Last updated: January 15, 2021
Place
Old Trace, Milepost 198.6
NPS Photo
Quick Facts
Location:
Natchez Trace Parkway, Milepost 198.6
Significance:
Old Natchez Trace
Amenities
2 listed
Historical/Interpretive Information/Exhibits, Parking - Auto
In the early 1800s many Americans believed that isolation and the difficulties of communication would force the Mississippi Valley settlements to form a seperate nation. Hoping to hold the frontier, Congress in 1800 established a post route from Nashville, Tennessee to Natchez, Mississippi.
The Trace, then a series of American Indian trails, had drawn from the Secretary of State the bitter comment "The passage of mail from Natchez is a tedious as from Europe when westerly winds prevail." To speed the mail, President Jefferson ordered the Army to clear out the trail and make it a road starting in 1803.
Post Riders, carrying letters, dispatches, and newspapers, helped bind the vast, turbulent frontier to the Republic. However their day passed by the mid 1830s when steamboats, running from New Orleans, Louisiana to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, robbed the Trace of it usefulness as a main post road.
The Trace, then a series of American Indian trails, had drawn from the Secretary of State the bitter comment "The passage of mail from Natchez is a tedious as from Europe when westerly winds prevail." To speed the mail, President Jefferson ordered the Army to clear out the trail and make it a road starting in 1803.
Post Riders, carrying letters, dispatches, and newspapers, helped bind the vast, turbulent frontier to the Republic. However their day passed by the mid 1830s when steamboats, running from New Orleans, Louisiana to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, robbed the Trace of it usefulness as a main post road.