Entries - County: Chicot - Starting with E

Sam Epstein, a Russian-Jewish immigrant, was a merchant, planter, and civic leader in Lake Village (Chicot County) and Chicot County in the early twentieth century. Sam Epstein was born to Menasha Epstein and Malke Epstein on July 25, 1875, on a farm near Riga, Latvia, in the former Russian Empire. He was likely the second of five children. Many Eastern European Jews fled violence and legal restrictions in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. While Epstein’s parents likely did not immigrate, at least five of their children, including Sam, arrived in the United States between 1891 and 1900. Epstein likely arrived in New York City in May 1896. He traveled to Memphis, Tennessee, and joined an older brother, Nathan, …

The city of Eudora, in the southeastern corner of Arkansas, was built on land rising twenty-five feet above the surrounding Delta flatlands. It came about as a result of antebellum plantations and an early twentieth-century railroad. Eudora survived the Flood of 1927 because of its elevation. The city calls itself the “Catfish Capital of Arkansas.” Louisiana Purchase through Reconstruction The rich land on which Eudora was established was still only sparsely settled when Arkansas became a state in 1836. A Presbyterian church was built on the ridge in the 1840s, and a Masonic lodge opened at that location in 1848. E. C. James owned 700 acres of Chicot County land, including the ridge; he named his homestead Eudora Plantation for …

Conflict along the Mississippi River did not end with the Confederate defeat at the July 1863 Battle of Helena. Throughout 1864, Confederate forces attempted to harass Federal shipping from the Arkansas side of the river. The Skirmish at Eudora Church resulted from Federal efforts to stop this harassment. The forces engaged were small in number and irregular in nature. The Confederates fielded only a squad (a party smaller than a company), and Confederate forces operating in this area were described as “independent squads, deserters, skulkers fleeing from conscription” and “lawless bands.” On the Federal side, one infantry company of the Mississippi Marine Brigade fought at Eudora Church. This brigade was created to protect Federal shipping from Confederate attacks along rivers. …

The Eudora City Hall, which houses governmental offices for the city of Eudora (Chicot County), is a two-story Art Deco–style brick building located at 239 South Main Street. Constructed in 1936 by the Public Works Administration (PWA), it continues to be used for city administration. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 5, 2006. Settlement in Eudora began in the mid-1800s with the establishment of a post office in 1856. The population remained small until after a railroad was constructed in the area in the late nineteenth century. City services including a volunteer fire department, water department, and jail were all in operation by the 1920s. The growth in the community made the need …

In August 1862, General Samuel Curtis, commander of the Army of the Southwest, dispatched a naval-escorted ground force from Helena (Phillips County) to Eunice (Chicot County). The purpose of the expedition was to capture a wharf-boat, gather useful information about Confederate forces in the area along the Mississippi River, and “annoy” the enemy. The venture was a complete success for the Union forces. On August 28, 1862, a Union force consisting of 200 men of the Fifty-sixth Regiment of Ohio Volunteers and two pieces of artillery manned by men of the First Iowa Battery boarded the steamers White Cloud and Iatan. The slow-moving force, which was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel William H. Raynor, was escorted by the gunboat USS Pittsburgh (often …