Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Memphis (2.)

MEMPHIS, a city of the United States, and port of entry, capital of Shelby county, Tennessee, is situated on the east bank of the Mississippi river just below the mouth of Wolf river, in about 35° 8' N. lat. and 90° 5' W. long., 450 miles below St Louis and 826 miles above New Orleans. The bluff on which the city stands has an average elevation of 47½ feet above high-water mark, with a further fall of 36 feet to extreme low water. Memphis is methodically and tastefully planned, and is adorned with many elegant private residences and public buildings, conspicuous among the latter being the United States custom house, located upon the esplanade between Front Street and the river, and built of the best quality of marble, the product of Tennessee quarries. A small park in the centre of the city contains a bust of Andrew Jackson. The streets are mostly well-paved, and are supplied with water from the Wolf river by the Holly system. The bayou Gayoso, with several branches, intersects the city, and prior to 1880 received most of its drainage. Since that date over 40 miles of sewers and more than that length of subsoil drain-tiles have been constructed on the Waring system, providing the city with a superior system of drainage.

Memphis is the largest city of the State, and the most important commercial city on the Mississippi between St Louis and New Orleans. The largest sea-going vessels ascend the river to this point, and navigation is open at all seasons of the year. The city also possesses abundant facilities for transportation by railway in every direction. Memphis ranks as the largest interior cotton-market in the United States. The receipts for the season ending September 1, 1881, were 470,267 bales, with a value of $23,090,109. The aggregate receipts from the mercantile and manufacturing interests for the year ending September 1, 1882, amounted to about $60,000,000, of which the trade in groceries and western products contributed nearly $40,000,000; dry goods, clothing, boots and shoes, and general merchandise $15,000,000; and various home manufactures about $5,000,000. There are oil-mills and refineries, whose annual product of about 30,000 barrels of cotton-seed oil, together with oil-cake and re-ginned cotton, amounts to over $1,000,000. There are also numerous foundries, machine shops, flouring-mills, and manufactories of carriages, furniture, and tobacco.

The city contains, besides the usual religious, educational and commercial institutions, a public library of 9000 volumes, three daily and ten weekly newspapers, a chamber of commerce, and a cotton exchange.

Memphis was laid out as a village in 1820, and incorporated as a city in 1831. Its population at each census since has been as follows:—3360 in 1840, 8841 in 1850, 22,623 in 1860, 40,226 in 1870, and 33,592 in 1880. According to a census taken on October 1, 1882, the population within the city limits was 47,976 (29,130 white and 18,846 coloured).

During the civil war Memphis was early occupied by the Union forces (June 6, 1862) after a naval engagement in which Commodore Davis with a fleet of nine gunboats and rams defeated a similar Confederate fleet of eight vessels, and captured or destroyed all of them but one. The city was held by Federal troops to the close of the war, with the exception of a brief occupation, in August 1864, by General Forrest, who captured several hundred prisoners, but immediately withdrew. The decrease of population between 1870 and 1880 was due to the ravages of yellow fever in 1873, 1878, and 1879. The epidemic of 1873 resulted in over two thousand deaths. In 1878, according to the report of the Howard Relief Association, the number of those attacked with the fever was 15,000, and the number of deaths reached the total of 5150, of whom 4250 were whites and 900 coloured. At the return of the fever in 1879 better care and strict quarantine arrangements prevailed, but there were 1595 cases, with 497 deaths. During the epidemics of 1878 and 1879 fully two-thirds of the population fled from the city, many of whom died of the fever at other places, and a still larger number did not return. For three months during each year business was wholly suspended, and all ingress or egress except for the most necessary purposes was forbidden. The prostration of the business of the place left the city almost hopelessly bankrupt, and as a means of relief the legislature of the State in January 1879 repealed the city's charter, and, assuming exclusive control of its taxation and finances, constituted it simply a “taxing district,” placing its government in the hands of a “legislative council.” This anomalous proceeding has been declared constitutional by the supreme court of Tennessee. Under it Memphis is at least regaining its prosperity, and by thoroughly cleansing, repaving, and sewering its streets, and supervising the construction of buildings, is likely to become one of the healthiest cities on the Mississippi river.