Washington, Mississippi

Washington is an unincorporated community in Adams County, Mississippi, United States. The community is close to Natchez. Located along the lower Mississippi River, it was the second capital of the Mississippi Territory.

This area along the Mississippi River had long been inhabited by indigenous peoples. At the time of European encounter, the Natchez people controlled much of the area. They were descendants of the earlier Mississippian culture that had built earthwork mounds.

European Americans, settling the area after the American Revolutionary War, named the town for George Washington. Some of the original settlers of the area were Colonel Andrew Ellicott, Joseph Calvit and John Foster. Washington became the second territorial capital, when the seat of the Mississippi Territory's legislature was moved from Natchez to Washington on February 1, 1802.

The Mississippi statehood convention of 1817 met in Washington at the Methodist Meeting House (which was purchased by Jefferson College in 1830). After Mississippi was admitted to the union in 1817, the legislature met once in Washington, and afterward in Natchez. The capital was officially moved to Jackson in 1822, in keeping with the Act passed by the Assembly on November 28, 1821, which chose to have a more central location for better accessibility to more residents.

Fort Dearborn, located at Washington, was for a time the largest military installation then extant in the United States, with more than 2,000 soldiers stationed there, including such notables as Brigadier General Leonard Covington and future General Winfield Scott. It was established in 1802 to protect the capital of the Mississippi Territory.

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