1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Greenville (Mississippi)

GREENVILLE, a city and the county-seat of Washington county, Mississippi, U.S.A., on the E. bank of the Mississippi river, about 75 m. N. of Vicksburg. Pop. (1890) 6658; (1900) 7642 (4987 negroes); (1910) 9610. Greenville is served by the Southern and the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley railways, and by various passenger and freight steamboat lines on the Mississippi river. It is situated in the centre of the Yazoo Delta, a rich cotton-producing region, and its industries are almost exclusively connected with that staple. There are large warehouses, compresses and gins, extensive cotton-seed oil works and sawmills. Old Greenville, about 1 m. S. of the present site, was the county seat of Jefferson county until 1825 (when Fayette succeeded it), and later became the county-seat of Washington county. Much of the old town caved into the river, and during the Civil War it was burned by the Federal forces soon after the capture of Memphis. The present site was then adopted. The town of Greenville was incorporated in 1870; in 1886 it was chartered as a city.