Thomas Jefferson Johnson (1793-1847), who came from Pulaski County to southwest Georgia in the early 1820s to establish a plantation, was one of the legislators responsible for the creation of Thomas County in 1825. The county was named for one of Johnson’s relatives, soldier-architect Gen. Jett Thomas (1776-1817).

Johnson built his first house on the property that came to be known as Pebble Hill circa 1825 and married Jane Wilkinson Hadley in 1827. According to the National Register of Historic Places, it was “…a simple two-story dwelling with farm outbuildings and slave cabins nearby.”

Jane died after the birth of their third child and Johnson remarried in 1839, to Martha Evans Everett. They had no children. Julia Ann was the only one of Johnson’s three children to live to adulthood.

At the time of Johnson’s death in 1847, he owned 3000 acres and twenty slaves, who made the plantation a model of self-sufficiency.

When Martha Johnson died in 1850, the property was inherited by Julia Ann, who married John William Henry Mitchell, Sr., soon afterward.

The Mitchells replaced the original house with a more refined structure, commissioning English-born architect John Wind, who had already built many fine area homes and the Thomas County Courthouse.

Their eldest daughter, Jane Temperance Mitchell, complained of constantly sweeping pebbles from the walkways around the house, and complained that the family lived on a “pebble hill”. The name has been synonymous with the property ever since.

Mr. Mitchell entered Confederate service late in the Civil War, as an adjutant of local militia, serving in the defense of Atlanta at the request of Governor Joseph E. Brown, but upon returning home to a greatly reduced labor force, died from pneumonia in March 1865.

The land was subdivided among the Mitchell heirs in 1876. Julia Ann and her children, Jane Temperance Stevens, Martha Josephine Stubbs, Mary Elizabeth (Bettie) Davenport, and John W. H. Mitchell, Jr. all received parcels. Julia Ann died in 1881.

By the 1890s, Pebble Hill as it had existed in its heyday had been further subdivided and sold to Horace J. McFarlan of New Jersey.

During this time, Thomasville and Thomas County had become a popular destination for wealthy Northern tourists seeking winter relief.

After briefly being owned by McFarlan and Thomasville judge Henry W. Hopkins, Pebble Hill was purchased by Howard Melville ‘Mel’ Hanna circa 1900. In 1901, Hanna gave Pebble Hill to his daughter, Kate Hanna Ireland. Mrs. Ireland increased the size of the property to around 4000 acres in short order and brought her children, Robert Livingston ‘Liv’ Ireland and Elizabeth ‘Pansy’ Ireland for long visits each winter.

They began spending more time in Thomas County and became very attached to the property. Kate Ireland added gardens near the main house, increased the living space through the construction of a new wing, and built structures to accommodate the growing number of visitors who came to hunt and explore the land.

Kate established a championship Jersey herd in the 1920s and with it, a corporate function of the plantation, known as Pebble Hill Products.

Kate divorced in 1919 and married Perry Williams Harvey, an executive with the Hanna Company in Cleveland. The focus of the Pebble Hill property at this time had shifted to a shooting plantation. In fact, it was the crown jewel of the Thomas County quail plantations. My friend Joe Kitchens, who served as the first director of Pebble Hill when the site opened to the public in 1983, and who wrote the text accompanying Hank Margeson’s photographs in The Quail Plantations of South Georgia & North Florida (UGA Press, 1991), gives an excellent background at his Longleaf Journal: “There is history behind this story. When the railroads first began bringing northern tourists and outdoors men and women to Georgia, the track literally ended in Thomasville. Below was Florida- still malaria and yellow fever country. In addition to its comfortable winter weather, the “piney woods” of Thomasville offered health benefits- or so it was claimed-as well as outdoor adventure. Five large resort hotels, a carriage course around the town and a “Yankee Paradise” Park attracted winter visitors from the “frozen north.” Horseback riding, coaching, fishing for largemouth base (gigantic in the warm waters of nearby alligator-infested lakes, Iamonia and Miccossuki), and above all the chance to shoot quail (not “hunt”- in sporting parlance the dogs “hunted” and the humans “shot”). Dogs, horses, warm weather and shooting. An enticing alternative to freezing weather, snow and soot- filled air in Cleveland and other northern cities…Many of the new owners were partners and beneficiaries of the boom in oil-and the monopolizing enterprise of John D. Rockefeller, whose Standard Oil Company made Cleveland the heartland of financial and industrial ambition. Among those who flourished there were the Hannas, the family and kin of Senator Mark Hanna of Ohio. Hanna emerged as a “king maker” in national politics by managing the campaign of presidential aspirant William McKinley. Mark Hanna seems to have nourished ambitions of being president himself. In the Gilded Age, potential Republican presidential candidates were vetted in Thomasville by the wintering millionaires. A grand niece of Mark Hanna, Mrs. Parker Barrington Poe, or “Pansy” as she was universally known, owned Pebble Hill. It was said you could walk across Thomas County and never leave Hanna- owned land.”

The National Register of Historic Places notes: “Large expanses of land were burned off each season to allow freedom of movement for both wildlife and hunters, and fields of corn and other grains were planted and left, unharvested, to attract game birds, particularly quail. Local residents were hired and trained to assist in running the plantation and in organizing the hunts. Since hunting season meant many guests remained for extended periods, a large house staff was required to meet the needs of the family. To house all of these workers, cottages were constructed on the grounds. More than sixty such families lived on the property.”

During this period, Kate oversaw an expansion of the built environment at Pebble Hill, commissioning numerous support structures and landscaping that reflected her passion for the property.

Abram Garfield, son of President James A. Garfield, designed a complex of service buildings, including a dairy, cow barn, stables, and a carriage house. Apartments and offices for workers were also constructed at this time.

Besides Easter and Christmas celebrations for the employees and their families, Black workers were feted on Emancipation Day. This was unheard of in the rest of the South, but Northern Republicans of this time were quite progressive and it was the norm at Pebble Hill and other plantations in Thomas County.

Perry Harvey died in 1932, and in 1934, the historic plantation house was destroyed in a fire that left just a 1914 expansion wing intact.

Kate Harvey again called on Abram Garfield to build a new residence, and V. Ethylwyn Harrison, one of the few female landscape architects in the nation, designed new gardens and landscape features to complement the house.

Another innovation at the plantation in the early 1930s was felt throughout Thomas County, thanks to Kate Harvey’s foresight. The Pebble Hill School and Visiting Nurse Association was ahead of its time and was encouraged and supported by other plantation owners. At a time when simple medical care was out of reach for many in this region, Kate Harvey provided registered nurses who traveled throughout the county tending to sick plantation workers and other laborers.

In May 1936, just four months after the completion of the house, Kate Harvey died.

Elizabeth ‘Pansy’ Ireland inherited the estate and spent the rest of her life preserving its legacy, especially the improvements her mother had made during her ownership.

She also inherited her mother’s love of the outdoors and of Pebble Hill itself, and continued many of the traditions associated with the property.

She was one of the few female polo players of her era, and kept several champion thoroughbred horses on the property.

She also owned over a hundred hunting dogs at one time, even building a dog hospital and luxury kennels.

She married Parker Barrington Poe (1914-1991) in 1946 and at the time of her death in 1978, had established a foundation to preserve Pebble Hill in perpetuity and to open it for public visitation.

Mr. Poe oversaw this transition and the site was opened in 1983. It remains the finest example of the hunting plantations that put Thomas County on the map.

Pebble Hill not only offers a rare glimpse into plantation life, but is a living museum of two centuries of agriculture, architecture, social change, and preservation.

National Register of Historic Places