Editing Covington County (section)

=== Population Changes''':''' ===
·       '''1820:''' 2,230

·       '''1830:''' 2,551

·       '''1840:''' 2,717

·       '''1850:''' 3,338 

·       '''1820:''' 1,824 whites; '''406 enslaved''' (≈'''18.2%''' enslaved). This is the key early benchmark and shows Covington as a low-slaveholding “Piney Woods” county compared with river counties.

·       '''1850:''' Total '''3,338'''. The federal abstract for Mississippi lists county-level totals (white/free-colored vs. enslaved) for 1850; 

·       '''Trend toward 1860 (context):''' By '''1860''' Covington had '''2,845 whites''' and '''1,564 enslaved''' (about '''35%''' enslaved), showing growth in slaveholding on the eve of the war, though still below Black Belt levels. On the 1860 many of the 1850 farmers were listed as "Planters" on the 1870 census they were farmers again. [''NOTE see if anything happened during the 1860's]''