Mississippi was the second southern state to declare its secession from the United States, doing so on January 9, 1861. It joined with six other southern states to form the Confederacy on February 4, 1861. Mississippi's location along the lengthy Mississippi River made it strategically important to both the Union and the Confederacy; dozens of battles were fought in the state as armies repeatedly clashed near key towns and transportation nodes.
Memorial "commemorating the service of the 1st and 3rd Mississippi infantry regiments, and all Mississippians of African Descent who participated in the Vicksburg Campaign"
Nathan Bedford Forrest
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Nathan Bedford Forrest was a Confederate Army general during the American Civil War and was later the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan from 1867 to 1869.
Nathan Bedford Forrest Boyhood Home, Chapel Hill, Tennessee (2021)
"N. B. Forrest – Before the War" from Andrew Nelson Lytle's Bedford Forrest and His Critter Company (1931)
N. B. Forrest, his 15-year-old son W. M. Forrest, and his 25-year-old brother Jeffrey E. Forrest all enlisted in the Confederate States Army on the same day ("Capt. William M. Forrest With a Group of the Members of Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest's Staff" Memphis Commercial Appeal, February 9, 1908)