The United States is more a continental federation than a country. Mississippi is a different place to California. Rather like asking a Norwegian why Hungary is a certain way and expecting them to have a deep insight because they are all Europeans, it seemed to be a good time to get a bit smarter about other places and go visit fellow Americans down south.
THE ROUTE
Memphis, Tennessee was the start and finish point, with a counter-clockwise route following the Mississippi south to Vicksburg and Natchez, cornering at Lafayette, Louisiana, before stopping on the Gulf coast at Biloxi and Ocean Springs, Mississippi. Then up to Oxford, Mississippi and finally back to Memphis.
MEMPHIS
Memphis grew as a trading hub on the Mississippi River and as a large urban center for western Tennessee and the surrounding states.
It’s a mid-size town with many cultural identifiers as the center of the Memphis Blues, and the home of the Civil Rights Museum. Elvis lived here and a visit to Graceland is worth the 2-4 hours that the tour takes. You’ll really need a car though – the downtown is quite small and while Beale Street is worth a look as the cradle of the Memphis Blues, it’s been touristified and most other locations are a bit dispersed. I stayed east in the Midtown area. The airport is just 10 miles from the city center and easy to use. A few places to see include:
National Civil Rights Museum (450 Mulberry Street). Located on and built around the Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King was assassinated in April 1968, this is well worth visiting to understand the civil rights struggle in the US.
It’s quite extensive and mostly focuses on the postwar period through to the 1970s, and you should allow at least 2 hours.
The museum features exhibits about the Green Book, a travel guide published in Harlem between 1936 and 1966 so that African-American travelers could avoid discrimination and violence, and find a welcome place along their journey.
Stax Museum of American Soul Music (926 E McLemore Avenue). Stax Records was the pre-eminent soul record label in the 1950s-1970s, and the museum explains how musicians in the Memphis area gathered in gospel, blues and country influences to produce a unique sound that complemented other regional sounds such as Motown and Nashville. The other major Memphis label, Sun Records, founded by Sam Phillips in 1952, was famous for discovering the likes of Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash, but moved to Nashville in 1969.
Graceland (Elvis Presley Boulevard). Elvis Presley’s mansion and accompanying personal aircraft. Allow at least two-three hours for the organized tours and book ahead online at https://www.graceland.com. You can also stay at the affiliated guesthouse for the full Elvis experience.
Eating Out. Not surprisingly BBQ and hot fried chicken are two staples worth checking out, although there are plenty of more contemporary takes on southern cooking.
Central BBQ – traditional local mini-chain, downtown (147 E Butler Avenue) and midtown (2249 Central Avenue).
Arnold’s BBQ and Grill (337 Madison Ave #2).
Hattie B’s Hot Chicken – classic fried chicken, in the midtown (596 Cooper Street).
Gus’s World Famous Fried Chicken – one of the originals, downtown (310 S Front Street) is usually busier than the east Memphis (730 S Mendenhall Road) branches and both are excellent.
Craft Beer. Memphis has some good craft beer options, mostly around the downtown area.
Ghost River Brewery & Taproom (827 S Main St, Memphis, TN 38106)
High Cotton Brewing Company (598 Monroe Avenue)
Memphis Made Brewing Co. (768 Cooper St), located in the Cooper-Young district.
Wiseacre Brewing Company (main taproom at 398 South B.B. King Boulevard and also for East Memphis at 2783 Broad Avenue).
The Mississippi Delta Cottonfield Country
Driving south towards Vicksburg along the east side of the Mississippi, you’ll pass through cottonfield areas – requiring substantial irrigation hence their location close to the river – that are now industrial farms. This was a major center of the slaver agricultural economy and to this day, towns like Clarksdale and Greenfield are still quite poor – Mississippi takes turns with West Virginia to have the lowest average per capita income in the Union. This is also the home of many blues and gospel artists and Clarksdale is worth a stop to see the Delta Blues Museum (1 Blues Alley, Clarksdale) and take a wander round.
The center has a rundown air to it, common to many smaller towns that peaked in the postwar period but then depopulated or suburbanized. Clarksdale and the surrounding area saw substantial outward migration as agriculture mechanized in the mid-20th century and urban centers such as Chicago offered better opportunities.
There are various memorials to musicians, such as Sam Cooke, who grew up here but left, or Ike Turner, who was also a local DJ, as well as the infamous but now workaday crossroads (North State Street and Desoto Avenue) where Robert Johnson allegedly sold his soul to the devil in exchange for his musical talent. The Mississippi Blues Trail website is worth visiting to see who did what and where: http://www.msbluestrail.org/delta
Abe’s Bar-B-Q is located on the southeast side of the crossroads at 616 N State if you’re there around lunchtime. A good place to stay is the historical Riverside Hotel, which as an African-American owned hotel accommodated many musicians in the day. http://www.riversideclarksdale.com
Vicksburg
Vicksburg, located on a hilly overlook of the intersection between the Yazoo and Mississippi rivers, is a good place to stay for a day, and a visit to the Civil War battlefield park just east of the city is well worth it. A major market center for the cotton economy, it was fortified by the Confederacy and heavily shelled during siege by Union forces in 1863. Subsequently rebuilt with a residential and downtown core from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, it’s walkable and attractive. You’ll find a set of historical buildings in town, including the 1863 siege headquarters of the Confederate General Pemberton (1018 Crawford Street) and the postwar railroad terminal (1010 Levee Street), by the river, also the site of the local battlefield museum (http://www.vicksburgbattlefieldmuseum.net).
Washington Street has most of what you need for an evening out, including craft beer (Cottonwood Public House, 1311 Washington) and few southern cooking options (Rusty’s Riverfront Grill, 901 Washington and 10 South Rooftop Bar & Grill, 1301 Washington). I stayed at the Duff Green Mansion (1114 1st E Street), which has a preserved antebellum-era interior.
The Vicksburg National Military Park (3201 Clay Street https://www.nps.gov/vick/index.htm), just east of the city, covers most of the battlefield sites of the Union attack and siege of Confederate Vicksburg in 1863. Grant’s first major victory, the conquest of Vicksburg on July 4, 1863, robbed the Confederacy of control of the Mississippi River and split the southern states apart. Founded in 1899, the park covers specific battle sites and fortifications are identified, along with monuments installed by States and veterans of both sides after the war.
The Confederate monuments – mostly installed at the turn of the 19th century – are oblivious to the misery that slavery caused, or the fact of their treason. The park is best accessed by car and there are parking areas along the route so that you can get out and walk the main areas. You can also download the battlefield app (https://www.battlefields.org/visit/mobile-apps/vicksburg-battle-app) which supplements the rather handy park map.
The battlefield’s preservation less than 40 years after events kept many of the features from development and you can understand what it must have been like to make a frontal attack on a well-entrenched enemy.
You’ll enhance your experience and help the park if you hire a guide via the park website. It’s worth seeing the USS Cairo (3201 Clay Street), a recovered and partially restored Union Navy steam-powered ironclad that bombarded Vicksburg and is now housed in an open air shelter.
Vicksburg is surrounded by other smaller battlefield memorials. The campaign consisted of multiple attempts to force the city, including the futile Battle of Chickasaw Bayou, where General Sherman’s force of 9,000 attacked from a bayou against a Confederate fortification and were thrown back with heavy loss of life. Port Gibson, about 20 miles south of Vicksburg, was the scene of a holding action by the Confederates as the Union forces advanced north from their landing grounds.
Natchez
Natchez was founded in 1716 as a French fort and trading post on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi. It was the southern river hub for the Natchez Trace, a trail that linked the Mississippi with settled colonial-era regions in the southeast, that ran through to Nashville.
Natchez grew as a port and urban center for the Southern agricultural economy and is dotted with former slaveholder mansions. It surrendered in 1862 and avoided the damage inflicted on Vicksburg. Today Natchez is a sedate, well-preserved Victorian-era town, although the lower town on the banks of the river once had a seedy dockside reputation.
There are a couple of decent bar/restaurants, including The Camp, which has a good food and craft beer menu, and the more atmospheric Under-the-Hill Saloon (21 and 25 Silver Street). The Natchez Brewing Company in the main town (207 High Street) is worth a visit for local beer.
Natchez is a good overnight stop; as with many southern towns, there was a violent civil rights struggle in the 1950s and 1960s, that is memorialized outside the City Hall and in the Museum of African-American Culture (301 Main Street). There are various preserved antebellum homes in town and a city trail that overlooks the river. I stayed at the Guest House Mansion Inn (401 Franklin Street).
