Tupelo National Battlefield is a single acre on Main Street, a lawn with a granite monument and two cannons and no staff. The War Department set it aside in 1929, the Park Service took it over in 1933, and a tornado in 1936 tore the first concrete monument from the ground. The granite replacement honors the men of both armies and records the result: a Union victory.
The fight came because of Atlanta. In July 1864 Major General Andrew J. Smith marched about fourteen thousand men south from La Grange, Tennessee, to keep Confederate cavalry under Nathan Bedford Forrest from raiding William T. Sherman's railroad supply line. Smith laid waste to the countryside as he went. On 14 July, beginning at 7:30 in the morning, Confederates under Stephen D. Lee made a series of uncoordinated charges and were beaten back. The 61st and 68th United States Colored Troops were among the units that held. Estimates put Union losses near 650 and Confederate losses near 1,300. Smith then started back toward Memphis, and fighting resumed on 15 July at Old Town Creek, a few miles from town.
Black regiments under Colonel Edward Bouton guarded the supply train and covered the army's rear before the battle. The monument has no visitor services, so stop first at the Parkway Visitor Center, six miles north, and treat the site as one half of a pair with Brices Cross Roads. It lies 1.2 miles east of the Parkway.
The closest stops worth working into your route