Natchez

History

Established by French colonists in 1716, Natchez is one of the oldest and most important European settlements in the lower Mississippi River Valley. After the French lost the French and Indian War (Seven Years' War), they ceded Natchez and the surrounding territory to Great Britain in the Treaty of Paris of 1763. (It later traded other territory east of the Mississippi River with Great Britain, which expanded what it called West Florida.) The British Crown bestowed land grants in this territory to officers who had served with distinction in the war. These officers came mostly from the colonies of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. They established plantations and brought their upper-class lifestyle to the area. Beginning in 1779, the area was under Spanish colonial rule. After defeat in the American Revolutionary War, Great Britain ceded the territory to the United States under the terms of the Treaty of Paris (1783). Spain was not a party to the treaty, and it was their forces who had taken Natchez from British troops. Although Spain had been allied with the American colonists, it was more interested in advancing its power at Britain's expense. Once the war was over, they were not inclined to give up that which they had acquired by force. In 1797, Major Andrew Ellicott of the United States marched to the highest ridge in the young town of Natchez, set up camp, and raised the first American flag, claiming Natchez and all former Spanish lands east of the Mississippi above the 31st parallel for the United States. After the United States acquired this area from the Spanish, the city served as the capital of the Mississippi Territory and then of the state of Mississippi. It predates Jackson by more than a century; the latter replaced Natchez as the capital in 1822,…

Geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which are land and (4.62%) is water. The physical characteristics that control land use within the municipality are the natural drains, which locals call 'bayous', and the network of deep ravines across the landscape. The elevation of the Mississippi River at Natchez is approximately , and the river gauge reference point for Natchez is . The Natchez bluffs are composed of strata that might indicate a later geological event that cut a trench into the bluffs depositing a soil variation. Natchez has a humid subtropical climate (Cfa) under the Köppen climate classification system.

Race & ethnicity