Editing Leakesville, Mississippi (section)

==History==
Like most of Mississippi, this area was part of the traditional territory of the historic [[Choctaw people|Choctaw]]. Under the [[Indian Removal Act]] of 1830, they were forced to cede their lands in this area to the United States. The Choctaw were the first of the Southeast [[Five Civilized Tribes]] to be removed to Indian Territory (now Oklahoma), west of the Mississippi River. Some members remained in the state and their descendants have maintained cultural identity. They gained federal recognition as the [[Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians]].

A post office called Leakesville has been in operation since 1829, when European Americans established a settlement here.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.postalhistory.com/postoffices.asp?task=display&state=MS&county=Greene | title=Greene County | publisher=Jim Forte Postal History | access-date=14 June 2015}}</ref> The town was named for [[Walter Leake]], third governor of Mississippi.<ref>{{cite book|last=Gannett|first=Henry|title=The Origin of Certain Place Names in the United States|url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_9V1IAAAAMAAJ|year=1905|publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office|page=[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_9V1IAAAAMAAJ/page/n132 183]}}</ref> The area was developed for cotton plantations in the nineteenth century, and remains mostly rural.

In 1927, an African-American man named [[Lynching of Bernice Raspberry|Bernice Raspberry]], aged 23, who had been arrested for alleged improper conduct with a white woman, was taken from the jail and [[Lynching in the United States|lynched]].<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/11972542/bernice-raspberry/ |accessdate=April 20, 2021 |title=Texas Negro Lynched for Jones Crime | newspaper=[[Clarion-Ledger]] |date=May 27, 1927 |page=1}}</ref>