Historic Doors

 The doors at the Campbellton Masonic Lodge…Oh, the history that has passed through these doors!

 The lodge was erected in 1848 and is still used today.

Looking Back to Campbell County, Part One

From an article dated February 7, 1932 in one of the Atlanta papers soon after Campbell County became a part of Fulton County. The article was penned by Charles L. Bass and is titled “Campbell County, Now Part of Fulton, Important in Early History of Georgia” with the sub-headline that said, “Campbellton, now one of the state’s ‘deserted villages,’ flourished as county site before the Civil War”.

At the outset of the article Mr. Bass predicts Campbell County would be lost by absorption by Fulton County….that it would submerge as well as merge with Fulton .

Mr. Bass correctly asserts Campbell County’s “history and traditions will silently slip into the annals of the past and become but a memory”, and I would have to agree.

Most people today – eighty-four years later – have no idea Campbell County ever existed.

The article covers several things, but in this post I’m going to relate the information regarding Native Americans and the earliest days of Campbell County.

Later this week I’ll post the remainder of the article.

In the bottom lands of the streams in Campbell County the Indians held their corn dance festival; the early settlers related having observed them.  It is a tradition that on a hill near Pumpkintown a fierce battle had been fought between the Creeks and Cherokees fought with such savage fury that the victors drove the vanquished into the river.

It is probably true as an unusual number of human bones and Indian relics have been washed up near here in seasons of extremely high waters.

Evidence of Indian trails leading to the well-known Three-Notch and Five-Notch trails is still seen as reminders of the occupancy of the vanished race who once proudly claimed it as their own.

The new country with its fertile lands along the Chattahoochee River and its magnificent forests of fine timber then unspoiled by the reckless ax of the woodmen was an inviting territory.

However, settlement in the county was retarded by fear of the Indians who were angry at the treaty made by General McIntosh and who had been foully assassinated by a mob of Cowetas or Lower Creeks at his home in May, 1825.  And constant rumors of further vengeance and unrest against the whites were circulated.

Previous to the treaty signed at Indian Springs on February 12, 1825, by General William McIntosh, representing the Creek Indians, and Duncan G. Campbell and James Meriwether the United States government, the proud descendants of the brave warriors who owned and possessed the land roamed in happy freedom. It was the territory of the Creeks but on the borderland of the possessions of the Cherokees.  Indeed, across the Chattahoochee there was a strip of land considered neutral ground. Here Creeks and Cherokees met and made treaties.

But even before the creation of Campbell County settlers had moved into the territory. Among these early residents were Judge Walter T. Colquitt and with him his young secretary Benjamin Camp, the latter was to become one of the county’s most prominent citizens.

Judge Colquitt had an extensive plantation on the Chattahoochee which had grown a settlement known by the homely name of Pumpkintown or Cross Anchor at the time the county was organized.

I’ll post the remainder of this article later this week……

A Woman and Her Ferry

It is often discussed how Maime Weir owned and operated the Campbellton Ferry from time Alfred Austell, Jr. died until the 1950s when a bridge was finally built crossing the Chattahoochee River. 

Some might even think Maime Weir was the only female ferry owner in Campbell/Douglas County, but they would be wrong. 

Pull out an issue of the Southern Banner dated January 11, 1844 you would see the following blurb under state of Georgia legislative news, “An act to authorize Leah Rice to keep a ferry across the Chattahoochee River in Campbell County.”

The image below is the ferry crossing at Campbellton some 60 years later, but I would imagine it hadn't changed that much.

 

 

So, as early as 1844 a woman owned a Campbell County ferry – the one that operated right near the current Highway 92 bridge.

Regarding Mrs. Rice I want to point out that legally she owned the ferry, but I do not think she actually operated it.  The prior ferry owner had been her father, Armistead Bomar who owned property on both sides of the river including the Irwin-Bomar-Rice-Austin-Bullard House which still stands along Highway 92.  His will mentioned his mill and ferry.

 

Leah Rice Bomar was married pastor Thomas Sherod Rice who had passed the year before his wife took control of the Campbellton Ferry.

Presently, I’m not sure where Leah and her husband lived.

Ten Hats for Ten Daughters

Towards the end of Reconstruction a blurb appeared in the Southern Watchman dated March 31, 1869 that said, "A lady residing in Campbell County visited Atlanta one day during the present week and purchased at Kisers ten hats for her ten daughters. The Constitution says she deserves a medal."

I'd have to agree.

Shopping with one daughter is a monumental undertaking - shopping with or shopping for ten daughters - well, I can't even imagine.

It seems totally plausible that this woman would go to Kiser's store - or as it was more formerly known - M.C. and J.F. Kiser & Company. It was a wholesale drygoods store owned by the Kiser brothers, and more than likely the mother knew one or both of the brothers because in the 1820s the Kiser family moved to Campbell County to farm.

Here's an ad from an issue of The Atlanta Constitution dated March, 1869. Notice that at the time the store was located at Old Stand Talley and Brown, Whitehall Street in Atlanta. Later, they would move to the corner of Pryor and Wall Streets.  

M.C. Kiser (Marion Columbus) would be wildly successful with his business with little or no formal education. In 1887 he was a Fulton County Commissioner and during Lithia Springs resort days Mr. Kiser would the president of the Piedmont Chautauqua working with Henry W. Grady to present a wonderful program of speakers and entertainers each season.

When Marion C. Kiser died in 1893, he left the largest estate to that point in Atlanta history.

Now I have to wonder….how many women in Campbell County during the year 1869 had ten daughters?

Hmmm.....

Is there really such a thing as an egg-sucking dog?

An article in the Campbell County News during May, 1883 stated, “One of our citizens has recently been troubled with suck-eggs dogs. He suspicioned a dog belonging to [someone] in the neighborhood."

"Finally, on last Saturday night he and his wife decided to leave a dose of strychnine near the nest, and thus rid the settlement of so worthless a cur. Imagine that gentleman's feelings when he arose the next morning and beheld his own faithful yard dog lying cold in the embrace of death.”

I guess it never occurred to this unidentified Campbell County man that the dog going after his eggs was his own hound.

A suck-egg dog.

What in the world is a suck-egg dog?  I've led a sheltered life away from the propensity of dogs to suck eggs.

Who knew?

Apparently, a suck-egg dog is one that  goes after the eggs your chicken lays.

Perhaps I'm naïve regarding this issue due to the fact I've never owned chicken.

At least that's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

 

Speaking at the Campbellton Lodge

I had the pleasure of speaking at the Campbellton Lodge 76 F &AM, or as many lovingly refer to it the Old Campbellton Lodge, to a crowd of folks including several young people Saturday night.

Just to spend a little time in one of the last surviving buildings of Campbellton was enough, but they let me speak.

Imagine that!

The lodge building dates back to 1848. It is the oldest lodge in the state of Georgia still hosting meetings. Many of Douglas County's earliest citizens were members of this lodge.

A few weeks ago in preparation for my talk Worshipful Master, James (Rocky) Rothrock invited me to the lodge for a little tour.

The building is priceless with many original furnishings and historical artifacts. The blue color of the meeting room upstairs gives the lodge its other name - the blue lodge.

A bullet hole is very visible on one of the walls. Possibly a stray bullet from a skirmish or two when the Yankees crossed the Chattahoochee on their way south.

The downstairs area of the lodge building was used as a general store and post office when Campbellton was a thriving town. The original shelves still adorn the walls.

My topic Saturday night happened to be two of Campbellton's best known citizens - Thomas Coke Glover and his wife Lizzie. I've written about their importance to Confederate history here and here.

Joining me on the program were the Wool Hat Boys. During the Civil War the name was given to a group of men from the Sand Hill area of Carroll County who formed Company H of the 37th Georgia Infantry Regiment. When it came to name their group they thought of the hats made in John Carroll's factory at Sand Hill. They were "hard to wear out", and since the men wanted their group to be strong and "hard to wear out" as well they took on the name Wool Hat Boys.

Today's group are Masons who are also members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. Various members discussed how the brotherhood of Masons crossed the lines of battle during the Civil War as terms such as North and South and Union and Confederate did not matter. If a man identified himself as a Mason the brotherhood between the two men took precedence over the uniform they wore.

Several of the members spoke including Charlie Lott.

As did Jerry Vogler, Jr.

and Mr. Gonzalez, who discussed the education programs the group presents to local students. 

It was a most enjoyable evening!

Thomas Coke Glover: The Fighting Physician

One of the things I try to avoid as I share my research regarding Douglas County history is a dry recitation of someone's birth and death dates, where they are buried, who their parents were, their spouse's information and their children's names.

I wouldn't want to write it, and you certainly wouldn't want to read it.  Even when I was still in the classroom I thought of myself as a storyteller because that's what history is...a collection of true stories.

As I related in 2006 in a post I wrote for my blog History Is Elementary, "Thousands of people throughout history have gone to great lengths to record history through newspapers, diaries, journals, saved letters, family Bibles, and oral traditions."

I want to do more than just record a litany of facts.  I want to gather up as many of the bits and pieces of the story as I can from as many resources as I can to tell the story

Sometimes it's a real challenge, but in the case of Dr. Thomas Coke Glover or Dr. T.C. Glover depending on the source the story is just too compelling not to relate it. 

Though Glover was born in Augusta, Georgia he chose to make Campbell County his home.   The genealogy research of Joe Baggett indicates Glover was in Campbellton as early as 1850.  He was a medical doctor and evidence suggests he was highly respected and known across the state.

I obtained the following picture from Ancestry.com

The picture was posted by Harold Glover a descendant of Dr. Glover's and he advised this was the original office from which Dr. Glover practiced medicine from 1850-1861 in Campbell County.   I'm not sure of the exact location of the building, but following the war Harold Glover advises the building was used as a voting site and finally as a general store.  He also adds that if you look closely at the side of the building, just below the lower left corner of the drink sign, you will see a hole.  This is a result of an artillery shell fired by General Sherman's troops when his men marched from what would later become Douglas County and crossed the river into Campbellton.  

The building no longer exists, but it is said the cannon shell hole can be observed if you visit the History Room at the Old Campbell County Courthouse in Fairburn.

Now you may be asking yourself why I'm discussing a man from Campbell County when my focus is Douglas County history.  Please remember Douglas County was birthed out of Campbell and many of our citizens hold ties to the original settlers of Campbell County including Dr. Glover. 

Dr. Thomas Coke Glover interests me due to the choices he made during the days leading to the Civil War.  He was a respected physician who married Elizabeth (Lizzie) Susan Camp in 1852.   Glover was one of the original town commissioners of Campbellton in 1854 per the research of Joe Baggett.

Glover also served the people of Campbell County as one of the two delegates they sent to represent them at the Secession Convention held in Milledgeville from January 16 to March 23, 1861.  An image of the secession document is published below:

Not only did Glover vote for secession he also assisted with writing the new constitution for the Republic of Georgia.

Of course it was assumed Glover would serve in the Confederate Army, and it was naturally assumed he would serve as a medical doctor, but this is where Glover deviates from the expected.  By serving as an army doctor he would have been spared from actual combat, but Glover chose to fight and set about at once organizing a company of men.

Richard B. Stansberry writes in So Sings the Chattahoochee..."[Upon from the Secession Convention] Dr. Glover organized the Campbellton Blues which became Company A of the Twenty-first Georgia Infantry Regiment.   The men drilled on the streets and about the courthouse square [in Campbellton].  They received so much training they were dubbed the 'West Pointers' of the Georgia Twenty-first, and given the roster distinction of Company A."

The picture below shows the spot where the old Campbell County courthouse stood in Campbellton.....courtesy of Mark Phillips.    The site of Campbellton's old courthouse quare is is on your left...on the hill....as your cross the Chattahoochee River on Highway 92 entering Fulton County.

   

A complete muster roll of Company A including many men from Campbell County....ancestors of many of today's Douglas County residents can be found here.  

This might have been the end of my discussion regarding Thomas Coke Glover, but then I happened upon an interesting book titled History of the Doles-Cook Brigade by Henry Walter Thomas.  The book was published in 1903, and represents the history of four different regiments of the brigade - the Fourth, the Twelfth, the Twenty-first (Glover's regiment), and the Forty-fourth.  Thomas served in Company G of the Twelfth Georgia, and the book is an extensive  history provided mostly by the men who served.  

So often we have the information someone fought in the Civil war, but Thomas' book provides the details regarding where the men in Company A fought and contains eyewitness accounts of Dr. Glover's actions.

Thomas relates how Glover and Company A didn't reach Virginia until Second Bull Run, and soon after their arrival a feud began between some of the officers that grew and spread and lasted until death claimed the principal, Colonel John T. Mercer. 

When the order came to go to Manassas a large number of the regiment were down in their tents with measles.   When the order to strike tents was received the rain was pouring down in torrents, and Glover went to Colonel Mercer and asked that the tents be not struck down from over the men sick with measles stating the danger to their lives would ensue from their getting wet.  

Colonel Mercer refused to listen to him, and....Captain Glover refused to obey the order so far as his company's sick were concerned, and was placed in arrest...the tents were struck and about twenty men with measles were left in the rain.

Almost all the other company officers of the regiment took sides with Captain Glover, and the breach thus made was never healed as long as the principals lived.

On arriving at Manassas....the regiment went into camp and a few days later the arrested officers were returned to duty without any thing further having been done.

Glover and his men were soon caught up in assisting the Twenty-first North Carolina in capturing the Union supply at Manassas Junction.  Glover's commanding officer, Brigadier General Isaac Trimble gleefully said, "Give me my two Twenty-ones and I'll charge and capture hell itself!"

Glover and the Twenty-first Georgia took part in the Battle of Sharpsburg or Antietam in September, 1862.

One of the battle reports relates how the Twenty-first Georgia was ordered to wheel to the left, and, taking shelter under a low stone fence running at right angles to their former line, direct their fire upon the wavering Yankee regiment, with the view of breaking the enemy's line at this point.   They did so promptly, and a few rounds from them had the desired effect, and the enemy's line was entirely broken.

Discussing the same action Thomas' book states:

We were given orders to reach the fence.   In obedience to this command there was exhibited the most daring bravery that came under our observation during the war - a bravery not surpassed in the charge of the famous Light Brigade at Balaklava.  Volley after Volley was poured into the Twenty-first Georgia, mowing down the men by scores, yet they never faltered or wavered, but onward went, closing up the gaps in the lines as if on dress parade, with their gallant commander Colonel [Thomas Coke] Glover, in front with his sword in his uplifted hand calling for his men to follow.   And they did.   Oh God!  What a sight; what carnage.  What a feast of death was that!

....The fence was reached the work of death commenced at short range.  From this fence we poured volley after volley into them for some thirty to forty minutes....The regiment went over to the fence with one of its most blood-curdling rebel yells.

...Then they fled and the day was ours; but at what a cost!   ....Company A went into battle with forty-five men, nineteen were killed and twenty-one wounded, some of them fatally and others crippled for life. 

One of the wounded happened to be Glover himself who at some point during the battle realized ammunition was getting low and his men were wasting it on an enemy who was too far out of range.  The book Antietam: The Soldier's Story by John M. Priest relates how Glover sought out Colonel James Walker (C.O. Trimble's Brigade) to ask to move the men under his command.   

Walker gave the order for the Twenty-first Georgia to move out.   As his aide delivered the command to the regiment a ball struck Major Glover through the body and sent him to the ground - severely wounded.....but he did live to fight another day.

In fact, he lived to fight many fights before his death leading his men through 107 various engagements with the enemy.

When Colonel John T. Mercer of the Twenty-first Georgia was killed at Plymouth, North Carolina Glover rose to Lieutenant Colonel on April 18, 1864.  

Five months later on September 19, 1864 he was shot and killed instantly at Winchester, Virginia and was buried there.

Strangely, it is reported a few hours before his death, Lieutenant Colonel Glover heard about the fall of Atlanta and said, "Atlanta has fallen, and I fear all is lost, but I shall not live to see it."

How amazingly prophetic.

Thomas relates in The History of the Doles-Cook Brigade.....No braver or truer man that he ever drew the breath of life.  He was always at this post of duty ready to lead his men to battle.  His own safety was of no consideration to him when or where duty called  Not a single battle was ever fought by the regiment, but that this noble officer was with it, encouraging and leading his men to victory and glory...Colonel Glover was to the Twenty-First Georgia what Stonewall Jackson was to the army of the valley.

....and a final note regarding the Twenty-First Georgia including Company A from Campbell County......Of all the regiments engaged in the war between the states, North and South, the Twenty-first Georgia was the third in number of men killed in battle.  The regiment that lost the greatest number was the Eighth New York, and they were killed by the Twenty-first Georgia.  

Next Monday I'll continue the Glover saga with a post concerning his wife and her importance regarding how we remember the Civil War...not just here but across the South.

Juneteenth

An email from the Douglasville Convention and Visitor's Bureau rolled across my email screen earlier this week.   It said, “Join in the Juneteenth Celebration featuring entertainment, culture, and fun for the entire family!”

The celebration will occur this Friday and Saturday…..June 15-16…. in downtown Douglasville and is sponsored by the Black Education Historical Exhibit or BEHE.

An opening reception will be held Friday evening, June 15 at the Downtown Conference Center at 6:15 p.m. featuring Tuskegee Airman John Stewart.   Tickets are $10 each and can be obtained at the Douglasville Welcome Center.

Look for entertainment, arts & craft vendors, children’s activities, health screenings, senior bingo and more at O’Neal Plaza this Saturday….June 16^th.  The event is free and open to the public.

You can find out more about Douglasville’s Juneteenth Celebration at the official website.

But many may be asking….exactly what is Juneteenth?

The day is actually recognized as a state holiday or observance in 41 states…including Georgia.

The Juneteenth website states, “Juneteenth is the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States.   From its Galveston, Texas origin in 1865, the observance of June 19^th as … Emancipation Day has spread across the United States and beyond. “

Place the words June for the month and nineteenth for the date together and you come up with the name “Juneteenth”.

Of course, if you dig down deep and attempt to recall what you were taught regarding the Civil War in school you know Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation was issued on September 22, 1862.   The proclamation was an executive order that proclaimed those who were living under slavery in the states considered to be in rebellion were free.  

The Proclamation went into effect January, 1863 but for most of the slaves in the South there was little difference in their life.   Though many knew about the proclamation and many were given their freedom there were many more who didn’t know about it across the Confederacy.

Close to 2,000 federal troops reached Galveston, Texas on June 18, 1865.  The story goes that General Gordon Granger stood on the steps of Galveston’s Ashton Villa and read the contents of the Emancipation Proclamation and the celebration that began afterward is considered the first official Juneteenth.

Why are we worried about slavery and celebrating something like Juneteenth when Douglas County and Douglasville were created in the 1870s…..after the Civil War?   

Someone has actually said to me, ”There were no slaves here, so what’s the point with any sort of celebration?”

I will agree that slavery was no longer an institution when the City of Douglasville formed in 1875 just as it had ended in 1870 when Douglas County was formed, however, Douglas County didn’t appear as if by magic….it was created from an already existing jurisdiction.   

We have to look towards the former Campbell County to get direction regarding slavery in this area.   The land falling within Douglas Country’s borders today was once part of Campbell County.   The 1840 census for Campbell County indicates a total population of 5,372 with 842 of those listed as slaves.  

An entry from the Empire State….a newspaper in Spalding County…..for January 16, 1856 discusses one of Robert Jackson’s runaway slaves from Palmetto.    Mr. Jackson is offering $70 reward stating that the runaway slave named Phillip had frequently been in the counties of Carroll and Campbell without consent of his owner, with a forged pass.

I can’t help but wonder if Phillip had loved one he was willing to risk his life for in order to see time and time again.

This link shares a will written by Gideon Whitted who lived in Campbell County and left his slaves to various family members.   Mr. Whitted leaves his daughter Mary Gwynn a certain slave by the name of Peter….another daughter, Jemima King received two slaves…..a girl named Jinny about eight years old, and a boy by the name of Henry about nine years old.

When I was still in the classroom I taught eight, nine and ten year old children.   I can’t imagine any of my former students being willed to another human being…..never to have any formal education…..never to have the right to aspire to be anything other than a slave.

Men such as Judge Bowden, and Ezekiel Polk lived in parts of Campbell County that would become Douglas County, and they both owned slaves.  Many citizens of Douglas County today can claim some of those very slaves as their ancestors.

I’m not sure about you but it has always given me pause to read how humans were treated as property, tracked like animals, and actually inherited like furniture or farm equipment. 
   

I welcome a day to recognize the emancipation of slaves in the United States.   I welcome a day to celebrate and educate.

Slavery existed and it most certainly was a part of Douglas County’s history making  a Juneteeth recognition not only appropriate, but necessary!

Happy Juneteenth!

The Forgotten Town of Campbellton

Map of Campbell County, Georgia....1830

 Yesterday was one of those nice lazy days spent with family and friends that you want to bookmark and remember for a very long time.  We sat at my sister’s house under her lovely portico and watched a steady stream of traffic coming and going from the Cotton Pickin' Fair down at Gay, Georgia   Like many along the route Dear Sister had filled her front yard with several odds and ends in hope that the fair goers would stop and load up on some new found treasures.

We never actually made it down to the fair……

Who really needed to go all the way down to Gay when both sides of the road in Dear Sister’s little crossroads of a community was filled to capacity with crafts, odds and ends, signs that exclaimed boiled peanuts and funnel cakes as well as any other item that could be sold.    Seriously, if you could conceive it you would have found it on the side of the road meandering south from Fayetteville towards Gay, Georgia.

Of course, the draw for me wasn’t yard sale after yard sale.  It had something to do with my niece being town, something to do with getting to see the newest edition to the family as well…..a sweet little baby boy.  Then there was the promises of the grilled feast my brother-in-law can produce….sitting around with friends….and enjoying the down home locale where my sister and her husband now make their home. 

And what a home it is…...    I have to admit I’m drawn to Dear Sister’s home….a turn of the century house with lots of character and hints of history that we have yet to discover.  No, it’s not hard for me to  cross the Chattahoochee River and head south at all when that invite is extended.

Our route home was lit by the Supermoon.  I swear we could have turned off the headlights and still could have made our way home.  

Wasn’t the moon beautiful….so big and bright?   

We headed back into Douglas County along State Route 92, and as we approached the four way crossing at Charlie’s Market I couldn’t help but notice how bright the remaining features of the town of Campbellton were…..the Methodist Church on my left with its old graves , the old Baptist Church cemetery up the hill on my right along with Campbellton Lodge No. 76 F & AM which dates to 1848. 

I made a silent wish I could look up on that hill and see the old Campbell County Courthouse with the moonlight bouncing off the window panes, but no matter how hard we wish sometimes…..they just can’t come true.   The old courthouse was torn down many years ago.

As we zoomed across the river I turned back towards Campbellton and noticed how the moonbeams lit up the river making a path right through the middle of the water.   I was overcome with sadness at that moment….mourning the town that had been along the banks of the Chattahoochee River , and I recalled a description Atlanta’s esteemed historian Franklin Garrett had penned in his book Atlanta and Its Environs.  

Garrett said, Old Campbellton, upon its eminence overlooking the Chattahoochee with its brick courthouse, masonic hall, academy, and ante-bellum homes gleaming through the avenues of magnolia, myrtle, or cedar, were doomed.  Most of its old families drifted off to other places, including the newer railroad towns of Fairburn and Palmetto.   Weeds rioted and choked neglected flower gardens.   Rows of comfortable homes, once housing a population of some 1200, fell into decay.  The Masonic Lodge Hall was deserted.  For two decades the red brick courthouse stood dark and silent the habitation of owls, bats, and ghostly memories of better days, until it was mercifully dismantled.   The names upon mossy tombstones in the Methodist churchyard and the old Baptist cemetery are the only remainder of the once flourishing and beautiful town, the site of which, since 1932, has been in Fulton County.

So, how did Campbellton basically become a ghost town of sorts?   Here’s a little regarding how it all played out……

Campbell Count was named for Colonel Duncan G. Campbell.   Part of Campbell’s claim to fame is he helped to negotiate the Treaty of Indian Springs – the treaty where the Creek Nation ceded a portion of their land including the land that would become Campbell County.

If an initial settler in the area – Judge Walter T. Colquitt – had gotten his way the county seat for Campbell County would have been established on his property at Pumpkintown eight miles south down the river, but an online publication by the Chattahoochee Hills Historical Society states another judge – Francis Irwin – offered his eight acres of undeveloped land [along the river]….with an added incentive for free lots for prospective builders and inhabitants….

By 1829, establishment of the county government began in earnest with the creation of a judicial system and the appointment of James Black, Jesse Harris, Robert O. Beavers, Thomas Moore, and Littleberry Watts as electoral commissioners and county organizers….and by 1835, streets and lots in Campbellton were surveyed and [ready for construction].

Eventually, the town would have a courthouse, doctor’s office and pharmacy, academy, hotel, blacksmith, stores, lodge hall, post office and many homes.

One of the homes I’ve pictured below….

The Latham Home....Campbellton, Georgia

It’s known as the Latham Home and per this webpage it was built in the 1830s.   You might remember it…I know I do.   You could see it from Charlie’s Market .  Built in the 1830s it faced Old Campbellton Fairburn Road which crossed the Chattahoochee via the ferry.  Around 1958 the old road was closed and a new road was cut behind the home going to the new Chattahoochee Bridge (that we cross today).

In his book The Courthouse and the Depot:  The Architecture of Hope in an Age of Despair Wilbur W. Caldwell discusses a Coweta County account that relates in 1830, Samuel Keller moved from Newnan to Campbellton ‘lured by expectations’ of steamboats on the Chattahoochee River.

Yes!  Steamboats!

   

Can you imagine?

Chattahoochee Hills History mentions there were high hopes for the rich loamy soil [ which did make the area successful agriculturally, but] there were also high hopes for the Chattahoochee to become a major transportation and shipping channel in the region….but the river proved to be shallow and difficult to navigate.

Caldwell also mentions something from a Troup County history source that recalls in 1831 Colonel Reuben Thompson brought a load of goods upriver from West Point to Campbellton,  but just the one trip can be confirmed.   The dream of a Chattahoochee navigable all the way up to Atlanta persisted well into the second half of the twentieth century, but it was never to be.

The death sentence for the town of Campbellton came about per most sources when the Atlanta & West Point Railroad failed to be built through Campbellton.  The line went through Fairburn, Georgia instead.    Many local sources state the citizens of Campbellton refused the railroad, but Caldwell states, a quick look at the terrain ‘on the banks of the Chattahoochee’ reveals some pretty rough country for railroad building while the natural ridge at Fairburn is flat and inviting.  Thus it seems unlikely that the opinions of the citizens of Campbellton had much influence on the survey of the Atlanta and West Point Railroad.

Even so…the loss of the railroad meant a slow death for Campbellton over the next several years beginning in 1870 when as Caldwell reports the citizens of Campbellton moved to Fairburn in droves.  One local account relates Campbellton residents were dismantling their homes and moving them as well.  The town had close to 1200 citizens at its peak, but by 1860, only 239 white citizens still remained.

The original courthouse in Campbellton was wooden, but was eventually replaced with a brick structure.  The picture below was taken in 1914 after it had been neglected for several years per this webpage.  

A local man – Robert Cook – bought the building and dismantled it.   He used the materials to build a barn on his property along Cedar Grove Road.

All that remains of old Campbellton today is Campbellton United Methodist Church  and even though the Baptist church building is not original to the town the cemetery is original. The Baptist church faces what once was the town square where the courthouse stood.   Both Union and Confederate soldiers rest in the cemeteries.  Close to the Baptist church stands the Beaver home – a Greek Style farmhouse which was taken over by Union soldiers when they crossed the river at Campbellton during the Civil War.   The house sits across from where the original Campbell County Courthouse stood. 

You might be asking yourself why I’m discussing a dead town that lies on the Fulton County side of the river today, but back in 1828 Campbell County extended beyond the river into what is today Douglas County.   In fact, Douglas County was created from Campbell County in 1870.  You can read more about that here. 

Many of our county’s forefathers were citizens of Campbell County long before they were citizens of Douglas County.  

The long forgotten town of Campbellton IS important to Douglas County history…..it is our beginning.

Ephraim Pray: An Amazing Man

Currently, I have the number twenty on the brain–as in twenty years. When I was twenty I was working as a paralegal for law firm in Marietta. Looking back on it now I had it made. I had my own money, but I lived with my parents. Mother was available as my cook and laundress while Daddy served as my advisor and back up banker. My main activity when not working or sleeping was hanging out with my friends.  

Even though I worked it wasn’t back-breaking labor. I was in a very nice air-conditioned office with machines such as a word processor and a copy machine to help me with my job which basically consisted of drafting complaints and researching case law. The attorney I worked with never came in before twelve each day, so twice a week I’d venture over to the courthouse and answer a calendar call on his behalf. I ate lunch out every day in places that had real waiters and cloth napkins. 

Even though I was great at my job and took it very seriously the words cushy, charmed and spoiled come to mind, but it wasn’t lost on this student of history I was experiencing a much different lifestyle at twenty than many of my female counterparts who had gone before me. I had more opportunities than my aunts had experienced, much more than either of my grandmothers, and my great-grandmothers would have been shocked I didn’t already have three or four kids trailing after me and one on my hip while I took care of the house, the garden full of produce and a yard full of chickens outside my back door. 

Go back to the 1820s and 1830s and life was just plain hard–not just for women, but things were difficult for men as well when compared to today.  Folks didn’t have the ease of today’s modern fabric regarding clothing choices, education was lacking unless you had money and the right connections, and modern conveniences such as the phone, electricity, and modern travel just didn’t exist.

To reach a certain age such as twenty years old and venture off to make your way in the word was a hard thing to do. There was no constant contact with loved ones and friends like there is today. Striking out on your own meant being on your own–TOTALLY!  Once you left your family’s side a letter could take several weeks to reach its destination. Overnight postal service didn’t exist.

In fact, if you left your family and moved to another state or even more than fifty miles away it was very probable you might never see your family again. Yet, people did leave their families and did make their own way in the world including a very important man in Douglasville history. 

Ephraim Pray – one of the area’s earliest citizens even before Douglas County or Douglasville existed, and he actually hailed from the North.
  

Yes! A Yankee in our midst! All joking aside, Ephraim Pray became a model for hard work and responsible citizenship...

THANK YOU for visiting “Every Now and Then” and reading the first few paragraphs of “Ephraim Pray: An Amazing Man“ which is now one of the 140 chapters in my book “Every Now and Then: The Amazing Tales of Douglas County, Volume I”. 

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