The city is named after Jean Baptiste de Girardot, who established a temporary trading post in the area around 1733; he was a French soldier stationed at Kaskaskia, Illinois, 1704-1720. The Cape in the city name was a rock promontory overlooking the Mississippi River, later destroyed by railroad construction. As early as 1765, a bend in the Mississippi about sixty miles south of the French village of Ste. Genevieve had been referred to as Cape Girardot or Girardeau. The settlement there dates from 1793 when the Spanish government, which had secured Louisiana in 1762, granted Louis Lorimier, a French-Canadian, the right of establishing a trading post. His grant gave him extensive trading privileges and a large tract of land surrounding his post. Lorimier was made commandant of the district and prospered from the returns of his land sales and trade with the Indians including the Ozark Bluff Dwellers and the Mississippian. The town of Cape Girardeau was incorporated in 1808, prior to Missouri statehood, and was reincorporated as a city in 1843. The advent of the steamboat in 1835 led it to become the biggest port on the Mississippi River between St. Louis, MissouriSaint Louis and Memphis, TennesseeMemphis.

The American Civil WarCivil War Battle of Cape Girardeau took place on April 26, 1863. The Union and Confederate Armies collided in a fierce, four-hour artillery, on that day,
23 Union and 30 Confederate soldiers were killed.Today, Cape Girardeau is the home to numerous Civil War sites and memorials such as,
* Fort D
* Old Lorimier Cemetery
* Port Cape Girardeau
* Union Monument & Fountain
* Common Pleas Courthouse
* Confederate War Memorial
* Minton House
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Girardeau%2C_Missouri