A HISTORY OF DUBLIN AND 

LAURENS COUNTY,  GEORGIA 

Part Two

The Post-Revolutionary War Period

Some two months after the American Revolution officially ended, Georgia acquired all of the land between the Ogeechee and Oconee Rivers from the Cherokee and Creek Indians under the Treaty of Augusta.  The entire area was known as Washington County.  The first owners of the new lands were soldiers of the Continental Army.  Later lands were granted under the headright system to heads of household.  Each grantee was given 287.5 acres.  Enlisted non-commissioned officers, commissioned officers, and elected officials were given substantially more land at prime locations. 

Among the earliest settlers in what became Laurens County were David Blackshear, Elijah Blackshear, Joseph Blackshear, John Brewton, William Brewton, William Bush, John Culpepper, Thomas Fort, Benjamin Harrison, Blasingame Harvey, Peter Messer, Elijah Anderson, Reuben Barrow, William Bracken, Sherwood Bonner, William Blount, John Braswell, David Bryant, Daniel Butler, William Carroll, James Creswell, John Culpepper, Sampson Culpepper, Daniel Curry, Jacob Darden, John Dean, Asa Emanuel, Benjamin Evans, Daniel Evans, Jacob Falkner, Thomas Fort, , Peter Grant,  Leonard Green, James Hill Harvey, Charles Holmes, James Hunt, Robert Jackson, Hugh Washington, William Nelson, Thomas Pullen, Joel Rees, William Scarborough, John Stokes, Thacker Vivian, Jesse Wommack, and William Neel.   The earliest settlements were located in today’s Buckeye and Smith’s Georgia Militia Districts in northeastern Laurens County.

Most notable among the land grant holders in eastern Laurens County was one Elijah Clarke, who is prominently mentioned in the first two chapters of the History of Laurens County, Georgia. General Clarke, left, was one of Georgia’s heroes of the American Revolution.  In 1788, Clarke received a grant of 1050 acres centered around Ben Hall Lake and Thundering Springs Lake in Northeastern Laurens County.  William Glascock received a grant of 1000 acres on Buckeye Creek in 1784.   Glascock served as a Governor of Georgia during the American Revolution. 

In the winter of 1793, Georgia Governor George Matthews made an inspection of the frontier from South Carolina down to Carr’s Bluff at the bend of the Oconee River, some five miles northeast of Dublin.    Matthews found that there were great security concerns about an Indian attack.   Matthews, left,  suggested that the state militia place forts, located twenty or so miles apart, along the western frontier. The areas between the forts were scouted every day. 

The State of Georgia established a  one-hundred-man Fort Telfair at Carr's Bluff in 1792.  The fort was among a series of forts placed at strategic points along the eastern bank of the Oconee River but were too far apart to prevent all Indian intrusions into Georgia.   The soldiers stationed at Fort Telfair, some seventy-five feet above the median water level,  had a commanding view of the river bend and beyond. 

 

On December 19, 1793,  most of present-day eastern Laurens County was placed in Montgomery County. All lands north of the line remained in Washington County.  The dividing line ran from Carr’s Bluff in a northeasterly direction following the Lower Uchee Trail.  

George Walton

During the 1790s, George Walton, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and William Few, a signer of the Constitution, presided in the Superior Court of Montgomery County.  

William Few 

In a letter from one Lieutenant Roberts in 1794, he refers to the “Point of Rocks,” which most likely corresponds with “Carr Shoals” at the bottom of Carr’s Bluff.   Troubles with the Indians plagued the new settlers until October 28, 1795, when Benjamin Harrison, militia captain of the 52nd Georgia Militia District in Montgomery County, massacred seventeen Indians while they were on a friendly visit in the area.  The incident nearly precipitated a war.  Diplomats prevailed, and hostilities ceased. 

Benjamin Harrison was a captain of the Edgecombe County, North Carolina Infantry. the Continental Army during the Revolution.  If the Native Americans believed in Kharma, Harrison got a mortal dose of it when he was murdered in 1811.  Harrison, the first known murder victim in Dublin, is mostly buried in a long-lost cemetery on South Franklin Street.  A small intermittant branch, Harrison’s Branch was named in his honor.

Around 1794 and culminating in 1796, sellers of fraudulent lands were sold primarily to unsuspecting Northern landowners.  Millions of acres, some of which were located in southern Laurens County, but mostly in neighboring Montgomery County, were sold to other investors, who had no knowledge of the fact that the land did not exist.  The affair was known as the Pine Barrens Speculation.   Pine Barrens were defined as lands studded with pines growing in acidic and infertile soil.  The bulk of lands, also covered with grasses and shrubbery, were mostly found in areas that were formed by glacial deposits.  Many of these lands can be seen today on the eastern side of the county along the eastern banks of rivers and creeks.  

Laurens County was included in the Trans Oconee Republic.  The fledgling country, centered in southern Laurens, bounded on the north by present-day Baldwin County, on the south by the forks of the Altamaha, and on the west and east by the Ocmulgee and Oconee Rivers,   was founded in 1791 by Gen. Elijah Clarke, Georgia's hero of the Revolution.  With a show of military might with the blessing of President George Washington, Generals Jared Irwin and John Twiggs forced their good friend and colleague Clarke, to leave the country’s capital, which was located above Toomsboro and Milledgeville.  Clarke built a town and two forts, Fort Advance and Fort Fidius.  

 

  Tne most famous of the first settlers on the eastern side of the Oconee River that became aportion of Laurens County was General David Blackshear.  Blackshear, (left) a boy soldier in the American Revolution, was known to have been granted as many as seventeen square miles of land.  He is the namesake of Blackshear's Ferry, which was one of the earliest ferries in the area. 

Home place of General David Blackshear, ca. 1790s.

With the de facto removal of the Indians beyond the Ocmulgee already accomplished, the Indian nations sold the lands between the Oconee and Ocmulgee Rivers to Georgia.  On May 11, 1803, Wilkinson County was created and encompassed a portion of western Laurens County.  These new lands, a virtual wilderness of virgin timber, unimproved fields, and barren impassable roads were granted under a lottery system to all eligible residents of Georgia in 1805.  The remainder of western Laurens County was granted to settlers in the Land Lottery of 1807.   Most of the early settlers came from the Carolinas and Virginia, or indirectly from other parts of Georgia.  Their heritage was mostly English, Scottish, and Irish, with a few families of German heritage.  

Wilkinson County, the parent county of Laurens County,  was named for General James Wilkinson (left) following the original practice of naming new counties.   The General was a top Senior General in the American Army from 1800 to 1812.  Wilkinson was the first government of the Louisiana Territory. Some fifty years later, historians found that Wilkinson hid a dark secret. Wilkinson was deeply involved in spying as an agent for Spain.   President Theodore Roosevelt denounced Wilkinson by exclaiming "In all our history, there is no more despicable character!"  

On August 1, 1807,  Poplar Springs North Baptist Church was established in central Wilkinson County.  This church, which is now located in Laurens County and is still in existence, has the oldest church congregation west of the Oconee River in Georgia.  In today’s world, it is somewhat unbelievable that churches were integrated.  A negro woman, Mary, was among the founding members of the Church. 

It is most likely that a small trading post was set up on the eastern banks of the Oconee River, then in Montgomery County before the formation of Laurens County.  The area was strategically located at the point where the Chicken Road and the Indian Springs/Macon/Savannah Road converged.  One of the earliest names for this area was Sandbar.