26 GEOLOGY AND MINERAL RESOURCES OF MISSISSIPPI. 
The character of the Wilcox in its lower portion is well shown in the railroad cut 1^ miles 
east of Ackerman, Choctaw County. The cut is through the divide between the waters of 
Tombigbee and Pearl rivers, and the following section is exposed: 
Section of lower Wilcox formation 1\ miles east of Ackerman. 
Feet. 
11. Lafayette sands and sandstone which has been cemented into a ferruginous mass capping top of 
ridge. In places this sandstone is 10 to 15 feet thick 20 
10. Yellow stratified sand 10 
9. Bed of lignite which is not continuous, but changes laterally into a dark lignitic clay. When wet 
the whole mass has a tendency to slide down on the railroad track. Large pilings have been 
driven into the earth to prevent landslides. There is more or less sand and mica throughout 
the whole mass of lignite and lignitic clay 5 
8. Dark-blue clay, weathering to gray 6| 
7. Impure lignite 1 
6. Chocolate-colored joint clay 5 
5. Thin band of ferruginous sandstone i 
4. Dark-blue clay, similar to No. 8 \\ 
3. Laminated dark clay ^ 6 
2. Laminated clay in which thin ferruginous bands alternate with bands of soft chocolate clay 5 
1. Gray micaceous joint clay, weathering to white; bottom of cut 5 
The strata have a slight dip to the west. The above section shows that the prevailing 
material here is clay, with a slight amount of sand through the clay. 
One mile north of Ackerman a section in the deep cut along the newly constructed Mobile, 
Jackson and Kansas City Railroad shows less clay and more sand. 
Section of Wilcox formation 1 mile north of Ackerman. 
Feet. 
3. Lafayette sand 2 
2. Cross-bedded sandy gray clays, alternating with bands of yellow clayey sand 15 
1. Dark-gray sandy clays, containing fragments of leaves and lignitic material 10 
At the north end of the cut the clayey material is replaced at the same level by a mass of 
coarse-grained siliceous sand of gray, yellowish, and purple colors. 
Along the Mobile, Jackson and Kansas City Railroad, in the vicinity of Maben, there are 
numerous cuts which show a dark-blue, highly micaceous, plastic clay containing small 
lenses of sand. Many of the wells reach this blue clay, which produces a bad water. The 
clay in places is so compact that the wells do not have to be curbed. -The same variation 
of sands and clays is found along the eastern border of the Wilcox. 
Hilgard « gives the following section near Hickory Flat, in sec. 33, T. 5 S., R. 1 E.: 
There is a bluff about 70 feet high, which consists of alternating strata, from one-fourth inch to 2 feet 
in thickness, of gray and brown clay, sand, and sandy clay; the whole overlaid by a few feet of Orange 
sand [Lafayette]. 
The following section is also taken from the same source, page 114: 
Section of lignite strata, from an outcrop in T. 6 S., R. 1 E. 
Feet. 
3. Gray sandy clay with conchoidal cleavage, nonfossiliferous 6 
2. Black laminated clay with impressions of leaves and a seam of lignite at the base 1^ 
1. Blue massy clay, nonfossiliferous 8 
This section represents faithfully numerous outcrops in southern Lafayette and northern Calhoun 
counties. Some sections, however, exhibit nothing but sharp, yellow sand, with faint impressions of 
leaves. The region in which the above section occurs is remarkable for the number and large size of 
the ferruginous nodules occurring on the surface of the formation; silicified trunks, also being very 
common in the same position, and remarkable for the perfect preservation of their vegetable structure. 
Farther west, near the center of the formation, there appears a greater amount of purer 
stoneware clay and less of the dark-blue lignitic clays. This is particularly true in Mar- 
shall and Lafayette counties, south of which the white stoneware clays seem to grade into 
the more lignitized darker clays. The same line of clays continues north from Marshall 
a Geology and Agriculture of Mississippi, 1860, p. 112. 
