Lt.Col. Mills Stephenson-- Part 10: Running the Flat Boats

After the War of 1812 he acted as a sheriff of Adams County before the formation of Brown County.  Then he got into a milling business near Ripley, Ohio and built and ran flat boats from there to New Orleans.  He would build the flat boat and float it down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to New Orleans, sell his cargo and break apart the boat and make his way back to Ripley over land.

On one of these trips, he contracted fever and died at Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1823.  (This gives us two dates, 1822 and 1823 for when he died and two places, Helena, Arkansas, and Vicksburg, Mississippi.)

--Brock-Perry