The historical marker, on the grounds of the Graves County Courthouse,  reads: “In May, 1861, delegates of seven Kentucky and twenty Tennessee westernmost counties, the Jackson Purchase, met in Mayfield.  Belief in Southern cause, dissatisfaction with Kentucky adherence to Union and Tennessee delay joining South caused convention vote to secede and form a Confederate State.  With Tennessee’s vote to secede, June 8, 1861, proposal abandoned.” A journalist for the Louisville Journal was present at this meeting and his eye-witness account sent back to his editor revealed that the attendees included from Kentucky:  Henry C. Burnett, then First District of Kentucky…

Although born in Kentucky (Christian County) on June 3, 1808,  Jefferson Davis’  family moved to Louisiana (1811) and then to Mississippi (1812) where he was raised.  Jefferson attended Jefferson College in Mississippi, and Transylvania University in Kentucky before graduating from the United States Military Academy (West Point) in 1828.  Davis fought in the Mexican-American War in 1846. He resigned his military commission to marry Sarah Knox Taylor, daughter of Zachary Taylor, in 1835.  Contacting malaria three months after the wedding, Sarah died.  In 1836 Davis moved back to Mississippi.  Davis married again in 1845 to Varina Howell, granddaughter of former…