Fort Panmure
"During the summer of 1764, a large detachment of British troops occupied
Fort Rosalie at Natchez, which was thenceforth
known as Fort Panmure," says the historian-geologist, Wailes. Fort Rosalie,
however, was at that date mere ruins, overgrown with trees, and there is a
tradition that a new site for Fort Panmure was selected. It seems to be assumed
that the old fort was reconstructed, and, of course, for a permanent occupation
barracks were constructed for the troops. This occupation must have been
sometime after Maj. Loftus, attempting to ascend the river to the Illinois
country, was turned back by the shots of a few Indians near the heights which
afterward bore his name, the site of Fort Adams. That event was in March, 1764.
The troops were withdrawn from West Florida to St. Augustine in 1768, and Fort
Panmure left in the care of one man. It is not likely that the fort was
garrisoned at the time of Willing's visitation, in 1778. But Natchez district
was loyal to the British government, and shortly after the Willing raid, says
Wailes, "Governor Chester sent Colonel Magellan to raise four companies of
militia, and with orders to fit up Fort Panmure. The command of these troops was
given to Lyman, Blomart and Mclntosh, who were soon ordered to Baton Rouge in
consequence of the prospect of a war with Spain, and a Captain Foster, with a
hundred men, was left in command of Natchez." After this, it appears, occurred
the conflict between Capt. Michael Jackson, whom the Pensacola governor sent to
take command at Panmure, and Col. Anthony Hutchins and Capt. Lyman, in which the
possession of the fort was contested, with some bloodshed. The fort was
surrendered to Galvez, without resistance, after the capitulation of Baton
Rouge, in which it was included, and at that time there seems to have been a
small garrison of regularly enrolled British soldiers, possibly "Hessians." In
the revolt of 1781, the garrison under the Spanish flag was besieged by the
Natchez district people and compelled to surrender, but the fort soon returned
to the hands of the Spanish officers and Creole soldiers, and so continued until
the evacuation of March 30, 1798, upon which the United States flag, that had
flown for a year and a month from the camp of Ellicott or Guion, hard by, was
raised over the ancient works. (See Fort Rosalie.)
Governor Williams ordered "the old blockhouse" to be torn down and the timber
sold, November, 1805.
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Mississippi Forts
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Source: Encyclopedia of Mississippi History, by Dunbar Rowland.
