped that it would become the State university,
and this hope was realized to the extent of State recognition and sup
port from the "seminary lands." Failure to achieve permanent State
support, however, caused Clinton citizens to turn the school over to
the Presbyterian Synod in 1842. The Presbyterians gave it back in 1850,
and when it appeared that the school was about to become extinct, the
Mississippi Baptist State Convention rescued it and has cared for it
ever since.
The period of enthusiasm just after the Baptists took over the school
resulted in the building of the COLLEGE CHAPEL, the only ante
bellum structure on the campus. The Baptists had succeeded in obtaining
a $100,000 endowment fund; then in 1858 a building fund was raised,
and from its $30,000 was created this Corinthian style temple. It is a
square building constructed of red brick and stucco with a slate roof.
The capitals, railings, interior columns, and other ornaments are of
cast iron. The stuccoed ground floor is given to classrooms, but the
chapel itself is lofty enough to include a balcony around three sides of
the chamber. Particularly attractive are the triple-hung sash windows,
fully 20 feet high. When the War between the States began, the Missis
sippi College Rifles was organized from the student body. The endow
ment decreased in value, and the school would have been sold for debt
had it not been for the aid Mrs. Adelia Hillman gave in raising funds
in the North. For a long period after 1877 the college faculty worked
on a contingent basis instead of with guaranteed salaries. It has pro
duced many of the outstanding men of the State, including three gov
ernors: Brown, Longino, and H. L. Whitfield.
Closely associated with Mississippi College in spirit as well as in
organization is HILLMAN COLLEGE, the oldest existing school for
girls in Mississippi. Almost hidden in a quiet tree-shaded campus, the
brick and frame buildings are of no definite design. The school was
begun by the Central Baptist Association in 1853 as the Central Female
Institute, in 1891 it was renamed "in honor of those who have done so
much for it, Dr. Walter Hillman and Mrs. Adelia M. Hillman, his
wife." For 16 years it was under the direct control of the Baptist Asso
ciation; it is said to have been the only educational institution in the
South that held classes uninterruptedly throughout the War between the
States. Even when the campaigns against Vicksburg brought the roar
of the contending armies cannon to the quiet campus the institute was
TOUR 2 311
enrolling a hundred pupils annually and was graduating classes ranging
from nine in 1860 to two in 1865. Although the school remained open
during the conflict and was unharmed by Federal troops, it was heavily
in debt at the close of the war. In 1869 the Baptist Association turned
the property titles over to the school s president, Dr. Hillman. It has
since been operated privately, but has retained its denominational char
acter. Dr. Hillman remained as president until his death in 1894.
At one time the school possessed the best natural history museum in
Mississippi; it now shares science laboratories with Mississippi College.
At Mississippi College is the junction with the graveled Raymond road.
Left on the Raymond Road and on the westernmost of twin hills S. of Mississippi
College are the ruins of the old MOSS HOME, 0.6 m. (R), formerly the home
of Col. Raymond Robinson. The crumbling ruins are of a beautiful red brick,
and enough is left to give a vivid idea of the original structure, built before
1810. Much of the original roof still protects the broken brick walls. The design
of the structure, of somewhat hybrid type, is based upon Spanish and English
Georgian traditions. This is notable in its H-shaped plan, raised basement story,
the high central section with its low-pitched hip roof and tall flanking chimneys.
The secondary roof of similar construction once covered the lower wings
and deeply recessed front and rear porches. The porches, now gone, were in the
form of loggias between the wings. At the eaves of the roof a heavy wooden
cornice with modillion brackets is impaled with cut nails upon hewn joists and
rafters. The great central hall on the second or principal floor, with its large
window openings and graceful arched doorways, flanked by small half-length side
lights, opens onto the porches. These, in turn, give access to the two rooms on
each side. Each of the side chambers has corner fireplaces. The dining room,
scullery and other services were on the ground floor. Facing N. on the crest of the
hill, the house was originally approached by a drive crossing the ravine and
circling the knoll. It is guarded and half hidden by two tall cedars on each side
of what was once the entrance staircase. In 1818 Andrew Jackson, then land
commissioner at Clinton, was a guest in this home.
Here the wealthy widow of Judge Caldwell (see below) was found murdered
shortly after her re-marriage.
Between the Moss home and the Raymond road, on the other hill, are the RUINS
OF GOVERNOR LEAKE S HOME, Mount Salus, facing the lake across the
road. When built Mount Salus was the first brick house in the county. It was
burned in 1920.
In the middle of the road between the hill and the lake is the SITE OF THE
CALDW ELL-PEYTON DUEL. This duel, taking place in 1829, was the result
of a quarrel between Judge Isaac Caldwell of Clinton and Maj. John R. Peyton
of Raymond As a member of the State legislature Peyton cast the deciding vote
which established Jackson as State capital over Clinton. His action so enraged
Caldwell that he challenged Peyton to a duel. Both men escaped uninjured, but
in 1835 Caldwell fought a duel with Samuel Gwin, this time to defend the honor
of his friend, George Poindexter. Gwin had hissed a speech of Poindexter s at a
free-drinking inaugural levee for Governor Lvnch. Caldwell and Gwin were each
armed with six pistols and were advancing upon each other as they fired. Cald
well died that day; Gwin lingered in agony a year.
US 80, W. of Clinton, passes through cuts showing a pebbly clay
outcropping. The land is not heavily wooded; the homes are poor. An
occasional Negro is seen hoeing or plowing in fields which are separated
by clumps of trees. There are pastoral landscapes, and at intervals groups
of fine o.iks.
312 TOURS
At BOLTON, 130.2 m. (216 alt., 441 pop.), the highway runs
through an avenue of water oaks that shade the residences on each
side. Bolton exemplifies the quiet, shadowy, old inland hamlet found
in the prairie belt W. of Jackson. It has three steam cotton gins.
West of Bolton good farms lie on both sides of the highway, white
folks tractors alternating with Negroes mules in the work. Fresh eggs
and cool buttermilk can be bought at the roadside farmhouses.
At 739.2 m. is EDWARDS (226 alt., 456 pop.).
1. Left from Edwards on a graveled road, the old Edwards-Bolton highway, to
CHAMPION S HILL, 4.4 m., situated at the point where the middle Raymond
road intersects the old highway. The old highway extends over the crest of the
hill, an elevation 70 feet above the surrounding country. On the crest of this hill
on May 16, 1863, Confederate General Pemberton s left wing was placed, facing
E. against the far larger Union Army under Grant. The occasion was momentous.
Grant was in possession of Jackson and was moving toward Vicksburg. The three
divisions of Pemberton s army were trying frantically to unite with Johnston.
Grant moved in between. South of Champion s Hill Pemberton s army stretched
three miles, 15,000 Confederates fighting desperately to save Vicksburg from
destruction, but it was for the hill that Grant and Pemberton fought. One of the
most brilliant movements on either side was the charge of Cockrell s brigade of
Bowen s division, preparing the way for the advance of the Confederate front to
beyond the crest of the hill. This movement was accomplished in the evening
of May 1 6, following an afternoon of steady contest for possession. The weight
of the Federal forces, increased by fresh divisions moving up from Raymond,
however, finally turned the Confederate wing and Pemberton retreated across the
Big Black River. The Confederate loss was 324 killed, 3,269 wounded or cap
tured, and all artillery. The Federal loss was 410 killed, 2,031 wounded or cap
tured. One division of Confederate troops, consisting of almost 4,000 men, was
cut off from the rest of the army and forced to flee in a southeasterly direction
beyond Jackson. Grant s victory was the decisive stroke of the campaign. The
Confederates were scattered and the Federals were rapidly nearing Vicksburg,
their objective. The evening after the battle Grant received Halleck s order, sent
five days before, telling him on no account whatever to undertake such a campaign.
Grant could read the order with calmness ; he had staked everything and had won.
2. Left from Edwards on a country road leading across the wooden bridge over
the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. tracks to the TILGHMAN MONUMENT,
3 m. The monument is on the L. just beyond a church on the R. The stone is not
50 feet from the road and is easily visible, but is on the other side of a bordering
gully. A path leads down into the gully and up to the railed enclosure. The road
has every appearance of age, winding through a cut below the level of the fields,
bordered with trees. A single small cedar shades the monument, whose inscrip
tion reads: "Lloyd Tilghman, Brigadier General C.SA., Commander First
Brigade, Loring s Division. Killed here the afternoon of May 18, 1863, near * ne
close of the battle of Champion s Hill." Tilghman died defending the ford across
Baker s Creek while the Confederates retreated. The story is that he was shot by
a sharpshooter from the HENRY COKER HOUSE, 3.3 m., on the next hill. It is
a one-and-a-half-story country house, painted brown, with a central hall and a
small four-columned porch. At the four corners are giant magnolia trees. Along
the drive in front are cedars with moss hanging from the limbs. The hou.se is on a
knoll. In its front door and jambs are bullet holes made during the battle on
Champion s Hill, three miles NE. across the hills and ravines.
The SOUTHERN CHRISTIAN INSTITUTE, 140.2 m. (L), a Negro
college known as Mount Beulah, was established in 1875 on the planta
tion of the Cook family. Its 1937 enrollment is 222. The school struc
tures, set on a hill just off the highway are grouped about a white, square
TOUR 2 313
frame building two stories in height, housing the administrative offices
and the classrooms; the boarding students live in small one-story frame
structures scattered over the campus. At the school the highway flattens
out into the bottoms of the Big Black River.
At 145.3 m. is the junction with the old road across the Big Black
River.
Left on the old road leading under the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. to an
old BRIDGE, 0.3 m., across the Big Black River. Near this concrete railroad bridge
the Battle of the Big Black was fought, confirming the outcome of Champion s
Hill. The Confederates were routed in panic, losing the fortifications of the
bridge and 18 guns, in addition to 1,751 men taken captive by Grant. After the
battle Pemberton concentrated his remaining forces in the bluff hills encircling
Vicksburg.
US 80 climbs into the bluff hills immediately W. of the Big Black
River. The cuts through which the new road passes are in some places
25 feet deep, showing brittle loess. The highway runs through a stretch
of large and varied trees to come suddenly at 154.7 m. upon a spider
web of intersecting roads the ENTRANCE TO THE VICKSBURG
NATIONAL MILITARY PARK (see VICKSBURG).
US 80 follows Clay St. to Washington St.
VICKSBURG, 155.5 m. (206 alt., 22,943 pop.) (see VICKSBURG).
Points of Interest. Warren Co. Courthouse, a number of ante-bellum, siege-
marked homes, and others.
Here is the junction with US 61 (see Tour 3).
Left from Vicksburg on Clay St. to Cherry St. ; R. on Cherry St. ; L. on a local
blacktop road that cuts an intricately winding path through the hills and bluffs of
this section. The landscape is very rugged, with dense forests and undergrowth
throughout, and contrives to give a scene of primeval beauty. The L . S. WATER
WAYS EXPERIMENT STATION (guides at Administration Budding. 9-4
weekdays), 4.6 m., is a hydraulic laboratory installed for the purpose of building
and operating small-scale models of the Mississippi and other rivers. The lab
oratory is on a Federal reservation containing 245 acres. In the valley at the en
trance is the Administration Building, flanked with auxiliary buildings containing
special laboratories, shop facilities, and warehouses. Back of these is an Ho-acre
lake, while spread in front across the valley are miniature reproductions of sec
tions of rivers, bays, and harbors.
Beyond this valley a winding road up a steep wooded hill leads to a plateau
that was levelled to provide a loo-acre experimental field. Here larger models are
in operation. Among them and probably of greatest interest is the Mississippi
River model, the largest of this type in the world. It represents a 6oo-mile
stretch of the river from Helena, Ark., to Donaldsonville, I.a. including the
entire main river channel and the backwater areas of its tributaries. The model,
like all the others, is constructed of concrete and is covered with fluted screened
wire that represents roughness such as trees and undergrowth or anything that
hinders the flow of water. The model is 1,055 ft- long, has an average width of
167 ft., and covers 111,600 sq. ft., which represents 10,250,000 acres of the
actual Mississippi area. One cubic foot per second of water flowing through the
channel of the model is equivalent to 1,500,000 cubic feet per second in nature.
The water is introduced into each of the tributaries by means of V-notch weir
boxes, several of which are also scattered over the model to simulate run-offs
from rainfall.
In seven small houses are gauges recording the height of the water surface in
the models. Telephones installed in these houses enable all operators to keep in
p
HIGHWAY THROUGH LOESS BLUFFS TO VICKSBURG
touch with each other. An automatic timing device gives a signal with the passing
of each "day," which requires five minutes and 24 seconds on this model. The
purpose of this work is to test flood control devices, such as cut-offs, floodways,
and storage reservoirs. This is carried out by running water into the model in
which have been constructed proposed levees, dikes, or dredge cuts in order to
determine if these constructions will produce the desired results. Two full-time
photographers make pictures during these tests which need detailed study.
The station studies problems not only of the United States but also of foreign
countries. The model of Maracaibo Bay in Venezuela, South America, shows the
Pacific Ocean and the channel from the ocean to the bay through which heavily
loaded oil barges must travel and are sometimes caught. The purpose of the study
is to find a means of keeping the channel open without periodic dredging. In
this model there is an apparatus that reproduces actual tides, and a machine that
reproduces the waves, both of which are electrically operated and controlled.
Thirty-five minutes of operation in this study of tides equals a 24-hour day. The
model is on the plateau but is housed in a building 200 feet square.
The route continues L. on Washington St. (US 80-61). US 80 crosses
the VICKSBURG TOLL BRIDGE, 157.7 m. (cars $1.2.5, passengers
25$, pedestrians free) over the Mississippi River. A cantilever type and
through truss spans, the bridge was designed and constructed by Har
rington, Howard and Ash of Kansas City. It was opened for traffic in
1930. The river, the boundary line between Mississippi and Louisiana, is
73 miles E. of Monroe, La.
TOUR 3 315
Tour 3
(Memphis, Tenn.) Clarksdale Vicksburg Natchez (Baton Rouge, La). US 61.
Tennessee Line to Louisiana Line, 334.6 m.
Two-thirds route hard-surfaced, two lanes wide, rest being paved.
Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. parallels route throughout.
Accommodations of all kinds available; hotels chiefly in cities.
Caution: Look out for stock wandering on road at night.
Sec. a TENNESSEE LINE to VICKSBURG, 206.4 m.
US 6 1 passes through the State s great alluvial plain, an extensive flat
land with sluggish rivers, lakes, and bayous. The land, often lying below
the level of the Mississippi River, which flows between a system of
high man-made embankments called levees, is not strictly a river delta.
But for thousands of years the river has deposited over it the rich topsoil
of half a continent, giving it a fertility equaling that of the Nile and
making it one of the world s finest cotton-producing areas. For this
reason the section is colloquially called the Delta. Spreading leaf-shaped
to the south, it is a land of cotton and cotton planters. In the fall, or
cotton-picking time, it is a sea of white, broken at intervals by dark lines
of trees that grow along the bayous. The plantation big houses are sub
stantial but not pretentious; the tenant cabins are all alike. Smaller towns,
hardly more than plantation centers, are of a single pattern; each is
centered about a gin, a filling station, a loading platform, and a short
line of low-roofed, brick stores. The points of interest, aside from the
land itself, are the levees and the river, the lakes, the Indian mounds,
and the cotton fields.
At m. US 61 crosses the Mississippi Line, 7.9 miles S. of Memphis,
and, dropping from the hills to the Delta, gives an occasional glimpse of
the green levee bank that is 25 ft. high (R) and of the wooded bluffs (L).
At 7J m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on thii. road is LAKEVIEW, 0.4 m. (222 alt., 200 pop.), a fishing resort
(buffalo, crappie, perch, bass, catfish, and trout) by one of the lakes formed in
an old bed of the ever-changing Mississippi River. The lake is six and a half
miles long. Its front is privately owned (no overnight accommodations; boats
.1 to fishermen, $1 a day).
WALLS, 3.4 m. (213 alt., 150 pop.), is a plantation town built near
the Walls group of Indian mounds; so far as is known no post-Columbian
material has been found in the mounds.
LAKE CORMORANT, 8.4 m. (208 alt., 207 pop.), borders a lake
of the same name, which is typical of the bodies or water left behind
when the Mississippi River changes its course; it is four and a half
miles long and only 100 yards wide.
316 TOURS
Between Lake Cormorant and Robinsonville the highway cuts due
southward while the levee (R) swings slightly westward and the bluffs
(L) swing eastward; here the leaf -shaped Delta, at the northern end not
two miles wide, begins to widen; further south it reaches a width of
approximately 85 miles. At various points, plantation roads lead through
the fields and over the levee. From any of these roads at the top of
the levee the river is seen still farther to the west, and occasionally a
cultivated field in the swamps between the levee and the river.
At 16.3 m. is ROBINSONVILLE (204 alt., 150 pop.).
Right from Robinsonville on State 3, a graveled road, is COMMERCE, 4.8 m.
(201 alt., 50 pop.), once a rival of Memphis for the river trade, now a planta
tion centered around the big house built on the slope of a large Indian mound.
The land was originally bought from the Chickasaw by Dick Abbay, who built his
first log cabin in 1832. Other early settlers were Tom Fletcher, a Choctaw Indian,
and Col. Tom Burns. By 1850 Commerce had become the seat of Tunica Co., but,
just before the War between the States, the river, which had been responsible
for the growth of the town, started destroying it. Abbay s log cabin was washed
away. Trying to save their homes, the settlers built the first levees in this section
of the Delta, Abbay being assisted by Gen. James L. Alcorn, later Reconstruction
governor. But the river climbed the levees, spilled into the streets, and swallowed
Memphis rival. Today the old COLONEL BURNS STABLES of whitewashed
brick serve as commissaries on the Leatherman plantation which borders both
sides of the five miles of road leading from Robinsonville to the big house. The
present LEATHERMAN HOME (private) was not built directly on the 5o-foot
Indian mound because of the unwillingness of the builder to desecrate a mound
"full of the dead." The mound rises behind the house. From its top, so the in
evitable legend goes, Hernando De Soto in 1541 had his first glimpse of the great
river that was to be his grave. The view of the river is now cut off by the levee
and the trees. The Leatherman house is a modern structure, an impressive center
for the silos, great barns, and Negro cabins on this typical Delta plantation.
At 5.7 m. a great bend in the levee brings it close to the road. From the top of
the great sloping green mound is a good view of the lowland that has been con
demned for habitation by the Federal Government. Here is a i,ooo-acre tract that
gives a good illustration of what Delta planters have to fight again and again.
This field is planted each year in corn, but if the planter breaks fifty-fifty with
the overflowing backwater of the nearby river he considers himself fortunate. The
river wins more crops than the planter, yet the yield per acre is so great that
even one-third of a full crop pays for the effort and risk.
At 7.8 m. on the plantation road is the DE BE VO1S INDIAN MOUNDS, nine
small ones centered about one as tall as the Leatherman mound but much larger.
Because of its size the center mound is believed to have been the place on which
Chief Chisca of the Chickasaw tribe built his home, and the site of the skirmish
De Soto had with the Chickasaw before he crossed the river.
TUNICA, 26.4 m. (197 alt., 1,043 PP-)> * s tne t rac " n g center for
the stretch of the Delta between Clarksdale and Memphis. The river
(R) near Tunica has changed its course so often that what was Mississippi
shore 30 years ago is now Arkansas territory.
At 39.5 m. is DUNDEE (190 alt., 300 pop.).
Right from Dundee on a narrow graveled road climbing over the levee (road
between levee and jerry h low; drive with care) to a ferry, 6 m., crossing the
river to Helena, Ark. (18-hr, service, leaving on the half -hour; $1 for car ana
driver, 25$ each passenger).
TOUR 3 317
At 44.6 m. is LULA (180 alt., 448 pop.).
Right from Lula on a graveled road to GRANT S PASS, 2.5 m. A small wooden
bridge near the head of Moon Lake, here a bayou, marks the place where Gen.
U. S. Grant dynamited a pass from the Mississippi into the Coldwater River in
order to get his gunboats through the Coldwater into the Yazoo and then descend
on Vicksburg from the rear. The scheme failed, however.
West of Grant s Pass for several miles lies MOON LAKE (R), a Delta recrea
tional center (fishing, swimming, boating) ; the scene is delightful.
At 14 m. on the graveled road circling Moon Lake is FRIAR POINT (171 alt.,
988 pop.), lying in the shadow of the levee that conceals the Mississippi River
from the town. From the levee s broad, flat top, however, is an extensive view
of the river. The town is old, the only one of the towns established on the river
in the 1830 $ that has not been swallowed by the waters that originally gave them
importance. Nevertheless the river is a menace; because of it the county records
were, in 1930, removed to Clarksdale, and Friar Point was abandoned as a
county seat. Today the town lives by growing and ginning cotton, but it once
had a steamboat trade that bustled and hummed in the days before the War be
tween the States. Grant stopped here on his way with a fleet of transports to
Vicksburg. The ROBINSON HOME (open by permission) has a hole in its
facade made by a cannon ball when Federal and Confederate gunboats were
skirmishing in the river at that time. Ferry to Helena, Ark. (18-hr, service, leaving
on half -hour ; $1 for car and driver, 25$ passengers) .
At 46.6 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to COAHOMA, 3-5 m. (177 alt., 295 pop.), a small planta
tion center. Directly across from the depot is the L-shaped, clapboard HOME OF
MRS. BLANCHE MONTGOMERY RALSTON (open by permission). Mrs.
Blanche Montgomery Ralston, prominent for many years in civic and social serv
ice work in Mississippi, is now Regional Director of the Women s and Profes
sional Projects of the Works Progress Administration.
At 48.6 m. on US 6 1 is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road 3.6 m. is JONESTOWN (175 alt., 506 pop.).
1. Left from Jonestown 1.4 m. on a graveled road to MATAGORDA (open by
appointment), a plantation with a home built by Col. D. M. Russell around a
two-room log cabin constructed before the War between the States. Colonel Rus
sell had attained notoriety by resigning from Yale in 1856 as the leader of the
Southern students rebellion against President Woolsey s anti-slavery remarks.
Kept from fighting because of weak lungs, Russell was commissioner of the
Confederate States for making purchases in England, and on his return planned
the Confederate raid on the banks at St. Albans, Vermont. Colonel Russell s
initials, D. M. R., C. S. A., are said to be carved on the top of St. Paul s
Cathedral in London; Russell is supposed to have made the climb on a dare,
despite a lung hemorrhage. The name Matagorda was given to the place by
Colonel Russell for a special variety of long-staple cotton he raised, a variety
well known on the Liverpool Exchange. The house contains 22 rooms and five
baths, has one of the best private libraries in the State, a choice collection of old
china, and one of the State s largest and finest private art collections. Although
the house is two stories high, its length and wide porches give it a low, rambling
appearance. Climbing roses, gnarled cedars, and water oaks grace the grounds.
2. Right from Jonestown 2.4 m. on a graveled road to EAGLES NEST PLAN
TATION. The plantation was the home of Gen. James L. Alcorn, whose
persistence in fighting for a State levee system was finally successful. It was Alcorn
who gave the plantation its name. Atop an Indian mound on the plantation is a
MONUMENT TO ALCORN marking his grave. Alcorn served as Governor of
318 TOURS
Mississippi from 1870-71. He died in 1894 (see AN OUTLINE OF FOUR
CENTURIES).
At 38.7 m. is the junction with State 6 (see Tour 14).
CLARKSDALE, 62.3 m. (173 alt, 10,043 PP-) * s a typical Missis
sippi Delta city with level surface, far horizons, and broad surrounding
cotton fields. Viewed from a distance, the bare and treeless business
district of stores, gins, warehouses, and loading platforms appears squat
and dwarfed; yet silver-leaf maples and water oaks line the residential
streets giving the homes a secluded air. As many of these streets end
abruptly in the cotton fields, the sudden emergence from shade into
open country offers a startling contrast of light and shade. Fringed by
dark cypresses and bright willows, the narrow Sunflower River winds
through the city eastward and westward. Along its banks are many of
the oldest homes of Clarksdale large, comfortable frame houses, with
wide front galleries.
There is hardly a planter, tenant, or sharecropper on the surrounding
plantations whose business does not bring him to Clarksdale every
Saturday, the planter for business transactions, the tenant to buy supplies
and fertilizer. These Saturday trips afford opportunity for much visiting
on street corners; neighbors of the countryside call each other by their
first names and with delightful informality extend invitations to fox
hunting, fishing, or dancing. Weekends in the country form a large part
of Clarksdale s social life.
Though a few French Huguenot families are said to have been estab
lished earlier in the locality, John Clark is given credit for founding
Clarksdale, the seat of Coahoma Co. Clark was the son of an English ar
chitect, who was sent to Halifax by the British Government to help rebuild
the city destroyed by fire. The elder Clark died of yellow fever in New
Orleans in 1837 leaving John, age 14, to make his way. In December
1839 he landed at Port Royal near the present town of Friar Point in
Coahoma Co., where he met Ed Porter who became his partner in the
logging business. After several years both Clark and Porter quit logging
for farming. Clark bought his first 100 acres of land from the Govern
ment in 1848. The land site was well-chosen, for though the Delta above
the Lake Washington district was largely a trackless swamp at the time,
here on the banks of the Sunflower was a narrow spot of dry ground.
Formerly it was a point of intersection for two most important Indian
routes: the Chakchiuma trade trail, which ran northeastward to old
Pontotoc, and the Lower Creek trade path which extended westward
from Augusta, Ga., to New Mexico. At the point of intersection was
a fortification. After Clark s arrival, more Huguenot families came in,
cleared land, and settled on plantations. In 1858 he began work on
Hopedale, the original Clark home, and in 1868 opened a store and
platted off a village on the site of the Indian fortification. In 1882 it
was incorporated as Clarksdale. Frequent floods, a fire that swept away
the business houses in 1889, and the lack of roads retarded the devel
opment of the town for many years, but since 1900 its corporate limits
TOUR 3 319
have pushed the cotton fields farther and farther back on all sides. A
network of paved highways now connects it with the other parts of
the State, and, perhaps more important, ties it close to other plantation
centers. It is today the trading, ginning, compressing, and financial hub
of a great cotton-growing area. Of secondary importance are lumber mills
and planing mills, using timber cut from the Delta swamps.
The CUTRER HOME (private), NW. of courthouse on Friar Point
Road, occupies the site of one of the first houses in Clarksdale. Built
by the daughter of John Clark and almost hidden by oak and cedar
trees, on the bank of the river, it is a red-roofed, stuccoed mansion of
good proportions.
HOPEDALE, adjoining the Cutrer home, is the original John Clark
home. Begun in 1858 by workmen brought from Philadelphia, the house
was not quite finished at the outbreak of the War between the States.
Clark and his family moved in, however, and at the close of the war
completed the construction. Though remodeled and modernized, the west
side of the home, facing a large lawn studded with magnolia and oak
trees, retains its earlier character. The interior trim is of solid walnut,
the lumber having been whip-sawed from trees grown on the plantation.
The CARNEGIE PUBLIC LIBRARY, SE. corner Delta Ave. and
First St., a red brick English Tudor type building, was completed in 1914
at a cost of $25,000, but within recent years additions have more than
doubled its value. With 49,250 volumes, the largest public library col
lection in the State, and an annual book circulation of 167,982, it is one
of the outstanding libraries in Mississippi. The collection of Indian
relics on display here is also outstanding; excavated from the old forti
fication and from the many nearby mounds, are agricultural implements,
hunting knives, beads, pipes, and pottery.
The Delta Staple Cotton Festival, held usually in late Aug. or early
Sept., is an event that attracts visitors from a number of States. It is
the social climax of the harvest season.
At Clarksdale are the junctions with State i (see Side Tour 3 A) and
US 49 (see Tour 7, Sec. a).
Between Clarksdale and Cleveland the highway traverses cotton fields
stretching for miles on each side. The cotton stalks grow taller than a
man. In the few fields where it is cultivated corn reaches 15 ft. in height.
BOBO, 71.9 m. (164 alt., no pop.), is an early plantation settle
ment.
ALLIGATOR, 754 m. (163 alt., 278 pop.), was named for the
alligators that formerly infested Alligator Lake by which the town lies.
DUNCAN, 77.3 m. (157 alt., 337 pop.), like many Delta towns, has
several Chinese families. In 1929 all buildings here were swept away
by a tornado that killed 22 people. Since then the town has been com
pletely rebuilt.
HUSHPUCKENA, 80.3 m. (250 pop.), is a pecan-shipping center.
At SHELBY, 82.7 m. (141 alt., 1,811 pop.), the two crews building
tlic Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. from Vicksburg to Memphis met
in 1884.
320 TOURS
WYANDOTTE, 85.7 m. (142 pop.), also known as Chambers and
Winstonville, is a suburb of Mound Bayou.
MOUND BAYOU, 88.7 m. (143 alt., 834 pop.), Renova and Wyan-
dotte are the only towns in the State populated entirely by Negroes.
Mound Bayou was founded in 1887 by Isaiah T. Montgomery and Benja
min T. Green, Negroes. Montgomery was a former slave of Joseph
Emory Davis, brother of Jefferson Davis, and purchased the Davis planta
tion at Davis Bend after the war, living there with his family until he
moved to Mound Bayou. Later he, the only Negro delegate to Mississippi s
Constitutional Convention of 1890, supported the provision whose effect
was to bar Negroes from voting.
Montgomery and Green, accompanied by their cousin, J. P. T. Mont
gomery, and twelve families, most of whom came from Davis Bend,
Warren Co., Miss., surveyed this site in Bolivar Co. and cleared it for
occupation. Indian mounds NE. and SE. of the site gave the town its
name. The population had reached 183 before the end of the first year
of settlement. In February 1898 the Negroes petitioned the Governor to
incorporate the village, and in August the charter was signed and sealed.
The town has the usual mayor, sheriff, aldermen, and chamber of
commerce ; the inhabitants engage in farming, lumbering and merchandis
ing and service businesses. Here is the BOLIVAR COUNTY TRAIN
ING SCHOOL, a coeducational institution. Overnight accommodations
for white visitors are available at the Montgomery Home (R), a red
brick house.
Founder s Day, held annually in July, is attended by prominent
Negroes from all parts of the country.
MERIGOLD, 91- 4 m. (804 pop.), with a population composed of
whites, Negroes, and Chinese, has two white churches, three Negro
churches, a high school for white children and a Rosenwald grammar
school for Negroes. In the park are a swimming pool and tennis courts.
CLEVELAND, 98.8 m. (139 alt., 3,240 pop.), is a growing Delta town
made prosperous by the large planting interests of its inhabitants. Many
of the white frame cottages in its residential section are perhaps the
best examples in the State of the modern adaptation of the Greek Revival
design for small dwellings.
DELTA STATE TEACHERS COLLEGE is a modern plant, estab
lished in 1924 to serve the northwestern section of the State. It is a
Grade A fully accredited senior college. The NATURAL HISTORY
MUSEUM (open), though small, exhibits articles of interest. The Choral
Club is outstanding in the State.
SHAW, 109.4 m. (133 alt., 1,612 pop.), is a lively cotton ginning
and marketing center. Its well-built frame cottages, paved streets, brick
consolidated high school, and outdoor swimming pool (open) form a
typical center of the new Delta.
At LELAND, 125.1 m. (113 alt, 2,426 pop.), along the high slop
ing banks of Deer Creek is a charming residential section. Unlike the
majority of Delta towns, which are dependent solely on the production
of cotton, Leland profits from the growing of three other major products
TOUR 3 321
alfalfa, vegetables, and pecans. Leland, formerly Three Oaks Planta
tion, was settled in 1847 by Judge James Rucks, whose commodious home,
with its surrounding slave quarters, smokehouses, cotton houses, barns,
and stables, was a settlement in itself. At that time Deer Creek was
navigable, and the fact that Three Oaks was in a bend on the high banks
was responsible for its transition from a plantation to a plantation center,
the change taking place in 1884 with the coming of the Yazoo &
Mississippi Valley R.R.
Here is the junction with US 82 (see Tour 6).
Right from Leland on an asphalt road along Deer Creek to the DELTA EXPERI
MENT STATION at STONEVILLE, 2.5 m. established in 1906 and containing
760 acres under the supervision of Federal experts working in collaboration with
Mississippi State College. The station has recently acquired 3,000 acres of sub-
marginal land that is to be reforested.
At 132.2 m. (R), facing Deer Creek, is a two-story stucco home with
red tile roof and bright green lawn; it is typical of the new Delta big
houses.
ARCOLA, 135.4 m. (115 alt., 343 pop.), is a plantation trading center.
At 136.6 m. (R) is a house, facing Deer Creek from a great oak
grove, that is typical of the ante-bellum Delta homes. A square frame
building two stories high, it sits on a high foundation and has a wide
screened porch; at the rear is a one-story wing.
At ESTILL, 139-4 m. (50 pop.), US 61 crosses the lower end of the
38,000 acres of the DELTA AND PINE LAND CO. PLANTATION
(see Side Tour 3 A).
At 143.1 m. is HOLLANDALE (in alt., 1,211 pop.).
Right from Hollandale on a marked dirt road is LEROY PERCY STATE PARK,
4.2 m., the first of the Mississippi State parks; it was opened to the public May
i, 1936. The administration building, the superintendent s home, and seven over
night cabins have been completed. Projects under way include additional over
night cabins, a swimming pool, development of the warm water pools, stables
with horses for hire, two large lakes for fishing, canoeing facilities by Black
Bayou, playgrounds for children, tennis courts, and trails. A hostess arranges
for club meetings, parties, and dances; there is equipment to serve banquets to
as many as 300 people. The entire area of 2,541 acres will be used as a game
preserve and stocked by the Mississippi State Game and Fish Commission. The
park is named for the late U. S. Senator LeRoy Percy (1860-1929), one of
Washington County s most distinguished sons (see Side Tour 3 A).
PERCY, 7^8 m. (217 pop.), is the trading center and shipping point
for a large plantation.
At 148.9 m. US 61 crosses the northern boundary of PANTHER
BURN PLANTATION, owned by McGee & Co. of Leland and typical
of the large corporation-owned plantations in the Delta (see AGRICUL
TURE). This plantation has a total acreage of 12,400 and a population
of 2,200. The frame tenant cabins (L) face Deer Creek across old US
61. The railroad (R) is said never to have been able to purchase this
strip of land, making it the only privately owned right of way used by
the Illinois Central System. At 7:57.2 m. is the little town that forms
I the plantation center. At 757.7 m. the highway crosses the southern
boundary of the plantation.
322 TOURS
The dark brown, one-story frame buildings, each flanked by a basket
ball court, that dot the roadside in this section are schools built by
planters for the children of tenant families.
NITTA YUMA, 154.7 m. (109 alt., 25 pop.), according to old settlers,
was settled in 1768 by the Phelps family who were conducted up the
Mississippi River by Indian guides. On the south bank of Deer Creek,
W. of the railroad, is one of the cabins erected in 1768. It is constructed
of cypress logs put together with wooden pegs. One end now houses a
business office. West of town on the creek are the remains -of several
log cabins, slave quarters, and. brick cisterns, built before the War be
tween the States. At the time of settlement much of this section was
owned by the Vick family (see V1CKSBURG). The large house (L)
shows well the originality the early planter used in adapting current
modes to his needs. Though having some Georgian characteristics, the
house has a large archway through the center, furnished and used as
a terrace.
ANGUILLA, 158.3 m. (107 alt., 467 pop.), was settled in 1869 by
William C. H. McKinney. In what was little more than a snake-infested
canebrake he built the first store and later a post office. The town, how
ever, was not incorporated until 1913. It is a plantation center slightly
enlarged by a lumber mill, and several gins and compresses.
Right from Anguilla on the graveled Deer Creek road to the BARNARD HOME,
0.4 m., an ante-bellum structure with fine old furnishings. The summer house is
built upon an unexcavated Indian mound.
ROLLING FORK, 163.7 m. (104 alt., 902 pop.), the seat of Sharkey
Co., is named for Rolling Fork Plantation, which Thomas Chancy cleared
in 1826. Chaney s daughter was the first white child born in Sharkey
Co. Lying in the lowest of the bottom lands of the Yazoo-Mississippi
Delta, the town has frequently been flooded by overflow from Deer
Creek, but in spite of this menace it has a substantial trade. On the SE.
bank of Deer Creek is a group of THREE INDIAN MOUNDS, one
of which is said to be the tallest in the county.
Here is the junction with State i (see Side Tour 3 A).
Between Rolling Fork and the Yazoo River the highway runs through
one of the Delta s poorer and less interesting sections, part of which
is to become a national forest. The so-called Delta Unit is the most
recently purchased of the seven in the State, and is bound roughly by
Yazoo City, Rolling Fork, and Vicksburg. Much of the area is under
water when the Mississippi and Yazoo overflow, the backwater some
times reaching a depth of ten feet. There are numerous Indian mounds
scattered through the hardwood forests.
At 79.5.2 m US 61 crosses the YAZOO RIVER (Ind., river of death).
Here the Delta ends precipitately. South of the bridge over the Yazoo
is the monument marking the SITE OF FORT ST. PETER, known dur
ing the siege of 1863 as Fort Snyder. In 1719 French missionaries erected
here a stockade to protect settlers from raids of the Yazoo and Tunica
Indians. Between the monument and Vicksburg the route is attractive,
winding up through the Walnut Hills, heavily wooded with magnolia
TOUR 3 323
trees. Along the crest of these hills the trenches and earthworks thrown
up by the Confederates in an attempt to turn back the Federal advance
are plainly visible.
At 196.6 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road 1.9 m. (L) to BLAKELY (open by appointment). Reached by
a narrow trail leading up a hillside, the house is the northernmost of the ante
bellum plantation homes that crown the Mississippi bluffs between the Walnut
Hills and Woodville. The original cabin of sassafras logs became a refuge for
Thomas Ferguson and his wife in 1833, when their home at Haynes Bluff burned.
The cabin s site on a natural shelf halfway up the hillside and about 300 yds. W.
of the Old Trace seemed to the Fergusons an excellent place for their new home,
and they immediately ordered from Cincinnati a pre-fabricated one-room frame
house that came by flatboat and was joined to the north end of the cabin. After
Ferguson s death in 1838, Mrs. Ferguson married Benson Blake, who, in 1842,
built a southern addition to the house. This entire structure was remodeled in
1873, when further proof of the cabin s great age was found in burials in lime
discovered under it. While the yard and sunken garden were being graded the
burial place of a horse with saddle and bridle was revealed, substantiating the
story of old settlers that the cabin had once been a rendezvous of the highway
man, Murrel (see TRANSPORTATION). During the War between the States
Jefferson Davis and a large staff of officers, including Generals Smith and
Breckenridge, breakfasted here in two relays on their way to inspect the fortifica
tions at Snyder s Bluff. The first shell fired from Admiral Farragut s flagship at
Vicksburg was presented the day it was fired to Mrs. Benson Blake; this shell
now stands by the front steps at Blakely. During the siege of Vicksburg both
Grant and Sherman dined here more than once, the dining room then as now
being the original log cabin whose age not even Ferguson, who was interested to
the point of making inquiries, could determine when he bought it in 1833.
Between here and Vicksburg the highway cuts across the foot of hills
that give a good idea of the difficulties General Sherman faced toward
the close of 1862, in the short but deadly Battle of Chickasaw Bayou
when Grant was making his second assault on Vicksburg. In trying to
gain the fortified bluffs (L), Sherman s two brigades were cut to pieces
by the storm of Confederate bullets from the entrenchments along what
is now the old highway. The flat land (R) was the scene of death, the
total Federal loss being 1,929, the Confederate 206.
At 200.1 m., near a small lumber mill, is the junction with a dirt road.
Right on this road across the Yazoo River to EAGLE LAKE, 11 m. This lake,
formed when the Mississippi changed its course, is 17 miles long and in some
places three miles wide. It is a well-known fishing place (black bass, trout, I
perch, buffalo, goggle eye, catfish). In winter the wild duck and geese flocking to
the willows and marshes along its shore line make the lake a mecca for hunters.
(Hotel facilities; canoes, outboard motors, and fishing tackle for hire. Road to
lake t irtnally impassable after htai > rains and und<.r u .itcr u hen Yazoo River
/j .// fiauJ >tage.)
Between the junction and Vicksburg US 61 passes a number of large
hardwood mills and through a "catfish row" or Negro shacks.
At 20M m. (L) is the VICKSBURG NATIONAL CEMETERY,
where more than 17,000 Union soldiers who lost their lives in the
campaign and siege of Vicksburg are buried. Of this number, nearly
13,000 are unidentified. There are no Confederate soldiers buried in the
cemetery; they lie in Cedar Hill Cemetery in Vicksburg. A few Spanish
324 TOURS
American and World War soldiers are buried here. The much-visited
grounds have been beautifully landscaped, with walks and drives, ser
pentine ravines, terraces, plateaus, long avenues of rare trees and shrub
bery, and variegated tropical plants. The cemetery has no connection
with the Vicksburg National Military Park.
Paralleling the highway (R) is the Yazoo Canal on which is a base
of the United States Engineering Fleet (see VICKSBURG).
US 6 1 enters on Washington St.
VICKSBURG, 206.4 m. (206 alt., 22,943 pop.) (see VICKSBURG).
Points of Interest: Warren County Courthouse, Vicksburg National Military
Park, a number of ante-bellum siege-marked homes, and others.
At Vicksburg is the junction with US 80 (see Tour 2).
Sec. b VICKSBURG to LOUISIANA LINE, 128.2 m. US 61.
The eastern bluffs rimming the circuitous Mississippi River between
Vicksburg and Fort Adams are the wildest and most precipitous of the
many hills in the State. The fertile loess, caked in giant hummocks of
silt, supports a profusion of vines and trees. Moving with slow, meas
ured grace at their feet, the river that has brushed the bluffs with the
debris of half a continent gives them doubled beauty. It rolls by mile
after mile of settlements that belong to the Deep South; south of the
cliffs at Natchez its tawny waters have received the blood of Indians,
Frenchmen, Spaniards, and British. For the 16 years before the ac
cession of the Spanish the hills were a i4th colony of George III of
England; but in 1779 the dons came back to the stream that had been
De Soto s grave and restored to the bluffs the ceremony and punctilio
to which the Natchez Indians had been accustomed. Wealth brought a
renaissance. On escarpments appeared structures combining Spanish grace
with classic proportions. The produce of the trans-Appalachian States
drifted downstream in flatboats that tied up at Natchez Under-the-Hill;
they were clumsy, blunt, and heavy with corn, whisky, and hides. But
these, with the cotton raised on the bluff plantations, were the materials
that enabled men to make fortunes almost overnight.
What Williamsburg is to Colonial Virginia, Vicksburg, Port Gibson,
Natchez, and Woodville are to the Old Deep South. The story of this
southwest corner of Mississippi is the bulk of the colonial and territorial
history of the State, and is an integral part of the story of the Southwest.
Of all the spots in the Territory none was tougher than Natchez Under-
the-Hill, none more genteel than Natchez on the Bluffs. Both by ante
cedents and by way of life, many of the Natchez settlers were men of
heroic characteristics, as great in strength as in weakness. The names of
the plantations Auburn, Richmond, Rosalie, Elmscourt, Melrose, Windy
Hill, The Briars, Arlington are indicative of the culture that developed
here.
The death of this old culture did not efface all signs of the former
TOUR 3 3 2 5
life. Though many of the old homes are gradually falling into ruin,
enough of them remain to stamp the scene with their character. The
manner, too, survives, curiously expressed in the use of bric-a-brac
cherished as evidence of the old way of life. The woods, festooned with
vines and long gray moss, are as grand as they were to the first pioneer.
South on Washington St. in VICKSBURG, m., US 61 and the river
separate, the highway winding between the bluffs, and changing its
character every few miles.
At .5.9 m. the road temporarily flattens out on the Mississippi bottoms
where, on plowed fields (R), is the SITE OF WARRENTON, founded
in 1802, which became the first seat of Warren Co. The shelling and
partial burning of Warrenton by Federal troops in 1863 put the finishing
touches to a death that had been coming slowly since the river changed its
course in the 1840*5.
Opposite the fields of Warrenton the hills (L) almost touch the high
way. The profusion of creeping vines and thick green shrubbery in the
woods is striking. Perched in clearings on the slopes and facing the river
bottoms are Negro cabins.
At 8.9 m. US 6 1 comes close to the Diamond cut-off on the Mississippi
River, approximately three miles W., the shortest water route to desolate
Palmyra Island, for many years the plantation home of Jefferson Davis.
At YOKENA, 11 .5 m. (52 pop.), the highway climbs a wooded hill;
long moss hangs from the cedars.
At 13.6 m. US 61 crosses the Big Black River. South of the river
the highway ascends as sharply as it descended and for several miles
i traverses rugged country cut by ravines, with the few visible habitations
standing in hilly patches.
At 24-1 m. (R), set against a bluff, is the northernmost of the fine
plantation homes fringing Port Gibson, the JOHN TAYLOR MOORE
PLACE (open by permission), a large white frame two-story house with a
1 broad double-deck front gallery and immense chimneys on each side.
John Taylor Moore was the wealthiest of the old Port Gibson planters,
the "Marse John" of Irwin Russell s verse, and the son-in-law of Resin
P. Bowie for whom the bowie knife was named. It was Moore who
donated the money to build the Catholic Church at Port Gibson (see
below).
US 6 1 flattens out for Bayou Pierre. Leading from the highway on
I each side are sunken wagon roads worn deep into the loess, their depth
an evidence of their age.
At 26 m. is the junction with an old graveled road.
Right on this road to THE HF.RMITAGE, OJ m. (open by permission), the
home of Confederate Brig. Gen. B. G. Humphreys, first post-war Governor of
Mississippi. The house, or Southern Planter type, with a broad front gallery and
a wide enclosed central hall, was built about 1800 by George Wilson Humphreys,
the general s father; it is well preserved. B. G. Humphreys was born here in
1808; he entered West Point in the same class with Robert E. Lee. but was dis
missed for participation in a Christmas riot. Returning to Mississippi he repre
sented Claiborne Co. at different times in both houses of the State Legislature,
then moved to the Delta; in 1861 he organized a company known as the Sun-
326 TOURS
flower Guards, which proceeded to Virginia without waiting for the State to
organize troops. He rose rapidly in rank, serving at Chickamauga, Knoxville, in
the Wilderness, and at Richmond until badly wounded in 1864, but when the
war ended he was again on duty in Mississippi. In 1865 the conservative party
in the State elected him governor. Increasing friction between Governor Hum
phreys and Congressional reconstructionists led to his expulsion from the mansion
at Jackson. It is said that Andrew Jackson, entertained by the Humphreys on a
visit to Port Gibson, remembered the charm of this place and named his own
home The Hermitage.
West of the Hermitage the old road leads to GRAND GULF, 5.5 m., named for
the whirlpools and eddies formed in the Mississippi by the current from the Big
Black River and by a sandstone cliff jutting into the river. The danger of the
Grand Gulf whirlpools was known to all early voyagers on the river, and a Brit
ish settlement had been made at the mouth of the Big Black River before the
American Revolution. On the level plain just above the eddy and cliff the town
was laid out in 1828, was incorporated in 1833, and had a population approach
ing 1,000 by 1860. It was an important river landing, and to it cotton was barged
down the Big Black River from as far as Jackson for transshipment. In 1835
Grand Gulf ranked third in commercial importance in the State, and for the next
20 years handled more cotton than any other town in Mississippi, not excepting
Natchez or Vicksburg. A railroad, begun in the 1830 $, was completed to Port
Gibson to take the place of a wagon road so bad that Joseph Jefferson, the actor,
commented forcefully on its discomforts. Huge stores, buying fancy goods in
New York and selling cotton in Liverpool, were grouped near the wharf. Two
of the store proprietors, Buckingham and Hume, were of the English gentry.
Grog shops were plentiful and frequent duels were fought on the sand bar.
The decline of Grand Gulf started when the river began to cut into the bluff.
There were times when the town was moved piecemeal away from the caving
banks. Practically all that remained was destroyed by fire in 1862 when Federal
gunboats were running the batteries in the successive campaigns against Vicks
burg. General Grant said later that pistols would have been more appropriate
the gunboats and land batteries were so close together. The fall of Grand Gulf in
1863 was the prelude to the siege and fall of Vicksburg. Grant took the town
and used it as his supply base for the remainder of the campaign. Traces of the
Confederate fortifications, breastworks, and caves can be found on Tremont
plantation back of the town, and trenches, still in good condition, are visible in
the old cemetery. After the war, Grand Gulf s citizens attempted to revive the
town life, but were again defeated by the river, which this time moved away
toward the W. The river is now working in toward the one store and the few
small houses that remain. The Federal Government has bought the cliff, from the
top of which can be seen the Warren Co. Courthouse at Vicksburg, 25 miles
away. A Geodetic Survey Station has been set up, and revetment work is planned.
At 27 m. US 6 1 crosses the big fork of Bayou Pierre.
At 28.4 m. (R) is the entrance to the SITE OF GLENSADE, one
of the Humphreys homes, now destroyed. The towering grove of oaks
under which the house stood is easily found. South of Glensade a curve
of the highway gives a view of Port Gibson.
At 29.7 m. US 61 crosses the south fork of Bayou Pierre over the
new 1RW1N RUSSELL MEMORIAL BRIDGE. From the new bridge
is visible, less than 100 yards away (L), the hulk of the bridge the
Confederates burned in 1863 trying to check Grant as he pushed his
armies toward Vicksburg. Of the old bridge only the pylons, cables,
railings, and iron cross beams are left, and these are gradually rusting
away. The flat-spring cables, however, remain to distinguish it as having
been the only one of its kind.
TOUR 3 327
PORT GIBSON, 29.8 m. (116 alt, 1,861 pop.), is today what it has
always been, a small cotton-growing town that thrives without hurry.
Purely ante-bellum in tone, it rests tranquilly in the curve of Bayou
Pierre, its quiet oak-lined streets and well proportioned white frame
homes supporting the story that General Grant said, when he passed
through on his march to Vicksburg in 1863, "Port Gibson is too beauti
ful to burn."
The town s founder, Samuel Gibson, exemplifies the pioneer of his
period. He came to this section in 1788 and soon became stockman,
bee keeper, hunter, gardener, orchardist, planter, and operator of a grist
mill and cotton gin. Salt, sugar, tea, and coffee were the only commodi
ties with which Gibson could not supply himself. His plantation was
a rendezvous for early travelers and circuit riding preachers, and in his
backwoods library were a surprising number of volumes. GIBSON S
GRAVE is in the Protestant Cemetery at the east end of Greenwood St.
Harman Blennerhassett, an associate of Aaron Burr s in the South
west conspiracy, brought his wife to Port Gibson in 1810, two years after
he had been acquitted of charges of conspiracy against the United States.
He had come to America because he had been ostracized in Ireland for
marrying his young niece. The sensitiveness aroused by this ostracism
and the collapse of his friend Burr s schemes made Blennerhassett name
the plantation he bought here, La Cache, his hiding place. His ability
and wealth made him a man of affairs in the community, but the same
sensitiveness brought him continually in conflict with his neighbors.
In 1818 he gave up La Cache, selling it and his 18 slaves for $25,000,
and moved to Montreal.
The IRW IN RUSSELL MEMORIAL, SE. corner College and Coffee
Sts. (ope.n), is a square white brick house, originally the home of Samuel
, Gibson. During the War between the States it was used as a Confederate
hospital; it had been used by the Port Gibson Female College for 104
years when the Irwin Russell Memorial Committee purchased it in 1933
, for a community center. One room of the building is furnished with
i articles intimately associated with the life of Mississippi s outstanding
Irwin Russell; and there is an exhibit of some of his manuscripts.
Russell, recognized as one of the South s three poetic geniuses, was
born in Port Gibson in 1853. He was one of the first writers of genuine
Negro dialect stories, Christmas Night in the Quarters being his iruster-
; piece. His career, however, was cut short, for he died when only 2(i
years old, and it is only within recent years that he lias received the
recognition due him. Russell left Port Gibson early in his manhood to live
in New York, but soon tiring of that city moved to New Orleans where
he died in 1879. Various anecdotes revealing his quick and brilliant mind
are still told by those natives who knew him intimately. The town hall
and a library occupy the other rooms of the memorial.
The L. P. WILLIAMS HOME (open by permission). NW. corner
Church and Walnut Sts., is a well-proportioned white frame house one
story high. One of the finest of the old homes here, it was the birthplace
of Constance Gary, the woman who made the first Confederate flag. Archi-
328 TOURS
bald Gary, distinguished lawyer and father of Constance, was a kinsman
of Thomas Jefferson and was reared in Jefferson s household, moving to
Port Gibson in the i83o s and becoming the editor of the town s first
newspaper. His wife was related to Lord Fairfax. In the 1840 $ the
Carys returned to Alexandria, Va., and it was there during the War be
tween the States that Constance made the flags from "ladies silk dresses."
The flags were presented one each to Generals Beauregard, Van Dorn, and
Johnston. It was from the porch of this home that General Grant made
his announcement concerning the beauty of Port Gibson.
The PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, NE. corner Church and Walnut Sts.,
has a steeple surmounted by an enormous galvanized-iron hand in place of
the conventional cross. The original hand, fashioned by Daniel Foley and
placed on the church when it was erected in 1829, was made of wood cov
ered with gold leaf and was the hand of a scholar. The present hand, with
the forefinger pointing to heaven, replaced the rotting original some years
ago and represents the hand of a laborer.
Chandeliers in the church are a gift from the owners of the steamboat,
Robert E. Lee, which in 1870 won the race with the Natchez, the most
celebrated event of its kind in the history of Mississippi River packets.
The church still has a slave gallery.
The CATHOLIC CHURCH, Church and Coffee Sts., was built with
money donated by John Taylor Moore, the "Marse John" of Russell s dia
lect poems. The brick church, of Gothic design, has mellowed to a reddish-
pink color with the years. The walnut altar rail and the heavy overhead
beams were carved by Daniel Foley. On the wall above the altar is a por
trait of Christ, painted by Thomas Healy, a brother of George Healy
(1813-94), painter of portraits and historical pictures.
The CATHOLIC CEMETERY, Coffee St., contains the GRAVE OF
RESIN P. BOWIE, inventor of the bowie knife. The original knife de
signed by Bowie was a deadly weapon fashioned by a Natchez cutler
from a blacksmith s rasp. It was the first knife to have a guarded hilt and
was first used by James Bowie, brother of the inventor, in a duel at Nat
chez. The original knife was on James Bowie s body at the Alamo when
in 1836 James was found dead surrounded by 20 dead Mexicans.
THE H1L, S. end of town near Y.&M.V. R.R., is a large brick house
erected early in the i9th century by the father of Gen. Earl Van Dorn,
C.S.A. The house is in bad condition yet retains its dignity. On the hill
opposite the house is the grave of Earl Van Dorn, one of the most dash
ing and brilliant of the Confederate Cavalry commanders. Born at Port
Gibson Sept. 17, 1820, Earl Van Dorn later graduated from West Point
and was given a lieutenancy in the 7th infantry in 1842. He took part in
Scott s campaign in Mexico and won the brevets of captain and major for
gallantry. He was wounded at the Belen gate of Mexico City. He served
in the war with the Seminole Indians in Florida and, in 1855, received
four wounds in a battle against the Comanche Indians in the West. Upon
secession of Mississippi he resigned his commission to become one of the
four brigadier-generals of the State s army. He later served with the regu
lar Confederate army, becoming commander of the Army of the West.
RUINS OF WINDSOR, NEAR PORT GIBSON
His career was ended at Springhill, Alabama, on May 7, 1863, when a
j-li\sician of that town assassinated him.
Right from Port Gibson on a graveled road are a number of relics of the Old
South. For several miles the road is a mazy, tree-shadowed pathway leading past
tangled woodlands and steep embankments. The embankments arc covered with
soft green moss, shaded by the long gracefully curled Spanish moss hanging in
great gray bunches from extended tree branches. Around each curve is a new and
pleasing vista.
At 1.4 m. the road forks; R. here. The landscape gradually loses its secluded
picturcsqueness and emerges into open farming country. Bayou Pierre lies little
more than 3 miles (R) from the highway; the black silt about it is unexcelled
for growing cotton. When Vicksburg, Port Gibson, and Natchez were in their
hevday as river towns, this section was a stronghold of plantation life. But now
only the ruins of the splendid mansions are left.
The amazing RUINS OF WINDSOR loom up at 10.3 m. (L). Twenty-two
gigantic stone Corinthian columns remain as testimony to what was perhaps the
supreme gesture of the grand manner of ante-bellum Greek Revival architecture.
These columns, joined by Italian wrought-iron railings which were once at the
upper gallery level, form a perfect outline of the house, which was rectangular
in shape with a narrow ell, the service wing, at the rear. Windsor was built by
S. C. Daniel, a wealthy planter who had holdings in the vicinity and across the
river in Louisiana. When completed in 1861, it \\.ix considered the handsomest
home in Mississippi. It had five stories topped by an observatory. The furnishings
were imported and the library housed rare old books. Rich tapestries and velvet
draperies adorned it. During the War between the States for a short period the
Confederates used its lofty tower, which commanded a view of the Mississippi
River, as an observation point; then the Federals used it as a hospital. Mark
Twain, when a pilot on Mississippi steamboats, used to chart his course at this
point by the peak of the tower. In 1890 Windsor wax J.stroyed by tire. I-xccpt
for a few pieces of jewelry nothing was saved.
At 10. S m. is A junction with an unmarked dirt lane (impassable when tret): R.
here 3 m. to BRU1NSBURG L.-l.VP/.YcV. which affords one of the loveliest views
of the Bayou Pierre. Before flowing into the Mississippi the bayou thrusts
out in two giant arms to embrace luilamls hazy with moss. The land
ing is a secluded spot today, its few inhabitants living in a primitive logging
33 TOURS
camp and in shanty boats moored to the shore. But in the days of river traffic,
it was a lively port and cotton market. On April 30, 1863, Grant transported his
40,000 Union soldiers across Bayou Pierre, coming up the river to Bruinsburg.
A fugitive slave that he brought with him from Louisiana guided him and his
troops to meet an army of 5,000 Confederates at Port Gibson. Along the banks
of the bayou at Bruinsburg are numerous Indian relics, flint, arrowheads, and bits
of pottery. When wandering bands of Choctaw under Captain Chubby came here
from their settlements in the eastern part of the State, efforts were made to get
them to pick cotton, but they scorned the menial labor and its associations.
At 11.6 m. is the BETHEL VOCATIONAL SCHOOL for Negroes, in a brown
frame one-story building, sharing a small clearing with a little white frame
church.
At 11.9 m. is the junction with a graveled road; R. here 8 m. is RODNEY
(124 pop.), a ghost river town that died in 1876 when the Yazoo & Mississippi
Valley R.R. was built. Prior to the War between the States, Rodney with a pop
ulation of 4,000 supported a wharf, a boat landing, two warehouses, and numer
ous stores and dwellings. During the war the PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH was
shelled by Federal gunboats, and the marks of cannon balls are visible on its
walls. Because of the changes in the river s course, the village is now 3 miles
inland.
At 13.1 m. is OLD BETHEL CHURCH (L), a weathered red stuccoed brick
structure that has faded to a salmon-pink. The stucco has peeled in many places
exposing the brick. The Greek temple effect of the building is spoiled by a pro
truding square entrance tower surmounted by a small incongruous wooden spire.
In the interior a broad, flat slave gallery faces the pulpit across plain pine pews.
In the center of the auditorium is a modern, coal-burning heater. Dr. Chamber
lain built the church in the early 1820*5, and in it the first classes of Oakland
College (see below) were held. General Grant s army passed here on its march
to Vicksburg and riddled the belfry with bullets. The church is used by Presby
terians of the Bethel Community.
At 14-2 m. is CANEMOUNT (open by permission), erected by John Murdock
who died in 1826. Placed in a picturesque setting on sloping grounds planted in
oaks and cedars, the one-and-a-half story white brick house is more elaborately
designed than was the typical Southern Planter type of its period. A wide gallery
extends around the first floor. The interior is divided by a wide hall, to the right
side of which is the parlor and library, and on the left an unusually long dining
room. The woodwork is cut in wedge-shaped patterns and the mantels, on both
the first and second floors, are of white marble. In the library is a large triple-
arched window that lends unusual charm to the room. The ceilings of the first
floor rooms are ornamented with plaster arabesques, the dining room having a
diamond shaped ornament in its center. The stairway has a mahogany rail, and
the second floor hall is lighted by a dormer with triple-arched windows. Two
frame wings extending from the main house form a rear court. These wings, used
for guests, are typical of the lavishness of ante-bellum entertaining, when friends
lingered weeks and sometimes years. Each wing contains four rooms, the front
ones having open fireplaces. John Murdock, a native of Ireland and related to
Robert and George Cochrane who settled in the Natchez area during the Spanish
Era, amassed a large fortune and, like his kinsmen, was a man of considerable
importance during the Territorial period.
At 15.2 m. is the entrance to ALCORN AGRICULTURAL AND MECHAN
ICAL COLLEGE, a Negro high school and senior college accredited and sup
ported by the State. The college was established in 1871 during the administration
of Governor Alcorn, and given his name. The first allotment made for its main
tenance was $50,000. About 90 percent of the Negro teachers of Mississippi are
graduates of Alcorn. Many of the buildings were once a part of old Oakland
College, established in 1830 by the Rev. Jeremiah Chamberlain. Chamberlain
TOUR 3 331
came to Mississippi from Philadelphia, Pa., in 1823, sent by the General Presby
terian Hoard of Domestic Missions. The college was organized at a meeting held
in the Bethel Church, the members of that church subscribing $12,000 toward the
college fund. In 1851 Dr. Chamberlain, still acting president, was stabbed at the
front gate of his cottage on the campus by a hotheaded Secessionist, who believed
that the doctor was favoring the doctrines of the Unionist party in his teachings.
The college gradually declined because of the war and yellow fever epidemics.
The old buildings are distinguishable by their aged brick walls and large white
wooden columns. The CHAPEL (R), a large, plain brick post-Colonial, Southern
type structure, has been changed little since its erection in 1831 ; the original seats
of solid walnut, hewn from trees in nearby woods, are still in use. The front
steps of the building, of wrought iron, originally belonged to Windsor.
US 61 S. of Port Gibson crosses the fertile loess that made the town
rich. The land is hilly with alternating woods and tilled fields. At 31.3 m.
US 6 1 enters the northern end of a tract of 29,000 acres being planted and
terraced by the U.S. Soil Conservation Service.
LORMAN, 42.8 m. (211 alt., 200 pop.), is a shaded village with a
Sabbath-like quiet.
HARRISTON, 50 m. (277 pop.), is a country village, grouped about
a depot on the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R.
FAYETTE, 52.1 m. (292 alt., 848 pop.), is a typical southwest Mis
sissippi village, interesting chiefly because its courthouse holds the records
of the extinct County of Pickering, one of two Territorial counties founded
in 1799. From the community have come many outstanding citizens,
among them Gen. Thomas Hinds, who commanded the Mississippi Dra
goons at the Battle of New Orleans, and Cato West, Secretary and Acting
Governor of the Mississippi Territory (1803-05).
At 54.3 m. is the junction with a sunken road.
Left on this road to HOME HILL, 2 m. (open by appointment), which was the
plantation of Gen. Thomas Hinds (see JACKSON).
At 57.8 m. is McGARRY S FORKS.
Right from McGarry s Forks to the SITE OF OLD GREE\ \ ILLE, 0.2 m. On
Feb. 8, 1804, in "Gallows Field" at Greenville, Wiley "Little" Harp and James
Mays, notorious outlaws along the Natchez Trace, were hanged. They had been
recognized at Natchez as they attempted to claim the reward for beheading their
former partner, Samuel Mason (see TRANSPORTATION), and had been recap
tured he-re after they escaped. After the execution, the head of Harp was mounted
on a pole at the north end of town along the trace, and the head of Mays at the
south end. Their bodies \vtre first huriexl in the town graveyard, hut were later
exhumed by outraged citizens and reburied in a spot now unknown.
At iS.R m. (L) is a monument marking a CROSSING OF THE NAT
CHEZ TRACE (see TRANSPORTATION). The old road, leading off
US 6 1 (L) from the monument, is deeply cut in the loess and arched with
ancient trees.
The highway S. and \\". of the monument rides the ridge, deep hollows
dropping; away on each side.
At 67.2 m. (L) is .S7W.V 67-77:7. /> (dJm. 2}f) t in a grove of lofty
trees. This two-story Planter type house was erected in 1791 by Col.
Thomas Marsden Green. Across its front extend wide upper and lower
galleries supported by six Doric columns. The recessed doorways are sim-
332 TOURS
pie, with side lights of plain design. The interior is spacious with wood
work carved by hand in a lacy design. The mantels, carved by Spanish
workmen, are unusually large. According to tradition, Andrew Jackson
and Mrs. Rachel Donelson Robards were married here in 1791.
West of Springfield US 61 winds through very beautiful woods, with
moss six feet long hanging from trees whose trunks are almost hidden
in a jungle of vines and shrubs.
RICHLAND (L), 61.7 m. (open by permission), was built in the
1840 $ by Robert Cox, whose wife had inherited the plantation from her
grandfather, Col. Thomas M. Green, the owner of Springfield and of an
other large tract of land granted him about 1788. The white gracefully-
proportioned house is built of brick and hand-hewn timber and there is a
wide gallery with square columns across the front. The roof is broken by
dormer windows. The front door is massive, with Corinthian pilasters on
each side. The hall is unusually wide and, extending to an arch in the
rear, meets a cross hall, from which rises a stairway. Set back from the
highway in a grove of green cedars, and with a part of the original gar
dens remaining, the setting of Richland is particularly attractive. Among
the camellia japonicas is a red variety that is rarely seen. The crapemyrtles
have grown into shade trees, their venerable appearance enhanced by fes
toons of Spanish moss.
At 62. 1 m. is the junction with an unmarked road.
Right on this road to CALVERTON PLANTATION, 34 m., to which Aaron
Burr was carried after his capture in 1807. The capture was as much a burlesque
as was the excitement raised by the expedition. For two years after he had quitted
the Vice-Presidency, Burr had plotted and planned, bringing into his scheme Gen.
James Wilkinson, the man who was to betray him. Yet for all his preparation,
Burr s flotilla when it arrived at the mouth of Bayou Pierre numbered but 9
boats and less than 60 men. Because of the politics involved and the excitement
raised by President Jefferson s proclamation, Acting Governor Mead arranged
for an interview with Burr at the plantation home near the mouth of Coles Creek,
and it was here that Burr agreed to surrender himself to the civil authorities and
await the action of the grand jury. The original plantation home has been
destroyed.
At 66 m. (R) on a hill stands CHRIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, a
small, gray stone, Gothic type structure, erected in 1857. -^ ts exquisite ex
terior details and its silhouette against the sky are impressive. This con
gregation was established in 1820.
The SHIELDS HOME (R), 66.2 m. (open by permission), a two-
story frame structure that is of no definite style but typical of many houses
in the Natchez country, was built in the early 1830*5. The Shields and
Dunbar families were the first settlers in this community and influential in
establishing Christ Episcopal Church, in which their descendants hold the
largest membership today.
South of CHURCH HILL, as the community around the Christ Epis
copal Church is known, US 61 follows a high winding ridge. There are
fine views (L) of COLES CREEK VALLEY.
At 72.7 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to the SELSERTOWN INDIAN MOUND, 0.7 m. (R), cov
ering nearly six acres. Roughly a pyramid about 600 ft. by 400 ft., it is considered
TOUR 3 333
a giant among Mississippi mounds. It has been opened on many occasions, and
articles of pottery and several implements of war have been found with human
bones.
At 76 m. is the junction with a narrow dirt road.
Left on this road 0.7 m. to SELMA PLANTATION, settled by Gerard Brandon I
immediately after the American Revolutionary War. Brandon had been forced to
flee from Ireland because of his implication in an Irish uprising for independ
ence. Reaching South Carolina just in time to join the Colonial forces in the
revolution he was made a colonel under Gen. Francis Marion. In afteryears one
of his proudest possessions was a rifle on the barrel of which was engraved
"Given For Valiant Conduct At King s Mountain." At the close of the Revolu
tion Brandon came to the Natchez district and settled first on St. Catherine s
Creek. Later he married Dorothy Nugent and obtained a Spanish land grant of
600 arpens. The grant was later confirmed by the U. S. Government. Brandon s
first home burned soon after erection and the present one was built on the site
This frame house, one of the oldest homes in Adams County, illustrates a stage
in the development of the Southern Planter type; the structure sits on a high
foundation, has wide eaves, and a front gallery more than 80 feet long. The
entrance leads into an immense banquet room, suggestive of the ancient banquet
halls of Ireland. The cooking was done in a large basement but a crane hung over
the fireplace in the dining room. At each end of the dining room are two large
rooms and on the back, under a sloping roof, are several smaller ones. Outside
stairways lead from the back gallery to the top floor where the central room is of
extraordinary size. On the plantation is a grove of 500 pecan trees, offshoots of
what are said to have been the first pecans in the Natchez district. Brandon s
son, Gerard Brandon II (1788-1850), was the first native-born Governor of
Mississippi.
At 76.9 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road 0.3 m. to PROPINQUITY (reached by private drive; open),
a two-story white frame house with a hip roof and green shuttered windows. It
was erected about 1810 by Gen. Leonard Covington and called Propinquity be
cause of its nearness to the barracks at old Fort Dearborn. The house has old
furnishings and the original hand-painted window shades are still in place.
At 77 m. (L) is the SITE OF FORT DEARBORN, where Propin
quity s owner, Gen. Leonard Covington, was commander before he died
in the War of 1812. Fort Dearborn was built in 1802 to protect Wash
ington, the capital of the Mississippi Territory. All traces ot the fort have
vanished.
WASHINGTON, 78 m. (200 pop.), between 1802 and 1820 was in
turn Mississippi s second Territorial and first State capital. On the hill
(L) is the CLEAR CREEK BAPTIST CHURCH, a red brick building in
bad repair, said to be the oldest Baptist church in Mississippi. Washington
was the first station E. of Natchez on the Natchez Trace. That the United
States land office, the Surveyor General s office, the office of the Commis
sioner of Claims, and the United States courts were here is evidence of its
early i9th century importance.
JEFFERSON COLLEGE, entrance Main St. (R), founded in 1802, was
the first institution of learning incorporated by Mi^i^ippi Territorial leg
islation, and the oldest endowed college in this part of the country. Audu-
bon, the naturalist, and James Ingraham, the author of pirate tales and
later a clergyman, were early members of the faculty. Here in 1815 An
drew Jackson camped going to and returning from the Battle of New
IB
THE BURR OAKS, JEFFERSON COLLEGE CAMPUS, WASHINGTON
Orleans, and in 1825 Lafayette witnessed a drill of cadets. The two orig
inal square, brick buildings, two stories in height, were joined by a third
building a few years after their erection, giving the appearance of one
large building constructed of three types of bricks. The central portion is
now used as a gymnasium. On the campus near the entrance are the BURR
OAKS, in the shade of which Aaron Burr was tried for treason. Near the
Burr Oaks is a white marble MONUMENT erected on the site of the old
brick church in which Mississippi s first Constitutional Convention and
first State legislature met.
The SPANISH HOUSE (private), with a raised red brick basement and
a frame upper story (R), was built before 1800. The red brick METH
ODIST CHURCH (L), a large rectangular, box-like structure, was erected
in 1825. Just behind the church, hidden from the highway by the trees
surrounding it, is the former HOME OF COWLES MEAD, erected about
1800. It was Mead who gave the order for Burr s arrest. Later the house
became the home of Mississippi s first geologist, B. L. C. Wailes. INGLE-
WOOD (R) was a home built in the 1850 $ by the Affleck family;
Thomas Affleck was a scientist who did important botanical research.
Some of his specimens are in the Smithsonian Institution. The Spanish in
fluence is seen in the steep roof and severe walls of the rear parts of the
house.
TOUR 3 335
At Washington is the junction with US 84 (see Tour 13) which unites
with US 6 1 between this point and Natchez.
1. Left from Washington 1.3 m. on a graveled road to (R) the brick Southern
Planter type HOME OF DR. JOHN W. MONETTE (open by permission),
author of the History of the Discovery and Settlement of the Mississippi Valley.
Dr. Monette, typical of the cultured citizens of the Washington community be
fore the War between the States, is remembered primarily for his history, for
many years the standard source book of Mississippi students.
At 1.5 m. (L) on this same road is a small roadside marker reading: "The first
women s college in America. Chartered on Feb. 17, 1819, to confer degrees on
women. Named in honor of Elizabeth Roach, through whose generosity the
College was made possible. Audubon was on the faculty." The hill above the
marker is the SITE OF ELIZABETH FEMALE ACADEMY, founded in 1818
with the support of the Methodist Church; it was the first girl s school in the
United States to have legislative recognition of its authority to confer degrees.
Mrs. Caroline V. Thayer, "a lady of scholarly attainments and literary reputa
tion," and a granddaughter of General Warren, the hero of Bunker Hill, was
governess here in the 1840 $ when the academy enjoyed its greatest reputation
and when it was known for the thoroughness of its work. The site is marked by
two sides of a former square of massive moss-hung cedars, which frame two
ruined walls of brick. White-washed Negro cabins stand behind the ruins.
2. Right from Washington on a graveled road to FOSTER S MOUND, 2.5 m.
(R), rising approximately 40 feet. The mound s base is circled by a low hedge of
shrubs; its summit is crowned by a ring of magnificent oaks, within which is the
FOSTER HOUSE, now used as an agricultural experiment station. Early maps
point to a Natchez Indian village on this site. Within recent years the mound has
been excavated by archaeologists from the Smithsonian Institution, and artifacts
have been removed. The house, known today by the name of a comparatively
recent owner, James Foster, was built in the Spanish era (1779-98). It is a long,
low, white frame structure with three dormer windows. Its homelike appearance
is accentuated by the narrow gallery, which runs its entire length, and by the
old shrubs planted about the doorstep.
Year after year the intricately winding road has sunk deeper into the yielding
loess, and the moss on the bordering forest oaks has grown denser. On each side
of the highway, almost hidden from view by the trees, are some of the oldest
homes in the Natchez district, varying widely in architectural designs. Many show
Greek Revival and others Spanish influences; a few show both. The hybrids, for
the most part, were built during the Spanish era; later cupolas, columned gal
leries, dormers, and other fashionable ornaments \vere added.
The PINE RIDGE CHURCH, 5 m. (R), with a foundation and one wall that
were a part of the second Presbyterian church built in Mississippi, is one of the
last mementos of a Scottish settlement made early in the iSoo s. It is a faded, red
brick building with a steep roof.
Here is the junction with two roads that run like narrow tunnels beneath the
branches of aged moss-covered oaks.
i. Right from the church on the first road, 0.1 m. (R), to the PRESBYTERIAN
AiANSE (open by permission). More than 100 years old, the manse was built at
the same time as the Pine Ridge Church for the ministers who served that
church. In spite of its bad repair, its architecture still suggests a characteristic
Spanish-Georgian Colonial hybrid type. From the porch of the house is an excel
lent view of the church.
At 0.4 m. (L) is EDGF.W OOD (open during Pilgrimage), a large
two-story plantation home with a French style roof. The brick of Edgewood
has mellowed to a faint salmon pink. The house was built in 1850-60, on the
Juan Bisland land grant; eight slender fluted Doric columns support the flat
roof of the gallery. In the house is a collection of portraits by Lamdin.
336 TOURS
2. Right from the church on the second road 0.4 m. to (R) the private lane lead
ing to MOUNT REPOSE (open during Natchez Pilgrimage). Built in 1824 and
recently restored, the house is a large, two-story structure of Southern Planter
type with a grace that obscures its massiveness. The long double-deck gallery has
six square columns supporting its roof, and the entrance is hand carved. The old
brick kitchen, now painted white, has been converted into a garage. The lands
were granted to the Earl of Ellington prior to the American Revolution, but dur
ing the Spanish Era were regranted to Juan Bisland, whose descendants own the
place. Elizabeth Bisland was a novelist of the reconstruction period. Connected
with the Ladies Home Journal for years and an early reporter of the old Picayune,
Elizabeth gained international attention with her Life of Lafcadio Hearn. The
Negroes who work on this plantation call it "Monty-pose."
At 1.5 m. (L) is the entrance lane of PEACHLAND (open by permission);
built in 1830 this house is a good example of post-Colonial architecture infor
mally treated, with low hip roof, double-deck gallery, and wide chimneys flank
ing the sides. Dormer windows break the straight lines of the rear roof, but the
downward sweep at the front is uncompromisingly steep and severe. The interior
is simple, with a hall running the length of two rooms, low ceilings, and almost
plain woodwork. There are six rooms on the first floor and four on the second
floor. The walls of the hall and living room are papered in old-fashioned figured
paper. The parlor mantel is delicately carved, and much of the furniture is of
carved rosewood. It is said that the present name is a corruption of Pitchlyn,
interpreter for the Choctaw Indian tribe, whose house once stood on this site.
At 83 m. (L) on US 61 is D EVEREUX (adm. 25$), on a hill above
the old trace. Though the gardens have been ruined, the house itself pre
sents much the same appearance as it did when it was built. It is consid
ered by many the most beautiful late Greek Revival structure in Missis
sippi. Designed by a Mr. Hardy whose initials are unknown, it is a large
white mansion with fluted Doric columns two stories high, and is sur
rounded by enormous moss-hung oaks and magnolias. Because of its
beauty it was used in the filming of scenes in Heart of Maryland, a recent
movie. D Evereux was completed in 1840 for William St. John Elliott, a
close friend of Henry Clay. When Clay visited here the Elliotts gave in
his honor one of the most elaborate balls ever held in the Natchez area.
The double drawing rooms were originally furnished in rosewood, of
Empire design, with Duncan Phyfe tables, bronze sperm-oil lamps having
crystal pendants, and magnificent chandeliers and bronze candelabra hav
ing long cut-glass prisms that reflected the light of sconced candles. The
bookcases in the library were of the finest woods. The banquet hall walls
had panels of soft green felt; the furniture was of hand-rubbed mahog
any, the central table with an Italian marble top. The china was made on
special order by E. D. Honore of Paris.
The original grounds covered 12 acres, of which a large part was
wooded. A double driveway crossed and recrossed under oak, catalpa, and
magnolia trees to form designs that were further outlined by borders of
luriamundi, an indigenous shrub. On each side were hedges of Cherokee
rose. In the rear a courtyard opened into a terraced garden brilliant with
camellia japonicas, roses, and massed azaleas. At the foot of the lower
terrace was an artificial lake on which swans floated.
During the War between the States, Federal troops turned the garden
into a camp ground and chopped down many of the oaks and magnolias
D EVEREUX, NEAR NATCHEZ
for fuel. Opposite the front gate is a tree beneath which two Union sol
diers were executed following their court martial for the killing of George
Sargent at Gloucester in 1864. D Evereux was the maternal family n.ime
of Hlliott, whose uncle, General D Evereux, was a Bolivian patriot and
close friend of General Bolivar.
At 83.4 m. is the junction with a marked paved road. Here (R) is the
SITE OF SLAVE BLOCK from which Negro slaves were auctioned to
the highest bidders.
Left on this road is the SITE OF THE OLD SLAVE BARRACK, 0.1 m., now
occupied by a row of Negro cabins, manv of which contain timbers taken from
the original building. Negroes brought direct from Africa were delivered here,
fed, clothed, and taught a few words. They were then sold on the block that
stood on what is now US 61, then a part of the Natchez Trace.
At 0.2 m. on the paved road is the junction with the Liberty Road and E.
Franklin St.
i Left on the Liberty Road 0.2 m. to (R) MOXTEIGXE (often during Pil-
gr/nuge), a. story-and-a-half brick structure smoothly stuccoed in pale pink. The
steep hip roof is surmounted by a balustraded deck, the classic entrance is formed
by a square portico with slender white columns. The floor of the portico is
laid with mosaics. On each side of the building is a narrow gallery with delicately
designed iron banisters. Tradition says the bricks were made by slaves and the
heavy timbers were sawed by hand. Montcigne was begun in 1853 by William T.
338 TOURS
Martin, later a major-general in the War between the States, and though the con
tractor never quite completed the building as it was designed, it was occupied in
1855. The architect is unknown, but as Monteigne originally stood it was an
adaptation of a French chalet. When the house was remodeled by Weiss and
Seiferth, New Orleans architects, the rear patio with its original service wings,
camellia japonicas, and wistaria vines was left unchanged. The grounds include
landscaped gardens and are shaded by giant, ivy-covered oaks. During the war
the double drawing room was used by Federal troops as a stable; other horses
were pastured in the gardens.
On the Liberty Road at 0.4 m. (L) is OAKLAND (open during Pilgrimage), a
raised brick cottage erected in 1830 by a son-in-law of Don Estevan Minor, one
time Acting Governor during the Spanish regime in Natchez. Oakland is furnished
as it was in the i83o s. A fine portrait of Don Minor in Spanish regimentals, and
other relics from Concord, mansion of the Spanish governors (see ARCHITEC
TURE), are on display.
On the Liberty Road at 4.1 m. is (L) the entrance to WINDY HILL MANOR,
1.8 m. (open Sun.; adm 25$), a planter s house, one-and-a-half stories high with
a portico having four irregularly spaced Tuscan columns. The dormer windows
and the fanlight of the front entrance have panes of an early glass whose tints
are opalescent and wavy. In the wide hall is a spiral stairway remarkable for its
workmanship. The plantation was in the hands of Col. Benijah Osmun, a veteran
of the Revolutionary War, by 1788. Colonel Osmun built the home that is now
incorporated in the present manor. It was here in 1807 that the colonel invited
his old friend, Aaron Burr, to stay when Burr was released on bail after his
arrest for treason. Nearby, at the foot of Half Way Hill, lived Maj. Isaac Guion,
who in 1798 raised the first American flag over Fort Panmure at Natchez. Both
Guion and Osmun had served throughout the Revolution and both had known
Burr intimately. Their continued friendship with and defense of the man who
was branded a traitor is an evidence that many did not accept the popular judg
ment of Burr. As Colonel Osmun s guest he was treated with some of the respect
he thought his due.
While there he met the lovely, unsophisticated Madeline Price, daughter of the
Widow Price, who lived in a cottage on top of Half Way Hill. The admiration
and devotion he won from Madeline pacified his wounded ego. When he for
feited his bond in February 1807, he risked capture by remaining at the widow s
cottage in a fruitless effort to persuade Madeline to leave with him. The little
cottage is gone, and Major Guion s lands have become a part of Windy Hill
plantation, but Burr s desperate grasp at love at a time when his ambitions had
been wrecked gives an aura of romance to the weather-worn timbers of Windy
Hill, and to the avenue of moss-draped cedars and myrtles where he walked with
Madeline.
In February 1817, a decade after Burr had fled into the night, the plantation
was sold to Gerard Brandon I. The Brandons furnished Mississippi s first native-
born Governor, Gerard Chittocque Brandon, and, according to historians, furnished
the State more Confederate soldiers than any other family. One of the present
mistresses of Windy Hill, Elizabeth Brandon Stanton, is the author of an his
torical novel on the Burr conspiracy, Fata Morgana. Windy Hill is in a state of
poor repair.
2. Right from the paved road on E. Franklin St. 0.1 m. to MONMOUTH (open
by appointment), a brick mansion with a well-proportioned portico having four
square columns. Wrought-iron railings enclose the upper gallery. Monmouth
was built in 1820 by John Hankinson of New York, who was related to the
Schuyler family of that State. The house has beautiful old furnishings. It was
the home of Gen. John A. Quitman, hero of the Battle of Chapultepec in the
Mexican War, U. S. Congressional Representative, and from 1850-51 Governor
of Mississippi.
At Monmouth is a junction with the Linden Road.
LINDEN, NEAR NATCHEZ
Left on the Linden Road 0.2 m. (L) is LINDEN (open during Pilgrimage), the
older part of which was built in 1788-89. The frame wings that flanked the
center were erected in 1825 by Thomas Reed, first U. S. Senator from Mississippi.
A gallery 90 feet long with 10 slender columns extends across the front. The
entrance with its beautiful fanlight, geometrically designed panels, and hand-
carved decorations has been photographed frequently. The house contains old
furniture, silver, and china, as well as paintings by Audubon. An old detached
brick kitchen wing in the rear with posts of solid logs faces a patio.
On the Linden Road at 0.7 m. is MELROSE (open during Pilgrimage), one of
the best preserved of the ante-bellum mansions in the area. The house, grounds,
and furnishings are practically as they were in the 1840 $. It is constructed of
brick and its double portico has four huge Tuscan columns. The interior
has elaborate furnishings of hand-carved rosewood, with flawless mirrors,
and with the original draperies of green and gold brocatel imported from France.
Candle shelves built over the front and rear inside doors of the central hall each
hold a dozen candlesticks. A detached kitchen, a milk house, and a carriage
house face a courtyard in the rear
US 6 1 enters on St. Catherine St.; L. on N. Pine St.
NATCHEZ, 84.5 m. (202 alt., 13,422 pop.) (see NATCHEZ).
Points of Interest: Historic and architecturally interesting homes and public build
ings, exhibited especially during annual Pilgrimage, and others.
Right from Natchez on N. Pine St. which becomes the Pine Ridge Road 2.7 m.
(I.) to HOMEWO.OD (private), a massive, three-story mansion topped by an
observatory. Constructed of bright red brick the principal facade is dominated by
a massive Ionic portico. Above the front doorway and under the porch roof is a
long balcony with an elaborate iron railing. On each side is an octagonal,
wrought-iron porch. The house was built in 1860-65, when the architectural
trend was still to the Greek Revival in style. A Maltese cross is formed by the
hallways on the ground floor. Scenes of the motion picture, In Old Kentucky,
were filmed here.
340 TOURS
The landscape between Home-wood and Lansdowne is one of unmarred beauty.
Vines and Spanish moss grow luxuriantly from spreading branches, giving the
woodlands a story-book appearance.
At 3.2 m. (R) is LANSDOWNE (open during Natchez Pilgrimage; adm. 25$),
a simple buff brick cottage, with the graceful features designed in the Georgian
Colonial style. Here, where all the furnishings are the originals, is a portrait by
Sully. The house was built in 1853.
The route continues S. on N. Pine St. to Homochitto St. ; L. on Homo-
chitto St. (US 61). At 87.2 m. is the junction with the Lower Woodville
Road. The space between the fork is the SITE OF WHITE HORSE
TAVERN, a rendezvous of bandits on the Natchez Trace. The road, nar
row and winding in a deep cut, passes some of the finest plantation homes
in the Natchez district ; because of the woods and the low position of the
roadbed few houses are visible from the highway.
Right on the Lower Woodville Road, which was the Natchez Trace, 0.2 m. (R)
to the entrance of LONGWOOD (open daily; adm. 25$). The house, an un
finished structure of oriental magnificence, stands at the end of a half-mile drive
way cut through the hills. It was designed by Sloan of Philadelphia and was
under construction when the War between the States began. The laborers on it
dropped their tools to go to war and the work was never resumed. The eight-
sided brick structure is six stories high and is topped by an octagonal drum with
an enormous onion-shaped copper dome. It contains 32 octagonal rooms.
Elaborate gallery porches on the exterior are adorned with lacy jig-saw ornaments.
Niches were built to hold Italian and Grecian statuary. The fireplaces were to
be made of Italian marble.
On the same road at 0.5 m. is (L) GLOUCESTER (open during Pilgrimage),
which was the home of Winthrop Sargent, first Territorial governor of Missis
sippi (1798). The square house, erected between 1800 and 1804 of brick baked
on the plantation, is the oldest mansion in the Natchez district and is a fine ex
ample of the Greek Revival style of architecture. Its pedimented double portico
has four huge Tuscan columns. Two recessed entrances with arched fanlights lead
into two long halls. Between the hallways is a cross hall that on each side opens
into a hexagonal room. The floors have the original wide planking, and the door
sills are cypress slabs two feet wide. The doors have inside bars, necessary in the
days of Indian and bandit attacks. The basement windows are iron-barred and
overlook a dry moat. The place is luxuriously furnished.
Opposite Gloucester is the SARGENTS PRIVATE CEMETERY, in which is the
tomb of Seargent S. Prentiss (1808-50), gifted Mississippi orator. The cemetery
was reserved by a former owner in such a manner that only heirs of the Williams
(Prentiss married a Williams) and Sargent families might use it. The first Terri
torial governor, Col. Winthrop Sargent (not related to Prentiss), is also buried
in this graveyard.
South of Natchez US 61 is a route of picturesque beauty, cutting be
tween high banks overgrown with green moss, and deeply shadowed by
the overhanging branches of aged live oak trees.
At 87.3 m. (L) is the entrance to 1NGLES1DE (private), a Southern
Planter type, one-and-a-half stories high with a roof extended to cover a
low gallery. A large hexagonal room has been added since the original
building was erected in 1832. Its windows somewhat resemble the gar co-
meres seen on Louisiana homes. Ingleside was erected by Dr. Gustavus
Calhoun, who was related to many of the prominent families of the period.
At 87.5 m., (L) and visible from the highway, is GLENBERNIE (pri-
TOUR 3 341
rate), the scene of the murder of Miss Jennie Merrill in 1932 (see below).
The beautiful one-story house, with wide galleries supported by slender
colonnettes, is more than a century old.
At 87.5 m. (R) is the entrance to ELMSCOURT (open during Nat
chez Pilgrimage), reached by a long, winding roadway. The square, two-
story, brick center of this commodious mansion, a reproduction of an Ital
ian Renaissance villa, was erected in 1810 by Lewis Evans, first sheriff of
Adams Co. When a later owner, Frank Surget, one of the first Natchez
millionaires, presented the home to his daughter as a wedding gift, exten
sive improvements were made; two one-story wings were added, the ban
quet hall was extended, and many interior fixtures, including hand-wrought
iron and bronze chandeliers and marble mantels, were imported for it.
The double galleries, front and rear, are trimmed in fine, hand-wrought
iron lace-work of grape design made in Belgium. The long, central hall is
flanked on the left by double drawing rooms, a smoking room, and a bil
liard room. On the right are a music room, a library, and a banquet hall.
The living quarters are upstairs. The house today has fine old furnishings:
portraits, busts, chandeliers, Duncan Phyfe chairs and dining table, and a
particularly beautiful pier table. Surget s daughter married Ayres P. Mer
rill, who became U.S. Minister to Belgium during President Grant s ad
ministrations. Elmscourt from the first was famous for its hospitality and
entertainments ; Jenny Lind, Gen. Andrew Jackson, Lafayette, and Thack
eray were guests at different times. During Pilgrimage week Elmscourt is
the scene of the Ball of a Thousand Candles, with the illumination the
name implies.
At 87.9 m. (L), with only a bayou and a stretch of woodland separat
ing it from Glenbernie, is GLENWOOD (adm. 25 $). All that is visible
from the highway is a large placarded gate and a dilapidated road house
called Bucket of Blood. Glenwood itself is hidden in the dense thickets.
It is much in need of repair, but still shows its substantial construction;
though a corner column has fallen out, the roof has held its line.
The architectural design, a hybrid Georgian Colonial-Southern Planter,
was characteristic of the country gentleman s house of the 1830*5. It is
constructed with heavy hand-chopped sills and joists fitted tongue and
groove, and all woods used are nne and well seasoned. The rectangular
mass of the edifice is crowned with a heavy cornice and paneled parapet,
behind which a low hip roof is broken by arched and pedimented
dormers. Across the principal facade is a double gallery with simple
wooden balustrade and two tiers of slender columns. The central door
ways at the first and second stories are set in deep elliptical arches with
side lights and fan transom. Behind the big house is the kitchen, now
tumbling down, with a brick floor, an old-time fireplace, and a Dutch
oven. An outside stair once led to the servants quarters above the kitchen.
On the left of the central hall is the library, and behind it is a mildewed
recess from which a mahogany staircase rises to the upper floor. A second
room on the left, formerly the dining room, is now the dining room and
kitchen. On the right are double drawing rooms. In the four second floor
bedrooms are heavy, old-fashioned beds cased in dust.
34 2 TOURS
The front of the house is stuccoed; to the N. is the now dilapidated
schoolroom and tutors apartment, a small building with pilastered door
ways and a portico. The builder of Glenwood was Frances E. Sprague.
In 1839 Glenwood was bought by Frederick Stanton and was his home
until he erected Stanton Hall (see NATCHEZ), with materials and fur
nishings brought from Europe in a chartered ship. In 1852 the place was
sold to T. M. Davis, who was the first millionaire in Natchez and one of
the founders of Mississippi s first bank. In time Glenwood became the
home of Mrs. Mary Ker, a daughter-in-law of Territorial Judge David Ker.
In August 1932 the present owner of the now shabby old place had the
misfortune to be arrested on a murder charge; he was later freed. During
the period when he and his housekeeper were under arrest, newspapers
exploited the case, and because goats were found living in the house, the
papers renamed it Goat Castle.
At 92 m. is the junction with a private road.
Right on this road to ELGIN, 0.5 m. (open by appointment), a two-story white
frame house with a double-deck front gallery supported by two tiers of Doric
columns. Built before 1838 it was later the home of the scientist, Dr. John Car-
michael Jenkins. In ante-bellum days Elgin was noted for the beauty of its gar
dens; the place is still in excellent condition.
At 98. 3 m, is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road at 5.4 m. (R) is the entrance to HOLLYWOOD (private), on
the Spanish land granted to James Alcorn Gillespie about 1785. Various addi
tions were made to the original house, making it architecturally one of the most
peculiar houses in the Natchez country. It is composed of two separate buildings
connected by a hip-roofed gallery extending the length of the house. The vaulted
ceilings of the gallery were originally plastered and, except where large rooms
have been added on each side, small hand-made balusters still enclose it. In ap
pearance the house is reminiscent of the primitive dog-trot type. It sits on a
knoll and through the open central hall is a charming view of meadow lands
beyond.
The road, cutting narrowly through steep embankments covered with Cherokee
roses, circles a tranquil countryside in the valley of the once navigable Homo-
chitto River. One of the first English settlements in the area and the first Prot
estant settlement in Mississippi was made in this neighborhood in 1772, when
Capt. Amos Ogden, retired naval officer, came to claim the 25,000 acres that
had been granted him by the British Government in 1768. He was accompanied
by Samuel and Richard Swayze, to whom he sold 19,000 acres at 2O</ t per acre
and by two surveyors, Caleb and Joseph King. The party went from New Jersey
to Pensacola, Fla., thence through a chain of lakes into the Mississippi, and up
the Homochitto. With them they brought 10 or 15 families including their own.
Many old homes stand in this vicinity and their occupants, for the most part, are
descendants of the early English settlers. These homes stand among the aged,
moss-covered oaks.
At 6.4 m. (R) is the lane leading to \FOODSTOCK (private), set deep in an
oak woods heavily festooned with moss. The brick red-roofed house has a re
cessed front entrance with fluted pilasters. The house was built in recent years,
on the site of old Woodstock, but duplicates many features of the older house.
At 6.7 m. is MT. CARMEL CHURCH (R), a toy-like, exquisitely designed struc
ture with white walls, green-shuttered windows, a tiny porch, and a small cupola.
The congregation was organized in 1825.
TOUR 3 343
At 7 m. is the FOSTER HOME (L), known as The Hermitage. This is a dilapi
dated frame structure, standing gloomy and deserted on a high bank. Of Spanish
Provincial type architecture, its timbers show great age. According to early
records it stood here prior to 1834.
At 7.5 m. is the junction with old US 61 ; R. here.
KINGSTON, 11.4 m. (25 pop.), is an old community with a modern white,
frame consolidated school and a general store. The original village, which de
veloped around a blockhouse, was called Jersey Town until about 1777, when
Caleb King, son-in-law of Richard Swayze, laid out lots around his plantation
home. Until about 1825 Kingston prospered, having several stores, a tailor, a
saddler, and a blacksmith. The Congregational Church, built in 1798, was the first
Protestant church in Mississippi. Prior to this time services were held secretly
in the woods or in private homes, the Spanish Government being opposed to any
sect other than that of the Catholics. With the establishment of other towns in
this district Kingston slowly began to decline. By 1830 it was little more than
it is today.
At 12 .5 m. on old US 61 is the junction with a graveled road; R. here.
At 12.8 m. is the KINGSTON METHODIST CHURCH, a typical plantation
neighborhood church, built of brick with a small portico in front. Inside is a
slave gallery. On the grounds are old steps from which riders mounted their
horses. This church is the successor of the one founded by Lorenzo Dow in 1803,
at which time he deeded land to the trustees for the erection of a church. The
original church, according to tradition, was destroyed by a tornado in 1840, and
the present one erected in the early 1850*5.
In a field diagonally across the road from the church is the GRAVE OF CALEB
KING, founder of Kingston, marked by an impressive monument rising high
above tall meadow grass.
At 13.2 m. is the COREY HOUSE (open by appointment), formerly known as
Hillside. It is a one-story, square, compactly built, Southern Planter type house,
with galleries on all sides and green-shuttered windows that extend to the floor.
Delicately painted shades as old as the house hang at the windows, and much of
the furniture is the original. Sliding doors make it possible to convert the entire
dwelling into one immense room. The Coreys came to the Natchez country with
the Swayzes in 1772-73.
At 13.9 m. (L) is the OLD PUBLIC BURYING GROUND, enclosed by a sag
ging wire fence and overgrown with tangled weeds and flowering shrubs. The
tombstones bearing names of early settlers Swayze, Ogden, Foule, and King
date back to 1784.
At 15.7 m. is MANDAMUS (L), a simple country cottage, that has lost most of
its original features in successive alterations. The house has a deep side porch,
with small, square posts, and dormers breaking the steep lines of the roof at the
front.
At 103.1 m. US 61 crosses the HOMOCH1TTO (Ind., shelter creek)
RIVER. Sand bars and masses of water plants form a swamp, choking .1
stream that in 1772 was navigable for sailing vessels.
Between the Homochitto River and Buffalo Creek US 61 climbs grad
ually but steadily for five miles to a hill giving an excellent view of the
surrounding country.
At 113.5 m. the highway dips into the Buffalo Creek bottoms. The sand
beaches on the inner bends ot Buffalo Creek, 215.8 m., indicate that the
loess is thinner toward the S.
Between Buffalo Creek and Woodville the highway runs over a loess
mixed with clay and gravel; the dwellings are poorer.
344 TOURS
WOODVILLE, 119.8 m. (560 alt, 1,113 pop-) seat of Wilkinson
Co., is on a watershed. Northeast of it are the former longleaf pine hills;
W. and S. are the bluff hills of the Mississippi, so like and so much a
part of the Natchez district that it is hard to draw the line between the
two areas. Indeed, Woodville s most distinguished citizen, Judge Edward
McGehee, was used in So Red the Rose to typify the best in the Natchez
district planter. Judge McGehee gave the town its life and tone, and today
it retains the marks of his influence.
The present POST OFFICE was formerly the station of the West Fe-
liciana R.R., which McGehee financed and which was chartered in 1831.
This was the first railroad built in Mississippi, the second in the Missis
sippi Valley, and the fifth in the United States. The railroad, the rails of
which were made of cypress, cedar, and heart of pine hewn by McGehee
slaves, is now a part of the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R., a subsidiary
of the Illinois Central System. It was among the first American railroads to
use the standard gauge, the first to issue and print freight tariffs, and the
first to adopt cattle guards and pits.
Facing the station is the two-story COURTHOUSE, 40 feet square,
with massive columns on front and rear, each two feet in diameter, rising
the full height of the walls.
The METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH SOUTH, on a high oak-
shaded bluff, SW. corner of Main St. and US 61, is a neat wooden struc
ture, with tall windows and a large slave gallery facing the rostrum. The
church was built in 1824 and is probably the oldest of its denomination
in the State. Judge McGehee s name was the first on the roll of member
ship. At the rear of the building, in a small enclosure under some cedars,
are the graves of the family of Col. John S. Lewis, whose wife donated
the lot for the church. Prominent in the church s annals is the Mafftt Re
vival. In the early 1840 $ John Newland Maffit so stirred the people that
a group of young men, the "sons of Belial," determined to break up his
meeting. They threatened to pelt his pulpit with rotten eggs if he preached
again. He preached and one egg was thrown; the man who threw it was
at the altar the next day pleading for forgiveness.
The BAPTIST CHURCH, one block diagonally SE. of the Methodist
church, is possibly the oldest church building of any denomination now
standing in Mississippi. It is a large well-preserved red brick structure
with four round white columns on the facade, a tall bell tower, green
shutters, and white trim. In 1806 the Baptist congregations in this area
met at Bethel, a small community four miles SW. of Woodville, and
formed an association that has grown into the present Baptist State Con
vention. The exact date of erection of the Woodville church is unknown;
the first meetings of the congregation were secret because Roman Catholi
cism was the state religion of the Spaniards, titular sovereigns of the
country N. of the 3ist parallel until just before 1800, and of the country
S. of the parallel (10 miles from Woodville) until 1810.
ST. PAUL S EPISCOPAL CHURCH, corner Church and First Sts.,
erected in 1824, one of the oldest Episcopal churches W. of the Alle-
ghanies. Impressive in its stately simplicity, the gray frame structure, built
TOUR 3 345
high on a terrace and surrounded by oaks, is now, except for minor re
pairs, as it was when built. Its architectural style followed that of St.
John s Episcopal Church in Richmond, Va. No less impressive is its in
terior, with a massive crystal chandelier from an old monastery, a hand
somely carved altar, and an organ, still in use, brought from England
shortly after the church was built. In early days the novelty of Protestant
services with a liturgy attracted great crowds. Indeed, so unfamiliar was
the average Mississippian with the Episcopal form of organization and
worship that the legislature, granting an act of incorporation to the
church, changed the titles "warden" and "vestrymen" to the better-known
"trustees." In 1862 the congregation of the church forwarded the church
bell to General Beauregard to be melted into cannon, "hoping that its
gentle tones, that have so often called us to the House of God, may be
transmuted into war s resounding rhyme to repel the ruthless invader from
the beautiful land God, in his goodness, has given us."
The OFFICE OF THE WOODVILLE REPUBLICAN is two blocks S.
of the post office. The newspaper, the oldest in Mississippi, was founded
by Andrew Marschalk, pioneer printer in Mississippi, and was first pub
lished in 1812. The COL. JOHN S. LEWIS HOME (private), a block E.
of the Republican office, is, with its massive columns, strikingly like Rosa
lie in Natchez. This Woodville structure has been the home of the Lewis
family for more than a century. The Lewises, among the first English fam
ilies to settle in the State, in 1808 built the first house in Woodville.
At Woodville is the junction with the Fort Adams Road (see Side Tour
3B).
Left from Woodville 1 m. on the road that is a continuation of Church St. to
(L) HAMPTON HALL (private), the handsome old mansion formerly known as
Ararat because it stands on a hilltop. Hampton Hall, built in 1832, later passed
into the hands of Colonel Hoard, the engineer who constructed Judge McGehee s
railroad and assisted in planning the Erie Canal. Oaks almost obscure the two-
and-a-half-story, columned brick structure, and under them grow boxwood, sweet
olive trees as old as the house itself, and camellia japonicas. The murals inside
the house were painted by Grace McManus, sister of the present owner, before
she had received the art training that later enabled her to illuminate the prayer-
book for the coronation of King Edward VII.
At 1.5 m. on the side road is the junction with a graveled road; L. here 0.6 m. to
BOWLING GREEN (R), a plantation holding the ruins of Judge McGehee s
home. Four immense round columns shrouded by creeping ivy are all that remain
of the big house. Nearby are the old brick carriage houses, the brick kitchen, and
the brick office. The modest frame home now occupied by McGehee descendants
was built by Judge McGehee after Federal troops had burned the original struc
ture. In the present house is the grand piano saved from the fire. Under the moss
and sweet olive trees a few hundred yards from the ruins are the McGehee family
burial grounds. On the crest of a knoll and enclosed by a high wrought-iron
fence is the monument marking the GRAVE OF JUDGE McGEHEE.
US 61, paved between Woodville and the Louisiana Line, is bordered
_-reat hedges of Cherokee rose.
At 124.2 m. (L) is ASHWOOD (open by appointment), the former
plantation of George Poindexter (1779-1855), author of the first Mis
sissippi Code and second Governor of the State. The early history of
Mississippi could not be written without mention of him. He was born
346 TOURS
in Louisa Co., Va., in 1779, and came to the Mississippi Territory to open
a law office at Natchez when he was 23 years old. In 1807 he arranged
the meeting between Aaron Burr and Territorial Governor Cowles Mead,
and later was professionally connected with Burr s trial. As a Territorial
delegate to the U.S. Congress Poindexter first won national fame in 1811,
when he called Josiah Quincy of Massachusetts to order after Quincy s
impassioned speech against the admission of Louisiana; Poindexter re
marked that Aaron Burr had not gone as far in immoderate language as
Quincy had gone. In 1817 Poindexter was the leading member of the con
vention that framed Mississippi s first Constitution for which he was al
most wholly responsible. His code of laws, finished in 1822 while he was
Governor, was subsequently described by Governor A. G. Brown as the
best Mississippi "has ever had." In 1830 he was appointed U.S. Senator
to fill an unexpired term, and it is evidence of Wilkinson County s early
importance in the State s history that while Poindexter was Senator,
Gerard Brandon was Governor, and a third Wilkinson Co. citizen, Abram
Scott, was Lieutenant Governor. Poindexter s congressional career was
marked by a break with his former ally, President Andrew Jackson, and
an alliance with Calhoun, a realignment in accord with Poindexter s ex
treme doctrine of State sovereignty, in which he foreshadowed the course
Mississippi would take for the next generation.
At 128.2 m. US 61 crosses the Louisiana Line, 50 miles N. of Baton
Rouge, La.
>>>>>>>>>>
Side Tour 3 A
Clarksdale Greenville Rolling Fork, 133.5 m. State i.
Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. parallels route between Sherard and Rolling Fork.
One-third hard-surfaced roadbed; rest graveled; two lanes wide.
Accommodations in cities.
This route roughly parallels the Mississippi River between Clarksdale
and Greenville ; it passes through the oldest and some of the most interest
ing of the Delta plantations and rims a number of beautiful lakes. The
lakes, old beds left when the Mississippi River carved out new channels,
have retained the horseshoe shape of the pronounced river bends. They are
bordered by bright green willow brakes, and gnarled cypress trees that turn
russet brown in fall. Part of this highway was under water in 1927 when
TAKING COTTON TO THE GIN
the Delta about Greenville was inundated in the greatest flood Mississippi
has known.
State i branches W. from US 6 1 at CLARKSDALE, m. (see Tour 3,
Sec. a).
SHERARD, 9-3 in., is a typical large Delta plantation with 6,000 acres
under cultivation. The northern end of Sherard is three miles from the big
house (L) and commissary (R). In addition to the commissary two cotton
pnx a sawmill, and a pecan cleaner and grader are operated. J. H. Sherard
who cleared the plantation in 1874 lives (1937) in a low rambling house
shaded by pecan trees. His sons, grandson, and daughter have separate
dwellings grouped about his. One son, a doctor, practices almost exclu-
348 TOURS
sively among the families on the plantation. In the days when steamboats
could leave the Mississippi at high water and go inland as far as Clarks-
dale, Sherard the elder used to sail by what is now his plantation. His story
of clearing and draining the swamps that were the homes of snakes, alli
gators, and eagles, of building levees to hold the cleared lands, and of
prospering through cotton-growing despite these difficulties, is the story of
all the Delta.
At 11.3 m. the levee is visible (R).
GREENGROVE, 13.5 m., was, from the 1 8 50*5 until after the War be
tween the States, the plantation of Confederate Cavalry Gen. Nathan Bed
ford Forrest (see Tour 4). During the war Forrest brought his family here
for safekeeping.
At 15 m. is RENAL ARA (35 pop.), a hamlet that grew up on the
plantation of John P. Richardson who owned 18,000 acres of Delta land.
HILLHOUSE, 18 m. (157 alt., 75 pop.), is the center of the Beverly B
plantation and the shipping point for the Delta Cooperative Farm.
The DELTA COOPERATIVE FARM, 22.8 m. (open: no fee, contri
butions accepted), has achieved some fame as a laboratory experiment in
cooperative living. Organized in 1935 by Sherwood Eddy, New York
writer and reformer, the farm is being used to improve the social, racial,
and economic status of Southern sharecroppers (see AGRICULTURE).
On 2,138 acres of buckshot land were placed 19 Negro and 12 white fam
ilies; the number has been increased to 33 families (1938). There is an
1 1 -acre common garden in which vegetables are produced for immediate
consumption and for canning; a hog farm, a poultry farm, a sawmill, a
blacksmith shop, a school, and a commissary are collectively operated. Al
falfa as well as cotton is cultivated. The Rust mechanical cotton-picker is
in use. Thirty frame houses have been erected, and nearly 200 acres of
land have been cleared and reclaimed.
The board of trustees, holding a deed of trust on .the investment of
$25,000, is the supreme authority. Acting as a coordinator between the
board and the tenants is an advisory council of five elected every six
months from among the inhabitants of the farm; neither race may have
more than three representatives. Under the direction of the council are
operated the two cooperatives into which the colony is divided. The
Producers Cooperative supervises production planting, cultivating, and
building; the Consumers Cooperative has charge of distributing the sup
plies to the tenants and selling the products to outsiders. After operating
expenses and provisions for retiring the capital investment have been de
ducted, the net returns from all commercial crops and timber are prorated
among the member producers according to the kind and amount of work
done. Young social workers serve as directors and teachers without salary.
On the board of trustees are Sherwood Eddy ; Reinhold Neibuhr, a clergy
man ; William Amberson, a former professor of physiology at the Univer
sity of Tennessee ; and John Rust, the inventor.
The levee visible (R) between Hillhouse and Beulah was originally
built with Irish labor behind wheelbarrows, but has since been improved,
TOUR 3A 349
enlarged, and sodded many times to give what is now almost complete pro
tection from overflow.
At DEESON, 26.3 m. (153 alt., 30 pop.), are the headquarters of the
Delta Planter s Company, a Dutch organization operating a plantation of
8,800 acres, under the management of Oscar Johnston (see below).
At 30.8 m. is PERTHSHIRE (420 pop.).
Right from Perthshire is DENNIS LANDING, 4.3 m., a. fishing colony just W.
of the levee. The road runs through an extensive cotton field for two miles, meets
a green, sluggish slough, and follows it through an Osage orange grove, sup
posed to have been planted by Indians, to top the levee at 4 m. From the levee is
a good view of the low damp land that lies between it and the Mississippi River.
The landing is formed by a caved-in portion of the high bluff that is the bank of
the river. The people live in frame nouses built on a high secondary levee, and
fish for a living. Carloads of buffalo and of giant river spoonbill catfish, valuable
for their roe, are shipped weekly; the roe packed in ice is shipped in barrels.
While Chicago takes a part of the yearly catch which amounts to several tons,
other shipments go as far as New York.
At 3U m. on State i is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road is the BLANCHARD PLANTATION, 0.9 m., that has been in
the same family for four generations. Set off the road in the midst of the planta
tion s cotton fields is the big house, a spreading one-story frame structure typical
of the Delta s better types of rural homes. On the place are five Indian mounds
from which skeletons have been taken by Tulane University experts.
GUNNISON, 35.5 m. (153 alt., 484 pop.), is larger than the usual
plantation town, having several stores instead of one. Artesian wells here
have shown traces of gas, the town hydrant shooting a flame 10 feet high
when, after being capped for some time, it was ignited. Derricks of pros
pecting gas wells are visible from the town. On the northwestern limits of
Gunnison is the old CONCORDIA CEMETERY, a significant survival of
a prosperous river town that was so tough in its day that many of the grave
markers bear merely the epitaph "Killed in Concordia."
ROSEDALE, 45.8 m. (143 alt., 2,117 pop.), one of the seats of Boli
var Co., with a one-story cream-faced brick courthouse, is the only town of
size on the river between Memphis and Greenville. The force of the cur
rents from the confluence of the White and Arkansas Rivers opposite
Rosedale keeps the Misssisippi pushing against the Rosedale levee. The
view of the river from Rosedale landing, with shanty boats tied up here, is
interesting. Catfish caught here are shipped as far N. as St. Louis and Chi
cago. At MONTGOMERY POINT, on the river, David Crockett is re
puted to have crossed on his way to the Alamo. In the spring the town has
the appearance of a well-kept garden, worthy of its name. Annually in Oc
tober a Rose Show is held.
Perhaps the most noteworthy citizens of Rosedale and the surrounding
area were Walter Sellers, Sr., who was born here, and Charles Scott, who
came to Bolivar County shortly after the \Var between the St.
BEULAH, 51.4m. (143 alt., 506 pop.), is a fishing resort and farm town
on Lake Beulah, which parallels the highway a half mile distant (R) ; the
350 TOURS
lake was formed by the capricious Mississippi River as early as 1863. Fish
ing for perch and crappie is fair.
At 56.3 m. is LOBDELL (75 pop.).
Right from Lobdell on a dirt road to INDIAN POINT, 5 m., one of many points
at which De Soto is supposed to have discovered the Mississippi River. At this
point the gold seekers from Georgia and Alabama crossed the river in 1849 on
their way to California. PRENTISS, on Indian Point, was the first seat of Bolivar
Co. Because the old men and boys who remained at home took frequent pot-shots
at the Federal gunboats on the river, the Federals burned the village in 1863.
Only a few shacks now mark the site.
At 61.5 m. is BENOIT (137 alt., 438 pop.).
Left from Benoit on a graveled road running along Egypt Ridge to the old /. C.
BURRUS HOME, 0.8 m. (R). Egypt Ridge was so called because it was the only
place on which corn grew during the unprecedented flood of 1844. The Burrus
Home, called Hollywood plantation because of the grove of holly trees planted
about the great house, is the only ante-bellum structure in Bolivar Co. It was
built of heart cypress with slave labor. A portico with six slender columns having
unusual spool-shaped capitals makes the entrance imposing. The pediment has
generous proportions but simple detail. During the war it served as headquarters
for Confederate officers, among them Gen. John Early.
At 64.7 m. (R) is a view of LAKE BOLIVAR which parallels State i
for several miles. Fishing here is excellent for buffalo, crappie, perch, and
trout. Almost a mile wide, Lake Bolivar is somewhat larger than other
river lakes. Cypress trees of great beauty outline its banks.
At SCOTT, 67.4 m. (140 alt., 300 pop.), are the headquarters of the
DELTA AND PINE LAND CO. PLANTATION, the country s largest
plantation, containing 38,000 acres; it is owned by the Fine Spinners As
sociation of Manchester, England, and is under the management of Oscar
Johnston. Of the 38,000 acres, 11,700 are in cotton; the whole is under
the supervision of 12 unit managers, and is worked by 1,000 Negro share
croppers. The value of the property is about $5,000,000.
The company maintains a school, church, and hospital for tenants, the
croppers paying a 75^-per-acre hospital fee annually thus a man who
worked 12 acres would be assessed $9 a year for hospitalization. Women
are encouraged to go to the hospital for confinement rather than to de
pend upon midwives. Vaccination for small-pox and typhoid, inoculations
against malaria, and anti-syphilitic injections are offered as part of the
medical service. Tenant cabins, unscreened but stoutly built, are above the
Delta average in quality. The tenants eat the usual pork, molasses, and
cornbread, but an attempt is made to make up vitamin deficiencies by sup
plying them with free yeast. It is estimated that the average tenant here
clears about $300 a year above subsistence (see AGRICULTURE).
Oscar Johnston, a native Mississippian, took over the management of
the company in 1928 ; since then the plantation has shown a notable profit
for the first time since its establishment in 1910. Johnston was in 1933
Finance Director of the AAA, and later manager of the Federal cotton
pool.
The road leading from State i to the Scott railway station is an experi
ment made to find new uses for cotton. A heavy coat of tar was applied to
TOUR 3 A 351
the old graveled roadbed, over this was laid cotton fabric, and this in turn
was overlaid with an asphalt coating. Theoretically, the cotton mesh ab
sorbs moisture, thus lessening the amount of expansion and contraction of
the roadbed caused by changes in temperature. These changes are in some
part responsible for cracks in paving. The half-mile cotton textile road
was built in 1935.
At 743 m. is LOUGHBOROUGH, a low clapboarded structure, actu
ally two cottages with long sweeping roofs carried down over its front and
rear screened porches. The home was built in 1841 by Samuel Burks. In
front of the house, the concrete roadbed is laid on top of the old levee that
was built and maintained by the plantation owner before the war.
At 7J5.6 m. is WINTERVILLE (132 alt., 108 pop.).
Right from Winterville on a trail to CARTER S POINT, separated from the
Delta by a cut-off which becomes a raging channel when the river is up. Since
the cut-off forced the abandonment of the old plantations in 1900, duck, squirrel,
and bird hunting has been good on the point. The three plantations, Woodstock,
Salona, and Tarpley, were settled by the Carters and Randolphs of Virginia be
fore the War between the States. The plantation barns still stand. Because of the
river bend here, some Mississippi land is due W. of Arkansas.
At 76.6 w. (R) are the WINTERVILLE INDIAN MOUNDS, a group
composed of a great central mound 55 feet high surrounded by an irregu
lar ellipse of 14 smaller ones of various sizes. The view from the top of
the tall mound is worth the climb, the mounds being the only elevations in
this stretch of flat country.
GREENVILLE, 82.9 m. (125 alt., 14,807 pop.), the seat of Washing
ton Co., spreads at random along the east bank of the Mississippi River
and derives a brisk trade from the river. Tugs churn through the muddy
water to the dock, and along the levee sweating stevedores strain at heavy
cotton bales brought in from the surrounding plantations. The largest city
in the Yazoo-Mississippi area, Greenville is a cotton planting, ginning,
marketing, and financing center.
Laid out in broad avenues that run parallel to and at right angles with
the river, Greenville has a business district with solid, modern well-spaced
buildings interspersed with a few survivals of the past. In the residential
sections the wealth of the city is evidenced in the homes which vary from
Greek Revival, plantation-type dwellings to modern stucco and brick
apartments; most commonly seen, however, are the large, roomy Victorian
structures with bay windows, rococo cupolas, and gingerbread trim, their
idiosyncrasies half-hidden in the shadows of magnolia and live oak trees.
Greenville s early citizens were people of wealth and culture from Vir
ginia, Kentucky, and the Carolinas who brought with them not only their
household goods and their slaves but also bulky volumes of the classics,
Greek and Latin textbooks, and tutors for their children.
The population is 56.5 percent Negro; the remainder arc a cosmopol
itan mixture. Five Protestant churches, a synagogue, a Roman Catholic
church, and a Christian Science Church, in addition to 28 Negro churches,
hold regular services. Separate schools for white, Negro, and Chinese chil
dren are operated. The Catholic church maintains a private school, St.
35 2 TOURS
Rose of Lima Academy, for white children and the School of the Sacred
Heart, under the supervision of German nuns, for Negroes.
The embryo of the present town was the Blantonia plantation on Bach
elor s Bend. In 1828 the land was settled by Col. W. W. Blanton, and in
1866 sold by his widow, who was then Mrs. Harriet B. Theobold, for the
third county seat; the first was destroyed by inundations of the river and
the second was burned by fires from Federal gunboats in 1863. Greenville,
incorporated June 24, 1870, is a mile NE. of this second site, which, after
being burned, caved into the river. Block after block of the present town
fell into the river until 1927, when for 70 days the town was under water.
After this time levees were built higher and wider under Government di
rection; in 1935 the river was banished to a new course several miles west
ward and Lake Katherine was created at Greenville s western boundary. In
1937 its name was changed to Lake Ferguson. Boats still dock at its
wharf here, and Greenville s river trade goes on. Greenville was the birth
place of Nellie Nugent Somerville (1863- ), pioneer suffragist and
WCTU leader, the first woman elected to the State Legislature. Her daugh
ter, Lucy Somerville Howorth, an attorney, is a member of the Board of
Appeals of the Veterans Administration.
The PERCY HOME (open by permission), SE. corner Percy and Broad
way Sts., is owned and occupied by William Alexander Percy (1885- ),
lawyer and poet (see ARTS and LETTERS). He is the son of Senator LeRoy
Percy and the grandson of Col. William Alexander Percy (1834-88),
known as the Gray Eagle of the Delta because of his leadership of the South
ern whites during the days of reconstruction. In the home are five works of
Jacob Epstein: Head of Christ, bust of David Colon, Senegalese Girl, Indian
Boy, and Baby Head; two pieces of sculpture by Leon Koury, born in
Greenville, Nov. 4, 1909; a Negro head in bronze, and a head of William
Alexander Percy, the poet; and other notable objects.
In GREENWAY CEMETERY, end of Main St., is the GRAVE OP
SEN. LeROY PERCY (1860-1929), marked by a bronze figure, the work
of Malvina Hoffman. Possessed of the courage of his convictions LeRoy
Percy became an able and forceful lawyer and in 1909 was elected to the
U. S. Senate, serving until March 4, 1913. Senator Percy s private and pub
lic life was marked by the deep love for his home county that characterizes
the three generations of Percys who have been active in building the Delta.
His outstanding contribution to the Delta was his aid in organizing the
Staple Cotton Association, his connections with the Federal Reserve Sys
tem, the Drainage System, and his work for better roads development.
During the World War Senator Percy went to France for the National
Y.M.C.A.
In front of the VALLIANT HOME, NE. corner Central and Shelby
Sts., a one-story dwelling built in 1866-67, is a large oak tree that illus
trates the fertility of the Delta soil and the length of the Delta growing
seasons. Planted by Mrs. Frank Valliant in 1867, it was recently estimated
to have the growth of a tree 180 years old. Its spread of branches is mag
nificent.
The STARLING COLLECTION is housed in the GREENVILLE PUB-
JIC TJRRAPY S\Y7 rnrner Main snrl ShHhv Su This iimisiiallv fine col-
TOUR 3A 353
lection contains 2,600 old and rare volumes in English, French, Spanish,
Dutch, Persian, Arabic, Turkish, and Hebrew, and eight books belonging
to the cradle age of printing.
In the steeple of the Episcopal Church, Main St., is a relic of early Mis
sissippi River trade and old time plantation life, a STEAMBOAT BELL
taken from an old steamer and used on the Woodstock Plantation until
placed in its present position. It was the gift of Mrs. Harry Ball whose
grandfather settled Carter s Point.
U. S. GYPSUM PLANT, on the Mississippi River, makes insulated wall-
board from local cottonwood and willow trees. Established in 1930, it does
considerable reforestation upon land purchased. Trees cut in the company
forests are floated down the river to the mill at little cost.
CHICAGO MILL AND LUMBER CO. PLANT, on the river, also uti
lizes native woods to make boxes and dimension stock for radios, furni
ture, hoops, and staves. The mill was established in 19^0.
Between Greenville and Rolling Fork, State i passes the oldest and most
charming Delta plantations.
At 86.1 m. is WILDWOOD (L), with a one-and-a-half story house
used during the war as headquarters for Confederate scouts.
At Wildwood is the junction with a plantation road.
Right on this road past a large pecan orchard to LOCUST, 1 m. (L), a planta
tion home of historic value, built in 1846 by William Pinckney Montgom
ery, a pioneer Delta planter. Locust is a long low white structure raised, like
many of its neighbors, on brick piers; it has wide wings and long windows.
Though the kitchen at one side is of brick, the house is constructed of cypress.
The servants quarters and outhouses were made of brick for permanence, but the
planters feared malaria, which they thought was hastened by the "brick-sweating,"
and used cypress in their own dwellings. In front of Locust is a levee built by
slaves, and in the moat are cypress trees six feet through at the base. About the
house are pecan and magnolia trees.
On LONE PINE PLANTATION, 87 m. (L), is a cypress log eight
feet in diameter and 90 years old. The slaves from the old Montgomery
plantation used the log as a bridge when they hurried to Greenville at the
news of the Emancipation Proclamation. The banks of Ash Bayou, cutting
through the plantation, are formed of cinder beds left by the Indians after
burning their pottery.
At 88.2 m. (L) is SWIFTW ATER (private), built by Alexander B.
Montgomery in the 1840*8. With the exception of Longwood it is the best
example of ante-bellum architecture in the Delta. Its red roof, broken by
an open deck, matches in color the brick of the piers that lift it above the
swift waters of occasional floods. The one-story building with full-length
windows, wide doors, and a porch extending along three sides, is par
ticularly well adapted for life in this area. The outside walls arc white, the
porch ceiling is blue. Swiftwater was the refuge of Mrs. Ann Finlay and
her children when their home at Old .Greenville was destroyed by Federal
gunboats during the war. Before leaving, Mrs. Finlay collected quantities
of quinine, calomel, and castor oil from the Finlay Drug Store in the old
town, and, though some of it was confiscated on her way to Swiftwater,
354 TOURS
this small supply was the only medicine available in the community until
the war ended.
At 93.1 m. (L) is BELMONT (private), a dull red two-story brick
house, more French or Spanish in character than Georgian Colonial. In
place of the traditional thick white columns it is fronted with slender
gray posts, a feature quite in harmony with the wrought-iron railings
and French bays. The hip-roofed structure is spacious with doorways n
feet high. This house, finished in 1855, alone remains of those built
by the pioneer Worthington brothers. The home of one, on a nearby
plantation, caved into the river in 1885; that of another stood until 1932
when it was condemned by the Government in its levee-building program.
The new levee rises in front of the remaining house; between the levee
and the river is Lake Lee, the first lake, and one of the few lakes in
the Delta, made by man and not by the river. It was formed in the
1850 $ when Marcellus Johnson, a planter, made a cut-off here.
LONGWOOD, 102.1 m. (R), has been saved from the Mississippi
only by moving it twice, in 1854 and 1885. The house was built in 1832
by Ben Smith, a planter, on a tract of 30,000 acres bought from the
Government in 1822. Originally it had a raised brick basement, four
rooms, an encircling frame porch ornamented with cast-iron stars, a
balustrade, and a trellis. Four rooms were added in 1848 and four more
in 1870. The hip roof of seamed metal, painted red, is surmounted by
a long, low, glassed-in observatory. The porch is set, cantilever style,
several feet out from the face of the piers. There are large chimneys, long,
wide, well-spaced windows, and cleverly concealed cabinets. Longwood
on its third site occupies an elevation that was once four Indian mounds,
and is surrounded by prickly mock-orange trees.
At ELKLAND, 106.2 m., is the head of LAKE WASHINGTON, one
of the Delta s most beautiful lakes, which parallels the highway to Glen
Allan. Fishing and duck hunting here are excellent. About the lake are
poules d eau, called "poodle doos" by the Negroes. In southern Louisiana
these birds are considered a delicacy, but Mississippians think their meat
too fish-like. In the Lake Washington area is the nesting place for rare
birds such as the great blue heron, the American egret, and the snowy
egret. Members of the biology department of the Delta State Teachers
College (see Tour 3, Sec. a) have here observed the water-turkey, the
double-crested cormorant, the mallard, the green-winged teal, the wood
duck, the Virginia rail, the purple gallinule, the sora rail, the least sand
piper, and the dickcissel. At the foot of the lake is a flat of cypress and
water lilies that makes an ideal cover for ducks.
Right from Elkland on a graveled road to LAKE JACKSON, 5J m., a long nar
row body of water in the marshy land between Lake Washington and the river.
It has none of the beautiful blue water of Lake Washington, but its jungle of
moss-covered cypress, cane, and water lilies is attractive. Lake Jackson is noted
among hunters for duck and alligator. Between Lake Jackson and the river are the
sites of many former river landings, now extinct, among them Leota Landing (see
TRANSPORTATION) and Princeton. From the latter the first barrel of cotton
seed oil was shipped abroad.
Between Elkland and Glen Allan is one of the first settled parts of
?:>
MOONLIGHT ON LAKE WASHINGTON, ELKLAND
the Delta, called the Lake Washington Country and noted for its ante
bellum culture. A few homes are left to suggest the life of that period.
Before the coming of roads, the lake provided the means of transportation.
At 707.9 m. (L) is ERIY IN (private), with a plantation house that
WM built between the years 1827-30 by Junius \Vard, one of the
first settlers in the county. The story is that the ly-year-old Junius, while
hunting with Indian guides, was shown Lake Washington and was so
356 TOURS
impressed with the "most beautiful lake in the world" that he preempted
land and built a log cabin. The logs of the original cabin, now a part
of the rambling frame house, are visible in the attic.
At 108.7 m. (L) is MOUNT HOLLY (private), a great red brick
mansion of 30 rooms, as pretentious as Erwin is simple, built between
1855-59 f r Margaret Johnson Erwin. The bricks were made on the
place. Of special interest are the wrought-iron railings on the balconies.
The interior is notable for its rosewood staircase, rounded niches for
statuary, frescoes, walnut woodwork, and great oven. The walls of Mount
Holly are 2 feet thick and the ceilings 14 feet high. Perhaps the most
unusual feature is the asymmetrical plan, with a parlor projecting beyond
the front line of the entrance porch, verandas and bay windows. During
the 1927 flood the mansion was used as headquarters for relief com
mittees, who were able to land their boats on the lawn.
LINDEN, 112.3 m. (L), is the site of the first white settlement in
the county, made in 1825. The first settler, Frederick Turnbull, brought
with him from South Carolina a plant called the Pride of India, now
known as the chinaberry tree. Linden was for many years the home of
Gen. Wade Hampton of South Carolina. The present home dates only
from 1914, yet its Greek Revival effect and great Corinthian columns,
half-hidden by trees, are strongly reminiscent of Melrose and Auburn
(see NATCHEZ). Visible across the lake from Linden is EVERHOPE,
a red brick house built in 1841 by Andrew Knox. During its erection,
bottles of wine were sealed in the walls of the house, these to be opened
for the wedding of Knox s son who was then only a child. The boy died
in his youth and in that same year Knox sold the house. He died soon
afterward. But some say the marriage that never occurred was celebrated
each December for many years by a phantom wedding party, using the
wine. The bottles trotted out from hiding, placed themselves on great sil
ver platters, and throughout the revelry kept the glasses brimming full.
When all was over, the bottles, still full, hopped back to their hiding
place.
At 112.8 m. (R) is the landing pier for gravel barges. The barges are
loaded across the lake with sand and gravel pumped from the lake s bed.
The gravel that forms the bottom of Lake Washington is excellent for
road building.
GLEN ALLAN, 113.6 m. (275 pop.), is named for a plantation for
merly on this site.
Right from Glen Allan on a narrow paved road are the RUINS OF ST. JOHN S
EPISCOPAL CHURCH, 1.8 m. (L), completed in 1857, the first Episcopal struc
ture in the Delta. The group of planters who settled around Lake Washington in
the 1830*5 were of English descent; some of them were English born. Extensive
landowners in the older Southern States, they had come to Mississippi in boom
times and, from the proceeds of the sale of their former holdings, had invested in
the fertile acres of what were then known as the Mississippi Bottoms. The man
sions they built are the remaining evidence of their prosperity. To them in 1844
came Bishop Otey from Tennessee, and the fruit of his visit was the gift by
Jonathan McCaleb of five acres of land to be used as a site for the church and a
glebe. In October 1852, "at which time the families which leave that region in
summer months generally return to their plantations," the building was begun.
TOUR 3A 357
There was delay because of the necessity for importing materials from England
and an organ for the wilderness. When the church was dedicated in April 1857,
the services were stopped by a snow storm. Slaves were given their own gallery,
and the richly-carved chancel, pulpit, and altar were fashioned by the Negro sex
ton, Jesse Crowell, who was buried from the church, and was afterward given a
place in the adjacent cemetery. After the War between the States the church
began to decay, and a cyclone completed the ruin. Still evident is the out
line of the corner tower with circular brick windows webbed in vines. Its design
is based upon that of the English Gothic. The churchyard still bears the name of
Greenfield, the plantation of Jonathan McCaleb. In its well-kept enclosure a num
ber of iron crosses mark the graves of Confederate dead.
RICHLAND, 115.1 m. (L), with its face towards a bayou and its
side to the highway, is a one-and-a-half story frame house on a high
foundation; at the rear is a kitchen ell. The high, broken-roofed building
has a cross hall separating the main building from the back ell. The
house was erected by Jim Richardson, son of Edmund "Ned" Richard
son, known as the Cotton King of the World. A politician who was in
league with the carpetbaggers and renegade Confederates in both his
native Louisiana and in Mississippi, Ned Richardson maintained convict
labor gangs under the leasing system. With the labor gangs he accom
plished the Herculean task of clearing the almost impenetrable morass
of the central Mississippi Delta. Living on this rich soil and bringing
Negro tenants from the central hills, Richardson was able to add link
after link to his chain of plantations in Mississippi and Louisiana.
At 722.5 m. (R) is a group of three Indian mounds, the tallest of
them about 25 feet high.
EAGLE S NEST, 122.8 m., is a plantation by Lake Lafayette. It was so
named because eagles used to hatch in the great trees on the banks of
the lake.
At 723 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to LAKESIDE PLANTATION, 2.7 m. The home, built by
the Turnbulls from South Carolina (see above) in the 1840*5, is a simple dog
trot house built of wide boards throughout, with doors of plain paneling. The
spacious front porch faces Steele Bayou, whose steep banks with big trees add
dignity and beauty to the setting. Farther back from the bayou, but facing it in a
p>\v, are nine ante-bellum cabins. This plantation borders the bayou for two-and-
a-half miles. Across the bayou is HOPED ALE PLANTATION, also established
by Turnbull. At one time Steele Bayou was navigable, and cotton was shipped
down it to the Yazoo River and into Vicksburg.
At 728.5 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road is MAYERS VILLE, 7m. (136 pop.), county seat of Issa-
quena. Maycrsville, settled in 1830 by Ambrose Gipson, was called Gipson s
Landing until 1870, when the site was purchased by David Mayer. Five years
later Mayer deeded a part of the land as a county site, and that same year the
toun was incorporated as Mayersville. Until the mid-century decline of river traf
fic Mayersville was the shipping point on the Mississippi for the cotton of Sharkey
and Issaquena Counties. Showboats on the river during low water times and a
shifting population of river crews, gamblers, and traders gave the village a gay
rence that its present day quiescence belies. Since 1927 Maversville has been
adequately protected from caving river banks and floods, yet it has no railroad
facilities.
ROLLING FORK, 733.5 m. (104 alt, 902 pop.) (see Tour 3, Sec. a),
is at the junction with US 61 (see Tonr 3, Sec. a).
358 TOURS
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< <#> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Side Tour 36
Woodville to Fort Adams, 20 m. Fort Adams Road.
Graveled roadbed, two lanes wide.
No accommodations.
This route winds through the bluff hills in the extreme southwestern
corner of Mississippi, a tiny part of the State that holds more than its
share of historic interest.
Fort Adams Rd. branches W. from US 61 (see Tour 3, Sec. b) at
Woodville, m.
At 1 m. is the SITE OF THE HILLS (R), the plantation of John Joor,
a close friend of Andrew Jackson, under whom he served as an officer
at the Battle of New Orleans. General Joor acquired two brass cannon
captured in the battle, placing one in the courthouse square at Woodville
and presenting the other to Natchez. During the War between the States
both of the cannon disappeared.
At 2 m. the road forks. Left here.
At 6 m. (R) is the SITE OF LA GRANGE, the home of James A.
Ventress, a graduate of Edinburgh University. In 1844 he was appointed
a member of the first board of trustees of the University of Mississippi.
Because of his interest and work in organizing the school he was called
the father of the university. The house, burned recently, was a handsome
place, similar in appearance to the Hermitage near Nashville, Tennessee.
SALISBURY, 12 m. (L), reached by a lane, is a one-and-a-half-story
structure built in 1811 and still in good repair. Live oaks shade the
grounds.
WALNUT GROVE, 13 m. (L), was built by a Nolan, believed by
natives to have been a brother of the fictional character, Philip Nolan,
the "man without a country."
The JOHN WALL PLACE, or the Evans Wall Place (private), 13.5
m. (R), stands at the corner where the old Lower Natchez Trace crossed
the Fort Adams Rd. It was built in 1798 by John Wall, and in recent
years was occupied by Evans Wall, author of "No Nation Girl." Andrew
Jackson was a frequent visitor here.
The weather-beaten old structure, standing on a hill, is almost lost
behind the locust trees shading the sunken road that was formerly the
entrance lane. The forecourt is overrun with briars and lush grass, with
smilax, wistaria, and other old garden plants that have run wild. The
house has second floor porches on the front and rear, the ground floor
on the front being open and paved with brick, and on the rear enclosed.
The walls of the ground floor are of brick, deep rose and mellow with
age. There are large outside chimneys at each end and the interior is di-
TOUR 3B 359
vided into small rooms; each door has a very large wrought-iron lock and
si her knob.
At 15 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road is PINCKNEYVILLE, 7 m. (100 pop.), once the seat of
justice of Wilkinson Co. Oliver Pollock, a witness when General Wilkinson
was being investigated for conspiracy with Aaron Burr, lived at Pinckneyville,
as did a number of the first English-speaking settlers in the Natchez District.
The Kern per brothers (see AN OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES) used
Pinckneyville as a refuge after their forays into Spanish territory. Because the
railroad never reached Pinckneyville, the village has retained many of the char
acteristics of the old Deep South.
The Whitakcr Negroes here are a group with unusual racial characteristics; they
have gradually decreased in number until only six remain in the vicinity. Accord
ing to local physicians, the Whitaker Negroes have sub-normal sweat glands;
consequently, in warm weather they have to be near a pool or creek in which
they can immerse themselves. Frequently the Negroes take buckets of water to
the field with them, turning the water over their heads to soak their clothing.
Besides the peculiarity of the skin, which though dark has a shiny appearance,
they have few teeth, perhaps two or three at the top and a few below, and these
are fine and pointed. Their lips are large, thick, and protruding, making their
speech a bit indistinct and giving their faces an odd look. Their hair is fine and
silky but thin and short. They are perhaps slightly sub-normal in intelligence.
Their peculiarities seem to be inherited only by the male children, the females
being normal. The Whitaker Negroes are descendants of Louis Whitaker, a
Richmond, Va., Negro, sold as a slave in the old market at New Orleans. They
now live on Alto and Magnolia plantations.
In the vicinity of Pinckneyville are a number of typical old plantation homes.
ARCOLE, the home of Gen. William L. Brandon, was built on a Spanish land
grant received by General Brandon in 1790. It is constructed of blue poplar,
hand-hewn and whip-sawed by slaves; it is a story-and-a-half high with a broad
front porch, having heavy wooden columns. A mile N. of Pinckneyville is
DESERT, built by Capt. Robert Semple in 1800, a two-story structure with porch
columns supported by brick foundations and with elaborately hand-carved en
trance doors.
Two miles SW. of Pinckneyville is COLDSPRING PLANTATION, one of the
oldest in the section, with a house built of blue poplar on a brick foundation ;
over the flag-stoned, iron-railed back porch is an arch, from the center of which
hangs a Masonic emblem, a relic of the decade when men of widely divergent
character and views followed the Kemper brothers in throwing off Spanish rule
in the country S. of the 3ist parallel. Coldspring, built by Dr. Carmichacl, an
army surgeon, is perfectly preserved. Among its many legends is that of the
maiden who sat so long at an upper window watching for her lover that a flash
of lightning photographed her image on the glass an image still visible, it is
said. Coldspring has been in the McGehee family since it was bought in 1840
by Judge Edward McGehee, great-grandfather of the present owner.
At COLUMBIAN SPRINGS PLANTATION, 16 m., is the GRAVE
OF GERARD CHITTOOUE BRANDON, Mississippi s first native-
born Governor, serving in that capacity for a brief period in 1825 and
1826, and in the latter year commencing a term of office which ended
in 1832. Brandon, a typical planter, was an exponent of the conservative
views later expressed by the aristocratic Whig party.
FORT ADAMS, 20 m. (55 alt, 200 pop.), a small farming cen
ter, is on the site of a mission conducted by Father Davion in 1698
and takes its name from a fort built here in 1798 and later named for
360 TOURS
President John Adams. Its first commander was Gen. James Wilkinson
(1757-1825), who was probably the center of more storms and mysteries
than any other man who has held high positions in the American Army.
Wilkinson, born in Maryland, entered the Revolutionary Army and
advanced to high position as a very young man. His career was ruined,
however, by his utter inability to keep out of conspiracies and intrigue.
He was involved in the Conway Cabal but saved himself from complete
disgrace by revealing the details; for a time he was inactive but after
he went to Kentucky at the close of the war he became prominent in trade
and politics there. The next major scandal came when he entered the
Spanish conspiracy but he again managed to reestablish himself in the
good graces of those in Washington and after he applied for reinstate
ment was rapidly promoted to the position of general-in-chief of the
American Army. After two years in this position he was sent to Fort
Adams. While in this area he performed several services of value. The
settlers rapidly occupying the upper Mississippi Valley had to have free
access to the sea, which meant that they had to pass through the Spanish-
owned port of New Orleans. Wilkinson made valuable contributions to
the development of the territory by completing treaties with the Chicka-
saw and Choctaw Indians for opening roads through the wilderness (see
TRANSPORTATION). He became involved in Burr s scheme for a
southwestern empire, but exposed him, following his usual course in
such matters. Burr s trial was in a sense a trial of Wilkinson. He was
court martialed in 1811, charged with treasonable relations with Spain,
with negotiations with Burr, and with maladministration in the transfer
of troops. The court by its verdict turned the accusation into commenda
tion. Throughout his stormy career Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, and
Adams defended him. Agreement on Wilkinson s motives and character
may never be reached but the story of his various and complicated enter
prises proved a colorful chapter in American history.
Only traces of the old fort remain but the place has yet other inter
esting associations; it was here that Philip Nolan, "the man without a
country," was at one time stationed. There is also a legend that Richard
Butler, an officer of the garrison, defied General Wilkinson; Wilkinson,
having lost his own queue, ordered all the officers at Fort Adams to
have theirs cut. Butler refused, telling his physician that when he died
he desired that a hole be bored in his coffin and his queue be pulled
through so that Wilkinson would know that he had been defied even
in death.
In the vicinity of Fort Adams lived William Dunbar (1749-1810),
Scottish scientist frequently called "Sir" William Dunbar, who was the
first to recognize the value of cottonseed oil (see INDUSTRY).
TOUR 4 361
Tour 4
(Jackson, Tenn.) Corinth Tupelo Columbus Meridian Waynesboro (Mo
bile, Ala.). US 45.
Tennessee Line to Alabama Line, 298.6 m.
Route one-eighth paved; remainder, being paved.
Mobile & Ohio R.R. parallels route between Corinth and Shannon, between Macon
and Meridian, and between Quitman and Waynesboro.
St. Louis & San Francisco R.R. parallels route between Aberdeen and Columbus.
Accommodations in cities.
US 45 in Mississippi runs from the foothills of the Tennessee River in
the northeastern corner of the State to the red clay hills of Wayne
County in the southeast. Between Tupelo and Scooba it traverses the
Black Prairie Belt, formerly one of the richest cotton growing sections of
the State but now supplementing that crop with diversified farming and
dairying. Aberdeen and Columbus were prosperous ante-bellum centers
and, being in the fertile prairie, they still hold their prosperity. Between
Scooba and Waynesboro the highway winds through the uplands of east
ern Mississippi, where a more typical Mississippi scene is evident with
small terraced cotton patches scattered among the forests and between the
gullies.
Crossing the Mississippi Line, m., 44 miles S. of Jackson Tenn., US
45 follows the general route of the Union troops in their advance on
Corinth after the Battle of Shiloh in April 1862. Markers at intervals in
dicate various positions of the contending armies. At 2.5 ;;/. is a line of
earthworks paralleling the highway. The marker reads: "This earthwork,
i ! /2 miles from the outer protective earthwork of the Confederate Army
at Corinth, was thrown up by the Union Army between May 17 and
May 29, 1862, in Halleck s advance from Shiloh to Corinth. 1 The Union
advance was an example of Halleck s generalship. Without risking an
open engagement he brought an overwhelming force to the outskirts of
Corinth and entrenched it as strongly as were the defending Confederates.
From this earthwork the Federals could hear distinctly the movement of
trains and the beat of Confederate drums in the town.
CORINTH, 4.5 m. (456 alt., 6,220 pop.), Mississippi s only city in
the Tennessee River Hills, was closely involved in an important engage
ment during the War between the States. Here soldiers fought in hand-
to-hand combat, and for many years after the war, Presbyterians, inno
cently having built their church upon the site of an old Federal maga
zine, worshipped above a nest of mines. Yet the inhabitants find the
future more absorbing than the past; they are more interested in the de
velopment of their poultry farms, dairies, and textile plants than in the
fact that General Grant once occupied the town. They now ship more
3<$2 TOURS
than a million dollars worth of products a year, and are beginning to
produce milk commercially. A cheese factory provides a market for whole
milk; quantities of butter fat are sold in other markets. The city has a
hosiery mill and a garment factory. Industrial development is encouraged
by the low rate of TVA electrical power.
In 1855 officers of the Memphis & Charleston R.R. and the Mobile &
Ohio R.R. chose this site for the junction of their two lines, giving it the
obvious name of Cross City. Two years later the editor of the weekly
newspaper suggested that the community change its name to the more
imaginative name of Corinth, the Grecian crossroads city.
But when war broke out between the States, the asset of being the
crossing point of two trunk lines became a liability. From the beginning
of the war the Federals planned to capture the town, and the Con
federates kept it heavily fortified. After the Battle of Shiloh, April 6-8,
1862, Confederate General Beauregard retreated to the town, followed
by Federal General Halleck. When Halleck, after slow marching, at last
reached Corinth, Beauregard evacuated the town, permitting him to enter
without opposition. The Union army occupied the place for five months,
then General Grant, surmising that the Confederates under Van Dorn
intended to attack, ordered Rosecrans, who was defending the town, to
concentrate his troops. But Van Dorn and his forces swooped down from
Tennessee with extraordinary speed, and on October 3 crushed Rosecrans
men three miles N. of Corinth. The Federals retreated into the city at
dusk and spent the night preparing to renew the battle. The next morning
Van Dorn hurled his troops against the entrenchments of the Federals,
but his forces were disorganized and two battalions failed to attack simul
taneously. In the second day of fighting Col. Wm. P. Rogers led his
brigade in the charge against the Federal Battery Robinett. Rogers, after
desperate fighting, succeeded in taking the almost impregnable position
but paid with his life for the victory. Shortly afterward the Confederates
were forced by the augmented Federal troops to retreat. After the battle
Rosecrans had Rogers buried with military honors.
The NELL CURLEE HOME (private), 711 Jackson St., was built in
1857 by Hampton Mask. Iron grillwork is used for exterior ornamenta
tion. During the War between the States the house, then the showplace
of Corinth, was occupied successively by Generals Halleck, Bragg, and
Hood.
The FRED ELGIN HOME (private), 615 Jackson St., was used for
headquarters by General Grant; the large old bed in which he slept is
now displayed with pride by the owner. A two-story structure set in a yard
thickly planted with giant boxwood and magnolia trees, it is perhaps the
most typical ante-bellum house in town.
The A. K. WEAVER HOME (private), SE. corner Filmore and Bunch
Sts., is a long low white cottage with pleasing lines. The recessed en
trance is noteworthy. This home was occupied by Gen. Leonidas Polk
at the time of the Federal invasion of Corinth.
The NATIONAL CEMETERY, i mile SW. of the courthouse, en
trance on Meiggs St. (open 6-6), is a plot of 20 acres enclosed by an
TOUR 4 363
irregular brick wall. Here are buried more than 6,000 Union soldiers
from 273 regiments of 12 States.
The CONFEDERATE PARK, Polk and Linden Sts., holds the SITE
OF OLD FORT ROBINETT and is maintained by the Corinth Chapter
of the U. D. C. Within the park is a MONUMENT TO COL. WILLIAM
ROGERS, who was killed attacking the fort.
The JONES BOARDING HOUSE, 815 Waldron St., was originally
the Methodist church, and was at one time used as a Confederate prison.
South of Corinth is an area supplied with electricity by TVA. The TVA
Bill was introduced in the House by Hon. John R. Rankin, of the First
District.
At 18.3 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to the SITE OF DANVILLE, 1 m., the first white settlement
in the northeastern corner of Mississippi. An abundance of fresh spring water
suitable for tanning determined the site. It is said that the citizens of Danville
were noted for their piety and their law-abiding natures. Danville lost its pros
perity when the railroad skirted it, and, shortly after, completely disappeared when
the Federal Army moved the houses elsewhere to use them as quarters for its
troops.
BOONEVILLE, 24 .5 m. (509 alt., 1,703 pop.), was the scene of an
all-day fight between Hardee s Confederate cavalry and Sheridan s Fed
eral troops, July i, 1862, after the Army of the Mississippi had retreated
from Corinth and was reorganizing at Tupelo. A prosperous farm trading
center, it now has a garment factory.
1. Right from Booneville on a graveled road into the TIPPAH HILLS, 10 m.,
an extremely rugged section known for the number of wild flowers and dog
wood trees, and for opossum, fox, and quail hunting.
2. Left from Booneville on State 30, a graveled road, to BOONEVILLE LAKE,
1 m., and WALDEN LAKE, 4 m., both favorite picnicking spots.
BALDWYN, 3-5 J m. (374 alt., 1,106 pop.), is on the line between
Prentiss and Lee Counties, a division that has caused some amusing con
flicts of jurisdiction. Until 1920 the town had a hotel named the Forrest
House because Confederate Cavalry Gen. Nathan B. Forrest had used it
for quarters after the Battle of Brice s Crossroads, his greatest fight.
Right from Baldwyn on a graveled road to the BRICE S CROSSROADS BATTLE
MONUMENT, 5.8 m. (R). Against a force of about 5,000 Federals, including
cavalry, infantry, and artillery, Confederate Cavalry General Forrest interposed
a much smaller force of mounted troops, defeated the column in a brisk engage
ment June 10, 1864, then turned its retreat into a rout along the road to Ripley,
capturing 14 pieces of artillery, 5,000 stand of fire arms, 500,000 rounds of am
munition, and 250 wagons. The Federal casualties were 223 killed, VM wounded,
and 1,623 missing, as against Forrest s loss of 96 killed and 396 wounded. It was
a signal victory for Forrest s peculiar strategy and method of fighting. The marshy
terrain was to his advantage. He won a race for the crossroads, and, bluffing his
way as usual, charged against the Federals before they could emerge from the
Is. At one time he was in the front rank, pistol in hand, and his courage and
aggressiveness carried his daring n
At 40.5 m. is GUNTOWN (381 alt., 369 pop.). According to local
legend the village is named for a Virginia Tory, James Gunn, who fled
364 TOURS
here to escape the American Revolution. Gunn later married the daughter
of a Chickasaw Indian chief. He continued to toast the King of England
on his birthday as long as he lived.
At 49.9 m. (L) is a double-pen timber house typical of the early homes
of this section. It is particularly interesting in contrast with the TUPELO
HOMESTEADS, 55.3 m. (L) and .5.5 J m. (R), a group of homes
erected by the Resettlement Administration.
US 45 enters on Gloster St.
TUPELO, 55.8 m. (289 alt., 6,361 pop.) (see TUPELO).
Points of Interest. U. S. Fish Hatchery, cotton mill, Carnation Milk plant, and
others.
Here are the junctions with State 6 (see Tour 14) and US 78 (see
Tour 9).
The route continues on Gloster St. (US 45).
South of Tupelo the change from hill country to rolling prairie and
fertile bottom lands is evident.
VERONA, 60.6 m. (301 alt., 554 pop.), is the old town that lost its
leadership to Tupelo when the latter became the junction of the Mobile
& Ohio R.R. and the St. Louis & San Francisco R.R. (then the Memphis
& Birmingham) in 1887. After the Battle of Harrisburg General Forrest
was brought to the LUTIE McSHANN HOUSE on Johnson St., 4 blocks
E. of US 45, to be treated for wounds that had reopened during the
battle.
SHANNON, 66.6 m. (243 alt., 524 pop.) (see Side Tour 4 A), is at
the junction with State 23 (see Side Tour 4 A).
NETTLETON, 72.6 m. (252 alt., 834 pop.), is a small agricultural
center. It was the birthplace of Dr. Felix J. Underwood, executive officer
of the State Board of Health, and president of the State and Provincial
Health Authorities of North America.
At 90.1 m. (L), visible from the highway is a two-story white-columned
house typical of the ante-bellum planter dwellings in the Black Prairie.
At 96.8 m. (R) on top of a knoll commanding Aberdeen is an old brick
house with stepped end walls.
ABERDEEN, 91.6 m. (203 alt, 3,925 pop.), is a lovely old town
built on the western bank of the Tombigbee River at the edge of the
prairie region. It was first named Dundee by Robert Gordon of Scotland.
Objecting to the way the local people pronounced the name, Gordon
changed it to Aberdeen. Near the head of navigation of the Tombigbee
River and with the almost ideal cotton growing area to the W., Aberdeen
was one of the most prosperous of the Mississippi ante-bellum planta
tion towns.
In 1836, after the Indian land cessions, Gordon, who founded the
town as a trading post, auctioned building lots to new settlers, and in
1849 Aberdeen had grown so swiftly that it became the county seat.
Steamboats on the Tombigbee carried cotton grown in the vicinity down
to Mobile in the fall and carried back supplies in the spring. Negroes,
brought from Virginia to work on the newly-created prairie plantations,
a swiff transition from nioneer conditions to olantation
TOUR 4 365
comfort and Aberdeen became a social center with attractive town houses
built by the planters for their womenfolk. Though many of the old
structures need paint and repair, these ante-bellum homes, designed for
the most part on traditional lines, evidence the substantial pre-war pros
perity of the area. A good example is HOLLIDAY HAVEN (private),
on Meridian St., a white house with green shutters; its eight white Doric
columns, hand-carved by apprenticed Negro slaves, are loftier than the
classic rules of proportion demand, but they are not displeasing. There is
a balcony over the front door and long windows opening onto the
spacious gallery. Two immense magnolias frame the entrance; another
magnolia (R) is draped with a freely-blooming wistaria vine. At the end
of a sloping terrace (L) are the few plum trees remaining from the old
orchard that is now a garden filled with crapemyrtle and syringa.
The finest of the homes is the REUBEN DAVIS HOME (private),
block C on Commerce St., just W. of the Mobile & Ohio R.R. Station.
This white frame house, erected in 1847, in a Deep South variant of the
Greek Revival style, is of monumental proportions. Judge Reuben Davis
was born in Tennessee in 1813, the twelfth child of a Baptist minister
who farmed to supplement his income. The child had little schooling
except what he learned from adventurers who, temporarily penniless,
acted as his tutors on the frontier. Before he was of age he studied medi
cine with his brother-in-law and began a practice in which he was more
ambitious than learned.
Then he turned to the study of law and at the age of 20 was elected
district attorney, making $20,000 in his first year. He moved to Aber
deen in 1838 and entered State politics. Starting as a Whig, he be
came a Union Democrat, then a rabid secessionist, and finally, in 1878,
a Greenbacker. He dated all his mistakes and most of his troubles to
the Mexican War, in which he contracted an illness that long stayed
with him.
Throughout his misfortunes in politics in which he was continually be
ing stranded by all parties, he maintained a lucrative connection as attorney
for the New Orleans, Jackson & Great Northern R.R. and achieved suc
cess as a criminal lawyer. It is said that the use of red pepper in his
handkerchief to induce tears at the decisive point in a murder trial
heightened the drama of his courtroom orator) . In 1878 he was shot and
dangerously wounded by a prosecuting attorney whom he had outdone in
a criminal trial at Columbus, but he did not die until 1890. His Recollec
tions of Mississippi and Mississippians, published in 1880. is an excel
lent source for Mississippi history of his time. In this home at Aberdeen
his name is engraved in bold letters on the silver-plated doorbell.
The OLD CEMETERY on Cemetery Road is entered over a stile. Many
of the inscriptions on the grave stones refer to wives as "consorts" ; sev
eral of the graves are of Irish-born settlers who came to Aberdeen before
the War between the States. A square of 30 graves of unknown Con
federate soldiers recalls the skirmish at Egypt, Miss, (see Side Tour 4A),
from which these wounded men were brought to die. One unusual monu
ment carries the image of a woman surrounded by flames, the story being
366 TOURS
that an open fire caught her bouffant skirt and burned her fatally. A
mausoleum in the middle of the cemetery carries a legend that the occu
pant, at her own request, was entombed in a sitting position.
At 99 .5 m. US 45 crosses the Tombigbee River and between Aberdeen
and Columbus rides a levee in the Tombigbee Valley.
At 109.8 m. a house (L) marks the SITE OF HAMILTON, first
seat of Monroe Co. In the i82o s the county was separated from the other
white settlements in Mississippi by over a hundred miles of Indian terri
tory.
US 45 enters on 5th St. N., to ist Ave. N.
COLUMBUS, 119.9 m. (250 alt., 10,743 pop.) (see COLUMBUS).
Points of Interest. Mississippi State College for Women, a number of historic
and architecturally interesting homes, and others.
Here is the junction with US 82 (see Tour 6).
1. Left from Columbus on State 12, which here approximates the route of the
old Jackson Military Road (see TRANSPORTATION) to BELMONT, 9 m.,
the home built between 1822 and 1825 by Capt. William Neilson on a 2,560-
acre plantation granted to him as a bonus for his services in the U. S. Army
during the War of 1812. Architecturally Belmont represents the transitional
structure between the log cabin and the town house in the Black Prairie. Built
of oak and heart pine, with hewn sills, hand-sawed lumber, and home-made brick,
it is a lofty two-story house with a transverse roof ridge. The timbers are fastened
with wooden pins. The hardware and window glass were brought from Baltimore,
Md., by the skilled Baltimore Irishman who supervised the construction. The
manual labor was performed by slaves. Although the formerly separate kitchen
has been connected with the house, the main part of Belmont is as originally
built, with much of the first plastering and many of the old window panes still in
place. The house and 320 acres of the original tract have never passed out of the
possession of the Neilson family. At the foot of the hill on which Belmont
stands are two of what used to be a group of fine springs. Tradition has it that
De Soto camped by these springs in 1540, and a marker placed on the Jackson
road near them commemorates the camp.
2. Right from Columbus on old US 45, L. at every fork on a narrow road, and
crossing the Tombigbee River on an old-style cable ferry, to WAVERLY, 7.5 m.
This is an impressive mansion with an octagonal tower, colonnaded lower
floors, and flanking. wings. The years have ravished it of life and color, but its
mantelpiece of delicately carved marble, its woodwork executed by a discerning
English craftsman make it comparable to its Natchez forerunners. It is an archi
tectural extravaganza, elaborately ornamented. The plan is an "H", the wings
closing in Corinthian porches at front and back. The central octagonal hall rises
a full 65 feet to the dome of the tower. Two rooms of monumental scale flank
the hall on both sides for three stories. A massive double staircase winds up
through the structure, touching narrow circular galleries on which open second
and third floor bedrooms. So magnificent was the parlor that stories about it have
become legendary. Damask curtains overdraped the lace at long windows. The rose
wood chairs and divan were upholstered in blue and gold. Above the Italian mar
ble mantel hung a gilt mirror of stupendous size.
Col. George Young, the builder, born in Oglethorpe Co., Ga., in 1799, was one
of the first landowners with a large tract in the Black Prairie. At the bluff on
the Tombigbee, where the river formerly made a great bend that almost brought
it back on itself, he began the erection of Waverly in the 1840*5, and continued
its building until 1856. The velvet carpets, brocaded draperies, and handsome
furnishings were imported from Europe, after a first order had been lost at sea.
The colonel sank an artesian well, planted orchards and vineyards, laid out gar-
TOUR 4 367
dens, had extensive kennels of hunting dogs and a private boathouse on the river,
operated his own ferry, built warehouses of brick and stone, built a gristmill, a
sawmill, a tannery, a cotton gin, a brick kiln and an ice house, had a lighting
plant for the big house (he burned lighter wood and resin to make gas), and
made Waverly a small but complete village. A German gardener landscaped the
bluff side. A cement swimming pool with marble steps was laid out below the
house. As a planter he was well equipped for and devoted to entertaining; the
hospitality of Waverly was as extravagant as its furnishings.
The War between the States cast its shadow on Waverly. Six sons of the house
joined the Confederate Army, and Waverly became a refuge for men in gray.
Cavalry Gen. Nathan B. Forrest and his staff spent one night here. Though im
poverished by the war, the colonel s descendants kept Waverly open, with Cap
tain Billy and Major Val entertaining more simply but not less genially than
the colonel.
Waverly is still in possession of the family, but now needs repair. Some of the
stained-glass side lights from Venice on the front entrance are cracked. The 30-
foot hall has a wax-smooth floor and satin-smooth plastered walls, but the gilt-
framed mirrors on the white marble consoles are covered with a film of dust, as
is the piano with its mother-of-pearl keys. The draperies of the parlor windows
are faded and drab as the outside paint. A massive bronze chandelier still hangs
from the dome of the observatory, with cut-glass globes, but only the spacious
ness of the rotunda is left to make it impressive. The boxwood hedge is covert- 1
with vines. The green shutters are faded, the garden rank with weeds, and the
swimming pool dry. Unoccupied and dilapidated, it is still majestic.
Downstream two miles from Waverly (not reached by road or trail) at the junc
tion of the Tombigbee with Tibbee Creek is the SITE OF PLYMOUTH, an ex
tinct town that was formerly a rival of Columbus and Cotton Gin Port. It is said
to have been a camping ground for De Soto on his passage through Mississippi,
many scraps of armor and Spanish military equipment having been found here.
It also is said to have been the scene of Bienville s operations against the Chicka-
saw, though Cotton Gin Port is usually given that credit. What substantiates
Plymouth s assertion is that the first white settlers found a two-story fort of cedar
logs standing on a slight elevation about 500 yards from the river and sur
rounded by a circular ditch and embankment. The building was approximately
20 feet square with windows in the first story. The first settlers tore it down
to obtain material to build their cabins.
Tradition also makes the fort a base of operations for Gen. Andrew Jackson in
his campaign against the Creek Indians. The site of Plymouth was well known as
an Indian settlement and trading post even during French rule in this section, and
was the home of Maj. John Pitchlyn. Pitchlyn, born on St. Thomas Island in
1765, was left among the Choctaw when his father, an English officer, died on
his way from South Carolina to the Natchez district. John Pitchlyn s life with
the Indians gave him extraordinary influence among them, which he exerted in
favor of the United States. He had five sons, one of whom, Peter Perkins
Pitchlyn, was described by Charles Dickens after a visit to the United States; he
is buried in the Congressional Cemetery at Washington, D. C. John himselt
buried at Waverly in 1835, though his body was subsequently moved by his sons
to the Indian Territory.
After the Indian land cessions opened the west bank of the Tombigbee to settle
ment, Old Plymouth became an important cotton storage and shipping center
chiefly because of a nearby shallow ford in the river. It was incorporated in 1836,
but the low ground at the mouth of Tibbee Creek proved so unhealthful that
the planters moved back to their plantations, and the merchants and la^
crossed the river to Columbus. Nothing is left of the village though it is asserted
that the embankment around the fort can be traced.
The route continues R. on ist Ave. N., crossing the Tombigbee River,
TOURS
the western limit of Columbus. On the east bank of the river is a good
view (L) of the bluffs on which Columbus is built.
Between Columbus and Macon US 45 runs past a number of hay fields
breaking into the cotton in the prairie belt. The plowed fields and the
sides of the creeks and drainage canals show rich black soil.
MACON, 155.1 m. (114 alt, 2,198 pop.), is a pleasant old prairie
town built on the bank of the Noxubee River and spreading fan-wise
E., N., and W. from the river and courthouse. It was incorporated in 1836
on land ceded by the Choctaw under the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek,
and experienced a prosperity of which the big white-columned homes are
the remaining evidence. During the War between the States, when Jack
son was burned by General Sherman, the seat of the State government
was moved for a short while to Macon. The executive offices of Governor
Clark, whose home was on the outskirts of Macon, were in the buildings
of the Calhoun Institute, a private school for girls established by W. R.
Poindexter about 1856 on grounds now occupied by the Macon Public
School. Two sessions of the State legislature also met in these buildings,
and one of the buildings served as an improvised hospital, as did many
of Macon s churches. Cotton growing and lumbering always have been
industries associated with Macon; the town now has one of the largest
cream condenseries in the South.
1. Right from Macon on Pearl St. which becomes a country road; at 1.5 m.
L. 0.5 m. to SITE OF JACKSON S MILITARY ROAD (see TRANSPORTA
TION), which crossed Noxubee River. The deep trench cut through the bluff on
the east bank of the stream leads down to the ford and is plainly visible, though
now overgrown with vines and underbrush.
2. Left from Macon on State 14, a graveled road, to the ancestral BANKHEAD
HOME, 8 m. (L), a dwelling that has been little changed in the 80 years since
William Bankhead built it. In several rooms the original wallpaper remains. A
number of inside windows open into the hallways, and, as they serve no apparent
purpose, are rather mystifying. The Speaker of the National House of Repre
sentatives (1937), W. B. Bankhead, was married and several of his children
were born in the house.
At 760.7 m. US 45 crosses the Noxubee (Ind., stinking water) River
with its steep and sometimes slippery banks.
At 161.9 m. is the junction with State 14.
Right on this graveled road is MASHULAVILLE, 9 m. (200 pop.), a village
with a general store, a consolidated high school, two churches and a number of
scattered homes, not visible from the highway. Mashulaville, named for Chief
Mashulatubbee (Ind., the one who perseveres and kills ), was once a famous
Choctaw town. The Russell home, on the SITE OF THE HOME OF CHIEF
MASHULATUBBEE, links the placid community with a lively past. Mashulatub
bee succeeded his father Homastubbee in 1809 as District Chief of the Choctaw.
Though he is said to have favored a coalition with the Shawnee chief, Tecumseh,
who attempted to organize a general uprising against the whites in 1811, and gave
his own race absolute loyalty, he was friendly with the white people of the sec
tion, receiving them in his home with courtesy and hospitality. Like many other
chieftains of the day he vigorously opposed the Dancing Rabbit Treaty of 1830.
A man of considerable wealth, he became dissatisfied with his simple cabin and,
in 1819, hired Josiah Tully, a contractor from Pickensville, Ala., to build a house
for him at Mashulaville that would be more in keeping with his dignity as a
TOUR 4 369
chief. The dwelling had four rooms, two below and two above, and was built of
logs. He lived lure with his two wives and a house full of offspring until the
signing of the Dancing Rabbit Treaty. One of the chief s wives was partly white
and very beautiful. When travelers stopped at his home he liked to show her to
them, but the other" wife, who possessed the stronger character and intellect, was
his favorite. Upon his migration west, Mashulatubbee sold his home to Anthony
Winston for Sioo. Several hundred yards from the Russell home is an old spring
used by the chief, and on the property are numerous stone artifacts.
At 10.4 m. on State 14 is the junction with an unmarked dirt road.
Left 8 m. on this road to the DANCING RABBIT TREATY MARKER (L),
erected to memorialize the consummation of the treaty in which the Choctaw
Indians relinquished to the Government practically a third of north-central Missis
sippi in return for which they received certain annuities and land further W.
Near here in September 1830, 20,000 Choctaw gathered to consider the proposed
treaty. The Government sent agents to negotiate, and following them came white
traders with whisky and trinkets to bribe the Indians to sign the treaty.
The first conference was held Sept. 18, 1830. Sixty Choctaw leaders seated them
selves in a horseshoe on the ground. Facing them, seated on a fallen log, were
the Government agents, John Eaton, William Coffee, and the interpreter, John
Pitchlyn. Among the Indians a group of seven of the oldest women of the tribe
squatted, muttering their disapproval throughout the deliberations. During the
first day Government agents dominated the council. Only one Indian, Killahota, a
young half-breed, addressed the gathering. He spoke in favor of the treaty, and
the grunts and other signs of disapproval that had greeted the speeches of the
white men swelled in volume as he spoke. At one point an old squaw, unable to
control her indignation, rose and made a lunge at Killahota with a knife. For
several weeks the negotiations proceeded. Every half-breed present advocated
capitulation to the demands of the white men, and every full-blood Indian
opposed it. The influence of Greenwood Leflore (see Tour 6) finally brought the
Indians to accept the terms of a compromise treaty, which promised any Choctaw
who cared to remain in the State a section of land and the protection of the Gov
ernment. A hundred years passed before the Government formulated plans to
keep the white man s promise.
At 10 m. on this dirt road is an open field in which is BIG ROCK, 1 m. off the
highway (L), the traditional rendezvous of the Choctaw. This rock is at the foot
of a hill which rises high above the surrounding country. Rough and cylindrical
in shape, 10 feet in diameter and 20 feet high, it has the appearance of having
been thrust into the ground by some giant hand. Legend is that the Indians had
silver mines in the foothills of Noxubee and Winston Counties and that when
they returned from work they gathered at the foot of Big Rock. Pow-wows between
the Choctaw and neighboring tribes took place here, and once a treaty sponsored
by Andrew Jackson to make peace between the Choctaw and Creek tribes was
signed at this spot in Jackson s presence. At the foot of Big Rock is a small water
hole that never runs dry. The water is stagnant, but year in and out it remains
at the same level.
SHUQUALAK (Ind. hog-wallow), 161.1 m. (214 alt., 810 pop.), is
between prairie and flatwoods. Several large lumber mills operate here.
The cut-over timber land in the vicinity is the scene of annual field trials
of bird dogs, an event sponsored by the National Field Trial Club and the
Continental Field Trial Club, and held during the latter part of January.
The National Club conducts two trials; the first a free-for-all champion
ship stake in which any pedigreed dog can be entered, entrance fee $75,
purse $1,000 ; the second is a derby for two-year-olds, entrance fee $50,
370 TOURS
purse $ 1,000 which is split on a three-quarter one-quarter basis, $250
going to the runner-up. The trials sponsored by the Continental Club
differ from those of the National Club in only one important respect: a
derby for two-year-olds is the only event run. Entrance fees and purses are
the same. Saddle horses for following the dogs in the field are available
at $3 a day.
At 170.4 m. (R) is the southernmost of the Black Prairie Belt homes,
and at 176.6 m. are the southernmost white limestone outcroppings of
the prairie. Between here and Scooba the highway passes half-timbered
houses typical of the hill country.
SCOOBA, 181. 1 m. (192 alt., 933 pop.), is a small farming and saw-
milling center. Here is EAST MISSISSIPPI JUNIOR COLLEGE, a public
coeducational school established in 1927. The buildings of modern de
sign are grouped on a 254-acre campus.
Left from Scooba on a graveled road to GILES PLANTATION, 5 m., (open by
appointment), with a big house that is one of the few ante-bellum homes left
in this section. Jacob Giles and his wife came here from the Carolinas in 1835
and built a typical story-and-a-half planter home. It has a guest room and ball
room on the second floor, and big fluted columns supporting the roof over the
long gallery. The side walls are beautifully finished with hand-made plaster
cornices and friezes.
ELECTRIC MILLS, 185.1 m. (1,084 pp-) * s wnat its name implies,
an industrial village built around a large electrically-operated sawmill.
Here are examples of the better type of grouped houses built by corpora*
tions for their employees. In contrast with the Piney Woods mill-owned
houses, the houses here have four and five rooms and modern con
veniences.
Between Electric Mills and Lauderdale the highway passes a number of
aged dog-trot houses perched on the hills in the woodland clearings.
LAUDERDALE, 204. 1 m. (350 alt., 270 pop.), is the home of one of
the oldest potteries in the State. Housed in a small, modern brick build
ing, the work is done on an old hand-wheel pottery making vases and
jugs from the white clays of the vicinity. The articles are in demand be
cause their white surfaces can be painted.
At MARION, 276.6 m. (358 alt, 54 pop.), the old seat of Lauder
dale Co., an election riot occurred in 1874. Like many of the riots of the
period, this one started with the killing of two white men by Negroes,
and ended with a posse of white men pursuing the Negroes into the
woods. A local anecdote has it that a totally blind Negro being led
around by his son heard the bullets from the shooting whiz by his ears
and immediately regained his sight.
Right from Marion on a local road to a CONFEDERATE CEMETERY OF UN
KNOWN SOLDIERS, 1 m. The soldiers buried here died in a field hospital after
they had been wounded in various battles, Shiloh, Corinth, luka, Jackson, Ray
mond, Vicksburg, and Bakers Creek.
At 218.6 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to the U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE S HORTI
CULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION, 1 m., with a hundred acres planted to
TOUR 4 371
pecan trees, small fruits, and vegetables. Near the station is a group of 25 sub
sistence homesteads.
At 227.7 ;//. US 45 enters on i4th St.; L. on 26th Ave.
MERIDIAN, 222.6 m. (341 alt., 31,954 pop.) (see MERIDIAN).
Points of Interest. Industrial plants, Arboretum, Gypsy Queen s Grave, and others.
Here are the junctions with US 80 (see Tour 2), US n (see Tour 8),
and State 39 (see Side Tour 4B).
The route continues on 26th Ave. ; R. on C St. ; L. on Grand Ave.
South of Meridian the highway winds along a high and rugged ridge
for four miles. At 232.6 ;;/. (R) is a small country grist mill, and at
23^.2 m. (R) is the NEW HOPE BAPTIST CHURCH. Because several
tornadoes have swept through this section, many of the houses on knolls
have storm pits dug in the red clay banks around them.
At 246.6 m. is the CLARKCO STATE PARK, a 75O-acre tract being
developed as a part of the State park system.
QUITMAN, 249.5 m. (231 alt., 1,872 pop.), seat of Clarke Co., had
until the 1930 $ one of the largest pine lumber mills in the South. But,
after the cutting of the green pine forest the mill was moved to the Pacific
Coast, and Quitman, like other somnolent Southern towns, was left de
pendent upon farm trade. Before the war Quitman had traded with Enter
prise and the Gulf Coast by means of the Chickasawhay River, until the
sinking of a river freighter stopped navigation. On Feb. 17, 1864, Gen
eral Sherman completely destroyed the ante-bellum town.
At 254.2 m. (L) are the ARCHUSA SPRINGS of fine red sulphur
water, on the banks of Archusa Creek. Archusa, locally accepted as mean
ing sweet water, is probably a corruption of two Indian words meaning
little river.
At 2^4.3 m. (L) is a CONFEDERATE CEMETERY. Disregarded for
70 years, the cemetery was discovered when a Negro farmer plowed up a
handful of buttons from a Confederate uniform. Now it has been cleared
and provided with headstones and an arch.
At 255. 2 m. US 45 crosses the Chickasawhay, a large tributary of the
Pascagoula River.
Between the Chickasawhay and Shubuta the highway passes a number
of log houses with mud and wattle chimneys. Nearly every house has its
rose bush and small one-mule-power cane mill.
At 262.J5 m. is SHUBUTA (201 alt., 720 pop.).
Left from Shubuta on a graveled road is LANGSDALE, 8m. (41 pop.) ; here is
the old C. L. LANG HOME, a three-story plantation type house erected in the
late iSjo s. It has a third floor ballroom.
Right 3 m. from Langsdale on a country road is MATHERVILLE (100 pop.);
here is the HORNE HOME, the ante-bellum place of Col. ). H. Home, who
owned 800 slaves; he died in 1865.
Between Shubuta and Waynesboro the pines increase in number.
At 267 m. the highway recrosses the Chickasawhay River.
WAYNESBORO, 277 J m. (191 alt., 1,120 pop.), near the dividing
line between the hills and the Piney Woods, is a clay-stained town de-
372 TOURS
pending on the trade of the sheep-men, farmers, turpentine distillers, and
sawmill hands in the country around it.
Here are the junctions with US 84 (see Tour 11) and State 63 (see Tour
WINCHESTER, 282 J m. (165 alt., 359 pop.), a village centered
around its country store, stands near the site of old Winchester, at one
time a political center rivaling Natchez. Old Winchester was near the
Chickasawhay River S. of the present town. In 1813, when the Creek
Indians rose against the white men, the settlers at old Winchester hur
riedly built what came to be known as Patton s Fort. The ditches of the
old stockade can still be traced. The town, incorporated in 1818, was the
seat of Wayne Co. until the War between the States, and at one time
contained about 30 business houses. Many prominent men were asso
ciated with it; Powhatan Ellis, a Virginian who said he was a relative of
Pocahontas, was the first Judge of the Supreme Court District embracing
the southeastern part of the State. He was described as "a man of very
stately and courtly demeanor, of amiable temper and extremely indolent
habits." Despite his reputation for laziness, he also served as U. S. Sena
tor and as Minister to Mexico. The connection between the Chickasawhay
settlements and the Gulf Coast through the Pascagoula River system is
well illustrated in the life of John J. McRae, another Winchester citizen.
McRae s father, a cotton buyer, was the first to use the Pascagoula River as
a means of transportation for cotton destined for ocean shipment at New
Orleans. In 1825 he moved to Pascagoula at the mouth of the river be
cause the sea breezes were considered remediable for diseased lungs. A
son, John J., was educated first at Pascagoula, then read law with Judge
Pray at Pearlington. While still young, he, with a brother of President
Tyler, was engaged to help move the Mississippi Indians to the West,
and was the leader in agitation for the construction of the Mobile & Ohio
R.R. He later edited a newspaper at old Paulding (see Tour 8) and in
1850 was one of the fascinating orators with Quitman and Davis in the
States Rights Party, which was even then advocating secession. He was
Governor of Mississippi, U. S. Representative until the State seceded, and
then a member of the Confederate Congress.
BUCATUNNA (In^collected together), 293 m. (150 alt., 385 pop.),
is in the center of one of the earliest settled parts of the Piney Woods. Many
of the pioneers came in on the strength of land grants from the State of
Georgia. In 1811 the "Governor of Georgia and Commander-in-Chief of the
Army and Navy of that state and the militia thereof," gave William Powe
a pass to the effect that he "with his wife, eleven children, and forty-six
Negroes from Chesterfield district, South Carolina, have my permission to
travel through the Creek Nation, they taking special care to conduct them
selves peaceably toward the Indians and agreeably to the laws of the
United States." Powe, one of the first settlers in the district, rolled his
goods, packed in oaken hogsheads, along the ridges from the Chatta-
hoochie River through the Creek Indian country to Bucatunna and settled
on the creek about a mile N. of the present town. Other early settlers were
the McRaes, McArthurs, Mclaughlins, McDaniels, McDonalds, and Me-
TOUR 4A 373
Laurins, the Scotch-Irish edge of the pioneer axe that was cutting a new
center of civilization in the wilderness. At Bucatunna Gaelic was spoken
as late as the iS2o s.
The RAILROAD BRIDGE over Bucatunna Creek, 294.1 m. (R), was
in the i88o s the site of the Rube Burrows holdup of a Mobile & Ohio
R.R. train. Just before crossing the creek the train had to make a stop to
take on water. One day Burrows and his men quietly boarded the train
and ordered the engineer to pull out on the trestle and stop. Since no
one could leave unless he dived into the creek, Burrows and his men took
their time looting. When they were through they had $12,000. The saga
of Rube Burrows is a part of the story of all early railroad outlaws, and
has probably been colored with repeated tellings. The legend appears in
Carl Carmer s Stars Fell on Alabama.
At 298.6 m. US 45 crosses the Alabama Line, 64.5 miles N. of Mobile.
Side Tour 4A
Shannon West Point Macon, 84.1 m. State 23, State 25.
Mobile & Ohio R.R. parallels route.
Graveled roadbed two lanes wide.
Accommodations in towns.
This route is a central artery through the gently rolling Black Prairie
Belt, a dairying, and alfalfa and cotton growing country of warm black
soil, good drainage, and long, mild seasons for cultivation. Except for the
first few miles, where hills thinly forested with oak, gum, and elm furnish
the landscape, the scene is typically prairie. From Okolona southward to
Macon practically every acre of land is being used either for farming or
dairying, and the careful economy of the country is everywhere evident.
Unbroken stretches of furrowed fields, substantial barns, windmills, silos,
and fat cattle cropping the grassy plains make a prairie picture that is
more typical of Kansas than of Mississippi.
State 23 branches S. from US 45 (see Tour 4) at SHANNON, m.
(see Tour 4), and moves through alternating farmlands and wooded hills.
The hills often show white patches of limestone that appear bare and
white in the midst of trees and cultivated land. As the hills lose them
selves in the flat Chiwapa Creek bottoms, the trees thin out and the in
creasingly rich soil and the flattening landscape set the stage for the prairie
country immediately S.
At 3.3 m. the highway crosses Tallabinnela Creek.
374 TOURS
OKOLONA, 8.3 m. (304 alt., 2,235 pop.), wavers between the prairie
and the hills, an old town inhabited almost entirely by natives. Originally
called Prairie Mount and standing six miles N. on a stagecoach route, the
town moved itself to the proposed line of the new Mobile & Ohio R.R. in
1848, adopting the new name Okolona at that time. In 1859 the railroad
was built through. During the War between the States the town was
raided several times. In 1864 the hospital, depot, and 100,000 bushels of
corn were burned; in 1865 another detachment of Union troops visited
the town and this time burned it completely. In the CONFEDERATE
CEMETERY on the outskirts of town are buried 1,000 soldiers killed in
the Federal raids. The older inhabitants have forgiven and forgotten the
fighting and burning, but they still say that it was the Commissary Depart
ment of the Federals that first brought the bitterweed into the prairie. If
eaten by cows, the weed gives a bitter taste to their milk, and because the
prairie is a dairying section this often bitter-tasting milk is a constant re
minder that Federal troops once fought their way across the flat landscape.
A CHEESE FACTORY AND CREAMERY to take care of milk prod
ucts of the vicinity is the newest industrial plant. On the western edge of
the city limits is an 8o-acre MUNICIPAL PARK. Here are a swimming
pool, skeet grounds, lighted tennis courts, a well-stocked lake, and a chil
dren s wading pool. In the center of the park is a large convention hall,
more often used for dancing than for conventions.
EGYPT, 17 m. (300 alt., 150 pop.), was established just prior to the
War between the States when the Mobile & Ohio R.R. was built through
in 1858. It was named for the variety of corn grown here. During the war
corn was hauled here to await shipment to the Confederate army, but be
fore this could be accomplished Federal troops passed through and burned it.
The town has grown but little since that time.
At 18.9 m. the highway crosses the northern boundary of the NATCHEZ
TRACE FORESTRY AND FEDERAL GAME PRESERVE, which
embraces 30,000 acres of submarginal land lying in Chickasaw and Ponto-
toc Counties. Headquarters of this area are in Okolona.
As the highway moves southward it penetrates the prairie s heart. This
is wide and open country. The miles of earth rolling to meet far horizons
make the houses, barns, and even the towns look dwarfed and squat.
Dairy farms alternate with plowed acres of rich, black earth. Here the an
cestors of the older families built a culture that equaled that of the
Natchez district. But the younger families, those who have moved in after
the War between the States, have felt not so much the pull of the land as the
energy of a people who emerged apparently metamorphosed by the war.
A few have proved themselves such exponents of change that they are
willing to break with the land entirely and turn to industry, making the
modern prairie Mississippi s laboratory for the New South.
At 32.7 m. is the junction with State 25 ; State 23 and State 25 unite for
several miles.
WEST POINT, 41 m. (241 alt., 4,677 pop.), a roomy, prosperous
town fed by the farms and dairies of the surrounding flat lands, epitomizes
the prairie. Significantly, it developed on a section of land known as the
TOUR 4A 375
Granary of Dixie, which two Indian braves, Te-wa-ea and Ish-tim-ma-ha,
sold to James Robertson in 1844. Though a battleground during the War
between the States, the town, that once had moved itself from the extreme
corner of the county to be on the new railroad, was considered so attrac-
ti\e by a number of Federal officers that they came back after the war and
settled here permanently. In reconstruction days the town was the leader
in Clay County s Ku Klux Klan activities, but immediately after white
domination was restored, the people here opened one of the few private
schools for Negroes. The school, MARY HOLMES SEMINARY, a fully-
accredited junior college supported by the Presbyterian Church, is still a
flourishing institution. On a large, shaded campus, the brick, one-story
laundry, Music Hall, and Domestic Science Hall are grouped around the
I three-story red brick administration building which contains 112 rooms.
There are eight factories besides cottonseed oil mills, gins, and lumber
companies in West Point. The WEST POINT POULTRY AND PACK
ING PLANT is the largest in the mid-South.
Between West Point and Artesia the highway passes between fields
of waving alfalfa hay to descend into the marshy bottoms of Tibbee Creek.
Here Tibbee often spills over its ill-defined banks to cover miles of sur
rounding flat lands, affording excellent fishing and hunting.
At 43.5 m. is a large stone that marks the SITE OF AN OLD INDI.1\
CAMP GROUND. Across the highway at diagonal angles N. and S.
are two other markers on INDIAN BURIAL GROUNDS. The northern
marker is backed by a large tree-studded burial mound of the Chicka-
saw ; the southern sign marks the site of a Choctaw mound. Legend says
that the Chickasaw and Choctaw tribes once fought a great battle at this
spot and that after the battle each buried its dead in a separate mound.
In 1934 Moreau B. Chambers, Field Archaeologist for the Mississippi
Department of Archives and History, uncovered several burials in the
Chickasaw mound. The markers were placed by the Horseshoe Robertson
Chapter, D. A. R.
At 46.1 in. the highway crosses TIBBEE (Ind., water light) CREEK
on a steel and concrete bridge. Tibbee was named for the battle in \vhkh
the Choctaw and Chickasaw annihilated the main part of the Chakchiuma
tribe. The battle site is fixed by legend at Lyon s Bluff approximately five
miles upstream from this bridge.
Rising almost imperceptibly from the creek bottom, the highway passes
iinto country of peaceful pasture lands, where cattle and sheep graze in
waist-high clover and alfalfa.
At 46 m. State 23 branches from State 25; L. here on the latter.
MAYHEW, 52.8 m. (207 alt., 172 pop.), is a small agricultural village
that took its name from the mission established by the Rev. Cyrus K
bury of Massachusetts, who came here in 1818 to Christianize the Indians.
!The village is today the home of a very large APIARY containing 5,000
colonies of bees from which shipments are made to many places in
America and Europe.
ARTESIA, 55 m. (223 alt., 612 pop.), is the junction point of the
main line of the Mobile & Ohio R.R. and its Columbus and Starkvillc
TAKING THE QUEEN BEE
branches. It takes its name from an artesian well N. of the depot. Unus
ually large quantities of hay are shipped from this point.
Between here and Macon the dominant features of the landscape are the
HEDGES OF OS AGE ORANGE TREES planted in fence-like rows along
the prairie s edge. The highway runs like a narrow lane between their
thorny, tangled branches. In winter these prickly trees are etched grayly
against the sky, but in summer they burst into smooth green leaves and
pale yellowish blossoms, which are replaced by orange-like inedible fruit.
Many of these hedges were planted more than a century ago and con
stitute the pioneer planters mark upon the land. They confined stock and
kept prying Indians out of cornfields, and they conveyed to neighbors the
idea that the land encircled by the thorny fences was private property.
Sometimes called boh d arc (Fr., wood of the ark), these trees, ac
cording to legend, furnished the sturdy wood out of which Noah built
the ark. When lumber is cut from the trees, the tough wood often breaks
the teeth of the saw.
At 74-9 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road 0.5 m. is BROOKSVILLE (269 alt., 875 pop.), a quiet old
prairie town of old-fashioned homes softened by an even spread of shade.
Southward from here the houses, cattle, barns, fields, and pastures are
TOUR 46 377
typical of the prairie country. In winter the landscape reveals the bare
black soil ; in summer and spring the land shows a soft, pastoral char
acter, with orchards of peach and apple trees in bloom, fields of alfalfa,
and grassy meadows that stretch across low-rolling hills to meet the sky.
At 84.1 m. is MACON (114 alt., 2,198 pop.) (see Tour 4), and the
junction with US 45 (see Tour 4).
Side Tour
Shuqualak Meridian, 54.2 m. State 39.
Graveled highway two lanes wide.
Accommodations chiefly in cities.
State 39 between Shuqualak and Meridian is a less traveled but more
scenic route than US 45. Climbing abruptly out of the flat, fertile Black
Prairie, State 39 rides the backbone of a series of ridges that extend
southward. The fresh greenness of the pines, which have found foothold
in every ravine and on every hillside, and the intense redness of the
sandy clay soil make for a landscape of extravagant color. This is a
country of small patches of cotton and corn, of peach and pear orchards,
and here and there a noisy sawmill.
At SHUQUALAK, m. (214 alt., 810 pop.) (see Tour 4), is the
junction with US 45 (see Tour 4).
Southward from Shuqualak, State 39 for a few miles passes through
the Prairie Belt with its characteristic black loam extending into country
that is still apparently prosperous. In the rolling meadows are painted
farmhouses with solid barns and herds of cattle, and near the barns the
air has a pleasant smell of cattle and fodder. But at ^ J m. is a low flat
of cut-over land, part of the cutting of a large lumber company, that
marks the northern end of the highway s climb into the red clay hills.
Passing through a primitive, heavily forested country it follows the humps
of ridges for an excellent view of the countryside. The State has few
sections where the pines have been so little touched or where the land
scape retains such pristine freshness. There are no villages of any size,
only an occasional sawmill settlement. Ancient split rail fences enclose
the poor- looking farm patches, and the farmhouses built of dressed logs
and flanked at each end with mud chimneys are good examples of early
dog-trot structures.
North of De Kalb the soil takes a redness so lurid that it might have
given rise to the county s sobriquet, Bloody Kemper.
378 TOURS
DE KALB, 20 m. (888 pop.), seat of Kemper Co., is responsible for
the nickname. After the War between the States this formerly quiescent
Southern town became the scene of one of the bloodiest of the Recon
struction massacres. Over a period of years from 1868 to 1876 certain
elements of the county, under the carpetbag judge, William Chisholm,
and the Ku Klux Klan of Kemper, waged a bitter contest for supremacy.
Shooting was done from ambush, resulting in the deaths of members
of both factions and making travel through the country unsafe.
In 1876 John Gully, a member of the Klan, was shot and killed as he
rode horseback across the county one night. Judge Chisholm was accused
of the murder and was held in the De Kalb jail, his wife, daughter,
and two sons insisting on being locked in with him. In late December
1876 at thisjail the Chisholm Massacre took place; a mob, with the cry,
"Fire the jail," entered to take Chisholm. The judge seized a gun and pre
pared to escape with his daughter and son Johnnie. The three were shot
and killed as they appeared before the crowd at the top of the steps.
De Kalb, named for the German baron who came to America in
1776 to assist in the fight for independence, is on the site of the old
Choctaw village Holihtasha (Ind., the fort is there), and is often called
by that name by Indians of the vicinity.
Two blocks off State 39 (L) is the WILLIAM CHISHOLM HOME
(private), a simple white frame cottage that is a constant reminder of the
turbulent past of the county.
South of De Kalb the country drops off sheerly on each side of the
highway, the pines thin out, and yawning gullies appear.
KIPLING, 27 m. (30 pop.), was named for the English writer by
an early settler of the 1890 $ when a feverish admiration for Kipling s
books was sweeping the country.
DALEVILLE, 34 m. (118 pop.), is a small agricultural village that
swallowed up the population of old Daleville.
At 35.2 m. is a BRANCH STATION OF THE U. S. SOIL CON
SERVATION PROJECT, engaged in restoring eroded land, a work which
is largely due to the efforts of Congressman Ross Collins.
LIZELIA, 37 m. (20 pop.), was formerly known as Daleville and,
except for one or two solidly built white frame houses, every remnant
of the old settlement founded by Mississippi s picturesque general, Sam
Dale, has vanished. Dale, the tales of whose daring have become legendary,
is described as having been of giant-like stature, standing six feet three
inches, and as having a hawk-shaped face and piercing black eyes. Born
in Rockridge, Va., in 1772, he migrated with his family to Georgia when
a lad of twelve. Here he associated with the Indians and learned Indian
lore and warfare.
In 1799 Dale began trading with the Creek and Choctaw tribes and
soon established a wagon line, which he used for transporting families
of emigrants from Virginia and the Carolinas through Georgia into
Alabama and Mississippi. During the War of 1812 the "Canoe Fight"
occurred. Dale, traveling by canoe on the Alabama River, met a party of
Creek Indians paddling downstream. In the ensuing fight on the river,
TOUR 5 379
Dale killed n of the Indians. Two years later the most notable achieve
ment of his career was accomplished. Carrying dispatches to Gen. Andrew
Jackson from the Creek Agency in Georgia to Madisonville, La., he rode
the distance on horseback in seven and a half days. Upon his arrival Jack
son sent him back with replies to the Agency, though neither Dale nor
his horse Paddy had an hour s rest. In 1831 Dale was commissioned by
the Secretary of War to remove the Choctaw Indians to Indian terri
tory in the West. In later life Dale purchased from the Choctaw Chief,
locha-hope, two sections of land on the present site of Lizelia, and
there made his home. Before his death in 1841 he represented Lauderdale
Co. in the State House of Representatives for several terms.
Right from Lizelia on a graveled road to the GRAVE OF SAM DALE, 2 m., in
the old Cochrane Cemetery. For many years the grave of "Big Sam" was neglected,
but recently the Government has marked it with a plain marble slab. It is said
that the Choctaw chief, Greenwood Leflore, stood over this grave during his com
rade s burial, and, when the last spade of earth had been turned, said: "Big
Chief, you sleep here, but your spirit is a brave and a chieftain in the hunting
grounds of the sky."
Between this point and Meridian the slopes of the hills are dotted
with peach and pecan orchards, a few dairy farms, red barns, and white
washed trees giving color to the landscape.
At 49.7 m. are the stone entrance gates of the MERIDIAN COUNTRY
CLUB.
At 51 m. State 59 follows Poplar Springs Drive which becomes 24th
Avc., to the Civic Center.
MERIDIAN, 54.2 m. (341 alt., 31,954 pop.) (see MERIDIAN).
Points of Interest. Industrial plants, Gypsy Queen s Grave, Arboretum, and others.
Here are the junctions with US 45 (see Tour 4), US n (see Tour 8),
and US 80 (see Tour 2).
&&gt;>>>>>>>>>
Tour 5
phis, Tenn.) Grenada Jackson Brookhaven McComb (New Orleans,
La.). US 51.
Tennessee Line to Louisiana Line, 307.2 m.
Illinois Central R.R. parallels route throughout.
Route paved throughout, two hints wide.
nodations in cities.
380 TOURS
Sec. a TENNESSEE LINE to JACKSON, 208.3 m.
Cutting down the middle of the State between the Tennessee Line
and Jackson, US 51 traverses a country with a fairly old, prosperous,
and advanced culture. That in the bluff hills between Memphis and
Jackson was not dissimilar to that of Natchez, and, though not scenically
or historically as rich as US 61, the route is filled with points of more
than local interest.
Crossing the Mississippi Line, m., 16 m. S. of Memphis US 51
follows the approximate route of the old, planked, stagecoach road.
BULLFROG CORNER, 2.4 m., is a crossroads store so named because
it was built at a hole in the road where strangers said only a bullfrog
could live.
Left from Bullfrog Corner on a graveled road to the main office of GAYOSO
FARMS, 1 m., a. stock ranch having one of the largest herds of Guernsey cattle
and droves of Hampshire hogs in the South.
At 8.2 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road at 0.2 m. (R) to the WINNINGHAM PLACE (private), a
square, three-story, frame house that was formerly an inn on the stagecoach road
to Memphis. Here Jefferson Davis, Generals Grant and Forrest, and other
notables stopped in their travels on the old plank road. Built in 1837, it is in
an excellent state of preservation.
HERNANDO, 12.3 m. (390 alt, 938 pop.), was named for the Span
ish explorer, Hernando De Soto. The mark of a former importance is
left in the formidable towers of the DE SOTO CO. COURTHOUSE,
which is perhaps the most interesting public building in northern Missis
sippi. In its records are numerous transfers of land from the Indian chief
Musacunna to the earliest white settlers. Hernando was incorporated in
1837 and its academy, opened the same year, was the first established in
the Chickasaw land cession. At the home of Confederate Col. T. W.
White, both Confederate and Federal prisoners were exchanged during
the war. This house, completed in 1860, is now known as the MILDRED
FARRINGTON HOME. Hernando s best-known citizen, Felix La Bauve,
was born in France in 1809 and came to northern Mississippi in 1835.
He served as a colonel in the war, grew wealthy as a cotton planter, and
is remembered in the La Bauve Fellowship at the University of Missis
sippi. He is buried in the Hernando Cemetery.
SENATOBIA, 26.8 m. (284 alt., 1,264 pop.), is a refreshingly clean
town built near Senatahoba (Ind., white sycamore) Creek. The low
hill S. of Hickahala Creek and N. of the town was evidently an Indian
camp on the trail W. from Pontotoc toward the Mississippi River, and
it is thought that De Soto traveled it on his westward march in 1541.
Indian mounds can be traced under the cotton loading platform of the
Illinois Central R. R. depot. The Illinois Central (then the Tennessee &
Mississippi) was built in 1856 and gave the impetus for founding the
town. Charles Meriwether, an influential planter and slave owner, named
the new station Senatobia, a slight deviation from the Indian name for
the creek. The town grew swiftly, but was burned by Federal troops
after a skirmish near what is now the campus of the NORTHWEST
TOUR 5 381
JUKIOR COLLEGE. The brick-constructed two-story RANDOLPH
ROM" ELL HOME, of the Southern Colonial type, one of the few ante
bellum homes escaping the ravages of war, was the nucleus around which
the junior college was built in 1926. Senatobia was first incorporated
in 1860 in De Soto County, then became the seat of Tate Co. in 1873.
The courthouse, built in 1875 f locally manufactured brick, is still in use.
Left from Senatobia on a graveled road to (1937) a UNIT OF THE U. S.
SOIL CONSERVATION SERVICE, 0.8 m.
At 29-8 m. (R) the terracing on the hillside is evidence of an early
attempt at erosion control in these easily washed bluff hills.
At 30.7 m. is the junction with a private lane.
Left on this lane to AicGEHEE S GATE, 1.7 m. (private), the ante-bellum
home described by Stark Young, Mississippi author, in his Heaven Trees and
River House. It is a white, two-story Greek Revival style house, with a square-
columned portico. The delicate hand-wrought iron balcony over the front en
trance, and the walks bordered by aged boxwood under the shade of great
magnolias give it a typically Southern appearance. It faces away from the high
way and toward the sloping valley of Senatahoba Creek, and from the highway
approach it seems to be a farmhouse. The fanlights in the doorway are opalescent
with age and, though the house still shows dully white through the burnished
green of the magnolias, it has never been repainted. Col. Abner McGehee, the
builder, was one of the largest land and slave owners in northern Mississippi.
Treasures of a cultured family are housed in rooms whose size is reminiscent of
another age. A rosewood piano inlaid with mother-of-pearl, a gift of Colonel
McGehee to his bride in 1857, is the central piece of a collection of heirlooms
which includes Sevres vases, tester beds with posts carved in spiral whorls, and
a rosewood dressing table with legs bent in the shape of a lyre. An unusual
piece is a bathing machine, a shower and tub arrangement through which a slave
poured water. The present owner of the house is Miss Caroline McGehee, a
cousin of Stark Young.
COMO, 344 m. (367 alt., 851 pop.), established in 1856 when the
railroad came through and named for Lake Como in Italy, was like
other Mississippi plantation towns, wealthy just prior to the War be
tween the States. The land upon which Como was built was formerly a
part of the plantation of Dr. George Tait, one of the characters in
. ;/ Trees.
Right from Como on a graveled road at 1.1 m. (R) to WALLACE PARK
(private), a square two-story house half hidden in a wandering grove of crape-
myrtle, magnolia, and native cedar trees. This home was built in 1856 for Col.
Thomas Wallace by the old stagecoach road. Wortz and Mayer, respectively
from Indiana and Maine, were the architects, adding incongruous columns onto
the New England type house; the plain substantial mass is entirely separate from
its portico. The inside dimensions are more Southern, each room being a generous
2o-foot square. In one of the big upstairs rooms, Gen. N. B. Forrest stayed two
weeks during that trying period just before Grant took Memphis.
Between Como and Sardis the highway traverses a rolling, prairie-like
section that is excellent dairy country.
SARDIS, 39.6 m. (384 alt., 1,298 pop.), established on the Illinois
Central R.R. in 1856, took over the population of old Belmont, a river
landing on the Tall.ihatchie River some five miles SE. The W. D.
HEFLIN HOME (private) is Sardis ante-bellum showplace. Sardis is
382 TOURS
now (1938) headquarters for the SARDIS DAM AND RESERVOIR,
a Government project designed to control flood waters in the Tallahatchie
River basin. The earth dam, to be erected five and a half miles SE. of
Sardis, will be unusually large. The reservoir will cover approximately
100,000 acres and will give protection from overflows to nearly 800,000
acres in the Tallahatchie basin and in the Delta. The dam itself in places
will be a quarter of a mile thick at the base. The road to be constructed
from Sardis to the dam site will pass through old Belmont and near
the old DR. GEORGE W. LAIRD HOME, built about 1846 and re
putedly a rendezvous for Ku Klux Klan leaders during the Reconstruc
tion Period. The first postmaster of Sardis gave the town the name of
one of the churches mentioned in the Bible.
At 46 m. US 51 crosses the Tallahatchie (Ind., rock river) River.
At 49-3 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road is BATESVILLE, 1.4 m. (346 alt., 1,062 pop.) sitting on
the arm of the Delta made by the Tallahatchie River. A typical country trade
center, Batesville took over Panola s population when the railroad was put
through in 1856. Here is the junction with State 6 (see lour 14).
Right from Batesville on a graveled road 1 m. to the SITE OF OLD PANOLA,
marked by the old brick courthouse that has been remodeled into a residence.
Panola was the rival town of Belmont, both of them important landings on the
Tallahatchie River. Panola was incorporated in 1839, became a flourishing cot
ton shipping port in the 1840*5, and struck a body blow at its rival, Belmont,
by winning a long struggle for the county seat in 1846 through bribery, Bel
mont charged. When the Mississippi & Tennessee R.R. (Illinois Central)
skirted Panola, many of the frame houses were put on rollers and moved to the
new town of Batesville. The courthouse, its flaming red brick walls immovable,
was left at the wharf. The rivalry that formerly existed between Panola and
Belmont, however, is carried over into the friendly competition between Bates
ville and Sardis, both of them being seats of Panola Co., though but eight miles
apart.
At J>3.8 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road is COURTLAND, 0.6 m. (263 alt., 230 pop.), incorporated
in 1871, which took its name by popular vote from the fact that an unusually
large number of the settlers were married the year it was founded. The first
settler was Dr. George Randolph whose ante-bellum home is standing.
Right from Courtland on a graveled road 7 m. to TOCOWA SPRINGS in woods
of sugar maple, beech, and gum trees, where the hills meet the Delta. Above
the springs, the bluffs rise from 80 to 100 feet. The springs are on the old
Chickasaw-Choctaw boundary line and, having always been considered neutral
grounds, were the meeting place for all Indians. The name is a combination of
two Indian words, the Chickasaw ptoco, meaning healing, and the Choctaw
wawa, meaning water. It was here at the healing waters that the Indians as
sembled after the cession of their lands in 1832, preparing for their trek west
ward beyond the Mississippi River. In the 1890*5 Tocowa Springs was a famous
health resort; the old hotel still stands. The lines of trees planted as markers on
the Chickasaw-Choctaw boundary line have grown to giant size.
At 63. 1 m. US 51 crosses the Yocona River to cut through hills beau
tifully laid out with farm patches, pastures, and wood lots separating
substantially built, prosperous farmhouses.
At 83.2 m. the highway leaves the hills to cut across black flat land
that is a finger of the Delta extended eastward by the Yalobusha River.
TOUR 5 383
At 89.9 m. it rides a levee through swampland that is typical of what
the Delta was before artificial drainage systems developed it into the
South s best cotton fields.
At 92.7 m. US 51 crosses the Yalobusha (Ind., tadpole place) River.
GRENADA, 92 .5 m. (193 alt., 4,349 pop.), is on the eastern edge
of the Mississippi Delta and, though somewhat mellowed by great age,
has the cotton-consciousness, the wealth, and the character of a Delta city.
Cotton marketing and processing and lumbering are the leading industries.
The city embraces the two old towns of Pittsburg and Tulahoma, estab
lished on adjoining land grants by two rival speculating companies headed
by Franklin Plummer and Hiram Runnels, Mississippi political game
cocks in the 1830 $ (see Tour 13). Plummer s town, Pittsburg, was the
western grant and was separated from Runnels Tulahoma only by a
line. The personal and political antagonism between Congressman Plum
mer and Governor Runnels kept the towns at white heat, and in the
campaign of 1835 the excitement was so intense that bloodshed was
narrowly averted. Tulahoma was the slightly larger town, having seven
or eight grogshops (then called groceries) in addition to its seven or
eight houses. Pittsburg had the part-time post office and, until the editor
settled some of his personal debts by moving across the line and switch
ing his politics, the only newspaper, The Bowie Knife.
By 1836 the towns had grown weary of quarreling, and in sudden
penitence agreed to make up. It was decided to unite a couple in mar
riage as a symbol of the new friendship. Pittsburg furnished the groom;
Tulahoma the bride; and a Methodist preacher joined the two in matri
mony in July 1836. Both of the old names were dropped and a new
one, Grenada, adopted. Line Street marks the division between old
Pittsburg and Tulahoma. However, the troubles between the two were
not definitely ended with the ceremony, Pittsburgers and Tulahomans
finding it difficult to keep from backsliding until the common adversity
of fire and the war created a civic unity. In the fall of 1862 Confederate
General Pemberton made Grenada his headquarters while opposing Gen
eral Grant in the second campaign against Vicksburg. Much more
disastrous than the war, however, was the yellow fever epidemic of
1878, when out of a population of 2,500 there were 1,040 reported cases
and 326 dead. In 1913 the city was a pioneer in the State in paving,
covering its square with wooden blocks that are still in service. In 1917
it furnished Mississippi s first military company for the World War.
At Grenada is radio station WGRM, a loo-watt station operating
on a frequency of 1210 kilocycles.
GRENADA COLLEGE, a Methodist junior college for girls, sits in
a grove of oak trees and is centered about a red brick two-story building
whose age shows in the mellow coloring of the brick. Behind and to the
side are smaller brick buildings of more modern construction. The school
was opened in 1851 as the Yalobusha Baptist Female Institute; the
Methodist Church obtained control in 1882. The 1937 enrollment was
150. The IDA CAMPBELL HOME (open by appointment), on Cuff s
Hill, said to be the oldest residence in the town, was at one time the
384 TOURS
home of the Presbyterian Mission for the Indians. Hunly, the builder,
was a clerk in the United States land office. Almost as old as the Camp
bell place is the ESTELL ROLLIN HOME (open by appointment),
422 Doak St. Built in the 1 8 30*5 of hand-hewn logs, the house is now
covered with weatherboarding. The JOHN NASON HOME (open by
appointment), 410 College St., is said to have been used as a girls
school in the old town of Pittsburg. The BRUCE NEWSOME HOME
(open by appointment), 217 Margin St., is a two-story Southern Colonial
type house with a great white-columned portico. Designed by John
Moore, it is said to be the first house in Grenada planned by an archi
tect. Here Confederate Gen. Sterling Price had his headquarters when
Pres. Jefferson Davis reviewed the brigade under his command. It is
said that the great pillars of the house were brought from England to
New Orleans and thence up the Mississippi, Yazoo, and Yalobusha Rivers
to Grenada. The GOLLIDAY LAKE HOME, 605 Margin St., was
Davis headquarters. The IKE COHEN HOME, 204 Cherry St., was
constructed of material taken from a steamboat stranded by low water
on the Yalobusha River in 1842. The WALT HALL HOME, on College
Blvd., opposite Grenada College, is post-bellum but modeled after the
Walthall home in Holly Springs. It was here that Edward Cary Walthall
(1831-98), the embodiment of the ideal of Mississippi chivalry, lived
when he moved to Grenada in 1871. Walthall, with Forrest and Gordon,
was one of Mississippi s greatest volunteer leaders in the War between
the States. He entered as lieutenant in the i5th Mississippi Regiment;
was elected lieutenant-colonel of that regiment; in the spring of 1862 he
was elected colonel of the 29th Mississippi; in December was promoted
to brigadier-general, and in June 1864, was made major general. He
was once appointed and three times elected to the United States Senate.
He died in Washington, D. C, April 21, 1898, and is buried in Holly
Springs Cemetery, at Holly Springs, Mississippi.
At 96 m. (L) is TIE PLANT (60 pop.), a mill community cen
tered around the million-dollar creosoting plant in operation for 30 years.
GLENW1LD, 97.5 m. (L), is the plantation of John Borden, wealthy
Chicago sportsman. The original dwelling, on the brow of a hill over
looking an immense acreage, was a log house raised in 1839 by Col.
A. M. Payne, an influential pioneer. Unusual for a log house, it had a
cellar; 20 years later when Colonel Payne enlarged and weatherboarded
it to nearly its present size, the house adapted itself easily to its greater
prosperity. Six of the huge square two-story columns were raised in front
to carry the roof out over a part of the wide lawn, to make a setting
somewhat similar to Mount Vernon. With the additions made, the Paynes
used the plantation as their summer refuge from yellow fever in New
Orleans.
Just prior to the war, Colonel Payne succeeded in bringing the railroad
through Grenada past his home and was rewarded by having the first
locomotive dubbed the "A. M. Payne." But like many planters ruined
by the war, he was forced to sell Glenwild in 1866. The contract for
TOUR 5 385
sale gives an idea of what the large Southern plantation included. The
purchase price was $40,000 plus $25,000 for the stock and equipment.
The plantation embraced 4,500 acres, 2,300 of which were in cultiva
tion. With the real estate went 500 hogs, 200 head of cattle, 300 sheep,
9,000 bushels of corn, 30,000 pounds of meat, 15,000 pounds of cotton
seed, and 4,000 bushels of Irish and sweet potatoes, all produced on
the place in that year. In addition to the great house the deed of sale
also listed: "Meat House, Smoke House, Blacksmith Shop and Tools,
Carpenter s Shop and Tools, Good Grist Mill, Hospital, Overseer s House,
25 Negro Houses, Three Corn Houses, Ice House, Stable for Sixty
Mules, New and Complete Cattle Stable, Carriage House, Horse Stable,
Two Cotton Gins and Gin House, Four Hen Houses, Large Fruit Orchard
Bearing Apples, Pears, Peaches, and Figs without limit." Colonel Payne
urged the buyer to "take the place altogether, it is in better condition
better stocked than any plantation in the Confederacy." It was bought
in 1920 by John Borden and greatly improved. Capacious almost ex
travagant barns and silos have been set up, and the great house made
even greater. Its log facade now has ten widely-spaced columns which
continue from the east front around to the original section of the south
wing. To the N. another wing completes the plan of a rectangle to
afford a delightful inner court. The present ensemble is in keeping with
the original section.
ELLIOTT, 100.4 m. (235 alt., 128 pop.), established in 1818 as the
result of a petition made by David Folsom, Choctaw Chieftain, was the
first mission among the Choctaw Indians. The school was named for
John Eliot of Massachusetts, the "Apostle to the Indians." John Smith
of the same State was one of Eliot s disciples and the first teacher at the
schools. In its time the mission was one of the most important in the
Southwest.
DUCK HILL, 105.1 m. (251 alt, 553 pop.), is named for the large
green hill rising from a plain immediately E. of the town. This hill was
where "Duck," a Choctaw Chief, held his war councils; and it was
near this hill that Rube Burrows, notorious bandit (see Tour 4) killed
the engineer and robbed the express car on the fast Illinois Central
Express. In 1937 a double lynching occurred nearby that was given signif
icant publicity owing to the fact that the Gavagan Anti-Lynching Bill was
under consideration in the National Congress.
WINONA, 116.8 m. (386 alt., 2,607 pop-) (see Tour 6), is at
the junction with US 82 (see Tour 6).
VAIDEN, 128.1 m. (325 alt., 648 pop.), is one link in a chain
of small, comfortably prosperous towns, held together by a common
dependence on the cotton crops of outlying farms. It is a static village
whose population and character have changed but little in the 100 years
of its existence. A street of one-story frame stores spreads along the rail
road track (R) and homes of old-fashioned rambling architecture in
the clumps of trees beyond are outward signs of the easeful life that
the fertile surrounding cotton fields sustain. Ginning season sets a more
386 TOURS
lively tempo for the town, but after the last bale is marketed Vaiden
settles down again into a placid, relaxed existence. Here is the junction
with State 35 (see Tour 16).
Right from Vaiden on a graveled road to the SITE OF OLD SHONGALO,
1 m., the town taken over by Vaiden when the railroad was put through.
Shongalo was settled by cultured people who established the old Shongalo
Academy.
WEST, 737.9 m. (290 alt., 370 pop.), was one of the towns raided
by Grierson in 1863. The depot was burned, but Confederate soldiers
drove off the raiders before any dwellings could be looted.
DURANT, 148.4 m. (265 alt., 2,510 pop.), is a prosperous farm
ing town in the rich second bottoms of the Big Black River. Founded
in 1858 after the Illinois Central R.R. came through, it was named
for Louis Durant, a Choctaw Chief who got his own name from the
early French explorers along the Mississippi watercourses. In 1937 the
town issued bonds for $25,000 for the erection of a FACTORY, the
mill being leased by the Real Silk Co. The Durant mill was the first in
the State to be established under the Industrial Act of 1936 (see AN
OUTLINE OF FOUR CENTURIES).
Right from Durant on the lower Lexington Road 3.1 m. to CASTALIAN
SPRINGS (R), a watering place known for its natural beauty. The cures here
are due as much to the rest as to the waters; there is a rambling hotel. The
springs were used first by the Indians, and at one time a school for girls was
here, the school being converted during the War between the States into a
hospital. A number of Confederate dead are buried in a plot some distance from
the springs.
At 151.1 m. is the junction with a graveled ridge road.
Right on this road to the HOLMES COUNTY STATE PARK, 3 m. (L), a
tract of 419 acres of shortleaf pine now in process of development. This park
will have a lake with facilities for swimming, boating, and fishing; a lodge,
overnight cabins, bridle paths; picnic and camping grounds.
GOODMAN, 155.6 m. (608 pop.), has the general aspect of central
Mississippi towns; one long street is lined with single-story brick stores,
and another street has attractive modern homes. Goodman s life is con
nected with the HOLMES COUNTY JUNIOR COLLEGE, established
in 1925 as an addition to the Agricultural High School. The college,
having seven modern brick buildings, operates an adjacent 4o-acre farm
with student labor. On the hill between the college and the highway is
a single GRAVE, protected by a strong iron railing and marked by a
monument with the inscription, "Here lies buried an old bachelor."
The grave s occupant was a pioneer who was shot by robbers; at his
dying request the monument with its singular inscription was erected
to his memory.
At 160.8 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road 5.9 m. to the LITTLE RED SCHOOL (L), marking the
town of old Richland. The school is a two-story brick building, with its struc
tural material so deteriorated that it has become necessary to brace the building
with iron rods extending its width and fastened to the outside walls with huge
iron washers. In this small building, now used as a schoolhouse, the idea
THE COUNTY AC EXT VISITS
of the Order of the Eastern Star was conceived, and in it the greater part
of the Eastern Star Ritual was written. Here in the 1840*5 the Masons of
Lexington and Richland established a school of higher learning to keep their
sons nearer home. The first teacher they obtained was Robert ^Ior^is, who con
ducted his classes in this building in 1849 and 1850. Morris was a beloved and
388 TOURS
honored Master Mason of Oxford, Miss. While teaching at Richland he worked
out the plan of an organization for female relatives of Masons that became the
Order of Eastern Star.
PICKENS, 162.4 m. (234 alt., 635 pop.), in the days of keelboats
and barges was a river landing on the Big Black River. The present
name was not adopted, however, until the railroad was built through in
1858. The JOSIE BURTON HOME (private) is the handsomest of
the remaining ante-bellum homes.
At 762.9 m. is the main bridge across the Big Black River.
At 173.5 in. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to the retreat of ALLISON S WELLS, 1.2 m. (R), a low
rambling frame building of many gables and continuous well-screened porches,
a popular watering place. A State-wide bridge tournament is held here annually
in June. The mineral waters at the wells are supplemented with hot sulphur
baths and were celebrated before the War between the States for their supposed
efficacy in preventing yellow fever.
CANTON, 183.3 m. (224 alt., 4,725 pop.), the seat of Madison Co.,
was incorporated in 1836. Built on the low divide halfway between
Big Black River and Pearl River, it achieved a character that was neither
the Old South of the Big Black Valley nor the Piney Woods of the
Pearl River Valley, and is dotted with homes distinguished by their
variety of plan and appearance. The COURTHOUSE, raised in 1852,
and the SQUARE come closest to fitting the groove of other Mississippi
county seats. Its Georgian design is well suited to the ideals of those
early settlers from Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia who obtained
Canton s charter of incorporation. The old JAIL stands on a back alley
off Center St. near the square.
Travel on the Natchez Trace and cotton culture gave Canton the
wealth that was to express itself in the homes. The finest of those
left standing is the W. J. MOSBY HOME (private), Center St., two
blocks E. of the courthouse. Surrounded by formally landscaped grounds
this imposing, square, red brick structure is designed with a massive
two-story Corinthian portico and with two wings in the rear which
enclose a courtyard. The roof is topped with a cubical observatory. In
addition to the slave quarters in the basement, there are 15 large rooms,
most of which have a natural grace that has not changed since the house
was built in 1856 by Col. William Lyons.
Colonel Lyons, a pleasant but imperious landholder, left the task of
building with an architect who, prior to one of the colonel s European
excursions, implored his attention about a certain matter but was frus
trated by the colonel s pleasantries. When the colonel returned, the
greater part of the house was finished, but as he climbed the curved
staircase he was amazed to find he could go no farther than the second
floor the architect had tried to tell him there was no stairway to the
observatory. Subsequently the shaft was raised directly in the upper
hall and a lovely winding stair extended to the roof. The upper floor
of the home was used by General Sherman, the lower by his mules,
during a temporary Federal occupation of Canton. When Colonel Lyons
fell on evil days after the war, he went to his good friend, Mosby, the
TOUR 5 389
father of the present owner, expressing the wish to sell to him rather
than to a less appreciative owner.
Next to the Mosby house is the MARIE RUCKER HOME (Private).
The plan of the present two-story plantation house is a notable departure
from its original Georgian Colonial H-shaped plan. Built in 1822 by
Col. D. M. Fulton, a pioneer settler, a porch on three sides and a tower
for scanning the cotton fields have been added, giving it an unusual
appearance. The structure is painted red with a cream trim. This color
scheme emphasizes the baroque cornice and window blinds. The interior
is ornamented in the manner of an English house of the period of con
struction, the decorations having been done by English plasterers. The
dining room is approached by low, broad steps leading down from the
middle hall. A flagged brick terrace separates the detached kitchen, which
looks now as it did originally except for the removal of the crane from
the fireplace. The garden in the rear is laid out in scallops, and the
formal treatment of lawn and hedges is as English as the interior. The
original box hedge planted in a double heart design has grown luxuri
antly around the ancient cistern.
Near the end of East Academy St. on the south side of town is the
GUS LUCKETT HOME, a simple one-story white frame dwelling built
by Major Drane, an early settler of Madison Co., prior to the War
between the States. It was used as headquarters by Confederate Gen.
Albert S. Johnston during the war.
The EPISCOPAL RECTORY was the birthplace of John McCrady, one
of Mississippi s foremost contemporary painters. McCrady, the seventh
child of a clergyman, spent his early years in Canton and in Oxford; his
paintings are nostalgic scenes of the Deep South and show a quiet humor
that combines fantasy with realism. His work has been exhibited in Man
hattan s Boyer Galleries.
1. Right from Canton on the Flora road to BELLEVUE, 11 m. (private), a good
example of the plantation homes built in the rich cotton country around Canton.
2. Right from Canton on the graveled Madison Station road to the GEORGE
HARVEY PLANTATION, 5 m., comprising 3,000 acres of cotton and timber
lands. The 102 -year-old big house sits among large trees. The T-shaped house
has an impressive Doric portico, designed with square columns and a crowning
pediment, and a long one-story rear wing flanked by porches. From a central
hall a semicircular stairway leads to the spacious living quarters on the second
floor. The dining hall and scullery are in the rear wing.
Between Canton and Jackson US 51 passes through an increasing
number of fruit and truck farms, the first large peach farm being at
: 182.6 m.
At 19 5 m. is the junction with a paved road.
Right on this road is MADISON, 0.2 m. (335 alt., 325 pop.).
At 6.8 m. (R) is 1NGLESIDE, in a setting of live oaks and an artificial lake.
The house is a Greek Revival adaptation, with white stucco over brick, a red
roof, and four large fluted columns upholding the portico. Ingleside was the
home of the builder of the Chapel of the Cross (see below).
At 7.3 m. (R) on a slight rise well back from the road in a grove of hickory
and oak trees is the CHAPEL OF THE CROSS, overgrown with green vines.
390 TOURS
The ivy-clad brick structure is Gothic in style with a lofty bell tower. Wills,
an English architect, drew the plans of the chapel. It was completed and con
secrated in 1853. The arched main entrance is placed unobtrusively on the side;
it has double wooden doors fastened with an iron latch. The dim interior with
its long narrow windows, arched wooden trusses, and stone floor is decorated
with charm and simplicity. It has a stone baptismal font and a carved altar of
redwood decorated with gold leaf, both imported from Europe. Adjoining the
chapel on each side and at the rear is the CHURCHYARD in which are graves
grouped in family plots. Among them, close to the buttressed walls of the
chapel, is the grave of Henry Crew Vick, marked by a rustic stone cross. To
this grave belongs the story of the "Bride of Annandale," Miss Helen John-
stone, whose mother built the chapel. When John Johnstone, of a family from
Annandale, Scotland, came here in 1820 he built in the wilderness the first
Annandale, a log house, for his wife and daughter. Although he built Ingleside
later, he continued to live in the weather-boarded log house until his death in
1848. Before his widow raised a finer Annandale, she built the chapel with
brick and slave labor from her own place. Christmas of 1855 found Mrs.
Johnstone and Helen visiting at Ingleside while the new Annandale was under
construction. It was there that Helen met Henry Vick, son of the founder of
Vicksburg. From the meeting developed love and then an engagement. The wed
ding was set for May 21, 1859. Four days before that date, Vick was killed in
a duel in New Orleans, firing his own shot into the air to keep a promise to his
betrothed never to kill a man. His body was brought to Annandale for burial,
and work on the great house was suspended. Annandale was never actually
finished, though descendants of the Johnstones occupied it until it burned on
Sept. 9, 1926. Helen and her mother traveled for a while; then Helen returned
as the bride of Dr. George Harris, who had come as minister to the chapel.
The story is that Helen never gave her heart to her husband but remained the
bride of a ghost, the sweetheart of Henry Vick. Annandale was a huge structure
of French design planned by a New York architect and built with slave labor.
During the war it was stripped for the Confederate cause. The carpets were cut
into soldiers blankets, the bronze and brass pieces were melted and sent to
foundries to be cast into cannon, the Johnstone women s silk dresses were made
into battle banners, and the imported linens torn into strips for bandages. In the
later years of the war General Sherman and his staff made the home a head
quarters.
At 199.9 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to TOUGALOO COLLEGE, 0.5 m., an accredited school
for Negroes founded by the American Missionary Association of New York in
1869. Tougaloo s red brick buildings are grouped in a natural woodland around
the ante-bellum mansion of John Boddy, sold with a tract of 500 acres to the
association in 1869 and since used as the ADMINISTRATION BUILDING.
The largest of the halls is HOLMES HALL, housing the chapel, library, labora
tories, and classrooms. Many of the other buildings were erected by students
trained in the industrial department, with brick made in the school s own
brickyard. Truck farming, orcharding, dairying, and trade shops supply the
faculty and pupils and help support the institution. Various faculty members
hold degrees from Columbia, Chicago, Yale, and Harvard Universities (see
EDUCATION).
At 200.9 m. are the TOWERS OF W]DX, the Lamar Life Insurance
Company s radio station. The broadcasting studios are in the Lamar
Building, Jackson. The station operates on a frequency of 1270 kilocycles.
At 203.7 m. US 51 follows N. State St.; R on Pascagoula St. to S.
Gallatin St.
JACKSON, 208.3 m. (294 alt., 48,282 pop.) (see JACKSON).
Points of Interest. New Capitol, Old Capitol, Livingston Park and Zoo, Hinds
TOUR 5 391
Co. Courthouse, Millsaps College, Belhaven College, Battlefield Park, and
others.
Here are the junctions with US 80 (see Tour 2) and US 49 (see
Tour 7).
Sec. b JACKSON to LOUISIANA LINE, 98-9 m., US 51
South of Jackson, ;;/., US 51 follows S. Gallatin St.; R. on Hooker
St.; L. on Terry Road. US 51 is the most direct route between Jackson
and New Orleans. Centered around Crystal Springs and Hazlehurst is a
truck farming area of importance. In the vicinity of Brookhaven dairying
has supplanted lumbering, with cut-over lands now used for pasturage.
Throughout the route the variety of wooded areas and the contrasting
towns lend interest.
At 1 J /;/. is the junction with State 18.
Right on this paved road at 10.9 m. is the junction with a graveled road. Left
here 2 m. to COOPER S WELLS, A resort known throughout the State for the
mildness of its waters. The frame hotel, a rambling informal structure, sits on
a steep bluff, overlooking the well house in the ravine. From the front gallery
is an excellent view of the alluvial hills encircling Vicksburg. The land was
purchased in 1837 by the Rev. Preston Cooper, who, because of a recurring
dream that there was a valuable mineral spring here, dug the first well. A resort
hotel was built sometime later, but Federal troops burned it during the War
between the States. The present building (open in summer), which was built in
1880, has undergone many alterations. The mineral waters of the well are of use
in the treatment of several diseases. They are quickly purgative. Guests gather
around the well before meals and engage in contests to see who can drink the
greatest number of glasses. (Formerly the contest was with dippers of the
water, everybody drinking from the same long-handled dipper. This was the
custom as late as 1907. At that time in addition to the rambling old hotel there
was another building a few feet away, called the Bull Pen, occupied by men
only, where fortunes were lost and won at poker.)
On State 18 at 14.2 is RAYMOND (306 alt. , 547 pop.), incorporated as the
seat of Hinds Co. in 1829 with the advantage of being on the Natchez Trace.
For several years it was a larger and more progressive town than the capital,
and during the State s most prosperous days was the center of a flourishing
plantation life. The Old Oak Tree Inn, now burned, was famous as the meeting
place of ministers, doctors, lawyers, and scholars of Mississippi. From it Andrew
Jackson made an address during his visit to the town, and so great was his ova
tion that linen sheets were taken from the beds and spread upon the board walks
for him to tread upon. From a bed in this hotel Seargent S. Prentiss arose in
the middle of the night and made a speech in defence of a bedbug that had
bitten him. It was heard by a mock jury and judge, and the bedbug was formally
acquitted.
Right 0.6 m. from town water tank, to the MAJOR PEYTON HOME (private),
one of the oldest houses in Raymond. Erected in the early 1830 $ with slave
labor, it is an elaborate version of the type of plantation home popular at that
time. When erected, it marked the center of Hinds County.
The GIBBS BUILDING, corner Main and Port Gibson Sts., was built in 1854-
The lower story is now a tilling station but the upper story retains its
original iron railings and porches.
The HINDS COUNTY COURTHOUSE, a large gray building, green shuttered,
is the outstanding structure in Raymond. It has Doric columns on the facade
and a towering cupola.
39 2 TOURS
The EPISCOPAL CHURCH, next to the courthouse, is nearly a century old.
It is a small building of Gothic design.
The RATLIFF HOME (private), two blocks from the courthouse, corner Main
St. and Dupree Road, was built in 1853 by Dr. H. T. T. Dupree from lumber
given by John A. Fairchild to his daughter, Margaret, as a wedding present.
Mr. Fairchild owned and operated the first sawmill in this section, and the
lumber used in the home is heart pine cut in his mill. Cornices and mantels are
hand-carved. When Raymond was occupied by Federal troops, the household
furniture was thrown into the yard by Union soldiers, cotton was laid in thick
carpets on the floor, and wounded soldiers were brought here for treatment.
Dominating the eastern entrance to Raymond are the red brick buildings of
HINDS COUNTY JUNIOR COLLEGE (R) (see EDUCATION).
At 31.1 m. on State 18 is UTICA (285 alt., 652 pop.), an important vegetable
shipping center.
At 35.4 m. on State 18 to UTICA NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTE,
one of the State s outstanding institutions for Negroes. The school was founded
in 1903 as a grammar school. Since that time its curriculum has been expanded
to include high school and normal work, and many additional buildings have
been erected to accommodate its 350 students (1937). The school is known
outside Mississippi because of the Utica Singers, who have traveled in this
country and Europe singing Negro spirituals. In 1905 the institute sponsored
a Negro Farmers Conference, the object of which was to encourage Negro
tenants to buy land. At that time only one Negro in the Utica district owned his
property. At present, with the Farmers Conference an annual event, more than
35,000 acres in this area are owned by Negroes.
At 2.7 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to the FILTROL CORPORATION PLANT, 0.7 m. (open by
permission jrom office, 8:30 to 5 weekdays). Constructed of corrugated iron,
the building is of modern industrial design, with two elevator towers rising
from the center. The detached gray office building, surrounded by a grove of
pecan trees, is of bungalow type, with an experimental laboratory in the rear
wing. The corporation, established in May 1936, processes each week (1937)
approximately 800 tons of bentonite clay mined in Smith Co. (see Tour 2).
Trade-marked Filtrol, the fintehed product is used chiefly to bleach and absorb
impurities from vegetable and mineral oils. In the rear tower of the plant the
crude clay is crushed, mixed with water into a slurry, and treated with acid
for several hours under heat. This mixture then is piped into several large vats
where the acid is washed out and left to settle in artificial reservoirs before being
discharged into Pearl River. An Olivar filter press separates the clay from the
water, and the clay, conveyed to the front tower, is further dried and pulverized.
This product is supplementing the use of fuller s earth in chemical processes.
US 5 1 southward runs between fruit orchards alternating with suburban
bungalows. Further S. are Negro cabins with walls of plank weatherboard-
ing applied vertically. The cut at 7m. (R) reveals the type of soil in the
area, a mixture of clay and gravel with a warm yellow-red tint.
TERRY, 16.2 m. (291 alt., 412 pop.), is the northernmost of the truck
farming towns on US 51. Although the area had been settled before the
War of 1812, a town was not established until the railroad came through
in 1856 and put its depot on Bill Terry s land. Until 1910 Terry was an
active cotton market, but since that time vegetable growing and shipping
have become the main activities.
The best known early settler was Gov. A. G. Brown, whose home, the
old BROWN PLACE, still stands, a primitive farm house whose sim-
TOUR 5 393
plicity suggests the hardships of the early settler. Brown, Governor from
1844 to 1848, was the most popular and influential man in the State at
that time. As Governor he took the lead in repudiating the Union bank
bonds and in working for free public schools and the popular election of
judges. In national affairs he upheld State rights and all policies advo
cated by his small farmer constituents. He died at his Terry home in 1880.
The DUBOSE HOME (private), a cottage, contains Waldo Beauregard
Dubose s collection of oil paintings by American and European artists.
By profession Dubose is a designer of elaborate and spectacular evening
clothes for women, but his major interest is in the fine arts.
At 22.1 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road 0.2 m. (L) to the R. L. GANT HOME (private), a white
frame house where lives the owner of Mississippi s most famous pack of blood
hounds. Between 1906 and 1933 the pack tracked down several notorious
criminals. Gant has been successful in running down 85 per cent of the men he
sought, and has 12 wounds to show for his man-hunting.
At 23-5 m is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to LAKE CHAUTAUQUA, 0.2 m., an artificial lake in a set
ting of pines and oaks. Here from 1903 to 1915 the Mississippi Chautauqua
Association held annual sessions each July. Summer cottages and a community
house were erected and a lake for swimming, boating, and fishing was made.
Besides the Chautauqua programs, those using local talent were encouraged.
During the height of its popularity the Chautauqua was widely attended by
residents of Mississippi and of neighboring States. Cottages were rented for the
season of two weeks and the hotel accommodated 100 guests. The site is now
leased to the Illinois Central Railroad which uses the lake as a pumping station.
The grounds are popular for picnicking and camping; in the summer political
rallies are held here. On the elevation above the lake is the sturdy old tabernacle
of the Hennington Camp Meeting, one of the oldest camp meeting sites in the
State. Built before the War between the States, the tabernacle is constructed of
hand-hewn logs.
At 25.2 m. is the junction with a paved road.
Left on this road is CRYSTAL SPRINGS, 0.4 m. (463 alt., 2,257 pop.), one
of the largest tomato-shipping centers of the State. The story of commercial
gardening in Crystal Springs begins in 1870 with the first shipment of peaches,
i:rown by James Sturgis, to markets at New Orleans and Chicago. Tomatoes were
still known as love apples at that time, but N. Piazza imported seed from Italy
and with S. H. Stackhouse began scientific cultivation of tomato plants. With
the help of a German emigrant, Augustus Lotterhos, the industry achieved suc
cess. In 1878 Lotterhos pooled the products of a number of tomato growers to
ship the first full carload to Denver, Colo.
The shipping of other vegetables to Northern markets followed. Peas, beans,
cabbages, carrots, beets, and asparagus began moving in carload lots, but straw
berries had to await the development of refrigeration. To offset the occasional
losses due to a glutted market, the farmers started a tomato-canning plant,
Lotterhos being instrumental in its establishment. In 1927 the peak of shipping
was reached with 3,342 carloads of vegetables moving to markets in the United
States and Canada, of which 1,562 cars contained tomatoes. The vegetable grow
ing industry now supports a box and crate factory and a refrigeration plant.
These activities have made Crystal Springs different from Mississippi cotton
towns. It has two rush seasons: the typical cotton-picking and corn-harvesting
one, and the feverish weeks in the late spring when the truck crops are sent out.
394 TOURS
The schools open earlier than usual so that the children can get through a full
term and still work in the fields when crops, which perish rapidly, mature. The
CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL brings its 1,300 pupils from truck farms within
a radius of 15 miles.
Byron Patton Harrison, born in this town, has served Mississippi in one political
office or another for 32 of his 56 years. Born at Crystal Springs in 1881, and
educated in the Mississippi public schools and Louisiana State University, he
began his law practice in Leakesville, Miss., in 1902. From 1905 to 1910 he was
district attorney for the Second District. From 1911 to 1919 he represented his
district in Congress. Since 1919 he has been U.S. Senator. He led the movement
for flood control that resulted in the passage of the National Flood Control
Act in 1928, and did outstanding work in the fight for the Agricultural Adjust
ment Administration. Senator Harrison s home is now in Gulfport.
At 33-9 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road 0.2 m. to LAKE HAZLE, a favorite swimming and picnicking
spot.
HAZLEHURST, 34 m. (460 alt., 2,447 PP-)> tne seat of Copiah Co.,
is a fruit-and-vegetable-shipping town. Its history begins with the history
of Gallatin, seven miles W., chartered in 1829; when the railroad was
put through in 1857 the people of Gallatin moved close to the new depot,
which was named for George Hazlehurst, chief engineer of the New
Orleans, Jackson & Great Northern R.R. But because Copiah citizens had
built an expensive courthouse at Gallatin just prior to that time, Hazle
hurst did not become the county seat until 1872. Following the lead of
Crystal Springs, the town is now chiefly concerned with growing, packing,
and shipping vegetables. Like Crystal Springs, it has an ice plant and box
factory and also a large fertilizer plant.
Right from Hazlehurst on State 20 is GALLATIN, 7.5 m., marked now only
by a crossroads store, but in its day a town that lived up to what was expected
of a Mississippi ante-bellum seat of justice. "It enjoyed the reputation of having
a man killed once every week for pastime," and attracted to it some of the ablest
members of the bar in Mississippi. The town became the seat of justice of
Copiah Co. in 1824, and was named in honor of Albert Gallatin, Secretary of the
Treasury under Madison. Here Albert G. Brown (see above) was born and
reared, moving to Terry when a young man.
At 8.6 m. (L) on State 20, perched atop a ridge above a cluster of trees is the
old WILEY HARRIS HOME (private); it was here that Wiley Pope Harris,
the younger, the power behind the achievements of many of Mississippi s great
est statesmen, was reared. He was a nephew of the Harris who had bought this
home in the 1820*5 and died in it in 1845. The younger Harris practiced law at
Gallatin in 1839, but soon turned his talents to wider fields, becoming a mem
ber of Congress in 1853, and a leading member of the Southern convention of
1861 that adopted the Ordinance of Secession. So influential was he in the
troubled days at the outbreak of the war that he became the first delegate from
Mississippi to the Montgomery congress that framed the Confederate Constitu
tion. He was chosen a delegate by unanimous vote of the State convention.
Throughout reconstruction he was scathing in his denunciation of the Ames
Administration, and was openly an advocate of cooperation with the Liberal
Republican movement. His last service to the State was as a member of the
Constitutional Convention of 1890, where among men of tremendous stature he
was still first in influence. His was the level head that determined many of
Mississippi s decisions. This home in which he was reared is a simple one-
story, central-hailed dwelling with a long porch having six square columns.
TOUR 5 395
At 10 m. on State 20 is BROWN S WELLS (40 pop.), a health and pleasure
resort built around seven \\clk containing large quantities of minerals. The
first well was dug by Billie Brown before the War between the States, and
shortly after the war a hotel and cottages were built to capitalize the wells at
tractions. The resort is now a part of a 2,2oo-acre tract on which are week-end
cottages, a dancing pavilion, a swimming pool, and a nine-hole golf course.
At 44.1 vi. on US 51 is a crossroad.
Left on this road is BEAUREGARD, OJ m. (474 alt., 203 pop.), known as
Haliala when the railroad was put through in 1857, but changed to Beauregard
shortly after the war to honor Confederate General Beauregard. It is a lumber
town formerly known for the number and size of its saloons; only three homes
survived the cyclone of 1883, which destroyed most of the town. One of the
three was on the estate of Benjamin King, a testy lawyer of Gallatin, who pro
moted the erection of the expensive courthouse at the latter town to protect his
property rights against the railroad-made changes in population. The most inter
esting of the three houses, however, is the DR. E. A. ROWAN PLACE, with
23 rooms, first (1881) intended for a hospital but later made into a private
home. Four sudden deaths in the Rowan family are responsible for the legend
that the house is haunted. The story has been expanded and now includes the
assertion that there is a standing reward for anyone who will spend a night alone
with the ghosts in the dust-covered, cobwebbed place. A series of regular yet
mysterious flaggings of Illinois Central R.R. trains in front of the house in
1926 grew so annoying as to call special detectives to the case, but the cause
of the flaggings was never found.
WESSON, 46.7 m. (799 pop.), is one of Mississippi s older mill towns,
now devoting its attention to truck farming. It was named for Col. ]. M.
Wesson, who, when his plants in Choctaw Co. were destroyed by Federals
in 1864, decided to make a new start in the pine woods. His first move
was to build a sawmill. Soon he erected a cotton and woolen goods fac
tory. The latter prospered, passing from the control of Colonel Wesson to
a New Orleans company and growing rapidly between 1875 and 1891.
One of the factories reached six stories in height and employed 1,200 peo
ple. In 1891, however, after the death of one of the backers, labor trouble
began that culminated in the mills going into receivership in 1906 and
ceasing operations in 1910; during the World War the plant was torn
down and the machinery and building material sold. Wesson is now the
home of the COPIAH-LINCOL^ JUNIOR COLLEGE, the largest junior
college in the State. It is coeducational and State-supported.
At BROOKHAVEN, 54.8 m. (500 alt., 5,288 pop.) (see Tour 11), is
the junction with US 84 (see Tour 11).
Between Brookhaven and the Louisiana Line the pines grow thicker.
At .56.3 m. is the model DAIRY AXD STOCK FARM, on the former
plantation of Samuel Jaync, who in 1818 came from New York State to
clear a section of land for farming, and to operate a grist mill on the
Bog tie Chitto River. In time he built a one-room store, selling tobacco
and calico to the little settlement around him and handing out the mail,
whkh was delivered from Natchez. In 1851, when the New Orleans.
Jackson & Great Southern R.R. came through, it missed the Jayne settle
ment by a mile and a half. Almost overnight the people began to move to
the railroad, leaving Samuel Jayne, his little store, and his grist mill, but
taking with them the name Brookhaven (see Tour 11) which Jayne had
396 TOURS
given the settlement. The Bogue Chitto River, which used to turn the little
grist mill for Jayne, now supplies the cattle with water, and the old
JAYNE HOME, with the long avenue of loo-year-old cedars leading to
it, is used as a tenant house.
NORFIELD, 69.-? m. (1,399 PP-)> once a prosperous sawmill town,
has had a large exodus since the mill ceased operations in 1910.
Between the Pike Co. Line and the Louisiana Line, US 51 is a
Memorial Highway for World War dead.
SUMMIT, 77.4 m. (430 alt., 1,157 pop.), like many Mississippi towns,
was founded when the railroad was put through in 1857. ^ s elevation
gave it its name.
Left from Summit on a paved road 1 m. to the junction with another paved road;
L. 0.7 m. to the SOUTHWEST MISSISSIPPI JUNIOR COLLEGE, almost hid
den in pines; it is one of the most attractive agricultural schools and junior
colleges in the State.
McCOMB, 81.1 m. (10,057 pop), is a railroad and manufacturing
town, the largest on the Illinois Central R.R. between New Orleans and
Jackson. Col. H. S. McComb, founder of the town, was president of the
New Orleans, Jackson & Northern R.R. built in 1857 between New
Orleans and Jackson. Colonel McComb s decision to establish the railroad
shops here was responsible for the town s rapid growth. These shops were
the biggest in the State and attracted a sturdy class of mechanics that be
came the backbone of the population. Also of influence in developing the
town was the sawmill of Capt. J. J. White.
After the timber was cut, the settlers turned to raising cotton on the
cleared lands, which caused the establishment of the McCOMB COTTON
MILL, a block-long plant in South McComb employing 375 people and
operating 20,000 spindles and 410 looms. Other mills in the town pro
duce materials for upholstery and yarn, rayon, and silk garments. The
SOUTHERN UNITED ICE CO. PLANT illustrates a fourth stage in the
town s economic activities, from railroad servicing to sawmilling, to textile
weaving, to truck farming. This ice plant has a capacity of 180 tons a day;
it annually services the 5,000 refrigerator cars used in the truck-farming
belt along the Illinois Central R.R. If necessary the plant can ice 50 cars
at one time. The city school system is one of the finest in the State.
Here is the junction with State 24 (see Tour 13).
At 88.2 m. is the junction with State 48, a graveled road.
Right on this road to the PERCY QUIN STATE PARK, 3.5 m. (L), a 1,480-
acre tract now in process of development (see Tour 13).
MAGNOLIA, 88.7 m. (415 alt., 1,660 pop.), the seat of Pike Co., has
several times won a State prize offered for clean and well-kept streets. It
was named for the number of magnolias growing on the banks of the
little stream running through the eastern edge of the town. A large cotton
mill is the town s chief industrial plant.
Between Magnolia and the Louisiana Line, US 51 runs through some
of the loveliest pine forests left in Mississippi.
At 95 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
TOUR 6 397
Left on this road through oaks and pines so thick they make a twilight shade to
ST. MARY OF THE PINES, 1.2 m., a Catholic school for girls under the
management of the Sisters of Notre Dame. These sisters came to Chatawa from
Milwaukee in 1874 to open a day school for children of the village, and in
1879 they bought the present grounds and convent from the Redemptorist
Fathers, who had closed their seminary after the yellow fever scourge in 1878.
Under the superintendence of Sister Charissia the pine-clad hills have been de
lightfully developed. The convent and the chapel are ante-bellum brick and
stone buildings in Renaissance style. A dormitory and a music conservatory, a
lake and outdoor swimming pool, and recreation courts have been built. The
course of study is of high school rank, and St. Mary s is fully accredited. Half
of the resident students are from Louisiana Catholic families.
OSYKA, 98 J m. (251 alt, 750 pop.), has the rustic stamp of Missis
sippi, though as a dairying town it is economically closer to New Orleans.
At 98.9 m. US 51 crosses the Louisiana Line, marked by a cattle gap
and a spreading liquor stand just on the other side, 100 miles N. of New
Orleans, La.
Tour 6
(Tuscaloosa, Ala.) Columbus Winona Greenwood Greenville (Lake Vil
lage, Ark.). US 82.
Alabama Line to Arkansas Line, 168 m.
Columbus & Greenville R.R. parallels route throughout.
Graveled highway for most part with a few miles of concrete. Paving in process.
Accommodations in larger towns.
US 82, cutting across north central Mississippi, makes clear the geo
graphical and cultural divisions of the area. The eastern section runs
through the lower Tennessee Hills, then descends into the low- rolling
Black Prairie Belt, where is Columbus, the center of the prairie s ante
bellum culture. West of the land of cattle and corn the route winds
through the flatwoods of shortleaf pines, crossing the Big Black swamp,
where farms are few and logs are "snaked" from the bottoms by straining
teams of mules. Ascending from the swamplands by a devious 3O-mile
climb into Winona, the route next traverses the loam-covered Bluff
Hills, a wooded section with small farms producing diversified crops,
of Carrollton the route drops abruptly to end on the Delta s flatness
where plantations are extensive and cotton is king.
Crossing the Mississippi Line, //;., 50.9 miles W. of Tuscaloosa,
TOMBIGBEE RIVER BRIDGE, COLUMBUS
US 82 descends from the lower Tennessee Hills to the even contour of
the prairie.
US 82 enters on Military Road; L. on 9th St. N. ; R. on ist Ave.
COLUMBUS, 94 m. (250 alt., 10,743 pop.) (see COLUMBUS).
Points of Interest. Ante-bellum homes, Mississippi State College for Women,
Friendship Cemetery, and others.
Here is the junction with US 45 (see Tour 4).
The route continues on ist Ave. N., crossing Tombigbee River, the
W. city limit.
Between Columbus and Starkville the route penetrates the heart of
Mississippi s dairy and cattle country. The land is fertile and gently roll
ing. For miles little is visible except herds of cattle and meadows of
alfalfa and corn. At harvest time when the grain turns gold the land
scape is a monotone a vast stretch of gold spreading to the horizon.
STARKVILLE, 32 m. (362 alt, 3,612 pop.), formerly the local capital
of an old agricultural aristocracy, has become a center of the pioneer
dairying and cattle raising farmers of the State. Serving the country
around it, the town supports a condensery and a creamery, and ships
more cattle than any other town in the State. The first settlers, wealthy
slaveholders from the Seaboard States, grew cotton exclusively in the
black loam and only after the War between the States turned to other
sources of profit. The town s physical appearance is ante-bellum; it has
long streets of old-style houses and branching avenues lined by oaks.
MISSISSIPPI STATE COLLEGE, foot of Main St., is a standard four-
fcr J
TWIN TOWERS, MISSISSIPPI STATE COLLEGE, STARKVILLE
year coeducational college supported by the State. Founded Feb. 28, 1878,
as a land grant college (see EDUCATION), with Stephen D. Lee as its
first president, it was until 1930 known as Agricultural and Mechanical
College. Until 1887 the only courses offered were agricultural ones. Farm
boys from all parts of Mississippi came here for scientific knowledge to
be applied on the working of their own acres. Expansion of functions
started in 1887, when, in order to gather scientific information for in
struction in agriculture, a system of experiment stations was inaugurated.
Since then branch stations have been established in five major soil-type
sections of the State to augment the research program of the central station
located at the college.
In 1892 the curriculum was revised, and later the Schools of Engineer
ing and Agriculture were opened. The School of Science was established
in n;ii, the School of Business in 1915. In 1936 a Graduate School was
added. The Agricultural Extension Sen-ice is a branch of the school s ac
tivities, being directly under the administration of the president. In addi
tion, the State Chemical Laboratory, the State Plant Board, and the State
Li\c stock Sanitary Board are housed on the college grounds.
The college occupies a 4,ooo-acre tract of gently rolling land, 750 acres
400 TOURS
of which are set aside as a campus, with 18 buildings and 70 residences.
There are numerous farms and pastures for experimental and demonstra
tion purposes. No specific style of architecture has been followed in the
buildings. The oldest is Main Dormitory opened October 6, 1880; the
estimated value of buildings, equipment, and grounds is $7,500,000.
Left at the rear entrance of State College on a graveled road and R. at the fork
to (R) the OUTLAW HOUSE, 4.8 m. (private), a white frame two-story dwell
ing built in 1835 by Dorsey Outlaw who migrated from New Jersey. It follows
faithfully Georgian Colonial lines and has slender columns on its two-story
portico. A one-story wing breaks its otherwise symmetrical balance. The entrance
doorway and mantels in the drawing room are hand carved, the work of a slave
convict, who, it is said, worked shackled in chains. Floors throughout are of
native walnut. All work, including interior furnishings, was done by slave labor.
At 6.5 m. (R) is the RICE HOME (open by appointment), built in 1842. It is
similar to the Outlaw House in design, a two-story frame home with a square
hipped roof, long green blinds, and slender columns. The house was built by
Capt. John W. Rice, who owned 5,000 acres. All labor on the house was done
by slave carpenters.
At 9.1 m. on the graveled road is a junction with an unmarked road; L. here
1.4 m. to GIBEON (open), the oldest house in Oktibbeha Co. It stands upon a
knoll overlooking the wheel ruts of the old Robinson Road. No one knows the
builder of either the house or the road. Gibeon is constructed of hewn logs
morticed at the corners and with the cracks daubed with mortar, and stands today
on the original wooden-block foundation in fairly good condition. Originally
there were two rooms, one on each side of a wide dog-trot. Later a second story
was added, a duplicate of the first, with an exposed stairway leading up from
the downstairs central hall. Whatever its origin, Gibeon was a tavern stop on the
Robinson Road in 1820, when the route became the chief artery of travel between
Nashville, Tenn., and Jackson, Miss. At that time the owner was David Folsom,
half-breed Choctaw chief, who had moved his family over from Pigeon Roost on
the Natchez Trace to live on the newer highway. Here travelers rested overnight,
and horses, jaded from the long trip through forest and swamp, were changed for
fresh ones. After the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, Folsom sold the house to
William Shaw and moved to Oklahoma with his tribesmen. Indian territory was
being opened at the time, and the new host welcomed highway robbers and
honest settlers alike, matching his customers glass for glass at the bar. Soon the
place became notorious for its rowdy character. N. of Gibeon is a CEMETERY
in which are graves of victims who died here in drunken brawls.
At 1.7 m. on the unmarked road is the SITE OF THE CHOCTAW AGENCY
(L), marked by a small frame store. The place today is a backwoods voting
precinct.
At Starkville is the junction with State 23.
1. Left from Starkville on State 23 to the MONTGOMERY HOME, 1.3 m.
(open by appointment), built in 1839 by David Montgomery and modeled after
a two-story i8th century English dwelling. It is marked by restraint of treat
ment, no unnecessary details detracting from its good proportion. Long green
blinds hang at the small-paned windows, and walls and columns are white. Brick
chimneys, mellowed to a faint rose, flank the ends. The house sits on a knoll in
a grove of ancient and ivy-covered cedars. Beneath the cedars are beds of old-
fashioned flowers.
2. Left from Starkville on Louisville St. to the GILLESPIE HOME, 0.5 m., a
two-story house designed in what is a good example of the Prairie s adaptation
of the Greek Revival style. It was built in 1850 by Dr. James Gillespie.
Between Starkville and Mathiston are the dairy and stock farms that
TOUR 6 401
supply the Starkville market. Silos are as familiar a detail of this land
scape as are the gins and compresses in the Delta scene.
MATHISTON, 53 m. (405 alt., 484 pop.), is a railroad village where
life revolves about the comings and goings of the daily train. At train
time natives gather about the low frame depot; when the train arrives
the bulky mail bag is tossed off, milk cans are packed in the baggage car,
a few passengers climb aboard, and the train pulls away. Activity is then
transferred to the post office. Young and old gather to visit while the mail
is being put up one of the pleasantest of village customs.
On the northern edge of the town is WOOD JUNIOR COLLEGE,
organized in 1885 as Woodland Seminary, and known from 1900 to 1936
as Bennett Academy. At that time its name was changed to Wood Junior
College in honor of Dr. and Mrs. I. C. Wood of Logan, Iowa, philan
thropists. The school, with its frame and brick buildings grouped on a
48-acre tract donated by the citizens of Mathiston, is now under the man
agement of the Women s Home Missionary Society of the Methodist
Episcopal Church. In addition to the campus proper are several hundred
acres used for farming and dairying.
At Mathiston is a NATCHEZ TRACE MARKER erected by the
D. A. R.
West of Mathiston the prairie rises gradually, merging with the first
ridges of the Central Hills. Cotton patches replace the cornfields, and
the large painted farmhouses of the prairie disappear, dwellings here
being of the smaller two-room houses or dog-trot type.
EUPORA, 61.4 m. (1,092 pop.), is one of the largest poultry and egg
markets in the State. A neat town with wide paved streets shaded by tall
hardwood trees and vacant lots converted into well-kept parks, it now has
a peaceful, smoothly flowing life antithetical with that of its past. At one
time it was notorious for its feuds, killings, and lynchings. In the latter
part of the i9th century feuds were constant and difficulties were settled
without assistance of the law. Property rights, wills, love, and marriage
were causes of violent family controversy; hot tempers were cooled by
gunfire and arguments settled by a rope attached to the limb of a tall
oak tree. The bloodiest feud was that between the Gray and Edwards
factions a feud that grew out of dispute over property rights and ended
years later with the wholesale murder of the Grays at the Greensboro
jail, eight miles from Eupora. Old-timers still spin stories of these violent
days, and on the byways leading from town can point out trees that
supported the body of a mob victim at one time or another.
West of Eupora the range of hills is wide. The highway skims the top
of one ridge then another, and winds down through wooded hillsides to
peaceful low-lying valleys. Terracing is necessary on the hillsides, where
hardy cotton crops clutch at footholds in the thin top soil. Few tenant
cabins are visible, for farm owners do their own plowing and reaping, or
call in a neighbor to help when work is too heavy.
KILMICHAEL, 79 J m. (359 alt., 577 pop.), began as one small
store built and operated by Sam Baines in 1845. The name was sug
gested by an early Irish settler. The JAMES IT". K\ OX HOME, 200
402 TOURS
yds. E. of depot on US 82, was erected in 1858 with slave labor. Of
the usual plantation type, the house has pillars and chimneys of home
made brick.
WINONA (Ind., first born daughter), 91 m. (386 alt., 2,607 pop-)>
on the line between the swampland to the E. and the Mississippi-Yazoo
Delta to the W., is the small center of a fertile hill-farms district. A
majority of its stores were opened decades ago; its families are old;
its comfortable quietness is broken only on Saturdays, when there are
the bustling conversations and hand-shakings typical of a Mississippi
trading center. The narrow streets are heavily shaded with elms, oaks,
and locusts. Many of the houses were built in the latter part of the
1 9th century, though a few ante-bellum ones remain. Here are a cheese
factory, a cotton mill, and a hickory mill.
On May 4, 1883, W. V. Money and James K. Vardaman took charge
of the newspaper, The Winona Advance, with Vardaman as the editor.
Shortly after 1890 the name of the paper was changed to The Winona
Democrat, a change indicative of the feeling in the State at the time.
As editor, Vardaman catered to the tenant farmers and working men
of Mississippi, championing their cause in revolutionary editorials. When
he entered politics late in the i9th century he carried his ideals with
him and, after a heated campaign, became Governor in 1903. After his
governorship he was elected to the National Senate where he remained
until defeated by Byron Patton Harrison in 1918 (see Tour 5). Varda-
man s popularity was unrivaled in the State until he opposed Wilson s
war measure in 1917, and lost his seat in the Senate. He returned to
Mississippi, a broken old man, and died at his home in Greenwood,
June 25, 1930. Known as the "Great White Chief," Vardaman, with his
long white hair, wide-brimmed hats and frock coats, was a picturesque
figure. He drove about the countryside in a buckboard during his cam
paigns and never failed to arouse his constituents with his cry of "Nigger,
Nigger," symbolic of his racial prejudice.
At 316 Summit St. is the OLDEST HOUSE IN MONTGOMERY CO.,
a two-story, rambling, white frame home, set far back from the street
in a grove of willow, elm, and oak trees. Six thick columns reach to
the roof from the front gallery. On the upper floor is a small balcony.
The original log structure built nearly a century ago has been added
to and remodeled, but the general outline of the original house has been
retained. The two large front rooms have walls of sheathed logs; these
rooms lead into a large hall from which rises a stairway; in the rear
are the dining room, kitchen, and servants stairway. The house was
built by Col. O. J. Moore, who owned the land upon which the town
was built. It was here that Miss Ella Moore, his daughter, gave Winona
its name.
West of Winona the highway runs through thickly wooded hills.
At 93 m. (R) are the slight REMAINS OF OLD MIDDLETON,
the town that preceded Winona. On the site are a house and an old
cemetery enclosed by a dilapidated brick fence. When the cemetery was
laid out, Middleton citizens dug a deep ditch around it to keep wild
TOUR 6 403
animals away from the graves; traces of the ditch are still visible. Mid-
dleton s only remaining house, the C. G. PACE HOME, is a large, fairly
well-preserved frame structure standing far back in a grove of cedars.
Built with slave labor, the house has a chimney upon which is inscribed
"1837 Harvey Merritt." The nucleus of the town of Middlcton was a log
cabin store owned by Ireton C. Devane in the early 1820*5. Indian trails
crossed here, and the first public road in Carroll Co., extending from
Carrollton to Greensboro, ran by the place. The settlement was named
for its central position between Carrollton and Shongalo (now Vaiden).
At its height of prosperity Middleton had 8 or 10 stores, a newspaper
called The Family Organ, a girls school called Judson Institute (later
Middleton Female Academy) and a boys school, People s Academy (later
Middleton Male Academy). The female college was Baptist and the male
Methodist ; such a hot religious controversy arose between the two when a
site for the State University was being sought that Middleton lost the honor.
The town was almost deserted when the railroad established the station
of Winona; the remainder was destroyed in a Federal raid during the
War between the States.
NORTH CARROLLTON, 702.8 m. (394 pop.), runs into OLD
CARROLLTON, 703.7 m. (229 alt., 523 pop.), one of the oldest towns
in north central Mississippi, its written records beginning in 1834.
Settled by a landed aristocracy, made wealthy by cotton, and now devital
ized by the development of other towns in richer soils, Old Carrollton
has still a certain pleasant charm salvaged from the glory of the past.
The town was named in honor of Charles Carroll, a signer of the
Declaration of Independence. Carrollton s weekly newspaper carries, sig
nificantly, the name under which it was first published, The Conservative.
Carrolltown was the home of Hernando De Soto Money (1839-1912). A
planter and editor by profession, Senator Money represented the State in
the National Congress almost without interruption from 1875 to 1911.
1. Right from North Carrollton just E. of the railroad crossing, to COTES-
II ORTH (private), 1.6 m., home of the late Sen. J. Z. George, whose greatest
achievement was the framing of the present constitution of Mississippi. The
entrance to the 9oo-acre estate is marked by large iron gates hung from brick
pillars. About 135 acres are farmed; the remaining acres are in pasture and tim
ber land. The grounds immediately surrounding the house have beautiful formal
flower and fern beds, and cedars and red oaks, some of which are more than a
century old. The charming old home is two stories high with a columned portico.
The furnishings are still those of Senator George. George named the place for
his friend, Judge Cotesworth Pinckney Smith of the State s Court of Errors and
Appeals, now the supreme court. The estate was willed to W. Cott George for
life with the understanding that he, in turn, leave it to any other of the In
J. Z. George who were in good standing with the Baptist Church. Thus it
into the possession of Mrs. Lizzie George Henderson of Greenwood, who had it
repaired.
2. Right from North Carrollton on the old Greenwood highway which winds
picturesquely through forests green with pine and cedar to M.iLMAlS :
), 70.3 in. This palatial old home of Greenwood Leflore, last Ch
chieftain, was built in 1854 as a successor to the log house built by I.eriVre in
; . Named for the home in which the Empress Josephine found refuge
her divorce from Napoleon, the house shows both French and Southern Colonial
MALMAISON, NORTH CARROLLTON
influences in its architecture. It is a two-story white frame structure with massive
grooved columns on the porticos. Long narrow galleries extend the length of the
house on both sides. Irregularly placed are iron grillwork balconies. On the
roof is an observatory enclosed by elaborately designed iron railings. From here
Leflore s beloved Teoc (Ind. place of fall pines) country is visible for miles.
Fourteen immense rooms, seven on each floor, open off the wide hallways that
cross in the center of the house. Their furnishings were designed for Leflore by
Parisian decorators. In the parlor is a Louis XIV suite finished in gold leaf and
upholstered in rich red brocaded damask. On the walls large gold-framed mir
rors alternate with murals of French and Swiss scenes. On the linen curtains are
painted pictures of the French palaces, Malmaison, St. Cloud, Fontainebleau, and
Versailles. The library contains portraits of Colonel Leflore, his wife, and daughter.
Beneath the portrait of Leflore hang a sword and belt presented to him by the
U.S. Government upon his election as Chief of the Choctaw.
Greenwood Leflore, the son of Louis LeFleur, French trader and trapper (see
JACKSON), and Rebecca Crevat, niece of Pushmataha, was born at LeFleur s
Bluff (now Jackson) in 1800 and named for an English sea-captain. He was
adopted by Maj. John Donley, who owned a stage line on the Natchez Trace,
and was educated in Nashville. In 1819 he married the major s daughter Rose
and returned with her to Mississippi shortly afterward. In 1824, when for the
first time a Choctaw chief was chosen by general election, the honor went to
Leflore. He effected many reforms among his people, notable among which was
abolition of witchcraft practices and the establishment of schools for Indian chil
dren. For 10 years Leflore was tireless in his efforts to raise the standard of
living among the Choctaw. He was in his thirties, tall, handsome, and at the
height of his power, when a conference was called at Dancing Rabbit Creek to
decide upon the sale of Choctaw lands to the United States (see Tour 4). Be
cause he realized that the treaty was inevitable and sponsored it, Leflore was
condemned as a traitor by his tribe. It was through his influence, however, that
an amendment was added whereby an Indian who desired to remain in the State
TOUR 6 405
received a section of land and enjoyed full protection of the Government. Leflore,
after the removal of a majority of the Choctaw, lost face with the remaining
members of his tribe. His later prestige came entirely from his standing with
white men. As a cotton planter he prospered greatly during the period 1840-60.
He was elected to the lower house of the State legislature in 1835 and to the
Senate in 1844. For his third wife, Priscilla Donley, sister to Rose Donley, he
huilt Malmaison, expressing in it both his Indian love of display and his planter
wealth. Leading to Malmaison was a clay and cinder road, the first attempted
hard-surfacing of a road in the State. With the outbreak of the War between the
States, Leflore was ostracized by Indians and Southern whites alike. He refused
to give up his United States citizenship and to support the Confederacy, and
throughout the war the United States flag flew over Malmaison. On one occasion
an attack was made on his life by Confederates; at another time a fire of incend
iary origin broke out at Malmaison. When he died, August 21, 1865, he was
wrapped for burial in the flag he loved and interred on a hillside near Mal
maison.
US 82 turns L. on Carrollton Ave. ; R. on Fulton St.
GREENWOOD, 777.9 m. (143 alt, 11,123 pop.) (see GREEN
WOOD).
Points of Interest. Cotton gins, compresses, Terry collection of Leflore relics, and
others.
The route continues N. on Fulton St., which crosses the Yazoo River
to become Grand Blvd. ; L. on US 82.
At Greenwood is the junction with US 49 E (see Side Tour 7 A).
Between Greenwood and the route s end the Delta s flatness increases.
This is the State s last purely agrarian stronghold, with cotton-growing
absorbing the interest or the people and the landscape.
ITTA BENA, (Ind., home in the woods), 123.2 m. (125 alt., 1,370
pop. ) , was named by Greenwood Leflore. It is the home of the LEFLORE
CO. TEACHERS TRAINING SCHOOL FOR NEGROES.
BERCLAIR, 124.2 m., is a fishing village on Blue Lake (fishing jree;
boats, with Negro boys as paddlers, are rented at 50$ a day).
MOORHEAD, 736 .1 m. (1,553 pop.), one of the new Delta cotton
towns surrounded by many small cotton farms, is situated "where the
Southern crosses the Dog," an expression arising from the friendly rivalry
that existed between the Southern and the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley
Railroads, which cross at right angles in Moorhead; the latter was
derisively called the Yellow Dog by its competitor. The town, so low
that it is always threatened by floods, suffers whenever there is overflow
in the Delta. In the latter part of the i88o s a timber man gave his own
name to the bayou; soon afterward Chester Henry Pond of Illinois
cleared 10 acres on the banks of the bayou and built a stave mill, a
cotton mill, and, later, an oil mill. The town was incorporated as Moor-
head in 1899. A college for Negro girls, established in 1891 by Pond s
sister and supported by the Methodist Missionary Society of New York,
was abandoned in 1928. The SUNFLOWER JUNIOR COLLEGE, estab
lished in 1912, became a junior college in 1926. This is a fully accredited,
State-supported coeducational institution.
Between Moorhead and Indianola is an unending chain of cotton fields,
dotted with tenant cabins, gins, compresses, and residences.
406 TOURS
INDIANOLA, 144 m. (117 alt, 3,116 pop.), (see Tour 7A), is at
the junction with US 49 W (see Tour 7, Sec. a).
At 154 m. is a junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road 0.6 m. to DUNLEITH (open by appointment), once valued at
$1,000,000, and considered one of the finest of the Delta s plantations, with a
tile drainage system and every modern convenience. The rambling stucco con
structed house, with a red tile roof, is built upon an Indian mound from which
artifacts have been removed.
LELAND, 151.8 m. (113 alt., 2,426 pop.) (see Tour 3, Sec. a), is
at the junction with US 61 (see Tour 3, Sec. a).
Between Leland and Greenville the highway passes through a wealthy
plantation section, with modern planter houses of brick and stone, and
frame Negro cabins. Everywhere in this part of the Delta are signs of
good years in which the planter has lived bountifully on the products
of the land.
GREENVILLE, 162 m. (125 alt., 14,807 pop.) (see Side Tour 3A),
is at the junction with State i (see Side Tour 3 A).
Between Greenville and Warfield landing, 168 m., on the Mississippi
River, US 82 extends between two levees and, as it passes over the line
of the first, the river is visible in a rolling yellow sweep. (Perry service
6 a.m. to 2 a.m.; leaves Mississippi side on the hour, Arkansas side on
half hour; automobile with driver $1; 25$ passengers.)
Tour
Clarksdale Indianola Yazoo City Jackson Hattiesburg Gulfport. US 49, US
49W.
Clarksdale to Gulfport, 317 m.
Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. parallels route between Clarksdale and Jackson;
Gulf & Ship Island between Jackson and Gulfport.
Route paved throughout; two lanes wide.
Tourist accommodations in larger towns.
Sec. a CLARKSDALE to JACKSON, 157.6 m., US 49, 49W.
US 49 swings southward through the Delta and, until it meets the bluff
hills at Yazoo City, in a hundred miles gives a good presentation of the
new Delta and the old. The rapidly growing towns in the northern sec
tion have for the most part been established since 1900; many of the ex
tensive plantations lying between them are owned and operated by corpo
rations. Southward, the route traverses a section along the Yazoo River
TOUR 7 407
that is part of a land grant settled by Alvarez Fisk in the 1820*5. Here
along the river s bank and in the network of lakes that cut this country
into hundreds of small islands are a number of the Delta s oldest homes.
In these durable houses Jive descendants of the original landholders, grow
ing cotton on the same plantations their ancestors cleared more than 100
years ago. In the summer the Delta is first a great field of green plants,
then, after the bolls appear, a vast whiteness of cotton with the shapes of
Negro pickers silhouetted against it in bold relief. In the winter the land
lies sluggish, a rich black bog of unending flatness, while the rivers and
bayous rise to stand level with the levees. In early spring come the over
flows. Southeastward from Yazoo City US 49 crosses the hills that separate
the Pearl River valley from the Yazoo basin. The bluff country is studded
with shortleaf pine and hardwood trees, with the bottom lands cleared for
farming.
At CLARKSDALE, m. (173 alt., 10,043 PP-) * s * ne junction with
US 6 1 (see Tour 3, Sec. a).
The section S. between Clarksdale and Yazoo City is perhaps the most
uniform of the State, the scenery, the evenly spaced towns, and the social
and economic interests giving it the atmosphere of a large, friendly neigh
borhood.
MATTSON, 7.5 m. (163 alt., 200 pop.). De Soto s expedition passed
immediately S. of here, and Charlie s Trace cut directly through the center
of the village. Charlie s Trace, alleged to have been made by a Choctaw
Indian, was a short cut from Sunflower Landing on the Mississippi River
to a point in the hills 12 miles S. of Charleston, Miss. It was often the
route of the outlaws who marauded through this section in the early
iSoo s. An INDIAN MOUND in the center of the village is made con
spicuous by a small cemetery perched on top of it. The mound, said to
have contained approximately 50 burials, has been excavated by archeolo-
gists from the Smithsonian Institution and artifacts have been removed.
At TUTWILER, 75.8 m. (157 alt., 873 pop.), US 49 forks into US
49 W (R), which this route follows, and US 49E (see Side Tour 7 A).
Tutwiler is strung along Hobson Bayou in typical Delta fashion, the resi
dences on one side and the stores on the other. The bayous, which run
like veins through the Delta, are distinguishing marks upon a majority of
the towns and, with grassy banks accented by willow and cypress trees, are
spots of natural beauty. In the fall the cypress trees turn rusty red, giving
color to an otherwise somber scene. Tutwiler, like all Delta towns, is live
liest on Saturday, when people from outlying plantations come in to trade.
ROME, 20.7 m. (146 alt., 250 pop.), for all its grandiose name is a
plantation town. The daily train of the branch line of the Yazoo & Missis
sippi Valley R.R., stopping here to pick up hales of cotton and an occa
sional passenger, is known locally as the Yellow Dog, commemorating the
stray canine that used to chase the train through the village each time it
passed.
At PARCHMAN, 24.0 m. (140 alt., 250 pop.), is the MISSISSIPPI
PENAL FARM, a prison operated on an agricultural system. The farm is
a typical Delta plantation, consisting of 15,497 acres planted in cotton,
408 TOURS
corn, and truck, with cotton the leading crop. The prisoners, separated
into small groups, live in camps. The present (1937) number of prisoners
is 1,989. A brick yard, a machine shop, a gin, and a storage plant are op
erated by convict labor. The prison is self-supporting and operates at a
profit when the price of cotton is good. The "fifth Sunday" of months
that have more than four Sabbath days is visitors day, and it is then that
Parchman is best seen. A train called the Midnight Special brings the vis
itors to the farm, arriving about dawn and leaving at dusk. The Negro
prisoners have made up ballads about the train, which they sing and chant
while they work, waiting for fifth Sunday. One song is:
"Heah comes yo woman, a pardon in her han
Gonna say to de boss, I wants mah man,
Let the Midnight Special shine its light on me."
Between Parchman and Indianola the Delta s largest plantations are
concentrated. In late summer the fields are solid with white bolls ; in win
ter they are singularly colorless, the furrowed ground covered with the
previous year s cotton stalks. Against the encircling sweep of skyline are
blurred the bare branches of trees.
WHITNEY, 29.1 m. (26 pop.), is headquarters for the Gritman-
Barksdale plantation, owned and operated by a large Northern life insur
ance company. Divided into small tracts, the acreage of the plantation is
worked by tenants on the sharecropper system.
Cotton fields stretching out interminably for miles on both sides of the
highway are dotted with the tenants cabins, each with its small front
porch, a cistern, and a garden for growing vegetables, and each shaded
by a chinaberry tree or two. The furnishings are few, usually consisting
only of beds and chairs. When the families are large, the children often
sleep on pallets on the floor.
DREW, 31. 7 m. (136 alt, 1,373 PP-)> 1S a pleasant town typical of
the new Delta in its lack of provincialism. Drawing a wealthy planter
trade, the shops cater to expensive tastes for smart frocks, shoes, hats, and
the latest novelties. Restaurants offer a good cuisine. Drew citizens have
forgotten the roomy Southern Planter type of architecture to build com
pact English and Georgian Colonial cottages.
RULEVILLE, 37.7 m. (131 alt., 1,181 pop.), like Drew, draws a sub
stantial prosperity from the surrounding plantations. Here is a privately
supported Chinese school for the children of the few Chinese families
here and in Drew.
COTTONDALE, 40.2 m., is a group of neatly whitewashed tenant cab
ins clustered around a spreading, white frame plantation big house. The
plantation bell in the yard is typical of the Delta, being used to summon
hands from the fields. When rung its noisy clang is heard to the most re
mote corners of the plantation.
At 40.6 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road 0.9 m. to an EXPERIMENTAL VOCATIONAL SCHOOL
FOR NEGROES, established in 1914. The school consists of a one-story frame
administration building, a professor s home, a frame bungalow type dormitory for
faculty members and girl students, and 12 acres of land. Besides the regular voca-
TOUR 7 409
tional subjects, with emphasis on agriculture and home economics, the school of
fers a regular four year high school course. It is supported jointly by Federal and
county funds and has approximately 230 students.
At 42.1 in. is DODDSVILLE (124 alt., 317 pop.), a plantation center
for trading and shipping cotton.
Toward the S. the preponderance of Negroes is striking. About the
plantation stores a majority of the people are Negroes, and practically all
the tenant cabins are occupied by Negroes. The Negroes aged automobiles
and slow-moving mule teams furnish a large part of the traffic along the
highways.
At 50.4 m. is the village of SUNFLOWER (117 alt., 530 pop.). On
plantations in the vicinity perhaps more cotton is grown per acre than in
any other part of the State.
South of Sunflower the highway passes through a swamp fairly well
wooded with cypress, oak, and holly trees to cross Sunflower River at
36.8 m.
At .53.3 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road 0.6 m. to FAISONIA PLANTATION with a story-and-a-half
Georgian Colonial type cottage, unpretentious but roomy and gracious appearing.
A large veranda is screened against mosquitoes, and the house sits high on brick
pilings to protect it from Delta floods. About the house are many things that
make for comfortable plantation life shade of live oak, cedar, and pecan trees,
servants quarters, a carriage house (now used as a garage), fruit trees, and an
artesian well. The boat landing on the river is a reminder of the days when Sun
flower River was navigable and cotton was shipped downstream to New Orleans
by boats that came back laden with imported luxuries. The plantation was bought
by George W. Faison during the War between the States.
At 58 J m. on US 49W is the junction with US 82 (see Tour 6).
INDIANOLA, 59 m. (117 alt., 3,116 pop.), the county seat of Sun
flower on cypress-shaded Sunflower River, developed on a clearing made
near Indian Bayou in the late 1830*5. Ginning and compressing, along
with administering justice, are its chief businesses.
Between Indianoia and Inverness, "red cotton," a variety recently im
ported and grown with success in this area, adds color to the landscape.
INVERNESS, 67 m. (112 alt., 683 pop.), was named for the Scottish
city by a native who gave the railroad a right-of-way through her planta
tion. Though many plantation settlements had been made in the vicinity
much earlier, the town was not settled until 1904.
Right from Inverness on a graveled road to HOLLYWOOD. 2.2 m. (open by
permission), an early American ivth century type house built in 1855. It was
erected exclusively with slave labor, and bricks, puncheons, floors, walls, and
joists were hand-made. Logs used for walls arc- >o feet long and arc pinned to
gether with wooden pegs, the cracks being filled with sassafras blocks and plas
ter to make them airtight. The house sits upon a high ridge, and when built was
surrounded by a grove of holly trees. During the flood of iSS2 all the cattle of
the section were driven here for protection, and when hay gave- out the holly trees
were cut and fed to them. One of the owners of the house was killed in an up
stairs room by a Negro slave, and his ghost is alleged to haunt the house today.
Between Inverness and Yazoo City the highway penetrates the lake
country of the Delta. This is the rendezvous for fishermen and hunters
410 TOURS
throughout the State. In the labyrinth of streams game fish abound, and
even wild turkeys, deer, and foxes are in the dense woods along their
banks. Cotton fields still figure predominantly on the scene but, with the
usual gins and compresses, large sawmills show themselves in the towns.
At 71.2 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to the PRENTISS MOUND, 1.6 m., standing 20 feet high
and well wooded. Built by the Indians in prehistoric times, the mound was given
local fame when Seargent S. Prentiss addressed a group of Jackson lawyers from
its summit in 1841. The lawyers were on a bear hunting trip and Prentiss speech,
in a light vein, was said to be "not for publication."
At 73.7 m. the highway crosses LAKE DAWSON, a narrow winding
stream, its bank outlined by cypress trees. Fishing here is excellent.
ISOLA, 73 m. (107 alt., 519 pop.), on the banks of Lake Dawson, was
established in what was then a wilderness abounding in deer, wildcats,
foxes, turkeys, and bears. The name was given to suggest its remote loca
tion. Two years later a large sawmill was built on the banks of the lake
and as the country was gradually cleared other mills were established.
Lumbering gives the town its tone today.
The further S. the route goes, the more scenic it is, with frequent hard
wood forests breaking the monotony of featureless cotton fields, and rib
bons of lakes winding through the flat land.
BELZONI, 83.1 m. (124 alt., 2,735 PP-)> 1S a P art f tne section pur
chased by Alvarez Fisk in 1827. Fisk laid out streets, measured off lots,
named his town Fisk s Landing, and then waited for buyers to come,
amusing himself meanwhile hunting and fishing on his plantation. The
influx of settlers, however, was less than Fisk expected. At the time of the
War between the States only a dozen or more families had arrived at
Fisk s town, now called Belzoni in honor of the Italian archeologist, Gio
vanni Battista Belzoni, an acquaintance of Fisk s. When Grant was plan
ning the siege of Vicksburg, he sent a fleet of 19 gunboats up the
Yazoo River to open the way to that city. The boats gave out of fuel on
the way, and the Federal soldiers stopped at the squat log HOUSE OF
STEVE CASTLEMAN on the river, where they knocked down fences and
took them away to burn for fuel. The W. S. KNOTTS HOME, Jackson
St., faces the Yazoo River from the top of an Indian mound. The house
marks the original site of Fisk s Landing.
The Yazoo River parallels the route between Belzoni and Silver City.
In this section the watermarks on houses and trees tell the history of past
Delta floods. During high water in the spring, when the river overflows
its banks, a majority of the occupants of the cabins in the river flats "refu
gee" to the hills.
SILVER CITY, 89--? m. (361 pop.), is sprawled perilously close to the
banks of Silver Creek, but is protected from its high water by a steep
levee. Formerly the village was called Palmetto Home for the plantation
around which it grew. The first house was recently burned but pal
mettos growing luxuriantly around the marshes of the creek indicate why
it was so called. The /. PARASOTT HOUSE, on Silver Creek, is a dog
trot duplex. Two brothers built the house of logs in the 1850*5, separating
CULTIVATING A FIELD OF YOUNG COTTON
duplicate living quarters by a wide central hall. This hall has now been
enclosed, and the logs have been weatherboarded, but the design of the
house remains unchanged.
Between Silver City and Yazoo City the cotton fields fast lose them
selves in densely wooded swamps, the country becomes more sparsely set
tled, and the Yazoo River constantly appears and disappears (L). An oc
casional gloomy stretch of swampland, rank with cypress, palmettos, and
low thickets, and overshadowed with gray moss, gives a vivid conception
of the old Delta area before clearings were made and levees built.
MIDNIGHT, 94.1 in. (250 pop.), was born of a poker game played
beside a campfire in the dismal swamp here 50 or more years ago by a
party of hunters. One of the men laid claim to the land upon which they
had stopped, placing it as a bet. He lost. The winner, looking at his watch,
said, "Well, boys, it s midnight, and that s what I m going to call my
land." He settled here to build the first house upon the exact spot where
they had camped that night.
At 99.^ m. (R), visible from the highway, is an I \DI.-\\ MOU\ D.
It is especially conspicuous because of a plantation bell perched on its
summit.
South to Yazoo City the highway winds. Festooning moss drapes the
trees, making the woodlands perennially picturesque, while their density
makes them an excellent habitat for wild game.
As the highway crosses Yazoo River, 773.2 m., the Yazoo Bluffs, visi
ble in the foreground, give a striking contrast of Delta with hills.
412 TOURS
YAZOO CITY, 114.6 m. (120 alt., 5,579 pop.), offers a contrast of
Delta with bluffs, part of it being built on a low flat bordering the river,
and the other perched precipitously on steep hills above. The town was
established in 1824 as Hanan s Bluff, and for many years, with its boom
ing river trade, was a more important town than Jackson. It was incorpo
rated in 1830 as Manchester, in 1839 its name was changed to Yazoo
City. During the War between the States major battles and a great many
skirmishes took place on the river. At low-water periods the hulk of an
old gunboat sunk by the Federals is visible. In 1904 fire swept the town
and destroyed its ante-bellum homes and buildings. Rebuilt since that
time, Yazoo City is modern in appearance. During the flood of 1927, a
large Red Cross camp for refugees stood on the bluff above the river,
sheltering people from the vast inundated area in northwest Mississippi.
Yazoo City is the birthplace (1867) of Rear Admiral Thomas Pickett
Magruder, D.S.M., now retired from active service.
i. Left from Yazoo City on the Benton road to CEDAR GROVE PLANTA
TION, 11 m., home of John Sharp Williams (1854-1932), who was for many
years a leading figure in Mississippi politics. He served the State in the National
Senate for 25 years, where he became famous for his oratory and racy repartee. In
An Old Fashioned Senator, Harris Dickson has given a good characterization of
Williams. The house at Cedar Grove, a rambling story-and-a-half dwelling with
green shutters, red chimneys, and an entrance portico protected by a sloping shed
roof, was built in 1838 by John Sharp, grandfather of Senator Williams. Sharp
migrated from Tennessee, settling on a tract of 3,000 acres. Timbers for the house
were cut from the woodlands, hewn, mortised, and pinned together by hand. The
bricks were burned in a kiln on the place.
Originally the dining room and kitchen were separated from the main section,
and in wintry weather it was necessary to wear an overcoat to breakfast. In late
years the two parts of the house have been joined by a closed porch. A narrow
stair climbs crookedly to the bedchambers above. Here John Sharp used to sit,
shotgun in hand, guarding his sleeping wife and children from the Indians. His
fear of the Choctaw, however, was unfounded, for it was their boast that no white
person s blood was on their hands. The house sits in a deep cedar grove, and the
grounds are informally landscaped with old-fashioned flowers and shrubs. Near
the house in the family cemetery is the grave of Senator Williams.
2. Right from Yazoo City on State 3 is SATARTIA, 14-9 m. (97 alt., 139 pop.),
perhaps the oldest settlement in Yazoo Co. On the east bank of Yazoo River,
during the early iSoo s it was the shipping point from which the cotton of a
wide area moved by steamboat to New Orleans. The climax of its importance was
reached when General Grant sailed from Vicksburg on a gunboat and took the
town during the War between the States. Since that time, like most Mississippi
river towns, it has slowly receded in importance. Yet as long as the river curves
around its western boundary, the memory of a romantic bustling river trade will
endure. The WILSON HOME (open by appointment) is a two-story post-Colonial
type house, with dormer windows front and back and square-cut columns uphold
ing the front gallery. The house was built more than 100 years ago by Robert
Wilson, who had cypress boards sent by steamboat from St. Louis to be used in
its construction. Slaves on the plantation assisted a contractor in erecting the
house, and the ornamental plaster in the interior is their handiwork. During the
period of Grant s occupation of Satartia, the house was used as headquarters.
On the walls of upstairs rooms are messages scratched in the plastering by Fed
eral soldiers. Two of these are legible today: "How are you, Rebel ?" and "To
the owner of the house, your case is a hard one and I pity you." In spite of the
downstairs rooms having been under water to a depth of 9 feet in past floods the
house is in good repair.
TOUR 7 413
At 20.4 m. on State 3 is CHURCHILL DOWNS PLANTATION. The planta
tion house (open by appointment) was built by Dr. Bonney in 1830, when he
came from Kentucky to settle a tract of several thousand acres. It is similar to the
Wilson home in architecture, with dormers on the second story and square col
umns on the gallery. Poplar timber, mortised and pinned together, is used
throughout. Planking and weatherboarding were hand-sawed by the old whipsaw
method. Brick for foundations were burned in a kiln on the plantation. All work
was done by slaves. The place is named for the famous Kentucky racetrack, and
on the old brick chimney, now ivy-covered, both the name and date of erection
are scratched. During the War between the States jewelry, letters, and other val
uables belonging to the Bonney family were hidden on the grounds. The hiding
place has never been discovered.
South of Yazoo City the highway penetrates the bluff hills, where the
loess has produced a jungle-like growth of vines and Spanish moss; US 49
then traverses a pleasantly rolling prairie, which is a fairly old and fairly
prosperous truck farming belt.
FLORA, 737.6 m. (250 alt., 513 pop.), between the hills and the
prairie, retains something of its ante-bellum flavor in wide unpaved streets
and rambling old-fashioned homes. It is, as it always has been, a trading
center for outlying farms.
Left from railroad station in Flora 34 m. to junction with a graveled road;
R. here 0.6 m. to the BELLE KEARNEY HOME (open by permission). Set back
from the road in a grove of cedars, the two-story rectangular white frame house
has a double-decked gallery supported by six square columns across the front.
The capitals of the columns and the second floor gallery railing are hand carved.
The interior has four large square rooms on each side of a wide central hall. The
house was built in the early 1850*5 by Col. W. R. Kearney, whose daughter,
Belle, was associated with the prohibition and the woman suffrage movements.
She was State president of the W.C.T.U., and later was commissioned to go
around the world as a lecturer on temperance. In 1922 she was elected to the
State Senate, the first woman in Mississippi to receive this distinction.
At 737.8 m. is the junction with a narrow country road.
Right on this road to the PETRIFIED FOREST, 2.2 m. (open to public; free),
on a ridge extending eastward that has been worn into a series of hills. The logs
that give it its name project from a gully of ferruginous-sand and gravel in
which they are buried. They vary in length from 3 to 20 feet. It is estimated by
geologists that the logs became submerged during either the Pleistocene or near
the end of the Tertiary Period. As no roots are evident, it is believed that the
trees were swept into this region by prehistoric streams of great volume and vio
lence. The rugged logs are subdued orange in color.
POCAHONTAS, 742.6 m. (244 alt., 105 pop.), was named for the
daughter of Virginia s leading Indian chief. Here is an L\DIA.\
MOUND, rising 15 or 20 feet, that never has been excavated.
At 7.5.5. 4 m. US 49 enters on Bailey Ave. ; L. on Monument St.; R. on
N. Gallatin.
JACKSON, 7^7.6 m. (294 alt., 48,282 pop.) (see JACKSON).
Points of Interest. Old Cipitol, New Capitol, Livingston Park and Zoo, Hinds
County Courthouse, Millsaps College, Belhaven College, Battlefield Park ani
others.
Here are the junctions with US 80 (see Tour 2) and with US 51 (see
w 5).
Tour 5).
414 TOURS
Sec. b JACKSON to GULFPORT, 1594 m.
South of Jackson US 49 passes through the Piney Woods, a long
series of rolling red clay hills that were once covered with tremendous
growths of longleaf yellow pine, but are now scattered with new trees,
the skeletons of former mills, and mill towns. Near the southern end of
the route the highway descends to a low coastal plain, and the resort
section of the State.
East on South St.; R. on S. State; L. on Silas Brown St. in JACK
SON, m.
US 49 and US 80 run for a few miles through the center of a district
of taverns and night clubs that are almost hidden in the gloomy Pearl
River swamp. Fringing the swamp (L) is the State s largest gas pro
ducing field. In February 1930 the first well was brought in; the daily
output is 3,640,000,000 cu. ft. These wells furnish gas for Bogalusa,
La., Pensacola, Fla., and Mobile, Ala., as well as for many Mississippi
towns.
At 2.3 m. US 80 (see Tour 2) and US 49 separate; R. on US 49.
At 18.6 m. is STAR (414 alt., 350 pop.), a town at the northeastern
edge of the trucking belt. It was established in the late i88o s when the
Gulf & Ship Island R.R. was pushing its way up from the Coast.
PINEY WOODS SCHOOL, 22.2 m. (L), a nondenominational Chris
tian high school for colored boys and girls, was founded in 1909 by Laurence
Clifton Jones. Diversified farming and industrial arts are taught here,
i, 600 acres of land being used for experimental purposes. A side road
leads to the administration building (guides furnished ). The first build
ing owned by the school, an OLD LOG CABIN donated to the founders
when the school was established by a former slave, has been preserved
and is protected by a wire fence. Much of the work on later buildings
was done by students, who made the bricks and sawed the lumber by
hand. The Piney Woods Singers, the name by which the school glee club
is known, are famed for their rendition of Negro folksongs.
Between the school and the Coastal Meadow a few miles N. of Gulf-
port, US 49 shoots diagonally through the Piney Woods, a region of
uneven topography originally covered by an unbroken expanse of long-
leaf pine timber and extending over the southern half of Mississippi.
Until lumbering created fair sized towns in the wilderness, it was a
primitive country, and this it remains except in the towns. The pines
are still dense, and carpet the earth with pine needles in the few re
maining areas where lumbering has not destroyed the trees. The people
who settled here originally were uplanders, coming from Georgia and
the Carolinas with the great migration of 1815. They were an inde
pendent-spirited people, brought no slaves with them, and settled far
apart, clearing a few acres and building sturdy, compact log cabins.
They made their living by raising sheep and by cultivating patches of
potatoes and corn. After the War between the States, when the Gulf
& Ship Island R.R. opened the country to the lumber industry, the Piney
Woods became prosperous, then poor. Northern lumber companies bought
LONGLEAF PINES
416 TOURS
vast areas, and the farmers, forsaking even small-scale agriculture, went
to work in the lumber mills. The year 1911 saw the peak of lumbering;
360,000,000 feet of lumber were shipped from the harbor at Gulfport
(see GULFPORT). By 1930 the many widening acres of stripped timber
lands had been united. The trees that gave the section its name were,
for the most part, gone, and the great mills had closed their doors.
Today the area tells its own story in the denuded hills, in the boarded-up
ghost lumber towns, and in the gaunt, idle lumber mills; however, the
small farms, the occasional dairies, the naval stores plants, and the efforts
at reforestation offer evidences of reviving activity.
D LO, 29 .5 m. (290 alt., 514 pop.), is a quiet little lumber town.
Since the mill closed in 1930 there has been hardly more than a skeleton
of the town that supported a hospital, a school, several streets of stores,
and a great number of houses, all cut to a pattern. One story is that the
early French explorers called Strong River, along which the town lies,
de I eau (Fr., water) , and from their simple appellation, phonetically
spelled, the town took its name; probably a more accurate one is that
the name was chosen from a list submitted by the U. S. Post Office
Department.
MENDENHALL, 32 .1 m. (334 alt., 919 pop.), is the center of an old
farming community that has never been dependent upon the lumber
industry. Once a month a Community Day is held here; farmers from
a widespread area come together to take part in various contests. At the
hotel on Main St. meals are served on a REVOLVING TABLE, one of
the few left in the State.
SANATORIUM, 39.6 m. (200 pop.), is an unusually large State-
owned tuberculosis hospital (guides; 9-4 weekdays). The sanatorium is
in dry clean pinelands on a ridge, a spot well suited to the cure of the
disease. Both Negro and white patients are cared for here. The modern
fireproof buildings are in appearance rather like Southern Colonial homes.
A library, a moving picture theatre, and an auditorium provide enter
tainment for the patients, and the sanatorium publishes its own news
paper, which is edited by patients. Operated in connection with the
sanatorium, but separated from it, is a Preventorium for children under
twelve years of age who have been exposed to tuberculosis but have not
actually contracted it. Dr. Henry Boswell has been superintendent of the
sanatorium since its founding.
MAGEE, 42.1 m. (426 alt., 964 pop.), a substantial marketing town
for truck and poultry, has a history that goes back to the i82o s, when
the land in this section could be bought under the "Bit Act" for 121/2
cents an acre. In 1859 Richard Farthing, a Virginian and a tanner by
trade, came to Magee, then called Mangum in honor of Willie Mangum
who had built the first grist mill here, and built a log house and tan-
yard near Mangum s Mill. In less than five years, Farthing was doing
a thriving business. He contracted with the Confederate Government to
make shoes for the soldiers and hauled wagonloads of them to head
quarters himself. He became famous in south Mississippi not only for
TOUR 7 417
his army boots but for his red-top ones, which were kept for Sunday
wear by the purchasers. FARTHING S HOUSE, still in good repair, is
an excellent example of the stoutly built pioneer cabin. At the home
of Mrs. Mims Williams (open by anointment) is an unusually fine
COLLECTION OP WOVEN PIONEER PRODUCTS.
MOUNT OLIVE, 50.6 m. (325 alt., 812 pop.), takes its name from
an old Presbyterian Church built on a hill N. of the town. It is a town
gradually turning to farming after long dependence on lumbering.
South of Mount Olive the highway runs past a fairly good and fairly
well-populated truck-farming section, contrasting sharply with the cut-over
land immediately N. of Collins.
COLLINS, 60.7 ;;;. (274 alt., 935 pop.), stretches pleasantly along
the slopes of a steep hill, with a courthouse that dwarfs the town. The
town was wiped away in 1912 by a cyclone, but came to life again with
the development of the lumber industry. Several large mills, built during
the boom of the 1920*5, stand idle today. Like most county seats, it is
liveliest when court is in session. Virtually everyone in town attends the
sessions, and court week is the occasion for a general holiday.
Between Collins and Hattiesburg is a country of small farms, peach
orchards, and occasional areas with second-growth pine.
At 86.5 m. the highway crosses the northern boundary of the LEAF
RIVER FOREST RESERVE, a unit of the De Soto National Forest (see
Tour 8). The reserve has 180 miles of graveled roads and five fire obser
vation towers connected by 132 miles of telephone wires. The forest is
being developed into game preserves and recreation centers.
At 85.6 m. the highway crosses Leaf River.
HATTIESBURG, 88.2 m. (143 alt., 18,601 pop.), is a town whose
heart is in the noisy factory district from which rise the pungent odors
of turpentine and cut pine; the city s sedate cultural life revolves around
the campuses of two colleges. The community was established in the early
i88o s by Captain Hardy, pioneer lumberman of Mississippi, and named
for his wife. Unlike other towns of the longleaf pine belt, Hattiesburg
\\.is never wholly dependent upon the lumber industry for economic
security. At the time of the lumber boom of the early 1920*5, the city
was well established as a railroad center and had several major industrial
plants, which kept it from being affected appreciably by the period of
inflation and the subsequent crash. With timber practically exhausted,
Hattiesburg is following the trend of other New South cities in the
encouragement of diversified industries. Recently, in addition to naval
stores plants, several other factories have been established.
At 109 Walnut St. are the studios of WFOR (1370 kc.), radio station
owned and operated by the Forrest Broadcasting Co. (open).
MISSISSIPPI STATE TEACHERS COLLEGE, on State n, two and
a half miles from the center of town, is a fuhy accredited, State-supported
normal college, established by legislative act in 1910. On the grounds is
a KIRD SANCTUARY, comprising 800 acres. At the college audito
rium the week preceding Christmas the Vesper Choir presents Handel s
Mess/ab.
418 TOURS
MISSISSIPPI WOMAN S COLLEGE, on Tuscan St., one and one
half miles south of the business district, is a fully accredited, four-year
college, established in 1912 and supported by the Mississippi Baptist
Convention.
The PIONEER SILK MILL, NW. corner Edward and Tuscan Sts.
(guides; apply at office 8-4 weekdays), is the only mill in the State that
weaves cloth from raw silk. The low, squat mill with sides of glass
and with a sawtooth roof looks like a mammoth greenhouse. The im
mense room shimmers with the myriad rainbow colors of threads shuttling
back and forth in the looms. The bales of raw silk are received from
China; the soft and pliable raw material, which is either white or yellow,
arrives at the mill plaited into arm-length braids. Here it is soaked in
an oil-and-water preparation, then stretched, combed, and hung upon tall
shellacked poles in the mill to dry. After this treatment it has the feel
of fine, clean hair. The skeins go now to the throwing mill where "fugi
tive color" pink, lavender, green, blue, and yellow is given for tem
porary identification of the grades of silk ; this color remains in the threads
throughout the process of weaving, but it is washed out by the manu
facturer who eventually dyes and converts the woven cloth into wearing
apparel. The tinted skeins go to the winding department, where the
threads are wound on large bobbins similar to those of ordinary sewing
machines. Next the threads are made into warp and harnessed on the
looms, which make various types of cloth, such as crepe de Chine, geor
gette, flat crepe, and stocking crepe. Millions of vari-colored threads are
attached to a huge cylinder at the rear of each loom. As this cylinder
revolves, the threads unwind, passing through the loom where the
shuttles carry the filler in and out of the warp. The last process is the
cutting and grading of the cloth for shipment.
At Hattiesburg are the junctions with State 24 (see Tour 13) and
US ii (see Tour 8).
South of this point the country has an appearance of greater fertility.
Farms are larger and the economy of the land is evident in well-tended
orchards, beehives, barns, and silos. The carefully nurtured young pines,
in tracts fenced in by barbed wire, give the landscape a fresh greenness.
BROOKLYN, 109.1 m. (155 alt., 300 pop.), is the center of a dairy
ing, poultry, and truck-farming section. Here the South Mississippi Gun
and Dog Club holds its annual field trials in March.
ASHE NURSERY, 116.3 m. (L), is one of the agencies converting
thousands of acres of cut-over lands in the State into future revenue-
producing areas. This nursery, under the U. S. Department of Agricul
ture, operates with the aid of the Civilian Conservation Corps. The
principal species grown here are the four Southern pines longleaf, slash,
loblolly, and shortleaf. In addition, a million black locust trees are being
grown for planting to check soil erosion. The tiny trees are set out in
fenced plantations, each covering several thousand acres; it is the prac
tice of the Forest Service to clear the land of as much inflammable material
as possible before planting, by selling pine stumps and "topwood" for
turpentine distillation purposes. A system of fire breaks has been devel-
TOUR 7 419
oped by clearing lanes approximately 20 feet in width throughout the
plantations.
1 he nursery covers a total of 300 acres of land. At present 75 acres
are under cultivation. Although only 30,000,000 seedlings are now being
grown, the capacity is 50,000,000. More than six miles of water pipe-
are used in the irrigation system, which is of the overhead sprinkler
type. The seeds are extracted from pine cones collected in September and
October, dried for three weeks in the curing sheds and then run through
a kiln. After the cones open in the kiln, the seeds are extracted, cleaned,
and stored until planting time.
As the highway nears the Coastal Meadow, a low plain lying between
the Piney Woods and the Coast, the soil is increasingly sandy. Satsuma,
peach, and pecan trees, which thrive here, have been set out in hundreds
of acres of orchards. More and more the cut-over land is being used for
dairy farming in this area, and, with cattle and sheep nibbling grasses
in the rolling meadows, the landscape is becoming pastoral.
FRUITLAND PARK, 119.8 m. (304 alt., 64 pop.), takes its name
from the large number of surrounding pecan, tung, and fruit orchards.
Practically every man in the village is a nurseryman or fruit grower, and
in spring the homes are almost hidden behind the blossoms of the trees.
WIGGINS, 723.8 ;;;. (278 alt., 1,074 PP-)> 1S tne seat of Stone Co.,
which has the reputation of never having had a single slaveholder. It
is a village that sprang to life with the lumbering era. One of the largest
of the Mississippi mills was built here in 1919. When the mill had
consumed all timber in the surrounding country, the company purchased
redwood logs on the Pacific coast, shipping them by boat to Gulf port
and thence to Wiggins by rail. This practice was abandoned in 1930.
however, and the mill was closed. Recently a pickle factory, taking the
produce of a wide area, has been established. Annually in June a pickle
festival is held.
Left from Wiggins on State 26 to the DOLL S HOUSE, 1.5 m. (open l>y ap
pointment), the home of MISM.-S 1-mily and Marie Stapps, who are the authors of
a number of childrens books. The Cape Cod type cottage is named for the col
lection of 250 dolls that the sisters have on display. liach doll is authentically
dressed in the style of a different people. Interesting paintings and furniture are
in the house.
PERKINSTON, 128.9 m. (123 alt., 275 pop.), once the scene of
\.:st lumber and turpentine activities, is best known today for the State-
supported HARRISON-STONE-fACKSOX JUNIOR COLLEGE, estab
lished in 1925, a model institution of its kind. Approximately 2^0
students are boarded and housed here at a maximum cost of $17 each
per month, which includes tuition and laundry. The buildings are modern
fireproof structures.
At Perkinston the highway enters the Biloxi unit of DE SOTO NA
TIONAL FOREST, extending for several miles through an aisle of pines
The gloom of the dense woods, its majesty, and its clean odor, are a
reminder of what the Piney Woods formerly we- re.
Me HENRY, H-i.4 ;;/. (268 alt., 630 pop.), was incorporated as a
42O TOURS
town in 1902 to enable the inhabitants to rid themselves of seven flour
ishing saloons. The citizens could not outlaw these until the community
became a legal entity. In time lumber and turpentine mills were estab
lished, and now pecan and peach orchards supplement the livelihood
of the town.
As the road continues S. tung trees are seen in greater numbers, show
ing the increasing interest in this exotic tree, the culture of which began
recently in Pearl River Co. (see Tour 8).
SAUCIER, 139 m. (165 alt., 300 pop.), was settled by an exiled
French Acadian, Phillip Saucier, when the nearest town, Pass Christian,
was only a dot of a settlement. The homestead, erected by one of the Sauciers
sons on the present site of the town, is gone, but the large oak growing
there when he erected his house and the roses and crapemyrtle bushes
planted by his wife remain. The early Sauciers were prolific people and
their descendants are found throughout this section and along the Coast.
LYMAN, 150 m. (1,025 pop.), reached its peak of prosperity during
the lumber boom of the 1920 $ and since then has turned its attention
to growing citrus fruits and pecans. A few tung orchards have recently
been planted as experiments. The GEORGE A. SWAN FARM, on the
northern edge of town, was at one time the leading citrus farm of the
section.
Right from Lyman on a graveled road to RINGOLSKY FARM, 3.1 m. (visited by
permission of owner), formerly stump land and now a valuable tung orchard.
The first trees were planted in 1930 by the owner, I. J. Ringolsky. In 1934,
65,000 pounds of tung nuts were harvested. In addition both pecans and blue
berries are produced here in commercial quantities. On the farm is a packing
house for fruits and a warehouse in which equipment is stored.
US 90 enters on 25th Ave.
GULFPORT, 159 A m. (19 alt., 12,547 pop.) (see GULFPORT).
Points of Interest. Harbor, U. S. Veterans Facility, Hardy Monument, and others.
Here is the junction with US 90 (see Tour 1).
-B-
Side Tour 7 A
Tutwiler Greenwood Lexington Pickens. US 49?., State 12.
Tutwiler to Pickens, 98.2 m.
Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R.R. parallels route to Tchula.
Paved highway to Greenwood; remainder under construction.
Accommodations in towns.
US 49E, branching southward from US 49W at Tutwiler, follows the
eastern rim of the Delta to Tchula. At Tchula the route swings eastward
TOUR yA 421
to climb from the Delta into one of the oldest settled sections of the Cen
tral Hills and to end at Pickens. The Delta is flat and black, with numer
ous lakes and bayous ; it is a cotton land divided into extensive plantations
and cultivated by the labor of Negro tenants. The hill country is the
stronghold of the small farm owner and of numerous though small saw
mill interests. Here diversification has made headway in its fight against
King Cotton, with dairying and cover crops becoming a part of every farm.
At TUTWILER, m. (157 alt., 873 pop.) (see Tour 7, Sec. a), is the
junction with US 49 W (see Tour 7, Sec. a).
SUMNER, 5 m. (618 pop.), is divided by CASSIDY BAYOU. The
bayou, the longest in the State, has its ghost. At intervals for 25 years the
ghost has appeared at the home of Boone Jenkins, a farmer living one
mile N. of Sumner. Each appearance is accompanied by weird voices and
the shriek of a woman. Persons who have followed the voice say that it
leads to the bayou and, in some instances, to the Indian mounds in the vi
cinity ; the mystery of the Cassidy ghost has never been solved.
WEBB, 7 ;/;. (153 alt., 531 pop.), is the twin of Sumner, the interests
of the two towns being almost inseparable. On the old highway between
the two are a cotton mill and cemetery shared by both.
Left from Webb on a graveled road to TALLAHA SPRINGS, 3 m. (overnight
accommodations, boating, fishing, hiking).
At SWAN LAKE, 70.3 m. (147 alt., 100 pop.), a low, white frame
plantation house (R) is typical of the modern Mississippi planter home.
Left from Swan Lake on a dirt road to the STATON HOUSE, 2 m., a. typical
ante-bellum plantation home, built with slave labor in the latter part of the
i82o s by Eli Staton and given to his eldest son, James Harvey Staton. It is of
the story-and-a-half post-Colonial type, with wide white clapboarded walls, two
chimneys at each end, and a small square portico. The house faces a levee built
before 1830; in the Negro quarters near the house is the first Staton home, a
squat log structure.
South of Swan Lake there are 10 Negro cabins to every white cabin,
and Negro schools, churches, and cemeteries predominate. Scantily clad
children play in the cabin yards, men and women fish on the banks of
bayous and lakes and in late summer pick the cotton.
Negroes make almost a ritual of the cotton picking. They stoop before
the plants, pull the white seedy cotton from the bolls, and place it in long
white sacks, which they trail behind them. Each movement is graceful and
rhythmic, and is often performed to the accompaniment of song. These
cotton-picking songs are rarely sung in chorus, but rather as a number of
harmonizing solos. The tune varies from a minor note of despair to a tri
umphant major:
"Old Massa say, Pick Dat Cotton! (oratorical tone)
Can t pick cotton, Massa (whining tone)
Cotton seed am rotten! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
MINTER CITY, 23.8 m. (350 pop.), was settled when Delta land was
selling for 25^ an acre. The /. A. TO\l"i\ES HOME, the oldest in the
county, on the western bank of Tallahatchie River, is a log house built
near the ground with a breezy open hall.
422 TOURS
At 3.5 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to SHELLMOUND, OJ m. (75 pop.), the site of a battle be
tween the Chakchiuma and allied Choctaw and Chickasaw. Legend says the battle
gave the Yazoo (Ind., river of death) River its name.
At 39-2 m. is the junction with US 82 (see Tour 6).
US 49E turns R. on Grand Blvd. which crosses the river and becomes
Fulton St.
GREENWOOD, 43 m. (143 alt, 11,123 pop.) (see GREENWOOD).
Points of Interest. Cotton gins and compresses, Terry collection of old relics, and
others.
Right from Greenwood on Grand Blvd., here old US 82, to the WRECK OF
THE STAR OF THE WEST, 2.4 m., visible in Tallahatchie River when the
water is low. The ship was scuttled at Fort Pemberton during the War between
the States to block the channel and prevent passage of Federals in their effort to
get to the north side of Vicksburg. It was captured at Sabine Pass by General
Van Dorn without a shot being fired; the officers and crew were ashore on a
frolic. General Van Dorn, singularly enough, was in charge of a cavalry detach
ment at the time. On the same road is the SITE OF FORT PEMBERTON, 3.2
m., marked by a cannon. This fort was thrown across a narrow neck of land sep
arating the Yazoo and Tallahatchie Rivers and delayed considerably the fall of
Vicksburg. Confederate soldiers, not knowing the war was over, manned the fort
for two months after peace was signed.
The route continues on Fulton St. ; R. on Henry St. ; L. on Mississippi
Ave. (US 49E).
At 50.8 m. (R) is ARCHERLEADER PLANTATION (private), a
two-story white frame house with one of the best collections of fine old
furnishings in the State; these were brought from Anchuka, the ancestral
home of the Archer family (see Tour 3, Sec. b). This plantation has some
of the better type tenant cabins of the Delta. Three and four rooms large,
they are painted white with green trim.
Between Archerleader and Tchula the bluff hills are visible (L), contrast
ing sharply with the low, wide Delta horizon.
TCHULA, 67.8 m. (130 alt., 907 pop.), is divided by Tchula Lake.
The lake at one time was navigable, being known as Little River, and was
the shipping point for an abundance of cotton. Though no longer used
for river traffic, the lake now gives the town commercial importance in
that it abounds in catfish. Thousands of pounds of fish are caught annually
and marketed in neighboring towns or shipped to distant markets. Boats,
with Negroes to paddle them, are available for 25^ an hour, and in the
vicinity are numerous camping sites equipped with cabins.
At Tchula is the junction with State 12. The route continues southeast
ward on State 12, climbing from the lakes and bayous of the Delta into
the bluff hills that mark the central part of the State.
LEXINGTON, 80.8 m. (209 alt, 2,590 pop.), the seat of Holmes
Co., is one of the older towns of the Central Hills. Established as a trad
ing post immediately after the Treaty of Doak s Stand, Lexington was in
corporated on Feb. 25, 1836, and in 1906 was raised to the status of a
city. Though a trading center for the surrounding farm country, shipping
TOUR 8 423
12,000 bales of cotton and 300,000 pounds of butter annually, Lexington
is largely dependent on the lumber and the sand and gravel industries.
Left from Lexington on the old road to Emory to the /. H. ROGERS HOME,
8 m. (open by permission), a large rambling two-story house built by Col. J. H.
Rogers in 1817. The construction of the house, built of hand-hewn lumber, was
planned and supervised by Kirl Dixon, a Negro slave. Divided by a wide hall,
open at each end, the house contains five bedrooms, a dining room, and a kitchen.
The house, like the farm land surrounding it, has been in the possession of the
Rogers family since its erection. Strangely, neither land nor house has ever
been mortgaged.
The route between Lexington and Pickens passes through low-rolling
hill lands, where small sawmilling interests supplement the incomes from
small diversified farms of cotton and corn, and dairying.
At 5)6.6 m. is the junction with US 51 (see Tour 5, Sec. a), 1.6 miles
N. of Pickens (see Tour 5, Sec. a).
Tour 8
(Livingston, Ala.) Meridian Laurel Hattiesburg Picayune Santa Rosa (New
Orleans, La.). US n.
Alabama Line to Louisiana Line, 181.9 m.
Highway two lanes wide; three-fourths paved.
New Orleans & Northeastern R.R. parallels route throughout.
Accommodations chiefly in cities.
US ii runs diagonally across the southeastern corner of the State
through the swelling ridges and red clay hills of east central Mississippi ;
through cut-over lands of the Piney Woods; and at the southern end
across a small part of the Coastal Meadow. In the vicinity of Meridian
great hills with unbroken forests of longleaf pines crowd to the edge of
the highway. Then, almost abruptly, the route breaks from the forest into
country where for some years the shrill cry of the circular saw against pine
was heard until the larger mills had snaked their last virgin logs and
moved to more profitable areas. The towns and cities that they so extrava
gantly sired remain lean as starved ghosts, some hopelessly depending on
denuded lands, others, on the preparation of a limited quantity of naval
stores until newly planted pines mature.
Southwest of Laurel and Hattiesburg the people have realistically faced
the problem of cut-over pines, finding an answer in other products. Here,
on low swells once dominated by the pines, are orchards of pecan, tung,
and satsuma trees in long, regular, parallel rows. Between Poplarville and
Picayune is a concentrated area of tung trees, where in the spring, when
the waxy white blossoms stretch mile after mile, the landscape resembles
SECOND-GROWTH PINES
a Chinese countryside rather than southern Mississippi. At the southern
end of the route the land drops noticeably into the flat, marshy meadow
bordering the Coast, and the air suddenly is heavy and damp with a salty
smell. Meadow land and orchards give way to rank and moss-hung oaks.
TOUR 8 425
Crossing the Mississippi Line, m., 21 miles SW. of Livingston, Ala.,
US ii and US 80 (see Tour 2) are united to Meridian (see Tour 2).
US ii follows B St. to 26th Ave.
MERIDIAN, 19.1 m. (341 alt., 31,954 pop.) (see MERIDIAN).
Points of Interest. Industrial plants, Gypsy Queen s Grave, Arboretum, and others.
Here are the junctions with US 45 (see Tour 4), State 39 (see Side
Tour 4B), and US 80 (see Tour 2).
The route continues on 26th Ave. to 6th St. ; L. on 6th St. ; R. on 5th
St. (US ii).
For 10 miles S. of Meridian US ii is paved, cutting between steep
embankments of solid, creamy rock. This rock is used extensively in the
vicinity for building purposes, with pleasing effects, as ROCK HOUSE,
a tavern, 20.3 m. (R), illustrates. Paralleling the route (L), undulating
humps of ridges, western foothills of the Appalachians, are clearly visible.
At 20.8 m. is KEY AVIATION FIELD, where Fred and Al Key, on
June 27, 1935, broke the official world s endurance flight record set at
Chicago in 1930. After 653 hours and 34 minutes aloft in their mono
plane, "Ole Miss," the Key brothers landed here. In breaking the record
the Keys flew more than 50,000 miles and made 75 refueling contacts.
The route curves into BASIC, 31.2 m. (65 pop.), a railroad stop in the
pine woods, with a single store and a number or comfortable white frame
houses.
At 34.5 m. is ENTERPRISE (258 alt., 792 pop.), its age revealed in
gnarled clumps of cedars that formerly shaded houses that were burned
during the War between the States. The low brick PRESBYTERIAN
CHURCH (L) was used as a hospital for wounded Confederate soldiers.
Enterprise s history began in the days when the muddy Chickasawhay
River was navigable and boats would come up from Mobile. Then its
lively river trade gave the town the energy ana means to live up to the
promise of its name; today it is quiet, with a single block of one-story
buildings and two small depots, one at each end of town, a center for farm
trading and shipping.
1. Right from Enterprise on a narrow country road that is impassable in rainy
weather to DUNN S FALLS, 3.2 m., formed by a spillway into Chunky River.
Chunky River at this point is about 100 feet wide, its shallow bed lined with
sharp stones. The water from the spillway drops about 45 feet over a rock wall,
and at certain seasons of the year the cascade is picturesquely striking. At other
times the water dwindles to a thin stream. Approximately 100 yards below the
falls the river is deeper, forming an excellent swimming hole. An OLD WATER
MILL at the falls is used as. a dressing room for bathers.
2. Left from Enterprise on a graveled road is STONEWALL, 3.7 m. (2,048
pop.), dominated by a COTTON TEXTILE MILL that rises giantlike above rows
of low mill houses. The mill (visitors permitted) is one of the largest in the
State.
Between Enterprise and Pachuta the pines gradually thin along the
ruined slopes, giving way to hill farms producing corn and potatoes as
the principal crops. The red clay soil is infertile and hard, and the primi
tive farmhouses, often no more than one-room cabins with mud-chinked
chimneys, are indicative of the poverty of the section. The people who first
426 TOURS
settled here brought no slaves with them, and even today the absence of
Negroes is noticeable.
PACHUTA, 44.1 m. (267 alt., 338 pop.), has a railroad station, and a
sawmill and a number of modern cottages to stamp it as a 2oth century
village.
Right from Pachuta on a narrow country road that is impassable in rainy weather
is PAULDING, 10 m. (155 pop.). One long red clay street, forming an aisle
between immense live oaks, an ante-bellum home or two, a loo-year-old church,
and a jail are all that remain of the town once called the "Queen City of the
East." English pioneers of hardy yeoman stock settled here soon after the War of
1812 and by determined effort cut a town out of the wilderness. They built the
courthouse with their own hands, digging the clay for bricks from the gully (L)
at the entrance to the village, and baking the bricks in improvised kilns. When
completed, it stood as fiery red as the soil of the gullies, and, according to James
H. Street, was the only two-story building at that time between New Orleans and
Chattanooga.
In spite of the sterility of the soil the settlers before the War between the States
achieved sporadic wealth and a culture unusual in the Piney Woods. During
court week especially the town sparkled. Every other activity was suspended.
Aristocratic family carriages, stylish buggies, light sulkies, and battered farm
wagons crowded the long shady street. Women wore their richest gowns and gay
est plumes, the planters their fanciest waistcoats. But the lawyers held the center
of the stage. Driving into Paulding in elegant carriages with Negro attendants,
they attracted all eyes. The girls coquetted with them, and the youths imitated
their mannerisms while noting the color of ties and the cut of waistcoats. Paul-
ding of this ante-bellum period was a metropolis, its main street flanked with
store buildings, its homes white frame mansions with comfortable slave quarters.
Reconstruction, however, devastated it; and so deep were the scars left that, when
the States were called upon to vote on the i3th Amendment, the Paulding dele
gation held out staunchly against ratification. To this day, because of their firm
ness, Mississippi has never ratified the Constitutional Amendment freeing the
slaves.
Soon after Reconstruction it was proposed to build a railroad through Paulding,
but Jasper Co. refused to pay the necessary tax and Paulding was too enfeebled
to protest. Several years later its last remnant of prestige vanished when the
county was divided into two districts and a new courthouse built at Bay Springs.
The DEAVOURS HOUSE (R) is now used as a home for Paulding school
teachers. It is a story-and-a-half cottage, with four dormers and a square columned
front portico. The ell was added after the house was built nearly 100 years ago.
For many years this was the home of the Deavours family, many members of
which have been admitted to the Mississippi bar.
Beyond the Deavours home is the ORIGINAL PAULDING JAIL (L), built at
the same time as the courthouse and still in use.
Beyond the jail is the CATHOLIC CHURCH (R), more than 100 years old.
This is a simple white frame structure, with a peaked roof and a spire. When
the men of Paulding went off to fight in the War between the States, their wives
visited with the women of Rose Hill, an Irish settlement, several miles N. It is
said that when the men returned they found their wives converted to Catholicism,
and since that time the population has been largely Catholic. The church is kept
in good repair and mass is said here weekly.
The hills here S. of Pachuta become steep, stretching sheerly down to
the highway, their slopes covered with a uniform expanse of seedling
pines.
STAFFORD SPRINGS, 54.0 m. (50 pop.), is one of the State s best
TOUR 8 427
known mineral springs. Before the coming of the white man, the Indians
resorted here regularly to drink what they called bok-humma (Ind., red
water). The rambling gray frame hotel (open April through Sept.) re
flects the orange of the hills in its sloping roof.
Between Stafford Springs and Laurel US n traverses a land where
farmers work hard, tilling unpromising soil. Here no acreage of any size
is under cultivation, and not much farming is done commercially. The
yield of beans, potatoes, and corn, however, is fair and the houses are
painted and have a solid look.
SANDERSVILLE, 65 m. (281 alt., 565 pop.), was settled by a group
of Scotchmen who migrated from North Carolina and built the Good
Hope Presbyterian Church in the 1820*5. The town was named Sanders-
ville in 1855 to honor one of its pioneer families, the Sanders. The houses
lu\e a noticeable number of cupolas, a survival of the Victorian period.
The ED PARKER HOME, at the northern entrance (R), is the only
remaining ante-bellum home, a roomy red-painted structure, with many
cupolas and comfortable porches.
Right from Sandersville on a graveled road to BOGUE HOMO INDIAN
SCHOOL AND RESERVATION, 3.1 m. The school has been under Govern
ment supervision since its establishment in 1922. Dotted on a hillside are about
50 white cabins, a miniature frame church, and the school. In addition to farm
ing the Indians weave baskets, which they sell on the streets of Sandersville,
usually on Saturdays. The Indians wear ordinary modern clothes, but are recog
nizable by their dark skin, long braided hair, and childlike shyness.
Southward is typical cut-over land. Here and there second-growth pines
rise stragglingly above the miles of waste land, with, almost miraculously,
an occasional tall perfect virgin pine.
US ii follows Cook s Ave., which becomes i5th St., to Magnolia St.
LAUREL, 74 m. (243 alt., 18,017 pop.) (see LAUREL).
Points of Interest. Masonite Corporation, starch plant, canning plant, art museum,
and others.
Here are the junctions with US 84 (see Tour 11) and State 15 (see
Tour 12).
The route continues on Magnolia St. ; L. on Central St. ; R. on Ellisville
Blvd. (US ii).
US 1 1 is a concrete tie between Laurel and Hattiesburg whose interests
have been the same. Poultry and dairy farms appear along the route, and
small forests of second-growth timber, set out and carefully protected by
the Civilian Conservation Corps.
ELLISVILLE, / m. (240 alt., 2,127 pop.), is one of the Pincy Woods
oldest villages. As the seat of Jones Co., a unit notable for the individual
ism of its citizens, the village had a stormy political history. In 1861,
when the State was suddenly confronted with the problem of secession,
the backwoodsmen of the county, who owned no slaves themselves, met in
the Ellisville courthouse to voice their protest against what they called a
"planters war." They elected an anti-secessionist candidate to the State
convention at Jackson, but the candidate, mingling with the soft-voiced
428 TOURS
planters at the capital, became confused and betrayed his electorate by
voting with their opponents.
The citizens of Jones Co. gathered once more in Ellisville, this time to
express their contempt for the candidate by burning him in effigy. They
called their county the "Free State of Jones" with Ellisville its capital, and
so staunchly did they hold out against war that Newt Knight (see Tour
11) was able to organize a band of followers and declare war upon the
Confederate States of America. Operating from hide-outs in the Leaf
River swamps fringing Ellisville, Knight and his men made raids upon
Confederate troops and seized arsenals and supplies. The Confederacy
sent General Lowry and his troops against Knight, but without success.
Until the end of the war Knight carried on guerrilla warfare against the
secessionists. After the war Ellisville resented the sobriquet given the
county and petitioned the State legislature of 1865 to change the county
name to Davis and that of the county seat to Leesburg, "hoping to
begin a new history and obliterate the past."
At Ellisville is JONES CO. JUNIOR COLLEGE, coeducational insti
tution established in 1927. Its 1936-37 enrollment (481) was the largest
of the eleven State-supported junior colleges. On a rolling campus land
scaped with water oaks, cedars, and shrubs, its three modern brick build
ings overlook the southwestern edge of the town.
The ISAAC ANDERSON HOME is a substantial white frame struc
ture overlooking Tallahala Creek. In the dining room of this house Capt.
Amos McLemore, sent with a corps to round up Knight and his followers,
was himself killed by Knight. Blood stains alleged to be McLemore s
remain on the planked pine floor today.
ELLISVILLE STATE SCHOOL, 86 m. (R), was established in 1920
as a hospital and training school for the feeble-minded. The present en
rollment is 300. The institution has a farm, dairy, and fruit orchard where
male patients capable of working find occupation. Female patients work
in the kitchen and laundry.
Descending gradually into the Leaf River swamp, the highway flat
tens and crosses marshes where shiny-leafed bay trees are noticeable
among the pines.
ESTABUTCHIE, 95 m. (445 pop.), with its boxlike houses of pine
timber, is a typical lumber mill town whose activity has decreased with
the exhaustion of the timber.
The highway crosses Leaf River into the suburbs of HATTIESBURG,
103.2 m. (143 alt., 18,601 pop.) (see Tour 7, Sec. b). Here are the junc
tions with US 49 (see Tour 7, Sec. b) and State 24 (see Tour 13).
At 110.4 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to the SITE OF THE SULLIVAN-KILRAIN FIGHT, 3.7 m.
Here in a natural bowl below the spot where the road ends in a clump of trees,
in 1889 John L. Sullivan met Jake Kilrain in what was the last bare-knuckle
championship bout in American pugilism. The spectators, a mere handful, sat on
the ground and watched the two men battle for 75 rounds, before Sullivan was
declared the winner A hen Kilrain s seconds threw in a towel, although their man
was still on his feet and apparently able to go on.
TOUR 8 429
Sportsmen had tried to arrange the bout in New Orleans, but city officials barred
Marl ic Kith, in New Orleans at the time, told the promoters of a natural am
phitheater near his home town Hattiesburg. When the Governor of Mississippi
learned that a secret and illegal contest was to he held in the State, he summoned
the militia to guard all main highways and to watch incoming trains. Hut pro
moters slipped Sullivan and Kilrain into Mississippi, threw up a ring in the mid
dle of the clearing, sold tickets for Sio apiece, and proceeded to hold the match.
After the fight Sullivan and Kilrain, as well as the sportsmen who promoted the
bout, were arrested, carried to Purvis, and fined.
Between Hattiesburg and Purvis the hills increase in size, and the soil
shows a faint reddish tinge.
It has been said that PURVIS, 123.4 m. (363 alt., 881 pop.), is good
for an hour s conversation on any front porch in the State. Near the
turn of the century the town was thought by the preachers and reformers
of the State to be headed for doom. They thundered from pulpit and
platform about its gambling and drinking, prophesying its downfall.
Then in April 1908 a cyclone came. It swept upward from the Gulf
Coast, struck the town, killed seven people, injured several hundred, and
stopped the hands of the courthouse clock at exactly 4 p.m. Half the
State and all of Purvis felt assured the prophecy of the preachers had
been fulfilled, and, lest the townspeople forget, the hands of the clock
have remained at 4 p.m. ever since.
Two years after the cyclone Will Purvis, a relative of the Purvis who
founded the town, brought it again into State-wide prominence. Purvis
was sentenced to hang for murder, though he stoutly attested, and a large
part of the State believed, his innocence. On the appointed day throngs
of people poured into Columbia, where the hanging was to take place,
ana watched the noose being slipped around his neck. The trap was
sprung, but in place of seeing Purvis dangling at the rope s end, the
spectators saw the rope slip suddenly from around his neck. Someone
excitedly shouted that it was an act of God, and the State joined in
the chorus.
But what to do with Purvis was a problem. The State judges said he
had been sentenced to hang and hang he should; the people said a
miracle had proved his innocence. After much debating, a political cam
paign, and the election of a new State Governor, a compromise solution
was reached in the commutation of his sentence to life imprisonment.
Purvis served 15 years at the State farm; then another man, dying from
the poison of a snake he had allowed to bite him to prove his sancti-
fication and immunity from death, confessed to the crime, and Purvis
was released, restored to full citizenship, and paid $5,000 for his in
conveniences. Today he is a respectable farmer living on the edge of
town; the scars left by the noose remain on his neck.
At 126 m. the highway crosses the northern boundary of the Leaf
River unit of the DE SOTO NATIONAL FOREST, a dense beautiful
growth of pine, carefully protected from fire by lookout towers ( see Tour
7, Sec. b). The route begins to nose into the State s chief pecan-growing
section. Long rows of symmetrical, broad-limbed trees become a familiar
GATHERING PECANS
sight. Growing in low evergreen clumps, satsuma trees are often planted
beneath the pecan trees spreading branches, making not only an at
tractive scene but also a profitable twin crop for the farmer. The BASS
PECAN ORCHARD, 132.6 m. (R), is unusually large; the "Bass
Special," a slender papershell nut, is well known in pecan markets.
LUMBERTON, 1334 m. (260 alt., 2,374 PP-)> sti11 retains its mill
town appearance, though the industry that gave it its name is gone. Its
pleasantly shaded streets are lined with rows of one-style mill houses;
the large white frame HINTON HOME, residence of the former mill
owner, is the show place. Lumberton was established, along with Pica
yune and Poplarville, in the early i88o s when the New Orleans &
Northeastern R.R. opened up the Piney Woods and ruined the declining
older mill towns on Pearl River.
South of Lumberton are occasional, squat, dome-shaped tung trees,
planted experimentally with the pecans and satsumas.
The RANDOLPH BATSON HOME, 139 m., in a magnificent tract
of virgin trees, is a good example of the mansions built by lumber mag
nates during the 1920 boom.
POPLARVILLE, 146.3 m. (315 alt., 1,498 pop.), is a former saw
mill town now concentrating its energies on tung-tree culture and the
production of naval stores. Here is PEARL RIVER JUNIOR COLLEGE,
the first State-supported junior college in Mississippi, established in 1922.
TOUR 8 431
It was formerly the Pearl River Agricultural High School, the first in
the State, established in 1909. The home of Sen. Theodore G. Bilbo
(1877- ), Poplarville finds its chief diversion in helping to elect this
favorite son to whatever office he happens to seek. Before being elected
to his present office in 1934, he served as State Senator, as Lieutenant
Governor, and twice as Governor of the State. As champion of the com
mon man, Senator Bilbo wears a red necktie and espouses the cause of
the people in a drawling vernacular.
Left from Poplarville on a graveled road to Senator Bilbo s DREAM HOUSE,
6m. (L), in a large pecan orchard. The house gained both name and fame from
the language of its colorful owner. This four-story red brick mansion with dor
mers and two-story pedimented portico was built largely by contributions from
friends throughout the State and was opened with a housewarming in December
1935. The entrances have fanlights and side lights. There is a porte-cochere on
one side and a sun parlor and sleeping porch on the other. Nearly opposite the
house and of the same architectural style is the JUNIPER GROVE BAPTIST
CHURCH, 6.5 m., built by the Senator and his friends. The Senator was at one
time a Baptist minister. The church is supported by the people of Juniper Grove
neighborhood.
Between Poplarville and Picayune lies Mississippi s "tung-oil frontier,"
with Picayune the tung tree capital. This important new crop was intro
duced largely through the intense enthusiasm of Lamont Rowlands. Row
lands, a lifetime lumberman, sold his sawmill interest after the decline
of the lumber industry in the latter 1920 $ and turned his attention to
developing the cut-over timberland of the section into tung orchards.
Shortly before this time, as a result of the destruction of some of the best
tung plantations in China, the oil of the tung nut was scarce and prices
had risen. Tung oil has many uses, the most important of which is in
the manufacture of paint; the hulls of the nut are used as fertilizer.
Rowlands saw that it was a product in great demand, and of limited
supply.
Before putting out a tree or buying a foot of land, he hired a horti
culturist and agronomist, spending a year in investigating tung culture.
It was found that these highlands back of Pearl River met all necessary
conditions, having sufficient rainfall, acid soil, clay subsoil, a temperate
range, and good drainage. Moreover it was found that fertilization \\us
unnecessary, which greatly reduces the cost of growing. Rowlands then
purchased 10,000 acres of land, which he planted with tung trees. Fol
lowing in the wake of Rowlands other business men bought suitable
land, and today in this concentrated area are an estimated 100,000 acres
of tung orchards. The name of these trees (Chin., heart) is derived from
the heart-shaped leaves, which resemble those of the catalpa. The tree
is deciduous, shedding its leaves in October and leafing in March. The
well- shaped white blossoms, which appear before the leaves, have deeply
accented red centers. The flowers are staminate or pistillate (male or
female), both appearing on one tree, and are formed at the tips of
the branches of the preceding season. The fruit varies somewhat in size
but the average is about that of a small apple. The kernel, which is
very rich in oil content, is poisonous. Maturing early in autumn, the
432 TOURS
fruit drops to the ground and remains for weeks without deterioration.
The trees flank the highway for miles and even in winter, when the
branches are bare and sprawling, they have exotic beauty.
At 1 61. 3 m. is the McNEILL EXPERIMENT STATION, operated
by the Federal Government to examine the problem of developing cut-
over land for agricultural use.
The naval stores activities are increasingly apparent in this area. Inter
spersed with the tung orchards are young forests of pines from which
turpentine is extracted. During tapping season the oil that exudes fills
the countryside with a sharp clean odor. Great trucks loaded high with
pine knots and stumps, on their way to the naval stores plants at Laurel
and Hattiesburg, are constantly encountered on the highway.
PICAYUNE, 171.3 m. (50 alt., 4,698 pop.), now the tung tree center,
is beginning to regain the wealth and prestige it attained during the
lumber boom of the 1920*5 when the Crosby mill operated at full capac
ity and virtually every one in town was in some way connected with the
plant.
Col. L. O. Crosby, the mill owner, was one of the early developers of
the lumber industry of southern Mississippi. He operated the largest tung
tree plantation in the State.
ROWLANDS TUNG MILL (visitors permitted), on Rowlands planta
tion, is the fourth to be erected in the United States, and is the largest
and most modern. The galvanized steel structure has storage and drying
bins at one end. These bins having slotted floors and walls to facilitate
the flow of air, are banked along the sides of a narrow passageway, the
floor of which slopes to a foot-wide slot in the middle. Along the bot
tom of this slot runs a conveyor belt. The tung nuts are shoveled out of
the bins into the alleyway and rolled onto the traveling belt, which car
ries them to a hopper from which a conveyor raises them above a hulling
machine. Here a thick husk, enclosing the nut, is torn off. The nut meats
emerge at the bottom, and the husks are blown out through a long pipe
to a pile where they are loaded into wagons to be carried back to the
orchard and spread around the trees as fertilizer.
The nut meats, again carried aloft, are dumped into a grinder and then
into tanks, where they are heated. The meal is then fed into an expeller,
which squeezes the hot meal with tremendous pressure forcing the oil out,
to dribble into receiving troughs. The residue is also collected and used
as fertilizer.
The oil is piped into a filter press, where dirt and impurities are
strained out, and then is run into containers for shipment. Samples of oil
from the Rowlands plant have been tested and adjudged the purest ever
banks of Hobolochitto River is the HERMITAGE, former
home of Eliza Jane Poitevent, pioneer newspaper woman. A sturdy white
frame ante-bellum structure, the house was first occupied by Colonel
Poitevent, the builder, and then by his daughter, Eliza. Speaking of Eliza
Poitevent in her book Ladies of the Press, Ishbel Ross says that she
refused to appease her snobbish family, who thought that Eliza should
TOUR 8 433
bloom beside the magnolias until a good man arrived to take her into
his home. She took charge of the bankrupt New Orleans Picayune and
turned it into a fine paper with wide political power in the South. Eliza
\\.is born in 1849 in Pearlington, Miss., and was reared by her aunt.
In 1860 she had some of her verse printed in the New York Journal, a
debut that was a blow to her family. It was bad enough to write verses
about the birds, but to let them appear in a newspaper was a social error
of the worst order. Her verses, however, were liked by Col. Alva Hal-
brook, publisher of the Picayune, who gave her a job as literary editor
of his paper. It was practically unheard of for a woman to work for a
paper in the South, but Eliza, who had taken the pen name Pearl Rivers,
made good. She married the colonel, and after his death became editor
of the paper. Besides opening the journalistic field to women in the
South and developing the Sunday newspaper as a medium of entertain
ment for the entire family, Pearl Rivers started Dorothy Dix on her
extraordinary career. When she died in 1896 she left the Picayune a
prosperous and well-established paper. At the time the little town that
had grown up near the Hermitage was incorporated, it was named Pica
yune for the newspaper published by Eliza Poitevent.
South of Picayune the highway flattens gradually through eight miles
of low Coastal Meadow, which lies between the Piney Woods and the
Gulf. Here the land is for the most part covered with cut-over pine
forests, but small wooded sections of giant oaks, festooned with the
characteristic gray moss of the Gulf Coast, appear. Low, dank-smelling
marshes from the banks of which local people fish skirt the highway.
These people are descendants of the French Catholic immigrants who
settled here in the latter part of the i8th century. The country was back
woods until the highway made it accessible from the Coast, and the people
lived a life of almost pastoral simplicity, with many of the older among them
speaking only a patois. Even today, along with the religion and language
of their forebears, they cling to folkways, the most picturesque of which
is the decorating of graves on November i, All Saints Day. Unable to
cultivate flowers in the damp, marshy soil, they have developed the
making of artificial ones. In the humble cabins barefoot women and
children, often wearing clothes made of sugar sacks, express their love
of beauty in the flowers they create to sell in shops along the Coast.
On this holy day of the year, the people gather at local cemeteries with
their home-made floral offerings to deck the covered graves. For weeks
afterward the brightly colored flowers make gay spots in the quiet woods.
Between SANTA ROSA, 179.1 w., and Pearl River the highway crosses
the Mississippi part of the HONEY ISLAND SWAMP (L), a wildlife
refuge and for many years the hide-out of pirate bands as powerful, if
not so notorious, as the LaFittes of Louisiana. The king of Honey Island
and of all the outlaws in the swamps was Pierre Rameau; the swamp and
the Pearl River bottoms provide good fishing and squirrel hunting (dan
gerous without an experienced guide).
At 181.9 m. the highway crosses Pearl River, which is the Mississippi-
Louisiana Line, 54 miles NE. of New Orleans, La. In Louisiana the
434 TOURS
highway crosses free bridges at the Rigolets (pron., Rig-lees) and Chef
Menteur Passes in Louisiana. A shorter route between Pearl River and
New Orleans, 47 miles long, crosses a toll bridge on Lake Pontchartrain
in Louisiana (car and driver $1 ; passengers 25$ each).
Tour
(Hamilton, Ala.) Tupelo New Albany Holly Springs (Memphis, Tenn.). US
78.
Alabama Line to Tennessee Line, 124.6 m.
St. Louis & San Francisco R.R. parallels route between Tupelo and Tennessee Line.
Highway two lanes wide; three-fourths paved, rest graveled.
Accommodations chiefly in towns.
Cutting obliquely across the State, US 78 runs through country that
illustrates the history of northern Mississippi s cultural and economic
development. In the eastern part it drops rapidly away from wooded
pine hills, where crops are small and farmers supplement their incomes
by operating one-man sawmills, into the low-rolling fringes of the prairie.
Here the new dairies and bottom-land pastures encircling Tupelo give
what is probably the State s best example of the attempt to balance agri
culture with industry. The highway then climbs through a rugged region
of small dairy and cotton farms to reach at last a section of the north
Central Hills, which before the War between the States developed a
culture similar in its refinement and prosperity to that of the Natchez
country. In the hills a number of fine homes remain as evidence of this
culture, but the soil that produced it has been ravaged by erosion.
US 78 crosses the Mississippi Line, m., 13.7 miles W. of Hamilton,
Ala., to enter a vividly colored country characteristic of northern Mississippi.
The highway constantly mounts and descends a series of steep wooded
slopes; then it slowly sinks into Chubby Creek swamp, 5.1 m. The swamp
is gray with underbrush and boggy with still, shallow water. Then as
the swamp continues (L) the highway climbs suddenly away from it,
back into the steep rocky slopes, where numerous patches of cultivated
land are scattered across the red clay clearings. The farmhouses are
unpretentious but sturdy and well kept.
At 10 m. is CLAY (22 pop.), a small crossroads community with a
name that characterizes the area.
FULTON, 14 m. (927 pop.), the largest town in Itawamba Co., is
a lumbering and farming center. In the town square is the Itawamba
TOUR 9 435
Co. courthouse, a red brick building dominating the encircling group
of drug, grocery, and dry goods stores. From the town pump at the
corner of the square a well-worn path leads to the courthouse steps;
when court is in session, judges, attorneys, jurors, witnesses, and spec
tators gather at the pump to refresh themselves. The three modern brick
buildings of the Itawamba County Agricultural High School are on the
western edge of town.
At 76.3 m. the highway crosses the Tombigbee River (Ind., coffin
maker) to pass a number of sawmill communities; the one-man mills,
usually powered by tractors, have cut spasmodically at the heart of the
nearby woods. These mills, whittling away at the forest of shortleaf pine
but scarcely making an impression on their density, contrast with the large
mills of the longleaf pine belt of southern Mississippi, which have left
hardly a tree in their wake (see Tour 8). There is also a vast difference
in the value of the two woods, with fortunes being made from the
widely useful longleaf pine and only meager livings from the rough-
grained shortleaf, useful principally as 2 x 4 $ and short stripping.
At 20 .5 m. is DORSEY (40 pop.), a truck farming community that
absorbed the population of old Ballardsville when the highway missed
the older settlement. Here is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road is MANTACHIE, 7 m. (188 pop.), named for the Chickasaw
chieftain Man-at-chee, and formerly one of the largest of the Chickasaw towns.
Until the Treaty of Pontotoc (1832) Mantachie was occupied entirely by In
dians, but after their removal to western lands came a gradual influx of white
settlers. Tishtony Creek which outlines the town s eastern boundary perpetuates
in its name the memory of Tish-to-ni, an Indian warrior killed in a contest with
another Chickasaw. Today this former Indian village is furnished with electrical
power by the TVA.
MOORE VILLE, 24.7 m. (150 pop.), is a rural village named for the
Moore family, its first settlers.
1. Right from Mooreville on a graveled road is EGGVILLE, 6m. (50 pop.), a
rural farming settlement where the Northeast Singing Convention meets each year
on the Saturday before the first Sunday in July.
2. Left from Mooreville on a graveled road to the "HATTER" MOORE HOME,
OJ m., a dog-trot house little changed since its erection in the 1830 $. The builder
served as hatter for the whole countryside, using this house for his battery. Farm
ers, when they sheared their sheep, brought their wool to Moore who made them
a hat "on the half" that is, a hat for a hat. So enduring were the woolen hats
that a farmer seldom needed more than two in a lifetime.
At 6.6 m. on this road is RICHMOND, one of the oldest settlements in the county
and before the War between the States the recreation center of this section. Here
were a fair ground and other amusement facilities. The Baptist church is now in
what was the center of the old race track.
At 29.6 m. on US 78 is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to TOMBIGBEE STATE PARK, 3 m. (follow signs), a tract of
pine woodlands developed bv the Go\ eminent as a tamping site and recreational
center. The park is an excellent example of undisturbed rustic beauty, with a lake
for swimming and fishing set among the hills, a bridle path, and a native stone
and split-log community house for dancing. Overnight cabins are for rent.
Between Mooreville and Tupelo the highway breaks abruptly with
436 TOURS
the hills to drop into the fertile, rolling plain that is a part of the Black
Prairie Belt. Here large-scale farming and dairying replace lumbering
as the chief industries.
At 30.7 m. is the junction with State 6 (see Tour 14).
At 31.3 m. is EAST TUPELO which began as a subdivision but, with
a garment factory and a separate school, grew to independence. It is
now a small corporate town.
US 78 crosses the bottom-land drained by a series of channels or
creeks at 31.8 m. (narrow bridge). It was to drain this bottom that the
first county drainage laws were passed in the South.
US 78 enters on Main St. ; R. on Gloster St.
TUPELO, 34 m. (289 alt., 6,361 pop.) (see TUPELO).
Points of Interest. U.S. Government Fish Hatchery, cotton mill, garment factory,
Carnation Milk Plant, and others.
Here is the junction with US 45 (see Tour 4).
The route continues on Gloster St. ; L. on Jackson St. ; R. on Clayton
Ave.
Between Tupelo and Belden the highway follows the eastern humps
of the PONTOTOC RIDGE (L), a natural watershed that separates
the hills to the N. and W. from the prairie to the S. On this line of
hills the war-loving Chickasaw Indians had their chain of villages or
"Long Town," where a great number of tribesmen lived in a concentrated
area.
At 37 m. is the junction with a narrow graveled road.
Left on this road 1 m. to the probable SITE OF ACKlA, the Chickasaw fort at
tacked by the French under Bienville in 1736. By defeating the French here, and
thus preventing their settlement in the Chickasaw territory, the Chickasaw Indians
shattered the French scheme of forming a united barrier against the encroaching
English settlers. This battle was important in that it opened this section to the
English and at the same time closed it to the French (see AN OUTLINE OF
FOUR CENTURIES). The site has been excavated and the outlines of a fort
charted by Moreau B. Chambers, State Field Archeologist.
The characteristic black soil of the prairie is visible (R) in the fur
rowed fields, and farms and dairies are numerous. In front of nearly
every farmhouse are a bright tin mail box and a large galvanized milk
can. The cans are filled with warm fresh milk during the early dawn;
later in the day trucks from the milk plant in Tupelo pick them up for
transporting to market. Between Tupelo and Sherman is perhaps the
most thickly populated area on US 78.
BELDEN, 40.9 (271 pop.), has suffered because of its proximity to
Tupelo. Much of the business of the cotton gin and poultry market
here have been absorbed by the larger town.
SHERMAN, 45.6 m (359 alt., 464 pop.), is curiously on the boun
dary of three counties, Pontotoc, Lee, and Union. The town was settled
shortly after the American Revolution by Reuben Jones, who cleared a
plantation on the present site and planted cotton and corn. The nearby
Chickasaw Indians were friendly and left Jones and his family un
molested. The village that grew up around the Jones plantation was
TOUR 9 457
named Sherman many years later by a resident who had formerly lived
in the Texas city of that name. On the school grounds (R) is the SITE
OF AN ANCIENT INDIAN VILLAGE from which artifacts have been
removed.
The highway rises NE. of Sherman, and as the hills grow steeper the
landscape becomes more scenic. From the top of each ridge is a good
view or the surrounding country, where small terraced farms grow truck,
corn, and a little cotton. For generations the farmers, most of them
independent landowners, have dug a living from the rocky soil. Their
houses, roomy but unpretentious, sit in clean-swept yards and are, for the
most part, unpainted.
At 50.7 m. is BLUE SPRINGS, named jointly for the "blue" soil and
the deep artesian springs; it is situated on one of the highest of the
Pontotoc hills. Dairying is the industry of the surrounding highlands,
while in the creek and river bottoms corn and hay are grown.
WALLERVILLE, 55 m. (471 alt., 200 pop.), is said to have received
its name from a fight in which two drunken men engaged on the village
site, and smeared themselves with the clay-like soil in which they
wallowed.
At 56 m. (R) is the entrance lane leading to THE OAKS, built in
1857 by Andrew Duncan on a section of land that had been purchased
in 1816 by his grandfather, Wm. Duncan, from Pittman Colbert, a
half-breed Chickasaw chieftain. The cedars growing about the doorway
are from seeds brought from the battlefield of Manassas. The two-story
frame house, perhaps the handsomest in the section, is a contractor s
adaptation of a Greek Revival plan; the predominating exterior feature
is the massive two-story front portico with its hand-carved columns. In
the interior is a noteworthy hand-carved rosewood parlor suite, imported
from England soon after the house was built. In the 1890 $ the Southern
field trials were an annual event at the Oaks, attracting sportsmen from
every State in the Nation.
NEW ALBANY, 59.3 m. (364 alt, 3,187 pop.), spreads laterally
from the highway, which forms its main street, and is notable chiefly
for the fact that it is one of the few Mississippi county seats that is not
built around its courthouse square. Before the War between the States
the town was a stagecoach stop on the Holly Springs-Pontotoc Line.
After the war, when the Gulf, Mobile Northern R.R. was literally
built through the town, at right angles to and crossing Main Street in
the center of the business district, it was incorporated as the seat of
Union Co. Today it is a prosperous hub for farmers and dairymen who
drive to town on Saturday, park their cars at every conceivable angle,
and make the main street almost too congested for passage. The COURT
HOUSE GREEN on a Saturday morning holds a representation of the
population of the county, for everyone who has been able to obtain
transportation into town eventually drifts to the green to sit in the
sun on a wooden bench and chat with his neighbors.
At 60 .5 m. the highway crosses the Tallahatchie (Ind., river of rock)
River on one of the State s best examples of concrete-constructed bridges.
43 8 TOURS
The highway between New Albany and Holly Springs winds deviously
between high rocky hills, alternately windswept or densely covered with oak,
beech, and shortleaf pine trees. The evergreen pines in winter give
color to a 4O-mile area that would otherwise be forlorn and drab; the
sheep cropping the grasses on the slope make a scene uncommon in
Mississippi. The expensive raising of sheep through this section is a
recent development. For miles the country is unsettled, with only an
occasional grist mill or a country store along the way.
MYRTLE, 68 m. (415 alt., 313 pop.), is known for the natural lakes
in the vicinity where fishing is good, and for Hell Creek running south
ward from Myrtle to New Albany.
At 70.1 m. the highway crosses the eastern boundary of the HOLLY
SPRINGS NATIONAL FOREST, covering an area of 350,520 acres in
Benton, Tippah, Marshall, Union, and Lafayette Counties. The ranger
headquarters is at Holly Springs.
HICKORY FLAT, 74.1 m. (401 alt., 337 pop.), sits placidly in a
valley between two hills. Formerly a station on the Chickasaw trail
between Pontotoc and Memphis, the town is today the marketing place
for the produce of the surrounding country, and the place to which
nearby farm families come to take a train.
Right from Hickory Flat on a graveled road to the FOX HUNTERS CLUB, 12
m. (R), organized in 1925. The club owns 880 acres of highlands, a one-story
frame clubhouse with bedrooms, a taproom, and a kitchen, and a 2 5 -acre lake.
The purpose of the club is to encourage fox hunting as a sport in north central
Mississippi, where both the red and gray varieties of the animal still abound. Sev
eral hunts are held during the season each year.
Here the color of the soil begins to change. From a muddy dark
brown, it turns first rusty then reddish orange, as if anticipating the
fiery clay surrounding Holly Springs. In the banks of the hillsides various
contrasting strata lie bare to the sunlight.
WINBORN, 78.3 m. (105 pop.), is the site of the only iron mine
in the State. In 1912 a Birmingham, Ala., steel company built an iron
foundry here to manufacture pig iron, and several stores and houses
were erected. After three years of operation the manufacturers decided
that the cost of shipping the product to Birmingham was too great to
allow a profit, so the foundry closed. Since 1915 the town has slowly
decreased in population until it is now hardly more than a ghost of
its former self.
At 80 m. is a REFORESTATION CAMP, where the Government is
creating a park of several hundred acres. From the LOOKOUT TOWER
in the camp is one of the best views of Mississippi s Central Hills.
POTTS CAMP, 81.4 m. (334 alt., 326 pop.), is a sawmill town estab
lished as a levee camp in the iSyo s by Colonel Potts. The building of
the Memphis & Charleston R.R. (now Frisco) through in the i88o s
brought in new settlers but the old name was retained.
Between here and Holly Springs the descent from the hills is gradual.
Just south of the town are the first of the gullies that are to mark this
TOUR 9 439
route through the State. These gullies, land laid open in sheer red cav
erns, look as if some giant hand had lashed the earth until it bled.
US 78 enters on Van Dorn Ave. to courthouse square.
HOLLY SPRING, 94.1 m. (602 alt., 2,271 pop.) (see HOLLY
SPRINGS).
Points of Interest. Ante-bellum homes, churches, soil conservation bureau, and
others.
i. Left from Holly Springs on State 7 at 1.9 m. is the junction with a graveled
road; R. here to GALENA, 10.2 in. (L), the old home of the Cox brothers, con
nected with a story as bizarre as any William Faulkner has told. Low and broad,
it is but one story high and rambles into a sturdy yet graceful H, its broad porch
extending across the center hall and front rooms. Two identical sides and the en
closed hallway joining them are roofed in a dull red composition. The gray of the
frame walls is so drab and blotched that even the remaining chips of paint are
practically drained of color. Dulled to a lifeless blue are the heavy blinds that
run the length of the many stained windows to shut out all light of the outside
world. The original furnishings are in disorder, as if thrust aside in haste a half
century ago when the house was vacated. Massive oak and walnut furnishings
possess each room. In the front parlor an oil portrait of William Henry Cox looks
down from above the heavy mantel upon a lovely old secretary and an old fash
ioned piano scattered with lyrics, none dating to more modern times than the
"gay nineties." Staring back at the portrait are row after row of books along the
opposite wall.
The story of Galena had its origin in the i8th century. Lord Ainsley s daughter
married General Moultrie of Revolutionary fame and later Governor of South
Carolina. From their union was a daughter who became the wife of a young
Scotchman, William Henry Cox, who settled in Georgia. After the 1832 cession,
the elder Cox purchased estates from the Chickasaw and sent his five handsome
sons with several hundred slaves to Mississippi to cultivate them. William Henry,
Jr., built Galena from timber to brick, nails, and ironwork all with the labor
of his slaves. The slave quarters were so large that travelers often asked what vil
lage it was they were passing. The plantation name, given for the Scotch mineral
symbolizing peace, is in contrast to Galena s history. Lavish entertainers, foppish
dressers, heavy drinkers, dare-devil sportsmen, the Cox brothers came to violent
ends. William Henry, Jr., on a drunken spree, rode a spirited horse up a stairway
leading to the house and broke his neck. Toby, a younger brother said to have
been more beautiful than any woman, killed his bride during a drunken orgy,
then turned the gun on himself. Because his bride s family would not allow her
body to be buried on the Cox lot, she lies in an unmarked grave; but Toby sleeps
beneath a masterpiece of imported Italian marble, as do all the members of the
Cox family. Another of the brothers, groomed to the last degree, drove a span of
horses over the bluff at Memphis into the Mississippi River; a street in Memphis
now bears his name. Of the five brothers, William Henry was the only one to
have a child; his daughter, Lida, married Clark Brewer. At the death of her
father and uncles she inherited the plantation. The post office located in her store
was closed at her request; but when people living a mile or so from Galena
asked for a post office, the Government obtained permission from Mrs. Brewer to
use the st?mp of Galena. Hence the community, like so many other Mississippi
communities, took the plantation s name. During the War between the States, the
battle of Cox s Cross Roads was fought nearby, and a number of family treasures
were stolen. Other family heirlooms, however, are in possession of the descend
ants.
2. At 10 m. on State 7 the U. S. FIELD TRIAL CLUB, considered the oldest in
the United States, holds an annual field trial. The date is approximately the first
week in February and is usually set so as not to conflict with other field trials.
The club course, protected by a game warden, covers 10,000 acres.
440 TOURS
The route continues from the courthouse square on N. Memphis St.
RED BANKS, 102.1 m. (498 alt., 97 pop.), is one of northwestern
Mississippi s oldest communities, having been settled between 1820 and
1825, while the territory was still owned by the Indians. At that time
a group of North Carolinians came to settle near a Chickasaw trading
post and to clear the land for planting. Until the Chickasaw Cession
(1832), the whites and Indians lived amicably. After the removal of
the Indians to the West in 1836, Red Banks, typifying its natural set
ting in its name, developed as a social and cultural center. The few ante
bellum homes that remain are but the shell of the proud little village
that has died. The G. C. GOODMAN HOME, a two-story fram e struc
ture, was built by Henry Moore in 1840. During the War between the
States, when Federal troops entered to search the house for Confederate
soldiers, the house was set afire. But its mistress, Mrs. Eliza Moore,
defied the soldiers and extinguished the flames. The AUSTIN MOORE
HOME built during the same period is a slender-columned house of
conventional ante-bellum type. After a century of service the lumber,
planed by slave labor, remains sound. The MARTHA GARDNER HOME
offers an excellent contrast. Built during the 1 8 30*5, it is a solid log
house with brick chimneys at each end and an open central hall almost
a perfect example of early pioneer architecture. The house is owned by
descendants of the original builder, who received his land grant from the
Indians.
Right from Red Banks on a graveled road 3.3 m. to SUMMER TREES (open dur
ing Holly Springs Pilgrimage), the old Sanders Taylor place, built between 1820
and 1825. This is a one-story house; the roof of the front gallery is supported by
six slender grooved columns and the main roof forms a transverse ridge. The
front and back walls are painted white, but side walls are a mellow rose, the
color that bricks made from the clay of this section eventually turn. The house
has been restored recently by Neely Grant.
North of Red Banks US 78 passes through some of the most eroded
land in the State. The fields have great ravines that reveal a soil of
startling redness. Except for occasional cotton patches, little land is under
cultivation. It is used mainly for pasturage, dairying in this section
being a growing source of income. A great many crumbling mansions,
built during the flush times of the 1 830*5 and 1840*5, desolately face
the encroaching gullies. These houses, gradually mouldering away as the
earth slides from beneath them, are unpainted, with sagging porches and
rotting pillars; they are often occupied by Negro families.
BYHALIA (Ind., great oaks), 110.2 m. (386 alt., 565 pop.), lies
on the old Pigeon Roost Road leading to Memphis. The settlement was
begun in the late 1830 $, soon after the Chickasaw Cession, by planters
who belonged to the aristocracy of the seaboard States. Here on what
had so recently been Chickasaw hunting grounds, they developed an
elegant and prosperous society. Except for groves of scraggy cedars that
mark the sites of the old plantations, all the landmarks of old Byhalia
are gone. The town s chief industry is trading with farmers.
The COL. WM. MILLER HOME (open by appointment), 118.1 m.
(L), is a two-story frame house designed with unusual restraint. Four
TOUR 10 441
slender tapering columns support the roof of the wide front gallery, and
in the interior is an excellent spiral stairway. The house, more than 100
years old and held together by wooden pegs, has fine old furnishings.
It is approached through a boxwood drive laid out when the building
was erected ; the place has been in the Miller family for four generations.
OLIVE BRANCH, 121.1 m. (387 alt., 336 pop.), settled soon after
the treaty of 1832 by which the Indians relinquished their land, sym
bolizes in its name the peace made between the white men and the
Chickasaw Indians. The only landmark of the early settlement is the
MILTON BLOCKER HOME, a one-story double log house, with four
rooms and an attached kitchen. The logs were hand-hewn from native
oak trees on the Blocker estate. The building was erected by slave labor.
The logs have been weatherboarded and painted but the design remains
unchanged.
MAYW OOD RECREATIONAL CENTER, 122.5 m. (L), is on the
oak-shaded shore of a natural lake (camping, boating, swimming, fishing,
at nominal rates).
MINERAL WELLS, 123.2 m., is the site of a large resort hotel built
in the 1850*5 to accommodate visitors from Memphis who came to drink
the waters of the springs. After the hotel burned, the popularity of the
place waned, until today it is little visited except for picnic parties. A
substantial log house built in the 1830*5 marks the site of the village,
which at one time boasted of a depot, a telegraph office, and several
residential streets.
At 124.6 m. US 78 crosses the Tennessee Line, 9 miles S. of Memphis,
Tenn.
Tour 10
(Florence, Ala.) luka Corinth Walnut Slayden ( Memphis, Tenn.). US 72.
Alabama Line to Tennessee Line, 103.4 m.
Southern R.R. parallels route from Alabama Line to Corinth,
d raveled highways two lanes wide.
Accommodations chiefly in towns.
Skimming across the northernmost part of the State, US 72 traverses
a country of rugged contours, with sharp jagged ridges, rocky slopes, and
sweeping views of forested valleys and distant purple hills. Corinth and
luka, on the sites of two important battles of the War between the
States, are beginning to prosper by the development of the natural
44 2 TOURS
resources of the area. This section the State s experimental ground for
dairying, road building, and power development contrasts with the
somnolent agricultural villages toward the northwest, where the farmers
still plant cotton on the worn-out land, while the landmarks of an
agricultural aristocracy fall in ruins about them.
Crossing the Mississippi Line, m., 30.4 miles W. of Florence, Ala.,
US 72 enters the widest section of the State s highlands, the Tennessee
River Hills. These hills are a part of the 2,ooo-mile "Catchment Basin,"
a high region of broken topography with outcrops of gravel and sand,
and deeply cut by swift narrow streams. Large gravel beds shine through
scattered oak, poplar, and sweet gum stands.
TIPPLE, 1.2 m., is a small community sitting at the foot of a moun
tain of gravel that provides excellent road-building material. The South
ern R.R. operates a branch line along the crest of the mountain and
as the rock has been dug through the years it has been necessary to move
the track southward at intervals. At first convict labor was used to loosen
the gravel, but now hired laborers aided by machines and dynamite do
the work.
For a half mile W. of Tipple the almost inexhaustible deposits of silica,
sandstone, and limestone break out on the sliced surfaces of red clay;
then the highway crosses Clear Creek into a short stretch of bottom lands.
BLYTHE S CROSSING, 5.2 m., was once considered as a site for the
town of luka.
At 5.4 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to SHADY GROVE CEMETERY, 0.4 m., where 261 Confed
erate soldiers are buried in one trench. The only marker is a low brick wall
around the trench.
At 5.8 m. are the IUKA MINERAL SPRINGS (L), whose medicinal
value was first recognized by the Indians, who enclosed them with a
fence of hollow logs. In ante-bellum days the place was a noted health
resort. The springs today are in a landscaped park with century-old oaks,
sweet gum, beech, and birch trees. They are of six distinct varieties, each
with its traditional cure. Spring i has been exhausted only twice, first
when Grant s army drank it dry, and later when the entire county at
tended a barbecue given here.
IUKA, 6m. (554 alt., 1,441 pop.). The town s chief resources are
gravel and lumber, though lime, sandstone rock, and clays for the manu
facture of paint are being utilized in increasing quantities.
luka is the site of a Chickasaw village named for one of the lesser
chieftains of the tribe, a friend of the great chief Tishomingo, for
whom the county was named. Little is known of the Indian settlement
here, but it is thought to have been subordinate to one at Underwood
Village on the Alabama Line and to Colbert s Reservation, approxi
mately 12 miles W. The white settlement did not rise immediately after
Indians abandoned the site, but sprang into being when the Memphis
& Charleston R.R., now the Memphis branch of the Southern, was
completed in 1857; the entire town of old East Port picked up business
and belongings and moved to this place. Incorporated the same year,
TOUR 10 443
the community grew rapidly, building churches, a female college, a
boys military academy, and a fine hotel. The war, however, brought
opposing forces to the little town; in one major engagement here between
1,200 and 1,500 were killed or wounded, and three skirmishes were
fought within the city s limits.
Immediately after the Battle of luka, Sept. 19, 1862, practically all
the homes and business buildings were transformed into emergency hos
pitals. The dead, separated according to the color of uniforms they wore,
were buried, the Confederates in one long trench in what is now Shady
Grove Cemetery, and the Federals at first on the grounds surrounding
the buildings, then later in the National Cemetery at Corinth. At one
period or another Generals Price, Forrest, Kelly, Van Dorn, and Whit-
field of the Confederacy, and Grant, Rosecrans, Ord, and Hurbert of the
Union made their headquarters in the town.
After the war, the first normal college S. of Mason s and Dixon s
line was established here when Dean and Neuhardt built the luka
Normal Institute, now gone. Ante-bellum prosperity did not return here
and for more than a generation luka saw little activity. The recent build
ing of Pickwick Dam and the opening of the Commercial Gravel Co.
have brought new life to the place.
The McKNIGHT HOME (private), Quitman St. (L), was erected
first in the town of East Port, eight miles away on the Tennessee River,
when that town was the shipping point for northeast Mississippi. Then,
when the railroad town of luka replaced the river town of East Port
and East Port citizens moved en masse, William McKnight even brought
his house with him. Ox-drawn wagons hauled the pieces to luka over
the rough mountain road and through the hollow that is still known as
Long Hungry. In luka the house was re-erected. It is a low, one-story
frame building of no definite architectural style, with four large rooms
having ceilings 12 feet high, and with a wide hall.
The METHODIST CHURCH, NE. corner Front and East Port Sts.,
is the only remaining church of the early days of luka. This clapboard
structure, built in 1857, was at one time used as a hospital. It has been
remodeled several times; the slave gallery has been removed and the
exterior walls have been covered with red brick. A two-story red brick
wing has been added, but the tall Gothic spire, seen from every point
in town, remains unchanged.
The MATTHEWS HOME (private), SW. corner Main and Quitman
Sts., was built in 1857 by A. T. Matthews, the president of the luka
Townsite Co., who moved here from East Port. The white frame two-
story structure has green shutters and a deep porch supported by four
columns. Unlike a majority of the houses of its period, it has low ceilings
and a narrow stairway. The servants quarters and kitchen, connected
with the house by a brick and latticed runway, have been converted into
small apartments. During the many raids on and around luka, this
house was the headquarters of Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest. To it came
the excited courier bearing the message that two gunboats and two trans
ports loaded with Negro troops were steaming up the Tennessee River,
444 TOURS
expecting to land at East Port, march to luka, burn the town, and cut off
connections with Forrest and his army, at that time in Alabama. The
women, children, and men too old or too feeble for service gathered
in the basement during the Battle of luka. From the house went an aged
citizen carrying in his hands a broom stick with a white sheet nailed to
it as a flag of truce, to ask protection from Rosecrans for the women
and children of the town.
The T. M. McDONALD HOME (private), adjoining the luka Public
School, was built in 1858-59 by Col. Lawrence Moore of Alabama; it is of
Southern Planter type, with deep verandas on four sides. The basement
or ground floor originally contained the dining room with the kitchen
and a servant room to the rear. On the main floor each room has a
1 5 -foot ceiling and opens into a central hall 12 feet wide and 52 feet
long. Painted side lights and a fanlight frame the double entrance doors,
which are of oak 3 inches thick and 12 feet high. The walls and ceiling
of the front and back parlors are painted, and in one of them are the
carpet and draperies in use when Confederate Gen. Sterling Price and
Federal General Rosecrans successively had their headquarters here. In
another room is a carpet beneath which were hidden the notes of a Con
federate scout sent by Forrest to gather information of Grant s army in
camp at East Port; disguised as a woman selling gingerbread, the scout
passed through the Federal lines, secured Grant s plan of battle, and
returned to luka.
The CO MAN HOME (private), Quitman St. opposite the courthouse,
is a one-story frame cottage built prior to the War between the States
by Maj. J. M. Coman. Here John M. Stone married Coman s daughter
in 1872 and lived until his death in 1900. Stone was one of the most
conspicuous figures in the State during the Reconstruction Period. As
president pro tempore of the senate he became Governor for the first
time in 1876, after the impeachment of Governor Ames. During the
six years of his first administration governmental affairs were re
established on a systematic and economical basis, and the last traces of the
reconstruction corruption were removed. Mississippi State College was
founded as Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College during
this administration. His second administration, 1890-96, was marked by
the Constitutional Convention of 1890 (see AN OUTLINE OF FOUR
CENTURIES). His grave is in the luka Cemetery.
The BRINKLEY HOME (private), Eastport St., is a i2-room frame
structure two stories in height, with a portico with Doric columns. The
house, built on the site of Chief luka s home, was erected by Daniel
Hubbard who settled here 20 years before the founding of the town.
Hubbard later sold the house to Col. R. C. Brinkley, who made extensive
improvements. Here, during the War between the States, Grant had
headquarters, connected by a telegraph line with the house next door,
occupied by General Sherman. On vacating the house Grant left a note
telling the owners that he had taken good care of the property, even
to a pin cushion in his bedroom.
A CABIN IN THE COTTON
The CONFEDERATE MARKER fronting the courthouse commem
orates the 261 Confederate soldiers killed in the Battle of luka.
At luka is the junction with State 25 (see Tour 17).
Between luka and Corinth the highway traverses a region where thickly
wooded hills alternate with muddy bottom lands. At 11.7 in. (L) is a
particularly good view of hills and valleys glorified by pines. At 16 in.
(L) are visible the Tennessee Hills, contrasting with the rugged red-
banked ones over which the road climbs. At 76.6 m. compact growths of
tall pine glow richly emerald-green; beyond are ridges of darker green,
and beyond them are purplish-gray hills.
At CORINTH, 31.1 m. (456 alt., 6,220 pop.) (see Tour 4), is the
junction with US 45 (see Tour 4).
Between Corinth and Kossuth the highway passes into the northern
most fringe of the Black Prairie where the few elevations are topped
with growths of stunted post oaks and lean pine saplings. Farmhouses and
little plots of cultivated land are seen infrequently.
KOSSUTH, 40.2 m. (224 pop.), has the aged yet ageless appearance
of the country around it. It is much as it was in the 1840*5, when the
name of the village was New Hope and only 100 people lived here.
446 TOURS
In 1852 the name was changed to honor the Hungarian liberal, Louis
Kossuth, who visited the United States in 1851, after having been exiled
from Hungary. His mission was to arouse sentiment in this country
against the unification of Austria and Hungary. In 1857 the town had
two churches and has since added one. Here are also a grist mill, a
foundry, a machine shop, a plow factory, and a steam sawmill.
West of Kossuth the highway rolls through the hills, ascending into
the higher altitude of the Pontotoc Ridge, where the cedar and pine for
ests are more depleted, the shacks more dilapidated, the people fewer,
and the crops poorer, because of the sterility of the sandy red soil. Here
and there is a two- or three-room shack, of old, unpainted wood, with
a tin roof, a dog-trot through the center, a mud chimney, and a slack
line across the porch for faded garments. The people often go barefooted
and many are listless in manner.
CHALYBEATE, 56.2 m. (100 pop.), named for Chalybeate Springs
in a ravine on the northern edge of town, is the center of a cotton, corn,
and truck growing community.
WALNUT, j>8.7 m. (219 pop.), was christened Hopkins in 1871.
A mile S. lay another village, Hopkinsville, but no one minded the
similarity of names until a keg of whisky intended for Hopkins was
delivered to the station beyond. The train had to back a mile to adjust
the error, and the recipient of the whisky, shuddering to think how
nearly he had missed the keg, changed the town s name to Walnut on
the spot. Since the village s incorporation in 1912, lumber mill interests
have been making steady inroads upon the pines and hardwood trees of
the vicinity.
At 62.1 m. US 72 enters HOLLY SPRINGS NATIONAL FOREST,
which covers a gross area of 350,520 acres in Benton, Tippah, Marshall,
Union, Lafayette, and Pontotoc Counties. Ranger headquarters are at
Holly Springs.
West of Walnut is one of the State s most thinly populated sections.
Almost every crossroad, however, has a country store and gasoline pump,
serving some backwoods settlement. Bonneted women and overalled
farmers walk here from farmhouses in the hills to buy coal oil and to
bacco, and children sometimes stop to spend pennies for candies and
chewing gum. In winter teamsters gather around the pot-bellied iron
stove at the rear of the store to warm their hands and talk. The store
keeper is usually a man of ideas. His wits are sharpened by arguments
with his customers; he has strong opinions on government, the weather
and the universe at large.
CANAAN, 73 m. (50 pop.), sits upon land that belies the promise
of its name. The soil is fast washing away from the scattered farms, and
erosion has marked the woods and farmlands with blood-red scars.
At 743 m. the highway crosses the southern boundary of Holly Springs
National Forest.
SLAYDEN, 92.9 m. (75 pop.), has a well-equipped agricultural high
school, two churches, and several general stores.
West of Slayden US 72 passes a number of crumbling relics of ante-
TOUR ii 447
bellum culture. Before the war, when the now almost sterile soil was
productive, planters grew rich on cotton and built homes in keeping
with their prosperity. These houses, the majority of them Southern Planter
in type, are ghosts of the past; but even with sagging blinds, columns,
and chimneys, they are impressive.
MT. PLEASANT, 96.8 m. (107 pop.), keeps alive in its name the
pleasant, smoothly flowing life lived here before the War between the
States, when the red-gullied hills were white with cotton crops. The
few mansions that remain are anomalies in the present village scene.
The JESSE IVY HOME (visited by permission), 97.1 m., built in
the 1850 $, is a handsome red brick house designed with slender pro
portions in the manner of Georgian Colonial works. The double-deck
portico has large square columns and the banisters and railings are of
finely wrought ironwork.
The DEMPSEY CURL HOME (visited by permission), 98 .7 m. (L),
is a one-story clapboarded cottage of great simplicity. It has a square
entrance porch, and chimneys on each side.
By the Curl home is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road 200 yds. to a junction; L. here on a dirt road to SH1LOH
BAPTIST CHURCH, 0.4 m. The church, a small though notable example of
Greek Revival architecture, was built of hand-hewn timber with slave labor prior
to 1836. It is in good repair and services are held occasionally.
Osage hedges line the highway. Here the gullies are very deep and
gnarled cedars and water oaks clutch footholds.
At 101.4 in. is the shell of an ante-bellum mansion, unidentified and
without occupants. It is a good example of this section s ante-bellum
adaptation or the Greek Revival style of structure. It is of frame con
struction, two stories high, and has a portico with four square columns
that is perhaps too narrow and slender for the mass of the house.
At 103.4 m. the highway crosses the Tennessee Line, 22 miles S. of
Memphis, Tenn.
Tour ii
Wayncsboro Laurel Brookhaven Washington. US 84.
Wayncsboro to Washington, 191-3 m.
Mississippi Central R.R. parallels route between Prcntiss and Silver Creek, and be
tween Brookhaven and Washington.
Graveled roadbed two lanes wide.
Accommodations in cities and towns.
448 TOURS
US 84 in Mississippi runs through a backwoods country in the eastern
part of the State and through the Natchez plantation area in the west.
A great part of the country is rural ; the highway skirts Sullivan s Hollow,
brushes briefly the Pearl River communities and dairying and truck farms
near Brookhaven.
WAYNESBORO, m. (191 alt., 1,120 pop.) (see Tour 4), is at
the junctions with US 45 (see Tour 4), with which US 84 is united
to the Alabama Line, and State 63 (see Tour 15 ).
At 2.1 m. US 84 crosses the Chickasawhay River and meets the junction
with a graveled road that borders the river.
Right on this road to the unexplored PITTS CAVE, 1 m., on the Pitts farm. The
cave, with its entrance in the side of a hill, is a limestone formation. A number
of stories are associated with the place. An Indian, said to have lost his dog in
the cave, went in after it and was never seen again. Some say his skull was found
years later. The dog, it is asserted, came out at another entrance with its body
stripped clean of hair by the limestone gases. Another story has it that a Confed
erate detachment, pursued by the enemy, took refuge in the cave. The most en
thralling story, however, is that of the exploration made by Capt. L. S. Pitts,
father of the present owner, who many years ago decided to investigate the cave,
using twine and candles in a Tom Sawyer manner. After four candles had been
burned, Pitts was at the end of his twine and gave up his search for the end of
the cave. He had traveled, he estimated, three miles. When he emerged, his eyes
and face were swollen from the gas. Pitts believed the cave went under Chicka
sawhay River, for at a certain point in his trip he could hear running water above
him. The river is about a mile in a direct line from the mouth of the cave.
US 84, between the Chickasawhay River and the Bogue Homo Creek,
runs through a sparsely settled, marginal pineland and farm country. On
both sides are log cabins with mud-and-stick chimneys, storm pits cut
into red clay banks, and ancient, one-mule-power cane presses.
At 24.6 m. the highway crosses Bogue Homo (Ind., red creek) Creek.
At 25.6 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to the first fork; L. here to a crossroads where is the SITE OF
THE RUSHTON POTTERY KILN, 1.9 m., an unusual concern for such a re
mote place as the "Free State of Jones." The Rushton brothers, who were potters
by profession, came here from Staffordshire, England, and erected a kiln many
years before the War between the States. The owner, B. J. Rushton, gained a
reputation for himself throughout this section, fashioning pieces that ranged from
five gallon urns to saltcellars.
At the period of his greatest prosperity, between 1858 and the outbreak of the
war, Rushton owned 20 slaves, one of whom was such a fine potter that Rushton
is said to have refused $1,500 for him. Rushton mixed his clay with a log sweep
pulled by a mule. He fired his ware without a temperature gauge, using peep
holes in the top of the kiln to help him judge the color of the ware and the ex
tent of processing. For fuel he used dried split pine. The ware was finished with
a glaze called hickory pulp, made by a soupy mixture of clay and hickory ashes.
On Feb. 2, 1864, Rushton was shot through the door of his cabin by Babe White,
a member of the Newt Knight band (see Tour 8). For a time Rushton s 12 chil
dren operated the pottery, but they abandoned it after a new process of salt glaz
ing, which they introduced, proved unsuccessful. The site today is well strewn
with pieces of broken ware, and a mound of crumbling brick marks the place
where the furnace stood.
The highway here passes through the undulating, prairie-like country
**V Ib*
* *it** i
.^^^
^t
> ^
A ONE-MULE-POWER CANE PRESS
that appears at intervals along the northeastern edge of the Piney Woods.
At 30 .5 m. US 84 crosses the Tallahala (Ind., smooth rock} Creek.
US 84 follows Cook s Ave., which becomes i5th St., to 2nd Ave.
LAUREL, 31.5 m. (243 alt., 18,017 pop.) (see LAUREL).
Points of Interest. Masonite Plant, art museum, canning plant, and others.
Here are the junctions with US u (see Tour 8) and State 15 (see
Tour 12).
The route continues on 2nd Ave. ; L. on yth St. ; R. on 8th Ave. ; R. on
6th St.; L. on i3th Ave.; R. on 5th St. (US S.< ).
At 34.1 m. is the LAUREL COUNTRY CLUB AND GOLF COURSE
(open to visitors by c.irj) with a long i8-hole golf course.
450 TOURS
At 35.2 m. US 84 crosses Tallahoma (Ind., red rock} Creek. Talla-
homa and Tallahala Creeks are Laurel s legendary protection against
tornadoes, the Indian tradition being that wind storms will seldom cross
a running stream. The ridges around the plain and between the two
creeks are apparent as US 84 climbs slowly W. of the Tallahoma. The
timber stands on distant ridges are blue and hazy.
At 40.4 m. is the junction with a graveled ridge road.
1. Left on this road to BLTFALO HILL, 3.7 ;//., a beautiful low ridge between
Tallahoma and Big Creeks commanding Ellisville and the valleys of the Tallahala
and Tallahoma (R) some 200 feet below. This ridge at intervals has outcroppings
of salt that fashioned its history. Buffalo traveling the ridges of the Mississippi
Valley made the salt lick a favored gathering place, meeting here in mating sea
son. The sandy red clay soil began to wash, and torrential spring rains gradually
cut deep ravines across the ridges, following the buffalo paths. Now more than
half of the vast swelling hills are cut into deep gullies of fantastic shape and
color. A legend tells of a terrible drouth that drove the buffalo to new feeding
grounds shortly after the first white explorers came to Mississippi s Indian coun
try. The buffalo are gone, but the gullies they started grow deeper year by year.
2. Right on this road is SOSO, 1.6 m., a farm community dying swiftly as Laurel
drains its vitality. The MOSS PLANTATION, 5 m. (L), is an unusually fine
hill-country cotton plantation. In the creeks and runs that border the road
are cold, spring-fed, swimming holes, into which naked rural children dive from
the branches of trees.
At 434 m. (L) is a good example of the dog- trot log cabin, the
original type of house in this hill country.
At 44. 1 m. the highway crosses Big Creek. On the bank of the creek
is the BIG CREEK CHURCH, belonging to the oldest "Hard-shell"
Baptist congregation in Jones Co., organized more than a century ago.
The present white frame building, built about 1887, is a simple structure
set in a quiet lowland with a churchyard across the highway. In April
and May the creek banks at the rear of the church are a bower of laurel
blossoms, and all summer long the flowers bloom in the churchyard.
In the Lauren Rogers Library and Museum of Art in Laurel is a
PAINTING OF THE CHURCH by Paul King, A.N.A.
Between Big Creek and Hebron US 84 traverses poor cotton and corn
fields separated by woodland patches of scrub oak and surrounded by
crooked, split-rail fences.
HEBRON, 48.5 m., was once the home of Capt. Newt Knight of the
Jones County Free Staters (see Tour 8).
At 50.8 m. the highway crosses the Leaf River on Reddoch s Bridge.
The shell of the old bridge remains (L). The crossing is possibly a
century and a half old.
At Reddoch s bridge (L) is the entrance to DESERTER S END LAKE,
a horseshoe lake where Free-Stater Newt Knight and his band often hid
out to evade the pursuing Confederate cavalry. The peninsula within
the curve of the horseshoe was a strategic position at which to meet
attacking forces.
At 54.6 m. (L) is a country church and churchyard with graves cov
ered by small wooden sheds. The church has gingerbread trimmings,
COVERED GRAVES IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD
reminiscent of the architecture of the 1890*5 and incongruous with the
simplicity of its lines.
The highway in its tortuous descent of the ridge occasionally passes
good stands of timber.
COLLINS, 62.7 m. (274 alt., 935 pop.) (see Tour 7, Sec. b), is at the
junctions with US 49 (see Tour 7, Sec. b), and State 35 (see Tour 16).
WILLIAMSBURG, 67 ;;;., was the scat of Covington Co. when Coving-
ton included a large part of what is now Jefferson Davis Co. In the old
county Williamsburg was at the geographical center and, before the rail
road passed it by, was a political center of considerable influence. It is
now unpainted and almost uninhabited. Cane presses, log cabins with
separate kitchens, mud chimneys, and paling fences remain.
MOUNT CARMEL, 78.5 m. (218 pop.), marked by a half-dozen un
painted houses and unoccupied stores, was in the i88o s a thriving cross
roads town grown rich from the farming country around it. When the
railroad was carried through E. of the town, the white merchants dwell
ings in their faded splendor were taken over by Negroes.
At 81 .5 m. (R) on the hill is MOUNT ZION CHURCH, typical of
the hundreds scattered through this section of the State, where church
service is one of the few diversions in the weekly routine.
PRENTISS, 85.4 in. (655 pop.), a stubbornly independent farm town,
45 2 TOURS
is the seat of Jefferson Davis Co. the natives call it Jeff Davis. Like
a majority of Mississippi county seats it is dwarfed by its courthouse.
The farmers of Jeff Davis Co. were the first in the State to vote against
beer after its legalization in 1933. The residents of Prentiss, with this
same standard of morality, still refuse to sanction round dancing in the
community house constructed with WPA assistance.
Perhaps the most recent of the many stories of Prentiss concerns what
is locally called the Battle of Mississippi Run. The BANK OF BLOUNT-
VILLE in the center of the town was held up in 1935 by Raymond
Hamilton, a public enemy who had found a hide-out from G-men in
the Jeff Davis Co. hills. When the bank sounded its alarm the citizens
took out their squirrel guns and "Long Toms" and went after the
fleeing bandit. All day through the dust, he was followed by an ever-
increasing group of man-hunters, who were whooping at him from a
respectful distance. The climax was reached when Raymond turned,
waited for the vigilantes to catch up, and then held up and disarmed
them. Two of the sturdy citizens were taken as hostages and stuffed in
the rumble seat of the car in which Raymond made his get-away. He
abandoned the car and hostages at Memphis, Tenn.
Left from Prentiss on State 42 to the PRENTISS NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL
INSTITUTE, 1 m., a privately controlled but semi-public training school for Ne
groes, non-sectarian and coeducational, with a self-perpetuating board of trustees.
The curriculum, of four-year high school grade, aims particularly at teacher train
ing. Approximately 400 students come from rural homes of 25 south Mississippi
counties, and most of them work for their board and tuition. The property on
which the school is situated was once a plantation, and the ante-bellum big house
is now used as an office building. It is said that several grandchildren of slaves
who belonged to the plantation have graduated from the school. The Prentiss
Jubilee Singers have been used to publicize the work of the institution for more
than 20 years, a third of the operating expenses usually being met from funds
raised by the traveling singers; they have toured every section of the United
States.
Between Prentiss and Silver Creek the highway passes through a
remote section with small cotton farms, where farmers live almost inde
pendent of outside influences.
SILVER CREEK, 95 m. (263 alt., 341 pop.), has wooden sheds over
the gravestones in its graveyards.
At 101.6 m. the planter-style house (L) is indicative of the influ
ence of the Pearl River Valley.
At 101.8 m. the road parallels the river (L), passing through a cypress
swamp of considerable charm, and crosses Pearl River at 102.7 m. The
view (L) from the bridge is one of the finest in the valley.
MONTICELLO, 102.8 m. (200 alt., 606 pop.), is a good example of
a Mississippi inland river town. Fifty miles down the Pearl River from
Jackson, it was a port for river steamers running to and from New
Orleans as late as 1904. The town was founded in 1798, the year Missis
sippi Territory was created, and was made the seat of Lawrence Co. in
1815. From that time until 1880 it prospered, reaching its greatest popu
lation, 2,500, in the latter year. Just before the War between the States,
TOUR ii 453
the Illinois Central R.R. was built through Brookhaven 22 miles W. of
Pearl River; this has been a drain on Monticello s business.
During its period of prosperity, however, the town furnished the State
two Governors, Charles Lynch (1836-38) and Hiram Runnels (1833-35).
Hiram Runnels was the son of Harmon Runnels, founder of Monticello
and in 1817 a member of Mississippi s first Constitutional Convention.
Harmon Runnels was described by Col. J. F. H. Claiborne, Mississippi
historian, as a "Hard-shell" Baptist who had been a hard-fighting cap
tain from Georgia in the Continental Army, decidedly a pugilist in
temperament, and ready to flare up at anyone who slurred his religion,
his politics, or his friend, Gen. Elisha Clark. He ruled the Pearl Rivet
country as long as he lived and died an octogenarian at Monticello.
His son Hiram took office as Governor in 1833, then was defeated
by Lynch in 1835.
In the second campaign as he toured the State Runnels was heckled
by Franklin Plummer. As Colonel Claiborne, candidate for Lieutenant
Governor on the Runnels ticket, described the scene, Plummer, the rep
resentative of the United States Bank interests, "having no principle,
was able to keep provokingly cool and entertaining to the crowd," while
poor Hiram "found his indignation and resentment beyond expression in
parliamentary language." But the Runnells party were no mean hecklers
themselves. Their press dubbed Lynch as the "alias Van Buren, alias Jack
son, alias anti- Jackson, alias anything candidate." Both Lynch and Runnels
were vocal in opposition to the bank and to Calhoun s nullification theory,
their stand on these two national issues representing well the anti-capitalist
and anti-planter views of their Pearl River Valley constituents.
Monticello was selected the State capital in the 1820*5, but 24 hours
later the legislature changed its mind. In the courthouse, which has
been rebuilt three times, silver-tongued Seargent S. Prentiss, lawyer and
orator, received his license to practice law in 1829. Several of the in
scriptions in Monticello s two cemeteries, written in Hebrew and Greek,
show the learning of some of Monticello s early citizens.
At 103-4 m. (R) is the junction with a graveled road that borders
the river. This cool, shaded drive through a hardwood forest suggests
well the break the Pearl Valley makes in the typical culture of the Piney
Woods.
Between Monticello and Brookhaven, US 84, passing isolated churches
and churchyards, runs through the westernmost tracts of the Piney Woods
from which the truck-farming belt has developed. The truck fields begin
to appear near the OAK HILL FARMS, 118.8 m. (L), whose cham
pion Dulls have taken ribbons at many Southern stock shows.
BROOKHAVEN, 727 m. (500 alt., 5,288 pop.), has practically out
lived its ante-bellum character and with its dairying interests has become
a lively modern town. Until 1851, when it was the first northern terminus
of the New Orleans & Great Southern R.R., Brookhaven was little more
than a straggling group of plantations centered about the crossroads
store of Samuel Jayne, who had settled here in 1818. With the advent
454 TOURS
of the railroad, it slowly took shape as a village of wealthy merchants
who ensconced their families in great white-columned homes to live
leisurely but formal social lives. Until 1907 it was a place where ladies
never made calls without hats and gloves, where the blinds were drawn
for afternoon siestas, where streets were unpaved and shadowy with the
arching branches of live oak trees, and where the daily arrival of the
train and the mail were events to be anticipated. In that year, however,
Brookhaven broke with its staid past to pioneer in a new activity in
the State. The creamery established here was the first in Mississippi. Today
the town is the hub of southern Mississippi s dairying country, supply
ing a great part of the milk products shipped to New Orleans. It has
a well-knit business section and asphalt-paved streets; and sons and
daughters have left outmoded rambling Colonial-style homes to follow
every architectural fad in house building. Only burgeoning oaks and here
and there a landmark are left as relics of the former easy village life.
The HARDY HOME (private), S. end of Jackson St., is a good
example of the type of house wealthy citizens built prior to and just after
the War between the States. Constructed of red brick, the house follows
the Greek Revival style, with imposing fluted columns simulating the
stone ones of the Natchez district. The interior has ornamental plaster
ing and fine old furnishings. Built by Capt. J. C. Hardy, it has for
five generations been in possession of that family.
The W. C. F. BROOKS HOME (private), near the courthouse (R)
on Cherokee St., antedates the Hardy home by several years. It is a
one-story frame structure built in 1858 in the plantation tradition. Its
spread of rooms in long side ells, and the low sweeping lines of its
roof give it an attractive informality.
WHITWORTH COLLEGE, facing South Jackson St., was built in
1858 as a successor to Elizabeth Academy. Today it is a Methodist
junior college for girls that manages to retain a mellowed dignity in
spite of modern-minded undergraduates. During the war the school
dormitories were used as a hospital for wounded Confederate soldiers.
Here is the junction with US 51 (see Tour 5, Sec. b).
Between Brookhaven and Meadville the highway passes through a
country of pines and bluff hills. The pines are small but fairly thick.
The cuts through which the highway runs show the yellow gravel-and-sand
mixed clay that makes the section valuable for truck farming. The gradu
ally increasing undergrowth in the woodland patches indicates the ap
proach to the loess area. Split-rail fences border the road, and here are
a number of oak-shaded churches and several small frame school build
ings for Negroes. The rain-washed fields show the section s great need
for erosion control.
At 743.3 m. US 84 crosses the boundary of the HOMOCHITTO NA
TIONAL FOREST, first of the national forests to be established in
Mississippi. This one is irregularly shaped and lies for the most part
along the Homochitto River basin. It is used to demonstrate the control of
soil erosion that has formed the large bars in the river. The forests have
been cut over at least once, and most of the area has been severely burned.
TOUR ii 455
The old cotton fields, abandoned at the outbreak of the War between
the States, contain fine stands of second-growth loblolly pines.
Within the forest US 84 crosses the Homochitto (Ind., big red)
River, 7/7.6 ;//., a clear stream meandering through great white sandbars.
The mill towns in the forest, QUENTIN, 149.5 m (200 pop.),
EDDICETON, 152.4 m. (375 pop.), and BUDE, 7^6.7 m. (1,378 pop.),
are lively but stereotyped with their clustered cut-to-a-pattern houses.
At MEADVILLE, 161.1 m. (341 pop.), is the FRANKLIN COUNTY
COURTHOUSE. The county is named for Benjamin Franklin. On a
well-chosen knoll at the west end of town, squarely blocking the high
way, which serves as the main street, is the Meadville MASONIC HALL.
In outline at a distance it is imposing, but closer inspection shows it
to be plain. The town has no churches, religious services being held in
the Masonic Hall by various denominations. The bell mounted on a
scaffold at the side of the hall is rung before Sunday services.
Meadville is the home of Congressman Dan R. McGehee.
US 84 between Meadville and Washington shows well the fertility
of loess. Vines running to the tops of tall pines are akin to those of
the Natchez district. The great difference between these woods and the
woods on the savannahs N. of the Coast is the undergrowth. Whereas
the latter are park-like, these in the loess hills are jungles of tangled
vines and shrubs. Through them- the highway rides the comb of a ridge
affording charming vistas of the National Forest.
At 171.2 m. US 84 crosses the western boundary of the De Soto
National Forest.
At 786.6 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road 0.1 m. to old US 84; left on this road to entrance to TRAV
ELER S REST, 1 m. (private), the plantation home of Col. James Hoggatt. Hog-
gatt received his land grant from the Spanish authorities at Natchez in 1788 and
built Traveler s Rest in 1797. At one time the Hoggatt holdings were perhaps the
largest in Adams Co. Traveler s Rest is in reality two buildings joined by an im
mense open passage, with pointed arches at each end. It is an elaboration of the
double-pen principle usually seen in log cabins rather than in planter s homes. Across
the front and rear stretch galleries 84 feet long, supported by square colonnettes.
Seven generations of Hoggatts have occupied this home.
WASHINGTON, 191.3 m. (200 pop.) (see Tour 3, Sec. b), is at
the junction (R) with US 61 (see Tour 3, Sec. b), with which the route
unites between this point and Natchez.
456 TOURS
Tour 12
(Bolivar, Term.) Pontotoc Bay Springs Laurel Lucedale (Mobile, Ala.).
State 15.
Tennessee Line to Alabama Line, 330.5 m.
Highway one-third paved ; rest graveled, two lanes wide.
Accommodations chiefly in larger towns.
State 15 reveals many phases of rural Mississippi life. For a hundred
miles or more the scenes are typical of an upland : terraced corn and cotton
patches clutching at the rugged Pontotoc Ridge ; dog-trot houses with cool
open hallways and clean scrubbed galleries; shortleaf pine woods and
stumpy cut-over land dotted with nondescript grazing cattle. Between Lou
isville and Newton the ruggedness is modified but the scenes are more
colorful. Sandy red soil and a sprinkling of glistening longleaf pines that
shoot suddenly up among the duller shortleaf anticipate the Piney Woods
to the S., where yellow pine forests, miles of cut-over land, promising
young orchards, and farms alternate in rapid succession. Then abruptly
the highway drops into the shadowy river country. Here in Arcadian tran-
quility and charm the Leaf and Pascagoula Rivers flow quietly to mirror
in their waters the aged moss-hung oaks and gnarled cypress trees.
Crossing the Mississippi Line, m., 15 miles S. of Bolivar, Tenn., State
15 immediately enters a region that becomes more populated the farther
south it goes. On the rocky slopes fringing Walnut are a fair sprinkling
of dairy and truck farms.
At WALNUT, 3J m. (219 pop.), is the junction with US 72 (see
Tour 10).
South of Walnut for 25 miles the hills of the ridge are visible in a low
blue line.
FALKNER, 11.1 m. (466 alt., 275 pop.), is a typical upland farming
village that supports, also, a hardwood lumber mill. Quiet all week, it is
on Saturdays the center of a trade that brings a large number of wagons,
trucks, and automobiles to crowd its unpaved main street. The town was
named for Col. William C. Falkner, soldier, novelist, and grandfather of
the novelist, William Faulkner who has made north central Mississippi
live in fiction (see ARTS and LETTERS).
Between Falkner and Ripley is the farming country where the Saturday
traders live, growing cotton as an annual cash crop and raising sweet and
Irish potatoes and hogs enough to feed the family.
RIPLEY, 19.1 m. (508 alt., 1,468 pop.), was incorporated as the seat
of Tippah Co. in 1837. Today the court square is the nucleus of the
county.
Ripley s most colorful personality, Col. William Falkner, came to the
A HARDWOOD SAWMILL
village soon after the first courthouse was built, a barefoot boy of ten who
had walked the several hundred miles from Middleton, Tenn., to see his
uncle John Thompson with whom he wished to make his home. He ar
rived at dusk to find his uncle in jail, charged with murder. Disheartened
45 8 TOURS
and weary, he sat down upon the courthouse steps and wept. The story
goes that in that moment of discouragement he swore he would some day
build a railroad along the route he had walked. After the War between
the States, in which Colonel Falkner became a local hero by assisting Gen
eral Forrest in the defense of Ripley, he made his railroad something more
tangible than a dream by building a line from Ripley to intersect the
Memphis-Charleston line at Middleton. He first called his railroad the
Ripley, Ship Island & Kentucky, but later, extending it southward through
New Albany and Pontotoc, he renamed it the Gulf & Chicago. The rail
road is now called the Gulf, Mobile & Northern.
Colonel Falkner fought many duels, and it is a family legend that when
he made a bitter enemy of his old friend and railroad associate, Col. R. J.
Thurmond, by defeating him for the State legislature in 1899, he refused
to arm himself, saying that he already had killed too many men and did
not want to kill any more. On the day of Falkner s second election to the
legislature, Thurmond shot him dead on the main street of Ripley. A
MARBLE STATUE marks Colonel Falkner s grave in the local cemetery.
The Colonel is remembered not only for his railroad but for his novel,
The White Rose of Memphis, the realism of which shocked his generation
as much as his grandson s Sanctuary shocked present-day readers.
The MUR.RY HOUSE (private), two blocks (L) from court square, is
characteristic of the more prosperous town houses built in the Central
Hills before the War between the States. It was originally a frame two-
story dwelling with a central hall. Later embellishments include the elabo
rately grilled balustrade of the long front gallery and upstairs balcony.
The JAIL, Railroad St., memento of the War between the States, is now
too weatherbeaten and dilapidated to be of use.
Left from Ripley on the Rienzi Road to the THOMAS HINDMAN HOME, 1.3
m. (open by permission), a two-story frame house, with greater width than
depth, and a portico with balcony and four square columns. It is weatherboarded
and twin brick chimneys flank the end walls. Thomas Hindman, killed in a duel
with Col. Falkner, built the home in 1842. Hindman is buried in the cemetery 20
yds. W. of the house.
At 19.6 m. on State 15 is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to the GILLARD HOME, 0.3 m. (open by permission). A one-
story cottage with a square portico and four slender square columns, it stands
high on brick pilings. The ,house was bought in 1837 from the American Land
Co. by H. W. Stricklin and sold in 1877 to A. M. Gillard. Perched upon a high
bluff, the house, now in need of repair, is invisible from the road.
Between Ripley and Blue Mountain the highway climbs higher into
the steep and rocky Pontotoc Ridge. Few farms are visible from the high
way but pasturage is excellent. A substantial part of the milk that supplies
the condenseries, creameries, and cheese factories of the Prairie belt is pro
duced along this route.
BLUE MOUNTAIN, 25.8 m. (461 alt., 569 pop.), sits in a valley
between two of the highest Pontotoc Hills, drawing its subsistence from
the colleges that cling to the slopes of these hills. BLUE MOUNTAIN
COLLEGE (R) is a four-year accredited college for women, supported by
the Mississippi Baptist Convention. Founded in 1873 by Gen. Mark Per-
TOUR 12 459
rin Lowrey, it is the oldest senior college for women in the State. The
red brick administration building of modern design overlooks the town
from the center of the campus. To the rear and side of it are seven other
modern buildings including dormitories. MISSISSIPPI HEIGHTS, on the
hilltop opposite, is a newer school established in 1905 as a privately
supported preparatory school for boys. With a small enrollment, all school
activities take place in the square red brick building that dominates the
campus. From this is a sweeping view of the surrounding valleys. In spite
of collegiate activities centered here, the town of Blue Mountain retains
the dignity of age. It was established in the 1830 $.
The ridges, having reached their height at Blue Mountain, level off
between here and New Albany; with the rugged topography lost in gentle
undulations, farm lands are better and more acreage is under cultivation.
The scene is average Mississippi without the palpable signs of prosperity
that the Delta and Prairie flaunt, yet with comfortable living from the land.
This comfort is evident in well-tended vegetable gardens, cords of wood
stored under the farmhouses, chickens, geese, turkeys, and pigs around the
doorsteps and often a truck or automobile parked beneath a tree in the
yard.
At 31.1 m. is the junction with a local graveled road.
Right on this road is COTTON PLANT, 0.7 m. (415 alt., 150 pop.), best
known for the PAUL RAINEY ESTATE. In 1898 Paul Rainey, sportsman and
big game hunter, bought 11,000 acres and stocked them with wolves, bears, foxes,
and pheasants. During Rainey s lifetime sportsmen came here to hunt and to at
tend the annual field trials. The Rainey house, now occupied by a sister of
Rainey, is a plain white frame farmhouse that has lost much of the glamor of gay
parties, hunt balls, and breakfasts associated with it during Rainey s lifetime.
Since his death in 1926 the game preserve has been abolished and the estate con
verted into small tenant farms known as Tippah Farms. Prevalent in the neighbor
hood is the belief that Rainey s death, reported to have occurred while he was en
route to Africa on a hunting expedition, actually did not happen, and that the
hunter now lives incognito in Europe.
Between here and New Albany large galvanized milk cans sit before the
farm gates along the highway, giving a clue to New Albany s newest and
most flourishing industry.
At 31.6 m. is TIPPAH-UNION SCHOOL (R), a Smith-Hughes vo
cational high school.
At NEW ALBANY, 39.8 m. (364 alt., 3,187 pop.) (see Tour 9), is
the junction with US 78 (see Tour 9).
South of New Albany the well-built durable farmhouses are indicative
of the living derived from cattle raising and truck and fruit farming. In
peach time, when the upland orchards are bearing, the fruit is for sale at
houses along the highway. The rocky, semi-fertile soil produces an excel
lent peach of the Elberta variety.
At 45.9 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road is INGOMAR, 7. .3 m. (364 alt., 241 pop.), established by
Colonel Falkner as a stop on his Chicago & Gulf R.R. and named by him for a
character in his novel, Tne White Rose of Memphis.
At 5/.6 m. is ECRU (560 pop.), also established by Colonel Falkner
460 TOURS
and named for the color of the depot. Formerly a lumber town, it is now
dependent upon farming.
The lands encircling Pontotoc are closely associated with the history
and legends of the Chickasaw Indians. Before the Treaty of Pontotoc
(1832), in which northern Mississippi was ceded to the Government, few
white settlers had come among the warlike Chickasaw to disturb their
"long towns" scattered through the Pontotoc Hills (see ARCHEOLOGY
AND INDIANS).
PONTOTOC, 57.3 m. (462 alt., 2,018 pop.), is the seat of Pontotoc
County, a county well known in Mississippi for its individualistic point of
view and manner of living. Here the courthouse does not dominate the
business district by sitting solidly in the center of the square, but demo
cratically stands in line with the business houses facing the square. Ponto
toc is entirely dependent on rural trade.
In 1832 the Chickasaw Cession provided that a land office for the sale
of Chickasaw lands be located in the center of the former Chickasaw Ter
ritory, and, with the establishment of that office, Pontotoc came into exist
ence. In its name the town perpetuates the Chickasaw struggle to retain
their territory, the word being a compound (Ind., ponti and tokali, battle
where the cat-tails stood). The battle referred to is D Artaguiette s defeat
near old Pontotoc in 1736. The land boom of the 1830 $ brought settlers
of English and Scotch-Irish blood from Virginia, Carolina, and Kentucky
and before the War between the States made Pontotoc one of the most
popular and prosperous towns in northern Mississippi. The culture pro
duced at that time has not been effaced today.
CHICKASAW COLLEGE, a Presbyterian coeducational school founded
in 1852, is on the site of the Pontotoc Female Academy established in
1836. The JACK FONTAINE HOME, 1210 S. Congress St. (open by
appointment), is a frame two-story house with a high pitched roof and a
square entrance portico supported by large round columns. It was built in
1850. The TURNER THOMASON HOME, 705 S. Congress St. (open
by appointment), of Greek Revival design, has a one-story wing extending
from each side of the two-story main unit. The fluted Ionic columns of
the square portico and a double entrance door are its outstanding features.
The house was built in 1856. The FRANK A. CLARK HOME, half a
mile NE. of the courthouse on State 6, built in 1850, is on the site of the
old land office. The house is a gracefully rambling one-story cottage, with
low roof, porticoed entrance, and end chimneys that add to its informal
appearance. Painted white, with a green roof and shutters, it has a fresh
ness that belies its age. The CAPTAIN BOLTON HOME, in the first
block of E. Marion St., is a tiny one-story brick house, interesting in that
it was at one time the office of the New York-Mississippi Land Co.
Here is the junction with State 6 (see Tour 14).
At the southern limits of Pontotoc is the junction with a rough clay
road.
Right on this road to the SPENCER HOME, 0.8 m. (open), a low spreading
dog-trot house built in 1836 and since greatly enlarged with rambling additions
at the side and rear. The log walls are painted white and a narrow gallery runs
TOUR 12 461
the length of the house. The house is occupied by descendants of the builder, and
many pieces of the early family furniture are in use today. This structure is one
of the best examples of the pioneer home of this section, and it shows how an in
crease in family and wealth enlarged it.
At 58.8 m. on State 15 is the junction with State 41, graveled.
Left on State 41 at 2.9 m. (L) to STONY LONESOME (open). The name is an
eloquent description of the house that sits high on a ridge, its tall, straight un
compromising mass silhouetted against a landscape of unusual primitivenesv
Judge Joel Pinson, one of the county s earliest settlers, used hand-hewn timbers
1 6 inches thick for the walls and six-inch heart pines for the flooring when he
built the house in 1849. It is a two-story, frame dwelling with long gable, end
chimneys, and narrow front gallery. The exterior is covered with weather-beaten
clapboards, and the gallery with its slender wood posts has a shingled shed roof.
The central hall on each floor is flanked by large square rooms. The house is occu
pied by Negro tenants.
At 3.9 m. on State 41 is the jyARTAGUlETTE MARKER (L), a plain rock
slab bearing the following inscription:
"Pierre D Artaguiette
French Commander, was defeated in battle
With Chickasaw Indians Sunday, May 20, 1736
A week later D Artaguiette, Francois-Marie
Bissot De Vincennes, Father Antoine Senat,
Jesuit Missionary in all 20 Frenchmen captured
Were burned at the stake by their captors.
Father Senat
Scorning the offer to escape martyrdom,
Remained with his comrades and intoning the
Miserere, led them into the destroying flames.
Erected by the John Foster Society
Children of the American Revolution
Columbus, Mississippi 1934."
A map from the French archives, however, places the scene of this battle a few
miles further E. nearer Belden and Tupelo.
Between Pontotoc and Ackerman farming gives way to small-scale lum
bering. Hillsides thickly covered with shortleaf pine trees alternate with
small clearings made by the tractor-run sawmills characteristic of northern
Mississippi. The impress of the early pioneers remains here both in the
architecture and in the wholesome, unpretentious manner of the people.
The pioneers were Scotch-Irish mountaineers who moved out of the Pied
mont through Kentucky and Tennessee and into Mississippi in ox-drawn
carts. In their course of migration they did not touch the Tidewater coun
try, so they brought no traces of Tidewater culture with them. They built
dog-trot houses with no refining additions, and they centered their com
munities around square, box-like churches that had no slave galleries. A
number of the early homes and churches remain scattered over the coun
tryside as indications of the straightforward people who built them. Even
the newer homes and churches, patterned on the old, show an inherent
quality of plainness and independence that has not been colored by
modernity.
The JOHN PEARSON HOME, 59.3 m. (L), resembles the Spencer
home near Pontotoc in appearance, having been erected during the same
462 TOURS
pioneer period. The house stands directly upon the old Chickasaw Trail.
At 59.9 m. (R) is LOCH1NVAR (private), built in the early 1830 $
by Robert Gordon, a descendant of one of Scotland s oldest families. Com
ing to Mississippi in 1800, Gordon settled in the prairie country near Ab
erdeen, which town he named. Here he amassed a fortune trading with
the Indians and growing cotton (see Tour 4). With the opening of the
land office at Pontotoc he migrated to the hills to build his mansion, de
signed more in the manner of the hybrid Georgian Colonial style of the
Prairie Belt than that of the Central Hills area. Lochinvar is two-and-a-
half stories in height and contains a broad central hall and eight high-
ceilinged rooms, each 22 feet square. A spiral stairway leads to the third
floor. At the rear, separate from the house, is a brick kitchen that contains
the original brick Dutch oven. Timber used in the house is heart pine and
the framework is of solid hand-hewn pine. The columns of the front por
tico are of the Roman Doric order and rise two stories in height in support
of a classic pediment. A notable feature of the portico is the delicate detail
of the balustrade at the second floor gallery. The columns were shipped to
Mobile from a Scottish castle and were hauled overland in oxcarts. The
house is flanked by broad side porches, one story in height topped with flat
deck roofs. The house was designed by a Scotch architect.
At 64.9 m. (R) is the MONROE MISSION, a small box-like frame
building, gray with age, established by the Rev. Thomas C. Stewart. Sent
by the Presbyterian Synod of South Carolina, Stewart came as a missionary
to the Chickasaw early in 1821. Chief Colbert, leader of the Chickasaw Na
tion, helped the missionary to find a suitable site, though Stewart himself
selected the name, calling the mission for James Monroe, then President
of the United States. The mission is now a mortuary connected with the
cemetery in the churchyard.
At 68 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to the TOXISH BAPTIST CHURCH, 1.7 m. (L), built in
1840. With its white frame walls and square lines it is typical of Mississippi
country churches. Inside, coal oil lamps, pine benches, colored glass windows,
and a foot-pump organ are in keeping with exterior simplicity. The church occu
pies the site of the home of Col. John Mclntosh, who migrated here from the
Oglethorpe Colony in Georgia, and takes its name from an older church building.
At 73.3 m. is OLD HOULKA (Ind., sacred place). Nothing is left of
the town that at the time of De Soto s expedition in 1541 was well estab
lished as a seat of Chickasaw tribal culture and near which almost three
centuries later an Indian agency was established. This agency became an
important trading post on the Natchez Trace, which, running directly
through the village, determined much of its early history (see TRANS
PORTATION). After the cession of Indian lands in 1832, white settlers
took over the town, cleared the land, and built their homes. The town
prospered until the Gulf, Mobile & Northern R.R. was built a mile E. and
New Houlka absorbed the older settlement.
Between Old Houlka and Houston the landscape is marked by exten
sive rugged pasture lands. Along the highway shiny milk cans wait beside
farmhouse mail boxes for the milk truck that conveys them to Houston.
TOUR 12 463
HOUSTON, 83 .5 m. (324 alt., 1,477 pop.), the hundred-year-old seat
of Chickasaw Co., is named for Sam Houston, Texas general and life-long
friend of Joel Pinson who donated the land for the town s site. Closely
tied to the Prairie towns that fringe it on the E. (see Tour 4), Houston is
building its future on the newly developed dairying industry. Recently a
CHEESE PLANT to handle the milk products of a wide area has been
established. But tying it to the past are its ante-bellum homes of Georgian
and Greek Revival types of architecture.
The BATES TABB HOME is a nine-room house with a portico having
four ornate columns and, above the entrance door, a graceful balcony.
Erected in 1845 the house is in good repair today; a detached kitchen re
mains as it was in ante-bellum days, with pothooks and cooking vessels
intact. After General Grierson s raid on the town the house was used as a
hospital for wounded Confederate soldiers.
The /. M. GRIFFIN HOME was built by General Tucker a few years
preceding the War between the States. Although similar in floor plan to
the usual Southern Planter type of dwelling, the style of the house is early
Victorian. This is notable in its high hip roof, overlarge dormers, and lacy
jig-saw ornament.
The CARNEGIE LIBRARY, Main St., was the first Carnegie Library
to be established in the State.
GEOLOGY HILL, half a mile N. of the courthouse, is named for the
unusual geological formations of various colors and sizes found here. Near
the hill are INDIAN MOUNDS from which arrow points, pottery, and
crudely fashioned jewelry have been removed.
As the highway climbs among the Central Hills, comfortable frame and
log houses, country schools and churches, and crossroad stores are seen.
MABEN, 107.7 m. (444 alt., 508 pop.), is a slightly enlarged edition
of the numerous small communities that dot this highway. Its essential
characteristic, that of being a trading place for farmers, is the same; only
in the number of its stores, houses, and people does it differ. Suggestive
of old-time horseswappings is the auction of livestock, poultry, and farm
produce held here on Thursdays.
MATHISTON, 110.1 m. (405 alt., 484 pop.), is the junction with
US 82 (see Tour 6).
Between here and Ackerman small tractor-powered lumber mills have
cut blank patches in the green wall of shortleaf pines.
At ACKERMAN, 727.6 m. (522 alt., 1,169 PP-)> two lar g e sawmills
give the inhabitants a substantial industrial life. Though few of the lum
ber towns of this section have attained a prosperity equaling that of the
villages that mushroomed with the yellow pine dynasty in the Piney
Woods, none has been left to lie like a ghost in the shadows of gaunt.
deserted mills.
Ackerman is the home of Hon. A. L. Ford, Representative in Congress
(1934- )
Here is the junction with State 9 (see Side Tour 12 A).
South of Ackerman the scene slowly changes. This transition section be
tween the Central Hills and the Piney Woods is known as the flatwoods.
464 TOURS
A touch of the Prairie s roll creeps in to modify the rugged contour of
the land, and the clay changes from light orange to red giving color to
the landscape. The longleaf pines are visible in the wooded areas, and
there are houses of both classic and dog-trot type.
LOUISVILLE, 142.7 m. (536 alt., 3,013 pop.), represents both hills
and prairie, combining in its interests the lumber mills of one and the
large-scale farming and dairying of the other. The pattern upon which the
town is planned resembles that of most Mississippi county seats: with a
courthouse square and a Confederate monument in the center.
Left from Louisville on a graveled road to LEGION STATE PARK, 1m., occu
pying a 424-acre tract of rugged woodlands. The park was built by the Civilian
Conservation Corps as a camping site and recreational center. Hiking and bridle
paths cut through it in a network of scenic beauty. A part of the acreage has been
set aside as a bird and game preserve. The whole is enclosed by fences of native
orangewood, a wood of great strength and durability, which add to the pleasantly
rustic effect. In the center of the park is a recreation hall built of native rock;
overnight cabins, equipped with running water, are available at moderate cost.
NOXAPATER (Lat, dark father), 152 m. (487 alt., 526 pop.), is an
old village near the heart of Choctaw Indian country.
Left from Noxapater on a graveled road to a narrow winding lane at 6 m.; L.
here to NANIH WAIYA (Ind., slanting hill) 9-6 m. This, the sacred mound of
the Choctaw, occupies a unique position in Choctaw tradition in that it is con
nected with both the creation and the migration of the tribes. It was the center
of Choctaw life before the advent of the white men. The Indians call it "Great
Mother" and look upon it as the birthplace of their race. Out of it ages ago, they
believe, came first the Muskogee who sunned themselves on the rampart until
dry, then went eastward. Next came the Cherokee, who, after having undergone
the sunlight baking process, followed the trail of the older tribe. Then came the
Chickasaw who settled and made a people to the north. At last came the Choc
taw, who sunned themselves until dry, then settled about the mound, their "Great
Mother," who told them that if they ever left her side they would die. When
the Government remembered its century-old debt to the Choctaw (see Tour 4.)
and established the present Indian agency in 1918, most of the tribe who re
mained were found to be living near the sacred mound, clinging hopefully to the
legendary promise of protection. Nanih Waiya is more than 50 ft. high and cov
ers an acre.
North of Nanih Waiya 250 yds. is another mound, a small one where, according
to Choctaw legend, corn was first presented to the world. Soon after the Choctaw
had settled, a crow brought a single grain from across the great water (Gulf)
and gave it to an orphan child who was playing near the mound. The child
named it toncht (corn) and planted it. When it came up he "hoed it, hilled it,
and laid it by," and so began the cultivation of maize.
BURNSIDE, 158.9 m. (399 alt, 100 pop.), was established in 1846
by the Burnside brothers. In the early 1850*5 a sawmill, purchased in Ohio
and brought down the Mississippi River to Vicksburg and thence by way
of Pearl River to Burnside, was erected. This was the first steam mill of its
type in the State ; its erection marked the beginning of the lumber industry
in northern Mississippi. A large mill operates here today.
Between Burnside and Philadelphia the soil is increasingly red and
sandy. The farms that the highway passes are splotched colorfully against
it, making a gay and pleasing picture.
PHILADELPHIA, 167.1 m. (416 alt., 2,560 pop.), settled soon after
CHOCTAW HANDICRAFT, INDIAN AGENCY, PHILADELPHIA
the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek (see Tour 4) on the site of the an
cient Indian town, Aloon Looanshaw (Ind., bull frog place), is today the
center of Mississippi s Indian country. In the Philadelphia area are con
centrated the greatest number of the 1,745 Indians remaining in Missis
sippi, and in Philadelphia is the Choctaw Indian Agency, established in
1918. In direct control is a superintendent, and under him are a chief
clerk, two stenographers, a farm agent, a farmer, and a field nurse. The
466 TOURS
superintendent also supervises the modern 3O-room hospital, built espe
cially for the Indians, and the seven scattered day schools for Indian chil
dren. The work is financed by an annual allotment of approximately $100,-
ooo. The Indians are known today as "Mississippi Choctaw," meaning
MISSISSIPPI CHOCTAW
they are a remnant of the 3,000 Choctaw warriors who in 1830 refused to
give up this land and their homes to the U.S. Government (see ARCHE
OLOGY AND INDIANS).
Approximately 75 families live either in small white houses, dotting
hills purchased by the Government, or in small tenant houses on land
owned by the Roman Catholic Church. Scattered among the settlements
are 77 small farms that the Indians own and cultivate with implements,
stock, and seeds furnished them. In addition, two farm experts are pro
vided to help them plan, raise, and market their products. The farms are
of necessity the chief source of Indian income, though the men make axe
handles and split-oak-bottom chairs, and the women weave gayly colored
baskets, which, when sold, supplement the incomes. These products are
TOUR 12 467
exhibited the first of August each year at the Neshoba Co. Fair, and can
be purchased from the Indians themselves, from the agency, or from the
Municipal Art Gallery in Jackson.
A YOUNG CHOCTAW
i. Left from Philadelphia on State 19 is TUCKER, 6.3 m. (open), one of the
seven Indian day schools. The Tucker school is well situated on a tract of seven
acres, with a Roman Catholic Mission adjoining. The teacher s cottage is one-
story with six rooms; the school building is a large, white frame building with
two classrooms, a dining room, a kitchen, and two bath rooms. While morning
classes are in progress, the teacher s assistant prepares a substantial meal which is
468 TOURS
served at noon. The children receive baths at the school. The work done in this
and other Indian schools extends through the first six grades and compares favor
ably with that done in white schools.
At 13.4 m. on State 19 is the HOUSE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL, a two-story
box-like frame building. Here is the junction with a graveled road.
Left 2.2 m. on this road to the JAMES WILSON HOME (L), with the good
proportions and simple lines of the Southern Planter type of dwelling. Colonel
Wilson was the first white settler in this location which was formerly the Indian
village Emuchalushia (Ind., our people are there). He was living here in a log
hut when "the stars fell" in 1833, and the next year built the present house to be
used as a tavern for the stagecoach line he operated. Colonel Wilson drove the
coach himself, contracted for a certain number of miles with the Government,
and was paid by the mile. He drove four horses to a coach and would trot them
as fast as they could go, changing horses with each ten miles. The old taproom
of the hotel is known today as Traveler s Room. In it is a chimney stack 67.5
inches wide and 53 inches deep. Upon it hang the portraits of Washington and
Andrew Jackson placed there when the house was built.
2. Right from Philadelphia on State 16 to WILLIAM S STORE, 2 m., typical of
the country store in the South. A rambling one-story building, it serves a wide
spread farm community with various commodities from plug tobacco to plows.
Farmers wives meet here and gossip while their children munch candy and drink
soda pop. The farmers discuss crops, the weather, and politics with great heat,
and often political convictions are formed over the counter. Political candidates
find the country store of this type an excellent place to leave their cards for dis
tribution.
At William s Store on State 16 is the junction with a graveled road.
Left 4 m. on this road to NESHOBA COUNTY FAIRGROUND. The fair orig
inated in 1892 and is held annually the latter part of July or first part of August
(season tickets $1, single adm. 50$; accommodations at two hotels on fair
ground). The usual products of an agricultural county are shown. Concessions,
sideshows, merry-go-rounds, and ferris wheels entertain the customers. What has
made the fair unusual is that it has become the political ring into which State
politicians toss their hats during election years. Often candidates for office make
their first public announcement here. In a hall on the fairground, political speech-
making goes on continuously, and outside on the sawdust midway candidates dis
pense cards and food freely. The impression a candidate makes here at the fair
often remains in the minds of the public on election day and greatly influences
the vote.
One night of the fair is set aside as Indian night, at which time the Choctaw give
exhibitions of tribal games and dances. Their colorful costumes, adorned with
beads and horses tails, and their dances contrast strikingly with the homely fair
atmosphere. During fair week at least one Indian ballgame is played. It takes
place in the afternoon, following the same procedure and rules as the peculiar
game of the ancient tribe. This contest takes place on a field similar to a football
field in size. The player is equipped with two sticks approximately three feet
long, having loosely woven cups at each end. The object of the game is to hit
one s pole or goal, located at the end of the field, with a small golf-like ball
which is thrown by an opponent, caught by the player in the cup of his stick, and
quickly hurled again. The Choctaw spectators enjoy this sport as much as the
players, and betting is heavy. In the past the Choctaw would bet their ponies,
their crops, their clothing, and often a large part of their territory if they met a
rival tribe in a game. Several inter-tribal games in which territory was lost and
won took place between the Creek and Choctaw tribes, and one, the game at
Beaver Pond, resulted in war.
Between Philadelphia and Newton is open farming country. The red
sandy soil is especially adapted to fruit growing, and where formerly grew
TOUR 12 469
longleaf and shortleaf pines and a variety of hardwood trees, now peach,
apple, and pecan orchards stretch out in symmetrical rows. Indians are
passed often on the highway through this section, the calico dresses of the
women and children as gayly colored as the red clay hills that furnish
their background.
At 782.7 m. is UNION (471 alt., 1,705 pop.), occupying the site of
the Indian village, Chauki. The town was settled by white men in 1829
because the Indians here grew corn with great success. At that time a
stage line from Montgomery, Ala., to Jackson, Miss., ran through the vil
lage and assisted in the town s growth until April 1863, when General
Sherman burned all but a few of the houses.
The BOLER HOME, a sprawling two-story frame house, is the one
remaining example of ante-bellum architecture. It is in bad repair, but
long, wide galleries on the first and second stories, mammoth brick chim
neys flanking the ends, and a yard planted with magnolia trees still give
evidence of the comfortable small-town living that existed before the War
between the States. It was built by Wesley Boler in 1847.
Between Union and Newtor the red clay hills, modified both as to de
gree of color and ruggedness, have been stripped of their trees by lumber
mills.
DECATUR, 192.9 m. (408 alt., 654 pop.), lost the records of its ante
bellum history when Sherman passed through and burned the courthouse
in 1863. Since that time it has become so modern as to elect a woman for
its mayor and to build one of the best equipped junior colleges in the
State. Its interests are divided between hill farming and lumbering with a
substantial income derived from both.
Here is the EAST CENTRAL JUNIOR COLLEGE, a State-supported
coeducational school, established in 1928 (1936-37 enrollment, 345).
At NEWTON, 200.9 m. (412 alt., 2,011 pop.) (see Tour 2), is the
junction with US 80 (see Tour 2).
South of Newton the prosperous hill farms recede, and with the miles
the Piney Woods scene is more and more evident. Here longleaf pines
have crowded out other varieties of trees, and only a few small patches of
corn and cotton appear; the country centers its interests upon lumbering.
At 277.8 m. is MONTROSE (418 alt., 312 pop.), a village that
achieved prestige in the 1840*5 when Montrose Academy flourished here.
The school, after losing its president to the newly-opened University of
Mississippi, was abandoned in 1848.
At 222 .5 m. is LOUIN (427 alt., 583 pop.), a country village and rail
road stop on the Gulf, Mobile & Northern R.R.
BAY SPRINGS, 229.7 m. (406 alt., 927 pop.), operates a sawmill, a
stave mill, and a block and spindle mill, utilizing the material of the
nearby forests. It administers justice for the county from the red brick
courthouse on the crest of a steep hill at the northern edge of town.
Within the short span of less than 25 years the brief stretch of country
between Bay Springs and Laurel lived and died, and today is struggling
for a rebirth. Towns that mushroomed into prominence with the rise of
the yellow pine lumber industry are now desolate, ghost-like guardians of
47 TOURS
abandoned sawmills. The land lies now scarcely touched by man, as if left
free in its desperate struggle to replenish the once great forests of pine;
but the scars left by mill owners when the cutting was exhausted show
through the small, second-growth timber in miles of stump-covered fields.
The cutting of the virgin trees also gave an impetus to erosion; hillsides
and ridges, appearing a vague greenish-blue at a distance, have deep red
gullies eating at their hearts.
State 15 enters on 5th St.; R. on i3th Ave. ; L. on 6th St.; L. on 8th
Ave. ; R. on yth St. ; L. on 2nd Ave. to Magnolia St.
LAUREL, 253.6 m. (243 alt, 18,017 pop.)-
Points of Interest. Art Museum, vegetable canning plant, starch factory, Masonite
Corporation, naval stores, and others.
Here are the junctions with US 84 (see Tour 11) and US n (see
Tour 8).
The route continues R. on Magnolia St. ; L. on Central St. ; R. on Ellis-
ville Blvd. (State 15).
The cutover lands that extend southward from Laurel to the marshes of
the Leaf and Pascagoula Rivers are used as a laboratory for industrial ex
perimentation. Fruit and tung tree orchards, turpentine farms, forests of
young pines to be sold to pulp mills, poultry farms, and forest preserves
are seen. Occasionally the highway passes miles of stumpy former timber-
land, to come upon the skeleton of some mill town left as a relic of the
lumber dynasty. The hills of the Piney Woods then lose themselves in the
low flat Coastal Meadow, and the highway descends to a setting of pictur
esque beauty with live oaks and winding rivers furnishing the scenery.
DE SOTO NATIONAL FOREST, 264.7 m., is the scene of reforesta
tion efforts. A fine sprinkling of tiny seedling pines and a few remaining
specimens of virgin timber are being carefully protected by the Govern
ment. Southward truck and poultry farms dot the landscape to vary the
scene of seedling pines that extend for miles through this section and re
semble Christmas greens in their perfect uniformity and diminutive size.
RICHTON, 281 m. (160 alt., 950 pop.), abandoned a fast-dying lum
ber industry in 1927 to turn its attention to diversified farming.
Left from Richton on a graveled road to the FARM HOMESTEAD PROJECT,
2.5 m., the result of a "grown-in-the-county dinner," at which 47 articles of
food were served to the guests by the Rotary Club at Richton, inspiring the peo
ple of the county to a back-to-the-farm movement. The outgrowth of this dinner
was the erection of 15 houses in 1936. The houses were built on 80 acres of cut-
over land, the latter to be used for diversified farming. The houses contain five
rooms each, are painted white with green or red roofs, and have their private
wells, chicken yards, and barns. They have been erected by the Government and
are for sale on small -term payments. On Beaver Dam Lake, near the center of
the homestead project, is an OLD WATER MILL built in 1851. Formerly used
for sawing lumber the mill today grinds meal and thrashes a little rice grown in
the vicinity. Beaver Dam is alleged to have been built by Indians who came here
to camp and to swim in its waters.
South of Leaf River, 293 .5 m., the pines give place to sprawling live
oak trees, overgrown in a luxuriance of gray moss. The soil shows an in
creasing sandiness.
TOUR I2A 471
At BEAUMONT, 294.5 m. (93 alt., 350 pop.), is the junction with
State 24 (see Tour 23), the two highways uniting between this point and
McLAIN, 307.9 m. (76 alt., 350 pop.).
South of McLain the highway passes through LEAF RIVER SWAMP,
a sandy white thread twining among woods of shadowy beauty.
At 304.2 m. (L) the view of Leaf River Swamp, with moss-covered
cypresses reflected in still green marsh pools, is more suggestive of the
Florida Everglades than of Mississippi.
At 305 m. Leaf and Chickasawhay Rivers join to form Pascagoula River.
Right from the bridge the red sandy banks are a brilliant background for
the limpid green waters. East of the river the highway rises out of the
swamp to run through miles of pasture land thickly dotted with sheep and
cattle.
At LUCEDALE, 318.8 m. (185 alt., 834 pop.), is the junction with
State 63 (see Tour 15).
The highway is paved between this point and the Alabama Line, cut
ting through steep red clay banks. On both sides of the highway are roll
ing farms and pastures.
The LUCE FARMS, 319.8 m., the best example the route offers of
renascent cut-over land, were established in 1914 to furnish employment
to men left idle by the closing of the mills in Lucedale. The farms supply
the Luce Products Co. with vegetables, growing green beans, okra, toma
toes, turnip greens, peppers, English peas, beets, spinach, pineapple pears,
pecans, corn, oats, and rye. Many farmers of George and Greene Counties
are stockholders in the company.
The influence of the Luce Farms extends throughout the remainder of
the route in a patchwork of small fruit and vegetable farms.
The highway crosses Escatawpa River which forms the Alabama Line,
at 330.5 m., 27 miles NW. of Mobile, Ala. The hills of Alabama are visi
ble as a dark humped outline.
Side Tour I2A
Springville Calhoun City Ackerman, 80.8 m. State 9.
Graveled roadbed, two lanes, short paved sections.
Accommodations only in larger towns.
This route breaks in upon a brief stretch of country dominated through
out by strong sectional flavor. Lying among the last outcroppings of the
Pontotoc hills, the Kind is evenly spread with dark bristly growths of
TOURS
shortleaf pine, which furnish the main industry for the people. Inde
pendent landowners from the mountains of Virginia, Kentucky, and
Tennessee homesteaded the hill lands here in the 1840 $, settling in
clans and neighborhoods. Remnants of these clans still exist and the
pattern of life has changed but little since that time. Remote from a
railroad the natives have retained their dog-trot houses, their ancestral
quilts, and a great deal of their individuality. Their vocabulary has a
direct, poetic quality; archaisms are present in their speech. They sing
lusty old-time ballads and "cut the figures" of square dances far into
the night.
At SPRINGVILLE, m. (200 pop.) (see Tour 14), State 9 branches
S. from State 6 (see Tour 14) and climbs to a hilltop view of forested
hills and low-lying valley farms. The houses here are typical of the
houses throughout the route. Some are new, some old, some spacious,
and some compact, but, with few exceptions, all are weathered and un-
painted, with overhanging roofs, log-sidings, and squat mud-chinked
chimneys; and all are built around a roomy, open hallway or "dog-trot."
This dog-trot is an outgrowth of the climatic needs and gives the habita
tions an air of homely comfort; it is an excellent place to hang the
wash, to store a bale of cotton, or to "just sit" and catch the breeze when
a day s work on the land is done.
RANDOLPH, 5.4 m. (195 pop.), was named for the Virginia states
man by early settlers who were staunch followers of his belief in the
importance of States rights. Many years ago the village prospered from
the sale of moonshine whisky, but today the terraced farms along the
rugged hill slopes and in the more fertile creek bottoms are the chief
sources of livelihood.
Between Randolph and Pittsboro are some of the densest shortleaf
pine forests in the State. Visible and audible from the highway are
numerous portable sawmills. Farmers in this area cut a few pines, sell
the "billets," and plant a crop of corn where the trees formerly stood.
The trees are the farmers cash crops, for truck is raised in quantities
sufficient only for their own needs.
At 8J m. is GAREY SPRINGS BAPTIST CHURCH, where Sacred
Harp Singings are held annually on the third Sunday in June.
As State 9 travels southward the density of the pines increases, their
great height making long shadows across the road.
SAREPTA, 14.4 m. (150 pop.), has lived down a bad name acquired
during the i88o s when the swaggering backwoodsmen of the vicinity
had the habit of coming to the village and taking the law into their
hands. The memory of one infamous son, however, is kept green in the
"Ballad of Dock Bishop," of local origin. The ballad, telling in endless,
mournful verses of the crimes, the trial, and the hanging of Dock, is
sung by the people at neighborhood parties. In Calhoun Co. these neigh
borhood parties are not only an institution but are in a large measure
responsible for the perpetuation of the ballad here. Neighbors from miles
around gather in the "front room" of some farmhouse, where the biggest
TOUR I2A 473
feather bed is decked with the family s prize quilts, and standing around
the organ entertain themselves with ballad and hymn singing and eat
ing (see WHITE FOLKWAYS).
South of Sarepta in a low flat along Skuna (Shooner) River is BRUCE,
26.2 ;//. (946 pop.), an anomaly in this section, with a large, prosper
ing hardwood lumber mill. The town was established in 1927 when the
lumber mill that gave it its name was built here. Until that time the
forests had been a problem to the farmers, who saw them only as an
impediment to planting the land in cotton and corn, and had burned
much valuable timber as firewood and as waste after log-rollings.
At 27.3 m. State 9 crosses Skuna River and runs for a short distance
through low fertile bottom lands, which grow abundant corps of full-
eared, long-tasseled corn, and climbs once more among the hills.
PITTSBORO, 30.2 m. (249 pop.), has clung to the title of seat
of Calhoun Co. through a long series of contests with larger and more
accessible villages of the county. When Pittsboro s two-story brick court
house, which had reverberated to the oratory of Democrats and Whigs
of the county since 1856, burned in 1922, the other covetous villages
thought surely Pittsboro s hold would weaken. But immediately the fur
nishings of the old structure were moved into an empty store building,
and when the next session of court met, it met in Pittsboro, as before.
Long associated with court week in Pittsboro is the custom or art of
horse swapping. Formerly hundreds of tobacco-spitting, swearing, swash
buckling swappers poured into Pittsboro on the first Monday of court
to spend the day haggling over the merits of their respective horses.
All sorts of deals were made an old worn-out horse might be traded
for a jackknife. Occasionally a man would mount a wagon and auction
his horse to the highest bidder. Today, much of the color and excite
ment is gone from the trading, but old-timers still listen for the tune of
the jews -harp that heralds the coming of the traders, and for the rest
less neighing of horses.
Between Pittsboro and Calhoun City the toll on the forest has been
heavy, and the rugged stumpy hillsides have been converted into pastures.
The slopes are dotted with grazing red and brown cattle, and the wind
mills or nearby farms whirl in the breeze.
CALHOUN CITY, 36.3 m. (1,012 pop.), has the prestige that be
longs to the largest town and only railroad station in a county. One-story
drug and grocery stores and dress shops where women of the section
buy their Sunday garments enclose a central parkway, which has been
hopefully reserved since the town was laid out awaiting the time when
Pittsboro will relinquish the county seat and courthouse. The town was
settled on part of a 64O-acre tract of land that T. P. Gore bought from
an Indian, Ish-ta-hath-Ia. Tradition says that Gore obtained the entire
section for a handful of bright beads and several quarts of whisky. Gore
migrated here from Oklahoma, and, settling himself in a broad, squat
dog-trot house, led an easy life in which horse-racing and cock-fighting
figured prominently. Before his death Gore buried a great part of the
474 TOURS
gold he had amassed on his plantation, and died without revealing its
hiding place. Hopeful persons still dig diligently near the plantation
in search of the treasure. With three sawmills in bperation and the
opening of a railroad station on the Gulf, Mobile & Northern R.R. here,
Calhoun City developed from a straggling backwoods village into a
town that can offer smart clothing, exotic canned goods, and the diversion
of a picture show to country people who come in to spend the day.
Right from Calhoun City, 0.5 m., on State 8 to the GRAVE OF T. P. GORE,
the founder of Calhoun City. His tomb bears the date of his birth, 1776. Near
the grave and marking the site of Gore Plantation is GORE SPRINGS.
On the same highway is BIG CREEK, 8 m., sectionally famous for the Fiddlers
Contest held annually on or near the i5th of August. Selections range from old
"break-downs" to modern jazz, and competition among the perspiring farmers is
keen. Following the contest, dinner is spread on the school grounds.
Immediately S. of Calhoun City the town atmosphere lingers in spread
ing farmhouses, painted cheerfully red, yellow, and white, and in bill
boards displaying local advertisements. But the country is too primitive
to be bound long by a townish atmosphere and soon again assumes its
natural air. Dog-trot houses, usually with blue- jean overalls and calico
dresses blowing dry in the open central hall, contrast with the modern
bungalows outside the town.
SLATE SPRINGS, 44.3 m. (375 alt., 190 pop.), is one of the oldest
and highest communities in the county. At one time a college flourished
here, also a flour mill and two churches; but today its chief claims to
notice are the two nearby elevations known locally as Sand and Rocky
Mountains.
BELLEFONTAINE, 53.8 m. (129 pop.), originated in the early
1840 $ as a market town on the old Grenada trail. So dim was the trail
that it was necessary to ring a bell every hour for guidance. This bell,
a large noisy one, hung high in the air on a spot that later became the
village. Near the bell a saloon was established, and here travelers stopped
for relaxation.
At 54.9 m. (L) is the WILLIAM CASTLE HOME, a large elaborate
version of the dog-trot structure so commonly seen through this section.
Bill Castle built the house himself in 1833, and all material was made
by hand. The house is still in good condition and occupied as a home.
WALTHALL, 57.1 m. (124 pop.), has all the elements of a country
county seat a courthouse, a jail, a town pump, and a store the sides of
which are never without their colorful array of circus posters.
Between Walthall and Eupora the country is continuously high, hilly,
and rugged, dotted with occasional tractor mills, squat log houses, corn
and cotton patches, and dairies.
At EUPORA, 62.4 m. (1,092 pop.) (see Tour 6), is a junction with
US 82 (see Tour 6).
Between Eupora and Ackerman the highway flattens into low-lying
dank bottom land, then rises to heights not surpassed elsewhere on the
route. Close to its southern end State 9 enters a country in which the
peaks of the hills, the sheerness of the slopes stretching to the valleys,
TOUR 13 475
the density and height of the pines and the view of distant ridges call
forth superlatives.
At ACKERMAN, 80.8 m. (522 alt., 1,169 PP-) ( see Tour 12 )> is
a junction with State 15 (see Tour 12).
Tour 13
Junction with State 63 Hatticsburg Columbia McComb Woodville. State 24.
Junction with State 63 to Woodville, 206.4 m.
The Gulf, Mobile & Northern R.R. parallels route between McLain and Hatties-
burg; Fernwood, Columbia & Gulf R.R. between Columbia and McComb.
Graveled roadbed two lanes wide.
Accommodations in cities.
State 24 wanders through the heart of the Piney Woods, then, skirting
the lower part of the truck farming belt between Columbia and McComb,
it traverses the southern extremity of a section noted for its ante-bellum
prosperity. With the exception of the Hattiesburg, Columbia, McComb,
and Woodville areas it runs through a rolling country visited by few
Mississippians and fewer out-of-state travelers.
State 24 branches E. from State 63, m. (see Tour 15), 2.5 m. NW.
of LEAKESVILLE (see Tour 15).
McLAIN, 18.8 m. (76 alt., 350 pop.), has an easy rural manner that
is evidenced by the drinking fountain centering the crossroads around
which the town is gathered. The town s favorite story concerns the reve
lation of buried Spanish gold a few miles northwest of the drug store.
A century and a half ago, when the Spaniards ruled the territory then
known as West Florida, an American named Gaines acquired a fortune
by trading with the Spaniards and Choctaw. For safekeeping, he buried
his treasure in five caches; then he died, taking his secret with him.
Soon after the War between the States three of the caches were unearthed
and still later a fourth, containing Spanish gold, jewelry, and a gold
pocket knife. The fifth and last cache was revealed in 1934 to a farmer
named Sylvester when the bank of a small tributary of the Leaf River
washed away. This collection contained American coins and many old
Spanish gold pieces of eight.
Here is the junction with State 15 (see Tour 12).
Left from McLain on a forest firebreak road to the Progress School, 3.1 m.;
(L) from the Progress School to a LOG CABIN, 3.6 m. (priv***), one of the
best examples in the State of the pioneer s cabin. The builder raised the logs 75
47^ TOURS
years ago, made a single pen room, rived his shingles of cypress, and to escape
the heat and lessen the danger of fire built his kitchen apart from the house. The
logs refused to die, and now their growth has cemented them as firmly as if they
were rock. The kitchen, still separate from the main room, is now connected
with it by a hewn plank walk. The main room has been papered with a white
covering that bulges over the logs.
At 5.7 m. on this same road is the junction with a fire trail.
Right here along a ridge to LITTLE CREEK, 4.7 m. On the beech trees that
hold the bridge in place are ax scars thought to have been made by Andrew
Jackson s army returning from the Battle of New Orleans. Right from the bridge
is a deep hole where Jackson s men watered and rested their stock.
Between McLain and Beaumont State 24 and State 15 are the same
route (see Tour 12).
BEAUMONT, 27.2 m. (93 alt., 350 pop.), is in the second bottom
flats along Leaf River.
The highway runs between the river (R) and the Leaf River Unit of
the De Soto National Forest (L). The sandy texture of the soil and
the richer vegetation are indicative of the break made by the water
courses in the red clay and pine woods of the uplands.
NEW AUGUSTA, 34.7 m. (350 pop.), is the seat of Perry Co. and
a farm trading center.
Right from New Augusta on the Ellisville road to a bridge across Leaf River,
2 m. On the north bank of the stream is a triangular open plat of ground
shaded by tall oaks, the SITE of OLD AUGUSTA, 2.1 m. Among the relics is a
safe made of concrete and sheathed in rusted iron; this was a part of the old
courthouse vaults. Under the trees, almost hidden from view and shrouded in
creepers, is part of the old jail block. This cell, with a few iron bars left in the
broken window, was the one in which James Copeland, leader of the Copeland
Clan of outlaws, was confined before he was hanged in 1857.
Before the War between the States, the Piney Woods were not only an excellent
hideout and ambush for highwaymen, but they also offered wealthy prey in the
form of slave speculators on their way to New Orleans and the Natchez country,
and in the gentlemen who traveled from tavern to tavern with saddle bags and
money belts filled with gold. The story of the Copeland Clan is typical* of the
gangs that made this southern neck of Mississippi a part of their field of opera
tion. James Copeland, the leader, was born in 1823 near the Pascagoula River
about 20 miles north of the Gulf, and made his first theft when he was 12 years
old. Before he was 15 he had burned the Jackson Co. courthouse to destroy an
indictment against him. In 1839 the clan of which he was then a member raided
Mobile. Thieving expeditions to Florida, Texas, and Louisiana followed. Retiring
to a hideout somewhere on Red Creek near what is now Wiggins, Copeland and
his cronies murdered a number of their clan whom they thought to be spies, and
Copeland was made the leader. In Catahoula Swamp, Hancock Co., Copeland
buried $30,000 in gold.
The decline and fall of the clan was climaxed with the battle of Harvey on
Black Creek in which a small army of men outshot the outlaws. Copeland s
running saved him temporarily, though he lost the key map to his buried treasure.
Early in the 1850*5 Copeland was stabbed in an altercation, and a posse trailing
him by the blood stains arrested and carried him to Mobile. After a number of
trials and confusion over State sovereignties, he was hanged in 1857 at Old
Augusta, on the edge of the pine forests that had been his former sanctuary.
Except for the old jail cell nothing is left to mark the town that was, in 1822,
the Government land office and the most important settlement in the Piney Woods
TOUR 13 477
east of the Pearl River Valley. Its political importance as land office gave the
town an impressive start but in 1841 signs of decay were evident. Augusta citi
zens nuruged to exist by rafting logs down Leaf River to Moss Point on the
Coast. This period of existence as a river-landing was a part of the early history
of all the older settlements along the watercourses in the Piney Woods. Shortly
after 1900, the railroad having been built through in 1903, the few settlers left
in Old Augusta moved across the river to the railroad settlement at New
Augusta. The death of the old town is one of the best examples in Mississippi
of the influence of the first railroads the end of river town civilizations, and
the beginning of a new era.
At 53.1 m. (L) is a PINE FELT FACTORY (visited by special Per
mission), a long, wooden shed with piles of pine needles around it.
The factory, the only one of its kind, was opened in 1935. Pine straw,
formerly wasted, is processed for use in pillows, mattresses, upholster
ing, etc.
At HATTIESBURG, ,5:5.5 m. (143 alt, 18,601 pop.) (see Tour 7,
Sec. b), are the junctions with US 49 (see Tour 7, Sec. b) and State n
(see Tour 8).
West of Hattiesburg State 24 becomes a broad, improved highway
leading to the Pearl River valley, second only to the Natchez district
in date of settlement and density of early population. Cotton patches and
corn fields break the woodland stretches of oak and pine.
At 90.8 m. is the junction with a graveled road.
Right on this road to the MISSISSIPPI INDUSTRIAL AND TRAINING
SCHOOL, 1.2 m., a home-like institution for wayward, backward, and orphaned
children of the State. The plant, centered by the large, rectangular shaped admin
istration building, is scattered over a large landscaped campus and consists of 22
modern-design brick buildings, the majority of which are two stories in height.
The boys and girls are taught various crafts and trades to fit them for useful
lives. A large acreage of farmland surrounding the school supplies it with vege
tables and fruits; a dairy and syrup mill are operated in conjunction with the
institution. A swimming pool and ball park provide recreation for the children.
COLUMBIA, 92.4 m. (145 alt, 4,833 pop.), until 1929 was a typical
sawmill town with all interests centered about a large yellow pine mill.
Then the mill closed its doors and Columbia became a dreary place of
abandoned houses, a rotting mill structure, and a stagnant mill pond.
Through the efforts of its citizens who were proud of their white-lighted
main street and the other luxuries the mill had brought, the town, instead
of dwindling to a ghost, in 1929 adopted the economic philosophy of
balanced economy already in practice to a certain extent in the prairie.
The surrounding cut-over timber land, desert-like in its spread of cactus-
like stumps, was cleared for farming and dairying. So effective has been
Columbia s break with the past that few remember that in the early
iSoo s it was a river port, or that for three months it was the capital
of the State. Here the legislative session of 1821 met to vote Jackson
the permanent capital. But, with Jackson established, Columbia slipped
back into the easy life of a village until recalled to industry by the
lumber mill in the 1920*5.
SOUTHERN NAVAL STORES PLANT, S. of Courthouse Square (us-
.iitb permission), known locally as the knot factory, manufactures
478 TOURS
pine knots and stumps into turpentine, pine oil, rosin, and disinfectant.
This is the only use yet discovered for the stumps and knots left by the
lumber mills. The steel and concrete buildings of the plant are equipped
with six 8 1/2 -ton extractors and three i,8oo-gallon stills for refining
turpentine and pine oils.
The stumps and knots are first weighed by the ton, then, passing
into the mill house, moved from the hopper into the hog and thence
to the shredder, where they are reduced to particles the size of oats.
These small particles of pine are stored in loo-ton chip bins in the
extractor house until, in time, they are dumped into extractors where
a steam and solvent process extracts from them a crude form of tur
pentine and pine oil. Rosin, being cut from the chips with naphtha, is
sent to a refinery to go through six large washers each of an approximate
i5,ooo-gallon capacity, and from there to evaporators where the processing
is completed. The crude turpentine and pine oil go into tanks until
they can be placed in stills and refined under the supervision of chemists.
Certain grades of pine oil flow through copper tanks, never coming in
contact with iron which would cause contamination. Rosin is stored in
steel drums or wooden barrels and shipped. The drums are bought
knocked down, and then reassembled at the plant. The barrels are made
at the stave mill operated in connection with the plant.
The Southern Naval Stores Co. has under lease 75,000 acres of stumps,
but, as an ample supply can be obtained from farmers, their supply
remains untouched. Stumps from virgin pine timber stay in the ground
indefinitely without rotting. By dynamiting the stumps approximately
1 8 inches below the ground, the soil is made better for farming and
grazing purposes. In conjunction with a tour of the Naval Stores Plant,
a trip by car to the cut-over lands, where the process of dynamiting
stumps is being carried on, is of interest.
The DORGAN-McPHILLIPS VEGETABLE PACKING PLANT
(open 9-4 from March to Dec.) cans peans, beans, corn, carrots, and
sweet potatoes. Cleaning, paring, and cutting the vegetables are done
by Negro women. After this preliminary work, the vegetables, under
the supervision of white workers, are cooked at high steam pressure
in vats, then electrically canned and sealed.
The COLUMBIA BOX FACTORY (open 9-4 weekdays), across
street, manufactures veneered strips to be used by Northern manufacturers
in making packing boxes. The gum logs are soaked in water for three
days, then a circular saw, cutting round and round the log until the
heart is reached, shaves off strips l/ 2 in. in width. The strips are glued
in threes, the grain of the center strip running opposite to that of the
outside strips to give the material additional strength.
The HUGH WHITE HOME, Broad St., i mile from courthouse, built
during the lumber boom of the 1920*5, is typical of the houses of Colum
bia s lumber magnates. Set among landscaped gardens on a 3 5 -acre tract
of pine woods, it is a fine two-story house of Spanish design. White was
elected Governor of Mississippi in 1936 on a platform of balancing agri
culture with industry. The son of J. J. White, pioneer lumberman, he was
TOUR 13 479
born in McComb in 1881. He early identified himself with the lumber
industry in Mississippi, and until its closing in 1930 owned and operated
the White Lumber Mill at Columbia. With the collapse of the lumber in
dustry, he turned his energies toward rebuilding Columbia on a sounder
basis. He was for many years mayor of the town, the only public office
that he held before being elected Governor of the State (see AN OUT
LINE OF FOUR CENTURIES).
At 94 m. State 24 crosses Pearl River, which gave Columbia, like Mon-
ticello (see Tour 11), a. character apart from the rest of the Piney Woods.
The height of the road levee through the overflow bottoms and the mossy
cypress and water hyacinths in the bed are worthy of notice.
At FOXWORTH, 9:5.3 m. (200 pop.), is a water mill which now cuts
lumber, gins cotton, and grinds corn. The mill rocks are more than 100
years old.
Left from Foxworth, on a graveled road by a number of planter houses, to
BALL S MILL, 9.2 m., an old-fashioned water grist mill.
At 15.8 m. on this same road is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on the narrow road 2J m. to the old JOHN FORD HOME, on a plateau
approximately a mile from Pearl River. It is a rude but strong building, of ash-
gray timbers and yellowed brick two-and-a-half stories high. In its architecture it
shows the influence of the Spaniards, masters of the territory whose border was
five miles S. John Ford, the builder, was a Methodist minister who came from
South Carolina in 1805. Between 1805 and 1809, he built this first house in the
region, and subsequently filled it with five sons and two daughters. Four of the
five sons became Methodist circuit riders and the two daughters became wives of
circuit riders. One of the sons, Thomas, organized the Mississippi Methodist
Society and built the first church of that denomination in Jackson, the new State
capital. The second Mississippi Methodist Conference was held in the house in
1814. So pronouncedly religious was the Ford family that when Gen. Andrew
Jackson stopped here on his way to fight the British at New Orleans, the Rev
erend Mr. Ford, hearing that the general was a great man to swear, would not
grant him shelter until he promised he would use no profanity and would attend
family prayer.
The Pearl River Convention met in the home in 1816 and drew up a petition
asking for admission of the State to the Union. The enabling act was passed
soon after by Congress; the Constitutional Convention assembled the next year;
and Mississippi Territory became a State in 1817. Long before, the site of the
home had been identified with the Indians. Arrowheads, beads, and stone hatch
ets are found in the fields and woods around it. In the yard are traces of the old
stockade that surrounded the house. In the ceiling of one of the upper rooms is
a small trap door through which Tallapoosa, a friendly Indian, was hidden when
a strange Indian approached the house. It was Tallapoosa who kept the white
settlers informed of the movements of the hostile tribes.
The house is nearly square. Its ground floor has very thick brick walls and is
paved with brick. The second floor is frame, with clapboards of heart pine,
hand-cut and hand-dressed, and put together with hand-wrought iron nails made
at the home forge. The roof is shingled. Not a drop of paint has ever been put
on any part of the building, so the outside walls have taken on a soft gray shade
often seen on old dead pines. The side now seen first was originally the rear, the
house having been built to face the river. Two rooms at each end of the second
or main floor open on a porch enclosed on three sides and approached on the
open end by a straight stairway rising from the ground, with a round stair rail
and slender balusters. The front has a long porch added in the 1840*5. The
480 TOURS
medium-sized rooms are ceiled with narrow planks. The small windows are
many paned. The effect is that of a blockhouse.
At 105.2 m. is KOKOMO (100 pop.), a sawmill village that drew the
life from China Grove when the railroad came through.
At 109 m. is CHINA GROVE CHURCH, all that remains of one of
the oldest settlements on the ridge between Pearl River and Bogue Chitto
River. Built in 1854, it is a one-story, box-like frame building set in the
grove of trees for which the village and church were named. Above the
entrance in the interior is a slave balcony. China Grove was settled in 1815
by Ralph Stovall who used the power of Magee s Creek to run a sawmill,
a cotton gin and press, a rice pestle mill and fan for cleaning, and a grist
mill. Around these mills Scotch-Irish farmers from the Carolina Piedmont
settled.
At 113.8 m. is TYLERTOWN (1,102 pop.), a farming center and the
seat of Walthall Co., in which it is the only incorporated town. The place
was named for William G. Tyler, a settler from Boston, Mass., and an
artilleryman under Gen. Andrew Jackson in the Creek campaign and the
War of 1812.
Left from Tylertown to Collins Creek, on the bank of which is the CHAUNCEY
COLLINS PLACE, 2 m., the oldest house in the vicinity. This two-story house
with square frame columns was erected about 1822. The remains of Collins
bark-tanning mill are evident.
Between Tylertown and McComb, the corn and cotton patches show
pine stumps, a composition that clearly demonstrates the change made in
the former Piney Woods. The shotgun houses, their rooms built one be
hind the other, have clean-swept dooryards, chinaberry trees, and rose
bushes.
At 124.2 m. State 24 crosses the Bogue Chitto (Ind., big creek) River
on a bridge that is held in place by enormous moss-covered oaks.
At 129.1 m. is the junction with a narrow graveled road.
Right on this road is HOLMESVILLE, 4 m. (72 pop.), on the banks of the
Bogue Chitto River. Doomed when the railroad was pushed through McComb to
the northwest in 1857, it, like many other river towns in the State, is desolate
except for the few fine old homes (private). The first seen is the S. S. SIMMONS
PLACE, a two-story frame structure, one room wide and fully 80 feet long with
a columned porch down its long side. The HOLMESVILLE CEMETERY, 3.6
m. (R), overgrown with weeds and flowers, has headstones with inscriptions
dating back to 1824. The CHANCERY CLERK S OFFICE, 3.9 m. (R), is a
part of the old Holmesville courthouse, built in 1816, Holmesville having been
the first seat of Pike Co. The office has recently been repaired and converted into
a community center. Its sand rock foundation, with the original brick held to
gether by a mortar made by mixing clay with salt, and the original hewn window
and door sills are intact. In the yard a circle of cedars marks the site of the
courthouse, burned in 1884. At 4 m. (R) is the DR. GEORGE NICHOLSON
PLACE, a small frame house almost hidden by a century-old camellia japonica.
Near Dillon s Bridge on Kirklin Creek, one of the Bogue Chitto tributaries, is
the GEORGE SMITH PLACE, settled as early as 1817. The low house, con
structed of heart pine, and the old water mill are noted for their picturesque
beauty. The COL. PRESTON BRENT HOME, constructed of hewn logs sheathed
later with hewn lumber, stands in a grove of 1,000 crapemyrtle trees. The THAD
ELLZEY PLACE was built in 1812 of hewn logs a foot in diameter joined
with wooden pins and is unchanged except for a new roof.
TOUR 13 481
At 139.1 m. State 24 parallels the railroad shops and yards (L) that
made McComb prominent.
At McCOMB, 140 m. (10,057 pop.) (see Tour 5, Sec. b), is the junc
tion with US 51 (see Tour 5, Sec. b).
At 144.3 m. (L) is the junction with State 48.
Left on State 48 is PERCY QUIN STATE PARK, 1.4 m. (R). This park is a
rolling and slightly hilly tract of 1,480 acres lying along the Tangipahoa River.
On it is being constructed a very large earth dam that will impound water for a
lake of 540 acres. One hundred thousand cu. yds. of soil will go into the dam,
and the lake will be big enough for swimming, boating, and fishing. A lodge, a
boathouse, overnight cabins, trail-side shelters, and picnic grounds are available.
Virgin and second growth pine timber and thickly-growing hardwood trees shade
the grounds. The Percy Quin Park was named for the U. S. Representative,
Percy E. Quin, who was born in Amite Co., Oct. 30, 1872, and died in 1932.
At 145.2 m. (R) is the SABINE HOME on an elevated site. Con
structed in 1812 of red brick, the house is two stories in height and has
a double-deck frame porch with round columns. It is one of the oldest in
Pike Co.
Between McComb and Liberty the highway passes through the western
most part of the longleaf pine region. There is little good timber left, but
the farms tilled on the cleared lands are above the average for the pine
woods. The cuts show a mixture of the sandy clay of the truck farming
belt and the loess of the bluffs of the Mississippi. The impression is of
farms without the newness of the Piney Woods clearings east of Pearl
River, even though the fields are dotted with stumps.
The RED FRAME HOUSE at 154.8 m. (R) serves well to mark the
division between the truck farming belt and the old south section.
LIBERTY, 163.2 m. (300 alt., 551 pop.), is one point of the triangle
which, with Fort Adams and Vicksburg, bounds the corner of Mississippi
best epitomizing the deep South. The AMITE CO. COURTHOUSE, re
cently repaired, replaced in 1840 an earlier log structure that had marked
the seat of the county since its organization in 1809. The square in which
the early structure stood had been, before 1809, a ball ground for the
friendly Amite Indians. Later, the square was the junction point of the
Mobile-Natchez road with a road to Bayou Sara, La., both of them impor
tant arteries of travel in the Southwest. Men came 50 miles to attend court
here. In 1816, the year before Mississippi became a State, a census of the
town and county showed 3,365 whites, 1,694 slaves, and 19 free Negroes.
Slaves were one of the most important commodities of the period, and the
slave block where they were bought and sold was placed just north of the
present courthouse. Streams of oxcarts, each cart loaded with three or four
bales, carried cotton to the Natchez market, 60 miles northv
In addition to cotton culture, the town had industrial activities unusual
for Mississippi. In the GAIL BORDER HOUSE across from the court
house on Main Street, Gail Borden condensed the first can of milk. Hiram
Van Norman, who married Borden s step-sister, moved from Indiana to
Liberty, bringing Gail, a small boy, with him. Young Borden attended the
Liberty Male Academy, was made County Surveyor in 1825, and while
teaching at Zion Hill near Liberty married Penelope Mercier in 1828. He
482 TOURS
later made a fortune from the perfected formula for condensing milk, on
which he was working at the time of his marriage. Dr. Tichenor, who
made and perfected Tichenor s antiseptic, began his experiments in Lib
erty before the War between the States, although it was not patented until
1883. A contemporary reports that Dr. Tichenor said, "I will use my anti
septic freely on southern soldiers, but want no d yankees to get it."
He lived on what was known as the John Webb place, about il/ 2 miles
E. of Liberty. After a few years in Liberty, he moved to a place on the
Mississippi River in Wilkinson Co., and later to Baton Rouge, where he
secured the patent for the antiseptic. Speculation Creek, on the banks of
which the speculators established Liberty in 1809, became known as Tan-
tyard Creek, when in the i82o s Van Norman built on it a shoe factory
that he ran with slave labor. The water power supplied by the two prongs
of the Amite River moved the wheels of the cotton gins and the first
clumsy gristmills and sawmills. When the War between the States began
there were 16 water power mills in Amite Co. Liberty was given a blow
when, about 1882, the railroad was run to Gloster 15 miles northwest.
Beautiful homes were a manifestation of the wealth of the people. The
first house in the settlement to have glass window panes, a carpet and a
piano, the E. N. SKINNER HOME on a hill three blocks south of the
courthouse, is in almost as good condition as when built in 1824. Its
heart-of-pine timber was hand-sawn and put together with pegs, and all
interior woodwork, including an elaborate mantel, was hand-carved by
slaves. The carpet and piano were shipped down the Mississippi from
Kentucky. The builder of the house, Dr. Edward Carroll, shipped in a
steam sawmill also, but when he tried to run it with slave labor the engine
exploded, killing five of his Negroes.
The COURTHOUSE was built in 1840 of brick fired by slaves. It is a
square building two-stories high, with a low sloping roof. The flooring is
of planks a foot wide, and the stone steps are deeply hollowed by wear.
The first brick office buildings, also erected in the 1840*5, were made from
the same red and white local clays as was the courthouse. The OLD
OPERA HOUSE, now known as the Walsh Building, on the corner of
Main and East Girdle Sts. (formerly the street girdling the town), was
built in 1840. Its enormous brick columns on two sides have retained a
dusty yellow tinge, contrasting with the flame color of the other buildings.
In it Jenny Lind sang to the planters from the surrounding country. The
congregation of the present PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, organized in
1848 with a slave as one of its 14 charter members, meets in a building
erected in 1853 on the corner of East Girdle and Broken Sts. The brick,
the high-backed pews, the altar, the walls of the commodious auditorium,
and the slave gallery were hand-fashioned by slaves. The Amite Female
Academy, founded in 1853, had a plant of several brick buildings until
Federal troops destroyed all but one in 1863. The building left standing
is a part of the AGRICULTURAL HIGH SCHOOL on the eastern edge
of town.
When the War between the States had ended, Liberty began the task of
raising a MONUMENT to its dead. It was made in New Orleans, hauled
TOUR 13 483
the last 30 miles to Liberty by oxen, and raised in 1871. The total cost
was $3,322, representing hard-earned money in the post-war Reconstruc
tion period It is classic in style, a single eight-sided shaft of Italian mar
ble, 20 ft. high on a base seven feet square. A laurel wreath with the motto
"At Rest" is topped with a raised star and a Grecian urn; there are four
richly-uirved tablets inscribed with the names of the Amite County sol
diers who died in the war.
Left from Liberty on State 48 to an unmarked graveled road at 3.8 m.; L. here
to the TOM STREET HOME, 6 m. (R), a well-preserved house built in 1827.
Two stories in height with a double deck entrance porch, it has unusually large
rooms with high ceilings. Originally there was a ballroom on each floor.
At 174.4 m. on State 24 is the junction with an unmarked graveled
road.
Right on this road (L) to the THOMAS T ALBERT HOME (private), 1.8 m.,
a large, two-and-a-half story red brick structure, set high on a hill and visible a
half-mile away. Finished in 1853, it is probably the best remaining ante-bellum
home in the area. Thomas and Sally Talbert, the owners, were South Carolinians
from the Edge-field District. The brick was made by slaves and burned on the
place; the glass was shipped from Kentucky. The structure is of monumental
proportions: ceilings are 14 ft. high; a hall 40 by 14 ft. is flanked by rooms
20 ft. square; and solid brick walls, a foot-and-a-half thick, are still sheathed in
plaster that has neither cracked nor been repaired. The flooring is of heart pine,
as are the mantels, stained to represent dark marble.
A slave with a lamp on a stick burned figures of animals and other objects in
the stained pine of the second-floor ceilings; it now resembles tiling. The house
contains some of the original pieces with which it was furnished: four-posted
beds, old-fashioned dressers and chairs; a secretary; a large chest full of quilts;
and a whatnot, a thing of beauty with spindling props, three shelves, and a mir
rored back. There is a legend concerning a murder committed while a dance was
in progress in the parlor. A jealous husband, advancing on his wife s dancing
partner with upraised poker, was stabbed in the ensuing scuffle. The hill on
which the house stands was formerly terraced and planted with rows of cape
jessamine, some of which remain.
GLOSTER, 778.2 m. (434 alt., 1,139 PP-)> * s a comparatively new
railroad town named for the engineer who put the Yazoo & Mississippi
Valley R.R. through in the i88o s.
CENTREVILLE, 188.6 m. (374 alt., 1,344 pop.), is a small early set
tlement that did not become incorporated until 1880, when the Yazoo &
Mississippi Valley R.R. ran along the border between Wilkinson and
Amite Cos. Because the station was approximately midway between Lib
erty and Wood vi lie and about midway between Natchez and Baton Rouge,
it was appropriately named Centreville.
Right from the railroad station to the WILLIAM D1CKSOX HOME, 0.8 m.
(private), built in 1819 by William Winans, the eccentric and powerful Method
ist circuit rider, whose voluminous papers are preserved in the State Hall of
History. Of the usual Southern plantation type, it is .1 story-aml-a-half high with
a long wide gallery. A frame office is attached to the south end of the gallery.
Brick and lime hauled by ox cart from Natchez were used in the foundations
and chimney. Among the old relics is one of the seven pikes stolen from John
Brown s arsenal.
Between Centreville and Woodville the richness of the soil indicates the
approach to the Bluff Hills. The cabins and wooden churches in this stretch
484 TOURS
mark the last hold and former westward extension of the Piney Woods.
At 205.4 m. is ROSEMONT PLANTATION, on which Jefferson
Davis spent his boyhood. The house, built in 1830 for Lucinda Davis, his
sister, stands in a grove of live oaks. It has a long wide gallery across the
front and a spacious hall, with two rooms on each side. The half-story
with its two front dormers has the floor plan of,.the lower story. The hand
hewn timbers fastened by wooden pegs, as well as the plastered walls and
ceilings, are well preserved. The old mantel in the living room is of black
Italian marble. In the family burial ground near the house are the graves
of Jefferson Davis mother and his two sisters, Mary and Lucinda. In the
house now owned by Henry Johnson is a large spinning wheel said to have
been used by the mother of Davis.
At WOODVILLE, 206.4 m. (560 alt., 1,113 PP-) (see Tour 3b), is
the junction with US 61 (see Tour 3, Sec. b).
Tour 14
(Winfield, Ala.) Amory Tupelo Oxford Clarksdale. State 6.
Alabama Line to Clarksdale, 178.1 m.
Graveled roadbed, two lanes wide, with short paved sections.
Accommodations in larger towns.
State 6 is stamped by strong scenic contrasts, the result of varying soil
types which, in turn, have exerted a pronounced influence upon the eco
nomic development of the inhabitants. It rolls down from the southern
slopes of the Tennessee River Hills to cross the Tombigbee River into the
Black Prairie belt, then climbs the crest of the Pontotoc Ridge to follow
the cut-up surface of the North Central plateau for 40 isolated miles. En
tering the Delta at Batesville the route follows snaky rivers and bayous
past flat, featureless, and far-flung cotton fields into Clarksdale, a city under
the rule of King Cotton. Amory, Tupelo, Pontotoc, Oxford, and Clarks
dale are the key towns of the five sections connected by the route and fur
nish respectively a good cross section of the life of each.
Crossing the Mississippi Line, m., 30 m. W. of Winfield, State 6
rides the ridges of the Tennessee River Hills past pleasant small farm
houses and clearings in the midst of thick hardwood forests.
GREENWOOD SPRINGS, 4 m. (301 alt., 117 pop.), is a tiny village
tucked away in a valley between two precipitous hills. The village derived
its name and reason for existence from a mineral spring that for more
TOUR 14 485
than 100 years has been known by the hill people for its therapeutic val
ues. The old-fashioned, latticed summer house enclosing the spring, the
white frame hotel with rambling galleries, and the scattered village homes
all have a rustic simplicity representative of the Tennessee Hills.
At 7.1 vi. the highway ascends to give a good view of the farm-dotted
valley below and the forest-covered ridges in the distance. The red clay
swath made by the road is an intense contrast to the green of the pines on
the slopes. Between this point and Amory the ridges are less precipitous
and the valleys broader. Cotton and corn fields in the bottom lands are
mixed with apple orchards and pasture meadows.
AMORY, 20 m. (214 alt., 3,214 pop.), sits on the dividing line be
tween hills and prairie and has taken its development from both. Estab
lished in 1887 as a station on the St. Louis & San Francisco R.R., it has
been a shipping point for timber, cotton, grains, and dairy products; and
it still retains the character of a railroad town. The discovery of a natural
gas field at Amory in 1926 prompted a mild boom, but within a few years
the imminent practical exhaustion of the field turned the attention of
Amory s citizens back to farming and shipping.
Left from Amory on a graveled road to the SITE OF COTTON GIN PORT, 2.5
m., most important old town in northeastern Mississippi. Indians called the place
Tollamatoxa, meaning where he first strung the bow, referring to Bienville s disas
trous expedition against the Chickasaw in 1736. At the time the Chickasaw, al
lied with the English, were constantly attacking the French settlements on and
near the Gulf and were blocking French attempts at expansion toward the inte
rior. After the massacre of the French garrison at Fort Rosalie (see NATCHEZ),
a number of the Natchez tribe took refuge with the Chickasaw, and Bienville laid
immediate plans for a war of extermination. Outraged at the massacre, he trans
ported men and supplies up the Mobile and Tombigbee Rivers, erecting a fort on
the present site of Cotton Gin Port, at a distance of some 27 miles from what
were then the Chickasaw towns. It was to this fort that Bienville retreated after
the defeat of his expedition at Ackia (see Tour 9), the turning point in the his
tory of French colonization in Mississippi. De Vaudreuil, successor to Bienville
as Governor of the French colony, made a third attempt to conquer the Chicka
saw in 1752, but was unsuccessful. De Vaudreuil used Bienville s old fort as his
supply base. When he returned from the battle at the Chickasaw Old Fields near
Tupelo, the Tombigbee had fallen to such an extent that he was forced to lighten
his cargo by throwing his cannon into the waters. This point has since been
known as Cannon Hole.
After the treaty with the Chickasaw in 1816, Cotton Gin Port became an impor
tant frontier outpost, river town, and cotton market, being on the Tombigbee and
at the terminal of Gaincs Trace (see TRANSPORTATION). Its decline came
with the decline of river transportation and its death with the development of
Amory. Remnants of the old mound and the earthen wall around the fort used
by Bienville are visible; and i mile W. of the ferry, near the top of a hill, is the
site of the cotton gin established by Pres. George Washington to encourage the
cultivation of cotton among the Chickasaw. The town derived its name from this
gin. In 1837 the Indians of northern Mississippi were sent by the U.S. Govern
ment to the Indian Territory. For three days and nights the line of mourning
Indians marched through Cotton Gin Port. The town felt their departure, for trade
with the Indians had been a source of income, and white settlers were not coming
in fast enough to make up for their loss.
At 22.8 m. the highway crosses the Tombigbee River. The white sand
pumped from the stream here is used extensively in concrete construction.
486 TOURS
Between the Tombigbee River and Tupelo the red clay hills are replaced
by the rich lime soils of the Black Prairie.
At NETTLETON, 3.5 J m. (252 alt., 834 pop.) (see Tour 4), is the
junction with US 45 (see Tour 4).
PLANTERSVILLE, 45 m. (252 alt., 346 pop.), is a good example of
the smaller prairie farm town. Vegetables and milk are picked up here
and carried to Tupelo for marketing, and as a result Plantersville has be
come little more than an agricultural suburb of the latter city.
At 47.7 m. is the junction with US 78 (see Tour 9)-
State 6 enters on Main St.
TUPELO, 52.9 m. (289 alt, 6,361 pop.), first TVA city (see TU
PELO).
Points of Interest. Garment company, dress factory, fish hatchery, cotton mill, and
others.
At Tupelo is the junction with US 45 (see Tour 4).
The route continues on Main St. (State 6).
BISSELL, 57.1 m. (50 pop.), is a small community that has grown
from the Natchez Trace village known as Walker s Crossroads. The old
WALKER HOME (L) (private), a one-story Southern Colonial type
frame dwelling built in 1840 by William H. Thompson, occupies the site
of Colbert s Tavern, a station for travelers on the Natchez Trace operated
by Pittman Colbert, secretary of the Chickasaw Indian Council. Chief Col
bert was a famous hunter and kept the tavern well supplied with fresh
deer and bear meat until he migrated westward with his tribe. Today Bis-
sell s population is composed largely of Tupelo workers who have taken
advantage of lower suburban costs of living and whose tidy small homes
have little connection with the former village.
At 60.9 m. (L) State 6 crosses the old Natchez Trace.
Between the Trace Monument and Pontotoc, as the highway intersects
the Pontotoc Ridge, the cultivated land on the steep slopes is gradually
replaced by pastures and peach orchards.
ROSALBA LAKE, 67.7 m. (L), was originally a mill pond of the
Rosalba wheat mill, built in 1850 when north Mississippi farmers were so
self-sufficient that they grew their own wheat. Col. Richard Bolton was the
operator, having brought the mill engine from a cotton factory in Georgia.
Colonel Bolton s house was near the mill and was called Rosalba for a
beautiful white rose vine that rambled over the porch and for the snow
white flour produced by the mill. Since Bolton s mill was the only one
within a radius of 50 miles, the farmers often had to camp around it for
days awaiting their turn. A rustic inn is on the site of the mill, supplying
camping, boating, and fishing privileges for a small fee.
Between Rosalba Lake and Pontotoc the highway climbs one of the
longest hills in the State to the summit of the Pontotoc Ridge. From the
top of the ridge is a good view of heavily forested ridges and rocky pas
ture land.
At PONTOTOC, 71.3 m. (462 alt, 2,018 pop.) (see Tour 12), is the
junction with State 15 (see Tour 12).
TOUR 14 487
Between Pontotoc and Batesville the highway crosses the rugged sur
face of the North Central Plateau, a once prosperous farming area now
having its existence threatened by erosion and a one-crop economy. Farm
houses weathering or abandoned, raw red gullies gnawing at the vitals of
the swelling hills, fields reverting to forest growths, and villages with only
the schoolhouse and gasoline station new, are evidences of the plight
brought by the outmoded agricultural system.
TOCCOPOLA (Ind., the crossing of the roads), 85.9 m. (288 pop.),
was, before the white man came, an Indian village so old that in the an
nals of the Chickasaw the date is unknown. In 1840, however, two Caro
linians, Tobias and Allison Furr, settled here. Tobias Furr built a water
mill on the creek and Allison established a store at the crossing of two
roads. Other settlers made homes in the vicinity, and eventually the Indian
name Tok-a-pula was corrupted to Toccopola. Immediately following the
War between the States, W. B. Gilmer, who was forced by a wound re
ceived in the war to forsake farming for school teaching as a profession,
established Toccopola College, an academy for boys and girls. This college
continued operation until 1907. Toccopola s future was shattered when
the Gulf, Mobile & Northern R.R. passed it up in preference to Pontotoc,
its rival.
There is a local tradition that when Pierre D Artaguiette fought his dis
astrous battle against the Chickasaw in 1736 (see Tour 12), his retreating
army under the leadership of a 1 6-year-old boy named Voisin made their
first stop at Toccopola. Here Montcherval, commander of the Arkansas
force sent to reenforce D Artaguiette, met the retreating army and returned
with it to the Chickasaw bluffs.
On the campus of the high school a piece of concrete torn from an old
side walk marks the GRAVE OF BETSY ALLEN. Betsy, whose real name
was Susan, was a young Chickasaw woman who carried her legal fight for
property right to the Mississippi Supreme Court in 1837. When very
young, Betsy had been given another Indian as a slave by her mother. The
gift was completed under Chickasaw law in 1829, a year prior to the ex
tension of Mississippi jurisdiction over the Chickasaw. In 1837 Susan,
alias Betsy, refused to relinquish her servant to her husband who had been
ruined by debt and, carrying her fight to the court, won her case on the
grounds that she, her mother, and her family were members of the Chick
asaw tribe, that the gift had been completed under Chickasaw laws before
the establishment of Mississippi jurisdiction, and that, therefore, the court
did not have the right to deprive her of property gained in 1829. Betsy
died in 1837 and, like the court decision, was forgotten. A hundred years
later a newspaper columnist resurrected the case and gave it publicity as
being the first decision in the United States to grant property rights to
women. The newly created legend was widely circulated and prompted a
woman s civic club to remove a plot of dirt, representing Betsy s remains,
to the high school campus and there ceremoniously inter it in a new grave.
Betsy, figuratively removed from the old Indian burial ground that had
become a pasture, now rests near the white man s school, perhaps a little
bewildered by all the belated honor that eventually blew her way.
488 TOURS
State 6 enters on University Ave.
OXFORD, 707.6 m. (458 alt, 2,890 pop.) (see OXFORD).
Points of Interest, University of Mississippi, old opera house, ante-bellum homes,
and others.
The route continues W. on University Ave.; R. on S. 9th St.; L. on
Jackson Ave. (State 6).
1. Left from Oxford 19 m. on State 7 is WATER VALLEY (294 alt., 3,738
pop.) with all its business houses on one long street stretching N. and S. It was
named for the meanderings of Town Creek in the narrow valley between the
ridges E. and W. In this watered valley some stragglers of the Choctaw tribe, dis
possessed by the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, had established a temporary
village in 1843. With them was a young white boy, Bill Carr, who had been
captured from the dispossessors. Turkey Bill, as he later became known, was
Water Valley s first white settler, starting business with a blacksmith shop at the
point where Town Creek met Otuckalofa Creek. Water Valley was incorporated
in 1858; two years later the Mississippi Central R.R. was built through the town.
This railroad was burned during the War between the States, and for several
months the town was occupied by Federal troops. In the vicinity several impor
tant battles took place. Here, as in Oxford, there was a preponderance of white
persons, making the upheaval of reconstruction less felt than in other parts of
the State. In 1873 Water Valley was made county seat of Yalobusha, and in that
same year the town was struck by a yellow fever epidemic. Early identified as a
railroad town, Water Valley experienced an overnight development when, after
the war, the Illinois Central System absorbed a number of smaller railroads and
located the main division shops here. Until 1929, when the shops were moved to
Grenada, the town, entirely dependent upon its railroads, drew from them a com
fortable prosperity. The town now has replaced the shops with a cheese plant, a
silage mill, axe handle factories, and a stave mill. Water Valley s major activity,
however, is the growing and shipping of watermelons. The watermelon season is
climaxed in August with a Watermelon Festival. The Festival Queen is selected
from beauty queens of towns in Mississippi, Arkansas, and Tennessee.
The CEDARS, 211 Woods St. (open), is a white, brick and frame, two-story
Spanish-type house with green shutters. Capt. S. B. Brown built the house in 1863
using slave labor. Sills, floors, and joists are hand-made. English ivy covers the
outside walls, and the dwelling is surrounded by a grove of fine old cedars.
At Water Valley is the junction with the Batesville Road.
Left on this graveled road 5 m. to a COVERED BRIDGE, with stout timbers
wind -weathered and aged. The bridge is one of the few of this type remaining in
the State.
2. Right from Oxford on State 7 is ABBEVILLE, 9 m. (366 alt., 243 pop.), il
lustrating the changing fortune of the Tallahatchie valley settlements. A flower of
the old South in its culture and prosperity of a century ago, it is now so poor that
few of its inhabitants can afford to buy a mule with which to till the depleted
soil. Abbeville was settled in the early 1830*5 by emigrants from Abbeville, S. C.,
who lived among the remaining Chickasaw with apparently little friction, and
were especially friendly with Chief Toby Tubby who owned and operated a ferry
on the Memphis-Oxford stage coach route. L. Q. C. Lamar was among those who
settled at Abbeville during its pre-war prosperity. Lamar came from Georgia in
1849 on the strength of the statement of his father-in-law, Augustus Baldwin
Longstreet: "It is a farmer s paradise. There are men here who left Newton Co.,
Ga., in debt no more than eight years ago, who now own their farms, have 1 5 or
20 slaves, and are buying more every year." A dozen years after Lamar came,
however, this farmer s paradise was plunged into a war which marked the end of
the southern planters rule in the U. S. The war was particularly devastating in
the Abbeville neighborhood. Wild grape and trumpet vines now hide the earth
breastworks erected by Pemberton s Confederates in the valley, but the scars of
BUILDING A TERRACE TO CONTROL EROSION
the conflict can not be hidden. With the exception of two houses Abbeville was
burned after the Battle of Tallahatchie Bridge, June 18, 1862, as Federal troops
moved southward to Vicksburg. There was fighting on Tallahatchie River in
February and November of 1862, and in August of 1864. The post-war history
of Abbeville is one of slow decay. The building of the railroad meant the end
of the village s importance as a river landing, and the destruction of capital made
necessary the growing of an annual cash crop, which, in turn, speeded by the con
stant use of commercial fertilizer, ruined the land. Lamar s country home, Soli
tude, is a moldering heap on a local road 2.5 miles NE. of the village. The
home used by General Grant as a headquarters is occupied by the Smith family.
Between Oxford and Batesville are some of the State s best examples of
land erosion which year after year is eating into the foundations upon
which the towns and villages rest and into the farm lands upon which
they depend.
BATESVILLE, 136.4 m. (346 alt., 1,062 pop.) (see Tour 5, Sec. a),
is at the junction with US 51 (see Tour 5, Sec. a).
Between Batesville and Clarksdale the highway crosses a part of the
Delta that has been particularly plagued with floods from the swiftly ris
ing Coldwater and Tallahatchie Rivers. The Tallahatchie within the next
few years will be robbed of some of its terrors by the Sardis Reservoir
above Batesville (see Tour 5, Sec. a), but the Coldwater threatens its flat
low valley each winter and spring.
At 143 m. the highway crosses the Tallahatchie River. At this point the
river is in summer a narrow green stream twisting between dense woods,
but in winter it becomes a yellow spreading sea, filling the space between
the low Jevees confining
49 TOURS
State 6 crosses the Coldwater River at MARKS, 158.5 m. (165 alt.,
1,258 pop.), a flat Delta town with one street of stores ranging along the
railroad tracks. The Quitman Co. courthouse, a modern stone building
with a rounded dome, rises above the squat buildings to dominate the
scene. As a trading center for the large plantations surrounding it, Marks,
like other Delta towns, is dependent on the rise and fall of cotton prices ;
but flood control on the Coldwater is its greatest need.
The Delta between Marks and Clarksdale is a swampy tableland sprout
ing cotton on every foot of tillable soil.
At 175.4 m. is the junction with US 61 (see Tour 3, Sec. a).
CLARKSDALE, 178. 1 m. (173 alt., 10,043 PP-) fa* Tour 3, Sec. a).
Tour 15
Waynesboro Leakesville Lucedale Moss Point, 114.8 m. State 63.
Graveled roadbed, two lanes wide.
Accommodations in towns.
State 63 twists through a remote backwoods section about which little
has been written. Formerly the area was covered by unbroken pine forests,
but now the virgin timber is gone, and the fields, barren except for scat
tered stumps, alternate with areas well-wooded with young trees. Between
Waynesboro and Lucedale economic and social development has been
slower, perhaps, than in any other part of the State. The soil is poor, and
the small yield of cotton, corn, and truck from the farm patches provides
for few comforts of life. The homes are often unpainted log structures of
the dog-trot type. Ox teams, hoover-carts, wooden wash troughs, and bare-
feet are often seen. A sparseness of settlements and the primitive aspect
of the country give the few small towns an importance out of proportion
to their size.
Southward, between Lucedale and Moss Point, cultivation of the land
is more evident, and the people appear more prosperous. The low ram
bling houses, painted and well-fenced, are more substantial. Well-tended
orchards of pecan, peach, and tung oil trees, and young forests of second
growth pines dominate the landscape. For* a few miles N. of Moss Point,
the highway runs along a low, marshy flat paralleling Escatawpa River.
At WAYNESBORO, m. (191 alt., 1,120 pop.), are junctions with
US 84 (see Tour 11) and US 45 (see Tour 4). State 63 branches S.
At 2.5 m. the highway crosses CHICKASAWHAY RIVER, which was
LONGLEAF PINE TAPPED FOR TURPENTINE
at one time navigable for 50 miles above Waynesboro; most of the early
settlements were made along its banks. With few exceptions the first set
tlers were Scotch immigrants, and names prefixed with Mac are still
prevalent in this section.
492 TOURS
At 24.9 m. is PIAVE (1,000 pop. rapidly diminishing), remains of a
lumber town established during the lumber boom of 1927. One of the
largest sawmills in the South was built here, bringing to the surrounding
backwoods a prosperity never known before. Aside from the rows of stere
otyped mill houses, a great many larger residences, a number of stores,
and a picture theater were built. But prosperity was short lived. The mill
is closed, practically every house stands deserted, and the remains of a once
large forest stretch out for miles in each direction.
The lonesome, unfrequented country between Piave and Leakesville is
one of the State s last strongholds of old folk customs. As all the early
roads led to Mobile, and the people seldom went there more than twice a
year, they were completely isolated from outside influences. In recent years
the railroad and the highway have caused some changes in the lives of the
inhabitants, but folkways endure. Stimulated by privation, the desire is
keen for simple pleasures. Old ballads are covetously preserved. Square
dancing is entered into with zest. Young and old alike dance all night,
then walk the 5 or 10 miles home at daybreak, often carrying their shoes
slung by strings across their shoulders. Often the spryest dancer and the
lustiest ballad singer in the crowd is a man or woman nearing a hun
dred years of age.
At 47 m. is the junction with State 24 (see Tour 13).
LEAKESVILLE, 50.4 m. (105 alt., 662 pop.), the seat of Greene Co.,
is the center of a lumbering, farming, and stock-raising area. It was here
that Kinnie Wagner, the sawmill worker who became Mississippi s last
notorious outlaw, first "broke the law, and threw his life away," as the
old ballad says. Kinnie killed Sheriff Macintosh at Leakesville on May 2,
1925, then extended his operations into Tennessee, Arkansas, and Texas.
In Texarkana a woman sheriff captured him and brought him back to
Leakesville for trial. He was sent to the State penal farm at Parchman
(see Side Tour 7 A).
At 51.8 m. the highway recrosses Chickasawhay River on a new con
crete bridge.
LUCEDALE, 72.3 m. (185 alt., 834 pop.), the seat of George Co.,
has, like many Mississippi towns, the composite character determined by a
combination of tilling the soil and administering justice. Carved out of
back country woodlands to become a bustling lumber town in 1898, it lost
this identity with the decline of the industry in the i92o s. Today it has
regained prestige with diversified farming. The LUCE PRODUCTS CO.
PLANT is the largest vegetable packing house in the State. Main street
here is named 15-26-63, for the three converging highways.
Here is the junction with State 15 (see Tour 12).
George Co. has been under seven flags, and the original land grants,
many in the shape of long irregular sections, still exist unchanged in shape
through this territory.
South of Lucedale the topography changes gradually. The roll of the
hills is less pronounced, cavernous gullies disappear from the scene,
and the soil becomes white and sandy. The increasing number of trim
painted farmhouses, set among pruned and whitewashed orchard trees are
TOUR 16 493
in sharp contrast to the houses in the country northward. Both the vege
table canning plant at Lucedale and the recent development of the tung
oil industry have brought a measure of prosperity. Along the road refores
tation is evident, also, in the growth of young pines, almost wearying in
its extent and uniformity.
AGRICOLA, 83.7 m. (250 pop.), reveals its character in its name,
being the center of a wide farming area. The largest and most productive
fruit and vegetable farms of the county are near the village. Pecans and
satsumas, growing well in the sandy soil, make the largest and most prof
itable crop.
HARLESTON, 92.9 m. (30 pop.), bears a close resemblance to Agri-
cola ; they have a like interest in pecans and satsumas.
The highway at 113-8 m. crosses Escatawpa (Ind., dog river) River, one
of the tributaries of Mobile Bay, on a Jong, concrete draw-bridge.
Between here and Moss Point there is evidence of nearness to the Gulf
of Mexico in a strong smell of salt water and fish, and in an increasing
dampness of the air. Marshes, overgrown with sedge grass, lie dank and
low on both sides of the highway.
At MOSS POINT, 114.8 m. (2,453 PP-)> is * junction with US 90
(see Tour 1 ).
&&gt;
Tour 16
Vaidcn Kosciusko Carthage Raleigh Junction with US 84. State 35.
Vaiden to Junction with US 84, 141.1 m.
Graveled roadbed two lanes wide.
Accommodations in towns.
State 35 cuts through a narrow slice of the State that until recent years
was hemmed by pine forests and isolated by lack of transportation facili
ties. The lumber industry, following on the heels of the railroad, was the
first outside influence to stamp itself upon it, destroying a large part of
the barrier of pines. As the lands were cleared they were in the northern
section converted into pastures and toward the south developed into farms
with diversified crops. Thus, two new industries were ushered in.
The creamery and condensery at Kosciusko are among the largest in the
State; the vegetable produce and watermelons of the southern section are
noted for their superior quality. Throughout the area the rugged beauty
of hills and the rich redness of soil contribute to wayside charm. South-
494 TOURS
ward the highway skirts the notorious Sullivan s Hollow, the scene of
more bloodshed and crime than any other part of the State, and around
which extravagantly colorful stories have been woven.
State 35 branches S. from VAIDEN, m. (325 alt., 648 pop.) (see
Tour 5, Sec. a), which is at the junction with US 51 (see Tour 5, Sec. a).
The highway runs through a region with broad cultivated fields, solid-
looking farmhouses, and clustered tenant cabins, then through heavily
forested hills and red gullies. At 4.1 m. the route crosses the Big Black
River, S. of which is a gloomy region deeply wooded with thick-leaved
hardwood. Here and there is a paintless weathered cabin in a clearing with
a small corn patch; occasionally smoke from a mud-chinked chimney is
seen curling above the tall tree tops. The highway mounts steadily to the
crest of a high ridge revealing a panorama of wooded valleys, and drops
again at 9 m. into a smaller swamp and crosses Scoopchitto River, a shal
low meandering chocolate-colored stream. Between the river and Kosci-
usko lies a tableland free of trees and used for grazing. This is the heart
of one of the State s best dairying sections.
KOSCIUSKO, 24.9 m. (430 alt., 3,237 pop.), clings to the sides of a
series of ridges, its narrow paved streets ascending tortuously to the court
house square on the crest of the highest hill. Viewed from the grassy
square, the town is a mixture of the old and the new ; dilapidated frame
buildings stand shoulder to shoulder with compact brick ones; rambling
Victorian houses, with magnolia-littered yards, contrast with small new
cottages and bungalows ; neatly asphalted streets come to dead ends at the
edges of deep ravines or wander beyond the corporate limits as country
lanes.
The town was settled about Red Bud Springs, now dry, which, it is said,
appeared after the earthquake of 1811, though the Indians asserted they
were formed when the great chief Tecumseh stamped his foot in Detroit.
When Andrew Jackson marched back from the defense of New Orleans,
he followed the Natchez Trace and, because of an abundance of good
spring water, pitched camp in what is now Kosciusko s principal business
district.
Originally the little overnight station on the Trace was called Peking
because its founder hoped that the connotations of a foreign name would
prove attractive to settlers, but the meager food and poor accommodations
provided by the taverns caused the town to be known as "Peakedend."
The name was in time changed to Paris ; but, once more, the effort to dig
nify the struggling village with a grand title was made in vain. The name
was completed to Parrish, possibly because of a family of outlaws (mem
bers of the Murrell clan) living here; then it became Perish. Finally the
present name was chosen, honoring the Polish hero of the American Revo
lution, under whom a grandfather of a council member had served. The
village was incorporated in 1836.
In 1845 a girls boarding school, Beechwood Seminary, was established
here, and several years later a male academy. By 1859 the village had de
veloped such cultural appreciation as to organize a stock company, the
stock of which was sold at $10 a share in order to found a library which,
TOUR 1 6 495
when opened, had 389 well-selected books. The collection included his
tories, biographies, travel books, and general reference material but no
fiction. The present Attala Co. Library was organized in 1931 under the
direction of the Mississippi Library Commission.
Until 1920 the town s chief business was the marketing and shipping of
produce of Attala and neighboring counties. At that time the lumber in
dustry was clearing off the timber and in its wake dairying developed. In
1928 a creamery was established to care for the dairy products of the
county and the next year the Pet Milk Co. built a condensery. Both indus
tries speeded the development of the town, yet Kosciusko has been slow
to relinquish its village ways.
Such pleasures as checker-playing and domino games are still a part of
the social life. Each fall an Old Fiddler s Contest is held in the courtroom
of the courthouse before judges and a large audience. While prizes are
offered to the best players on various instruments, the fiddle receives the
most attention. There are several prizes for performances on this instru
ment, the contestants being divided according to age. "Yankee Doodle,"
"Turkey in the Straw," and "Leather Breeches" are favorite tunes. The
winners of the contests usually receive small amounts of cash and runners-
up receive such commodities as flour, coffee, and sugar. The giving of the
latter is a custom dating from a time when such everyday articles were
luxuries.
Music of a more modern and standardized type is taught in the public
schools.
KOSCIUSKO MOUND, on the schoolground, was built by 3,000 local
children during the Centennial celebration of 1934; each deposited a
small cupful of earth brought from their homes, duplicating a mound near
Krakow, Poland, honoring Thaddeus Kosciusko. Near the mound is a
NATCHEZ TRACE MARKER at a point where the old route formerly
ran.
WILLIAMSVILLE, 28 m. (200 pop.), is built around a large yellow
pine lumber mill, with the mill s commissary the only store. There are but
few dwellings, a majority of the workers Jiving in Kosciusko.
Between Williamsville and Carthage the highway threads its way
through the densest forests along this route, much of it the virgin timber.
The woodlands, covered with pine needles, have a clean appearance, and
the smell of the trees is fresh and sharp. Every mile or so the highway
climbs a ridge that presents a view of the rugged country. In autumn,
when the red and yellow leaves of sweet gum and oak stand out against
the evergreens, the scenery is notable for its vivid coloring.
HOPOCA (Ind., final gathering), 39 m. (5 pop.), is the site of an old
Indian village. It was settled by Gen. Nathan B. Forrest in 1832, and is
the point where the Choctaw gathered prior to their removal west of the
Mississippi. Gen. Sam Cobb, Indian chief who led the faction opposing
the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, made his home here. His log cabin,
about which numerous Indian relics have been found, is standing but it is
in poor condition.
CARTHAGE, .50J m. (998 pop.), the seat of Leake Co., has a modern
496 TOURS
white stone COURTHOUSE. The whole of the village, from the court
house to the frame store buildings and shaded dwellings, is seen at a
glance, and only the steeples of two white frame churches break the low
skyline. On Saturdays Indian families living on reservations to the E. and
in the backwoods come here to buy supplies and to sell their gayly colored
woven baskets. The town is known throughout the State because of the
Leake Co. Revelers, a group of local musicians who are keeping alive the old
folk songs of the section. Their instruments vary from the saw to the
harmonica.
Left from Carthage on State 16 at 1J m (L) to PEARL RIVER INDIAN DAY
SCHOOL, typical of the Government-controlled schools for Indian children. In
addition to the basic subjects of reading, writing, and arithmetic, carpentry, agri
culture, and home economics are taught. Recently attempts have been made to
familiarize the Indian children with the folklore and legends of their race.
At 52.3 m. the highway crosses Pearl River.
WALNUT GROVE, 63.3 m. (753 pop.), is an old town that has re
ceived a new life with the establishment of a large lumber mill. Practically
every white frame house has been built recently and sits behind a neat
whitewashed picket fence.
South of this point the country gradually loses its shut-in appearance,
the pines growing fewer, and many local roads intersect the highway. This
is a section of small hill farms, where even before the War between the
States the people were making comfortable livings from the soil. Their
surplus vegetables and small amounts of cotton are marketed in Forest.
HARPERVILLE, 70.8 m. (179 pop.), once a lively agricultural town,
was burned by General Sherman on his march from Vicksburg to Merid
ian, and has never recovered. The G. C. HARPER HOME, the only ante
bellum structure and the village showplace, follows early architectural
ideals in its straightforward two-story, square design. Of frame construc
tion, it is sturdy but in bad condition.
HILLSBORO, 73.6 m. (200 pop.), was formerly the seat of Scott Co.,
and a town antagonistic toward Forest because of the location of the latter
on the railroad. When Forest was named the country seat in 1866, Hills-
boro people tore up the first foundation for the courthouse, burned the
second, and carted away the third, brick by brick. Only by a legislative act
in 1873 was the seat permanently established at Forest. Hillsboro has
dwindled to a store or two and a few scattered frame dwellings.
1. Left from Hillsboro on a graveled road to the OLD JOE ROLAND HOME,
3 m., a log house held together by iron pegs and interesting as a good example
of early dog-trot architecture.
2. Right from Hillsboro on a local dirt road is GUM SPRINGS, 4 m., seven
springs within a few feet of each other, each with a different mineral content.
They received their name because of the large gum trees growing around them.
In 1863 Sherman s soldiers camped here for several weeks during his raid along
the Alabama & Vicksburg R.R. A Holiness Tabernacle is on the hill above the
springs, and during the summer old-fashioned revival meetings are held.
FOREST, 81.7 m. (481 alt., 2,176 pop.) (see Tour 2), is at the junc
tion with US 80 (see Tour 2).
TOUR 1 6 497
At 81.4 m. is a NEGRO C.C.C CAMP. In the woods two miles S. of
the camp is the REFORESTATION LOOKOUT TOWER, not visible
from the highway.
Between Forest and the southern end of the route the virgin pines have
been cut away to a great extent. The rugged hillsides, thinned of their
trees and split by huge crevices, show a magnificently colored clay soil that
runs the gamut from a startlingly rich red to a deep bruised purple.
Plowed fields, small farming communities, and infrequent sawmills are
seen at intervals.
At 87 m. is a good example of a Mississippi hill farm with a comfort
able farmhouse, painted outhouses, and several hundred acres of cotton.
The highway now climbs a steep ridge through fine stands of second
growth pines and hardwood trees.
RALEIGH, 707.6 m. (583 alt., 219 pop.), built on the top of a small
plateau with orange-colored gullies surrounding and encroaching upon it,
has discarded the colorful excesses of backwoods settlements and, accord
ing to James Street, has reckoned itself a cultural center. It has transferred
its interests from the doings of the "hollow folks" to the south to politics.
Court sessions are the inhabitants chief diversion. Not seasons but
court terms mark the annual cycle, thus: "I hope to see my corn up by
spring court" or "I m going to house-clean after court is over," or "Come
and stay with me next court week." The SMITH CO. COURTHOUSE,
a large red brick building Greek Revival in type, has a dignity out of keep
ing with the informal village clustered about it. HARRISON HOTEL, on
Main St., is an ante-bellum building, used by Civil War soldiers as a recre
ational center and a hospital. The JACK TULLOS HOME, across the
street from the hotel, is or the usual plantation type and was built of hand-
hewn timbers, before the war. For many years the local Negroes have be
lieved the OLD RALEIGH CEMETERY to be haunted, because of the
strange noises that come from it. The phenomenon has been explained by
the fact that a cave in the cemetery echoes the sound of approaching traffic
on the highway, the noise strangely like the rustling of wings. Raleigh is
the birthplace of Daisy McLaurin Stevens, onetime President-general of
the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
Right from Raleigh on a clay and sand road is COHAY, 7 m. (1,092 pop.), a
progressive farming and marketing center. Legend states that Jackson s men
crossed Rahoma Creek south of town on their way to defend New Orleans, and
on the bridge that spans the creek Jessie Craft served his volunteer troops a
sumptuous banquet before they left to join the Confederate Army in 1861.
Between Raleigh and Taylorsville the landscape has the beauty of an
unspoiled countryside. Small cotton and corn patches end on the edges of
dark pine woodlands, where virgin trees stand clean, straight, and tall.
Blackberry bushes and Cherokee roses grow lush beside the road. Farm
houses with adjoining orchards and vegetable patches evidence the de
pendence of the people upon the land.
TAYLORSVILLE, 124.6 m. (805 pop.), was a static little village,
backwoods in appearance and character until 1925, when the first lumber
mill of this section was built. The town changed almost overnight; the
498 TOURS
main street was paved, a drug store was built, and filling stations were
erected on the corners. But unfortunately the timber was soon exhausted
and the mill ceased to operate except for short periods of the year. At
present (1937) the remnants of the once fine forests are being used by
the naval stores factories at Laurel, and the dynamiting and hauling of
these stumps is the principal business at Taylorsville today. The so-called
INDIAN BATTLEFIELD has not been explored, but the large number
of arrowheads found here seem to indicate that it was once the scene of
an Indian battle. On the schoolyard is the GRAVE OF GENTLE SOUTH
WIND, a young Indian girl who was killed by her father Onubee in a
drunken rage. Her youth and beauty made her fate especially pitiable, and
sympathetic white settlers marked her grave, which they keep well-tended.
Right from Taylorsville on State 20, a graveled road, is MIZE, 8.4 m. (429
pop.), known by the nickname "No Nigger" and acknowledged the capital of
SULLIVAN S HOLLOW. Mize was reputedly settled by "Hog" Tom Sullivan,
whose neighbors by the nickname suggested indirectly the reason for the dis
appearance of their hogs.
The Hollow, a long narrow valley lying south of Mize, has been the source of so
many tales of feuds and bloodshed that it is now impossible to separate fact
from legend. Every Mississippian knows of it and uses its name as a synonym for
lawlessness. It was first inhabited by nine Sullivan brothers, fierce Irishmen who
brought with them from the South Carolina mountains the clannish customs of
that section. Moving into the Hollow in 1810, each brother homesteaded a
i6o-acre plot, and each cut a ditch around his land to separate it from his
brother s. At the mouth of the stream along which the farms lay, they built a
lumber mill, a gristmill, and a cotton gin. The collection of mills and farms
was called Bunker Hill for some reason satisfactory to the Sullivans, but soon
came to be known as "Merry Hell," because of the fights taking place there. The
brothers continued to clear the land and to increase their farms until they had the
entire valley under cultivation. Their arrogance, increasing with their prosperity,
caused them to be hated and feared by the neighbors, many of whom moved away.
"Wild Bill," a son of Hence, one of the nine brothers, was the most notorious
of the clan. But though he brawled, fought, and caroused up and down the
Hollow throughout his life, he managed to outlive the War between the States,
the World War, and, more remarkably, the Sullivan Feud, dying peacefully in his
bed. Alleged to have killed more of his kinsmen than any other Sullivan, he was
given the title "King of the Hollow." Neace, brother of Wild Bill, was the most
magnificent specimen physically. Tall, straight, gaunt, he had a dark beard that
reached below his waist. Once after a rough and tumble fight at Shiloh Church
in which two men were shot to death, Neace, with blood pouring out of his
intestines exposed by knife wounds, got up and walked 200 yds. and mounted his
horse. Stories of the efforts of officers to enforce the law on the Sullivans were
favorite local jokes. A sheriff and his deputies once attempted to arrest Bill and
Neace, but the brothers stopped their plowing and, forcing the officers into a
barn, locked them in. On another occasion, Bill and Neace placed a sheriff s head
between the rails of a heavy split-rail fence and left him there to starve. In 1874,
however, after Bryant Craft was shot for some good Sullivan reason, a serious
attempt was made to apprehend Bill and Neace, who took to the swamps and re
mained in hiding for four years. At the end of that time they gave themselves
up for trial, but a fire of mysterious origin destroyed the courthouse and the
records of indictment against them. They never came to trial.
Some of the earlier Sullivan men were very small, the youngest of "Small Jim s"
children being called "Runty Bill." The boy hated the name and was extremely
sensitive about his dwarf-like stature. Legend has it that Runty Bill on one of his
solitary walks was given a drink from an acorn cup by a woodland elf; the liquid
TOUR 1 6 499
was an elixir promoting growth and strength. After that he and all his descend
ants were of splendid physique. Because of his superior size he was able to win
from one of his smaller brothers the girl both loved, and it is said that the noto
rious infra-elan feud originated in the enmity which resulted. The fight broke out
about 1X60 and the offspring of the brothers were drawn into the argument.
Fighting words were hurled, and the feud lasted until 1910. Fights, ambuscades,
and wholesale executions were frequent. Brothers slew brothers and families ar
rayed themselves agains. in-laws. The fiercest battles were fought at Shiloh
Church on Bunker Hill. Once, the members of one faction caught a member of
the opposing faction and hitched him to a plow. Then, after plowing him all day,
they locked him in the ox s stall and fed him fodder. Saturday afternoons, regard
less of the weather, the men of the clan gathered in Mize and the wise citizenry
remained at home, content with the knowledge that, come Sunday morning, fewer
Sullivans would be in the world than had been the day before; the Sullivans
bullied, swaggered, and insulted one another until the desired fight began.
One Sullivan reformed and reported not only his own sins but also those of his
kinsmen to the preacher. Immediately his unappreciative kinsmen destroyed his
mill, burned his farm house and timber, and rode him out of the Hollow on a
rail. At a ball game in Mize in 1924 a squabble arose over a technicality and a
fight supplanted the game. After the fight was finished two persons lay dead and
a half dozen were seriously wounded.
Notwithstanding these activities the Sullivans were excellent farmers. They were
always prosperous and raised good cattle. Wade Sullivan offers a reason for their
success: "We watch all the times it thunders in February and, in April when
them days come, we kiver our garden up. It will sho frost on them days. Then,
too, we allus plant all day on Friday before Easter."
While lawlessness is by no means a thing of the past in the Hollow, the Sulli
vans have become more cautious in their ways. Occasionally, at election time and
during county fair week, someone will go berserk and act Sullivan, but com
munity spirit is against such reversions. Many of the more peaceable Sullivans
have moved away to less turbulent areas to make honored names for the family.
Between Taylorsville and Hot Coffee the highway makes a steady up
ward climb over the top of a chain of steep ridges. Far away are low-lying
valleys framed in forests of longleaf pines, and more remote hills are a
vague enchanting blue.
HOT COFFEE, 131. 8 m., is hardly more than a gin, several frame
houses, and a conspicuously new brick-constructed store building sprawl
ing beside the road, but because of its name it is known throughout the
State. According to James Street, immediately after the War between the
States, J. J. Davis of Shiloh swapped a sabre for a sick horse, swapped the
horse for a wagon, swapped the wagon for another horse, and after a week
of such swapping found himself with enough cash to start a store. He
gathered his possessions and came here, building a store by the old Tay
lorsville- Williamsburg Road. He hung a coffee pot over his door, and
served coffee that was both hot and good, made of pure spring water and
New Orleans beans. He used molasses drippings for sugar and the cus
tomer could have either long or short sweetening; he refused to serve
cream, saying it ruined the taste. Politicians from Taylorsville and Wil
liamsburg patronized the store, serving coffee to their constituents and
anyone else that happened to be around. Travelers coming by on their way
from Mobile to Jackson drank Mr. Davis s coffee while eating the food
they brought with them. Old Mr. Davis died in 1880 and one of the boys
500 TOURS
from Sullivan s Hollow took over the management of the place. One day
a drummer stopped and ordered coffee. "What s the name of this place?"
he asked. "Ain t got no name. Just Davis sto ," said the owner. The sales
man started to drink his coffee, but it was too hot. He strangled and sput
tered, "Mister, this is hot coffee," which was all right with the "sto keeper."
The same day another drummer came through. "Ever given this place a
name?" he asked. "Yessir," came the answer quickly, "this is Hot Coffee."
The present village store occupies the site of the one in which Davis made
his coffee.
At 141 .1 m. is the junction with US 84 (see Tour 11), i mile E. of
COLLINS (see Tour 7, Sec. b).
Tour 17
(Pickwick, Tenn.) luka Fulton Amory Junction with US 45. State 25.
Tennessee Line to Junction with US 45, 108.2 m.
Graveled highway two lanes wide.
Accommodations chiefly in towns.
State 25 winds through the foothills of the Tennessee mountains, the
most primitive and picturesque section of the State. Here tiny villages are
perched perilously on peaks, and shallow plow marks crook dizzily down
hillsides to cabins hanging miraculously to the edges of deep ravines.
It is Mississippi s chief stronghold of the ballad and old time customs;
the natives, of English, Scottish and Irish stock, are sturdy and self-
sufficient, slow to accept changes. Many use the spinning wheels, wash
troughs, and quilts of their forebears. Each householder cultivates his
own limited acres with the aid of his sons and seldom hires outside help ;
there is less tenancy here than in any other section of the State.
Crossing the Tennessee Line, m., 6 miles S. of Pickwick, Tenn., the
highway runs southward through country that is rapidly being cleared
for overflow by the Government. Within two years (1939), Pickwick
Lake (a part of the Pickwick Dam Project of the TVA) will occupy the
entire valley (L), flowing within four miles of luka. The dark humped
shape of the Tennessee hills parallels State 25 through this section, and
here and there the Tennessee River, tossed northward by the rugged hills,
is visible through clearings in the woods.
At 6.2 m. the winding highway crosses Yellow Creek bottoms, and for
several miles follows the old Natchez Trace.
-k i
THE CARDER
ISLAND HILL, 12 .1 m. (L), not visible from highway, is a limestone
bed belonging to the Paleozoic Period.
At IUKA, 15.8 m. (554 alt., 1,441 pop.) (see Tour 10), is the junc
tion with US 72 (see Tour 10).
At 76.8 m. (R) is the IUKA BATTLEFIELD where General Rose-
crans defeated Confederate troops on September 19, 1862, and brought
the control of luka into Federal hands. A white frame country house
known as "Battle Heights" marks the battlefield, and in the hills sur
rounding, relics of the battle, Minie balls, belt buckles, shrapnel, and
shells have been found.
As the highway twists over the hilltops southward from luka, it runs
through a fairly well populated area. Roomy log houses set on sheer hill
sides appear every mile or two. Constructed of unpainted dressed logs
with native limestone chimneys, these houses usually originate as two-
room cabins and are expanded with the needs of the occupants. They
often house married sons and daughters and their children as well as the
parents. On Sunday afternoons family groups of a dozen or so people
gather on the wide porches to rock and rest, giving evidence of the fact
that here children are still of economic value. \Vithout the aid of Negro
servants and with practically no modern conveniences, these families raise
their food, quilt their bedding, and often spin the cloth for their simple
clothing.
At 77.2 m. (R) is a good view of WOODALLS MOUNTAIN, a
502 TOURS
heavily forested ridge whose top, 780 feet, is the highest point in the
State.
TISHOMINGO (Ind., warrior chief), 30.4 in. (504 alt., 402 pop.),
is an old-fashioned hill village in the heart of the richest mineral deposits
in the State. Pottery clay, china clay, paint clay, sandstone, phosphorus
rock, and bauxite are found in the immediate vicinity. At the northern
entrance of the town is (R) GOOD SPRINGS, where Gen. Andrew
Jackson camped on his way to visit the Creek nation. The Natchez Trace
cuts directly through the center of Tishomingo, and is marked by a stone
boulder in the heart of the village.
Right from Tishomingo on a graveled road to BETHLEHEM CHURCH, 1.6 m.,
a narrow shell-like frame structure with a steep-pitched hip roof. Here the prim
itive or "Hardshell" Baptists annually hold an Old Harp Singing on the first
Sunday in June. Old harp books with shaped notes are used, and, after the tune
has been pitched, the congregation sings unaccompanied. After the singing, which
usually lasts until midafternoon, the singers eat dinner on the grounds (see
WHITE FOLKWAYS).
At 33.2 m. on State 25 is the junction with a graveled road.
Left on this road to TISHOMINGO STATE PARK, 1.9 m., one of the nine
parks being developed in the State by the U. S. Government. A 98o-acre tract
of highland forest, the park is divided by Bear Creek which flows northward
and empties to the Tennessee River. In the bluffs above the creek is a ledge
of limestone rock, at one time an Indian camping ground. Depressions in the
ledge show where the Chickasaw formerly ground their corn into meal. Wild
azaleas, japonicas, honeysuckle, violets, and many uncommon species of wild
fern grow prolifically in the forest shade, and the park is being stocked with deer
and other game. A limestone quarry is being worked by the CCC boys who have
a camp here, and the rock quarried is used in the construction of cabins. These
cabins, completely furnished and equipped with running water, are for rent at
nominal cost.
Just S. of Tishomingo the FREEDOM HILLS of Alabama are visible
from the highway (L). These far-flung ridges were so named because in
the early iSoo s they were the hide-out of outlaws of the Southwest.
DENNIS, 36.4 m. (605 alt., 238 pop.), is a sawmill village with a
group of frame stores built like steps on the side of a steep hill. The
two churches here are older than the village itself. The small frame
METHODIST CHURCH is an out-growth of old Valley Church, whose
congregation dates back 100 years; the PRIMITIVE BAPTIST PROVI
DENCE CHURCH, also of frame construction, has a congregation equally
old. At the latter, annual foot washing services are held on the second
and third Sundays in May. The men sit on one long bench on one side
of the church; the women are seated opposite. Each member of the con
gregation, a towel girdled about his waist, washes the foot of another
and then dries it according to scriptural command. A sermon and com
munion follow the ceremony.
Between Dennis and Belmont the road winds around hills of gravel,
limestone, and chert, and passes tracts of hardwood forests ruthlessly cut
over in spots. Just N. of Belmont is (R) the narrow valley of Big Bear
Creek with its ledges of sandstone rock.
TOUR 17 503
BELMONT, 40.2 m. (570 alt., 703 pop.), perched on a high ridge
between the Tombigbee River and Bear Creek, occupies the site of old
Gum Springs, where one of the county s first schools was established. The
ridges surrounding the village are rough and bare, having been stripped
of their pines and hardwood trees to supply the Belmont sawmill.
South of Belmont State 25 threads through a heavily wooded and
irregular highland, with few signs of habitation. A deep-bodied wagon
filled with women and children is not an uncommon sight in this section
where the hillman loads his family into his wagon and, accompanied by a
flop-eared hound dog or two, drives them into town. This occasional trip
to town is often the longest journey many of these hill people ever make.
The home and the church are the centers of all social life. Log-rollings,
quiltings, and serenadings are among the popular events. The principal
musical expression is hymn and ballad singing and fiddling; a number
of ballads of entirely local origin have been gathered from this section.
Unlike the ballads of the southwestern part of the State, which have a
medieval flavor dealing with knights, tournaments, and lordly manners
and passions, the ballads of these healthy, hardy people are vigorous and
earthy. Many have a broad vein of humor and many are "outlaw songs"
brought from over Bear Creek by outlaws in hiding there. Often the
ballads are sung formally by groups of neighbors gathered for a "sing
ing," but it is not uncommon to hear them from the farmer as he plows,
from his wife as she washes the family clothes, or from boys and girls
walking along the country roads.
As the highway twists southward the hills gradually brighten until they
become mounds of pure red clay against which evergreens and birches
gleam sharply green and white.
At 64. 5 ;;;. is the junction with US 78 (see Tour 9), with which State
25 unites briefly.
At 67 ;;;. is FULTON (927 pop.) (see Tour 9); L. here on State 25.
South of Fulton the Tombigbee (Ind., coffin maker) River parallels
the highway (R) throughout and is never more than three miles away.
At TILDEN, 74.8 m. (118 pop.), the oldest town in Itawamba Co.,
are dilapidated buildings with half-fallen-in roofs, remnants of clay
chimneys, and completely rotten steps. From a few fence posts straggle
pieces of rusty barbed wire. Many of the people who liye here hardly
know of the existence of other places more than 30 miles distant. Tilden
was settled in the early 1830 $ by a group of Scottish people from North
Carolina, all with the prefix "Me" to their names, and the present Tilden
church is an outgrowth of the one these Scotsmen established.
Left from Tilden on a clay road to the IT . T. McXEECE HOME (private),
0.5 m., oldest house in the county, built by a McFaddcn about 1830 with slave
labor. The house is a good example of the durable cabins of the pioneers of the
period. The exterior walls are covered with log siding and the chimneys are
chinked with mud. The enclosure of the central hall is a modern alteration. In
the yard are aged rosebushes, shrubs, and a well-house.
Between Tilden and Amory State 25 skims the last outcroppings of the
northeast Mississippi hills, dropping every few miles into a valley between
BOY, BROOM, AND BUTTERBEANS
the ridges. The pine woodlands through this stretch have been little
touched and give the landscape a perennial greenness.
At 83 m. the highway crosses the east branch of Tombigbee River.
SMITHVILLE, 84.4 m. (401 pop.), settled by an Indian chief named
TOUR 17 505
Chubby and included in the land purchase of 1836, is an old village
which has been rejuvenated by the shortleaf pine lumber industry.
At AMORY, 93.8 m. (214 alt., 3,214 pop.) (see Tour 14), is the
junction with State 6 (see Tour 14).
South of Amory the highway enters a section of the State as different
socially and economically from the highlands as it is scenically. The
country here evidences the Black Prairie prosperity, achieved by farming
and dairying. Painted houses with firewood piled high in the yard, large
red barns, and fat cows in the pastures are the outward signs of com
fortable living.
Near the route s end are good examples of the white frame houses of
proportions similar to those found in the more elaborate ante-bellum
homes of the Black Prairie (see ARCHITECTURE). In contrast with
these houses are the Negro tenant cabins, hugging the earth, with white
washed walls, mud chimneys, and naked, clean-swept yards.
At 108.2 m. is the junction with US 45 (see Tour 4), i mile E. of
Aberdeen.
PART IV
Chronology
1528-1937
Early Explorations
1528 Panfilo de Narvaez explores interior, possibly the Mississippi region,
from Tampa Bay. Expedition returns to sea and is dispersed by
storm.
1536 Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca, with three other survivors of Nar
vaez expedition, reach Spain after eight years spent among tribes of
American interior.
1537 Don Hernando (Fernando) de Soto, obtaining permission to con
quer Florida, organizes expedition.
1540 De Soto enters Mississippi, one year after his landing in Florida.
1541 De Soto discovers the Mississippi River; crosses, and explores
country, but fails to find the mythical cities of gold.
1542 Returning, De Soto reaches the confluence of Red River with Missis
sippi. Dies (May 21), and is buried in Mississippi River.
1629-30 Charles I makes first Carolina grant to Sir Robert Heath. Grant
includes what is now Mississippi.
1663 Charles II makes second Carolina grant to Clarendon, Carteret and
others of all territory, from sea to sea, between latitudes 31 and
36 N.
1665 Grant of 1663 is enlarged to extend south to latitude 29 N.
1673 Joliet and Marquette descend the Mississippi River from about 42
to about 34 N. latitude (from the Wisconsin to the Arkansas
River).
1682 LaSalle descends the Mississippi River from the Illinois River to the
Gulf of Mexico.
French Dominion. 1699-1763
1699 Pierre le Moyne, Sieur d Iberville, establishes the first colony on
what is now Mississippi soil. The colony was Fort de Maurepas on
the Bay of Biloxi.
1700 D Iberville, de Bienville, and de Tonti ascend the Mississippi to the
present site of Natchez.
1712 Louis XIV grants Antoine Crozat, Marquis de Chatel, a 15 years
monopoly of trade in Louisiana.
1716 Jean Baptiste le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville, French Governor of
510 CHRONOLOGY
Louisiana, builds Fort Rosalie, where the city of Natchez now
stands.
1717 Crozat surrenders his charter to the King. The Mississippi Com
pany (Compagnie des Indes Occidentales) is chartered, with exclu
sive privilege of developing Louisiana, but is obligated to introduce
within 25 years 6,000 white colonists and 3,000 black slaves.
1718 The Mississippi Company grants land for settlements on the Yazoo,
at Natchez, on the Bay of St. Louis, and Pascagoula Bay.
1720 Three hundred settlers locate at Natchez.
Collapse of the "Mississippi Bubble."
1721 Three hundred colonists, destined for the lands of Mme. de Chau-
mont, arrive at Pascagoula.
1723 Seat of government of Louisiana is removed from Biloxi to New
Orleans.
1726 Bienville is recalled. Perier becomes commander-general of Louisiana.
1729 French settlers and soldiers are massacred at Fort Rosalie; 237 are
killed and 227 made prisoners.
1730 French soldiers and Choctaw warriors practically annihilate Natchez
tribe in retaliation for the 1729 massacre.
1732 Mississippi Company surrenders its charter. The English proprie
tary charter is included in that of Georgia.
1733 Bienville reinstated as Governor.
1736 Governor Bienville fails to subdue the warlike Chickasaw.
1762 France cedes New Orleans and territory west of the Mississippi
River to Spain.
An English Province. 1763-1779
1763 By treaty with France, West Florida, including Mississippi Terri
tory south of 31st parallel, becomes an English province, Captain
George Johnstone, Governor.
1764 King in Council, in a second decree extends the boundaries of the
province of West Florida north to the mouth of the Yazoo, thus
including the Mississippi settlements.
1768-70 Scotch Highlanders from North Carolina and Scotland establish
Scotia, about 30 miles eastward from Natchez.
1772 Richard and Samuel Swayze, of New Jersey, purchase land on
Homochitto River (within present Adams County), and form a
permanent settlement. It is claimed that Samuel Swayze, a Congre
gational minister, built the first Protestant church in Mississippi.
1775 Revolution of American Colonies begins. British West Florida re
mains loyal to Crown.
1778 Continental Congress grants to James Willing authority to descend
the Mississippi and secure the neutrality of the colonies at Natchez,
Bayou Pierre, etc.
CHRONOLOC.Y 511
By order of the Governor of West Florida, Fort Panmure, formerly
Rosalie, is garrisoned by a company of infantry under Capt. Michael
Jackson of the British Army.
A Province of Spain. 1779-1798
1779 The Spanish general, Don Bernardo de Galvez, storms Fort Bute
(September 7), captures Baton Rouge from Lt. Colonel Dickinson,
who surrenders West Florida (September 21) including Fort Pan-
mure and the District of Natchez.
1781 The people of the Natchez District rebel against Spain, capture
Fort Panmure, and raise the English flag (April 30). Don Carlos de
Grandpre, appointed Spanish commander of the Natchez District
(July 29), recaptures fort and inhabitants but drives many colonists
from the territory.
1782 September 3. By definitive treaty of peace between the United
States and Great Britain the southern boundary of the United States
is fixed at the 31st parallel N. lat., from the Mississippi to the St.
Mary s River. But in ceding Florida to Spain England specifies no
boundary on the north; therefore Spain claims north to the mouth
of the Yazoo River.
1785 Georgia organizes the County of Bourbon, which includes all lands
east of the Mississippi, between latitude 31 and the mouth of the
Yazoo River, to which the Indian title had been extinguished.
1788 February 1. Act erecting Bourbon County is repealed.
1795 The State of Georgia sells to four companies the territory in dis
pute, consisting of approximately 40,000,000 acres, at the rate of
21/2 cents per acre. This act is known as the "Yazoo Fraud."
A Negro mechanic belonging to Daniel Clarke of Fort Adams,
Wilkinson County, makes a cotton gin from a crude drawing and
verbal description of the Whitney Gin, and Clarke introduces its
use to county.
By treaty with Spain, the southern boundary of the U. S. is
fixed at 31 latitude; the western boundary is fixed at the middle
of the Mississippi River, and free navigation is agreed upon.
1796 Sale of land by Georgia rescinded.
1797 February 24. Andrew Ellicott, commissioned by the U. S. to fix the
boundary line, with the Spanish commissioner, Don Manuel Gayoso
de Lemos, arrives at Natchez.
July. Col. Ellicott secures the election of a permanent committee of
public safety.
Andrew Marschalk, a soldier of the garrison at Walnut Hills, first
uses the printing press in the Mississippi territory.
1798 January 10. Col. Ellicott is notified by Governor-General of New
Orleans that the King of Spain had ordered the surrender of the
territory.
512 CHRONOLOGY
March 23. Fort Nogales on Walnut Hill is evacuated by Spanish
garrison.
March 29-30. Fort Panmure is evacuated about midnight.
Territorial Days. 1798-1817
1798 April 7. Act of Congress creates the Territory of Mississippi with
bounds including the region now Alabama.
May 7. Winthrop Sargent appointed first Governor of the Missis
sippi Territory by President Adams.
August 6. Gov. Sargent arrives at Natchez.
Gen. Wilkinson reaches Natchez; makes headquarters on Loftus
Heights, later Fort Adams.
1799 February 28. The first law made and promulgated by the Terri
torial authorities is signed by Winthrop Sargent, Governor, Peter
Bryan Bruin and Daniel Tilton, judges. The law provides for the
organization of militia.
1800 Population (U. S. Census) of Mississippi Territory, 8,850.
Benjamin F. Stokes publishes the Mississippi Gazette, the first news
paper in the Mississippi Territory.
Supplemental act of Congress regarding Mississippi Territory pro
vides that settlement shall be made with Georgia for claims on or
before March 10, 1803.
1801 May 25. William Charles Cole Claiborne is appointed Territorial
Governor by President Jefferson.
October 24. Treaty of Chickasaw Bluffs, between U. S. and the
Chickasaw Nation, gives road right-of-way between Mero Settle
ment to Natchez. This, with the Treaty of Fort Adams, opens the
Natchez Trace.
1802 February 1. The seat of government is moved from Natchez to
Washington, 6 miles east.
Port of New Orleans closed to American goods.
Jefferson College is established at Washington, Miss., by legislative
act.
April 24. The U. S. Government agrees to pay Georgia $1,250,000
to relinquish claims to certain disputed territory, partly in the new
Mississippi Territory.
Bandits infest the Natchez Trace. Governor puts price on head of
one bandit, Mason. The head is brought in by Little Harpe and
another bandit. They unsuccessfully claim reward. Little Harpe is
hanged.
1803 March 10. Natchez is incorporated as a city.
March. Port of New Orleans reopened.
March. Congress provides for survey of land ceded by Georgia
to U. S.
United States purchases Louisiana from France for $15,000,000.
CHRONOLOGY $13
1804 March 27. The territory north of Mississippi Territory and south of
Tennessee, e.g., the land ceded by Georgia to U. S., is annexed to
Mississippi Territory.
1805 March 1. Robert Williams, of North Carolina, succeeds W. C C
Claiborne as Governor.
By treaty with U. S. the Cherokee, Creek, and Choctaw Nations
permit roads to be opened through their districts.
1807 January 12. Aaron Burr arrives at mouth of Bayou Pierre. He sur
renders unconditionally to Mississippi Territory authorities.
January 18. Burr, at Washington, Miss., gives bond to appear be
fore the territorial court February 2.
February 4. No formal court action having been taken, Burr de
mands release from recognizance. Refused, he breaks bond next day,
but is arrested in Alabama.
Judge Harry Toulmin s digest of the laws of Mississippi is adopted
by the legislature; this is the first digest.
Eleazer Carver begins manufacture of cotton gins near Washington,
Miss.
1809 January 9. Congress extends the right of suffrage to Mississippi
Territory.
March 3. Gov. Williams resigns. Four days later David Holmes is
appointed his successor.
December 23. The Bank of Mississippi is established at Natchez.
1810 Population, 40,352.
1812 May 14. The District of Mobile, lying east of Pearl River, west of
the Perdido River, and south of 31, is annexed to the Mississippi
Territory.
1813 August 13. Fort Mimms, in what is now the State of Alabama, is
attacked by 1,000 Creeks under Weatherford, McQueen, and Francis;
260 of the garrison are massacred.
December 23. Mississippi troops, under General Claiborne, attack
and destroy Escanachaha, the Holy City of the Creek Indians.
1814 December. The naval battle of Pass Christian is fought near St.
Louis Bay.
1815 January 8. Mississippi troops take valiant part in the Battle of New
Orleans.
1816 Mississippi Territory gains new lands, ceded by Chickasaw and
Choctaw Nations.
Statehood. 1817-
1817 March 1. Congress passes act enabling Mississippi Territory to pre
pare for statehood.
July 7. Constitutional Convention in session at Washington, Miss.,
with 47 delegates representing 14 counties.
August 16. President of the U. S. is notified that State Constitution
has been adopted on the 15th.
514 CHRONOLOGY
September 1-2. David Holmes is elected State Governor and Louis
Winston, Secretary.
October 6. State legislature opens first session.
December 10. Act of Congress admits Mississippi as a State into
the Union.
1818 January 21. Legislature organizes the first Supreme Court.
1819 February 17. Legislature passes an act establishing Elizabeth Female
Academy at Washington, Miss.
1820 Population, 75,448.
January 5. George Poindexter elected Governor.
October 18. The Treaty of Doak s Stand is made between U. S. and
the Choctaw Nation with an exchange of territory.
1821 Legislature appoints commission to locate a permanent State Cap
ital. Le Fleur s Bluffs on the Pearl River is chosen, and site of
new capital is named Jackson, in honor of Maj-Gen. Andrew
Jackson.
1822 January 23. Legislature convenes at Jackson the first session in the
new capital.
June 30. Poindexter s Code adopted in special session.
1824 January 23. Imprisonment for debt is abolished in Mississippi.
1830 Population, 136,621.
Planters Bank is chartered.
September 15. By Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek the Choctaw
Nation cedes to U. S. remainder of their lands east of the Mississippi.
1831 The first Mississippi charter is granted for a railroad, to run from
Woodville to St. Francisville, La.
1832 September 10. Constitutional Convention meets at Jackson.
October 26. Convention completes labors.
November. At general elections, people ratify constitution. Under
new constitution the judiciary becomes elective.
October 20. By Treaty of Pontotoc Creek the Chickasaw Nation
cedes its lands east of the Mississippi to the U. S. and agrees to
move from State.
1833 February. Legislature creates the High Court of Errors and Appeals,
and appropriates funds for erection of a statehouse and executive
mansion.
1836 February 26. Erection of a State Penitentiary is authorized.
1837 January 21. Legislature charters the Mississippi Union Bank and
agrees to subscribe the equal of private subscriptions to the limit
of $15,500,000.
1839 Legislature sanctions the issuance of $5,000,000 State stock for the
Mississippi Union Bank.
The New Capitol, though unfinished, is occupied.
February 15. Legislative act defines married women s right to
property.
CHRONOLOGY 515
1840 Population, 375,651.
Act of Legislature provides for establishment of a State university
at Oxford.
State Penitentiary is occupied.
1841 Gov. McNutt advises legislature to repudiate Union Bank bonds.
This is done next year. Indebtedness, $5,000,000 with interest.
1844 February 24. The University of Mississippi is incorporated.
1845 March 6. Robert J. Walker is appointed Secretary of the Treasury
of U. S.
1846 March 4. The State is divided for the first time into Congressional
Districts. Law is passed establishing common schools.
1847 February 23. The Mississippi Volunteers, under command of Col.
Davis, render distinguished service at Buena Vista.
1848 February 7. Chickasaw school lands opened for leasing for 99 years.
March 2. Institution for the Blind, opened privately in 1847, is
authorized.
November 6. University of Mississippi is opened at Oxford.
1850 Population, 606,526.
1851 Gov. Quitman, arrested by U. S. authorities for violation of neu
trality laws of 1818 by abetting an expedition against Cuba, resigns
as Governor. Is acquitted and renominated, but withdraws before
election.
1853 The Planters Bank bonds are repudiated. Indebtedness, $2,000,000
with interest.
March 3. President Pierce appoints Jefferson Davis Secretary of
War.
1854 August. Institution for the Deaf and Dumb is opened.
1855 January 8. The Asylum for the Insane is opened.
1856 February 6. Amendments (4 and 5) to constitution make first Mon
day in October the day for general elections.
1857 Jacob Thompson, of Miss., becomes Secretary of the Interior.
1859 Delegates from eight States meet in convention at Vicksburg, to
consider reopening of slave trade.
Whitworth Female College at Brookhaven is opened.
1860 Population, 791,305.
November 26. Legislature in special session to consider withdrawing
Mississippi from Union. Convention is called.
1861 January 7. Convention opens and two days later passes an ordinance
of secession, 84 to 15. Is the second State to secede.
January 20. Confederate force seizes an unfinished fort on Ship
Island.
January 21. Senator Jefferson Davis in the U. S. Senate announces
Mississippi s withdrawal from the Union.
February 9. Jefferson Davis becomes the President of the Confed
erate States.
516 CHRONOLOGY
April. President Davis calls for 1,500 Mississippi troops to defend
Pensacola. Ninth and Tenth Regiments respond.
December 31. Federal naval force captures Biloxi.
1862 Mississippi invaded by Union Army.
1863 Vicksburg falls.
The seat of government moved to Enterprise, later to Meridian,
then to Columbus.
1864 Seat of government moved to Macon.
Reconstruction
1865 May 6. Upon surrender of General Taylor to General Canby, Gov.
Clark recalls State officials, with State archives, from Columbus to
Jackson.
May 18. Legislature convenes in special session at Jackson to con
sider repeal of ordinance of secession.
May 22. Gov. Clark is arrested and imprisoned in Fort Pulaski,
Savannah.
June 13. Federal Government refuses to recognize old State Govern
ment, and appoints Judge William L. Sharkey as Provisional Gov
ernor.
August 14-16. Convention drafts and adopts amendments to con
stitution of 1832.
Freedmen granted civil rights.
October. Benjamin G. Humphreys is elected Governor; inaugurated
on 16th.
1866-67 Legislature, in special session, refuses to ratify the 13th and 14th
amendments of the Constitution of the United States.
1867 March 2. Mississippi by Reconstruction Act comes within 4th Mili
tary District, Major General Ord commanding.
November 13. Gen. Ord orders W. H. McCardle, editor of Vicks-
burg Times, to be confined in military prison for obstructing the
reconstruction acts.
1868 January 6. "Black and Tan" Convention meets in Jackson to form a
constitution, adjourns May 18.
1868 January. Legislature rejects the 14th Amendment.
June 4. Gen. Irwin McDowell succeeds Ord as commander 4th
District.
June 15. Gov. Humphreys removed from office by soldiers. Adelbert
Ames is appointed Provisional Governor.
June 22-30. People, by vote of 63,860 to 55,231, reject constitution
framed by "Black and Tan" (Reconstruction) Convention.
1869 September 8. National Union Republican Party of Mississippi holds
convention at Jackson and adopts State ticket, the majority of
Democrats concurring.
November 30-December 1. At State elections constitution drafted
in 1868 is ratified, objectionable features having been removed.
CHRONOLOGY 517
1870 Population, 827,922.
February 17. Congress readmits Mississippi as a State into the
Union.
State Board of Education created; system of public schools estab
lished.
1871 First monument to Confederate dead in State raised at Liberty.
1873 General Adelbert Ames, with solid Negro vote, is elected Governor.
1874 December 7. Race riots near Vicksburg. Attacking Negroes dis
persed with much loss of life.
1875 Political strife between office-holders and taxpayers continues in
tense through 1874 and 1875. Rioting at many places, notably at
Yazoo City, September 1, and Clinton, September 4, 1875. Gov.
Ames appeals to President for protection; is refused. At State elec
tions (November) Democrats sweep Republicans from office, and
gain control of both houses of legislature.
1876 February 16. T. W. Cordozo, Negro Superintendent of Education,
is impeached; resigns and proceedings dropped.
February 22. Resolution is reported to favor the impeachment of
Gov. Ames. He resigns (March 29) and John M. Stone becomes
Governor.
March 13. A. K. Davis, Negro Lieutenant Governor, is impeached
and removed from office.
1877 State Board of Health created.
1878 By legislative acts, a system of free public schools is established,
and Alcorn University becomes Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical
College.
February. Agricultural & Mechanical College for white students
established.
August-November. Yellow fever epidemic.
1879 Mississippi Valley Cotton Planters Association is organized at
Vicksburg.
Labor convention meets (May 5) at Vicksburg "to consider the
Negro-exodus question."
1880 Population, 1,131,597.
Revised code of Mississippi laws is adopted by legislature.
1882 March 9. Legislature passes laws to foster industries and encourage
immigration; also an act prohibiting sale of intoxicating liquors
within five miles of University of Mississippi.
June. Trustees open State University to women.
Disastrous flood in Yazoo-Mississippi Delta.
1884 March 4. Act passed providing for railroad commission.
1885 October 22. The Industrial Institute and College is opened to the
young women of Mississippi.
1886 March 11. General local option (liquor) law is passed.
518 CHRONOLOGY
Extensive immigration of Negroes from hill country to river bot
toms in the Yazoo area basins.
1889 December 6. Jefferson Davis dies at New Orleans.
1890 Population, 1,289,600.
January 16. John M. Stone inaugurated Governor.
Australian ballot system of voting is adopted in all except Congres
sional elections.
November 1. New State constitution is promulgated, to take effect
January 1, 1891.
1891 June 3. Monument to Confederate dead is unveiled at Jackson.
1892-3 State relief for Confederate soldiers and widows is authorized.
February 7. State flag and coat of arms adopted.
1897 Mississippi raises 3 regiments for Spanish War service.
Disastrous flood.
1898 Yellow fever epidemic.
1900 Population, 1,551,270.
February 21. New State Capitol, with total appropriations of
$1,093,641, and to occupy site of old State Penitentiary, is au
thorized.
Pensions for Confederate soldiers are provided for.
Magnolia chosen State flower.
1902 February 26. Department of Archives and History created.
March 5. Department of Insurance created.
1903 June 3. Cornerstone of new State Capitol is laid.
August 6. First election held under new primary election laws.
Disastrous flood.
1904 A text-book commission is created.
Legislature passes laws requiring equal but separate accommoda
tions for white and blacks on street cars; authorizing a new code of
laws; creating Lamar County; providing for additional branch agri
cultural experiment stations, and a new institution for the deaf
and dumb.
1906 Laws are passed which change the management of the penitentiary;
create a Department of Agriculture and Commerce; adopt the code
of 1906; provide for Jefferson Davis and Forrest Counties; for a
memorial to Mississippi Confederate soldiers at the Vicksburg Mili
tary Park; and for a geological, economic, and topographical sur
vey of the State.
1908 Importation and sale of alcoholic liquor in Mississippi is prohibited.
County agricultural high schools are established.
1910 Population, 1,797,114.
State Board of Health succeeds Health Department created 50 years
before.
County agricultural high schools act is amended to provide equal
opportunities for the Negro.
CHRONOLOGY 519
March 30. Mississippi Normal College is created.
April 14. State schools placed in hands of one board of trustees.
1912 River overflows. Delegates to Democratic National Convention at
Baltimore instructed for Hon. Oscar Underwood, of Alabama, as re
quired by the people in the first Presidential preference primary
held in Mississippi.
Child Labor Law forbidding girls under 14 and boys under 12 to
work in industrial establishments is passed, with 8-hour day for
older youths.
Bureau of Vital Statistics is inaugurated.
1914 An act guaranteeing bank deposits passed.
State Factory Inspectorship created; State Board of Nurse Ex
aminers authorized.
State Truck Growers (cooperative) Association organized.
1916 Rural schools consolidated by authority of act of 1910.
January 18. T. G. Bilbo inaugurated Governor.
By constitutional amendment Supreme Court increased to six judges,
elected for term of eight years.
Public hangings are made illegal.
Law is passed making it a misdemeanor to mutilate or misuse the
U. S. flag, the State flag, and Confederate flag.
State Highway, State Tax, and Illiteracy Commissions are created.
March 25. Sanatorium for tubercular patients established at Magee.
March 28. Mississippi Industrial and Training School established at
Columbia.
1917 March 27. Mississippi musters its First Regiment and opens State re
cruiting office.
April 6. Mississippi ratifies Wilson s Declaration of War on Ger
many.
1918 National Prohibition Act is ratified by State.
Plant Board is created.
Pat Harrison is elected to the U. S. Senate.
1920 Population, 1,790,618.
Two amendments are adopted to State Constitution: 1. A uniform
poll tax of $2.00 to be used in aid of common schools in the county.
2. Pensions for Confederate soldiers and sailors, residents of Miss.,
and their widows.
April 3. Mississippi State School for the feebleminded is established
at Ellisville.
1922 March 25. An act is passed permitting women to vote.
A higher gasoline tax secures funds for improvement of highways.
Rehabilitation Act passed.
1923 March 3. John Sharp Williams, distinguished U. S. Senator, having
declined renomination, retires to private life.
1924 Inheritance Tax Law passed.
Income Tax Bill of 1912 is modified.
520 CHRONOLOGY
Commission of Education is established.
Delta State Teachers College is organized at Cleveland.
Sea Wall Bill is passed; extending along Gulf Coast, wall cost
$5,000,000.
1926 Mississippi Library Commission and Mississippi Forestry Commis
sion are inaugurated.
An act is passed to prohibit teaching in State-supported schools
that man evolved from a lower order.
First condensery, or factory for canning milk, in the South is
opened at Starkville, Miss.
First gas producing field is opened at Amory.
1927 April 21. The Mississippi River floods the Mississippi- Yazoo Delta
more disastrously than in floods of 1897 and 1903.
1928 U. S. Flood Control Act passed.
Theodore G. Bilbo becomes Governor.
July 1. First Mississippi Market Bulletin appears.
State Blind Commission and Malaria Control Commission are
created.
Sexual sterilization of insane becomes legal, when such action is
deemed advisable.
1930 Population, 2,009,821.
Tobacco and theatre taxes are imposed.
Research Commission is created to study Mississippi local govern
ment.
Official Code of 1930, containing in two large volumes the laws
of Mississippi, is adopted.
1931 Jackson Gas Field is opened.
Governor Bilbo reorganizes faculties of all State institutions of
higher learning, except Delta State Teachers College. In conse
quence, these colleges are removed from list of Association of
Southern Colleges.
1932 Game and Fish Commission is established.
Kidnapping is made a capital offense.
Sales Tax is passed.
Mississippi balances its budget.
Governor Conner reorganizes colleges and they are reinstated in
Southern Association of Colleges.
November. Relief work organization is set up.
1933 Twelve Civilian Conservation Corps camps are established in Mis
sissippi.
1934 State Health Officer made report: "Mississippi s death rate is prac
tically the lowest in U. S."
February 26. An act authorizes sale of light wines and beer.
Reforestation and Conservation Act is passed.
Act exempting small homesteads from State tax is passed.
1936 January 21. Hugh L. White inaugurated Governor.
CHRONOLOGY 521
February 21. An act to raise number of trustees of colleges from
nine to twelve is passed.
March 23. Old age Pension, Teachers Pensions, and Unemploy
ment Compensation Acts are passed.
Industrial Act is passed, providing means to "balance agriculture
with industry."
Funds are provided for the Mississippi Advertising Commission.
Act is passed to tax retail chain stores.
April 5. Tornado strikes Tupelo; 200 killed, 1,500 injured. 200
homes destroyed; property loss $4,000,000.
1937 Durant is first city to issue bonds under new industrial program.
Industrial Act held valid by court at Winona.
Bibliography
This bibliography is of necessity only a brief selective list. It is not a com
plete record of sources consulted in the preparation of this book, nor is it re
stricted to these sources. The Division of Bibliography of the Library of
Congress has prepared A List of References Relating to Mississippi; many
items from the list have been included in this bibliography.
GENERAL INFORMATION
Mississippi. Secretary of State. Mississippi Blue Book. Jackson, 1937, 291 p.
A biennial report from July 1, 1935 to July 1, 1937.
Wall, E. G. Handbook of the State of Mississippi. Jackson, Power and
Barksdale, 1882. The author was commissioner of immigration and agri
culture.
Whitfield, H. L. Know Mississippi. Jackson, Jackson Printing Co., 1926.
112 p.
DESCRIPTION AND TRAVEL
Cobb, Joseph B. Mississippi Scenes. Philadelphia, Hart, 1851. 250 p. A word
panorama of Mississippi by a traveler in the 1840 s.
Hildebrand. T. R. "Machines Come to Mississippi." National Geographic
Magazine. September 1937, v. 12: 263-318. A more general description of
life in Mississippi than the title implies.
Ingraham, J. H. The Southwest by a Yankee. New York, Harper, 1835.
570 p. 2 v. The account of a visit during the 1830 s to the Southwest, in
cluding the Natchez area. Statistics on population and farm production of
the time.
. The Sunny South, or The Southerner at Home. Philadelphia, G. G.
Evans, I860. 526 p. A romantic picture of the Natchez country just prior
to the War between the States.
Olmstead, Fred L. A Journey in the Back Country. New York, Mason, 1863.
565 p. A critical tourist s observations on the domestic life of Mississippians
in the 1850 s.
NATURAL SETTING
Bolton, Willa. Our State; a Geographical Reader of Mississippi. Richmond,
Va. Johnson Pub. Co., 1925. 310 p. il.
Connell, John T. and Wm. T. Fishing on the Gulf Coast in Mississippi. Gulf-
port, Miss., Gulfport Printing Co., 1930. 63 p. il. The what, when, and
how of fishing on the Coast by an authority.
Foster, L. E. "Jackson Adds a New Source of Wealth to Resources of Missis
sippi" [natural gas]. Manufacturers Record, July 31, 1930, v. 98; 44-46.
Grim, Ralph E. The Eocene Sediments of Mississippi. Jackson, 1936. 240 p.
524 BIBLIOGRAPHY
il., maps, photographs. (Mississippi State Geological Survey. Bulletin 30).
Technical but valuable as a reference.
. Recent Oil and Gas Prospecting in Mississippi. With a brief study of
subsurface geology. Oxford, University of Mississippi, 1928. 98 p. (Missis
sippi State Geological Survey. Bulletin 21).
Lowe, Ephraim N. Mississippi, Its Geology, Geography, Soils, and Mineral
Resources. Jackson, Tucker Printing House, 1915. 335 p. il. (Mississippi
State Geological Survey. Bulletin 12.) A non-technical treatment of the
physiography of the State designed to meet needs of general public.
. Plants of Mississippi: a List of Flowering Plants and Ferns. Jackson,
Hederman Bros., 1921. 292 p. (Mississippi State Geological Survey. Bul
letin 17).
Sinclair, J. D. "Studies of Soil Erosion in Mississippi." Journal of Forestry,
April 1931, v. 29: 533-540.
Stephenson, Lloyd W., and others. The Ground-water Resources of Missis
sippi. With discussions of the chemical character of the waters by C. S.
Howard. Prepared in cooperation with the Mississippi State Geological
Survey. Washington, Govt. Printing Office, 1928. 515 p. (U. S. Geological
Survey. Water-supply paper 576).
Mississippi. State Geological Survey. Forest Conditions of Mississippi. Jack
son, 1913. 166 p. (Bulletin 11). A reprint with additions of bulletins 5
and 7.
FIRST AMERICANS
ARCHEOLOGY
Brown, Calvin S. Archeology of Mississippi. University, Oxford, 1926. 372 p.
il., charts. Reconnaissance by an acknowledged authority.
Collins, Henry B. Archeology of Mississippi. Birmingham, Dec. 1932: pp. 37-
42. Address before Committee of State Archeological Survey. An unpub
lished survey of archeology in Mississippi, State Dept. of Archives and
History. Comprehensive resume of archeological research to date.
INDIANS
Byington, Cyrus. A Dictionary of the Choctaw Language. Edited by John R.
Swanton and H. S. Halbert. Washington, Govt. Printing Office, 1915. 611
p. (U. S. Bureau of American ethnology. Bulletin 46). An excellent but
not exhaustive study.
Cushman, H. B. History of Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Natchez Indians.
Greenville, Tex., Headlight, 1899. 607 p. Readable story of Mississippi s
three most important tribes.
Halbert, H. S. Choctaw Creative Legends. In Mississippi Historical Society
Publications, Oxford, 1901. v. 4, p. 267-270.
. Funeral Customs of the Choctaw. In Mississippi Historical Society
Publications, Oxford, 1900. v. 3, p. 353-366.
Lincecum, Gideon. The Choctaw Traditions: about Their Settlements in Mis
sissippi and the Origin of Their Mounds. In Mississippi Historical Society
Publications, Oxford, 1904. v. 8, p. 521-542. Not so readable as Halbert,
but authoritative.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 525
Ray, Florence R. Greenwood Leflore. Memphis, Davis, 1935. 141 p. il. An
idealized account of the Choctaw chief by his granddaughter.
Swanton, John R. Indian Tribes of the Lou er Mississippi Valley and Adja
cent Coast of the Gulf of Mexico. Washington, Govt. Printing Office, 1911.
387 p. il. (U. S. Bureau of American Ethnology. Bulletin 43).
. Source Material for the Social and Ceremonial Life of the Choctaw
Indians. Washington, Govt. Printing Office, 1931. 282 p. (U. S. Bureau of
American Ethnology. Bulletin 103).
Warren, Harry. Chickasaw Traditions, Customs, etc. In Mississippi Histori
cal Society Publications, Oxford, 1904. v. 8, p. 543-553.
GENERAL HISTORY
Claiborne, J. F. H. Mississippi as a Province, Territory, and State. Jackson,
Power & Barksdale, 1880. 545 p. v. 1. History of the State to the Civil War
period, enlivened with brief biographies.
Du Bois, William E. B. Black Reconstruction. New York, Harcourt, Brace,
1935. 737 p.
Fant, Mabel, and John C. History of Mississippi. Jackson, Mississippi Pub.
Co., 1928. 340 p. il., maps. School history.
Galloway, Charles B. Great Men and Great Movements; a Volume of Ad
dresses. Nashville, Tennessee; Dallas, Texas; Publishing House Methodist
Episcopal Church South, Smith and Lamas agents, 1914. 328 p. Mississippi
and Mississippians, p. 119-250.
Guyton, Pearl Vivian. History of Mississippi. Syracuse, Iroquois Pub. Co.,
1935. 362 p. il., maps. A political and economic history for children.
Lynch, John R. The Facts of Reconstruction. New York, Neale Pub. Co.,
1913. 325 p. The Negro s side of reconstruction as seen by a Negro recon
struction leader.
Rainwater, Percy Lee. An Economic Interpretation of Secession. Opinions in
Mississippi in 1850 s. Baton Rouge, Franklin Press, 1935. 18 p.
. Mississippi: Storm-Center of Secession, 1856-1861. Unpublished
thesis in University of Mississippi library. An almost exhaustive study of
the conflicting issues that swept Mississippi and led to secession.
Riley, Franklin L. School History of Mississippi. Richmond, Va., Johnson,
1900. 492 p. il., maps.
Rowland, Dunbar. Mississippi: the Heart of the South. Chicago, S. J. Clarke,
1925. 1,838 p. 2 v. il., maps.
. Mississippi; an Encyclopedic History. Atlanta, Southern Historic Pub.
Assn., 1917. 3000 p. 3 v. Excellent for quick reference.
Sydnor, Charles and Claude Bennett. Mississippi History. Chicago, Rand Mc-
Nally, 1930. 394 p. il., maps. One of the best histories of the State.
Tate, Allen. Jefferson Davis. New York, Minton, 1929. 311 p. Excellent
study of Davis and picture of ante-bellum agrarian society by a modern
agrarian.
EARLY
Barcia Carballido y Zuniga, Andres Gonzalez de. Ensayo cronologico para la
historia general de la Florida. Madrid, 1723. 366 p.
526 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Chambers, Henry E. Mississippi Valley Beginnings. New York and London,
Putnam, 1922. 389 p. il., maps. An excellent study of early explorations
and settlement of the Louisiana Territory.
Claiborne, J. F. H. Life and Times of Sam Dale, the Mississippi Partisan.
New York, Harper, I860. 233 p. il. Insight into history as made by "the
greatest Indian fighter of them all."
Gayarre, Charles E. A. History of Louisiana. New Orleans, Hansell, 1903.
v. 1. 558 p. Story of Mississippi as part of Louisiana Territory, too pic
turesque to be fully accurate, but readable.
Gomara, Francisco Lopez de. Histoire des generalle des Indes Occidentals
and terres neuues. Paris, Chez Michael Sonnius, 1569. 258 p.
Hakluyt, Richard. Divers voyages touching the discovery of America and the
islands adjacent. Published by Richard Hakluyt, 1582. Edited by John
Winter Jones, printed for the Hakluyt Society, London, 1850.
Hall, James. A Brief History of the Mississippi Territory. Oxford, 1906.
In Mississippi Historical Society Publications, v. 9. A reprint of Hall s
60-page history which appeared in 1801.
Latane, John Holladay. A History of the United States. Boston. Allyn and
Bacon, 1918. 589 p.
Lewis, G. H. The Chroniclers of the De Soto Expedition. In Mississippi His
torical Society Publications, Oxford, 1903. v. 7, p. 379-387. An adequate
study of first exploration records.
Lummis, Charles Fletcher. The Spanish Pioneers. Chicago, A. C. McClurg,
1893. 292 p.
Parkman, Francis. The Works of Francis Parkman. Boston, Little, Brown
and Company, 1903, 491 p.
Riley, Franklin L. A Contribution to the History of the Colonization Move
ment in Mississippi. In Mississippi Historical Society Publications, Oxford,
1906. v. 9, p. 313-414.
Romans, Bernard. Natural History of East and West Florida. New York,
printed for the author, 1775. 342 p., il. A good reference for Mississippi
history under British and Spanish rule.
Rowland and Sanders. Mississippi Provincial Archives. (1729-1740). Jackson,
Press erf Mississippi Department of Archives and History, 1927. 488 p.,
maps.
Smith, Buckingham. Coleccion de Varios documentos para la historia de la
Florida y tierras adyacentes. Londres, Trubner Z. Compania 1857. Tomo I.
(With the exception of five documents all the papers belong to the period
1516-69).
. Narrative of Alvar Nunez Cabeca de Vac a. Translated 1851. San
Francisco, Grabhorn Press, 1929.
Ternaux-Compans, Henri. Recueil de pieces sur la Floride. Paris, A. Bertrand,
1841. 368 p.
Tschan, Francis J. The Catholic Contribution in the Colonial Period. New
York, Catholic Book Company, 1935. v. 1, Catholic Builders of the Nation,
p. 129-147. Reviews the Spanish period in the Mississippi region.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 527
LATER
Bancroft, Frederic. Slave-trading in the Old South. Baltimore, J. H. Furst,
1931. 415 p.
Claiborne, J. F. H. Life and Correspondence of John A. Quitman. New York,
Harper, I860. 792 p. 2 v. Good picture of Mississippi politics in 1840 s
and 1850 s.
Davis, Reuben. Recollections of Mississippi and Mississippians. Boston,
Houghton Mifflin, 1891. 446 p. Interesting for its informal style and fund
of personal knowledge of the State and its citizens. Written by one of
Mississippi s most trenchant political figures of the middle nineteenth
century.
Dickson, Harris. Old-fashioned Senator. New York, Stokes, 1925. 205 p. A
romantic biography of John Sharp Williams.
Foote, Henry S. Casket of Reminiscences. Washington, Chronicle Pub. Co.,
1874. 498 p. Material, for the most part, deals with State politics from
1840 to 1870.
Garner, James W. Reconstruction in Mississippi. New York, Macmillan,
1901. 422 p. An excellent study by a thorough student.
Henry, Robert Selph. A Story of the Confederacy. Indianapolis, Bobbs-Mer-
rill, 1931. 514 p. il. The rise and fall of the Confederacy described in
popular style.
Sydnor, Charles S. Slavery in Mississippi. New York, Appleton-Century,
1933. 270 p. Comprehensive and accurate; excellent for reference and as
source material.
GOVERNMENT
Butts, Alfred B. "The Court System of Mississippi." Mississippi Law Journal,
Nov. 1930, v. 3: 97-125.
Cason, Clarence E. "The Mississippi Imbroglio." Virginia Quarterly Review,
April 1931, v. 7: 229-240.
Cohn, David Lewis. Picking America s Pockets. New York, Harper, 1936.
The story of the costs and consequences of our tariff policy.
Ethridge, George H. "Jurisdiction of the Circuit Court." Mississippi Law
Journal, February, 1934, v. 6: 195-211.
Mississippi. Statutes of the Mississippi Territory. Natchez, Samuel Terrell,
1807. 660 p.
. Mississippi Constitution. Jackson, Mississippi, Tucker Printing Co.,
1928. 784 p. Contains the act of Congress organizing Mississippi Territory
and the act enabling Mississippi to form a State government.
. Rtvised Code of the Laws of Mississippi. Natchez, Francis Baker,
1824. 743 p. Cited as Poindexter s code.
. Revised Code of the Statute Laws of Mississippi. Jackson, printed
by E. Barksdale, 1857. 943 p. 2 v.
Rowland, Dunbar. Jefferson Davis, Constitutionalist. Jackson, printed for
Mississippi Department of Archives and History, 1923. 6,041 p. 10 v.
Excellent source material.
528 BIBLIOGRAPHY
SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
AGRICULTURE AND INDUSTRY
Baldwin, J. G. The Flush Times of Alabama and Mississippi. San Francisco,
Bancroft- Whitney, 1899. 330 p. An account of the opening of the newly
released Indian lands.
Boeger, Ernest A., and Goldenweiser, E. A. A Study of the Tenant System
of Farming in the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta. Washington, Govt. Printing
Office, 1916. 18 p. (U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. Bulletin 337.)
Cohn, David L. God Shakes Creation. New York, Harper, 1935. 448 p. il. A
fast moving account of life in the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta, with emphasis
on economic conditions.
Dickson, Harris. Story of King Cotton. New York, Funk & Wagnalls, 1937.
309 p. il. A popular but authentic review of Mississippi s cotton economy.
Riley, Franklin L., ed. Diary of a Mississippi Planter. In Mississippi Histori
cal Society Publications, Oxford, 1909. v. 10, p. 311-482. Unvarnished,
everyday life on a cotton plantation.
Smedes, Susan Dabney. Memorials of a Southern Planter. Baltimore, Cush-
ings and Bailey, 1887. 342 p.
United States Department of Agriculture. Agricultural Census, 1935. Wash
ington, Govt. Printing Office, 1936. 27 p. A reprint of the Mississippi sec
tion of the National agricultural census.
White, H. "Mississippi Bids for Industry." Review of Reviews, December
1936, v. 94: 30-31.
TRANSPORTATION
Coates, Robert M. The Outlaw Years. New York, Macaulay, 1930. 308 p.
A thrilling story of life and bandits on the old Natchez Trace.
Quick, Edward. Mississippi Steamboating. New York, Holt, 1926. 342 p. il.
. "Mississippi Pioneers in Zoning State Highways." American City,
October 1930. v. 43, 129.
EDUCATION
Butts, Alfred B. Public Administration in Mississippi. In Mississippi Histori
cal Society Publications, Centenary Series, Oxford, 1919. v. 3, p. 20-147.
George, Jennings B. The Influence of Court Decisions in Shaping School Pol
icies in Mississippi. Nashville, Tenn., George Peabody College for Teach
ers, 1932. 265 p. An unpublished dissertation.
Jones, Laurence C. Piney Woods and Its Story. New York, Fleming H.
Revell, 1922. 154 p. An interesting history of the Piney Woods Country
Life School.
Mayes, Edward. History of Education in Mississippi. Washington, Govt.
Printing Office, 1899. 290 p. il. Comprehensive study of the development
of education in Mississippi up to the twentieth century.
State Department of Education. Mississippi Program for the Improvement of
Instruction. Jackson, Better Printing Co., 1934. 123 p. (Bulletin 1). A
thought-provoking study program for Mississippi teachers, with a good
selected reference list.
BIBLIOGRAPHY 529
Timberlake, Elise. Did the Reconstruction Regime Give Mississippi Her Pub
lic Schools? In Mississippi Historical Society Publications, Oxford, 1912.
v. 12, p. 73-93. Excellent source material on the origin of public education
in Mississippi.
United States Department of the Interior, Bureau of Education. Survey of
Negro Colleges and Universities. Washington, Govt. Printing Office, 1928.
964 p. A study of the principal Negro colleges and universities in the
United States.
Weathersby, W. H. History of Educational Legislation in Mississippi from
1798 to 1860. Chicago, Univ. of Chicago Press, 1921. 203 p.
Woodson, Carter Godwin. The Education of the Negro Prior to 1861. New
York, Putnam, 1915. 454 p.
RELIGION AND SOCIAL AGENCIES
Robinson, E. "Federal Aid Comes to Mississippi." Mississippi Library Jour
nal, February 1, 1935, v. 60: 95-98.
Rossell, B. S. "Book Relief in Mississippi." Survey, March 1935, v. 71: 73-74.
Taylor, H. "How Firm a Foundation." Virginia Quarterly Review, October
1931, v. 7: 562-572. Of religious institutions and affairs.
ARTS AND LETTERS
LITERATURE
Bradford, Roark. John Henry. New York, Harper, 1931. 225 p. il. Tales of a
Negro stevedore of heroic strength and ingenuity.
Clemens, Samuel. Life on the Mississippi. New York, Harper, 1908. 527 p.
Steamboat days on the river.
Cochran, Ed. Louis. Son of Haman. Caldwell, Idaho, Caxton Printers, 1937.
330 p. The story of an ambitious boy of the tenant class in the Mississippi
Delta.
Deavours, Ernestine C, comp. The Mississippi Poets. Memphis, E. H. Clarke,
1922. 204 p.
Dickson, Harris. Old Reliable. Indianapolis, Bobbs-Merrill, 1911. 341 p. A
fictional Negro character made real.
. Black Wolf s Breed. Indianapolis, Bobbs-Merrill, 1899. 288 p. "A
story of France in the Old World and the new happenings in the reign of
Louis XIV."
Faulkner, William. Sartoris. New York, Harcourt, Brace, 1929. 380 p.
. Absalom, Absalom! New York, Random House, 1936. 384 p.
Hudson, A. P. Humor of the Old Deep South. New York, Macmillan, 1936.
548 p. Mostly about the folkways of Mississippi preachers, politicians, doc
tors, farmers, and Negroes.
James, Alice, comp. "Mississippi Poets." American Mercury, May 1932, v.
26: 38-40.
, ed. Mississippi Verse. Chapel Hill, Univ. of N. Carolina Press, 1924.
94 p. With biographical notes on the authors.
McDowell, Mrs. Katherine Sherwood Bonner. Dialect Tales. New York,
Harper, 1883. 187 p.
53 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Percy, William Alexander. Sappho in Levkas and Other Poems. New Haven,
Yale Univ. Press, 1915. 78 p.
. In April Once. New Haven, Yale Univ. Press, 1920. 134 p. A col
lection of poems.
. Enzio s Kingdom and Other Poems. New Haven, Yale Univ. Press,
1924. 140 p.
Russell, Irwin. Christmas-night in the Quarters, and Other Poems. With an
introduction by Joel Chandler Harris and an historical sketch by Maurice
Garland Fulton. New York, Century, 1917. 182 p. il. by E. W. Kemble.
Rylee, Robert. Deep Dark River. New York, Farrar & Rinehart, 1935. 308 p.
The story of a Southern woman lawyer who defended a Negro.
. St. George of Weldon. New York, Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., 1937.
432 p. A fatalistic story of a decadent family.
Street, James A. Look Away: A Dixie Note Book. New York, Viking, 1936.
A collection of stories, some from Mississippi.
Sale, John B. A Tree Named John. Chapel Hill, Univ. of N. Carolina Press,
1929. 151 p. il. A little boy s life on a plantation, with Negro folklore
furnishing the backdrop.
Saxon, Lyle. Father Mississippi. New York, Century, 1929. 427 p. il. A read
able account of the river and of the people who make up the pattern of
river life. There is a good chapter on Negro voodooism, as practiced in
the southwestern counties. The 1927 flood is presented in detail.
Talley, Thomas W. Negro Folk Rhymes. New York, Macmillan, 1922. 347
p. il. A good collection of Negro folk rhymes, with a better study of the
making of these rhymes in slavery days. Many common to Mississippi.
Young, Stark. So Red the Rose. New York, Scribner s, 1934. 410 p. An ideal
ization of ante-bellum life in the Natchez area.
. Heaven Trees. New York, Scribner s, 1926. 286 p. Ante-bellum life
on a plantation "forty miles from Memphis by the carriage-road."
. River House. New York, Scribner s, 1929. 304 p. The scene is in
northwest Mississippi. A conflict of wills between the previous Southern
generation and the present.
PAINTING, SCULPTURE, Music
Hare, Maude Cuney. Negro Musicians and Their Music. Washington, D. C,
Associated Publishers, Inc., 1936. 439 p. Pictures and musical illustrations.
African influence on American music; Negro idioms and rhythms; musical
pioneers; world musicians of Negro race, including some Mississippians.
Hudson, A. P. Folk Songs of Mississippi. Chapel Hill, Univ. of N. Carolina
Press, 1936. 321 p. A collection of folksongs indigenous to the State. With
out musical notation.
Sutton, C. V., ed. History of Art in Mississippi. Gulfport, Dixie Press, 1929.
177 p. il. Material collected by the Art Study Club of Jackson.
Rowland, Dunbar. Biographical Guide to the Mississippi Hall of Fame. Jack
son, 1935. 36 p. The emphasis is placed upon paintings.
Young, Stark. "Ballads in Mississippi." New Republic, September 23-30,
1936, v. 86; 186-229.
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Index
Abbay, Dick, 316
Adair (James), 53
Affleck, Thomas, 334
Agriculture
Cotton:
early varieties of, 94; introduction of
Mexican seed, 95, 96; beginning
of "Great Cotton Era," 96; land
boom of 1830, 98; effect of War
between the States, 98, 99; credit
tenant system, 99; opening of
Delta, 99, 100; selective breeding,
100; fight against weevil, 100;
marketing of, 191; effect of ero
sion, 99, 203; shipping of, 197;
financing of, 191; ginning and
compressing, 192, 265.
Diversification of crops, 100
Fruit, 419, 420, 423, 430, 459, 470
Hay, 100, 376, 398
Indigo, 94, 95, 239
Legumes, 100, 105
Pecans, 287, 291, 319, 321, 333, 347,
371, 419, 420, 423, 429, 430
Soil Conservation, 105, 203, 378
Tobacco, 94, 239
Trucking, 6, 100, 393, 394, 396, 471
Tung Nut Culture, 111, 420, 431, 432,
470
Airlines (see Transportation)
Alcorn, James L., 74, 138, 317
Allen, Betsy, 487
Allen, Creighton, 161
Allen, Private John M., 138, 265
Amberson, William, 348
American Revolution, 65, 66
Ames, Adelbert, 74, 216
Amos Ogden Mandamus, 65
Annandale (site), 390
Arboretum, 233
Archeology, 45, 46, 47 (see Indians)
Architecture, 143-156
Black Belt, 144-145, 149; church, 145,
146, 461; commercial, 153; con
temporary, 150-156, 165, 166,
182, 189, 190, 195, 209, 228,
261, 262, 267; "dog-trot," 143,
144, 472; English influence on,
143; French influence on, 143,
146; Georgian, 147, 148, 149;
Government, 156; Grand Manner,
144; Industrial, 155; Institutional,
155; mill houses. 152, 153; South
ern Planter, 144, 148; Spanish
Influence, 144, 146, 147, 148;
tenant houses, 151; Victorian
Gothic, 152.
Archusa Springs, 371
Art, 134-142
early aspects, 134, 135, 136; Negro,
134, 135; contemporary, 135, 219-
220, 281. (See Collections and
Museums)
Ashe Pine Tree Nursery, 418
Audubon, John James, 139, 333, 335
Baily, Francis, 139
Ball, J. T., 228
Ball of a Thousand Candles, 341
Bali, Mrs. Harry, 353
Ball s Mill, 479
Ballads (see Folkways, Music)
Bankhead, William B., 368
Barbecue (see Folkways, Customs)
Bartram, William, 139
Bass Pecan Orchard, 430
Battles
Ackia, 436, 485; Big Black River, 313;
Booneville, 363; Brice s Crossroads,
363; Bruinsburg, 330; Chickasaw
Bayou, 272, 323; Champion s Hill,
312; Corinth, 362; Grand Gulf,
326; Harrisburg, 263; luka, 443;
501; Jackson, 213; Pass Christian,
297, 299; Tallahatchie Bridge,
489; Tupelo, 263. (See Holly
Springs, Vicksburg)
Bayous
Acadian, 298; Cadet, 301; Cassidy,
421; Davis, 291; DeLisle, 298;
Graveline, 290; Herring, 291;
Hobson, 407; Mulatto, 301; Pierre,
326; Portage, 298; Rotten, 298.
Bays
Pascagoula, 64, 286; St. Louis, 64, 298.
Beatty, Ellen Adair, 259
Beauregard, P. G. T., 263, 328, 345, 362
Beauvoir, 292-294
Benachi Avenue (Biloxi), 178
Berryhill, S. Newton, 141
Bienville, Jean Baptiste le Moyne, Sieur de,
63, 172, 238, 299, 485
Big Rock, 369
Bilbo, Theodore G., 77, 431
Biloxi Lighthouse, 178
Biloxi Yacht Club, 168
Bird Sanctuary (Jackson), 222; (State
Teachers College), 417
Bishop. Dock, 472
Bisland, Elizabeth, 336
Black Prairie, 7, 33, 34, 361, 373, 374,
377, 397
Blake, Benson, 323
Blanton, Col. W. W., 352
Blennerhassett, Harmon, 240, 246, 327
Blessing of Fleet (Biloxi), 169, 176
534 INDEX
Bluff Hills, 33
Boating (see Recreation)
Bodley, Hugh, 271
Bonner, Sherwood, 140, 206
Bonnie Blue Flag, 216
Borden, Gail, 481
Bowie, James, 328
Bowie knife, 328
Bowling Green (ruins), 345
Bowman Hotel (site), 220
Bragg, Braxton, 362
Brandon, Gerard Chittocque, I, 333, 338
Brandon, Gerard Chittocque, II, 307, 333,
346, 359
Brandon, William L., 359
Bridges
Bayou Pierre, 326; Big Black, 313;
Iberville, 178; Pontchartrain, 434;
Railroad (Bucatunna), 373; Red-
dochs, 450; Rigolets, 434; Russell
Memorial, 326; Tallahatchie River,
437; Tibbee Creek, 375; Vicks-
burg, 314; War Memorial Bridge,
292, 175; Woodrow Wilson, 308.
Brooks, Jonathan, 125
Brown, Albert Gallatin, 120, 138, 392-
393, 394
Bull, Ole, 159
Burr, Aaron, 67, 240, 332, 334, 360, 338
Burr Oaks, 334
Burrows, Rube, 373, 385
Bus lines (see Transportation)
Buteux, Father Louis Stanislaus Marie, 300
Butler, Benjamin, 304
Butler, Frances Parke Lewis, 297
Caldwell, Isaac, 311
Capitol, new, 75, 152, 217
Capitol, old, 214
Carmer, Carl, 373
Carr, "Turkey Bill," 488
Carroll, Charles, 403
Carter s Point, 351
Carver, Eleazer, 107
Cary, Archibald, 327
Cary, Constance, 327
Casket Girls, 63, 172, 303
Cemeteries
Aberdeen, 365; Biloxi, 179; Catholic
(Port Gibson), 328; Chapel of
the Cross, 390; Concordia, 349;
Confederate: Beauvoir, 294; New
ton, 306; Marion, 370; Okolona,
Chancery Clerk s Office (Holmesville), 480
Chapman, Walter, 161
Chaumont, Duchess de, 64, 286
Chickasaw Indian Agency (site), 462
Chisholm, John, 255
Chisholm Massacre, 378
Chisholm, William, 378
Choctaw Indian Agency, 465 (see also
Indians)
Choctaw Indian Agency (site), 400
Church Buildings (by denomination)
Baptist:
Bethlehem, 502; Big Creek, 450;
China Grove, 480; Clear Creek,
333; Gary Springs, 472; Juniper
Grove, 431; Mont Zion, 451; New
Hope, 371; Primitive Providence,
502; Shiloh, 447; Toxish, 462;
Woodville, 344.
Christian:
Columbus, 184
Episcopal:
Chapel of the Cross, 389; Christ
(Vicksburg), 279; Christ (Holly
Springs), 204; Christ, 332; St.
John s (site), 356; Saint Mark s
Chapel, 295; St. Paul s, 344; Trin
ity (Natchez), 250; Trinity (Pass
Christian), 298; Church of the
Redeemer, 176.
Holiness:
Holiness Tabernacle, 496
Lutheran:
Gulf port, 199
Methodist:
Holly Springs, 204; luka, 443;
Kingston, 343; Mount Carmel,
342; Natchez, 237; Old Valley,
502; Washington, 334; Woodville,
344.
Presbyterian:
Church with the Iron Hand, 328;
Enterprise, 425; First (Natchez),
243; Holly Springs, 206; Laurel,
155; Liberty, 482; Old Bethel,
330; Pine Ridge, 335; Rodney,
330.
Roman Catholic:
Our Lady of Good Hope, 298; Our
Lady of the Gulf, 300; Paulding,
426; Port Gibson, 328; St. Mary s
Cathedral, 249.
Cities (see Towns)
374; Oxford, 260; Davis Family] Civil War (see War between the States)
484; Friendship, 187; Gibeon,
400; Greenfield, 357; Greenway,
352; Greenwood, 218; Holmesville,
480; Kingston Public Burying
Ground, 343; Krebs, 289; Lake-
wood, 309; Live Oak, 298; Me
morial Park, 249; National (Cor
inth), 362, 363; National (Vicks
burg), 323; Sargent s Private, 340;
Paradise Point, 295; Raleigh, 497;
Routh, 251; Shady Grove, 442;
Southern Memorial Park, 292; St.
Peter s, 257.
Central Hills, 7, 34, 401, 434, 463
Claiborne, J. F. H., 49, 131, 139, 301,
453
Claiborne, William Charles Cole, 69, 211
Clark, Charles, 73
Clark, John, 318
Clay, Henry, 211, 336
Climate, 35
Clifton, Chalmers, 160
Cloud, Adams, 66, 113
Coast, 4, 34, 285, 286
Cobb, Joseph B., 137
Cobb, Sam, 495
Cohn, David, 3, 142
Colbert, Pittman, 437, 486
Cole s Creek Valley, 332
Collections, private
Antique furniture, 422, 193; books,
251, 317; china, 317; dolls, 419;
heirlooms, 193, 248; Indian relics,
46, 47; paintings, 393; weaving,
417.
Colleges (Negro)
Alcorn A. & M., 119, 330; Campbell,
124, 221, 222; Jackson, 125;
Leflore Teachers Training School,
405; Mary Holmes Seminary, 123,
375; Mississippi Industrial, 124;
Natchez, 124; Okolona Institute,
123; Premiss Normal and Indus
trial School, 125, 452; Rust, 125,
206; Saints Industrial Institute,
124; Southern Christian Institute,
122, 312; St. Augustine Seminary,
300; Tougaloo, 125, 390; Utica
Institute, 125, 392.
Colleges (white)
All Saints, 122; Belhaven, 219; Blue
Mountain, 128, 458; Chickasaw,
460; Clark Memorial Jr., 122,
306; Copiah-Lincoln Jr., 395; East
Central Jr., 469; East Mississippi
Jr., 370; Delta State Teachers, 127,
320; Grenada, 122, 383; Gulf
Park, 296; Harrison-Stone-Jackson
Jr., 419; Hillman, 122, 310, 311;
Hinds County Jr., 392; Holmes
County Jr., 386; Jones County Jr.,
428; Millsaps, 128, 219; Missis
sippi, 119, 310; Mississippi State,
127, 398, 399; Mississippi State
College for Women, 127, 186,
187; Mississippi State Teachers,
417; Mississippi Synodical, 205;
Mississippi Woman s, 418; North
west Jr., 380, 381; Southwest Mis
sissippi Jr., 396; Sunflower Jr.,
405; University of Mississippi, 125,
126, 127, 259, 260; Whitworth,
454; Wood Jr., 122, 401.
Collins, Ross, 378
Colmer, William, 287
Commercial Bank Building, 243
Community House (Biloxi), 177
Connelly s Tavern, 245, 246
Conner, Martin Sennett, 77
Constitution Fire Company House, 279
Cooper, Preston, 391
Copeland, James, 476
Copeland Clan, 476
Coronado (see de Coronado)
Cotton (sec Agriculture)
Cotton Gin Port, 485
Cotton Textile Road, 351
Courthouses
Adams County, 241; Amite County,
481; Calhoun, 473; DeSoto
County, 380; Franklin County,
455; Hinds County (Jackson),
214; Hinds County (Raymond),
391; Itawamba, 435; Lafayette,
254; Leake County, 495; Leflore
County, 192; Madison County,
INDEX 535
388; Marshall, 200; Quitman
County, 490; Smith County, 497;
Warren County, 277.
Covered Bridge, 488
Covington, Leonard, 333
Cox, Lida, 439
Cox, Toby, 439
Cox, William Henry, 439
Craft, Bryant, 498
Craft, Jesse, 497
Craig, John, 255
Creeks
Big Bear, 502; Chunky, 305; Little,
476; Tishtony, 435; Pottoxchitto,
305; Rahoma, 497; Tallahalla, 449,
450; Tallahoma, 450; Tibbee, 375.
Crismoreland Rose Gardens, 309
Crockett, David, 349
Crosby, L. O., 432
Crowell, Jesse, 357
Crozat, Anthony, 63, 172
Cuming, Fortescue, 139
Curtis, Richard, 66, 113
Customs (see Folkways)
Dairying (see Industry)
Dale, Sam, 378, 379
Dancing Rabbit Treaty (see Indians)
D Artaguiette, Pierre, 461, 487
Davion, Father Anthony, 113, 170, 359
Davis, Jefferson
Election to Presidency of Confederacy,
71; memorial to the family of,
176; "Night Shirt Address," 184;
inspection of fortifications at Sny-
der s Bluff, 323; visits to Jackson,
213, 217; homes: Beauvoir, 292,
294; Palmyra Island, 325; Rose-
mont, 484; Rise and Fall of the
Confederate Government, 294; last
public appearance of, 216; death of,
294.
Davis, Joseph Emory, 320
Davis, J. J., 499
Davis, Lucinda, 484
Davis, Reuben, 139, 365
Davis, Varina Anne, 294
Davis, Varina Howell, 253, 294
Davis Windows, 176
de Coronado, Francisco, 60
DcFrance, Abraham. 211
De Kalb, Baron, 378
De Lisle, Comte, 298
Delta, 3, 4, 31, 32, 99, 315, 406, 407,
411, 420, 421
Delta Cooperative Farm, 348
Delta Experiment Station. 321
Delta and Pine Land Company, 103, 321,
350
Delta Planter s Company Plantation, 349
Delta Staple Cotton Festival, 319
Democratic Party, 74
de Niza, Marcos, 60
Department of Archives and History, 218
De Soto, Hernando, 60, 182, 316, 324,
366, 380
De Tonti. Henri. 170
De Vaudreuil, 485
INDEX
d Iberville, Pierre Le Moyne, Sieur, 61,
63, 170, 238, 291, 303
Dickson, Harris, 141, 412
Dix, Dorothy, 298, 433
Dow, Lorenzo, 116, 139
Doxey, Wall, 203
Duels, (Caldwell-Peyton), 311; (Hind-
man-Falkner), 458
Dunbar, Sir William, 360
Dunn s Falls, 425
Durant, Louis, 386
Eastman, Lauren Chase, 225
Eddy, Sherwood, 348
Education, 118-128
Church schools, 119, 120, 128; develop
ment of agricultural high schools,
121, 122; early schools, 118, 119,
120; first free school in State, 182,
183; land-grant schools, 120;
Smith-Hughes Act, 122; Negro
schools, 120, 121, 122, 124, 125;
Chinese, 123; Indian, 123. (See
Colleges and Schools.)
Eggleston, B. B. (Buzzard), 213
El Camino Real, 85
Elizabeth Female Academy, 119, 335
Ellicott, Andrew, 66, 139, 246
Eliot, John, 385
Elliott, William St. John, 336
Ellis, Powhatan, 372
Engle, A. Lehman, 161
Epstein, Jacob, 352
Esplanade, 244
Evans, Lewis, 341
Falkner, W. C, 456-459 (see Faulkner)
Parish Street (Jackson), 221
Farm Homestead Project, 470
Farragut, David Glasgow, 272, 290
Farragut Home (site), 290
Farthing, Richard, 416
Faulkner, II, William, 3, 141, 256, 458
(see Falkner)
Fauna, 42
Favre, Simon, 79
Federal Music Project, 161
Federation of Music Clubs, 159
Ferguson, Thomas, 323
Ferries, Mississippi River
Dundee, 316; Friar Point, 317; Green
ville, 406; Natchez, 233; Vicks-
burg, 266.
Field Trials (see Hunting)
Finlay, Mrs. Ann, 353
First Free School, 185
First Memorial Day Service in America
187, 188
First Railroad Station, 344
Fishing, commercial (see Industry) ; rec
reational (see Recreation)
Fisk, Alvarez, 246, 410
Flat Woods, 34
Flood, Dr. William, 287
Flood Control, 76, 382
Flood of 1927, 76, 277
Flora, 40
Foley, Daniel, 328
Folklore
Ghost: 295, 356, 359, 395, 421, 497.
Legends, Indian: 176, 200, 287,
288, 375, 464, 494, 498; Miscel
laneous: 290, 296. Superstitions:
14, 27, 28, 29, 30.
Folkways
Ballads: 15, 157, 158, 408, 421, 472,
495, 503. Customs: Negro, 22-30;
white, 8-21, 433, 472, 473, 492,
495, 503; Indian, 50-58; foreign,
169. Spirituals, Negro, 157.
Folsom, David, 385, 400
Foote, Henry S., 138, 139, 212
Ford, John, 79, 479
Foreign Groups
Acadian French, 175, 298; Austrian,
166; Chinese, 351, 408; Czechs,
166; French, 165, 285, 286; Poles,
166, 175; Slavs, 168.
Forest Reserves
Ashe Nursery, 418; Bienville National,
306; Delta Purchase Unit, 322; De
Soto National, 419, 429, 470;
Holly Springs National, 438, 446;
Homochitto National, 454; Natchez
Trace Forestry and Game Preserve,
374; Leaf River, 417; Virgin Pine,
290. (See Parks, State)
Forrest, Nathaniel Bedford, 72, 263, 363
381, 443, 495
Fortification Street (Jackson), 218
Forts
Adams, site of, 359; Dearborn, site of,
333; Nogales, site of, 282; Massa
chusetts, 303; Maurepas, site of,
291; McHenry, site of, 282; Old
Spanish, 288-289; Patton s, site of,
372; Pemberton, site of, 422; Rob-
inett, site of, 363; Rosalie, site of,
244; St. Peter (Snyder) , site of, 322.
Frantz, A. J., 132
"Free State of Jones," 223, 427, 428
French and Indian War, 65, 436, 485
Friendship Oak, 296
Furr, Allison, 487
Furr, Tobias, 487
Gailor, Charlotte, 352
Gaines Trace, 86
Garner, James W., 120
Gas (see Industry)
Gayarre, Charles E. A., 49, 52
Gayoso, Don Manuel, 252
Geodetic Survey, 326
Geography, 31-35
Geology, 35-40
Geology Hill, 463
George, James Z., 74, 403
Gibbs Building, 391
Gibson, Tobias, 113, 280
Gibson, Samuel, 327
Giles, Jacob, 370
Gillam, Alva C, 73
Gillespie, James Alcorn, 342
Gipson, Ambrose, 357
Golf (see Recreation)
Good Springs, 502
Gordon, Robert, 364, 462
INDEX
537
Gore, T. P., 474
Gore Springs, 474
Governor s Mansion (Jackson), 220
Grandpre, Don Carlos de, 251
Grant, Ulysses S., 72, 201, 255, 272, 309,
317, 326, 327, 330, 361, 362,
443, 444
Grant s Pass, 317
Grave
Betsy Allen, 487; Gerard Brandon, II,
359; Resin P. Bowie, 328; William
Cocke, 188; Sam Dale, 379; Earl
Van Dorn, 328; Gentle South
Wind, 498; Samuel Gibson, 327;
Tobias Gibson, 280; L. P. Gore,
474; Gypsy Queen, 232; Judge
Hill, 257; Thomas Isom, 257;
Caleb King, 343; Felix La Bauve,
380; L. Q. C. Lamar, 257; A. B.
Longstrect, 257; John R. Lynch,
218; Judge Edward McGehee, 345;
D. N. McGill, 277; Senator Sulli
van, 257; Old Bachelor, 386.
Gravel (see Industry)
Gray and Edward Feud, 401
Green, Benjamin T., 320
Green, Col. Thomas Marsden, 332
Green, W. W., 131
Griffin, John, 100
Guion, Isaac, 246, 338
Gulfport Harbor and Ship Canal, 198
Gully, John, 378
Gum Springs, 496
Gunn, James, 363
Guzman, Nunez Beltran, 60
Gwin, Samuel, 311
Hagen, James, 131
Halleck, Henry W., 361, 362
Hall of Fame, 218
Hamilton, Raymone, 452
Hand Brothers, 295
Handy, W. C., 161
Harding, Lyman G., 252
Hardy, William H., 76, 196, 199, 417
Hare, Joseph Thompson, 84
Harpe (Harp) Brothers, 84, 331
Harris, George, 390
Harris, Wiley Pope, 394
Harris, W. R., 262
Harrison, Byron Patton, 394
Harrison County Courthouse (old), 295
Hays, Peter B., 248
Healy, George, 328
Healy, Thomas, 328
Henderson, John, 248
Henderson Point, 298
Henry, Robert S., 263
Hilgard, Eugene W., 99, 259
Hilgard s Cut, 259
Hill, R. A., 257
Hillman, Mrs. Adelia, 310
Hillman, Walter, 310
Hills, 33, 34
Blue Mountain, 458; Buffalo, 450;
Mount Barton, 228; Pontotoc
Ridge, 436; Tennessee Hills, 500;
Woodall s Mountain, 501.
Hills, The, site of, 358
Hindman, Thomas, 458
Hinds, Thomas E., 210, 242, 331
History
Exploration and Settlement: 60-66, 135,
170, 172, 238, 239, 269, 270,
271; West Florida Rebellion, 67,
68. (See French and Indian War.)
Early Statehood: Pearl River Con
vention, 479; First Constitutional
Convention, 70, 334; War of 1812,
69, 70; selection of capital site,
210, 211; flush times, 89, 99, 136,
201, 240. War between the States
( see War between the States ) .
Reconstruction, 73, 74, 132. Since
1900, 74-77.
Hoard, Col. L. M., 345
Hoggatt, James, 455
Holmes, David, 242
Homes
Airlie, 248; Anderson, 428; Arcole,
359; Arlington, 250; Ashwood,
345, 346; Auburn, 252; Banker s.
243; Bankhead, 368; Barnard,
322; Batson, 430; Beauvoir, 292,
293, 294; Bellevue, 389; Belmont
(Neilson), 366; Belmont (Worth-
ington), 354; Bilbo, 431; Billups,
186; Blakely, 323; Blocker, 441;
Boler, 469; Bolton, 460; Bonner-
Belk, 206; Borden, 481; Brame,
217; Brent, 480; Briars. The, 253;
Brinkley, 444; Britton, 243;
Brooks, 454; Brown, 392, 393;
Buntura, 244; Burrus, 350; Burton,
388; Campbell, 383; Canemount.
330; Castle, 474; Castleman, 410;
Cedar Grove, 412; Cedars, 488;
Chisholm, 378; Choctaw, 246;
Churchhill Downs, 413; Claiborne,
301; Clapp-Fant, 205; Clark, 460;
Cohen, 384; Coker, 312; Cold-
spring, 359; College Annex (Hull
Home), 205; Collins, 480; Co-
man, 444; Conti, 242; Cook-
Allein, 280; Corey, 343; Cotes-
worth, 403; Cottage Garden. 248;
Coxe-Dean, 205; Craft-Daniel,
207; Crump, 207; Curl, 447; Cur-
lee, 362; Cutrer, 319; Davis, 365;
Deavours, 426; Desert. 359;
D Evereux, 336, 337; Dickson.
483; Dix, 298; Dixie White
House. 297; Doll s House, 419;
Dubose, 393; Dunleith. 251;
Eagle s Nest, 317; Edgewood. 335;
Elgin, 342; Elgin. 362; Ellzey.
480; Elms. The, 250; Elmscourt.
341; Episcopal Rectory, 389; Er-
uin, 355; Ererhope. 356; Faisonia.
409; Farrington, 380; Farthing,
417; Faulkner, 256; Featherstone-
Buchanan, 207; Fontaine, 460;
Ford, 479; Foster, 335; Freeman,
204; French. 177; Galena, 439;
Gant, 393; Gardner, 440; Gary.
232; Gibeon, 400; Giles, 370;
53 8 INDEX
Homes (Continued)
Gillespie, 400; Gillard, 458; Glen-
bernie, 340, 341; Glenwild, 384;
Glenwood, 341; Gloucester, 340;
Goodman, 440; Gray Gables, 204;
Green, 279; Greenleaves, 250;
Griffin, 463; Hampton Hall, 345;
Hand, 295; Hardy, 454; Harper,
496; Harris, 394; Harvey, 389;
Haunted House, 295; Heflin, 381;
Hermitage (Foster), 343; Hermit
age ( Humphreys ) , 325; Hermit
age (Poitevent), 432; Hill, 258;
Hil, The, 328; Hindman, 458;
Hinton, 430; Holliday Haven, 365;
Hollywood (Gillespie), 342;
Hollywood, 409; Home Hill, 331;
Homewood, 339; Hopedale, 319;
Hope Farm, 251; Home, 371;
Howie, 156; Ingleside (Calhoun),
340; Ingleside, 389; Inglewood,
334; Isom, 257; Ivy, 447; Jayne,
396; Jones, 205; Kearney, 413;
Keller, 176; Kennebrew, 186;
Klein.280; Knotts,4lO; Knox,401;
402; Koch, 302; Laird, 382; Lake,
384; Lakeside, 357; Lamar, 257;
Lang, 371; Lansdowne, 340;
Leatherman, 316; Lee, 185; Leigh,
185; Lewis, 345; Linden (Hamp
ton), 356; Linden (Reed), 339;
Lochinvar, 462; Locust, 353; Long-
wood, 340; Longwood (Smith),
354; Loughborough, 351; Luck-
ett, 280, 389; Magnolia Vale,
247; Malmaison, 403; Mandamus,
343; Manship, 218; Marshall-
Bryan, 279; Mason-Tucker, 207;
Matagorda, 317; Matthews, 443;
McCaskill, 307; McCutcheon, 297;
McDonald, 444; McGehee s Gate,
381; McGowan-Crawford, 205;
McKnight, 443; McLaren, 187;
McLaurin, 307; McLemore, 231;
McNeese, 503; McNutt, 277; Mc-
Shann, 364; Mead, 334; Meek,
186; Melmont (Sans Souci), 248;
Ravenna, 250; Red Brick, 176;
Red Frame, 481; Reed, 156; Rice,
400; Richardson, 280; Richland
( Richardson ) , 357; Richland
(Cox), 332; Richmond, 253; Rob
inson, 317; Rogers, 423; Roland,
496; Rollin, 384; Rosalie, 244;
Rosedale, 188; Rosemont, 484;
Rowan, 395, 152; Rowell, 381;
Rucker, 389; Sabine, 481; Salis
bury, 358; Selma, 333; Shannon,
278; Shields, 332; Skinner, 482;
Skipwith, 259; Smith, 480; Spanish
(Biloxi), 177; Spanish (Natchez),
242; Spanish (Washington), 334;
Spencer, 460; Springfield, 331,
332; Stanton Hall, 246; Staton,
421; Stony Lonesome, 461; Street,
483; Strickland, 204; Summer
Trees, 440; Swiftwater, 353; Tabb,
463; Talbert, 483; Terry, 193;
Thomason, 460; Towers, The, 248;
Townes, 421; Travellers Rest, 455;
Tullos, 497; Valliant, 352; Waite-
Bowers, 208; Walker, 486; Wall,
358; Wallace Park, 381; Walters,
207; Walnut Grove, 358; Wal-
thall, 384; Watson, 204; Waverly,
366, 367; Weaver, 362; White,
478; Wigwam, 247; Wildwood,
353; Williams, 327; Willis-Cowan,
280; Wilson, James, 412; Wilson,
468; Windy Hill Manor, 338;
Winningham, 380; Woodstock,
342; Woodward, 187.
Hoffman, Malvina, 352
Hoggart, Col. James, 455
Homesteads, Tupelo, 364
Honey Island Swamp, 433
Hood, Thomas B., 362
Hospital Hill, 252
Hough Cave, 278
Houston, Sam, 70, 463
Howell, William Burr, 253
Hudson, A. P., 115, 138
Humphreys, Benjamin G., 73, 213, 325,
326
Melrose, 339; Mercer, 241; Met- Humphreys, George Wilson, 325
calf, 244; Miller, 440; Minor, 252; Hunting (see Recreation)
Monette, 335; Monmouth, 338;
Montgomery, 400; Monteigne, 337, Iberville (see D Iberville)
338; Moore, Austin, 440; Moore,
"Hatter," 435; Moore, John Tay
lor, 325; Mosby, 388; Moss, 311;
Mount Holly, 356; Mount Repose,
336; Murry, 458; Nason, 384;
Neilson, 259; Newsome, 384;
Nicholson, 480; Nugent-Shands,
220; Oaks, The, 437; Oakland,
338; Oldest house in Montgomery
County, 402; Ossian Hall, 297;
Outlaw, 400; Pace, 403; Parasott,
410; Parker, 427; Peachland, 336;
Pearson, 461; Percy, 352; Peyton,
391; Pirate s, 300; Plain Gables,
279; Polk, 207; Power, 217; Pres
byterian Manse, 335; Propinquity,
333; Ralston, 317; Ratliff, 392;
Iberville Cannon, 177, 291
Indian Charlie s Trace, 88
Indian Point, 350
Indians, 47-59, 400, 465
Customs (see Folkways)
Legends (see Folklore)
Mounds, 45, 48, 463, 464
Treaties, 59, 70, 71, 369
Tribes, 47, 49, 58, 59
Industrial Act, 79, 112
Industrial Plants
Back Bay Boatbuilding Factories, 178;
Buckeye Cotton Oil Company, 193;
Carnation Milk Plant, 266; Chicago
Mill and Lumber Company, 353;
Columbia Box Factory, 478; Co
lumbus Marble Plant, 187; Dorgan-
Industrial Plants (Continued)
McPhillips Vegetable Packing Plant,
478; Durant Silk Mill, 386; Fed
eral Compress and Warehouse, 193;
Filtrol Corporation, 392; Hamm
Lumber Mill, 232; Knox Glass
Company, 308; Luce Products Com
pany, 471, 492; Masonite Plant,
225; Mayhew Canning Plant, 225;
McComb Cotton Mill, 396; Merid
ian Garment Factory, 232; Merid
ian Grain and Elevator Company,
232; Milam Manufacturing Com
pany, 266; Okolona Cheese Fac
tory and Creamery, 374; Owens
Greenhouse and Nursery, 189; Pine
Felt Factory, 477; Pioneer Silk
Mill, 418; Planters Oil Mill Gin,
193; Poultry Packing Plant, 375;
Reed s Manufacturing Company,
266; Rowlands Tung Oil Mill,
432; Soule Steam Feed Works,
231; Southern Naval Stores Plant,
477; Staple Cooperative Association
Warehouse, 193; Stonewall Cotton
Mill, 425; Supreme Instruments
Corporation, 193; Southern United
Ice Company, 396; Sweet Potato
Starch Plant, 225; Swift and Com
pany Oil Mill, 232; Tie Plant Cre-
osoting Plant, 384; Tupelo Cotton
Mill, 265; Tupelo Garment Com
pany, 265; United States Gypsum,
353.
Industry, 106-111
Bentonite, 307
Boatbuilding, 169, 287
Dairying, 7, 110, 112, 203, 362, 373,
374, 398, 400, 401, 427, 436,
442, 459
Fishing, 168, 169, 198, 297, 349, 422
Garment factories, 112
Gravel, 442
Lumber:
Contemporary, 231, 435; development
of, 6, 196, 223, 247, 302, 423;
peak of, 196, 287, 295, 414, 430;
decline of, 224, 302, 414, 423,
469, 470.
Miscellaneous, 110, 111
Natural Gas, 214, 308
Naval Stores, 477, 478
Seafood Packing, 168, 175
Shipbuilding, 169
Turpentine, 432, 470
Ingraham, James, 333
Ingraham, Joseph, 139
Inn-By-the-Sea, 298
Institutions
East Mississippi Insane Hospital, 233;
Ellisville State School, 123, 428;
Mississippi Industrial and Training
School, 123, 477; Mississippi In
sane Hosrit.il, 155, 308; Missis
sippi Institute for Blind, 123, 219;
Mississippi School for Deaf, 123,
222; Protestant Orphanage, 248.
INDEX 539
Islands
Chandeleur, 304; Honey, 433; Palmyra,
325; Ship, 63, 170, 303.
Island Hill, 501
Isom, Sally, 258
Isom, Thomas, 255, 258
luka Battlefield, 501
luka, Chief, 442
luka Mineral Springs, 442
Jackson, Andrew, 69, 211, 216, 241, 301,
326, 332, 333, 334, 367, 369,
391, 479, 494, 502
Jackson City Hall, 214
Jackson Prairie Belt, 34
Jackson s Military Road, 86, 87, 299, 305,
368
Jackson, Rachel Donaldson Robards, 332
Jayne, Samuel, 395, 453
Jenkins, John C, 342
"Jim Crow" Law, 75
Johnston, Joseph, E., 213
Johnston, Oscar, 349, 350
Johnston, J. E., 224
Johnstone, George, 65
Johnstone, Helen, 390
Johnstone, John, 390
Jones Boarding House, 363
Jones, J. T., 196
Jones, Kate, 256
Jones, Reuben, 436
Jones, Thomas Catesby, 299
Joor, John, 358
Kearney, Belle, 413
Kemper Brothers, 67, 359
Ker, David, 342
Key Aviation Field, 425
Kilrain, Jake, 428
King, Benjamin, 395
King, Caleb, 342, 343
King, Joseph, 342
King, Paul, 450
Kingsbury, Cyrus, 375
King s Tavern, 249
Knight, Newt, 223, 428, 448, 450
Knox, Andrew, 356
Kosciusko Mound, 495
Kosciusko, Thaddeus, 494
Kossuth, Louis, 446
Koury, Leon, 135, 352
Ku Klux Klan (see History, Reconstruc
tion )
La Bauve, Felix, 380
La Bauve Fellowship, 380
L Adner, Jacques, 172
L Adnier, Christian, 296
Lakes
Beulah, 349, 359; Bolivar, 350; Boone-
ville, 363; Chautauqua, 393; Cor
morant, 315; Dawson. 410; Desert
er s End, 450; Eagle, 323; Farra-
gut, 290; Ferguson. 352; Hazle,
394; Jackson, 354; Lee, 354;
Moon, 317; Rosalba, 486; Pick
wick, 500; Tchula, 422; Walden,
540 INDEX
Lakes (Continued)
363; Washington, 354. (See Fish
ing. )
Lamar Life Building, 155
Lamar, L. Q. C, 74, 138, 257, 488
Langdon, Richard C., 130
La Salle, Robert Cavelier, Sieur de, 61
Lattimore, William, 211
Lauderdale Pottery, 370
Laurel Garden Club, 223
Lauren Rogers Library and Art Museum,
225, 226, 450
Law, John, 64, 65, 172, 299
Law Office of William Van Amburg Sul
livan, 258
Lawyers Row, 242
Leaf River Swamp, 471
Leake, Walter, 309
Lee, Stephen D., 72, 185
Le Fleur, Louis, 210, 404
Leflore, Greenwood, 190, 193, 369, 379,
403, 404
Legends (see folklore)
Lemos, Manuel Gayoso de, 249
Levee Street, 281
Lewis, John, 345
Lewis, Henry Clay, 137
Libraries
Attala County, 495; Carnegie, Clarks-
dale, 319; Carnegie, Houston, 463;
Fiske Memorial, 243; Lauren Rog
ers, 227; Greenville Public, 352,
353; Historical Reference, 282.
Lighthouses
Biloxi, 174, 178; Ship Island 304.
Lincecum, Gideon, 182, 183
Lind, Jenny, 159, 341, 482
Lindsay, Vachel, 296
Link, Theodore, 217
Lipton Cup Races, 168
Literature
early expressions, 136-140; since 1865,
140, 141.
Little, Peter, 244, 247
Little Red School, 386
Longstreet, Augustus Baldwin, 137, 255,
488
Lotterhos, A., 393
Lowrey, M. P., 128
Lowry, Robert, 307
Lynch, Charles, 453
Lynch, John R., 218
Lyons, William, 388
Maffit, John Newland, 344
Magnolia Hotel, 178
Manatchee, Chief, 435
Markers
Dancing Rabbit Treaty, 369; D Artagui-
ette, 461; De Soto Camp, 366; De
Soto s March, 266; Confederate,
281, 445; First Constitutional Con
vention, 334; Fort Rosalie (site),
244; Franklin Academy, 185; In
dian Burial Grounds, 375; Indian
Camp, 375; Iberville Landing, 178;
Natchez Trace, 331, 401, 486, 495,
502; Union, 281, 361.
Marschalk, Andrew, 129, 245, 345
Marschalk s Printing Office, 245
Martin, John D., 255
Martin, William T., 240, 337, 338
Martineau, Harriet, 139
Mashulatubbee s Home, site of, 368
Mason, Samuel, 84, 331
Masonic Halls, (Handsboro), 295; (Mead-
ville), 455
May hew Apiary, 375
Mayhew Mission, 375
Mays, James, 331
McCain, William D., 218
McCaleb, Jonathan, 356
McCasky, T. W., 137
McCarthy, Harry, 216
McClung, Alexander, 131, 138, 220
McComb, H. S., 396
McCrady, John, 135, 256
McGehee, Abner, 381
McGehee, Dan, 455
McGehee, Edward, 344, 345, 359
McGruder, Admiral, 412
Mclntosh, Sheriff, 492
McLaurin, Anslem, 307
McLemore, Richard, 228, 231
McNutt, Alexander, 220, 277
McRae, John J., Jr. (Governor), 372
McRae, John J., Sr., 372
Mead, Cowles, 70, 332; home, site of, 334
Memorial Hall, 243
Merchants Bank Building (Jackson), 155
Meriwether, Charles, 380
Merrill, Ayres P., 341
Merrill, Jennie, 341
Middlegate Japanese Gardens, 297
Millsaps, Ruben W., 219
Minor, Don Estevan, 252, 338
Miro, Estevan, 252
Mississippi Bubble, 64, 65
Mississippi Centennial Exposition, 199
Mississippi Highway Department, 91
Mississippi Penal Farm, 407
Mississippi State Fairgrounds, 220
Mitchel, Kelly, 232
Mitchell, Emil (Gypsy King), 232
Monette, John W., 139, 335
Money, Hernando De Soto, 403
Money, William F., 403
Monroe Mission, 462
Montgomery, Isaiah T., 320
Montgomery Point, 349
Montigny, Father, 113, 170
Montross Hotel, 173
Monuments
Alcorn, 317; Bodley, 278; Brice s Cross
Roads, 363; Confederate, 216, 281,
482; Colonel Falkner, 458; Davis,
Jefferson, 216; Gibson, 280; Hardy,
199; Percy, LeRoy, 352; Poindex-
ter, George, 218; Rogers, Col. Wil
liam, 363; Tilghman, 312; Union,
281.
Moore, "Hatter," 435
Moore, John Taylor, 325
Mound Bayou Founders Day, 320
INDEX 54I
Mounds, Indian Springs, 442; City, Laurel, 227;
Blanchard, 349; Deer Creek, 322; De Livingston, 222; Municipal, Oko-
Be Vois, 316; Foster s, 335; lona, 374; Naval Reserve, 178;
Leatherman, 316; Mattson, 407; Vicksburg National Military, 281.
Mound Place, 46; Nanih Waiya, Passes, Pass Christian, 296; Menteur, 434
464; Pocahontas, 413; Premiss,
410; Selscrtown, 45, 332; Winter-
viilc, 351.
Municipal Clubhouse and Yacht Club, 199
Murdock, John, 330
Murrell, James, 84, 331
Museums
Brown Collection, 46; Clark Indian Col
lection, 46, 319; Delta State Teach-
ers College, Natural History, 320;
Department of Archives and His
tory, 218; Starling Collection
(Greenville), 352; Hall of Fame,
218; Historical Museum (Vicks
burg), 282; Irwin Russell Me
morial, 327; Lauren Rogers, Art,
225, 450; Millsaps College, 47;
Municipal Art (Jackson), 219.
Music, 157-161 (see also Folkways, music)
Nanih Waiya, 464
Natchez District, 5, 66, 94, 145, 324, 325
Natchez Garden Club, 245
Natchez Trace, 84, 85 (see also Markers )
Natchez-under-the-Hill, 244
Natural gas, Rankin County field, 308
Neibuhr, Reinhold, 348
Negro
Contemporary, 166, 167, 182, 190, 195,
196, 200, 201, 209, 221, 224, 230,
237, 255, 262, 268, 269, 320,
359, 421. (See Art. Education,
Folklore, Religion, Folkways, His
tory, Customs, Reconstruction)
Neilson, William, 366
Neshoba County Fairgrounds, 468
Newspapers
History of, 128-133, 212; early, 212,
239, 271
Nolan, Philip, 360
Northeast Mississippi Singing Convention,
435
Oak Hill Farm, 453
Oakland College (site), 330
Oak Tree Inn (site), 391
Office of Woodville Republican, 345
Ogden, Amos, 342
Old Opera House (Oxford), 258
Old Opera House (Liberty), 482
Olmstead, Frederick L., 139
Osmun, Benijah, 338
Otey, Bishop, 356
Pakcnham, Sir Edward, 303
Parish House of San Salvador, 241
Parks
Patrons Union Camp Ground, 306
Patton, James, 2 1 1
Paulding Jail, 426
Payne, A. M., 384
Pecans (see Agriculture)
Pemberton, John Clifford, 272, 312
Pcricr, Gov., 65
Percy, LeRoy, 321, 352
Percy, William Alexander, 352
Percy, William Alexander, II, 142, 352
Petrified Forest, 413
Peyton, John R., 309, 311
Piazza, N., 393
Pickwick Dam, 500
Picnics (see Folkways)
Piernas, Don Pedro, 250
Piney Woods, 6, 34, 223, 414, 415, 423,
469, 470
Piney Woods Singers, 414
Pinson, Joel, 461, 463
Pirate Pitcher, 296
Pitcher s Point, 296
Pitchlyn, John, 336, 367, 369
Pitchlyn, Peter Perkins, 367
Pitts, S. L., 448
Pitts Cave, 448
Plantations
Archcrleader, 422; Blanchard, 349;
Bowling Green, 345; Calverton,
332; Cedar Grove, 412; Churchill
Downs, 413; Coldspring, 359;
Columbian Springs, 359; Delta
Cooperative Farm, 348; Delta
Planters Company, 349; Delta and
Pine Land Company, 103, 350;
Dunleith, 406; Faisonia, 409; Gay-
oso Farms, 380; Glenwild, 384;
Greengrove, 348; Gritman-Barks-
dale, 408; Harvey, 389; Hopedale,
357; Moss, 450; Lakeside, 357;
Lone Pine, 353; Nita Yuma, 322-
Panther Burn, 321; Rainey Estate,
459; Ringolsky, 420; Rosemont,
484; Selma, 333; Sherard, 347;
Swan Farm, 422.
Plummer, Franklin, 383, 453
Poindexter, George, 70, 218, 248, 345
346
Poindexter, Weenonah, 160
Poitevent, Eliza Jane ("Pearl Rivers"),
432
Poitevent, John, 432
Political Rally (see Folkways)
Polk, Leonidas, 207, 232, 279, 362
Polk, Thomas, 207
Pollock, Oliver, 359
State: Clarkco, 371; Holmes County,
386; Legion, 464; LeRoy Percy, Pontotoc Ridge, 34 , 436, 484
321; Percy Qum, 396, 481; Roose- Pope, John 139
velt, 307; Tishomingo, 502; Tom-
bigbee, 435.
Other: Battlefield, 221; Confederate,
363; Duncan, 252; Edgewater,
294; Highland, 233; luka Mineral
Postlewaite, Ann Dunbar, 248
Powe, William, 372
Prcntiss, Seargent S., 138, 340, 391, 410,
453
Price, Madeleine, 338
542 INDEX
Purnell Springs, 308
Purvis, Will, 429
Pushmataha, 69, 138, 305
Quarantine Station (Ship Island), 196,
304
Quin, Percy E., 481
Quitman, John, A., 338
Radio Stations
WAML (Laurel), 222; WCOC (Merid
ian), 227; WGAM (Grenada),
383; WGCM (Gulfport), 194;
WJDX (Jackson), 208; WTJS
(Jackson), 208.
Ragsdale, L. A., 228
Rainey, Paul, 459
Ralston, Blanche, 317, 319
Rameau, Pierre, 432
Randolph, George, 382
Randolph, William, 201
Rankin, John R., 363
Reber, Thomas, 240
Recreation
Boating: 168, 197, 198, 199, 304, 317,
441
Fishing:
Freshwater, XXII, 317, 321, 323,
349, 405, 410, 421, 422, 435,
486.
Salt water, 198, 287
Golf: 292, 294, 298, 309, 378, 395,
449
Hunting: XXII, 290, 298, 354, 369,
409, 418, 433, 438, 439
Resorts:
Allison s Wells, 388; Brown s Wells,
395; Castalian Springs, 386; Coop
er s Wells, 391; Eagle Lake, 323;
Fairley s Camp, 290; Greenwood
Springs, 484, 485; Gulf Hills, 292;
Lakeview, 315; Maywood Recrea
tional Center, 441; Nelson s Camp,
290; Stafford Springs, 426, 427.
Swimming: 168, 177, 198, 199, 303,
317, 374, 435, 441
Reed, Thomas, 339
Reforestation Lookout Tower, 497
Religion, 112-118
Early Catholic missions, 112, 113; First
Protestant church, 114; beginnings
of Protestantism, 113, 114; spread
of Protestantism, 114-116; second
Mississippi Methodist conference,
479; Diocese of Natchez, 115; first
Negro churches, 116; present day
aspects, 117; first Jewish synagogue,
117; church schools (see Educa
tion).
Resorts (see Recreation)
Resources, 39, 40
Revival Meetings (see Folkways)
Rich, Charlie, 429
Richard, Father, 113
Richardson, Edmund, 357
Ring in Oak, 176
Rivers
Amite, 482; Big Black, 35, 84; Big
Flower, 35; Bogue Chitto, 35;
Chickasawhay, 35, 425, 471, 491;
Coldwater, 35, 489; Escatawpa, 35;
Homochitto, 35, 343; Leaf, 35,
471; Little Flower, 35; Luxapalia,
182; Mississippi, 35, 79, 82, 247,
275, 276; Noxubee, 368; Pasca-
goula, 35, 287/471; Pearl, 35, 79,
211, 302, 452; Singing, 287;
Skuna, 35; Strong, 35; Tallahat-
chie, 34, 381, 489; Tennessee, 35;
Tombigbee, 35, 80, 84, 182, 366;
Yazoo, 35, 64, 190, 275, 411;
Yalobusha, 35; Yocona, 35; Yoka-
hockana, 35.
Rivers, Pearl (see Poitevent, Eliza Jane)
Roach, Spirus, 182
Rogers, William P., 362
Rosalba Mill, 486
Rosecrans, William S., 362, 443, 501
Rosenwald, Julius, 124
Rosenwald Fund, 124
Rowland, Dunbar, 218
Rowlands, Lament, 432
Runnels, Harmon, 453
Runnels, Hiram, 383, 453
Rushton, B. J., 448
Rushton Pottery Kiln (site), 448
Ruskin Oak, 291
Russell, D. M., 317
Russell, Irwin, 140, 141, 325, 326, 327
Rust, John, 348
Rylee, Robert, 142
Sacred Harp Singings (see Folkways)
Sage, Jerome, 161
Saint Augustine Seminary, 300
St. Cosme, Father, 113
Sales Tax, 77
Sanctuary, 141
San Germaine, Juan, 253
Sardis Dam and Reservoir, 382
Sargent, Winthrop, 128, 340
Saucier, Phillip, 420
Sauvolle, M. de la Villantry, 170
Schools
Creole :
Live Oak Pond, 290
Indian:
Bogue Homa, 427; Conehatta Day,
306; Pearl River, 496; Tucker,
467, 468.
Negro:
Doddsville Experimental, 408; Gulf-
side, 300; Oak Park Vocational,
224; Piney Woods High, 125, 414;
Sacred Heart Academy, 352.
White:
Castle Heights Academy, 459; Crystal
Springs Consolidated, 394; Gulf
Coast Military Academy, 295; Jef
ferson College, 118, 333, 334;
Little Red School, 386; Saint Rose
of Lima Academy, 352; Saint
Joseph s Academy, 249; St. Mary
of the Pines, 397; St. Stanislaus,
300; Tippah Union, 459.
Scott, Abram, 346
INDEX
543
Scott, Bud, 161
Scott, Charles, 349
Scottish Rite Cathedral, 231
Seashore Camp Grounds, 179
Secession Convention, 71, 216
Shannon, Marmaduke, 278
Sharkey, William L., 73, 138
Shearwater Pottery, 292
Sherman, William Tecumseh, 72, 213,
230, 307, 388, 496
Shegog, Robert, 256
Shipbuilding (see Industry)
Ship Island Lighthouse, 304
Shreve, Henry, 81
Shrine of Our Lady of the Woods, 300
Shultz, Christian, 139
Siege of Vicksburg (see History)
Slave Barrack (site), 337
Slave Block (site), 337
Small Craft Harbor, 199
Smith, A. J., 256, 323
Smith, Joe, 263
Smith, John, 385
Smith-Hughes Act, 122
Solitude (ruins), 489
So Red The Rose, 141, 248, 259
Southern Planter (see Architecture)
Spanish Fort, 288, 289
Sports (see Recreation)
Springs (see Recreation)
Stanton, Elizabeth Brandon (writer), 338
Stanton, Frederick, 246, 342
Stapps, Emily, 419
Stapps, Marie, 419
Star of West wreck, 422
State Tuberculosis Hospital, 416
State Penal Farm, 407, 408
Steel, John, 247
Stevans, Daisy McLaurin, 497
Stewart, Thomas C., 462
Still, William Grant, 160
Stone, Alfred H., 77
Stone, John M., 74, 444
Stovall, Ralph, 480
Street, James, 142, 497, 499
Stuart, Gilbert, 218
Sturgis, James, 393
Sullivan, John L., 295, 428
Sullivan, William Van Amburg, 258, 259
Sullivan Brothers. 498
Sullivan-Ryan fight, 295; Sullivan-Kilrain
fight, 428
Sullivan s Hollow. 498
Sully, Thomas, 340
Surget, Frank, 341
Swanton, John, 49
Swayze, Richard, 343
Swayze, Samuel, 66, 342
Sylvester Treasure, 475
Tallaha Springs, 421
Tecumseh, 305, 368, 494
Tennessee Hills, 6, 361, 397, 398, 442,
500
Tennessee Valley Authority, 77, 264, 500
Tenant System, 99, 101, 103, 104, 105
Terry, Mrs. Cora, 193
Thaylor. Mrs. Caroline V., 335
Theobald, Harriet B., 352
Thompson, C. C., 262
Thompson, Jacob, 256; home, site of, 256
Three Chopped Way, 85
Threefoot Building, 155, 228
Thurmond, R. J., 458
Tichenor, G. H., 482
Tilghman, Lloyd, 312
Tishomingo, Chief, 442
Tocowa Springs, 382
Tolstoy, Leo, II, 199
Toby Tubby, 488
Torlonia, Prince Alex, 249
Tower Building, 155
Towns
Extinct:
Augusta, Old, 476; Belmont, 382;
Biloxi, Old, 291; Blythe s Cross
ing, 442; Brookhaven, Old 395;
Bruinsburg Landing, 329; China
Grove, 480; Commerce, 316; Cot
ton Gin Port, 485; Danville, 363;
East Port, 442; Gallatin, 394;
Greenville, Old, 331; Grand Gulf,
326; Gum Springs, 496; Hamilton,
Old, 366; Hopoca, 495; Houlka,
Old, 462; Leota Landing, 354;
Lizelia, 378; Middleton, Old 402;
Mineral Wells, 441; Mount Car-
mel, 451; Panola, 382; Point Le-
flore, 190; Prentiss, 350; Plymouth,
367; Princeton, 354; Richland,
386; Richmond, 435; Rodney, 330;
Shongalo, 386; Warrenton, 325;
Williamsburg, 451; Winchester.
Old, 372.
Present Day:
Abbeville, 488; Aberdeen, 364-366;
Ackerman, 463; Agricola, 493;
Alligator, 319; Amory, 485; An-
guilla, 322; Arcola, 320; Artesia,
375; Baldwyn, 363; Basic, 425;
Batesville, 382; Bay Springs, 469,
470; Bay St. Louis. 64, 298, 299,
300; Beaumont, 476; Beauregard,
395; Belden, 436; Bellefontaine,
474; Belmont, 503; Belzoni, 410;
Benoit, 350; Berclair, 405; Beulah.
349; Big Creek, 474; Biloxi, 62,
63, 165-179; Bissell, 486; Blue
Mountain, 458; Blue Springs, 437;
Bobo, 319; Bolton, 312; Boone-
ville, 363; Brandon, 307; Brook-
haven, 453, 454; Brooklyn, 418;
Brookville, 375; Bruce, 473; Buca-
tunna. 372, 373; Bude, 455; Burn-
side, 464; Byhalia, 440; Calhoun
City, 473, 474; Canaan, 446; Can
ton, 388, 389; Carthage, 495, 496;
Centreville, 483; Chalybeate, 446;
Chunky, 305; Clarksdale, 318,
319; Clay. 434; Cleveland, 320;
Clinton, 309-311; Coahoma, 317;
Cohay, 497; Collins, 417; Colum
bia, 80, 477; Columbus, 179-189;
Como, 381; Conehatta, 306; Cor
inth. 361-363; Cottondale, 408;
Cotton Plant. 459; Courtland. 382;
544 INDEX
Towns, Present Day (Continued)
Crystal Springs, 393; Daleville,
378; Decatur, 469; Deeson, 349;
De Kalb, 378; Dennis, 502; D Lo,
416; Doddsville, 409; Dorsey, 435;
Drew, 408; Duck Hill, 385; Dun
can, 319; Dundee, 316; Durant,
386; East Tupelo, 436; Ecru, 459;
Eddiceton, 455; Edwards, 312;
Eggville, 435; Egypt, 374; Electric
Mills, 370; Elkland, 354; Elliott,
385; Ellisville, 427, 428; Enter
prise, 425; Estabutchie, 428; Estill,
321; Eupora, 401; Falkner, 456;
Fayette, 331; Flora, 413; Fontaine-
bleau, 290; Forest, 306; Fort
Adams, 359, 360; Foxworth, 479;
Friar Point, 317; Fruitland Park,
419; Fulton, 434; Gautier, 290;
Glen Allan, 356; Gloster, 483;
Goodman, 386; Greenville, 351-
353; Greenwood, 189-193; Green
wood Springs, 484; Grenada, 383;
Gulfport, 194-199; Gunnison, 349;
Guntown, 363; Handsboro, 295;
Harleston, 493; Harriston, 331;
Harperville, 496; Hattiesburg, 417;
Hazlehurst, 394; Hebron, 450;
Hernando, 380; Hickory, 305;
Hickory Flat, 438; Hillhouse, 348;
Hillsboro, 496; Hollandale, 321;
Holly Springs, 200-208; Holmes-
ville, 480; Hot Coffee, 499, 500;
Houston, 463; Hushpuckena, 319;
Indianola, 409; Ingomar, 459; In
verness, 409; Isola, 410; Itta Bena,
405; luka, 442-445; Jackson, 208-
222; Jonestown, 317; Kewanee,
305; Kilmichael, 401; Kiln, 298;
Kingston, 343; Kipling, 378; Ko-
komo, 480; Kosciusko, 494, 495;
Kossuth, 445; Kreole, 286; Lake,
306; Lake Cormorant, 315; Lake-
view, 315; Langsdale, 371; Lauder-
dale, 370; Laurel, 222-227; Leakes-
ville, 492; Leland, 320-321; Lex
ington, 422; Liberty, 481; Lobdell,
350; Logtown, 302; Long Beach,
296; Lorman, 331; Louin, 469;
Louisville, 464; Lucedale, 492;
Lula, 317; Lumberton, 430; Ly-
man, 420; Maben, 463; Macon,
368; Madison, 389; Magee, 416;
Magnolia, 396; Mantachie, 435;
Marion, 370; Marks, 490; Mashu-
laville, 368, 369; Matherville, 371;
Mathiston, 401; Mattson, 407;
Mayersville, 357; Mayhew, 375;
McComb, 396; McHenry, 419; Mc-
Lain, 475; Meadville, 455; Men-
denhall, 416; Meridian, 227-232;
Merigold, 320; Midnight, 411;
Minter City, 421; Mississippi City,
295; Mize, 498; Monticello, 452;
Montrose, 469; Mooreville, 435;
Moorhead, 405; Morton, 307; Moss
Point, 286; Mound Bayou, 320;
Mt. Olive, 417; Mt. Pleasant, 447;
Myrtle, 438; Natchez, 233-253;
Nettleton, 364; New Albany, 437;
New Augusta, 476; Newton, 306;
Nitta Yuma, 322; Norfield, 396;
North Carrollton, 403; Noxapater,
464; Ocean Springs, 291; Okolona,
374; Old Carrollton, 403; Olive
Branch, 441; Osyka, 397; Oxford,
254-261; Pachuta, 426; Parchman,
407; Pascagoula, 286-289; Pass
Christian, 296-298; Paulding, 426;
Pearlington, 302; Pelahatchie, 307;
Percy, 321; Perkinston, 419; Perth
shire, 349; Philadelphia, 464-467;
Piave, 492; Picayune, 432; Pickens,
388; Pinckneyville, 359; Pittsboro,
473; Plantersville, 486; Pocahontas,
413; Pontotoc, 460; Poplarville,
430; Port Gibson, 327, 328; Potts
Camp, 438; Prentiss, 451, 452;
Purvis, 429; Quentin, 455; Quit-
man, 371; Raleigh, 497; Randolph,
472; Raymond, 391; Red Banks,
440; Renalara, 348; Richton, 470;
Ripley, 456; Robinsonville, 316;
Rolling Fork, 322; Rome, 407;
Rosedale, 349; Ruleville, 408;
Sandersville, 427; Sanatorium, 416;
Santa Rosa, 433; Sardis, 381, 382;
Sarepta, 472; Satartia, 412; Saucier,
420; Scooba, 370; Scott, 350; Sen-
atobia, 380; Shannon, 364; Shaw,
320; Shelby, 319; Shellmound,
422; Sherman, 436; Shubuta, 371;
Shuqualak, 369; Silver City, 410,
411; Silver Creek, 452; Slate
Springs, 474; Slayden, 446; Smith-
ville, 504, 505; Soso, 450; Spring-
ville, 472; Stafford Springs, 426;
Star, 414; Starkville, 398; Stone-
ville, 321; Stonewall, 425; Summit,
396; Sumner, 421; Sunflower, 409;
Swan Lake, 421; Taylorsville, 497;
Tchula, 422; Terry, 392; Tie Plant,
384; Tilden, 503; Tipple, 442;
Tishomingo, 502; Toccopola, 487;
Toomsuba, 305; Tucker, 467; Tun
ica, 316; Tupelo, 261-266; Tut-
wiler, 407; Tylertown, 480; Union,
469; Utica, 392; Vaiden, 385;
Vancleave, 290; Verona, 364;
Vicksburg, 267-282; Wallerville,
437; Walls, 315; Walnut, 446;
Walnut Grover, 496; Walthall,
474; Washington, 333; Water Val
ley, 488; Waynesboro, 371; Wave-
land, 300; Webb, 421; Wesson,
395; West, 386; West Point, 374;
Whitney, 408; Whynot, 305; Wig
gins, 419; Williamsville, 495;
Winborn, 438; Winchester, 372;
Winona, 402; Winterville, 351;
Woodville, 344; Wyandotte, 320;
Yazoo City, 412; Yokena, 325.
Transportation, 79-92
Air, 92; bus, 92; early trails, 84-88;
highway, 91; railroads (develop
ment of), 88-91, 196, 212, 213,
INDEX
545
Transportation (Continued)
228-230; water, 79-92, 238, 239,
240, 269-271, 276, 277, 281.
(See also Natchez Trace)
Treaties (see Indians)
Trucking Belt, 6, 391
Trucking (see Agriculture)
Tucker, Gov., 220
Tupelo Fish Hatchery, 265
Tupelo Homesteads, 364
Tupelo Tornado, 264
Turpentine (see Industry)
Twain, Mark, 327
Tyler, William G., 480
United States Agricultural Experiment Sta
tion, 432
United States Coast Guard Air Base, 175
United States Dry Docks and Repair Yards,
289
United States Branch Horticultural Experi
ment Station, 370
United States Soil Conservation Project
Branch Station, 203, 378, 381
United States Veterans Facility, 178
United States Veterans Facility No. 74,
199
United States Waterways Experiment Sta
tion, 277, 313
Utica Singers, 392
Van Dorn, Earl, 201, 207, 328, 362
Van Dorn, Peter, 211
Vardaman, James K., 75, 138, 402
Ventress, James A., 358
Vick, Henry Crew. 390
Vick, Newitt, 269
Vicksburg National Military Park (see
Parks)
Vidal, Don Jose, 248
Wagner, Kinnie, 492
Wailes, B. L. C, 334
Wall, Evans, 358
Walker, Robert T., 71, 131, 138
Walthall, Edward Gary, 74, 204, 384
Ward, Junius, 355
War between the States, 71-73. (See also
Battles and Agriculture)
Warfield Landing, 406
Watermelon Festival (Water Valley), 488
Water Mill, 470
Watson, Anna Robinson, 205
Watson, J. W. C., 205
Weeks, Levi, 243
Wesley House, 176
Wesson, J. M., 395
West, Benjamin, 218
White, Judge Godentia, 208
White, Hugh L., 79, 477, 478
White, T. W., 380
White Harbor, 296
White Horse Tavern (site), 340
Whitaker Negroes, 359
Whitfield, James, 186
Wilkinson, James, 67, 84, 139, 332, 360
Williams, John, 190
Williams, John Sharp, 138, 204, 412
Williams, Robert, 248
Willing, James, 66
Wilson, Alexander, 139
Wilson, James, 468
Wilson, Woodrow, 199, 297
William s Store, 468
Winans, William, 483
Windsor Ruins, 329
Woodward, Ellen Sullivan, 259
Yazoo Canal, 324
Yellin, Samuel. 225
Yellow Fever Epidemic, 203, 230, 383
Young, George, 366
Young, Stark, 3, 141, 248, 259, 381
Zoo (Jackson). 222
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