Mississippi is a southern state of the USA. Mississippi was admitted as a State December 10, 1817. It was explored by De Soto, a Spaniard, in 1539, and by the Frenchmen, Joliet and Marquette, who came down the Mississippi in 1673. In 1682 La Salle took formal possession of the territory for the King of France. Biloxi was. settled by the French under Iberville in 1699.
After the Louisiana bubble the colonies in Mississippi grew slowly. The French ceded the territory to England in 1763, and it was included within the State of Georgia until 1798, when it was organized as a territory by the US Government under provisions like those of the Ordinance of 1787, with the exception of the article relative to slavery. An ordinance of secession was passed by a State Convention the January the 7th, 1861, but was not submitted to a popular vote. The State furnished the President, Jefferson Davis, of the Confederacy. Mississippi was readmitted to the Union on February the 23rd, 1870. In 1875 the white 'Democracy' resorted to intimidation to keep the blacks from the polls, and succeeded in securing possession of the State.
Abbreviations
Gazetteer
Research Mississippi