Editing Demopolis, Alabama (section)

===Civil War and aftermath===
[[File:Trinity Episcopal Demopolis 02.JPG|thumb|Trinity Episcopal Church was built in 1870 after the previous building burned in 1865 during the occupation of the city by [[Union Army|Federal]] troops.]]
[[File:Demopolis Historic Business District 05.JPG|thumb|Demopolis City Hall in 2010. It was built as a courthouse annex in 1869–70.]]

Marengo County, with its large number of slaveholders, favored secession from the [[Union (American Civil War)|Union]] and the formation of the [[Confederate States of America]]. White residents of Demopolis shared these sentiments. Prominent secessionists included Nathan B. Whitfield, Francis S. Lyon, Goodman G. Griffin, Kimbrough C. DuBose, George B. Lyon, Dr. James D. Browder, and George E. Markham. But many other powerful men in town opposed secession, including Benjamin Glover Shields, William H. Lyon, Jr., William B. Jones, Pearson J. Glover, Gaius Whitfield, Alfred Hatch, Joel C. DuBose, Robert V. Montague, and [[Henry Augustine Tayloe]]. In the end, most men on both sides of the argument joined in the Confederate cause once secession was inevitable.<ref name="peoplescity7">{{harvp|Smith|2003|pp= 129–218}}.</ref> It is not known whether the Jewish community supported or not the Union or opposed slavery.

With the start of the [[American Civil War|Civil War]], several [[Confederate States Army|Confederate]] companies recruited from the population of Demopolis and Marengo County. The 4th, [[11th Alabama Infantry Regiment|11th]], 21st, 23rd, and 43rd Alabama Infantry Regiments, in addition to the 8th Alabama Cavalry, Company E of the [[Jeff. Davis Legion]], and Selden's Battery, were all established by local men. During the course of the war, more of these men would be lost to disease, exhaustion, and malnutrition than to battle casualties, as happened in both armies.{{Citation needed|date=June 2021}}

The city, based on two navigable rivers and a railroad, was used as the base for a number of Confederate installations and offices. These included [[commissary]] and [[quartermaster]] offices and warehouses, engineers' offices and workshops, a large [[Military logistics|ordnance]] depot, two large hospitals, and offices of the medical purveyor of the Department of Alabama, Mississippi, and East Louisiana. A huge military encampment was established at the fairgrounds in Webb's Bend. After the [[Siege of Vicksburg|fall of Vicksburg]] and [[Siege of Port Hudson|Port Hudson]] in July, 1863, several regiments of paroled Confederate troops were sent to a camp at Demopolis to await [[Dix-Hill Cartel|exchange]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Cozzens |first=Peter. |author-link= |date=1994 |title=The Battles for Chattanooga: The Shipwreck of their Hopes |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JH5m7yVua5AC|location= |publisher=University of Illinois Press |pages=27 |isbn=978-0-252-06595-8}}</ref>  Thousands of soldiers entered the town at a time, which had only one thousand inhabitants prior to the war. Residents struggled to provide and secure sufficient food and accommodations.{{Citation needed|date=June 2021}}

Many hundreds of the soldiers who died in the hospitals during the war were buried in a Confederate cemetery on the south end of Webb's Bend. Today the site is underwater, following the damming of the river below Demopolis in the 20th century.<ref name="peoplescity7"/>

After the loss of its primary east–west railroad during the war, in 1862 the Confederate government completed the [[Alabama and Mississippi Rivers Railroad]] from [[Selma, Alabama|Selma]] through Demopolis and to [[Meridian, Mississippi]]. The project had been in the works since the 1850s, but several miles between Demopolis and [[Uniontown, Alabama|Uniontown]] had not been finished when war erupted. As the war raged in all directions around Demopolis in 1864, the city was subjected to a huge influx of war refugees. Nathan B. Whitfield noted in his journal that those from Mobile had taken every available vacant house, and others were crowded with local people, along with their descendants and relatives.<ref name="peoplescity7"/>

In March 1865 the people of Demopolis prepared to defend the town against [[Union Army|Union]] threats, and fortified key positions. Three circular [[artillery battery|batteries]], surrounded by earthworks, were constructed and other fortifications built across the southern reaches of town. With the impending fall of Selma in early April, during [[Wilson's Raid]], all of the railroad's rolling stock was sent full of supplies westward through Demopolis and on to Meridian. A flotilla of eighteen Confederate [[gunboat]]s and [[packet ship]]s were relocated to the Tombigbee River at Demopolis around this same time. These included the [[CSS Nashville (1864)|CSS ''Nashville'']], [[CSS Morgan|CSS ''Morgan'']], [[CSS Baltic|CSS ''Baltic'']], the ''Southern Republic'', ''Black Diamond'', ''Admiral'', ''Clipper'', ''Farrand'', ''Marengo'' and ''St. Nicholas''.<ref name="peoplescity7"/>

With the surrender of the last of the Confederates, Demopolis found itself a much different city from what it had been prior to the war. At the end of May 1865, the townspeople learned that an occupying force of Federal soldiers, the 5th Minnesota Infantry, were en route to occupy the town. Once there, they occupied the former fairgrounds. Despite the usual unpleasantness associated with the occupation of many defeated Southern towns, two of the Minnesota commanders, Colonel William B. Gere and General [[Lucius Frederick Hubbard]], apparently came to be well-liked by the townspeople. Despite some bright spots in relations, the Episcopal Church in the South was slow to give up on the notion of the Confederacy, resulting in the military governor of Alabama closing all Episcopal churches in the state, effective on September 20, 1865. Trinity Episcopal Church in Demopolis was put under Federal guard, and during this time the church mysteriously burned down. Blame was placed on the soldiers for intentionally burning it, but this has never been borne out by the facts. Aside from all of this, the more pressing matter was the devastated economy of the community and surrounding countryside, a problem that would continue through the [[Reconstruction era]].<ref name="peoplescity8">{{harvp|Smith|2003|pp= 219–332}}.</ref>

During Reconstruction, the new authorities in charge of the government decided to move the [[county seat]] of Marengo from its central location in [[Linden, Alabama|Linden]] to Demopolis by an act approved on December 4, 1868. The county appointed Richard Jones Jr., Lewis B. McCarty, and Dr. Bryan W. Whitfield to build or buy a new courthouse in Demopolis. They negotiated the purchase of the Presbyterian church on the town square, now known as Rooster Hall, for the sum of $3,000. It was conveyed to the county on April 8, 1869. The county built a fireproof brick building next door to the former church in 1869–70 to house the probate and circuit clerk offices. This building serves as Demopolis City Hall today. The move of the county seat was highly controversial, and the [[Alabama Legislature]] set April 18, 1870, as the date for a county-wide referendum to decide if [[Dayton, Alabama|Dayton]], Demopolis, or Linden would become the county seat. Due to the closeness of the vote and voting irregularities, a run-off between Linden and Demopolis was set for May 14, 1870. Irregularities appeared again and votes from Dayton, mostly in favor of Linden, were rejected by the board of supervisors. Linden continued an attempt to persuade the state legislature to move the county seat back to their town, with success in February 1871. The former courthouse buildings reverted from county ownership to Demopolis and remain city property today.<ref name="peoplescity9">{{harvp|Smith|2003|pp= 268–274}}.</ref>