Benjamin T. Montgomery (1819-1877) was born a slave in Loudon County, Virginia. In 1837 he was sold to Joseph E. Davis, a wealthy Mississippi plantation owner and older brother of Jefferson Davis. Ben Montgomery was educated and an astute businessman and inventor. Before and during the war he was overseer and manager of Davis’s plantations and businesses near Vicksburg. After the continued in the employ of Joseph Davis, but in 1866, Davis sold his property to Montgomery for $300,000 in the form of a long-term loan. After a major crop failure in 1876, Ben Montgomery defaulted on the loan and the property reverted to the Davis family. Montgomery’s son, Isaiah Montgomery (b. 1847), established a community of freed slaves at Mound Bayou, Mississippi in 1887.