Found this on Wikipedia:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... ge1863.jpg

Will MacDonald

After a nine day seige in the Mississippi state capitol, the Tramp brigade and the 17th were the last troops to leave, During the Vicksburg Campaign, the Tramp Brigade camped near Livingston. Unfortunately this is located in Madison County Miss. the richest county in the state, it is being developed at a massive rate. I would really like to find the camp that the South Carolinians were in. Livingston was a very small village with a rare running stream. The lack of water and the Mississippi thirst were real concerns for the SC soldiers. Artillerymen caught rain water with canvas tarps and filled barrels, they then had to post guards around the rainwater. Shade was rare. Livingston had good water and shade, the 17th stayed there almost seven days. The lack of water actually delayed the troops from relieving Vicksburg.

Here is a Union report of the area:

Volume XXXII

Page 220, KY. SW VA., TENN., MISS., ALA., and North GA.

CHAPTER XLIV (44)

March 2nd (??)

Command commenced moving at daylight for a few miles over rich, rolling country, with fine plantations. Passing through Livingston a town of about half a dozen frame houses, 13 miles fom Canton.

A. Hicken Cooper
Captain Fifth Ohio Battery & Chief Engineer
17th Army Corps

The 17th reached Livingston on June 29th, 22 miles from Jackson. They camped in a "piece of woodland near a running stream."

From "Wandering to Glory" page 109: Pvt. Elwell:

"The weather was intensely hot and very dry. Water was exceedingly scarce. There was veyr few creeks or branches, and these were our sources of our supply, for there were only two wells that I now remember, and we had no access to private cisterns. The sufferings of the soldier on the march cannot be described. The want of water and the suffocation from dust can be better imagined. At Livingston we found a few springs, and we camped for a week until we could obtain supplies or rations, which had become very scarce."

"we had no tents but, plenty of shade in the day, as our camoping place was in a thickly wooded belt country that lay between the public road and a branch, formed by the flow of water from the springs."


Find the road, the trees the spring and streams, along with the half dozen old frame building and you will have found the camp of 2,000 SC Confederates. Maybe this fall I can once agian search and find the camp. I would need a original map of Livingston. I printed and kept the Jackson map, that will prove useful and thanks for posting it.

Great to have other people interested in this type of detective work.

There are several old Cleburne's guys still living in the area. I think there are a couple who might have some info on where the camp is. I'll have to track them down.....

Will MacDonald