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Title:
True Democrat. : (Paulding, Miss.) 1845-18??
Place of publication:
Paulding, Miss.
Geographic coverage:
  • Paulding, Jasper, Mississippi  |  View more titles from this: City County, State
Publisher:
[s.n.]
Dates of publication:
1845-18??
Description:
  • Began in 1845.
Frequency:
Weekly
Language:
  • English
Subjects:
  • Jasper County (Miss.)--Newspapers.
  • Mississippi--Jasper County.--fast--(OCoLC)fst01207608
  • Mississippi--Paulding.--fast--(OCoLC)fst01284890
  • Paulding (Miss.)--Newspapers.
Notes:
  • Archived issues are available in digital format from the Library of Congress Chronicling America online collection.
  • Description based on: Vol. 1, no. 2 (May 21, 1845).
  • Latest issue consulted: Vol. 2, no. 51 (Aug. 18, 1847).
LCCN:
sn 87065542
OCLC:
16171391
ISSN:
2470-1777
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True Democrat. May 21, 1845 , Image 1

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True Democrat

Jasper, a rural, agricultural county located just north of the Piney Woods region in southeastern Mississippi, was created in 1833. Paulding, the county seat, was established the same year. Known as the "queen city of the east," antebellum Paulding was a thriving trade center with a population of over 1,000. After the Civil War, however, Paulding declined; by 1900 the population stood at 230 residents.

Issued on Wednesdays, the weekly, four-page True Democrat (1845-47?) was published during Paulding's heyday. Its primary competitor was another Democratic paper, the Eastern Clarion (1837-63), which today is the Jackson-based, statewide Clarion-Ledger (1941-current). Oliver C. Dease, the Democrat's owner and editor, stated in the prospectus that he had ". . . extinguished the last light of Whiggery in Eastern Mississippi, by purchasing the Aurora office" and supported the Democratic administrations of Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren and the tenets of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. The newspaper's motto was "We claim as large a Charter as the Wind, to blow on whom we please."

Foreign, national, state, and local news; and general interest stories, fiction, poetry, local advertisements, legal and marriage notices, and obituaries filled issues of the True Democrat. Politics and farming were frequent topics. The True Democrat supported former Governor Alexander Gallatin McNutt's (1838-42) unsuccessful bid for the United States Senate; and printed announcements of various candidates and reports on Democratic meetings in Jasper and nearby counties. The farming column contained practical advice such as how to dress a skin, treat a snake bite, and repel mosquitoes and included recipes for corn bread and ginger beer. Admission of Texas as a state in 1845 and the ensuing Mexican-American War (1846-48) were featured prominently in the short-lived newspaper. In its November 4, 1846 issue, the Democrat listed the dead and wounded at the battle of Monterey (Mexico) from the renowned First Mississippi Regiment, known as the Mississippi Rifles and commanded by Colonel Jefferson Davis, later the President of the Confederate States of America.

Provided by: Mississippi Department of Archives and History