Citronelle

City in Mobile County, southwestern Alabama, USA, 48 km/30 mi north-northwest of Mobile; population (1990) 3,700. In 1952 drillers discovered, at a depth below 3,050 m/10,000 ft, the Citronelle Oilfield, one of the South's (and the world's, at that depth) largest petroleum deposits.

Named after the oil-producing Asian citronella grass growing locally, it became in 1906 one of the first US centres producing oil from tung nuts. Livestock, market-garden crops, and cotton have also been important in the local economy.