Charleston, MS

Charleston is one of Tallahatchie County's two seats, on the east side of the Tallahatchie River in north-central Mississippi. The county seat moved here in 1837 after the original site at Old Tillatoba was found to have a defective land title. That administrative oddity still shapes the county map: Charleston serves the hill-side eastern part of Tallahatchie County while Sumner serves the Delta side. Charleston's roads and civic buildings sit at the meeting point of those two landscapes.

Charleston's older civic life grew around cotton, schools, churches, a bank, and the courthouse. The Charleston Female School opened in 1852, the Charleston Bank followed in 1901, and the city had cotton gins and a brick courthouse by the early 1900s. Today the East Tallahatchie School District operates Charleston schools, and Coahoma Community College offers classes at Charleston High School through a partnership with the district. The result is a county-seat town where education and local government still sit alongside the Delta's agricultural history.