[4] The 9th Alabama Infantry Regiment was organized in the town in November 1861, to fight in the American Civil War.

Braxton received the key to town hall from Stokes, but all of the records had been removed from the building.

Stokes and his allies refused to acknowledge Braxton as mayor and restricted his access to city mail and funds.

Stokes claims that they were "attempting to rectify a decades-old mistake by holding a special election".

This council held meetings without Braxton's knowledge and removed him as mayor and appointed Stokes to replace him.

[5] Braxton and his city council filed a federal civil rights lawsuit in November 2022, stating that Stokes and his allies were conspiring to prevent him from governing the town due to his race.

[5][6][7] Elections were not held in the town for decades and Stokes' lawyers stated that they had not occurred for 60 years.

[9] According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 1.2 square miles (3.1 km2), all land.

The town is located in the geographic region known as the Black Belt, related to the fertile soil which attracted developers of cotton plantations in the antebellum years, and also to the population of enslaved African Americans who worked at those sites.

Many areas of the rural Black Belt are still majority African American in population.