Mississippi : comprising sketches of towns, events, institutions, and persons, arranged in cyclopedic form Vol. I, Part 101

Author: Rowland, Dunbar, 1864-1937, ed
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Atlanta, Southern Historical Publishing Association
Number of Pages: 1030

USA > Mississippi > Mississippi : comprising sketches of towns, events, institutions, and persons, arranged in cyclopedic form Vol. I > Part 101

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

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count of the removal of the colored patients from Meridian to Jackson. The legislature was in session at this time and passed an emergency act enabling repairs to proceed at once and appropri- ated $90,000 to repair the loss. The main walls of the old struc- ture were still standing, and within a year it was again ready for occupancy. In 1900, the number of patients was again far in ex- cess of accommodations and $60,000 was again appropriated to erect two more colored annexes, similar to those already built. There are also two infirmaries, one for male and one for female pa- tients. These were built at a cost of $8,000, and accommodate 56 patients each, the white patients on the lower floors, the colored on the upper. The building is again crowded and more room must be provided, but the building space is so filled that it is prob- able that future additions must be made at Meridian. The races are kept separate, for separate treatment. As to any generaliza- tions, comparing the races, Dr. Mitchell says that "up to the pres- ent time the negro under his new surroundings has developed no reliable statistics but seems to be in a chrysalis condition." He is inclined to say that with a reliable census, there would be no appreciable racial difference as regards susceptibility to insanity. The negro's emotional demonstrations are chiefly on religious topics, in great devotion to church-going and shouting and sing- ing. "Their religious ardor now seems to dominate all other pas- sions and affections." The institution was known as the Lunatic asylum until the name was changed to the Mississippi State In- sane Hospital in 1902. The board of trustees, 1905: Gov. James K. Vardaman, R. J. Harding, H. N. Street, W. M. Carstarphen, J. G. Cashman, H. L. Taylor.

Insmore, a postoffice of Claiborne county, on the Natchez-Jackson branch of the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R. R., 16 miles east of Port Gibson, the county seat.

Insurance Department. The insurance laws of the State were revised by Chapter 59 of the acts of 1902, approved March 5, and the Department of Insurance was established, and "charged with the execution of all laws now in force or which may be enacted hereafter, relative to all insurance, including indemnity or guar- anty and other companies, corporations, associations or orders placed under this department." The chief officer of the depart- ment is the insurance commissioner, but until he was elected in 1903 the duties of the office were performed by the State auditor. For this office W. Q. Cole was elected in November, 1903, having received the primary nomination without opposition. His first re- port, to March 1, 1905, shows that life insurance companies had policies in force in the State at the close of 1904, to the amount of $81,902,000, on which premiums were paid amounting to $2,852,- 000 and losses paid $902,946. The fire insurance risks of 1904 were $115,000,000, on which the premiums collected were $2,334,- 107; losses paid, $1,946,666. Marine and Inland companies, risks, $18,326,000; premiums received, $38,775; losses paid, $11,927. Miscellaneous insurance companies-accident policies, $85,000;

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health, $5,000; liability, $47,000 ; fidelity and surety, $36,000; plate glass, $4,000; steam boiler, $11,000; burglary, $10,000; credit, $3,000; industrial, $3,000; total risks, $205,000; losses paid, $63,- 655. Tornado risks, $230,000; losses paid, $1,705. Besides these there was insurance in fraternal organizations for over $55,000,- 000, on which assessments were collected to the amount of nearly $1,000,000, and losses paid to the amount of $900,000. The report, the first in the history of the State, is of great interest, as showing how the financial operations of the State are dwarfed by the cor- poration transactions. The State collects from insurance com- panies a tax of two per cent on premiums, privilege taxes, fire taxes, and various fees, from which the next collections of the commissioner for the two years September, 1903, to October, 1905, were $217,844. Of this total the two per cent tax was $94,000. Out of the fire tax the commissioner defrays the expenses of in- vestigating fires when so required.

Internal Improvements. This term first occurs, in gubernatorial recommendations, in Poindexter's administration (q. v.). The spirit of improvement was stimulated by the Three per cent fund from the United States (q. v.), which was giving the State about $5,000 a year from the sales of public lands between 1825 and 1830. The chartering of navigation and turnpike companies began in this period. (See administrations of Leake and Brandon.) In 1826, when the State was considerably in debt, through the legis- lative habit of practicing "economy" by low taxation a large num- ber of bridges were ordered built and roads made, and the Homo- chitto & Buffalo navigation company was incorporated. In 1829 the legislature created a "Board of Internal Improvement for the state of Mississippi, to superintend and direct the improvement of the navigable streams and public highways." The State had previously attempted to borrow $250,000 for investment in the Bank of Mississippi, and now the governor was authorized to sell bonds for $200,000, payable Dec. 31, 1840, at 614 per cent interest, the proceeds to be invested in stock of the Bank, "as a permanent fund for internal improvement." The faith of the State was pledged for the payment of the loan. As the board of internal im- provements, the legislature elected James Green for the western district, Abraham Penquoite for the northern, and Charles Lynch for the eastern. They were authorized to employ an engineer.

Next January, 1829, the governor reported that Stephen Dun- can was appointed to negotiate the loan, but had failed, as the eastern capitalists were unwilling to invest money at so great a distance without provision for payment of interest and principal in their own city. Meantime the board had examined the naviga- ble streams and main roads and made a report. They recom- mended the borrowing of $300,000 for improvement of navigation and roads, the work to be done "by slave labor, the property of the state."

It was provided in the constitution of 1832 as a check to appro- priations, that a two-thirds vote in each house should be required

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for the same, and annual publication of receipts and expenditures should be made.

But the railroads (q. v.) began then to give the greatest prom- ise of transportation facility, and these the State began to aid not only through a diversion to that purpose of the improvement funds, but the railroad companies were authorized to establish banks and issue paper money to pay for construction work, which was a roundabout and very oppressive way of public taxation for the benefit of these corporations. Water transportation contin- ued, however, to be aided. In 1832 the Mississippi river pass from near Helena to the Yazoo river was about to be opened, making a channel opening into the Yazoo about 100 miles above its mouth. This was expected to divert a large part of the river traffic toward the interior of Mississippi. The channel was opened and some navigation made possible.

There was animated discussion of two rival railroad projects, in 1836, the railroad from New Orleans to Nashville, and from Natchez northeastward, with branches ramifying the State. One would build up a city in Louisiana, it was said, the other would give the State independence of the brokers and commission men of that city. Gov. Lynch was in favor of raising the capital neces- sary to build the Natchez system by mortgaging real estate, and regretted the constitutional provision against pledging the faith of the State. He could see no reason why the State might not build up an export city within its own bounds. The crisis had arrived, he said, when this question must be decided, and success demanded that unreasonable prejudices should be laid aside.

The ship Henry Clay sailed from Natchez for Liverpool May 7, 1837, with a cargo of 1,388 bales of cotton. It inspired the thought that Mississippi might awaken from the immemorial commercial dependence on New Orleans.

The internal improvement bill of 1839 provided for a chief en- gineer, a loan of $5,000,000 and the building of a railroad from "The Mississippi City," which was to be located on the Sound. A spirit of sectionalism also was to some extent manifest. Sen- ator Thomas J. Coffee reported on the plan for diverting southern trade to southern ports exclusively (1839), that it was to the in- terest of Mississippi to build up a port in her own borders, rather than be tributary to Charleston or Savannah or New Orleans, and .deprecated the spirit of sectional "animosity and unkindness" be- trayed by the Augusta, Ga., convention. Each State separately should direct her trade where she pleased, without regard to build- ing up of sections.

Gov. McNutt said: "Five hundred thousand dollars judiciously expended in clearing out the various rivers and creeks in the State would be of more real benefit to the people than the con- struction of all the railroads now in process of completion. The blending of banking and internal improvement will, in the end, prove injurious to the stockholders and the State. The State, with her credit, could make all the railroads she re-

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quires ; the rate of tolls could then be kept under the control of the legislature, and when the profits of the work had indemnified the State for the cost of construction, the road might be surren- dered to the free use of the people or the profits paid into the State treasury."

John Wheeler, engineer, under authority of an act of the legis- lature, inspected the Gulf coast and reported in December, 1839, regarding the harbors of "Pascagoula, Biloxi and Bay St. Louis," the most important harbor being that formed by Ship and Cat isl- ands, which lie parallel to the shore and at a mean distance of ten miles. This was to be the harbor of "The Mississippi city." The main entrance at the west end of Ship island at medium tide had not less than twenty-three feet of water in a channel a mile and a half wide. The city had been located near the line dividing ranges ten and eleven. "The improvements made by the proprie- tors of this infant city have already given it some claims to a com- mercial character; in reference to the harbor and the bay of Biloxi in the rear, it is certainly susceptible of being made a most im- portant commercial point." He advised that Mississippi should demand the reopening of Pass Manchac, obstructed in the war of 1814-15, so that the river would be accessible from her own har- bor.

The Mississippi & Alabama railroad, from Jackson to Brandon, was graded, ties laid and piles driven for a bridge over Pearl river, when the crash came. As creditor of the Brandon bank the State became virtually owner of the remains.

An act of the legislature in 1842 provided for loaning the Jackson & Brandon railroad company $25,000 of the Two per cent fund. But the governor declined to carry this out, owing to the condition of the company, whose charter expired in 1843. In 1846 the gover- nor recommended the expenditure of that amount by the State to complete the road. A road was already built from Jackson to Vicksburg, and the building eastward was urgently demanded in order to form part of a great commercial and military link between the Atlantic coast and the river. (See Two and Three per cent funds.) The Levee system (q. v.) was another great improve- ment undertaken by the State, with national aid.

In January, 1850, the governor was advised that the Southern railroad would be completed to Brandon, a distance of 141/2 miles, in a few weeks. It was being constructed by the State commis- sioners from the Two per cent fund. This was under an act of the legislature of February, 1848, "to extend the railroad easterly be- yond Jackson," under which State commissioners were appointed, of which D. O. Williams was president. A subcommittee, B. G. Weir and James E. Watts, were appointed and put in command of a fund of $70,000 from the Two per cent fund, for the purchase of slaves to do the work, and the purchase was made accordingly, but the commission reported that Weir and Watts were about $6,000 in arrears. Iron rails were contracted for, to be shipped from England and cost, including duty, insurance and all ex-

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penses, laid down at Jackson, $60 a ton. A cargo of 415 tons was lost by shipwreck in January, 1849. A later contract was made at about $54, when $27.83 was the cost of the rails in England; ocean freight was $5 a ton, tariff $8.70, transportation, New Orleans to Jackson, $10. On account of the cholera in England, and the lim- ited demand for shipping at New Orleans owing to the lateness of the cotton season, the iron did not arrive at New Orleans until November, 1849. It was laid down eastward from Jackson as fast as received. The expense of extending the road to the Alabama line was estimated at about $12,000 a mile, or a total of nearly $1,200,000.

In his message of 1852 Gov. Whitfield attacked the constitu- tionality of a protective tariff to make internal improvements and encourage manufacture. "But whilst our safety as a sovereign state consists in a firm opposition to the exercise of any such powers upon the part of the Federal government, we should at the same time remember that the duty of providing for the wants of the country by a liberal but judicious system of internal im- provements, is imperative upon the State government. I need scarcely dwell upon the great importance of having our sta- ple products manufactured in our own borders, thereby saving to the people of the State the vast amount now paid by them to sup- port the labor of other countries as well as the cost of transporta- tion, insurance, commissions, exchanges and profits, all of which are paid by the consumer." He would "impress upon the legisla- ture the necessity of passing such measures as will tend to make our State independent; such as giving liberal encouragement to manufacturing enterprise, and promoting the efforts now being made for a direct trade between foreign countries and our South- ern seaport cities."

He said the two great propositions deserving support were the projected Mobile & Ohio railroad, and the New Orleans & Jack- son road, which had been surveyed, and which it was then pro- posed to extend to Nashville. He suggested that the State become a stockholder in both roads.

The resources of the State for internal improvements were the 500,000 acres donated by the United States, to which had just been added all the swamp and overflowed land, of which it was proposed to devote the proceeds to building levees. The proposi- tion to divert the 500,000 acres to payment of the Planters bonds had failed, only $54,000 of the bonds having been taken up in that way by January, 1852.

The land grants of the United States government in aid of the Mobile & Ohio were held by the State for that purpose, and Gov. Guion appointed Charles F. Mayerhoff as the first agent to locate the lands.

In the fall of 1859 the Mississippi Central, 200 miles, was prac- tically complete, only 20 miles of rails remaining to be laid. The N. O., J. & G. N. was completed to Canton, and some grading was done toward Aberdeen, but the road had been crippled by a wash-

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out of the Mississippi. The private stock necessary to organize the G. & S. I. had been subscribed, and State aid was asked. Its advocates declared that it would render the pine forests more val- uable than the mines of California. The Southern had been given new prospects by the grant of 171,500 acres of land by the United States, which had been located at this date.

Then came secession and the war, and ended this period of the State's history. (See Railroads.)

Under an act to aid in the construction of the N. O., J. and G. N. railroad, Powhatan Robinson was appointed engineer to survey the line of the Gulf & Ship Island road, and make estimates of cost, and he reported the same in 1855.

Under the same act the governor paid the Mobile & Ohio rail- road $100,000, and received certificates of stock in the company. To the New Orleans, Jackson & Great Northern was paid $143,- 000, and to the Mississippi Central, $62,500, making in all, an in- vestment by the State of $305,000 in railroad stock. This money was derived mostly from the donations of land by the United States government, for the purpose of internal improvements.

The Chickasaw school fund (q. v.) was invested likewise ; in all, about $800,000, in four railroads. An act of 1863 permitted pay- ment by the roads in the depreciated paper money of that period. (See Railroads.)

Interregnum of 1851. See Guion-Whitfield Adm.

Iverness, a post-village in the south-central part of Sunflower county, and a station on the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R. R., 7 miles southeast of Indianola, the county seat. Population in 1900, 100; estimated in 1906 to be 500. The Bank of Inverness was organized in 1904, with a capital stock of $30,000. It has churches and excellent schools ; also telegraph and telephone offices.

Ipse, a hamlet of Perry county. It has rural free delivery from Hattiesburg.

Ireland, a postoffice of Wilkinson county.

Irene, a post-village in Pike county, on the Liberty-White R. R., 7 miles west of Magnolia, the county seat.

Iris, a postoffice of Coahoma county.

Iron and Coal. "Iron ore of good quality, in the form of brown hematite, is occasionally found, partly in the form of small va- riously shaped nodules, statactitic in the intereior (as in the south- west corner of Tippah county), partly in thin sheets of pure fi- brous ore, interstratified with sand (as in Tishomingo county and other localities near the Alabama line). I have nowhere, however, found it in quantities sufficient to justify the erection of a furnace, and where its occurrence in large masses has been reported, a dense variety of the ferruginous sandstone has commonly been mistaken for workable ore." (Hilgard, 1860.)

"Bituminous coal is not to be looked for, since the strata ap- pearing in Mississippi correspond to those underlying the coal measures in Alabama and elsewhere; so that by mining in them we should recede from, instead of approaching to the level at

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which the coal is always found. According to the geological map of Alabama, the rocks of the Coal Measures of the Warrior field approach nearest to (within 7 or 8 miles of) the Mississippi line, in Marion county, Ala., but I am not aware whether the coal itself extends so far." (Hilgard, 1860.) "No iron ore of workable qual- ity and quantity occurs in the district, and no other metallic ore has ever been found there (in the northeast) or is likely to occur. True coal beds are confined to the small area of Carboniferous rocks, but lignite is found quite extensively in the LaGrange beds as well as in other formations. At present, however, it cannot be regarded as being of economic value, because of the nearness of the Alabama coal fields." (U. S. Geological Survey.) There is a bed of lignite three feet thick at DeKalb, near the east edge- of the LaGrange beds.

Ironwood Bluff, an extinct town in Itawamba county which existed before the War. It was located on the west side of the Tombigbee river, about 12 miles south of Fulton, the county seat.

Isola, a post-hamlet and banking town in the eastern part of Washington county, on the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R. R., about 30 miles southeast of Greenville, the county seat. The name is an Italian word, signifying "island." It is located at the south end of Lake Dawson. It has a money order postoffice. Population in 1900, 76 ; estimated in 1906, to be 300.

Issaquena County was established January 23, 1844, during the first administration of Governor Albert G. Brown. Its name is an Indian word meaning "deer river." Its territory was formerly embraced within the limits of Washington county (q. v.), and its limits were defined as all that part of Washington county south of a line, "commencing on the Mississippi river between townships 13 and 14, and running east, between said townships, to the western boundary of Yazoo county." March 29, 1876, together with Wash- ington county, it contributed to form the county of Sharkey (q. v.). Issaquena constitutes one of the later subdivisions of the so-called New Purchase, acquired from the Choctaws in 1820. It is a long, narrow county on the western border of the State, in the Missis- sippi and Yazoo delta, and is bounded on the north by Washington county, on the east by Sharkey and Warren counties, on the south by Warren county and on the west by the Mississippi river. It has a small population composed very largely of negroes and possesses no towns of any size. It has a land surface of 473 square miles. Its wealth lies in its fertile plantations and its extensive and heavily timbered areas. The county seat is Mayersville, a river town in the northern part of the county, which has a population of 250 souls and was named for David Mayers, an extensive land owner in the county. Other small towns in the county are Duncansby and Chotard, on the river, and Valley Park, Grace and Booth on the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R. R., which touches the county at its northeastern and southeastern extremities. The Mississippi river washes most of its western boundary, affording excellent and cheap transportation by steamboat. Other waters are Deer creek, on the

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eastern border; Steele's Bayou, Lake Lafayette, Moon Lake, Five Mile Lake and Cypress Lake. About two thirds of the county is heavily timbered with a heavy growth of cypress, oaks, ash, gum, hackberry, hickory, locust, walnut and sassafras. The soil is a rich alluvial loam and will produce luxuriant crops of cotton, corn, oats, etc., even with improvident and negligent cultivation. When the soil is properly handled, it will raise from one to two bales of cotton per acre and from forty to eighty bushels of corn. Too much atten- tion has been paid to raising cotton in the past and not enough to the production of corn, oats and meat, for which the region is peculiarly adapted.

The twelfth United States census, 1900, yields the following statistics: Number of farms, 1,646 ; acreage in farms, 90,676 ; acres improved, 55,052; value of land exclusive of buildings, $1,456,110; value of buildings, $413,870 ; value of live stock, $334,035, and total value of products not fed, $887,071. The number of manufacturing establishments was 38, capital, $174,390 ; wages paid, $13,989 ; cost of materials used, $49,393, and total value of products, $119,363. The total assessed valuation of real and personal property in the county in 1905 was $1,489,928 and in 1906 it was $1,517,410.50, which shows a gain of $27,482.50. The population in 1900 was composed of 622 whites, 9,778 colored, a total of 10,400, and a falling off since 1890 of 1,918.

Ita, a hamlet of Itawamba county, 6 miles north of Fulton, the county seat. The postoffice at this place was discontinued in 1905, and it now has rural free delivery from Fulton. Population in 1900, 24.

Itawamba County was erected February 9, 1836, during the ad- ministration of Governor Charles Lynch, and is said to have been named for an Indian chief's daughter. Four years earlier, in 1832, the Treaty of Pontotoc had been concluded with the Chickasaw nation of Indians, whereby they finally ceded to the United States all their remaining lands in the northern part of the State. Out of this large and fertile territory, a dozen counties had been created by the close of the year 1836, one of them being the subject of the present sketch. Its original limits were defined as follows: "Be- ginning at the point where the line between townships 6 and 7 intersects the eastern boundary of the State, and running with the said boundary line to a point one mile north of its intersection with the line between townships 11 and 12; thence due west to the line between ranges 5 and 6 east; thence north with the said range line, to the line between townships 6 and 7, and thence east with the said township line, to the beginning." October 26, 1866, it contributed a large part of its western territory, to assist in forming the new county of Lee (q. v.), and a few years later the dividing line between Itawamba and the counties of Prentiss and Tishomingo was defined by a line running east from the southwest corner of section 14, between sections 14 and 23, township 7, to the eastern boundary line of the State. In common with all of this Chickasaw region, Itawamba county had been rapidly settled by a strong tide

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of emigration, not only from the older counties of the State, but from the States of Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia as well. The Indians, reluctant at first to abandon their "ancient homes and the graves of their ancestors," by the close of the year 1839, had nearly all retired to their new allotments west of the Mississippi river. The villages of Van Buren, Wheeling, West Fulton and Ironwood Bluff were among the earliest places in the county to be settled. All four have now disappeared. Van Buren was located on a high bluff on the Tombigbee river. Winfield Walker, a nephew of Gen. Winfield Scott, opened a store there in 1838, and the following year W. C. Thomas & Brother also began business there. Other busi- ness men of the place were Mr. Dines, from New York; John W. Lindsey, J. C. Ritchie, H. W. Bates, Elijah B. Harber, - - Weaks, E. Moore, and R. F. Shannon. The building of the Mobile & Ohio R. R., caused the place to decay and the old site is now in cultiva- tion. Wheeling was located on the Tombigbee, three miles below Van Buren, soon after the Chickasaw land sales. Jowers & Hol- comb, and R. P. Snow did business here for a short time. After two or three years its life was absorbed by Van Buren, three miles up the river. Old West Fulton, says Mr. Eli Phillips, of Fulton, Miss., was on the west side of the Tombigbee river, 214 miles from Fulton, and Ironwood Bluff was about 10 miles south of West Fulton, on the same side of the river. The county is situated in the northeastern part of the State, on the Alabama border. It has a land surface of 526 square miles. It is bounded on the north by the counties of Tishomingo and Prentiss, on the east by Alabama, on the south by Monroe county and on the west by Lee county. It is a county without railroads, large towns or important manufac- turing interests. Its transportation facilities are confined to the Tombigbee river during the winter season and wagon roads. Its wealth lies in the products of its soil and its valuable timber tracts. The county seat is the little town of Fulton, near the center of the county, containing 250 people. The whole county is thickly dotted with small settlements, among which may be mentioned Mantachie and Rara Avis. The surface of the county is level, broken or hilly, and undulating; the timber consists of oaks, pine, hickory, black- jack, maple, beech, walnut, gum and cypress. It lies partly in the so-called Sandy Lands region and partly in the Northeastern Prairie belt, and is watered by streams forming the head sources of the Tombigbee. The soils consist of fertile bottoms, prairie limestone and hill soils, some strong and some poor. They produce cotton, corn, oats, wheat, sorghum, potatoes and grasses. The live stock industry is extensive and the pasturage is good the year around. All varieties of fruits and vegetables are raised for home consump- tion. A few small grist and saw mills are doing business.

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Mississippi : comprising sketches of towns, events, institutions, and persons, arranged in cyclopedic form Vol. I, Part 101

Author: Rowland, Dunbar, 1864-1937, ed Publication date: 1907 Publisher: Atlanta, Southern Historical Publishing Association Number of Pages: 1030

Author: Rowland, Dunbar, 1864-1937, ed
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Atlanta, Southern Historical Publishing Association
Number of Pages: 1030