USA > Mississippi > Mississippi : comprising sketches of towns, events, institutions, and persons, arranged in cyclopedic form Vol. I > Part 58
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).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88 | Part 89 | Part 90 | Part 91 | Part 92 | Part 93 | Part 94 | Part 95 | Part 96 | Part 97 | Part 98 | Part 99 | Part 100 | Part 101 | Part 102 | Part 103 | Part 104 | Part 105 | Part 106 | Part 107 | Part 108 | Part 109
The remnant of Price's division began the retreat ordered by VanDorn, Lovell following as rear guard. They escaped because Rosecrans was too slow in pursuit. At the Hatchie Bridge on the 5th, they were met by Hurlbut, who roughly handled the remnants of Moore's and Pfifer's brigades, and captured four guns of the artillery. Maury and Villepigue held Hurlbut in check while Van- Dorn found another crossing, six miles south, and Bowen's brigade, mainly Mississippians, held back McPherson's fresh troops, from Corinth. Bowen crossed the Tuscumbia in safety, burning the bridge behind him and saving most of the wagon train. Capt. E. H. Cummins, of Maury's division, wrote: "We brought off two captured guns and lost five, and brought along 300 prisoners. Price is reduced from 10,000 to between 5,000 and 6,000. Lovell has not suffered a great deal. More than half of the line officers of Price's army are killed, wounded and missing." The official report of Confederate losses was 505 killed, 2,150 wounded, 2,183
570
MISSISSIPPI
missing. Rosecrans' report was 355 killed, 1,841 wounded and 324 missing. He reported the capture of 2,268 prisoners, including 137 officers, 14 stand of colors, 3,300 stand of small arms, 45,000 rounds of ammunition.
The loss of Mississippi was heavy: Col. Martin, Col. Richard W. Leigh of the 43d, and Maj. Enoch McDonald, of the 40th, among the killed; Colonels Moore and McLain, Lieutenant-Colonels Ter- ral and Campbell, and Majors Keirn and Yates among the wounded. Col. William P. Rogers, formerly of Aberdeen, a captain of the Mississippi rifles, in 1847, was killed at the head of his Texas regi- ment. (See M. H. S. Publ. IV, 63).
Corinth, siege of, see Army of the Mississippi.
Cork, a postoffice of Winston county.
Cornersville, a post-hamlet of Marshall county, about 24 miles southeast of Holly Springs, the county seat. It has a church and several stores. Population in 1900, 165.
Cornish, a post-hamlet of Lafayette county, about 12 miles south- east of Oxford, the county seat.
Cornwell, a hamlet of Winston county, 10 miles southwest of Louisville, the county seat. Population in 1900, 35. It has rural mail service from Plattsburg, Miss.
Coroas, see Indians.
Cotton. Charlevoix, on his visit to Natchez in 1721, saw the cotton plant growing in the garden of Sieur le Noir, the company clerk. Bienville, in one of his dispatches, April, 1735, stated that the cultivation of cotton proved advantageous. Major Stoddard believed it was cultivated in the colony in 1740, and a despatch of Governor Vaudreuil, of 1746, mentions cotton among the products which came down annually from the country up-river. The varie- ties which had been chiefly cultivated in Mississippi, wrote B. L. C. Wailes in 1854, were sea island cotton in a very few plantations on the seaboard, the upland (first to be introduced), both of these varieties having the smooth black naked seed; the Tennessee cot- ton, in which the seed is covered with a thick down, which super- seded the smooth seed for a few years, on account of its freedom from the rot, and the Mexican, "which is now chiefly cultivated, or is the basis of all the varieties now in favor." The Mexican seed, it is believed, was introduced by Walter Burling, of Natchez, who brought some seed on his return from the Wilkinson mission, in 1806. It is said that the viceroy permitted him to bring some dolls stuffed with the seed, the export of seed being forbidden. "The practice of horizontal cultivation, or circling the rows, so as
571
MISSISSIPPI
to keep them on a level on hilly and rolling land, was introduced by the late William Dunbar, of the Forest, in Adams county, at the suggestion of President Jefferson, with whom Mr. Dunbar corresponded for many years. Having observed, when in France, this economical manner of cultivating the mountain sides, Mr. Jefferson recommended it as well adapted to our broken lands. The practice was tardily adopted, and, like all similar innovations on established usages, met at first with its shares of ridicule."
Mr. Wailes also wrote in 1854: "Like type-setting, cotton-pick- ing is and must still continue to be performed by the fingers; but its rate has become as accelerated as if some new motive power was applied to the process. Ffty years since, fifty pounds a day was accounted fair work. Now the children double this; and two hundred pounds is not unfrequently the average of the whole gang of hands, to say nothing of those who pick their four or five hundred pounds of cotton (bolls?)"
At the first the cotton was cleaned by the fingers, next a small roller gin was introduced, operated by two boys who turned the crank and fed the cotton between the rollers. Treadle power was later added, so that one could do the work. This machinery was made exclusively of wood. About 1792 came the application of power to several small gins by belts from one cylinder, this im- provement being attributed to a merchant at Augusta, Ga., father of President Longstreet, of Mississippi university. These small gins were applicable only to the naked seed varieties of cotton. Under the most favorable conditions of the atmosphere, half a bag could be ginned in a day with five pair of rollers. Hence, until the intro- duction of Whitney's gin, no one grew more than a small patch of cotton, mainly for domestic uses.
The long staple, or sea island cotton, had not then been intro- duced, and "it does not appear from the most diligent inquiry, that more than a single small lot of only three bales, or rather, round bags, was exported from the country previous to the introduction of the saw gin. This was produced by William Vousdan, (in Adams county) near the site of the ancient Whiteapple village on Second creek."
The gin invented by Eli Whitney, of Massachusetts, was pat- ented in 1794, and first manufacture at New Haven, but the sim- plicity of the machine caused it to come into general use without regard to the patent right. As a result of this invention the value of the cotton crop of the United States was increased in ten years from about $150,000 to at least $8,000,000. It became more than
572
MISSISSIPPI
half the value of the whole domestic export of the United States. The gin came into use in Mississippi in 1:95. Daniel Clark (q. v.), living near Fort Adams, had one constructed by a negro me- chanic from drawings and descriptions furnished by a traveller. In 1797 several other gins were in operation and cotton suddenly became the great crop of the Natchez district. One of the earliest gins, after Clark's, was that of Thomas Wilkins, on Pine Ridge, near Natchez. (See Greenleaf and Carver). Merchants at Natchez and Washington erected public gins at which the seed cotton was received by weight and ginned for one tenth. Most of those plant- ers who adventured on a gin of their own, took their neighbors' crops to clean, and on this basis some fortunes were built. William Dunbar wrote in 1199, "I have reason to think the new gin has been much more improved here than anywhere else. The latest and best gins cannot injure the cotton more than a pair of cards might do."
Anthony Hutchins wrote to Daniel Clark, Sr., June 30, 1797: "Petit says that cotton in London is 2/6, but that our cotton will fetch but half that price and that he intends to buy but will not give more than 14Dolrs for that which is gin'd on our gins of this country as he sais it can't be spun so fine, nor, sais he, is it so strong. I did not see him. I suppose he is a gentleman of ver- acity." In a postscript: "May not some of the rascally cotton have been shipped to England; such would disgrace the country."
The official inspection of cotton was one of the earliest cares of the territorial government. Governor Claiborne said in October, 1803: "The act providing for the inspection of cotton remains unexecuted ; the necessary warehouses and machinery not being yet completed. The grand jurors for the districts of Adams and Jefferson have recommended suitable characters as inspectors ; some have been commissioned. . The loss of character which the cotton of this territory might sustain in foreign markets, by the carelessness or frauds of a few of the cultivators or gin- ners of that article, may prove injurious to the planting interest, and it is the duty of the government to guard against the evil."
The cotton seed, ginners atempted to get rid of by burning. Wailes wrote in 1854, "No suspicion of their value as an applica- tion to the land seems to have been entertained." The practica- bility of oil manufacture was unknown to him. Gin holders were required to keep the seed piles enclosed to prevent the hogs from feeding upon them, the food being considered injurious. The cot- ton stalks were burned, and no attempt was made to restore any-
573
MISSISSIPPI
thing to the soil. The receipts given by the ginners became the circulating medium of the country, received by merchants as money, and readily exchanged for dollars, when they could be found, at five to the hundred pounds of cotton called for.
Cotton was first packed in large round bags containing about 300 pounds, and sea island cotton is still so packed. In Missis- sippi, square bales were first made in a rough lever press. This was about the year 1779. William Dunbar received from Philadel- phia, in 1801, a screw press, made to his order, which he also hoped to use in pressing oil from the seeds. Greenleaf introduced the press with two wooden screws, turned alternately, which has not yet entirely gone out of use. The detached single wooden screw- press, with the long and ponderous A sweeps, was widely intro- duced from Georgia into eastern and northern Mississippi. The McCombs and Lewis screw presses, with contrivances for increas- ing the rapidity of compression, were the best in use in 1854, and were the inventions of two ginwrights of Claiborne and Warren counties. Bales were estimated as averaging 400 pounds, but 500 pounds was not unusual. Bales were wrapped in Kentucky bag- ging made of hemp, but this was becoming so inferior that India bagging was introduced about 1850. The bales were generally tied with ropes made of Kentucky or Missouri hemp, only a few large planters, in 1854, having made use of the cotton ties of hoop iron. These were preferred not only for neatness, but because in the frequent fires on the river and ocean the iron ties prevented the sudden and explosive combustion that followed the burning of the rope. Most gins were propelled by horse power, but in 1854 steam engines were coming into use on the great river plantations.
De Bow's Review in 1856 printed a showing of a plantation in South Carolina. The capital invested was $150,000, including 254 negroes set down at $89,000. The income was 330,000 pounds of cotton, which sold at six cents, bacon and other provisions, and 5 per cent increase in the slaves, amounting to $26,793. The gross expenses were $6,791, leaving a net profit of $20,000, or thirteen per cent.on the investment. Solon Robinson, a famous authority, declared on the same items, that the profit was only $1,000. (See Agriculture.)
Professor Hilgard, in his census report of 1880, said: "Missis- sippi stands first in total production, while sixth in population, among the cotton States." This is not because of the remarkable fertility of the delta, for only a little over one-fourth of the State's product comes from the river bottoms, over one-half coming from
574
MISSISSIPPI
the first class uplands-the table land belt bordering the river bluffs, the yellow loam region and the two prairie belts, and the remaining one-fourth from the sandy up-lands or pine lands. He explained the great cotton production on the ground that quite one-half of the State is possessed of soils of exceptional fertility, and the people followed cotton planting with such exclusiveness. The crop was increased more than 70 per cent in 1870 to 1880, and in the latter year over two million acres were devoted to the pro- duction of 963,111 bales, valued at more than $43,000,000.
The cotton crop of 1900 was 500,000,000 pounds, valued at $45,- 000,000. The State now ranks third in cotton production, Texas being far in advance of any other State, with Georgia second, and Alabama and Mississippi close together. The ginneries operated in 1901 were 4,145. The crop of 1901 was 1,275,439 bales. About 3% of the bales are round. In recent years two systems of round bale machines have come into limited use, the Bessonette and Lowry systems. The latter makes a bale with twice the compres- sion of the square bale. No sea island cotton was reported from Mississippi in the last census. The cotton product of the State is about 13 per cent of the total of the United States. The great- est cotton counties are Bolivar, 67,000 bales; Coahoma, 44,000; Washington, 50,000; Yazoo, 35,000 ; Leflore, 31,000 ; Hinds, Holmes and Tallahatchie, about 27,000 each; Copiah and Jefferson, about 25,000 each. (See Cotton Seed Oil.)
Cotton Claims. The Confederate government, at one time or another, owned 127,431 bales of cotton in Mississippi, which were held as security for loans. About 60,000 bales were seized and confiscated by the United States government. Of the remaining cotton, some was removed to Texas by those on whose planta- tions it was stored, or it was burned, or it was sold by the slaves to speculators. "Private cotton seized was of three kinds: that abandoned by the owners on the approach of the enemy; that cap- tured in the course of military operations; that confiscated on ac- count of its use in aid of the Confederate cause. In the case of abandoned cotton, the owner was entitled to recover its value if, upon the conclusion of peace, he could furnish satisfactory proof of loyalty throughout the war. The same was true of cotton im- properly captured. Of course, nothing could be recovered for confiscated cotton." (Garner, Reconstruction, p. 127.) Nearly 37,000 bales were collected by agents of the United States treasury after June 1, 1865, as captured cotton, mainly. Between 1872 and 1878 claims were filed for $6,285,240 on account of cotton seized by
575
MISSISSIPPI
the United States authorities. The court of claims adjudicated a considerable amount of these claims, allowing $890,227 up to June 30, 1868, and in 1871 congress created a commission to take charge of the matter. "Claimants were compelled to establish positive proof of loyalty in order to secure an award." The commission al- lowed claims to the amount of about $565,000 in 1872-79 inclusive. "By an act of June 15, 1878, it was provided that all claims not reported should be forever barred thereafter."
Cotton Gin Port. This is an historic old settlement, in Monroe county, and the oldest abandoned town in Northeast Mississippi. It had a beautiful site on the east bank of the Tombigbee river, a little over a mile below the junction of the Tombigbee river, and Town creek. There is an elevated plateau at this point, near the ferry, and on this the town was built. Both the Tombigbee and Town creek were navigable in former years for some distance above the settlement. The old public road, from the settlements on the Tennessee river, built by George S. Gaines, a brother of Gen. E. P. Gaines, and known as "Gaines' Trace," ran through Cotton Gin Port, due west for ten miles to the home of Major Levi Col- bert, a Chickasaw Chief, where it forked, one branch running north- east and connecting at Pontotoc with the Natchez Trace, the other branch running southeast to the home of John Pitchlyun, on the Tombigbee. To the north and northeast of Gaines' Trace were situated the Chickasaws' towns, in the prairie region near the present city of Tupelo. By the Treaty of Chickasaw Council-house, concluded January 7th, 1816, Gaines' Trace and the Tombigbee river on the west were made the boundary line between American and Chickasaw territory, and Cotton Gin thus became an impor- tant frontier post. The Federal Government constructed a cotton gin about one hundred years ago one mile west of the ferry, on the high ground, to encourage the cultivation of cotton among the Chickasaws, and also as a diplomatic measure to eradicate the anti- American prejudices of the tribe, which had long been allied with the English. This was the origin of the name of the town. An immense oak tree, the ancient "council tree" of the Indians was near the old cotton gin. Unfortunately, this old landmark has been lately destroyed.
It was at this point on the river that Bienville, the French Gov- ernor, erected a fort in 1736, during his disastrous expedition against the Chickasaws. Marquis de Vaudreuil, Bienville's succes- sor, also landed at Cotton Gin Port and used the old fort for a
576
MISSISSIPPI
base, in a second vain effort to subdue the warlike Chickasaws in 1752.
After the cession of 1816, the territory east of the Tombigbee rapidly filled with settlers, and a large concourse of adventurers and traders gathered at Cotton Gin Port, which offered ready ac- cess to the Indian country on the north and east, and to the settle- ments on the Tennessee via Gaines' Trace, as well as to points on the Gulf coast by way of the Tombigbee river. When the county of Monroe was formed in 1821, courts were held at Cotton Gin Port pending the location of the seat of justice at the town of Hamilton. We are told (1) "In September, 1824, Dr. Boyakin, who is now a citizen of Blue Rapids, Kansas, took charge of the first school that was ever taught at this place. At that time the place contained six or seven log houses 'scattered around without any regularity.' Among its inhabitants were: The Waltons, the Lucas family, the Doggates, and the Mayfields. Among the pio- neers who lived within two miles of the place were Bowers, Guna- way, Rayburn, Bickerstaff, Mayfield, Malone, Thomas, Folks, Can- non, McQuarry and Cooper. For a long time the site of Cotton Gin Port had been the camping ground of a restless class of adventurers .* "
The old place reached the height of its prosperity about 1848, when the population had attained to about five hundred, while about twenty stores, a flour mill and a carding factory composed its principal business enterprises. A few of the leading citizens at this period of its history were H. B. Gillespie, Isaac Mayfield, B. G. Knowles, John Bickerstaff, Johnson Bickerstaff, Capt. J. H. Montgomery, Dr. T. B. Moody, George Abrams, A. J. Owen, and Jack Hill.
The Kansas City, Memphis & Birmingham railroad was con- structed through this section in 1887, but missed the old town, whose business and population were absorbed by the new town of Amory on the railroad. (1.) Dr. F. L. Riley's Extinct Towns and Villages of Miss., in Publications of the M. H. Soc., pp., 358- 359.
Cotton Money. Under an act of the legislature authorizing the issue of treasury notes as advances upon cotton, passed Dec. 19, 1861, the State auditor issued treasury notes to the amount of $5,000,000 upon the bonds of planters, with personal security in addition to the bonds, on cotton pledged to be kept at the risk of
*See also Article by George J. Leftwich, Pub. M. H. Soc. p. 263.
577
MISSISSIPPI
the planter, and delivered at some specified city or seaport in the Confederate States. These treasury notes had written across their faces, "Receivable in payment of all dues to the State and counties, except the Military tax." The bonds of the planters were to be paid in gold and silver, and in treasury notes when required by proclamation of the governor.
Jan. 6, 1866, Governor Humphreys called upon all persons to whom loans had been made to deliver the cotton pledged, within 90 days. No cotton was received, but by October, 1866, $2,515,000 in the treasury notes had been turned in to cancel a corresponding amount of bonds. Sept. 25, 1866, the governor called for payment of the outstanding bonds, and a suit was begun to test the ques- tions of law. The tax collectors refused to take the notes, and a suit was pending to compel them to do so.
The notes had depreciated to 15 or 20 cents on the dollar. But the proclamation caused a rise in value to 75 cents on the dollar, and great speculation arose in the notes. It was uncertain, how- ever, lest the courts decide they were issued in aid of the Confed- erate cause, in which case they were worthless. While the ques- tion was unsettled, some people were able to pay debts easily, and it was said that one bale of cotton would in that way pay a debt of $2,000. The supreme court of the State held the act of the legis- lature creating the cotton money to be null and void, and the cot- ton notes were no longer of value except as relics.
Cottonplant, a post-hamlet in the southern part of Tippah coun- ty, on the Mobile, Jackson & Kansas City R. R., about 10 miles by rail south of Ripley, the county seat. Blue Mountain is the nearest banking town. It has a money order postoffice, 'a church, and one of the best general stores in the county. Population in 1900, 103.
Cotton Receipts. The act of Oct. 30, 1800, in the administration of Governor Sargent, provided that "cotton receipts," might be given by the owners of cotton gins, and thereupon the quantity of cotton named should be construed as due the ginner. If no date were named, the cotton would be considered due in four months, non-delivery incurring a penalty of fifteen per cent. Such cotton receipts could be assigned the same as promissory notes. This was a plan for enabling planters to realize money for their cotton in advance. In other words they were made negotiable, like bills of exchange. There was no law providing that they should be used as currency. It is said by Claiborne however, (page 300) that the cotton receipts "passed from hand to hand like other currency."
37-I
578
MISSISSIPPI
This law was in force with some amendment through the Terri- torial period, and was reenacted in Poindexter's code of 1822.
Cotton Seed Oil. In 1783 the society in London for the encour- agement of arts, manufactures and commerce, being informed that a considerable quantity of oil might be obtained from the seeds of cotton, and that after the expressing of the oil the cakes afforded a strong and hearty food for cattle, offered a gold medal to "the planters in any of the British islands of the West Indies who shall express oil from the seed of cotton, and make from the remaining seed, hard and dry cakes, as food for cattle." (Darby's Emigrant's Guide, 1818). William Dunbar, of the Natchez district, in 1799, having ordered a screw press for baling cotton made at Philadel- phia, according to plans of his own contrivance, consoled himself regarding the price he was asked, $1,000, by the proposition to ex- press oil from the seeds. He thought the oil would be "between the drying and fat oils, resembling linseed in color and tenacity, but perhaps less drying." Whatever experiments were made, did not have such results as to encourage the industry. But it was an impatient period, in which the energies of men were absorbed in the creation of great plantations, populated by many negroes, from which great profits might be reaped in a careless and easy fashion. Utilization of by-products was to come later, and begin in older communities. Not far from the time of Dunbar's exper- iments (according to Niles' Register, 1829) Dr. Hunter, of Phila- delphia, was so strongly impressed with the promise of oil manu- facturing that he moved to New Orleans, taking two engines; but he failed to set up a factory. In 1818 Col. Clark was trying the oil in lamps. There was then, it must be remembered, no kero- sene. About 1829, when the oil was selling at Providence, R. I., at 80 cents a gallon, a Petersburg, Va., inventor was testing a machine to hull the seeds before expressing the oil. There was an attempt to manufacture oil at Natchez in 1834, but the venture was a failure commercially. In 1847 another attempt at New Or- leans had the same fate. "Frederick Good, of that city, used to show his friends an ounce bottle of the crude oil which he said had cost him $12,000." Of course attempts like these were made in other places, but the amount of oil expressed was very small, a few gallons here and there. In 1855 L. Knapp invented a decorticating machine which separated the hulls from the kernels, and since that time it has proved very successful. The great trouble at first was the lack of proper machinery, and especially machinery for removing the linters. The hullers were also comparatively poor ;
579
MISSISSIPPI
for while there is an average of 50 gallons of oil in a ton of seed, at that time the hullers were so poor and the presses so imperfect that less than 30 gallons were extracted. In 1855 the manufac- ture was established for the first time in this country on what may be considered a commercial basis. A mill was established at Providence, R. I. The company then formed as the Union Oil com- pany, still exists, as a part of the American Oil company. At first it obtained the seed from New Orleans. Aldige, of New Orleans, may be called the father of the industry in the South. He visited Europe where oil was manufactured from Egyptian cotton seed, and modeled his crushing machinery from that. After he had his machinery ready he managed to persuade some personal friends among the planters to take the trouble to sell him seed. His son, Jules Aldige, for many years prominent in the industry, remem- bered when an agent traveling for eighteen months procured only 1,764 tons. Even the steamboat captains discouraged the handling of the "worthless stuff." Mills were established at Vicksburg and Petersburg, and these and the Providence mill, were the sole mills in 1861, after which the business was paralyzed for four years. During the naval blockades of the Mississippi river, necessity forced the use of oil cake and hulls as food for cattle, and this new value of the by-product was so well established by 1865 that the prosperity of the industry was more than ever assured when it was resumed in peace. But the growth was slow. Two years after the war there were only four or five mills in the South. In 1870 there were only 26; in 1880, 45, though much larger than the first mills. In 1880 there was an invested capital of $4,000,000; $889,000 was paid in wages, and 3,000,000 tons of seed were used. In 1882 there were 60 mills, producing 12,000,000 gallons of oil. Then the combinations began for the control of the price of seed and volume of product, which resulted later in the anti-trust laws of the South- ern States. The American Cotton Oil Co., began in 1883-84, soon after the formation of the Standard Oil Co., and was based upon a combination of 17 oil manufacturers in Arkansas and Texas.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.