Remember what I said about not wanting less water beneath our keel? Well, on the way out of the channel the depth-gage showed 0.1 feet. The level is controlled by the TVA at Pickwick Dam and for some reason, they haven’t released any water for a few months. One of the men at the marina thinks they are doing either construction or repair work at the dam. At least we did not go aground.
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From Perryville, we traveled a short distance to Clifton, TN where we are spending two nights exploring the area and preparing for our first lock at Pickwick Landing Lock and Dam.
In the late 1800’s Clifton became the most important commercial area in Wayne County. Local lumbermen and farmers shipped livestock, lumber, cotton, and tan bark on the river from Clifton. Supplies coming into Clifton were distributed around the county by wagon.
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Famous Son: Clifton, T.S. Stribling, 1933 Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist.
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Today the town was pretty quiet. We did find the public library and were bemused by the sign on their door.
Civil War History (April 12, 1861 – May 9, 1865)
From the spring of 1862 until July 1863, Union forces waged a campaign to take the Confederate stronghold of Vicksburg, Mississippi. On December 15, 1862, a Confederate force of eighteen hundred, under the command of General Nathan Bedford Forrest, crossed the Tennessee at Clifton to launch a two-hundred-mile raid on Union lines and supplies in order to delay the Union campaign against Vicksburg.