page_title: Randolph, Tennessee
section_title: European settlement
hierarchical_section_title: Randolph, Tennessee / History / European settlement
caption_attribution_description: 25 foot long replica of a flatboat in which Abraham Lincoln floated down the river as a young man. Replica was built 2004 and was acquired by the Mississippi Riverpark and Museum, Memphis, Tennessee in 2010. Commercial Appeal, Memphis, TN
context_page_description: Randolph is a rural unincorporated community in Tipton County, Tennessee, United States, located on the banks of the Mississippi River. Randolph was founded in the 1820s and in 1827, the Randolph post office was established. In the 1830s, the town became an early center of river commerce in West Tennessee. Randolph shipped more cotton annually than Memphis until 1840. In 1834, the first pastor of the Methodist congregation was appointed. The fortunes of the community began to decline in the late 1840s due to failed railroad development, an unfavorable mail route and other factors. The first Confederate States Army fort in Tennessee was built at Randolph early in the Civil War in 1861, a second fortification at Randolph was constructed later that same year. During the Civil War, the town was burned down twice by Union Army forces.
  The settlement is located on the second Chickasaw Bluff, the landscape is dominated by valleys carved into the soil as a product of erosion. The surface soil is composed mostly of silt loam, derived from eroded loess, and is found in different qualities and at different stages of erosion. The stratum beneath the surface consists of glacial gravel.
context_section_description: Around 1800, Europeans began settling the land east of the Mississippi River that was inhabited by the Chickasaw Indians for centuries prior to the arrival of Europeans. Chickasaw land in West Tennessee and southwestern Kentucky was ceded in the Jackson Purchase. In 1818, both sides agreed to the transfer by signing the Treaty of Tuscaloosa.
  In the early 19th century, the terrain of the Chickasaw Bluffs provided promising locations for a harbor on the Mississippi River for Randolph. In 1820, the area had an estimated population of 54. Early in the 1820s, investors John T. Brown and Robert Bedford were the owners of the land that would form Randolph a few years later. Only 40–50 miles (60–80 km) north of Memphis by water, they described the area as "a good landing for Mississippi River flatboats". The Hatchie River, joining the Mississippi River just north of Randolph, was accessible to steamboats upriver to Bolivar. Brown and Bedford chose the site to lay out the plan for Randolph, a promising river town. The Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture gives the date of Randolph's official establishment as 1823. Other reports date the foundation to 1827 or 1828. The settlement is named for John Randolph (1773–1833), a leader in the United States Congress from Virginia.
caption: Modern replica of an early 1800s flatboat
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