Richard Griggs (Issaquena County)
State House: 1870-1873
Commissioner of Agriculture & Immigration: 1873-1876
Born: January 10, 1839 in Bolivar, TN
Died: July 2, 1883 in Mayersville, MS
Sergeant in the 48th Infantry of U.S. Colored Troops in Louisiana. Also served as chancery clerk of Issaquena County. The Mississippi Department of Archives and History has Griggs’ Guide to Mississippi (1874). Griggs appears with his wife (Mariah Elizabeth Williams), daughter (Florence Inez Griggs), sister, and niece and nephews on the 1880 census in Mayersville, where his occupation is listed as “Clerk of the County.” Both his sister and his wife were teachers.
Mariah Elizabeth Williams Griggs was born free in New York City. Her sister, Laura J. Williams, married Thomas W. Cardozo, the Superintendent of Education for Mississippi from 1874-1876.
Florence Inez Griggs married Beverly Henry Watts and lived in Hot Springs, Arkansas, where they are listed with three children on the 1910 census. Florence died before 1919.
Click here to read a transcript of Griggs’ 1872 autobiographical pamphlet, The Life of Richard Griggs of Issaquena County, Mississippi, which relates stories about his multiple attempts to escape slavery before the war. The pamphlet was included as part of Mariah Griggs’ USCT widow’s pension file for Richard Griggs on pages 29-35 of the PDF. The pension application file also includes affidavits from Blanche K. Bruce and John R. Lynch (p. 67-68).
This page was last updated on June 23, 2026.