Grand Gulf, Mississippi

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Grand Gulf, Mississippi
Map of Mississippi River showing Grand Gulf, Mississippi and Bruinsburg, Mississippi (1840).jpg
1840 map of Mississippi River showing Grand Gulf, Bruinsburg, and Rodney
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Grand Gulf
Location of Grand Gulf
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Grand Gulf
Grand Gulf (the United States)
Coordinates: 32°02′00″N91°03′09″W / 32.03333°N 91.05250°W / 32.03333; -91.05250
Country Flag of the United States.svg  United States
State Flag of Mississippi.svg  Mississippi
County Claiborne
Elevation
29 m (95 ft)
Time zone UTC-6 (Central (CST))
  Summer (DST) UTC-5 (CDT)
GNIS feature ID670578 [1]

Grand Gulf is a ghost town in Claiborne County, Mississippi, United States. [1]

Contents

History

Grand Gulf was named for the large whirlpool, (or gulf), formed by the Mississippi River flowing against a large rocky bluff. [2] La Salle and Zadok Cramer commented on the dangers caused by the eddies at Grand Gulf. The British and Spanish created settlements in the area and it continued to grow after the land became part of the United States. [3] The community of Grand Gulf was incorporated in 1833. [2]

Cotton from Copiah, Hinds, and Claiborne counties was shipped on the Mississippi River from Grand Gulf, and the town served as the shipping point for Port Gibson, which was located further inland. [2] By 1835, Grand Gulf handled more cotton than any other city in Mississippi except Natchez and Vicksburg. A railroad was built to connect Grand Gulf to Port Gibson. [4]

By 1854, Grand Gulf was home to almost 1,000 citizens, had two churches, a town hall, a hospital, theater, cotton press, saw mill, and grist mill. [5]

Grand Gulf was devastated by multiple yellow fever epidemics, which were reported across the country at Pittsfield, Massachusetts. [6] The epidemics traveled with passengers and workers on the riverboats, repeatedly recurring through the nineteenth century.

A newspaper, The Grand Gulf Advertiser, was published in Grand Gulf. [2]

A post office operated under the name Grand Gulf for more than 100 years, from 1829 to 1932. [7]

Civil War

Lithograph of Union forces in pursuit of Confederate forces at Grand Gulf on May 26, 1862 Grand Gulf, Mississippi (1862).tiff
Lithograph of Union forces in pursuit of Confederate forces at Grand Gulf on May 26, 1862

During the American Civil War, Grand Gulf was the site of multiple encounters. In 1862, Admiral David Farragut attempted to take a fleet of Union gunboats upriver past Grand Gulf to attack Vicksburg. He was harassed by guerillas shooting from Grand Gulf, which caused General Thomas Williams to attempt to burn the town. Local residents convinced him that the gunfire did not come from citizens and the town was temporarily spared. [8] A few weeks later, however, the town was burned by Union forces, after they learned that the Confederates were placing artillery in the village. [9]

During Ulysses S. Grant's Vicksburg Campaign, Confederate forces repelled his invasion fleet during the Battle of Grand Gulf. They did not let his forces pass north on the Mississippi River. Grant took his forces south to Bruinsburg, fought the Battle of Port Gibson, and marched overland to take Vicksburg. [3]

Decline

After the Civil War, Grand Gulf's population continued to decline. The Mississippi River slowly shifted westward and the town soon became landlocked. [3] By 1900, Grand Gulf had a population of 150. [2]

Today

The Grand Gulf Military State Park contains a museum with artifacts from the battle and multiple interpretive exhibits, along with the earth works from Forts Wade and Cobun. [10]

Grand Gulf is the location of the Grand Gulf Nuclear Station. After an upgrade in 2012, it is the largest single-unit nuclear power plant in the country and fifth largest in the world. [11]

The Grand Gulf Mound, an Early Marksville culture archaeological site, is located near Grand Gulf. [12]

Notable residents

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Claiborne County, Mississippi</span> County in Mississippi, United States

Claiborne County is a county located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2020 census, the population was 9,135. Its county seat is Port Gibson. The county is named after William Claiborne, the second governor of the Mississippi Territory.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Port Gibson, Mississippi</span> City in Mississippi, United States

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vicksburg campaign</span> 1862–63 American Civil War campaign in Mississippi

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grand Gulf Nuclear Station</span> Nuclear power plant in Mississippi

Grand Gulf Nuclear Station is a nuclear power station with one operational GE BWR reactor. It lies on a 2,100 acres (850 ha) site near Port Gibson, Mississippi. The site is wooded and contains two lakes. The plant has a 520-foot natural draft cooling tower. As of January 2023, the plant employs 675 people.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Port Gibson</span> Battle of the American Civil War

The Battle of Port Gibson was fought between a Union Army commanded by Major General Ulysses S. Grant and a reinforced Confederate States Army division led by Major General John S. Bowen. Though the outnumbered Confederate soldiers fought stubbornly, they were steadily pressed back during the day by Major General John A. McClernand's troops. Bowen eventually conceded the field by withdrawing north toward Vicksburg, Mississippi. The battle occurred near Port Gibson, Mississippi, during the Vicksburg Campaign of the American Civil War.

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The Battle of Raymond was fought on May 12, 1863, near Raymond, Mississippi, during the Vicksburg campaign of the American Civil War. Initial Union attempts to capture the strategically important Mississippi River city of Vicksburg failed. Beginning in late April 1863, Union Major General Ulysses S. Grant led another try. After crossing the river into Mississippi and winning the Battle of Port Gibson, Grant began moving east, intending to turn back west and attack Vicksburg. A portion of Grant's army consisting of Major General James B. McPherson's 10,000 to 12,000-man XVII Corps moved northeast towards Raymond. The Confederate commander of Vicksburg, Lieutenant General John C. Pemberton, ordered Brigadier General John Gregg and his 3,000 to 4,000-strong brigade from Jackson to Raymond.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Grand Gulf</span> 1863 battle of the American Civil War

The Battle of Grand Gulf was fought on April 29, 1863, during the American Civil War. Union Army forces commanded by Major General Ulysses S. Grant had failed several times to bypass or capture the Confederate-held city of Vicksburg, Mississippi, during the Vicksburg campaign. Grant decided to move his army south of Vicksburg, cross the Mississippi River, and then advance on the city. A Confederate Army division under Brigadier General John S. Bowen prepared defenses—Forts Wade and Cobun—at Grand Gulf, Mississippi, south of Vicksburg. To clear the way for a Union crossing, seven Union Navy ironclad warships from the Mississippi Squadron commanded by Admiral David Dixon Porter bombarded the Confederate defenses at Grand Gulf on April 29. Union fire silenced Fort Wade and killed its commander, but the overall Confederate position held. Grant decided to cross the river elsewhere.

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The Port Gibson Battlefield is the site near Port Gibson, Mississippi where the 1863 Battle of Port Gibson was fought during the American Civil War. The battlefield covers about 3,400 acres (1,400 ha) of land west of the city, astride Rodney Road, where Union Army forces were establishing a beachhead after crossing the Mississippi River in a bid to take the Confederate fortress of Vicksburg. The Union victory secured that beachhead and paved the way for the eventual fall of Vicksburg. A 2,080-acre (840 ha) area surrounding part of the site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972, and a larger area was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2005. In 2009, the battlefield was designated by the Civil War Preservation Trust as one of its Top 10 most endangered Civil War battlefields. In 2011, the Civil War Preservation Trust was renamed the Civil War Trust, which in 2018 became a division of the American Battlefield Trust. The Trust and its partners have acquired and preserved 644 acres (2.61 km2) of the Port Gibson battlefield.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Grand Gulf Military State Park</span> United States historic place

Grand Gulf Military State Park is a Mississippi state park located 10 miles northwest of Port Gibson in an unincorporated area, now the ghost town of Grand Gulf, in Claiborne County, Mississippi. The park includes the remnants of two batteries that fired on and repelled Ulysses S. Grant's forces during the Battle of Grand Gulf. After the Battle of Port Gibson, Grant made Grand Gulf his base of operations. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is a Mississippi Landmark.

The Grand Gulf Mound (22CB522) is an Early Marksville culture archaeological site located near Port Gibson in Claiborne County, Mississippi, on a bluff 1 mile (1.6 km) east of the Mississippi River, 2 miles (3.2 km) north of the mouth of the Big Black River. The site has an extant burial mound, and may have possibly had two others in the past. The site is believed to have been occupied from 50 to 200 CE. Copper objects, Marksville culture ceramics and a stone platform pipe were found in excavations at the site. The site is believed to be the only site in the Natchez Bluffs region to have been actively involved in the Hopewell Interaction Sphere. It is one of four mounds in the area believed to date to the Early Marksville period, the other three being the Marskville Mound 4 and Crooks Mounds A and B, all located in nearby Louisiana. The mound itself was built in several stages over many years, very similar to the Crooks Mound A in La Salle Parish, Louisiana. Unlike some other Hopewell sites, such as the Tremper Mound in Scioto County, Ohio, the site showed no evidence of a mortuary or communal structure previous to the construction of the mound. The beginning stage is believed to have been a rectangular earthen platform .5 feet (0.15 m) in height, 20 feet (6.1 m) wide on its east–west axis and 3.5 feet (1.1 m) long on its north–south axis. After a period of use, this platform was covered with a mantle of earth 5.5 feet (1.7 m) in height and 26.5 feet (8.1 m) wide along its east–west axis, with an extremely hard cap of earth 0.2 feet (0.061 m) covering the mound. During a third stage another mantle of earth was added to the mound, bringing it to a height of 10 feet (3.0 m) and to approximately 32 feet (9.8 m) in width on its east–west axis.

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References

  1. 1 2 "Grand Gulf, Mississippi". Geographic Names Information System . United States Geological Survey, United States Department of the Interior.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 Rowland, Dunbar (1907). Mississippi: Comprising Sketches of Counties, Towns, Events, Institutions, and Persons, Arranged in Cyclopedic Form. Vol. 1. Southern Historical Publishing Association. p. 794.
  3. 1 2 3 Bragg, Marion (1977). Historic names and places on the lower Mississippi River. Vicksburg, MS: Mississippi River Commission. p. 174.
  4. Mississippi: The WPA Guide to the Magnolia State. Univ. Press of Mississippi. 12 November 2010. p. 326. ISBN   978-1-60473-289-4.
  5. Conclin, George (1854). Conclins' New River Guide, Or, A Gazetteer of All the Towns on the Western Waters: Containing Sketches of the Cities, Towns, and Countries Bordering on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, and Their Principal Tributaries : Together with Their Population, Products, Commerce, &c., &c., &c. : and Many Interesting Events of History Connected with Them. Cincinnati, Ohio: J.A. & U.P. James. p. 102.
  6. Weiser, Kathy. "Grand Gulf, Mississippi – A Bustling Port Along the River". Legends of America. Retrieved 15 May 2020.
  7. "Claiborne County". Jim Forte Postal History. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  8. Ballard, Michael (2000). Civil War Mississippi. Jackson, MS: University of Mississippi Press. p. 42. ISBN   0-87805-870-2.
  9. Miller, Donald L. (2019} Vicksburg: Grant's Campaign That Broke the Confederacy New York:Simon & Schuster. p.136 ISBN   1451641370
  10. "Grand Gulf Military Monument Park". battlefields.org. American Battlefield Trust. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
  11. "Grand Gulf Nuclear Station". entergy-nuclear.com. Entergy Corporation. Retrieved 15 May 2020.
  12. Brookes, Samuel O. (1976). The Grand Gulf Mound: Salvage Excavation of an Early Marksville Burial Mound in Claiborne County, Mississippi. Mississippi Archaeological Survey Report. Jackson, Mississippi: Mississippi Department of Archives and History.
  13. Thomas H. Somerville, "A Sketch of the Supreme Court of Mississippi", in Horace W. Fuller, ed., The Green Bag , Vol. XI (1899), p. 512.
  14. "James Monroe Trotter". ohiocivilwarcentral.com. 20 October 2022. Retrieved 12 November 2023.