The Local Government Records Office (LGRO) of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH) recently completed the Lowndes County portion of the ongoing County Records Inventory Project.
Beginning in 2010, the LGRO began a multi-year project to assist and advise county governments in managing their earliest records. One component of that project was to inventory the pre-1920 records in Mississippi’s oldest counties.
Starting in January 2012, project staff began an inventory of the pre-1920 records in Lowndes County in order to identify holdings, and to help determine possible actions to preserve and provide access to these records. Staff also evaluated the condition of microfilmed copies of the records held at MDAH.
Staff inventoried Lowndes County records housed at both the Lowndes County Courthouse as well as at the Billups-Garth Archives in the Local History Department at the Columbus-Lowndes Public Library.
Lowndes County records inventoried include materials such as marriage bonds, Police Court Minutes, Slave Owners Register, will records, estate records, deed books, minute books, and much more.
Inventories of each county will be online as they become available. To access inventories already available visit http://opac2.mdah.state.ms.us/territorial.html.
The project is funded by the Mississippi Historical Records Advisory Board, through a grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, with matching funds provided by the MDAH/LGRO.
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