The Jackson Purchase Historical Society will meet on April 25th in the Conference Center in the park office building at Columbus Belmont State Park beginning at 10:30 AM. The park is in Columbus, Kentucky off State Highway 123.
The program, “Kentucky and Tennessee Connections to the Sultana Disaster,” will be presented by Jerry O. Potter. The Sultana Disaster of April 27, 1865 was a steamboat explosion on the Mississippi River near Memphis that killed 1,167 people, many of whom were Union soldiers returning home from Confederate prison camps. 
Potter is the author of The Sultana Tragedy: America’s Greatest Maritime Disaster (1992). He has also written a number of articles in regional historical journal and is a recipient of the Tennessee Historical Commission Merit Award. He is a member of the board of the Sultana Disaster Museum in Marion, Arkansas. Copies of his book will be available at the meeting for purchase.
The park will be open and those attending the conference are invited to tour it after the meeting to learn of the area’s history. The park snack bar will also be open for those who want to have lunch while enjoying the spectacular river views. Columbus is one of the oldest communities in the Purchase and was the first county seat when the region was a single county. The iron bluffs along the Mississippi, a dominant feature, were first described and named by the French explorers Marquette and Joliet in 1673. 
The river has played an important role in the community’s history. Columbus became a part of Indian removal on the Trail of Tears when nearly 1,100 Cherokee led by John Benge arrived in 1838. They camped on a bluff overlooking the river and town of Columbus, originally located on the riverbank. The detachment waited ten days to be ferried across the Mississippi River. The importance of the river was especially evident during the Civil War when Columbus was first a key point in the Confederate defense line in the western theatre and later a major Union installation supporting the Vicksburg campaign and other activities. The community suffered major damage in the 1927 Mississippi River flood which led to the relocation of the town.