Tagged: Memphis

Allen James Walker was born a slave near Germantown in 1845. During the Civil War, Walker was one of the thousands of local slaves who escaped from their bondage. Walker joined the Union Army, which raised 51 black companies from Shelby and Fayette County alone.

As a soldier in the 7th US Colored Heavy Artillery, Walker was stationed at Corinth, Mississippi and Ft. Pickering, here in Memphis, but was ultimately sent to Ft. Pillow, overlooking the Mississippi and Hatchie Rivers.

Ernst von Hesse-Wartegg, an Austro-German traveler, visited Memphis a few months after the 1878 Yellow Fever epidemic.

He described his mixed reactions to the city in his memoir Travels on the Lower Mississippi.

He wrote, “After traveling to the four corners of the world, I cannot remember impressions anywhere as disagreeable as those upon entering this Memphis.