USA > Georgia > Georgia's landmarks, memorials and legends, Volume I > Part 62
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PIERCE
Created by Legislative Act, December 18, 1857, from Appling and Ware. Named for General Franklin Pierce, of New Hampshire, a distinguished Northern Democrat, who became the fourteenth President of the United States. Blackshear, the county-seat, named for General David Blackshear,
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a noted officer of the State militia, who distinguished himself by his exploits against the Indians of Georgia and Florida, during the War of 1812. He also built the famous "Blackshear Road", one of the old land- marks of the south-eastern part of the State; and, when a lad, shouldered his musket in the cause of American Independence. He came from North Carolina to Georgia, at the close of the American Revolution.
Recollections of Gen. Blackshear.
Volume II.
Original Settlers. See Appling, from which county Pierce was formed; also Ware from which a part was taken.
E. D. Hendry and J. W. Stevens who represented Pierce in the Secession Convention at Milledgeville were among the original pioneers of this section. Benjamin Daniel Brantley came to Pierce from Ware when the county was first opened in 1857. Included among the oldest families of Pierce may be mentioned also: the Hyers, the McDonoughs, the MeGees, the Overstreets, and the Walkers. William G. Brantley, one of the strong- est members of the Georgia delegation in Congress since the war, was born in Blackshear. For the practice of law he located in Brunswick.
PIKE
Created by Legislative Act, December 9, 1822, from Monroe County. Named for Brigadier-General Zebulon M. Pike, of the United States army, who discovered Pike's Peak, in the Rocky Mountains, on an expedition to trace the sources of the Mississippi River. He was killed by the explosion of a mine, in a victorious assault upon Toronto, during the War of 1812. Zebulon, the county-seat, also named for Gen. Pike.
The Story of Austin Dabney.
Volume II.
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Pike in the At the outbreak of hostilities with Mexico,
Mexican War. in 1845, Pike County organized a company of volunteers for the front, called the Fannin Avengers. It was named in honor of a native Georgian, Colonel J. W. Fannin, who, with his entire regiment, was brutally massacred in the old Spanish fort at Goliad. The Fannin Avengers were annexed to the Georgia Regiment of Volunteers, in command of Colonel Henry R. Jackson, of Savannah. The officers were as follows : Captain, II. J. Sargent; 1st. Lieut., G. D. Alex- ander ; 2nd. Lieut., H. B. Holliday ; Sergeants, F. M. Ison, G. D. Johnson, William F. Moore, and Robert Lattimer Corporals, Alex. O. Reed, T. D. Bertody, Joseph Johnson and Benj. F. Ingraham. 93 members enrolled.
Gordon Institute, one of the best co-educational schools in the State, with a military department for the boys, under a West Point instructor, is situated at Barnesville. The school was chartered as a co-educa- tional institute, in 1852, and incorporated under the present name, in 1872. It was called Gordon Institute in honor of the South's great soldier-General John B. Gordon. The founder of the school, Prof. Charles E. Lambdin, was one of the pioneer educators of this sec- tion. Four times since 1872 the city has assumed heavy bonded indebtedness to meet the increasing needs of the institute for additional building and equipments. It is strictly non-sectarian. It pays no dividents to private individuals. It is governed by a self-perpetuating board of trustees, who serve without emolument, and the stand- ard both of scholarship and of discipline maintained at Gordon Institute is proverbially high. Not a little of the credit for this achievement belongs to former State School Superintendent, Jere M. Pound, who was for many years president of Gordon Institute. Resigning this chair to become the head of the State Normal School,
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at Athens, he was succeeded by Prof. E. T. Holmes, an accomplished educator of Southern youth, under whom the institute continues to prosper.
The Sinking of the Jacques Futrelle, the famous novel- Titanic. ist, who lost his life on board the ill- fated Titanic, on the night of April 16, 1912, was a native of Pike, in which county his early life was spent. Mr. Futrelle accompanied by his wife was on his return voyage to America, after a season spent in European travel. The Titanic was the greatest vessel afloat. She was making her maiden voyage from Liverpool to New York, and some of the foremost men of the world were on board, including multi-millionaires, philanthropists, and men of letters. Something like 1,600 lives were lost. In many respects, it was the most colos- sal disaster in the annals of the sea, but one in which the chivalry of brave men shone resplendent. With the most engaging gallantry, they complied with the unwritten law of the great deep-"women and children first"; and while the heroic musicians, with death staring them in the face, played "Nearer My God to Thee," the vessel sank to rise no more. Isidor Straus, the New York mil- lionaire and philanthropist, a former Georgian, was among the number ; and his wife, refusing to be torn from his side, went down to her watery grave, locked in his arms. It was one of the ironies of fate that while the body of Mr. Straus was afterwards found by the rescue hoats among the wreckage, to be splendidly entombed in New York, that of his wife lay entangled in a shroud of sea-weeds in the mid-Atlantic. Nothing in the life of John Jacob Astor became him like the manner in which he met death. The maid-servant who accompanied Mrs. Astor was gallantly assisted by him to one of the life- boats, while the man of uncounted millions became a bed- fellow of the humblest steerage passenger on a sandy couch, far beneath the waves of the ocean. It is said that
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one of his last acts was to smuggle a little boy into a place of safety, by putting a girl's bonnet on his head of golden hair. Archibald Butt, the chief of President Taft's military staff, en route home from an official visit to the Pope of Rome, was among the number who perished at sea, though the peculiar nature of his errand, if pleaded, might have saved him. The tribute which his tragic death drew from Mr. Taft was well deserved: "He died, I am sure, like a soldier and a gentleman." He too was a Georgian. But no one on board met death more gallantly than did brave Jack Futrelle. Coaxing his wife to enter a life-boat, with the lover's plea that he was not in any danger and that he expected to rejoin her in a few moments, he went to his grave waving her a fond adieu-"it will be only for a little while dearest, au revoir." No purer pearl of chivalry ever sank to rest amid the pearls of the sea. In the hearts of Georgians his memory will always be green.
Original Settlers. The original settlers of Pike, accord- ing to White, were: John Marshall, Isaac Cooper, Benjamin Jordin, Jacob Gilder, S. Steph- ens, Thomas Mathews, Elbert Phillips, Binford Gorce, Joseph Weaver, William Mobbley, Ephraim Mabry, Wil- liam Amos, Eli Walker, William Taylor, John Farey, Jabez Gilbert, James Johnson, Richard Myrack, John Moore, General Daniell, James Neal, J. B. Read, J. B. Williamson, H. G. Johnson, W. E. Mangum, 'Gideon Barnes, Willis J. Milner, William Ellis, P. Orr and John Neal.
To the foregoing list of early settlers may be added : David Neal, a soldier of the Revolution, William Barrett, Thomas J. Barrett, Alvis Stafford, James M. Madden, Zachariah Lawrence, Colonel J. H. Barker, a veteran of both Mexican and Civil Wars, and a number of others.
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Alvis Stafford was for more than forty years one of the leading merchants of Barnesville. He was the father of Mr. J. A. Stafford. In 1861, Dr. J. C. Beauchamp, a well- known legislator and physician, settled in Pike, coming here from Troup.
Rev. John Milner, an early pioneer Baptist minister, who was immersed by the great Jesse Mercer, lived for many years in Pike. He owned at one time the ground on which the present town of Barnesville is located. He was a man of great usefulness in his day and he often preached to multitudes of people in the heart of the wilderness. Milner, Ga., was named for the family to which he belonged.
There have been numerous instances of longevity in Pike. Mr. Adam Cooper was living in 1854 at the age of 100. He kept both his coffin and his shroud for years under his bed. Mrs. Crawford lived to be 105. William Nelson died at the age of 100, and in memory of him a church was afterwards dedicated called Century Nelson. Mrs. Harper and Mr. Lushing were both 90.
Charles S. Barrett, one of the ablest leaders to whom the direction of the South's agricultural interests since the war has been entrusted, is a native of Pike. It was in this county that his boyhood days were spent on his father's plantation. As President of the Farmers' Union. Mr. Barrett is today one of the best known and one of the most useful men of his time, devoted with in- tense zeal to a great cause. His father, Thomas J. Bar- rett, represented the county in the Constitutional Con- vention of 1877 and for fifty years was a prominent figure
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in the political affairs of Pike. Rev. J. W. Beck, a distin- guished educator, lived for a number of years at Concord.
POLK
Created by Legislative Act, December 20, 1851, chiefly from Paulding County, originally Cherokee. Named for Hon. James K. Polk, of Tennessee, during whose administration as President of the United States occurred the War with Mexico. Cedartown, the county-seat, so called because of the luxuriant cedars which grew in this neighborhood.
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Cedartown. Cedartown, the county-seat of Polk, was so named because of the predominant growth in this locality of luxuriant cedars. The existence here of one of the boldest limestone springs in the State served to attract settlers to the new town at an early date, and to make it something of a health resort. It has been a seat of culture since the early fifties, and there is not a locality in Georgia in which a better class of people can be found. During the ante-bellum days, it was the home of wealthy planters who cultivated extensive tracts of rich valley lands in this immediate neighborhood and who lived in an elegance of style which the present generation has not surpassed. It is said that the far-famed blue- grass lands of Kentucky are in no respect superior to the fertile lands of Cedar Valley, through which flow the waters of Cedar Creek. Since the war Cedartown has become quite a thriving commercial and industrial center. It boasts a member of prosperous mills, and several strong banks.
Rockmart is famous for an industry in which it takes the lead. The slate quarries in this vicinity are world renowned. For roofing purposes, it is said to be un- rivalled. Piedmont Institute is located here, a school of very high character. Micajah Brooks, a patriot of '76, is buried 5 miles west of Rockmart.
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Original Settlers. According to White, the original set- tlers of Polk were: Dr. E. H. Richard- son, William Peek, Asa Prior, Colonel Springer, R. C. Gibson, William F. Janes, W. E. West, G. W. West, James O. Griggs, B. F. Bigelow, W. O. B. Whatley, and B. Crabb.
To the foregoing list of early settlers may be added : Colonel Herbert Fielder, Judge Isaac N. Jones, Colonel James D. Waddell, General James O. Waddell, Major Joseph A. Blance, J. A. Peek, D. A. Whitehead, T. F. Burbank, Dr. D. M. Russell, Capt. S. A. Borders, Hon. R. W. Everett, Judge Charles G. Janes, Major Armistead Richardson, Robert Young, Augustus Young, James Young, Brooks M. Willingham, Jesse M. Wood, Hezekiah Witcher, Henry Gibson, William T. Gibson, Silas I. Cox, William H. Hines, Ephriam Thompson, Augustus N. Verdery, Joseph Mansell, Dr. Benjamin Wright, Rev. W. W. Simpson, Augustus G. Tomlinson and others.
Polk's Distinguished Two distinguished lawyers, both of Residents. whom wrote splendid biographies of eminent Georgians, were long resi- dents of Cedartown: Colonel James D. Waddell, who wrote a "Life of Linton Stephens" and Colonel Herbert Fielder, who wrote a "Life of Joseph E. Brown." Hon. Robert W. Everett, a former member of the National House of Representatives and a leader among the farm- ers of Georgia, is still a prominent citizen of Rockmart. Judge Charles G. Janes and Hon. William C. Bunn, both of whom recently passed away, were distinguished Geor- gians, the former a jurist of high rank, the latter an advocate with few equals at the bar. General J. O. Wad- dell, a successful planter, a leader among the Confederate Veterans, and a grandson of the noted Dr. Moses Wad-
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dell, long president of Franklin College, is also a resident of Polk. Cedartown is the home of the present able chairman of the State Democratic Executive Committee, Hon. William J. Harris, who married a daughter of the famous Confederate cavalry leader, General Joseph Wheeler. Here too lives Hon. G. R. Hutchens, a former member of the State Prison Commission and a leader in State politics.
PULASKI
Created by Legisative Act, December 13, 1808, from Laurens County. Named for the brave Polish nobleman, who fell mortally wounded at the siege of Savannah. The story that he died at sea lacks verification. His death occurred at Greenwich, whither he was taken from the battle-field; and his body rested in a private burial-ground in this same locallty until exhumed in the fifties for the purpose of being re-interred under the Pulaski monument in Savannah. Hawkinsville, the county-seat, named for Colonel Benjamin Hawkins, a distinguished officer of the American Revolution, who, after occupying a seat in the Senate of the United States, accepted from President Washington the arduous post of resident agent among the Creek Indians of Georgia. For a cultured gentleman of letters, thus to bury him. self in the wilderness for the purpose of uplifting an alien race of people, constitutes one of the nobest exampes of sef-sacrifice in the history of the Federal government. Originally, Pulaski embraced Bleckley.
Hartford One of Georgia's Lost Towns. Hartford, the first county-seat of Pulaski, formerly stood on a high bluff of the Ocmulgee River, just op- posite the site of the present town of Hawkinsville. It is today numbered among the dead towns of Georgia, but in the early days of the State it was an Indian trading post of very great importance, on what was then the frontier. The river at this point formed the boundary line, separating the territory of the whites from the domain of the Indians. The town was named for Nancy Hart, the celebrated heroine of the Revolution. In 1837, the court-house was removed from Hartford to Hawkinsville, dating from which event the fortunes of the little border stronghold began to decline, until it became at last only a dim memory of the remote past ; and there survives today but a few fragmentary re- mains to mark the spot.
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Original Settlers. The first comers into Pulaski, accord- ing to White were: Joseph Reeves, Ed- mund Hogan, S. Golson, George Walker, William Ha- thorn, J. M. Taylor, E. Blackshear, and Mark Mason.
To the foregoing list of early settlers may be added : Jeremiah Coney, James O. Jelks, Robert A. Ragan, his son, Alexander Ragan; Colonel Charles T. Lathrop, Cur- tis Joiner, Robert Anderson, his son, Capt. R. W. Ander- son ; Thomas McGriff, his son, Judge Patrick T. Mc- Griff; Mathias McCormac, his son David McCormack; James L. Walker, James J. Kitchen, Hardy Powers, Isaac Pipkin, and others.
Pulaski's Distin- Colonel Lucius M. Lamar, a gallant
guished Residents Confederate officer, a legislator of high rank, and for a number of years Marshal for the Southern District of Georgia, was a resi- dent of Hawkinsville. He was occupying the Speaker's desk, in the capacity of Speaker pro. tem. of the Georgia House of Representatives, when Henry W. Grady, at the head of a column of Atlanta citizens, in the fall of 1884, entered the State capitol and, brushing past the sergeant- at-arms, announced the election of President Cleveland in his famous words: "Mr. Speaker, a message from the American people !" To which announcement, Col. Lamar, catching the spirit of the invasion, replied : "Let the mes- sage be received." Then followed an adjournment of the Legislature in an outburst of pandemonium. Due to a scar which he carried on the back of his neck, Colonel Lamar wore his hair long. It fell in curls over his shoul- ders, making him one of the most picturesque men in the public life of Georgia ; and combined with his courtly man- ners, it gave him a charm of person which no one in his day excelled. Colonel John F. Lewis, the father of ex-
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GEORGIA'S LANDMARKS, MEMORIALS AND LEGENDS
Congressman Elijah B. Lewis, of Montezuma, was one of the pioneer bankers of Hawkinsville, an honor which he shared with the late Judge John Henry, of the same town. Both were sagacious financiers and constructive forces. Colonel J. Pope Brown, a former Treasurer of the State of Georgia and a popular minority candidate for Governor, owns an extensive plantation in Pulaski. Judge W. L. Grice, a Nestor of the Georgia bar and a much beloved man, lives in Hawkinsville; and here, too, ressides Judge John H. Martin, a jurist of note and a leader among the veterans of the Lost Cause.
PUTNAM
Created by Legislative Act, December 10, 1807, from Baldwin County. Named for General Israel Putnam, of Connecticut, one of the most noted patriots of the Revolution. He was ploughing in his field when he heard the news of the battle of Lexington. Without stopping to change his clothes, he left his plough standing in the field and hastened to Cambridge, riding over a hundred miles in a single day. He was given at once a Brigadier-General's commission. His career at every point bristles with dramatic interest. Eatonton, the county-seat, named for General William Eaton, an adventurous American, who in 1805 at the head of a force of five hundred men, marched across the Lybian desert, in the interest of the rightful Pasha, to effect the successful capture of Derne, the second largest city of Tripoli. He held it against three repeated assaults of the Arabs, but was finally obliged to relinquish it, due to a treaty of peace concluded with the usurper by the United States Consul-General at Algiers, Tobias Lear, acting in agreement with Commodore Rodgers, who com- manded the fleet.
Union Academy : Where William H. Seward Taught. Nine miles from Eatonton, near the famous Turner plantation, stood Un- ion Academy, a school of which the great William H. Seward, who after- wards became one of the most dramatic figures in Ameri- can politics, was at one time principal. Mr. Seward rose to be Governor of the State of New York, a representative of the same great commonwealth in the Senate of the United States, and Secretary of State in the cabinet of President Lincoln. It was only by the narrowest margin that the latter defeated him for President in the contest of
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1860. (For an account of Mr. Seward's sojourn in Geor- gia, see Vol. II.) It was on the Turner plantation that the famous Joel Candler Harris began his literary career by setting type for the Countryman, then the only news- paper in the world edited and published on a plantation. According to local tradition, the site of Union Academy is today occuiped by Phoenix School, which stands two or three hundred yards from the old printing-office of the Countryman. The primitive wooden structure in which Mr. Seward taught the young ideas of Georgia how to shoot was burned to the ground more than fifty years ago; and the new building which rose in time from the ashes of the old one was not inappropriately called the Phoenix*
Eatonton Starts a Crusade for Internal Improvements. In the fall of 1831, there assembled at Eatonton the first gathering of progressive and wideawake men of affairs ever convened in Georgia for the purpose of discussing the subject of internal improve- ments ; and to the organized impulse created by his initial meeting much of the development which has taken place in Georgia along industrial and commercial lines can be distinctly traced. Delegates were present from every part of the State. The main question to be decided was whether canals or railroads should be recommended. Routes were reported for both; and at the same time a committee was appointed to bring the matter before the General Assembly and to urge upon the law-makers the importance of some definite course of action.
On the motion of Mr. Irby H. Hudson, of Putnam, one of the most zealous promoters of this great project, Hon. Thomas Stocks, of Greene, was made president of the convention. William Turner, Sampson W. Harris and William Wilkins, were chosen secretaries. On ac-
* Letter from Prof. W. C. Wright, Supt. of Putnam County Public Schools, dated Sept. 14, 1812.
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count of the vital bearing of this pioneer movement upon the subsequent fortunes of the Empire State of the South, the personnel of this important body is given in full. The delegates in attendance were as follows:
Bibb-Oliver H. Prince and William B. Rogers.
Butts-Irwin Case and James H. Starke.
Campbell-Martin Cobb and E. B. Thompson.
Chatham-William B. Bulloch, Mordecai Myers, John C. Nicoll and Thomas Young.
Columbia-Nathaniel Bailey, Edmund Bowdre, James 1. Hamilton, and George W. Hardwick.
Effingham-John H. Hines and Clem Powers.
Fayette-Finley G. Stewart and Nathaniel Blanchard.
Greene-Thomas Dawson, Thomas G. Janes, and Thomas Stocks.
Ilancock-Joel Crawford, John Graybill, James B. Ransom and William Terrell.
Harris-Henry J. Harwell.
Heard-William II. Houghton and John T. Leftwich.
Henry-Abner Davis, Frances C. Manson, and Amassa Spencer.
Jasper-William Burney, Eli Glover, Alexander McDonald and William Williamson.
Jefferson-John H. Newton.
Jones-James Gray, Thomas Hamilton, and Thomas Moughon.
Liberty-John Dunwody and Charles West.
Meriweather-Alfred Wellborn.
Monroe-Thomas N. Beall, George W. Gordon and N. B. Williams.
Morgan-Stewart Floyd, William Porter, John B. Walker, and John Wingfield.
Museogee-John Milton.
Newton-William D. Conyers Charles H. Sanders, Josiah Perry. Pike-John Neal and John B. Bird.
Putnam-Henry Branham, Irby H. Hudson, L. W. Hudson, W. W. Mason and James A. Meriwether.
Richmond-William Cumming and John Moore.
Talbot-Samuel W. Flournoy and Charles Pace.
Taliaferro-Marens Andrews, Absalom Janes and Simon Morris.
Twiggs-Nimrod W. Long, Stephen F. Miller and Matthew Robertson.
Upson-James R. Cox and Moses Wheat.
Warren-Gray A. Chandler.
Washington-William Hurst.
Wilkinson-Thomas Gilbert.
The Old Lamar Homestead.
Volume II.
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Genealogy of the Lamar Family.
Volume II.
Recollections of Mirabeau B. Lamar.
Volume II.
Anecdotes of Judge Lamar. Volume II.
Boyhood Haunts of Joel Chandler Harris. Volume II.
Original Settlers. White gives the original settlers of Putnam as follows: William Wilkins, Benjamin Williamson, John Lamar, John Buckner, Eli S. Shorter, Stephen Marshall, John McBride, Captain Vesey, James Hightower, John Trippe, Isaac Moreland, John White, Benjamin Whitefield, Joseph Cooper, Josiah Flournoy, M. Pounds, Ward Hill, Rev. Richard Pace, Rev. John Collinsworth, Jesse Bledsoe, William Turner, Willis Roberts, Mark Jackson, Peter F. Flournoy, Thomas Park, Raleigh Holt, A. Richardson, Tarpley Holt, James Kendrick, Reuben Herndon, T. Woolridge, Joseph Turner, Warren Jackson, Edward Traylor, Samuel M. Echols, James Echols, E. Abercrombie, Mat- thew Gage, Thomas Napier, and William Jackson. .
To the foregoing list may be added: Joseph Maddox, Samuel Reid, William E. Adams, William Turner, Rich- mond Terrell, Reuben DeJarnette, Robert Jenkins, Irby- Hudson, and Dr. Adiel Sherwood.
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Major Charles Abercrombie, an officer in the Revolu- tion, became one of the wealthiest planters and one of the most influential citizens of Putnam. His daughter, Jane married Bolling Hall, afterwards a member of Con- gress from Georgia. Captain Joseph Turner, a soldier in the patriot army, lies buried in an unmarked grave near Eatonton but the spot is said to have been identified and in the near future will doubtless be marked by the D. A. R. There probably sleep in the neighborhood of Eatonton a number of veterans of the first war for inde- pendence. But they passed away at a time when the State was suffering from the dire consequences of war, and when there were no means at hand for providing permanent memorials.
Putnam's Distin- George Holt, a native of Virginia,
guished Residents. settled in Putnam in 1810 and here established the ancestral seat of one of Georgia's most distinguished families. His sons- George, Hines, Peyton, Tarpley, Roy, Thaddeus, Simon, Robert and Cicero-were nine in number and most of them attained distinction.
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