By the Treaty of Paris of 1783 Great Britain ceded its Indian Territory(1) to the
US.
Like the rest of the territory its southern part - inhabited by independent Native
American nations (Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, ...) - remained at first unorganized
and was claimed both by Georgia (at first the whole area, later only the northern
part) and Spain (the southern part).
By the Treaty of San Lorenzo of 1795 Spain relinquished its claim and three years
later this part was organized as the US Mississippi Territory.
In 1802 Georgia - which had made some attempts to colonize the part it claimed (2)
- gave up its claim in exchange of $ 1,250,000 and in 1804 the northern part was
added to the Territory.
After the arrival of the first important groups of white migrants the Mississippi
Territory was divided in 1817 into the US state of Mississippi (western part) and
the new US Territory of Alabama (eastern part). (3)(1) This Indian territory - establshed in 1763 as a separate British dependency,
covering the lands between the Mississippi and the original US states - can
not be confused with the Indian Territory established in 1834 West of the
Mississippi by the US government.
(2) Twice the government of Georgia granted the so-called "Yazoo Lands" to
colonization companies :
1789 : the South Carolina Yazoo Company, the Tennessee Company and the
Virginia Yazoo Company
1794 : the Georgia Company, the Georgia-Mississippi Company, the Tennessee
Company and the Upper Mississippi Company.
Each time the attempt failed mainly as a consequence of financial fraude and
corruption.
(3) As to the Native American nations they gradually ceded all their lands to
the US and were for the most relocated to Indian Territory in the 1830's
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STATE OFFICERS
Governors
1844 - 1848 Albert Gallatin Brown 1813 - 1880
1848 - 1850 Joseph Warren Matthews 1812 - 1862
1850 - 1851 John Anthony Quitman (2x) 1798 - 1858
1851 John Isaac Guion* 1802 - 1855
1851 - 1852 James Whitfield* 1791 - 1875
1852 - 1854 Henry Stuart Foote 1804 - 1880
1854 John Jones Pettus* 1813 - 1867
1854 - 1857 John Jones McRae 1815 - 1868
1857 - 1859 William McWillie 1795 - 1869
1859 - 1861 John Jones Pettus (2x), continued
as governor of the Confederate
state of Mississippi
MISSISSIPPI 1861 - 1870 : CONFEDERATION AND RECONSTRUCTION
Chronology
(See also CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA - to be added)
1861
Jan 09 : Mississippi seceded from the Union.
Feb 08 : Mississippi became a founding member of the Confederate States of America.
1862
May 30 : The capture of Corinth initiated the occupation of Northern Mississippi
by Union forces, who later gradually conquered the whole state.
1863
Jul 04 : The major Union victory at Vicksburg and the subsequent occupation of the
state capital Jackson (Jul 17) effectively ended Confederate rule in most
of the state, forcing the Confederate government to move the seat of its
administration first to Macon (Aug 1863) and then to Columbus (Nov 1863)
and again to Macon (Mar 1864). (1)
1865
May 04 : The Confederate surrender in Mississippi was followed by a brief period
of direct military rule (Union Army and Department of the Tennessee).
Jun 13 : Restoration of civilian rule under Union occupation (first under the Union
Department of the Mississippi until 1866, then under the Union Department
of the Tennessee)
1867
Mar 02 : To prevent Mississippi from rejecting the Fourteenth Amendment of the US
Constitution, providing citizenship to - and protection of - freed slaves
the state was placed under direct Union military rule. (The Amendment was
nevertheless rejected on Jan 21 1868).
(1)"The Free State of Jones"
In Oct 1863 Confederate deserters led by Newton Knight seized power in much
of the county of Jones in Southern Mississippi.
More or less supported by local Union forces they resisted for some months
all attempts of the Confederate army to subdue them. But in the course of
1864 they were eventually dispersed, only a handfull of them surviving in
the impenetrable swamps until the end of the war.
These events were later amplified both by the locals and by Union writings,
giving birth to the legend of a "Free State of Jones", described as a kind
of anti-Confederate mini republic.
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STATE OFFICERS OF THE CONFEDERATE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI 1861 - 1865
Governors
1861 - 1863 John Jones Pettus (2x),
governed only part of the state
since May 1862 s.a.
1863 - 1865 Charles Clark, governed only
part of the state, arrested
by the Union authoorities 1810 - 1877
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ADMINISTRATORS UNDER UNION OCCUPATION AND RECONSTRUCTION 1865 - 1870
(for more on the Union administrative structure and offices in the occupied South
see : The Confederate States of America : Union occupation and Reconstruction - to
be added)
UNION MILITARY COMMANDERS AND ADMINISTRATORS
Union forces operating in Mississippi were at first subordinated to the Union Army
and Department of the Mississippi (in 1862) and thereafter to the Union Army and
Department of the Tennessee.
(No military governors seem to have been appointed for the "pacified" parts of the
state and the commanders of the field armies remained in charge of administrative
affairs until the restoration of civilian government)
A separate "Reconstruction" Union Department of the Mississippi was established in
1865.
Commanders of the Union Department of the Mississippi
(subordinated to the Union Military Division of the Gulf in 1865 and then to the
Union Military Division of the Tennessee)
1865 - 186. MajGen. Henry Warner Slocum 1827 - 1894
...
In 1866 this separate department was abolished and Mississippi became part of the
Union Department of the Tennessee. Thereafter it was included into the 4th Military
District from 1867 to 1870.
Commanders of the Union District of Mississippi
(= de facto military governors, directly supervising the whole state administration)
1867 - 1869 MajGen. Alvan Cullen Gillem 1830 - 1875
1869 - 1870 MajGen. Adelbert Ames, also
provisional governor of the
state of Mississippi since
1868 1835 - 1933
Assistant Commissioners of the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands
(The "Freedmen's Bureau" was concerned with the general welfare of the freed black
slaves - especially with their education - and with their integration in the postwar
society)
1865 - 1866 Col. Samuel Thomas
1866 - 1867 MajGen. Thomas John Wood 1823 - 1906
1867 - 1869 MajGen. Alvan Cullen Gillem s.a.
1869 MajGen. Adelbert Ames s.a.
STATE OFFICERS
Governors
1865 William Lewis Sharkey, appointed
provisional governor by the US
President 1797 - 1873
1865 - 1868 Benjamin Grubb Humphreys,
removed from office by the US
military authorities 1808 - 1882
1868 - 1870 MajGen. Adelbert Ames, appointed
by the Commander of the 4th Military
District, also Commander of the
Union District of Mississippi in
1869 - 1870 s.a.
US STATE OF MISSISSIPPI
On Jan 17 1870 Mississippi finally ratified the 14th Amendment and was consequently
readmitted into the Union on Feb 23. (1)
(1) The State remained however under Union military occupation until 1877, first
as part of the Union Department of the South, then (since 1871) as part of
the Union Department of the Gulf.
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STATE OFFICERS
Governors
1870 - 1871 James Luck Alcorn 1816 - 1894
1871 - 1874 Ridgley Ceylon Powers 1836 - 1912
1874 - 1876 Adelbert Ames (2x) 1835 - 1833
1876 - 1882 John Marshall Stone 1830 - 1900
1882 - 1890 Robert Lowry 1830 - 1910
1890 - 1896 John Marshall Stone (2x)
1896 - 1900 Anselm Joseph McLaurin 1848 - 1909
1900 - 1904 Andrew Houston Longino 1855 - 1942
1904 - 1908 James Kimble Vardaman 1861 - 1930
1908 - 1912 Edmund Favor Noel 1856 - 1927
1912 - 1916 Earl LeRoy Brewer 1869 - 1942
1916 - 1920 Theodore Gilmore Bilbo 1877 - 1947
1920 - 1924 Lee Maurice Russell 1875 - 1943
1924 - 1927 Henry Lewis Whitfield 1868 - 1927
1927 - 1928 Herron Dennis Murphree* 1886 - 1949
1928 - 1932 Theodore Gilmore Bilbo (2x)
1932 - 1936 Martin Sennett Conner 1891 - 1950
1936 - 1940 Hugh Lawson White 1881 - 1965
1940 - 1943 Paul Burney Johnson 1880 - 1943
1943 - 1944 Herron Dennis Murphree* (2x)
1944 - 1946 Thomas Lowry Bailey 1888 - 1946
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