Tag Archives: Georgia Indian Wars

Bailey-Heard-Dallis House, Circa 1828 + 1842, LaGrange

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Typical of Georgia’s grandest town homes, the Bailey-Heard-Dallis House evolved from a smaller and plainer space to a larger, more architecturally-inspired vision. It’s also an important survivor of gentrification, as the 1974 application for the National Register of Historic Places attests: “…the house is currently the only Greek Revival dwelling left in its block. Only a few years ago there were seven such homes on the block.“

Thought to be the oldest house in LaGrange, it was built circa 1828 by General Samuel A. Bailey, who used it as his headquarters during the Creek Indian War of 1836. It was originally a simple vernacular form, with four rooms downstairs and two up, separated by a central hallway. When George Heard bought the house in 1842, he added four rooms and the exceptional colonnade, with six fluted Doric columns on the front and two more on each side of the house.

The home was acquired by George Dallis in 1888 and has remained in his family ever since.

Broad Street Historic District, National Register of Historic Places

Mercer Grave Houses, Candler County

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A wooden grave shelter, surrounded by a white picket fence, located in a cemetery with gravestones and trees in the background.

These grave houses, located at Salem Baptist Church Cemetery, mark the final resting places of Clemons* Mercer (1832-1881) and Jane Elizabeth “Janie” Johnson Mercer (1835-1880). Clemons Mercer served in the Third Seminole War in Florida and contracted malaria there in 1856, which he never completely recovered from. He was later a lieutenant in the Emanuel County Militia (Captain Moring’s Company) during the Atlanta Campaign in the Civil War. Janie Mercer bore him 11 children, all of whom lived to adulthood.

Gary Lee writes: Local lore is that it was raining the day of her burial and her husband promised that another raindrop would never touch her grave. Her family actually rebuilt these a few years ago. Also near her are two of her sisters, Hattie and Adeline who were married to twin brothers, George Washington Lee and Henry Clay Lee who gave the land and the materials for the church.

*also recorded as Clemmons Mercer

Jared Irwin House, Circa 1830, Lumpkin

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Thought to be the oldest house in Lumpkin, this was originally a log dogtrot to which siding was later applied.  It was the home of Jared Irwin, namesake nephew of the early Georgia governor. Upon the death of the younger Irwin’s parents, Alexander and Penelope Irwin, he was adopted by his uncle. He was in the first graduating class of Franklin College (now the University of Georgia), was an original settler of Lumpkin and served as clerk of the inferior court of Stewart County. During the Creek War of 1836, he was killed in the Battle of Shepherd’s Plantation and was tied to his horse, which returned his body to Lumpkin.

The house has been modified over time but the interior remains in largely original condition. The shed room along the rear and the front porch are later additions. It is also known as the Irwin-Partain House.

National Register of Historic Places

Blockhouse Replica, Fort Gaines

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In August 1814, the Treaty of Fort Jackson opened 24 million acres of Creek lands to white settlement, a result of the Creek War of 1813-1814. Cemochechobee Creek, which marked the border with Spanish Florida at the time, crosses the Chattahoochee River near this site. The government ordered the establishment of a fort in the area and in 1815, Major General Edmund P. Gaines and Lieutenant Colonel Duncan Lamont Clinch, with a battalion of the 4th U. S. Infantry, selected this site, on a bluff 130 feet above the Chattahoochee, just north of the Cemochechobee. The fort they built, rectangular with two blockhouses, was named in honor of General Gaines. It also served as a supply depot in the First Seminole War of 1817-1818.

A new fort was constructed as a defense during the Creek War of 1836. The war was short-lived and the fort was soon razed.

The third and final fort was built by the Confederates during the Civil War to protect Columbus from Union gunboats. An original cannon remains in one of the gun emplacements.

Battle of Shepherd’s Plantation Monument, 1936, Florence

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This monument, placed as a centennial remembrance by the Roanoke Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution and the WPA in 1936, commemorates the bloodiest engagement of the largely forgotten Creek War of 1836. The main text reads: On this site was fought the Battle of Shepherd’s Plantation between Creek Indians and pioneer settlers aided by volunteer soldiers stationed at Forts Ingersol Jones and McCreary under Major Henry W. Jernigan and Captain Hamilton Garmany. A second tablet lists the four Stewart Countians killed in the battle: Captain Robert Billups; Jared Irwin*; David Delk; and —-Hunter. *-[Jared Irwin was the nephew of Governor Jared Irwin].

I believe commemorations of victories and massacres against Native Americans should tell the whole story about their removal but I believe they’re important as geographical markers and should invite broader study.