Fayette is a city in Jefferson County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 1,614 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Jefferson County.

History

In 1879, the Jesse James gang, based in Missouri, raided southwest Mississippi, robbing a store each in Washington and Fayette. The outlaws absconded with $2,000 cash in the second robbery and took shelter in abandoned cabins on the Kemp Plantation south of St. Joseph, Louisiana. A posse attacked and killed two of the outlaws but failed to capture the entire gang. Jesse James and most of his gang succeeded in returning to Missouri. He was killed three years later in 1882 at his home in St. Joseph, Missouri. In 1890, the white Democrat-controlled Mississippi legislature passed a new constitution, which effectively disenfranchised most black people in the state, crippling their integration into society and the Republican Party of the time. After Congressional passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, black people began to register and vote again. Charles Evers was elected as mayor in 1969 by the people of Fayette; he was the first African-American mayor elected in post-Reconstruction Mississippi. He beat the white incumbent R.G. Allen, 386 votes –225 votes. Evers was an activist and the brother of slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers, head of the Mississippi chapter of the NAACP when he was assassinated in 1963.

Geography

Fayette is located at 31.71111°N, -91.06222°W (31.711144, -91.062246). According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 1.2 sqmi, all land.

Demographics

2020 census

As of the 2020 United States census, there were 1,445 people, 510 households, and 291 families residing in the city.

Education

The city of Fayette is served by the Jefferson County School District.

Notable people