WARREN COUNTY
MISSISSIPPI
Captain John Bobb was born in
Kentucky in 1794, moved to Natchez in 1820 and then moved to Warrenton in
1823.
In 1826 he bought property
from the Vick family and moved to the newly platted city of
Vicksburg. He later purchased
Lot 243 of Square 41 and on this
property he built the Balfour House and a structure that was later Pemberton's
Headquarters during the siege of
Vicksburg. He was a machinist, builder, riverboat pilot, and brick
maker. He built
the Vicksburg Marine
Hospital and was appointed by President Franklin Pierce to be
Superintendent of that facility in
1855.
Captain Bobb was appointed by
President James Buchanan to be the Collector of Customs for the District of
Vicksburg
in 1860. He was a friend
and political supporter of Jefferson Davis and his son, John Bobb, Jr., served
under Davis in
the 1st. Mississippi Regiment in
the Mexican War and his son Seymour was a Lieutenant in the Hill City Cadets
(Co F, 10th Infantry) during the
Civil War. A cousin named John H. Bobb, purchased McRaven in
1849. He built the
Third Section of the house with
Captain John Bobb's help in the early 1850's.
John H.
Bobb was murdered by Union troops in 1864 when he threw a brickbat at
them for trampling his newly planted
garden. The Bobb family and
the Barfields and Ferguson all intermarried and most lived in the Porters
Chapel area.
Captain John Bobb died on April
13, 1863 in Vicksburg and is buried in Cedar Hill cemetery.
Information furnished by Bill Bobbs