"Natchez, Mississippi, once had more millionaires per capita than anywhere else in America, and its wealth was built on slavery and cotton. Today it has the greatest concentration of antebellum mansions in the South, and a culture full of unexpected contradictions. Prominent white families dress up in hoopskirts and Confederate uniforms for ritual celebrations of the Old South, yet Natchez is also progressive enough to elect a gay black man for mayor with 91 percent of the vote"--

Originally published in 1947, this book by New Orleans native Harnett Kane provides over 300 pages of detailed history of the Natchez area in Mississippi. It includes vivid descriptions of over 20 antebellum mansions, the personal stories of the families that built them, and the individuals who called them home. History buffs will be interested in reading about the many famous figures named in this book, such as Andrew Jackson and Aaron Burr, who were among those who helped shape the state’s history, and in some cases, the history of the American nation. Also included in Kane’s retelling of interesting and entertaining stories about Natchez are two that garnered national interest in years past: the famous steamboat race between The Natchez and The Robert E. Lee, and the infamous story of Natchez’s "Goat Castle." A fascinating read.

The most comprehensive history of the Revolutionary War in the lower Mississippi Valley

"This manuscript focuses on the interactions between Native Americans and European colonists during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, particularly the relationships that developed between the French and the Natchez, Chickasaw, and Choctaw peoples. Milne's history of the Lower Mississippi Valley and its peoples provides the most comprehensive and detailed account of the Natchez in particular, from La Salle's first encounter with what would become Louisiana to the ultimate disappearance of the Natchez by the end of the 1730s. In crafting this narrative, George Milne also analyzes the ways in which French attitudes about race and slavery influenced native North American Indians in the vicinity of French colonial settlements on the Gulf coast, and how in turn Native Americans adopted and/or resisted colonial ideology"--

Charting the Plantation Landscape from Natchez to New Orleans examines the hidden histories behind one of the nineteenth-century South’s most famous maps: Norman’s Chart of the Lower Mississippi River, created by surveyor Marie Adrien Persac before the Civil War and used for decades to guide the pilots of river vessels. Beyond its purely cartographic function, Persac’s map depicted a world of accomplishment and prosperity, while concealing the enslaved and exploited laborers whose work powered the plantations Persac drew. In this collection, contributors from a variety of disciplines consider the histories that Persac’s map omitted, exploring plantations not as sites of ease and plenty, but as complex legal, political, and medical landscapes. Essays by Laura Ewen Blokker and Suzanne Turner consider the built and designed landscapes of plantations as they were structured by the logics and logistics of both slavery and the effort to present a façade of serenity and wealth. William Horne and Charles D. Chamberlain III delve into the political activity of formerly enslaved people and slaveholders respectively, while Christopher Willoughby explores the ways the plantation health system was defined by the agro-industrial environment. Jochen Wierich examines artistic depictions of plantations from the antebellum years through the twentieth century, and Christopher Morris uses the famed Uncle Sam Plantation to explain how plantations have been memorialized, remembered, and preserved. With keen insight into the human cost of the idealized version of the agrarian South depicted in Persac’s map, Charting the Plantation Landscape encourages us to see with new eyes and form new definitions of what constitutes the plantation landscape.

In 1932, the city of Natchez, Mississippi, reckoned with an unexpected influx of journalists and tourists as the lurid story of a local murder was splashed across headlines nationwide. Two eccentrics, Richard Dana and Octavia Dockery—known in the press as the "Wild Man" and the "Goat Woman"—enlisted an African American man named George Pearls to rob their reclusive neighbor, Jennie Merrill, at her estate. During the attempted robbery, Merrill was shot and killed. The crime drew national coverage when it came to light that Dana and Dockery, the alleged murderers, shared their huge, decaying antebellum mansion with their goats and other livestock, which prompted journalists to call the estate "Goat Castle." Pearls was killed by an Arkansas policeman in an unrelated incident before he could face trial. However, as was all too typical in the Jim Crow South, the white community demanded "justice," and an innocent black woman named Emily Burns was ultimately sent to prison for the murder of Merrill. Dana and Dockery not only avoided punishment but also lived to profit from the notoriety of the murder by opening their derelict home to tourists. Strange, fascinating, and sobering, Goat Castle tells the story of this local feud, killing, investigation, and trial, showing how a true crime tale of fallen southern grandeur and murder obscured an all too familiar story of racial injustice.

This handbook for travelers and nature lovers selects and describes 100 of the most common wildflowers along the most scenic trail of the Deep South. 100 full-color plates. 23 line drawings. Map.