USA > Mississippi > Lowndes County > Columbus > A history of Columbus, Mississippi, during the 19th century > Part 6
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Maj. Jack (John Pytchlyn, Sr.), died at his home near Columbus in the fall of 1835. He was buried, temporarily, in a field directly in front of the Waverly mansion. His grave was enclosed for several years by a good brick wall. His widow paid one or two annual visits to keep the grave in good repair. After one of the visits the grave had the appearance of having been opened. The neighbors supposed that Mrs. Pytchlyn had taken up the remains and carried them with her to the Nation, especially as she returned no more. A large oak tree immediately over the grave and a few scattered brick mark the spot where he was buried.
The funeral was conducted after the manner of the Choc- taws and all his war equipments were deposited with the coffin. His old war horse was also brought to be killed and buried in the grave, but Judge Samuel Gholson, of Aberdeen, who was present, interposed and assured the widow that a horse suiting his rank would be furnished him by the Great Spirit in the Happy Hunting Ground. She consented to spare his horse. Daniel W. Ragsdale was also present at the funeral.
The temporary interment accounts for the fact of a Choc- taw chief's burial in the Chickasaw territory.
A copy of The Southern Argus, a paper published in Col- umbus, Miss., in 1836, contained a notice concerning the sale of certain lands in Lowndes county, dated January 14, 1836, and signed by Samuel Garland, executor of John Pytch- lyn, Sr.
Samuel Garland was probably the son-in-law of John Pytchlyn, and son of J. Garland, a noted Choctaw mentioned in the Dancing Rabbit Treaty.
After the death of John Pytchlyn, Sr., all the Pytchlyn family moved west to the Choctaw reservation in the Indian Territory.
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COL. GEORGE H. YOUNG. (1799-1880.)
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EARLY SETTLERS.
The enlargement of Lowndes county, in 1833, by the addition of that section of the country west of the Tombigbee River, included a portion of land north of the Tibbee creek, about 40,000 acres which belonged to the Chickasaw nation. These lands came into market in 1835, and were soon regarded extremely fertile and specially adapted to the growth of cotton, the rock underlying the soil being at a lower depth, thus allowing the tap root more easily to descend and obtain moisture during the summer months in which matured its crop of fruit.
Lands with a shallow soil were better adapted to the growth of corn which was supported almost entirely by surface roots and could be made before the summer drouths appeared.
These Chickasaw lands attracted the attention of settlers from the older states, among whom was Col. George H. Young, from Georgia, who came out to examine and select lands for his friends at home. Col. Young soon became acquainted with their location and merit, and attended the land sales at Pontotoc in 1835. Gen. Humphries represented the gov- ernment at these sales and Col. Young was made his secretary. After the sales, he assisted several of the land speculators in disposing of their purchases and bought for himself five sections of prarie land from Jones Colbert, a white settler among the Chickasaws of considerable note. He lived in the prairies a short distance from West Point. The prairie was called Colbert prairie after him, as was also the ferry over the Tombigbee river at the county line. Col. Young first settled on his prarie farm, but afterwards moved to the bluff on the Tombigbee River then known as Mullen's bluff.
George Hampton Young was born in Oglethorpe county, Geor- gia, December, 1799. He studied at the University-then Franklin College-of Georgia, subsequently going to Columbia College, New York, where he received his degree in 1820. He chose law for a pro- fession and practiced it till he came to Mississippi, where his large planting interest fully occupied him.
He served several terms in the legislatures of Georgia and Missis- sippi. His genial manners and unstinted hospitality drew a constant stream of visitors to "Waverly,"his country home, where many of the most distinguished men of the state and nation were entertained .- EDITOR.
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He bought out Mullen and Beal and Bigbee, thus making it a large estate and a permanent home for himself and family. He called the place "Waverly" and continued his improve- ments until he had made it one of the most beautiful and noted country residences in northeast Mississippi. His home mansion was a very large two-story, many roomed house, equal to the entertainment of his sons and daughters and their families, and his numerous friends. He planted orchards, had kennels of hunting dogs, fishing boats and erected bath houses at the artesian well near the house. He built ware- houses, erected a store and a large saw and grist mill, and operated the ferry; thus making the place assume the ap- pearance of a hansdome village. Col. Young was a prominent Lowndes county politician and was well acquainted with men of state and national reputation. He was a prosperous planter and continued adding to his lands until his estate was equal to any in the country. After his death his estate passed into the hands of his family, several of whom live in Columbus. He had six sons, Watt, Valley, Beverly, Thomas, Erskine, James, and William Lowndes. Maj. Valley and W. L. still survive and live on their paternal estates. His daught- ers, Mrs. Sue Chambers, Mrs. Georgia Young, and Mrs. J. O. Banks live in Columbus at this time and still own large farms out of the paternal heredity. Mrs. Reuben O. Reynolds lives in Aberdeen. The Waverly homestead is the property of Mr. W. L. Young.
The writer easily recalls the names of many of the early settlers on the West Point road, and as many of their farms became the property of Columbus citizens they deserve men- tion at this place: Fortson settlement, now owned by Dr. William Burt, of Columbus; G. H. Lee; Gov. Brown and Thos. Martin, of Tennessee, afterwards bought by Col. Young; D. W. Wright, afterwards owned by Richard Sykes and his sons, Col. E. T. Sykes and Dr. Richard Sykes, of Columbus; Winston, of Mobile, bought by Dr. R. F. Matthews, now owned by his daughter, Mrs. Sullie Bradford; Gen. Griffin, bought by C. R. Crusoe, Esq .; Sethe Poole, afterwards owned by Capt. W. Harris; Lloyd, now owned by Prof. Barrow; Westbrook, Crump and others.
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This section of the county in 1871 was set off by legis- lative enactment to Colfax, now Clay county, notwithstanding the vigorous protest of the citizens of Lowndes. The matter occupied the attention of two sessions of the legislature, and was at last concluded by providing that Colfax county should pay her share of the Lowndes county debt which had become very large under "carpet bag" rule. Lowndes county lost by this transaction between 40,000 or 50,000 acres of her most fertile and valuable lands.
PLYMOUTH.
Four miles below the Waverly bluff was another bluff which, on account of its ancient traditional importance, was called by its earliest settlers, Old Plymouth, and was claimed by some of them to have been the camping ground of DeSoto in his passage through Mississippi. Many scraps of old ar- mor and pieces of pottery and war implements of Spanish manufacture were found there and they claim also that it was a stronghold of defense against the Indians, and a deposit for munitions of war and provisions for the use of the army operating in this section of the country. Some claim that it was fortified by Bienville and that he made it his place of deposit in his operations against the Chickasaws and not Cotton Gin Port, as it is stated in the histories of the State. Remains of the fortifications existed within the knowledge of our old settlers, especially that of a large fort inside of the fortifications, built of large cedar logs, two stories in height and perforated with port holes above and below for the use of fire arms by the defendants within. This cedar fort was taken down by the Canfields who now own Old Plymouth, and was used to build other houses on the plantation, which still are in a good state of preservation. Some believe the fort was built by General Jackson in his operations against the Creeks and was the base of supplies. Until history makes a more satisfactory explanation of the old Spanish relics, stockade fortifications, and cedar forts, our Lowndes county traditions are as credible as any account yet given.
After the settlement of the Choctaw lands began, Old Plymouth became a site of considerable importance on ac- count of its facilities for crossing the river at a shallow ford
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near by, and as a place for the storage and shipmentof cotton. It was also considered a beautiful spot with its prodigious growth of large cedars for the location of the homes of the families of the neighboring settlers. James Prowell, Sr., Orlando Canfield, Sr., John Morgan, Sr., and John Cox, Sr., built residences there.
The Irbys, Billingtons, and Mullens erected warehouses and stores. Richard Evans, Esq., and his brother Dr. Evans, and Mr. L. M. Hatch also settled there, and in 1836 the town was incorporated and laid off into squares and streets and was the prospective rival of West Point just below, and Colum- bus across the river. It became a trading point of importance; a great number of bales of cotton were shipped from there but the place proved so unhealthy and the death rate so great that it was abandoned. The planters moved to their plan- tations and the merchants and lawyers to Columbus.
Old Plymouth is now a field cultivated by Mr. Orlando Canfield and despite the superstitions of the negroes, and the application of the New England query, " Who ate Roger Williams?" grows abundant crops of corn and po- tatoes.
The Plymouth prairie was settled by the senior Canfield, Prowell, Morgan, Hayden, Cox, Swearingen and Speed, and is still the home of their descendants, families of brave men and women who are making a noble fight to hold their estates against all the odds of negro tenants and scarcity of white associates, schools, and churches.
They are still trying the problem of negro labor and the agricultural world is looking to these courageous, self-denying planters for the result of their costly experiments and their industrious effort to repeat the success of their fathers and grand-fathers, citizens of whom old Lowndes has reason to be justly proud.
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CHAPTER X. EARLY SETTLERS IN LOWNDES COUNTY WEST OF THE TOMBIGBEE CONTINUED.
Across the long bridge over Catalpa creek lies what is known as the Cannon fields, and now cultivated by a company of German farmers who prefer good, sandy soil and plenty of wood and water to prairie lands with a scarcity of both.
This large body of land was opened and settled by Hon. Rasha Cannon and his sons, Col. Wm. R. Cannon and Thos. E. Cannon, who came from South Carolina in 1833 or 1834 and made their first home in Mississippi in this section of Lowndes county. After the death of Mr. Rasha Cannon, the homestead became the property of his younger sons, Newton and Robert Lowndes Cannon.
Col. William R. Cannon settled first near Tibbee station. After the death of his first wife he returned to South Carolina and married Miss Eliza Jane Cannon, a wealthy heiress and highly educated lady of Darlington district. They brought with them her large patrimony of negro slaves, and Mrs. Cannon soon made her Choctaw home a pattern of elegance and comfort. Flowers, gardens, and home appointments soon exhibited the taste and refinement of her South Carolina lineage.
After a few years, Col. Cannon bought a large tract of land in the center of the Mayhew prairie and built for his family a spacious home colonnaded on three sides, which commanded a view of all the neighboring farms. This home was large enough for all his family and his friends, and in it he dispensed a princely hospitality. He soon became a leading politician in Oktibbeha county, his home being just within its limits, and served that county in the legislature and senate of which body he became president. He was also a prominent candidate for governor, being defeated for the nomination by only a few votes. He moved to Columbus in 1852, built the residence now occupied by Mrs. E. J. Meek and died there in 1858.
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After a number of years Mrs. Cannon married the Hon. A. B. Meek, of Mobile, Ala. She is still a resident of Columbus and though infirm in body, in the eighty-second year of her age, enjoys a vigorous intellect and can look back with pleas- ure on a well spent life, and forward to a longer and more glorious life in Heaven.
The Hon. Jesse Speight, a distinguished Lowndes county politician, who served the county in the State Senate and Mississippi in the United States Senate, lived in the Mayhew prairie. His son-in-law, Mr. Thos. E. Cannon, lived on an adjoining farm. Mr. Thos. E. Cannon moved to Columbus and became a successful merchant of the firm of Simpson, Cannon and Company. After the war, he moved to Verona, Miss., and died in the eighty-sixth year of his age. On the south side of the Starkville road were Mrs. Sarah Tabb, Mrs. Amanda Cannon, Mrs. Jane Morrow, and Mrs. Maria Wither- spoon, all of whom, after the death of their husbands, moved to Columbus. Mrs. Witherspoon afterwards married Mr. E. B. Mason, and can at this time, with Mrs. Sarah Tabb, give their octogenarian testimony to the healthfulness of the city, the home of their adoption.
WEST PORT
One mile above Columbus, on the west bank of the Tom- bigbee River, just as soon as the Choctaw lands began to produce crops of cotton, there sprang up a village called by its settlers West Port, and built to accommodate the planters of western Lowndes and the adjacent counties in the shipment of their cotton and reception of their plantation supplies to and from Mobile, Ala. They thus avoided the payment of the ferriage across the river, and had good camping grounds for their wagons and teams. M. M. Carrington, relative of Col. John W. Burn, sheriff of Lowndes county in 1835, built its first store and warehouse. He was followed by Messrs Hoskins, Brownrigg, Hale and Murdock, Dick Jones, Foster, Alexander, and others. A town was regularly laid off; good residences, fine hotel, stores with large stocks of goods, and immense cotton sheds were erected with all the appointments of a prospective town. The shipment of cotton reached 30,000 or 40,000 bales annually; but in 1840 a fine bridge was
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built across the Tombigbee free to all Lowndes county citizens, which soon divided the storage of cotton and brought thous- ands of bales to the warehouses of Columbus.
The great high water in 1847 deluged the town, swept off some of its warehouses and destroyed much of the sandy bluff on which it was situated. During this flood, the steam- boat Avalanche passed around the west buttress of the bridge to relieve the West Port and upper Tombigbee sufferers. This overflow recorded the highest water mark of the Tombig- bee River at Columbus.
In 1861 the Mobile and Ohio Railroad and its branch to Columbus were completed, and West Port succumbed to the inevitable and is now a desert of white sand on which Daniel Davis (colored) with his black-smith shop and little farm hard by resides, its only occupant.
The first warehouse in Columbus, on the Tombigbee River, was built on the bluff adjoining Mrs. E. B. Mason's residence and was owned successively by E. F. Calhoun, B. Drake, B. S. Long, and others. Another was built mid- way between this warehouse and the present bridge, and was owned by George Shaeffer, Aikin and Brown, Thomas March and others; but the high waters soon prevented its use and it was abandoned. Another warehouse was located on a foundation dug for the purpose in the bluff just above the railroad bridge, but was soon destroyed by the high waters.
In 1901, a splendid iron bridge, free to all, spans the Tombigbee at the foot of Main Street in Columbus, and brick fire proof warehouses store and ship the cotton of the county, and large mercantile houses sell supplies to the planters on both sides of the river. In 1899 the storage of cotton reached its highest number, 66,000 bales.
At the foot of the iron bridge begins the old Robinson road established by the legislature of 1821 from Jackson, the State capital, to Columbus, Miss., through the Choctaw Nation for transportation of the mails and the use of the traveling public. It was probably surveyed and opened by a man named Robinson, after whom it took its name, and though it has been changed to some extent it still exists very nearly as originally laid out. This road is mentioned
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in the text of the Dancing Rabbit Treaty in 1830, and in the bill extending the Lowndes county line in 1831.
In 1901 it is still called the Robinson road and extends in a south western direction through the county, emerging at its south western corner near Choctaw Agency, an old United States Agency and trading depot situated in the south- east corner of Oktibbeha county. On this road lived Maj. Jack Pytchlyn, in Lowndes county, and David Folson in Oktibbeha county, two noted Choctaw chiefs.
Among the early settlers on the Robinson road, beginning one mile from West Port, was Dunstan Banks, who had a store and a residence, which he afterwards sold Maj. Sparkman.
Large farms were opened north of the Robinson road in the Pytchlyn prairie by Col. John D. Bibb and Maj. John Oliver. These farms afterwards became the property of Charles McClaren and Calvin Perkins. Col. Bibb was the grand-father of Mrs. Ledyard Vaughn, and Maj. Oliver was the grand-father of Dr. John Oliver.
On the south side were Thos. Gray, Hezekiah Leigh, Gen'1. Richard T. Brownrigg, who was the father of Dr. John Brownrigg, a prominent physician in Columbus, and whose second son, Capt. R. T. Brownrigg, a gallant officer in the Confederate army, was killed in the trans-Mississippi service. His third son, Capt. Tam Brownrigg, was an officer in the famous battallion of sharp shooters commanded by Col. W. C. Richards. He died after the war in the state of Texas.
On the Mayhew road were Thos. Short, William Peters, Rev. William Leigh, Col. Jack Moody, whose farm is now owned by Mrs. E. J. Meek, and Willis Banks, of Tuscaloosa, who opened a very large plantation now owned by Col. J. O. Banks, and Ryland, now owned by the McClary brothers.
Returning to the Robinson road, the following well re- membered names occur: Mottley, Banks, Cobb, Amis, Cole- man, Maer, Williams, Hart, Bell, Whitfield, Randle, Connell, Winston, Lawrence, Toland, Mims, Tut Peebles, Brothers, Cook, Melton, Cromwell, and Shular.
Cromwell owned the land on which the station Artesia is situated.
The first settlers and merchants of Artesia were Crump and Cannon, Perkins, Brothers, and Dismukes.
" WAVERLY," HOME OF COL. GEORGE HI. YOUNG.
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The Gilmer road leaves the Robinson road three miles from Columbus and runs in a south westerly direction to Crawford. Among the early settlers on this road were Whit- field, "Daddy Mize," Jimmy Thompson, the Lanier place first settled by the Mottley's in 1833, who were ousted after making two crops for not registering; Philip St George Cocke, and Col. John Gilmer, a historic character who deserves more than a passing notice. He entered and opened a very large body of land on this road. He was married twice, his second wife being a wealthy widow, the mother of Dr. J. J. Gresham, of West Point. Col. Gilmer was a man, plain in his manners and frugal in his habits, with a strong, native intellect and love of literature, especially of politics and religion. He early became a Lowndes county politician and before 1840 had served two terms in the state legislature. He was the author and strenuous advocate of the celebrated Woman's Law, and secured its passage in 1839. The enactment of this law made a new era in the civil rights of women and a epoch in the jurisprudence of Mississippi. By this law a wife could own separate property from her husband, real and personal, not subject for his debt nor to his sale or devise, without her consent, and has continued in force until this date.
The Gilmer road was called after Col. Gilmer. He bought the stately McLaren mansion, perhaps the finest private residence in northeast Mississippi, now the residence of Capt. W. W. Humphries. He died at this place in 1861.
Col. John Gilmer was the largest original stockholder in the company that built the Gilmer hotel, and this in con- junction with his earnest advocacy of the Woman's Law, decided its name. He has two daughters now residing in Columbus, Mrs. Susan McGee and Mrs. M. M. Burke, who own a large portion of his land estate.
Beyond Col. Gilmer's home were Hartwell Thomason, Ca- pers Cross, the senior Toland, J. W. L. Smith, Samuel Mc- Gowan, P. G. Thompson, Belton, father of the Rev. John L. Belton, one of the first missionaries of the Southern Metho- dist church to China in 1853. He died at sea on his way home to recuperate his health. 7
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Opposite this farm was located the famous Prairie Hill camp ground, which continued its annual meetings for a number of years. Very many of the early settlers heretofore mentioned built and occupied tents every year. This camp- meeting was distinguished for the generous hospitality of its tenters, the large number of visitors reaching up in the thousands, and its sweeping revivals of religion. The writer of these chapters is proud to call this camp ground his spiritual birth-place in 1849 and sincerely hopes the religion there obtained will continue to last him until his close of life.
Beyond Prarie Hill camp ground the names of the fol- lowing persons are recalled: James Toland, Gilmer, Walker, Lawrence, Ledbetter, Randle, Carr, Brooks, Scales, and Cava- naugh.
The village of Crawford was called after the Rev. Peter Crawford, and was distinguished from its earliest history for the morality and intelligence of its citizens, good schools and churches, and its stores well furnished with large stocks of goods. It was incorporated, governed by a mayor, and selectmen, made pleasant at all seasons of the year by its extensive plank sidewalks, and altogether is one of the most delightful prairie villages in this section of the state.
From the Gilmer or Crawfordville road there stretches east a broad upland prairie, reaching almost to the Tombigbee River. In this section of the county many of Lowndes county's most excellent and worthy citizens settled. Among them were Lemuel Fields, Ervin, Hairston, Carson, Allison, Drennon, Love, Artemias Jennings, William Ervin, Sr., Samuel Witherspoon, James and Richard and Joseph Sykes, Dr. Grattan, Mottley, Odeneal, Deering, the Hargroves, Vaughans, Harveys, McCarty, Goolsby, the Easts, Gen. J. V. Harris of Georgia, and John Cox. Returning, on the Macon road across McGowah, were the Kyles, Jas. W. Harris, Bradford, Barry, Butler, Morton, Watson and Holdiness.
The rapid growth and development of Columbus is due very largely to the fact that so many of these prairie planters moved into Columbus and built superb homes; expended their wealth in assisting to build Columbus churches and colleges and added to its high moral and social position among the cities of Mississippi.
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FRANKLIN ACADEMY- COLUMBUS, MISS
FOUNDED IN 1821.
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CHAPTER XI. SCHOOLS, COLLEGES, AND NEWSPAPERS. FRANKLIN ACADEMY.
Education having been so closely connected with the location and origin of the city of Columbus, it is deemed logical and appropriate to give to its schools, colleges, and news- papers the first mention in the special department of her history.
The original survey of the town of Columbus in 1821 and the lease of its lots constituted the legal and financial basis for the establishment of its first school, the Franklin Academy. This school is the oldest free public school in the State of Mississippi, and is now in the seventy-ninth annual session of its continued existence-a school second to none in educational excellence and school appointments, and offer- ing its advantages to all educable children, white or colored, male or female, in the city of Columbus and in the township in which it is situated. The literary history of the Franklin Academy for the first fifteen years is very meagre indeed, being confined to a description of its earliest school building and the names of but two teachers.
All the histories agree that the first school building was a frame building about 30 by 40 feet in dimension, unceiled or unplastered, glass windows in front and long open windows with shutters in the rear, and covered first with boards and afterwards with shingles. The two teachers memtioned were Mr. Lawrence in 1828 (?) and Rev. David Wright, principal, 'in 1832. Mr. Jefferson Humphries was a teacher in 1835.
In 1835 two new brick buildings were erected as the male and female departments of Franklin Academy. Each of the buildings was two stories high, containing two rooms above for the assistant teachers and one large room below for the use of the principal. They were well built of hard brick and continued in constant use for fifty-two years.
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