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INTRODUCTION
While Hancock County has never been in the mainstream of history, neither is it a backwater. It has usually been just on the sidelines, a witness to major events, and often, in some small way, a contributor to their fulfillment. This peripheral participation has produced an incredibly rich and romantic local history for this little corner of the Mississippi Gulf Coast, a story that deserves to be written down and shared with others.
While much of Hancock County's history has resulted from its proximity to the water routes between Mobile, Biloxi, and New Orleans, and between New Orleans and Mississippi's interior, perhaps just as much has resulted from the isolation caused by a lack of roads and land routes before the railroad came in 1872, and from the lack of a highway bridge over the Bay of St. Louis before 1928.
There is the question of just what should be included in a history of Hancock county. After all, the history of this area began before there was any county, and even after there was a county, its boundaries were much larger than the territory that now constitutes Hancock County. Should Biloxi history be included? It was once in Hancock County. Should the history of Picayune and Pearl River county be included? I have not attempted to include a detailed history of Biloxi, as this has