Prentiss Ingraham is reported to be the most prolific Mississippi writer. He is credited with writing 600 novels and 400 novelettes. These were primarily dime novels and may not be considered great works of literature, but they were extremely popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They made Ingraham quite famous and his works were still in demand 10 years after his death. He also authored several plays.

Prentiss Ingraham was born near Natchez on Dec. 28, 1843. His mother was Mary Brooks, the daughter of a wealthy planter. His father was Joseph Holt Ingraham who was born in Portland, Maine, but to moved to Natchez in the 1830s. Joseph taught foreign languages at Jefferson College in Washington (five miles east of Natchez) in the 1830s, and he was also writer of romance novels. He also wrote a two travelogue books called “Southwest By A Yankee: Volumes I & II.” These books are still studied by historians because of the information they contain about the South of the 1830s.

Prentiss Ingraham received his early education at Jefferson College which at that time consisted of elementary, secondary and college departments. Later he attended St. Timothy’s Military Academy in Maryland where one of his classmates was John Wilkes Boothe. When the Civil War started in 1861, Ingraham was studying to be a surgeon at the Mobile Medical College in Mobile.

He left medical school to enter the Confederate Army in Withers’ Mississippi Regiment of Light Artillery. He later transferred Ross’ Brigade Texas Cavalry where he rose to the rank of commander (captain) of scouts. He was wounded in the foot while fighting at the siege of Port Hudson, La., and this wound troubled him the rest of his life. He was taken prisoner but escaped and received a second wound while fighting at the Battle of Franklin, Tennessee.

When the war ended he went to Mexico and fought with Benito Juarez against the French under Emperor Maximillian. (Ingraham was fluent in both French and Spanish which was probably because his father had taught those subjects at Jefferson College.) By 1866 Ingraham was fighting with the Austrians against the Prussians in the Austro-Prussian War. He later fought the Turks on the Greek island of Crete. After his time in Crete he served for a time with Khedive’s army in Egypt. Following this adventure he joined the rebels revolting against Spain in Cuba. He was made a colonel in the Cuban rebel army when he did duty on land and was a captain in their navy. He was captured by the Spanish while trying to smuggle arms into Cuba. He escaped, but thereafter he always used the title colonel.

His literary career began in 1869 while he resided in London writing a few short stories and poems, but in 1870 he moved to New York City. There he met Rose Langley, an author, artist and composer, whom he married. He then began writing novels, and plays. He wrote his first dime novel “The Masked Spy” in 1872 and after that he wrote so many dime novels that he is sometimes referred to as the “king of the dime novels.” His novels covered a wide range of subjects from pirates to private detectives, but after a trip West in the early 1870s most his novels were westerns. His westerns were so popular that some historians credit him with popularizing the cowboy hero and shaping a popular perception of the Western frontier that still exists today. We may never know how many books he actually wrote because he wrote under at least 13 different pen names.

Ingraham, who could not use a typewriter, hand wrote all his works. According to his biographer Charlie Hill “He once wrote a 70,000 word novel in a week and even produced the manuscript of a 35 thousand word novel in 24 hours.”

Even though many of his westerns were based on fictional characters, he also wrote over a hundred novels about Buffalo Bill Cody. He is reported to have written some of these novels two years before he actually met Cody in 1879. They became good friends, and for a short time Ingraham served as the press agent for the Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.

In 1903 Ingraham was diagnosed with Bright’s disease, a fatal kidney disorder; which was attributed to the foot wound he received in the Civil War. He retired to the Confederate home at Beauvoir in Biloxi for treatment and died on Aug.16, 1904. He is buried in the Confederate Cemetery in Biloxi.

Clark Burkett works at Historic Jefferson College. He writes a monthly historical column for The Democrat.