History of McNairy County Tennessee United States of America

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Local History Notes:

McNairy County was erected on October 8, 1823, from a part of Hardin County and named in honor of John McNairy, whom President Washington had appointed one of the three judges of the Southwest Territory. The act creating this county directed that the first court should be held at the house of Abel V. Maury, near the center of the county. At the first session of the Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions held on the second Monday in January, 1824, a commission was appointed which selected for the county seat Purdy, named for John Purdy, a surveyor in the service of the government. Judge Joshua Haskell presided over this court which elected the following officials: Henry S. Wilson, sheriff; Joseph Barnett, clerk; Maclin Cross, Circuit Court clerk; Wm. Maury, register; Benjamin Rice, surveyor; Robert M. Owens, trustee.

The first white child born was Hugh Kerby, in 1821.

The first store was owned by John Chambers and Nat Griffith.

In 1855, the citizens of Purdy successfully resisted the efforts of the Mobile & Ohio Railroad Company to build their road through the town, which action caused a gradual decline in the place, so that when, in 1870, an effort was made to move the county seat to the railroad many favored the project; however, the effort was not crowned with success until 1890, when P. H. Thrasher gave the county a courthouse located at Selmer.

Strong characters of the early days were: Col. James Warren, Gen. John H. Meeks, Wm. G. Jopling, John G. Gooch, and Maj. Benj. Wright who fought in the battle of Tohopeka.

The first church organization in the county was Bethel, in 1828. This was a Presbyterian Church and was soon followed by the Baptist Church at Gravel Hill.

In 1857 Isaac Nash began in Purdy the publication of the West Tennessee Argus, the first paper published in the county. Two of the most eminent men whom this country has produced were John V. Wright and Col. D. M. Wisdom.

Statistics of McNairy County: Population, 1920, 18,350. Assessed valuation of taxable property, 1921, $6,829,882. Area, 550 square miles. Number of farms, 3,263. Railway mileage, 42. Drained by the Hatchie River and affluents of the Tennessee. Part of the county is level and in some portions of the county there is a fine growth of timber. Staple products are cotton, corn and hogs. The Mobile & Ohio and the Southern Railway traverse the county. Selmer, the county seat, is on the M. & O. Railroad, thirty-five miles south of Jackson. It has good schools and churches, a weekly newspaper, three banks, prosperous business establishments, and a population of 546. Scholastic population of county, 6,127; high schools, 6; elementary schools, 109.

From: Moore, John Trotwood. Tennessee, The Volunteer State, 1769-1923. Vol. 1. Chicago, IL, USA: S. J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1923.

Biographies:

Mark Perrin Lowrey, soldier, was born in McNairy county, Tenn., Dec. 6, 1828; son of Adam and Marguerite (Doss) Lowrey. Adam Lowrey was of Scotch descent and came from the north of Ireland to East Tennessee, early in the nineteenth century settling at Lowrey Ferry in East Tennessee. Mark was a soldier in the war with Mexico, 1847; became a Baptist minister, and served churches in Farmington, Corinth, Rienzi, Ripley, and other north Mississippi points, 1852-61. He married Sarah Holme and resided at Meadow Creek, Miss. In 1861 he was captain in and then colonel of the 2d Mississippi regiment, enlisted for sixty days, his regiment going direct to Bowling Green, Ky., where they were disbanded. He then raised the 32d Mississippi regiment for the war and was commissioned its colonel. He took part in Bragg's invasion of Kentucky and was severely wounded at Perryville, Oct. 8, 1862, where he led his regiment in Wood's brigade, Buckner's division. At Chickamauga, Sept. 19-20, 1863, he commanded Gen. S. A. M. Wood's brigade, Cleburne's division, Hill's corps, as senior colonel in command of the 32d and 45th Mississippi; and after the battle, when General Wood resigned, he was given command of the brigade in recognition of his gallantry. He covered the retreat of the Confederate army into Georgia notably at Ringgold Gap, Nov. 27, 1863, and when Cleburne succeeded to the command of Hardee's corps he became commander of Cleburne's division. At the battle of Franklin, Nov. 30, 1864, when General Cleburne was killed, General Lowrey succeeded to the command of the division, and soon after, when Gen. John C. Brown was severely wounded, he was transferred to the command of Cheatham's division, which he led in the battle of Nashville, Dec. 15-16, 1864, after the battle covering the retreat of the Confederate army. During his service in the army, General Lowrey preached regularly to the soldiers, and on one occasion baptized upwards of forty soldiers, going into the water in his major-general's uniform. At the close of the war he resumed his missionary duties, and reorganized the Baptist churches throughout the state. He edited the Mississippi department in the Baptist, Memphis, and contributed to the Christian Index. He founded the Blue Mountain Female college in 1873, and was its president, 1873-85, when he was succeeded by his son, William Tyndale Lowrey . He refused political office when urged to stand as candidate for U.S. senator, for representative in congress and for governor of the state. While president of the college, he was active pastor of the churches at Blue Mountain and at Ripley; for ten years was president of the Mississippi Baptist state convention, and was a trustee of the University of Mississippi, 1872-76. He received the honorary degree of D.D. from Mississippi college. He died suddenly, surrounded by a company of his pupils, in the waiting-room of the railroad depot, Middleton, Tenn., Feb. 27, 1885.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

Joseph Lewis Morphis, representative, was born in MaNairy county, Tenn., April 17, 1831; grandson of Joseph Morphis, a soldier in the Revolution. He was left an orphan at an early age, and was brought up as a planter. He represented McNairy county in the Tennessee legislature as a Whig in 1859; entered the Confederate army as captain in 1861, and removed his family to Pontotoc, Miss., in 1863. He was a member of the state constitutional convention in 1865; represented Pontotoc county in the Mississippi legislature, 1866-68, and was a Republican representative from the second congressional district of Mississippi in the 41st and 42d congresses, serving from Feb. 28, 1870, to March 9, 1876. He was U.S. marshall for the northern district of Mississippi, 1877-85. In 1890 he was licensed as a trader on the Osage Indian reservation and was still engaged in that business in 1902.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

History of McNairy County Tennessee

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