In the palmy days of steamboating, the charges for way-travel were varied according to the locality.  Below Memphis it was the rule to take no single fare less than five dollars, even if the passenger were going but a half-dozen miles.  Along Red River the steamboat clerks graduated the fare according to the parish where the passenger came on board.  The more fertile and wealthy the region, the higher was the price of passage.  Travelers from the cotton country paid more than those from the tobacco country.  Those from the sugar country paid more than any other class.  With few exceptions, there was no “ticket” system.  Passengers paid their fare at any hour of their journey that best suited them.  Every man was considered honest until he gave proof to the contrary.  There was an occasional Jeremy Diddler, but his operations were very limited.

When the Rebellion began, the old customs on the Mississippi were swept away.  The most rigid “pay-on-entering” system was adopted, and the man who could evade it must be very shrewd.  The wealth along the Great River melted into thin air.  The bonhommie of travel disappeared, and was succeeded by the most thorough selfishness in collective and individual bodies.  Scrambles for the first choice of state-rooms, the first seat at table, and the first drink at the bar, became a part of the new regime.  The ladies were little regarded in the hurly-burly of steamboat life.  Men would take possession of ladies’ chairs at table, and pay no heed to remonstrances.

I have seen an officer in blue uniform place his muddy boots on the center-table in a cabin full of ladies, and proceed to light a cigar.  The captain of the boat suggested that the officer’s conduct was in violation of the rules of propriety, and received the answer: 

“I have fought to help open the Mississippi, and, by ——­, I am going to enjoy it.”

The careless display of the butt of a revolver, while he gave this answer, left the pleasure-seeker master of the situation.  I am sorry to say that occurrences of a similar character were very frequent in the past three years.  With the end of the war it is to be hoped that the character of Mississippi travel will be improved.

In May, 1861, the Rebels blockaded the Mississippi at Memphis.  In the same month the National forces established a blockade at Cairo.  In July, ’63, the capture of Vicksburg and Port Hudson removed the last Rebel obstruction.  The Imperial was the first passenger boat to descend the river, after the reopening of navigation.

Up to within a few months of the close of the Rebellion, steamers plying on the river were in constant, danger of destruction by Rebel batteries.  The Rebel Secretary of War ordered these batteries placed along the Mississippi, in the hope of stopping all travel by that route.  His plan was unsuccessful.  Equally so was the barbarous practice of burning passenger steamboats while in motion between landing-places.  On transports fired upon by guerrillas (or Rebels), about a hundred persons were killed and as many wounded.  A due proportion of these were women and children.  On steamboats burned by Rebel incendiaries, probably a hundred and fifty lives were lost.  This does not include the dead by the terrible disaster to the Sultana.  It is supposed that this boat was blown up by a Rebel torpedo in her coal.