In February 1858, a steamboat named Eliza Battle set out on a cruise down the Tombigbee River, carrying 60 passengers and more than 1200 bales of cotton from Columbus, Mississippi, down to Mobile, Alabama. But on March 1, an unseasonably cold night, the cotton caught fire and quickly engulfed the ship in flames. It was the greatest nautical disaster in the river’s history, leaving 33 passengers and crew dead. On brisk and chilly nights, people sometimes see the burning Eliza Battlerising from the misty waters where it sank, trying to complete its journey to Mobile.
