Cotton Gin Port is a

ghost town Ghost Town(s) or Ghosttown may refer to: * Ghost town, a town that has been abandoned Film and television * Ghost Town (1936 film), ''Ghost Town'' (1936 film), an American Western film by Harry L. Fraser * Ghost Town (1956 film), ''Ghost Town'' ...

Monroe County Monroe County may refer to seventeen counties in the United States, all named for James Monroe: * Monroe County, Alabama *Monroe County, Arkansas * Monroe County, Florida * Monroe County, Georgia *Monroe County, Illinois *Monroe County, Indian ...

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 ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

Geography

Cotton Gin Port was located at on the east bank of the Tombigbee river.

History

Cotton Gin Port was the first town settled by Europeans in what became north

. It was developed on the east bank of the

Tombigbee River The Tombigbee River is a tributary of the Mobile River, approximately 200 mi (325 km) long, in the U.S. states of Mississippi and Alabama. Together with the Alabama, it merges to form the short Mobile River before the latter empties int ...

, at a crossing of vital Indian trails. This had been a base of expeditions of French explorers

Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville (; ; February 23, 1680 – March 7, 1767), also known as Sieur de Bienville, was a French colonial administrator in New France. Born in Montreal, he was an early governor of French Louisiana, appointed four ...

in 1736 and Vaudreuil in 1752. After the United States acquired the territory, it was first considered part of Marion County in the

Alabama Territory The Territory of Alabama (sometimes Alabama Territory) was an organized incorporated territory of the United States. The Alabama Territory was carved from the Mississippi Territory on August 15, 1817 and lasted until December 14, 1819, when it w ...

. The new demarcation lines of 1820-21 established a state boundary that allocated the town and related area to Mississippi. The early U.S. government built a

cotton gin A cotton gin—meaning "cotton engine"—is a machine that quickly and easily separates cotton fibers from their seeds, enabling much greater productivity than manual cotton separation.. Reprinted by McGraw-Hill, New York and London, 1926 (); a ...

in 1801 at Cotton Gin Port as part of a "plan of civilization" for the local

Chickasaw The Chickasaw ( ) are an indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands. Their traditional territory was in the Southeastern United States of Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee as well in southwestern Kentucky. Their language is classified as ...

, whom it wanted to have adopt European-American customs. The settlement soon became recognized as a trading post for business with the Chickasaw. A road,

Gaines Trace The Gaines Trace was a road in the Mississippi Territory. It was constructed in 1811 and 1812 from the Tennessee River (opposite the Elk River's mouth) to Cotton Gin Port on the upper Tombigbee River and on to Fort Stoddert on the lower Tombigb ...

, was built to the town in 1811 and 1812. This road ran from close to present-day

Muscle Shoals Muscle Shoals is the largest city in Colbert County, Alabama, Colbert County, Alabama, United States. It is located along the Tennessee River in the northern part of the state and, as of the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census, the populati ...

on the

Tennessee River The Tennessee River is the largest tributary of the Ohio River. It is approximately long and is located in the southeastern United States in the Tennessee Valley. The river was once popularly known as the Cherokee River, among other names, ...

to Cotton Gin Port, where it crossed the Tombigbee. From there it continued south to

Fort Stoddert Fort Stoddert, also known as Fort Stoddard, was a stockade fort in the U.S. Mississippi Territory, in what is today Alabama. It was located on a bluff of the Mobile River, near modern Mount Vernon, close to the confluence of the Tombigbee and Al ...

, Alabama. As railroads were constructed in the region, the

Kansas City, Memphis & Birmingham Railroad The Kansas City, Memphis & Birmingham Railroad is a historic railroad that operated in the southern United States. The company was created by consolidation in 1887 from a line of the same name (which was originally incorporated in Mississippi on F ...

bypassed Cotton Gin Port, and established a new railroad town at

Amory, Mississippi Amory is a city in Monroe County, Mississippi. The population was 7,316 at the 2010 census. Located in the northeastern part of the state near the Alabama border, it was founded in 1887 as a railroad town by the Kansas City, Memphis and Birmingh ...

. In a pattern repeated in numerous other places, this bypass resulted in the older town being abandoned, as businesses and residents moved to have access to the railroad at Amory. The ruins of the old town can still be found between the Tenn-Tom Waterway and the

. Relics from the former settlement can be seen at the Amory Municipal Museum.

Levi Colbert Levi Colbert (1759–1834), also known as ''Itawamba'' in Chickasaw, was a leader and chief of the Chickasaw nation. Colbert was called ''Itte-wamba Mingo'', meaning ''bench chief''. He and his brother George Colbert were prominent interpreters ...

, a chief of the Chickasaw, is said to have lived on the bluff west of Cotton Gin Port, near a large spreading oak known as the council tree, a meeting place for tribal elders. The former cotton gin was built near here.Dr. W.A. Evans, ''Aberdeen Examiner'', July 2, 1936 (excerpt from ''The Heritage of Lamar County, Alabama'', by John Mitchell Allman III, (1938-2018)).

References

* Elliott, Jack D. and Wells, Mary Ann. (2003). ''Cotton Gin Port : a frontier settlement on the Upper Tombigbee''. Jackson, Mississippi: Quail Ridge Press for the Mississippi Historical Society.

External links

*http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~cmamcrk4/pkt14.html *https://web.archive.org/web/20120219002136/http://files.usgwarchives.org/ms/monroe/history/cottongp.txt {{authority control Former populated places in Monroe County, Mississippi Ghost towns in Mississippi National Register of Historic Places in Monroe County, Mississippi Populated places on the National Register of Historic Places in Mississippi Chickasaw Louisiana (New France) Pre-statehood history of Mississippi Native American history of Mississippi