Greene County, Mississippi

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

County Seat: Leakesville
Year Organized: 1811
Square Miles: 713

Court House:

P.O. Box 460
County Courthouse
Leakesville, MS 39451-0460

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Greene is named for American Revolutionary War general Nathanael Greene.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

County History

This county is among the oldest erected in Mississippi, having been established on December 9, 1811, while David Holmes of Virginia was serving as territorial governor. The Counties of Amite, Franklin, Wayne and later George contributed to form its area, and its original limits were thus defined:

"Beginning on the line of demarcation, where the trading road leading from the Choctaw nation to Mobile crosses the same, thence along said trading road to where the fifth parallel township line crosses the same, thence west with said line to the fourth range of township east of Pearl River, numbering from whence the line of demarcation crosses the same, thence down the said range of townships to the line of demarcation, and with the same east to the beginning."

That portion of the county lying west of the dividing line between the eighth and ninth ranges, was taken February 3, 1820, to form the county of Perry.

Among its earliest settlers was a large infusion of industrious arid conservative Scotchmen from the Carolinas and Virginia, as is evidenced by the prefix "Mac," which appears in so many of the names. It was named for General Nathanael Greene, a distinguished officer in the Revolutionary war, and performed its share in shaping the early history of the Commonwealth, being represented by Laughlin McCoy and John McRae in the constitutional convention of 1817.

The county seat is at Leakesville and was named for Gov. Walter Leake. It is located on the Chickasawhay River.

The first Court House was a little log building, which was destroyed by fire in 1875, all records were destroyed. A second log building was built, then a third, a brick Court House was built in 1899. A fourth building was built during the 1930's with assistance from the W. P. A.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 719 square miles (1,861 km²), of which, 713 square miles (1,846 km²) of it is land and 6 square miles (15 km²) of it (0.82%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Wayne County (north)
Washington County, Alabama (northeast)
Mobile County, Alabama (southeast)
George County (south)
Perry County (west)

Cities and Towns:

- Leakesville (County Seat)	town	Incorporated Area
- McLain	town	Incorporated Area
- State Line	town	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."