Remembering Morven and the Old 660Th District

By Stephen W. Edmondson

Co. E was part of Symons Regiment, 1st Regiment, and commanded by Angus Morrison, recently Ordinary of our county. They went by rail from Thomasville to the sand walled artillery fort on the Great Ogeechee, protecting a vital railroad bridge, just upriver, from federal gunboats. Under the higher command of Gen. Lafayette McLaws and the post command of Major Anderson of nearby Lebanon Plantation, they faced Shermans huge well armed forces who needed to punch through to obtain supplies from the federal fleet. Co. E had 47 men on duty when Shermans much larger force attacked late on Dec. 13, 1864.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 28, 2014
• ISBN: 9781491732502

Stephen W. Edmondson

Dr. Stephen W. Edmondson is a retired physician with a life long interest in history. He attended Georgia Tech, the University of Georgia and the Medical College of Georgia. He has done much genealogy research and articles for local histories and one privately published book, ISAAC EDMONDSON OF GEORGIA AND HIS DESCENDANTS. He now lives in the mountains of Georgia.

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Copyright © 2014 Stephen W. Edmondson.

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ISBN: 978-1-4917-3248-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-3249-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-3250-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014907087

iUniverse rev. date: 04/15/2014

CONTENTS

Preface

Chapter 1: Beginnings

Chapter 2: Early History

Chapter 3: Independence and the War of 1812

Chapter 4: First Settlement

Chapter 5: The Coffee Road Then and Now

Chapter 6: Antebellum Growth and Development

Chapter 7: Sustained by Faith

Chapter 8: Social Life

Chapter 9: Tilling the Land

Chapter 10: Livestock and Wildlife

Chapter 11: Common Crops

Chapter 12: Early Government

Chapter 13: The Naming of Morven

Chapter 14: Brooks County Established

Chapter 15: Homesteads and Houses

Chapter 16: War and Rumor of War

Chapter 17: Government after 1858

Chapter 18: Later Wars

Chapter 19: Churches and Cemeteries

Chapter 20: Lodges and Clubs in the 660th District

Chapter 21: Post Offices in the Old 660th District

Chapter 22: Communities

Chapter 23: Timber, Sawmills and Naval Stores

Chapter 24: Businesses and Professions

Chapter 25: The Town of Morven

Chapter 26: Schooling in the Old 660th District

Chapter 27: Rural Schools

Chapter 28: Town of Morven Schools After 1898

Chapter 29: Morven School Teachers and Staff

Chapter 30: Students, Morven White Schools

Chapter 31: School Clubs and Activities

Chapter 32: A Little Place Called Barney

Chapter 33: Schools in Barney

Appendix

PREFACE

Tell ye your children of it, and let their children tell their children, and their children another generation….the Prophet Joel.

Much history is lost with each generation. Time passes. Memories fade. Records tell us only a part of the story. How did our people actually live in old Morven District? Our purpose with this volume is to save as much as we can. Those with roots in old Morven district will probably be interested. Perhaps what you read here will stir your memories of experiences and things heard from older family members or friends. The old 660th Georgia Militia District covered the northeast quarter of Brooks County and included the communities of Morven, Barney, East Side and Tallokas. It comprised most of the 12th Land District and a slice of the 9th District near Little River on the north.

We base this account on printed sources, personal memories, family tradition and interviews with many older citizens. No history is ever complete. You might find errors and certainly much is not covered here due to lack of information. But you will read of familiar people and events, places now gone, the folkways of earlier generations and the elements which helped to make us who we are. Maybe you will learn a few things and we hope you will pass on your own experiences to those who follow you.

Words from the Book of Ecclesiasticus are a call to honor our forefathers:

Let us now praise famous men, and our fathers that begat us. The Lord hath wrought great glory by them through his great power from the beginning. Such as did bear rule in their kingdoms, men renowned for their power, giving counsel by their understanding, and declaring prophecies. Leaders of the people by their counsels, and by their knowledge of learning meet for the people, wise and eloquent in their instructions. Such as found musical tunes, and recited verses in writing: Rich men furnished with ability, living peaceably in their habitations: All these were honored in their generations, and were the glory of their times. There be of them, that have left a name behind them, that their praises might be reported. And some there be which have no memorial, who are perished as though they had never been, and are become as though they had never been born; and their children after them. But these were merciful men whose righteousness hath not been forgotten. With their seed shall continually remain a good inheritance, and their children are within the convenant. Their seed standeth fast, and their children for their sakes. Their seed shall remain forever, and their glory shall not be blotted out.

An accepted sociological principal is that people transplanted to a new place drop unimportant parts of their culture and strengthen more vital parts. They are not fractured but tempered by the move. They stay together if possible. The following account is such a story.

CHAPTER 1

BEGINNINGS

Little is known of southwest Georgia before the first white settlers came. A few hunters, explorers and traders with the Indians ventured into this remote section in the 1700’s. Spanish missionaries left no mark and no one has found the legendary silver treasure at Mule Creek. The earliest English settlers were primarily from Virginia, North Carolina and older sections of Georgia. A few came from England and even fewer came directly from Europe. Some brought slaves of African origin. Most were of English, Welsh, Scotch and Irish background. Only a few were from France, Austria, Holland, Switzerland and Germany and almost none from Spain, Italy and Portugal.

Migration is central in human history, prompted by need, greed and fear, and sometimes by a love of freedom and adventure. Most migrants move only a short distance. Those who migrate greater distance do so usually in a group to share risks and work.

Few of European and African background are aware that people have lived in this area of South Georgia and North Florida for 15,000 years or more. Findings in the Aucilla River by archeologists prove hunters pursued and killed mastodons with spears, predating the better known Clovis settlements in the West. Thus the story is a long one. The experts suspect the first migrants to this part of the continent came from Europe and not Asia.

Only a hundred years before white settlement began, the Creek tribes drove out earlier Indian inhabitants or absorbed them. The Creeks would be forced west and into Florida after being on the losing side of the War of 1812. An occasional arrowhead or cache of tools found here or there and the names of some creeks and rivers are our main evidence of their lives here.

Geology and Topography

We are shaped by the place where we live. Geology and topography dictate how we live. Brooks County is almost square, lies just north of the Florida border and is bound on the northeast and east by the Little River and the Withlacoochee River. One oddity is that a 300 acre tract is completely separated from the rest of the county and lies in a crook of the river south of Lowndes County, one of our parent counties.

The topography is part of the central Coastal Plain, with rolling hills, broad valleys, low broad ridges and some level areas. Large ponds formed in a few depressions and local streams were easy to dam. Several water courses traverse the district.

Okapilco Creek in the western range of the district follows a meandering course from its rise north of Moultrie and is fed by branches which rise near Burney Bridge, by outflow from Brice’s Pond, by Mule Creek and its tributaries, by Coon Creek south of Fodie, by Rainy Creek which rises north of Williams Road and is fed by Crevasse Pond, and other smaller streams. Millrace Creek and Reedy Creek rise north of Troupeville Road and feed the Okapilco before it is joined by Piscola Creek in the Nankin section south of us. Okapilco flows into the Withlacoochee south of Valdosta. The Okapilco has a wide flood plain but the main channel can be deep and narrow. Little River rises west of Tifton and forms much of the northern county boundary with Cook and Lowndes, joining the Withlacoochee near Valdosta. It is fed by Slaughter Creek which rises north of Highway 122 and flows southeasterly under Highway 76 and is joined by Pike Creek (Campground Creek) to feed Lawson Pond. Slaughter flows out of Lawson Pond and is joined by water from Jones Creek and Downing Creek south of Morven, before flowing into Little River. Walden Branch east of Barney and Rountree Creek flow into Little River as do small creeks northwest of Barney. The Withlacoochee flows south to the Suwannee system and to the Gulf of Mexico. Little River has some high bluffs and changes course irregularly, with connections with underground limestone streams. In earlier days it had wide limestone sand beaches in some spots. It is spanned today by Burney Bridge, the South Georgia Railway bridge, the Highway 76 bridge, Folsom Bridge on Highway 122 and old Miller Bridge on Lawson Pond Road (formerly Miller Bridge Road). Two large man made ponds are notable. Brice’s Mill Pond is a cypress pond of many hundreds of acres. Lawson Mill Pond is fed by Slaughter Creek as stated. A smaller man made pond is located on Pike Creek, just east of Campground, another pond at the head of Slaughter Creek on Burton farmland and others. Does anyone recall James Alderman’s digging a channel with a shovel from his pond beside Burton Road to drain that pond to the Little River below Burney Bridge? We have no natural ponds of any note. In the early days, the water table was high and water wells usually brought a good supply at sixty feet from the vast limestone aquifer which lies under us. Wells now require drilling to 200 feet as the aquifer has been depleted. Occasional heavy rain seasons, especially if linked to Gulf storms, cause flooding along streams and rivers, sometimes overflowing bridges. Malaria was a scourge for generations, now eradicated, but insect life is profific, especially gnats and ticks.

The soil varies from clay to sand and loams of the two, much richer in bottoms and broad valleys. Tifton Sandy Loam, brownish-gray to light brown, somewhat pebbly, is prominent in the district. Though early farmers placed low value on this type soil, most of it is under cultivation today. Tifton fine sandy loan is also common. Our climate is ideal for crops and rainfall is usually abundant. Winters are short and mild, allowing three crops of vegetables such as tomatoes and greens. Summers are long and humid. Spring comes early. Dry seasons require irrigation and rigs are a common sight on larger farms. Peaches, cotton, cabbage, peanuts, Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes, watermelons, turnips and mustard, pecans, corn, oats and other crops thrive. Pastures are lush and livestock has long been a mainstay. One of the largest dairies in the state is in the lower part of the district. Goats and sheep were once numerous but are rarely seen now.

Timber of many varieties covered the area in pioneer days. Yellow pine, red oak, white oak, live oak, hickory, blackgum, poplar, tupelo, cypress and other varieties provided vast quantities of lumber for local use and for shipment to mills elsewhere. The mayhaw around ponds produces a special small apple used for jelly valued by natives. Hickory nuts and walnuts are well known and pecans, the Mississippi hickory, thrive here and are a money crop now popular in China. Our area is among the six most diversified in the state and south Georgia one of the world’s best agricultural areas.

Geological formations are mainly of limestone with many sinks and springs which feed streams. Some watercourses suddenly disappear and then reappear, such as Dry Lake in another part of the county. Much sulphur is found in shallow well water.

Gristmills and lumber mills were built on streams in the early days, replaced by steam, oil and then electric power in the last century. Water is often stained from the tannin of local trees and in other places appears black from mud bottoms. We have many swamps. Fish have long abounded in our rivers and streams and man made ponds.

Poor land management caused much erosion until soil conservation programs in the 1930’s. Soil Conservation Districts were formed and plans drawn to restore depleted fields. Terracing and proper land use with diversified methods minimize erosion risks today. Heavy irrigation from the aquifer and a dropping water table is a current issue.

The Eastern Indigo snake is native to this area and is endangered today, protected by conservationists. No one has seen a panther in generations but they once roamed. Alligators were thinned out but have resurged and are again numerous as are deer. Domesticated hogs have gone wild and herds are found in the swamps. The coyote, introduced a half century ago, is a threat to small animals.

Brooks County contains 497 square miles. It had 10,000 parcels of land in 2010, 19 of them over 2000 acres and only two over 5000. The old 660th District covers the northeastern part of the county.

CHAPTER 2

EARLY HISTORY

It is hard to imagine the sylvan wilderness here before European settlement. To keep the terrain open for hunting, the Creeks burned out the woods as settlers did. Misguided forest management discouraged it but controlled burning is practiced again. The Indians subsisted on wild game and fishing with limited seasonal gardens and corn crops. Fruits and vegetables were dried for storing and easy transport. As mentioned earlier, we have only a few relics and names of streams such as Okapilco, Aucillla, Piscola and Withlacoochee to remind us of the Indian tribes displaced in the early 1800’s. A notable find in the 1960’s was made by James Alderman on his farm northwest of Barney when he plowed a field near Little River. He turned up a cache of axe heads, spear heads, bowls and arrows. Are these in a museum today? Camps of this sort were scattered up and down the rivers and main streams.

Columbus’s discovery of the islands south of us led to exploring on the mainland but we know of no one except Hernando de Soto who came through our section. In 1513, Ponce de Leon landed at the future site of St. Augustine. De Soto landed near Tampa and marched north looking for gold, travelling into North Carolina and dying near the Mississippi River. He left no trace here. In 1564 the French built Fort Caroline on the St. Mary’s River across from Amelia Island. The Spanish wiped them out in a short time and in 1565 the victors started St. Augustine, the oldest continuing settlement in the United States. In 1568 Sir Francis Drake attacked and burned St. Augustine but it survived. Spanish missionaries are said to have come into the Brooks County area about 1570 but no evidence of a mission has been found.

Pensacola was founded in 1698 by the French in West Florida. The colony of Georgia was started in 1732, a story well known to most Georgians. James Oglethorpe led a number of debtors, good people in the main who had lost their shirts and their estates in the Great South Sea Company bubble a few years earlier. The colony vowed to have no slaves, no liquor, no Jews and no lawyers. Soon all these ideas were dropped and the rest is history. The General invaded Florida and decisively defeated the Spanish at Bloody Marsh on St. Simons Island in 1740, as the Spanish tried to retaliate. Thus we speak English in this part of the country today. Many South Carolinians, including French and German speaking Swiss, flocked into Georgia and settlement moved westward in steady stages, traders venturing ahead of settlers. The Spanish ceded West Florida and East Florida to the British at the end of the Seven Years War in 1763 but official westward movement was legally forbidden until the War for Independence. The treaty gave France land west of the Mississippi and Great Britain uncontested control of that east of the great river. The Creek Indians were British allies and remained so through the Revolution and the War of 1812. Settlers from the upper South moved to open areas in Georgia until independence was gained and were itching for new land.

CHAPTER 3

INDEPENDENCE AND THE WAR OF 1812

Great Britain was left with huge debts after the French and Indian War, part of a worldwide struggle with France during which their blue water fleets drove the French off the seas. The efforts of the home country to collect taxes to pay down their large public debt evoked much resistance in the American colonies and cries of no taxation without representation. Our forebears in settlements in eastern Georgia (Georgia stretched to the Mississippi River until future Alabama and Mississippi were ceded to the federal government in the 1790’s, on a promise of Indian removal from the state) were split on independence. The losers fled the state and their property was taken to reward leaders and soldiers for their sacrifices. Many migrants to southwest Georgia were Revolutionary soldiers and their children. At the end of the War, the Treaty of Paris returned Florida to the Spanish, our ally. Successive Creek cessions opened more and more land to white settlement. A huge earthquake centered at New Madrid, Missouri, in 1811 must have been felt in our area as it changed the course of the Mississippi and was the largest one for hundreds of years. That area and not California is our greatest earthquake risk today. But a new war with Great Britain was about to officially start, one in which we had few victories. The Creeks ravaged frontier settlements. The capture and destruction of Ft. Mims, on the Alabama River north of Mobile, August 30, 1814, was especially barbarous. 200 militia and about 400 civilians were slaughtered, including many children, by the Creeks, incited by Tecumseh. This led to Gen. Andrew Jackson’s invasion of the Alabama Territory with the aid of Gen. Floyd’s Georgia troops in 1814. The decisive defeat of the Creeks at Horseshoe Bend was followed by a punitive treaty requiring the Creeks to evacuate Georgia and most of Alabama. Jackson went on to take Pensacola from the British who now controlled it and to march on to New Orleans where he smashed a superior British force in early 1815, after the Treaty of Ghent had been signed.

Many at the time thought our area of the state was worthless, just holding the world together, but soon Georgia voted to establish three new counties in the Wiregrass: Appling, Irwin and Early. This was the Tallassee Country of the Creeks, taken as punishment with no payment as they were allies of the British. About this time a little known incident occurred a few miles from Irwin County on the Appalachicola River. Rep. Maston O’Neal of the Second District in his article, The Tallassee Country, gave a vivid description sixty years ago. Slaves had escaped to northwest Florida for some time and had formed a colony on the Bay, associating with the Seminoles, Creeks who had broken away (those who have left us) and refused to recognize the Treaty of Horseshoe Bend. The British supported this unrest and Col. Nichols of the British Army built a strong fort on the Appalachicola River about 17 miles north of the Bay. Nichols had been at the Battle of New Orleans and had no love for Gen. Jackson. Nichols took a Seminole chief to London and made him a Brigadier General. He then sent a threatening letter to American officials. The fort was on a bluff, well built, with cannon and a large arsenal of muskets, carbines, swords and 763 barrels of powder! About 1000 people had settled there, escaped slaves and Indians, who were harassing American and Spanish settlements. Gen. Gaines built Ft. Scott south of Bainbridge and sent supplies from the Gulf by boat. The renegades attacked the supply boats, killed men and scalped them. Col. Clinch in 1816 surrounded the fort and his troops were fired on. His boats fired their small cannon, using heated cannon balls. The first volley hit one of the powder magazines, sheer luck, and it exploded. The fort was completely demolished, probably the largest powder blast in the country until that time. Only three people in the fort survived. This was the first stage of three Seminole Wars which followed.

Contraction of credit caused by the Second Bank of the United States brought an economic depression in 1819 and many Virginians and others were unable to pay their debts. Many lost their property and sought new land on the frontier. North Carolinians moved in large numbers to Georgia as well.

The First Seminole War in 1817-1818 involved forays into Florida by Gen. Jackson. The Americans accused Spain of aiding Indians in cross border raids into Georgia and settlers brought pressure to have Spain cede Florida to the U.S. The Spanish and the United States signed a treaty in 1819 making Florida a U.S. territory. This was ratified in 1821 and Jackson became the first military governor. The first territorial legislature met in Pensacola in 1822 and in St. Augustine in 1823. A half way point was chosen for the 1824 meeting of the legislature and was named Tallahassee, a name chosen by Octavia Walton, daughter of George Walton of Georgia, the territorial governor. This capital of Florida is just fifty miles from us in the Morven District. Some humorist in later years commented that the Florida Constitution required the legislature to meet 60 days every two years but they should meet 2 days every 60 years!

In Georgia, the land lottery in 1820 gave titles to unsettled farmland in far southwest Georgia and land speculators acted as middle men for those who wanted to trade. Each grant required an $18 fee to the state within two years and settlement or sale of the land. A few squatters had already moved into our section, names not known, and buyers had to contend with them in some cases as legal settlers moved in. Each land lot contained 490 acres. These land lot numbers help us today to locate early homesteads.

CHAPTER 4

FIRST SETTLEMENT

The General Assembly of Georgia, Dec. 21, 1819, created three new counties, Appling, Irwin and Early, stretching across southwest Georgia just north of Florida. The first order of business was surveying the area and dividing it into Land Districts and Land Lots. Only then could a Land Lottery be held. No record of this original survey has been located.

As early as 1819, according to descendant Everett Hall, Sion Hall and his son Enoch Hall checked out the prospects in our area. They lived then in Telfair County. In the 1820 Census, both were in Irwin County. They moved in 1823 with Nancy Hall, Sion’s mother and widow of Revolutionary soldier Enoch Hall, to the Morven area. They brought a steam sawmill, slaves and land titles bought from lottery winners. They settled on Land Lot 271. Another early settler was John Bryan who homesteaded in 1823 on land in the fork of Okapilco Creek and Mule Creek. Washington Joyce appears to have arrived about the same time and operated a ferry at the Miller Bridge site on the Little River in later years. The federal government directed the building of a road into southwest Georgia from Tattnall County and Gen. John Coffee undertook its clearing and construction in 1823. See the section on Coffee Road. This road ran past the Hall place and on to John Bryan’s neighborhood. The road ran towards the southwest past present day Barwick and across Thomas County to the Florida line near the Ocklocknee River, north of Tallahassee.

The Hall home became an inn used by many travelers, including officials and the county court. Lowndes County was soon created from Irwin and included our district. Sion Hall died in 1849 but Enoch became a political and military leader and continued to operate the inn for years. The Halls operated a store in which a young man named Hamilton W. Sharpe worked for a short time before starting his own store about a mile south in the edge of present day Morven. Sharpe’s Store was shown on many early maps and had a post office opened in 1828 with the same name. Though some sources indicate Hall’s store and Sharpe’s Store were at the same site, this seems unlikely. Pines and Pioneers says Sharpe sold the store back to the Halls and then to Sion’s uncle John Hall who ran it for a few years. The first Superior Court of Lowndes County was held at Hall’s inn, the jurors sitting on logs and passing the jug to ease their discomfort.

The next stop on the Coffee Road was some 15 miles southwest in the edge of present day Barwick, then in Thomas County, at Lovett’s. The Court was held at Francis Rountree’s home in 1828.

Other settlers arriving in the 1820’s included Willis King who settled below Quitman, the Rev. Fleming Bates, Alexander Campbell, Nathan Gornto, Lawrence A. Folsom, John Lawson, G.W. Mitchell, John Pike, John Folsom, Pennewell Folsom, Elijah Folsom, Thomas Folsom, Ashley Folsom, William Blair, James J. Joyce, David Platt, Francis Rountree, Ivy Simmons, William Yates, the widow Nancy Edmondson with sons John, David and James and sons-in-law John Mathis, William Holloway, and William Alderman, Thomas Alderman, William Hendry, James E. Hendry, Simpson Strickland, William Newton, William Jones, John Green, Zechariah Fletcher, Uriah Rogers.

The first county seat of Lowndes was at Franklinville on the Withlacoochee, east of Hahira. A road was opened from that site to join the Coffee Road. Franklinville never was more than a village and the site is hard to find today. James Edmondson’s house was close by. The village was about 15 miles east of Sharpe’s Store. Court was held there in May, 1829, in a little log courthouse. In 1833, the legislature moved the county seat to a spot to be called Lowndesville on Land Lot 109, 12th District, but before any building there, the Inferior Court moved the county seat to Troupeville, in the angle of the Little River and the Withlacoochee, in 1836. A little town grew there soon and a road was built from this point west past Morven to Thomasville. An 1842 map shows Sharpe’s Store, though possibly no longer owned by Sharpe. A few years later, the post office was called Magnum and on July 21, 1853, became Morven. Though an 1865 map shows both Morven and Sharpe’s Store, Hamilton Sharpe had moved away but his son William Sharpe had returned to Morven.

Many accounts of living conditions in these early years have been preserved. Readers might struggle to understand just how primitive conditions were and how self reliant and neighborly the settlers were. Arriving on foot and in oxcarts and wagons, a settler family and neighbors traveling together would carry a few pieces of furniture, tools, seeds, rootings of useful plants, guns, shot and powder, and a limited supply of essential food. The settler would lead or drive livestock needed for a start. Locating his land, he had to find a water source and many first homes were placed near streams. He soon cut trees, used some for firewood and more to build a crude shelter. This cleared space for a garden and initial feed crops. Game was plentiful and skilled hunting brought in needed venison and other meat to sustain the family. As soon as possible, crudely carved logs were used to construct a cabin, usually just one or two rooms, with a fireplace and chimney and dirt floors. Weather was colder then than now. Windows and doors were of wood planks with no window glass. Insects and wild animals plagued both people and livestock. Panthers were then common as were bear, deer and wildcats. At first, trees were merely killed by girdling to open areas for planting and then gradually cleared as time and labor permitted. Neighbors helped each other to roll logs for houses and barns and to construct them. Hand tilling and ox and horse drawn crude plows