Adams County, Mississippi

Adams County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Natchez
Year Organized: 1799
Square Miles: 460

Court House:

P.O. Box 1008
County Courthouse
Natchez, MS 39121-1008

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Adams is named for the 2nd U.S. President, John Adams.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

County History

Adams County was created on Apr. 2, 1799 from Natchez District. The County seat is Natchez and was named for President John Adams.

Adams County, as the first-named of the two counties created by Governor Sargent's proclamation of Apr. 2, 1799, is the oldest county in Mississippi. It was one of the two original counties of the Natchez District, and, upon the conclusion of the Treaty of Mount Dexter, it became also an original county of the Choctaw Cession of 1805.

Adams County is located in the south-western part of the state, bounded on the south by the Homochitto River, and on the west by the Mississippi River. The size of the county is 400 square miles. Surrounding counties are Wilkinson County on the south, Jefferson County on the north, and Franklin County on the east. Concordia Parish, Louisiana lies due west, across the Mississippi River.

The county was originally known as the Natchez District. In 1799 it was established as Adams County. While the north and east boundaries have remained constant, Adams County traded parcels of land with Wilkinson County, off and on, until 1914 when the present-day boundaries were established.

There are a large number of Indian mounds in Adams county that were constructed by the Natchez Indians that occupied the area for many generations prior to the appearance of the white man

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 486 square miles (1,259 km²), of which, 460 square miles (1,192 km²) of it is land and 26 square miles (67 km²) of it (5.34%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Jefferson County (north)
Franklin County (east)
Wilkinson County (south)
Concordia Parish, Louisiana (southwest)
Tensas Parish, Louisiana

Cities and Towns:

- Natchez (County Seat)

city

Incorporated Area

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resources

The history of our nation was a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names given the counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of this country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."