History:

Leakesville, county seat of Greene County, was one of the pioneer settle­ ments of the state, and as early as 1812 a sawmill was operated at this site. At the time of the War between the States Leakesville was a well-defined village, though still unincorporated. It is today (1939) the largest-town in this county and the center, of a lumbering, farming and stock -raising area.

Leakesville is at its liveliest during court week's end on Saturdays, when trade day brings in the truck farmers from the surrounding sections. Besides serving as a market for agricultural produce Leakesville maintains a turpentine plant and a cooperative mercantile company.

It was here that Kennie Wa gner, the sawmill worker who became Mississippi's last notorious outlaw, first broke the law and threw his life away," as the old ballad says. Kennie killed Sheriff McIntosh at Leakesville on May 2, 1925, then extended his operations to Tennessee, Arkansas, and Texas. In Texarkana a women sheriff captured him and brought him back to Leakesvil le for trial. He was sent to the State Penal Farm at Parchman.