Windsor Mounds

Long before the decadent columns of the nearby Windsor Mansion were raised, this area tucked in the Mississippi hills was reshaped by Indigenous hands. Between 1100 and 1600 A.D., Native mound builders raised four rectangular earthen platforms overlooking the river valley. Their purpose is now uncertain—perhaps ceremonial, perhaps residential—but the mounds endure as the oldest monuments on this land. Evidence of a structure were located on mound B through a 2013 excavation.

Centuries later, one of these mounds took on a new life as the final resting place for the owners of the plantation. Found tucked away north of the Windsor Ruins, the cemetery sits on Mound C, where the graves of the Daniell and Freeland families can be found. It is rumored that the Windsor Ruins remain haunted by the inhabitants of this cemetery, with sightings of both the original owner, Smith Coffee Daniell II, and the graveyard's first inhabitant, Frisby Freeland, an American Revolutionary War soldier, having been reported.

Today, the Windsor Mounds still sit quietly among thick woods and fields, with the cemetery remaining visible on the mound. A historical marker can be found just up the road from the ruins, offering a map detailing the location of each mound.