Edward McGehee
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Edward McGehee (November 8, 1786 – October 1, 1880) was an American judge and major planter in
Wilkinson County, Mississippi Wilkinson County is a county located in the southwest corner of the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of 2020, its population was 8,587. Its county seat is Woodville. Bordered by the Mississippi River on the west, the county is named for James Wil ...
. He owned nearly 1,000
slaves Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...
to work his thousands of acres of cotton land at his Bowling Green Plantation. In the 1830s, McGehee was among a group of major planters who founded the Mississippi Colonization Society to transport
free people of color In the context of the history of slavery in the Americas, free people of color (; ) were primarily people of mixed African, European, and Native American descent who were not enslaved. However, the term also applied to people born free who we ...
from the state to West Africa. They intended to remove what they considered the destabilizing threat of free people of color in a slave society. In 1838, they created a settlement known as Mississippi-in-Africa, which became part of the
Commonwealth of Liberia Liberia, officially the Colony of Liberia, later the Commonwealth of Liberia, was a Colony, private colony of the American Colonization Society between 1821, before becoming the self-proclaimed independent nation of the Liberia, Republic of Liberi ...
in 1841.


Biography


Early life

Edward McGehee was born on November 8, 1786. His father was Micajah McGehee and his mother, Ann (Scott) McGehee.


Career

After becoming established as an attorney, McGehee was appointed as a state judge in Mississippi.Helen Kerr Kempe, ''The Pelican Guide to Old Homes of Mississippi: Natchez and the South'', Gretna, Louisiana: Pelican Publishing, 1989, pp. 9–1

/ref> A wealthy cotton planter, he owned the Bowling Green Plantation near Woodville in
Wilkinson County, Mississippi Wilkinson County is a county located in the southwest corner of the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of 2020, its population was 8,587. Its county seat is Woodville. Bordered by the Mississippi River on the west, the county is named for James Wil ...
.D. Clayton James, ''Antebellum Natchez'', New Orleans, Louisiana: Louisiana State University, 1993, p. 19

/ref>Patti Carr Black, Marion Barnwell, ''Touring Literary Mississippi'', Jackson, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi, 2002, p. 7

/ref> The plantation spread across several thousand acres; McGehee held nearly 1,000 slaves to work this vast area.Harold S. Wilson, ''Confederate Industry: Manufacturers and Quartermasters in the Civil War'', Jackson, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi, 2005, pp. 190–19

/ref> Additionally, McGehee owned a textile factory on his plantation, with about 100 slaves working in it. In 1831, he purchased the West Feliciana Parish, Louisiana, West Feliciana Rail Road Company in
Louisiana Louisiana ( ; ; ) is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It borders Texas to the west, Arkansas to the north, and Mississippi to the east. Of the 50 U.S. states, it ranks 31st in area and 25 ...
. As early as the 1830s, together with other planters Isaac Ross (1760–1838),
Stephen Duncan Stephen Duncan (March 4, 1787 – January 29, 1867) was an American planter and banker in Mississippi. He was born and studied medicine in Pennsylvania, but moved to Natchez District, Mississippi Territory in 1808 and became the wealthiest ...
(1787–1867),
John Ker John Ker (8 August 1673 – 8 July 1726), born John Crawford in Crawfurdland, Ayrshire, was a Scots Presbyterian linked with Cameronian radicals who between 1705 and 1709 acted as a government informer against the Jacobites. Dogged by financi ...
(1789–1850), and educator/minister
Jeremiah Chamberlain Jeremiah Chamberlain (January 5, 1794 – September 5, 1851) was an American Presbyterianism, Presbyterian minister, educator and college administrator. He was president of three institutions of higher education between 1823 and 1851, specifica ...
(1794–1851), McGehee co-founded the Mississippi Colonization Society, whose goal was to send freedmen and free people of color to
Liberia Liberia, officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country on the West African coast. It is bordered by Sierra Leone to Liberia–Sierra Leone border, its northwest, Guinea to Guinea–Liberia border, its north, Ivory Coast to Ivory Coast–Lib ...
in West Africa.Mary Carol Miller, ''Lost Mansions of Mississippi'', Jackson, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi, 2010, Volume II, pp. 53—5

/ref>Dale Edwyna Smith, ''The Slaves of Liberty: Freedom in Amite County, Mississippi, 1820–1868'', Routledge, 2013, pp. 15–2

/ref> The organization was modeled after the
American Colonization Society The American Colonization Society (ACS), initially the Society for the Colonization of Free People of Color of America, was an American organization founded in 1816 by Robert Finley to encourage and support the repatriation of freeborn peop ...
, but it focused on freedmen from Mississippi, where slaves outnumbered whites by a three-to-one ratio. During the
American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861May 26, 1865; also known by Names of the American Civil War, other names) was a civil war in the United States between the Union (American Civil War), Union ("the North") and the Confederate States of A ...
of 1861–1865, McGehee supported the Union. However, he also sold clothes made in his textile factory to the
Confederate States Army The Confederate States Army (CSA), also called the Confederate army or the Southern army, was the Military forces of the Confederate States, military land force of the Confederate States of America (commonly referred to as the Confederacy) duri ...
. The mansion at his Bowling Green Plantation was burned down by
United States Colored Troops United States Colored Troops (USCT) were Union Army regiments during the American Civil War that primarily comprised African Americans, with soldiers from other ethnic groups also serving in USCT units. Established in response to a demand fo ...
in 1864.Donald Davidson, ''Still Rebels, Still Yankees: And Other Essays'', New Orleans, Louisiana: Louisiana State University Press, 1999, pp. 99–10

/ref> His wife wrote about the incident in '' Army & Navy Herald,'' a Confederate newspaper.


Personal life

He married Mary Hines Burruss. They had three sons and two daughters: * Charles Goodrich McGehee (1823–1903) * Francis William McGehee (1831–1843) * John Burruss McGehee (1836–1913) * Harriett Lucinda McGehee (1844–1851) * Augusta Eugenia McGehee (1854–1882)


Death

McGehee died on October 1, 1880, at his plantation in
Woodville, Mississippi Woodville is one of the oldest towns in Mississippi and is the county seat of Wilkinson County, Mississippi, United States. Its population as of 2020 was 928. Geography According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of ...
.


Legacy

* Author
Stark Young Stark Young (October 11, 1881 – January 6, 1963) was an American teacher, playwright, novelist, painter, literary critic, translator, and essayist. Early life Young was born on October 11, 1881, in Como, Mississippi. His father, Alfred Al ...
(1881–1963) was his nephew. He wrote about the fire that destroyed the plantation house in his 1934 novel ''So Red the Rose''. He also referred to it symbolically in his 1951 novel ''The Pavilion''. * The former ''Edward McGehee Church of the Methodist Episcopal Church,'' built between 1851 and 1853 and located at the intersection of Lafayette, Girod and Baronne streets in
New Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...
, was named in his honor.Mary Louise Christovich, Roulhac Toledano, ''New Orleans Architecture: The American Sector'', Gretna, Louisiana: Pelican Publishing, 1 Jul 1998, p. 15

/ref> It was purchased by the Freemasonry, Freemasons in 1906 and renamed as the ''Scottish Rite Cathedral.'' * The former ''Edward McGehee College of Girls'' in Mississippi was named in his honor; author Henry Walter Featherstun (1849–1932) served as its President.Patronize Home Industry.
''
Woodville Republican The ''Woodville Republican'' is a weekly newspaper published in Woodville, Wilkinson County, Mississippi. It is the oldest newspaper, as well as the oldest business, in continuous incorporated operation in Mississippi Mississippi ( ...
'', December 5, 1891


References


Further reading

* Pitts, Stella. ''The Burning of Bowling Green: The McGehee Mansion, Wilkinson County, Mississippi: an Illustrated History''. Bowling Green Books, 1997. 24 pages.


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:McGehee, Edward 1786 births 1880 deaths People from Wilkinson County, Mississippi American cotton plantation owners 19th-century American planters American slave owners People of the American colonization movement American people of Scottish descent