Levin R. Marshall (October 10, 1800 – July 24, 1870) was an American banker and planter in the Antebellum South. He was a founder and President of the

Commercial Bank A commercial bank is a financial institution which accepts deposits from the public and gives loans for the purposes of consumption and investment to make profit. It can also refer to a bank, or a division of a large bank, which deals with cor ...

Natchez, Mississippi Natchez ( ) is the county seat of and only city in Adams County, Mississippi, United States. Natchez has a total population of 14,520 (as of the 2020 census). Located on the Mississippi River across from Vidalia in Concordia Parish, Louisiana, N ...

. He owned 14,000 acres in

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

and

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

, and 10,000 acres in

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the Osage ...

Early life

Levin R. Marshall was born October 10, 1800, in

Alexandria, Virginia Alexandria is an independent city (United States), independent city in the northern region of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Virginia, United States. It lies on the western bank of the Potomac River approximately south of Downto ...

.''Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Mississippi'', Gretna, Louisiana: Pelican Publishing, 1999, Part 1, p. 39

/ref> His father, Henry Marshall, was from

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

, and related to Chief Justice Marshall. His maternal grandfather, Stephen Minor, was a prominent planter.D. Clayton James, ''Antebellum Natchez'', Baton Rouge, Louisiana: Louisiana State University Press, 1968, p. 15

/ref>

Career

Marshall started his career as a banker for the United States bank in

Woodville, Mississippi Woodville is a town in and the county seat of Wilkinson County, Mississippi, United States. Its population as of 2020 was 928. History This historic town, one of the oldest in Mississippi, is set among the rolling hills and pastures of Wilkins ...

. In 1831, he moved to

, where he continued his work as a banker. He then established his own bank, the

of Natchez. Marshall also owned the Mansion Hotel in Natchez and worked for the commission house J. B. Byrne & Co. of

New Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

as well as Marshall, Reynolds, and Co. of Natchez. In 1825, he led a group of local children to welcome

Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de La Fayette (6 September 1757 – 20 May 1834), known in the United States as Lafayette (, ), was a French aristocrat, freemasonry, freemason and military officer who fought in the Ameri ...

to Natchez. Marshall owned many cotton and sugar

plantation A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...

s in Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas.Historic Resources Inventory: Richmond
/ref> Indeed, he owned five plantations in Mississippi and Louisiana which spanned 14,000 acres, and 10,000 acres in Arkansas. By the 1850s, he produced more than 4,000 bales of cotton every year. In 1860, he owned 817 African slaves. He also owned a large livestock herd. For a time,

Henry Wirz Henry Wirz (born Hartmann Heinrich Wirz, November 25, 1823 – November 10, 1865) was a Swiss-American officer of the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. He was the commandant of the stockade of Camp Sumter, a Confederate pr ...

worked as an overseer on one of Marshall's plantations in Louisiana; Wirz would later serve in the Confederate Army as commandant of the notorious prisoner-of-war camp known as Andersonville.

Personal life

In 1826, Marshall married Maria Chotard (1807–1834), the daughter of John Marie Chotard, in Woodville, Mississippi. They had four children, only one of whom survived: George Matthews Marshall, who later married Charlotte Hunt, the daughter of planter David Hunt, and resided at the Lansdowne Plantation. A portrait of Levin R. Marshall and George M. Marshall painted by

Louis Joseph Bahin Louis Joseph Bahin (1813-1857) was a French-born American painter in the Antebellum South. Early life Louis Joseph Bahin was born on October 6, 1813, in Armentières en Brie/Isles, Seine & Marne France.Patti Carr Black, ''Art in Mississippi, 172 ...

hangs in the dining room at Lansdowne.Lansdowne Plantation: Tour
/ref> After Maria's death, Marshall remarried to Sarah E. Elliott Ross, daughter of Dr. Elliott and widow of

Isaac Ross Isaac Beattie Ross (born 27 October 1984) is a New Zealand rugby union player. He plays in the lock position for the Austin Gilgronis of Major League Rugby (MLR) competition. Professional career Ross is of Māori descent, and played for New ...

. They had eight children. They resided at

Richmond Richmond most often refers to: * Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States * Richmond, London, a part of London * Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England * Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada * Richmond, California, ...

in Natchez and also maintained a residence in

Westchester County, New York Westchester County is located in the U.S. state of New York. It is the seventh most populous county in the State of New York and the most populous north of New York City. According to the 2020 United States Census, the county had a population o ...

Death

Marshall died on July 24, 1870, at the age of 69.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Marshall, Levin R. 1800 births 1870 deaths Businesspeople from Alexandria, Virginia People from Woodville, Mississippi People from Natchez, Mississippi People from Westchester County, New York American bankers American planters American slave owners