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Palmyra
Marion County, Missouri
"The Flower City"
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Palmyra is located
seven miles west of the Mississippi River on a natural rock foundation
that contains a clear, sweet spring. By the time European settlers arrived
in the area in the early 19th century the site had been a popular Sac and
Fox campsite for many years. The first settlers to the area were
Kentuckian Benjamin Vanlandingham and his family, who shared the spring
with the natives. A replica of their 1818 log cabin can still be seen
today, near the Big Spring.
In 1812
a survey was taken to indicate the size and shapes of the new counties that
were to be partitioned from St. Charles County. In 1819 Palmyra was platted
by four men who intended that it become the county seat of the future Marion
County. The town's name refers to a biblical-era oasis city of Tadmor along
a desert caravan route between Syria and the upper Euphrates and called
Palmyra (Palm City) by the Greeks and Romans. Palmyra prospered after it was
selected the site of the first land office in northeast Missouri in 1825 and
the Marion County seat in 1826. Economic growth continued with the arrival
of the Hannibal & St. Joseph Railroad in 1857 and of the Palmyra &
Quincy in 1860.
 The Civil War found Palmyra and Marion County
divided and a hot bed of fighting. In 1862 Col. Joseph E. Porter of the
Confederate Army was roaming the countryside and in September succeeded in
raiding Palmyra, releasing prisoners kept in the Marion County Jail, and
capturing a few of his own. Among them was Andrew Allsman, a Union
sympathizer who had the reputation of betraying neighbors sympathetic to the
Confederacy to the local militia. Col. John McNeil, the commander of the
Union forces, publicly demanded Allsman's return. Porter reportedly freed
Allsman and dispatched an escort to see him safely to a road leading to
Palmyra but Allsman was never seen again. When Allsman failed to return
McNeil ordered the execution of 10 Confederate prisoners, which was carried
out on October 12, 1862. A granite monument was erected in their memory on
the grounds of the courthouse in 1907. |
 Palmyra
has been called the Handsomest City in North Missouri and has over 200
antebellum structures in a variety of architectural styles with six
buildings individually listed on the National Register of Historic
Places. Among these homes are the 1869 Italianate Darwell
House, the childhood home of Jane Darwell, who won the winner in 1940 of an
Academy Award for her role as Ma Joad in “The Grapes of Wrath,” and the
1855 P. J. Sowers Home, which was once the home of William Russell, one of
the founders of the Pony Express. During the warmer months visitors can pick up walking tour maps at
the Gardner House on Main Street during the warmer months. The Gardner House
(photo left) has served as a stagecoach inn, tavern, private school, a
private residence, and now is home to a museum and visitor center. |
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