Death Along the Natchez Trace

by Josh Foreman, Ryan Starrett

Overview

The Natchez Trace is the "Path of Nations," a 450-mile-long game trail stamped into the earth by primeval bison. Once the domain of the Natchez, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek and Cherokee tribes, the Trace nurtured these groups, but it was also watered with the blood of tribesmen long before any white man trod on it. European settlers eventually used the path to navigate between the backwoods Cumberland settlements and the cosmopolitan city of Natchez, with Spanish gold clinking in the seams of their clothes and wads of tough jerky turning in their cheeks. Today, the Natchez Trace stands as one of the prettiest and most history-soaked pathways in the United States. Join authors Ryan Starrett and Josh Foreman as they look at the myriad ways people have lived and died along it.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781540251251
Publisher:	Arcadia Publishing SC
Publication date:	02/21/2022
Pages:	162
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.44(d)

About the Author

Ryan Starrett was birthed and reared in Jackson, Mississippi. After receiving degrees from the University of Dallas, Adams State University and Spring Hill College, as well as spending a ten-year hiatus in Texas, he has returned home to continue his teaching career. He lives in Madison with his wife, Jackie, and two children, Joseph Padraic and Penelope Rose. Josh Foreman was born and raised in the Jackson Metro Area. He is a sixth-generation Mississippian and an eleventh-generation southerner. He lived, taught and wrote in South Korea from 2005 to 2014. He holds degrees from Mississippi State University and the University of New Hampshire. He lives in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, with his wife, Melissa, and his two children, Keeland and Genevieve.

Table of Contents

Foreword Tony L. Turnbow 7

Preface 9

1 First Contact: Bows, Broadswords and Dead All Around 11

2 Grand Village: A Natchez Funeral 20

3 Creatures of the Trace: Alligators, Snakes and Mosquitoes 27

4 Bleeding Country: Friends and Enemies on the Cumberland River 39

5 The Duelists: Norris Wright, Samuel Gwin and Henry Vick 52

6 The Sauce of Hunger: Scrounging for Food on the Trace 63

7 War on the Trace: The Chickasaw Campaign of 1736, the War of 1812 and the Civil War 74

8 Ages of Bandits: The Men Who Took 88

9 Acts of God: The New Madrid Earthquakes and the Tupelo Tornado of 1936 96

10 "Wagon Loads of Pigeons": A Spectacular Bird Vanishes from the Trace 106

11 A Fiery End: The Tragic Tales of Daniel Burnett and Sam Burns 113

12 To Be or Not to Be? That Was the Question for Meriwether Lewis, Naomi Judd and Briana Browne 119

13 Eerie Menagerie: All through the Years, Monsters Stalked the Trace 132

Notes 143

Bibliography 153

About the Authors 160