Devil's Punchbowl (Natchez, Mississippi)

The Devil's Punchbowl was a refugee camp created in Natchez, Mississippi during the American Civil War to provide temporary housing and assistance to the freed slaves.

Description
In order to house the large numbers of formerly-enslaved African Americans, the Union Army created a refugee camp for them at a location known as the Devil's Punchbowl, a natural pit surrounded by bluffs. Many of the formerly enslaved there died of starvation, smallpox, and other diseases. It has been suggested by some that over 20,000 formerly enslaved people died here in one year. However, the scale of the tragedy has been disputed by multiple historians, with history professor Jim Wiggins arguing the 20,000 estimate is baseless and inflated tenfold, and author and activist Ser Seshsh Ab Heter-Clifford M. Boxley referring to the story as "concocted Confederate propaganda" aiming to cast the Union Army in a negative light.