For More Whitesburg History
Friends for McIntosh Reserve
Banning Mills: An Online Exhibit
Historical Banning Mills
Whitesburg Methodist Church
Whitesburg Methodist Church was originally a wooden structure which was destroyed by fire in 1912. By 1913, a beautiful little brick church building was built just across the railroad tracks.
It is unique in that the two outside front entrance ways are still visible.
Whitesburg Baptist Church
The Whitesburg Baptist Church on Main Street was built in 1875-1876. Its Gothic Revival style arched windows and front entrance, and interior make it architectural and historically significant for its time.
The property was a common burying ground for all early inhabitants, both black and white rolex replica watches.
Whitesburg Train Depot
During 1873 while grading the road and the workmen encountered a huge layer of rock that would all but stop progress in laying train track into Carrollton. Due to this, the Whitesburg became the a railway depot serving as an end destination for the time being. Thus Whitesburg became the first rail center in Carroll County. The Central of Georgia depot at Whitesburg was built alongside the Central's Chattanooga line.
The town virtually started to spring up overnight. Within just a few months, a Post Office named "Whitesburg" (in honor of Andrew J. White) was established. Omega Replica Watches Shortly after, Whitesburg became a central hub for shipping for the mills along the Snake River.
In 1874 Whitesburg was incorporated and the mill towns of Bowneville and Banning were merged into the single community of Whitesburg.
Historical Banning Mills
Banning Mills was comprised of several water powered mills along the gorge at the Snake Creek in Whitesburg.
Because there were very few water power sites in the Carroll County area, large scale industry was late in developing there. In 1846, the earliest manufacturing community, built by brothers, Thomas, William, John and Kit Bowen was located on the Snake Creek which is about two and a half miles from present day Whitesburg. It consisted of a textile mill with five hundred spindles that produced yarn that was sold to individuals to be woven on home looms. The mills and town that grew up around it was originally called Bowensville. The town had company housing for mill workers, a general store, church and post office.
The textile mills, one known as the Amis mill, owned by the Carroll Manufacturing Company and organized by William Amis began were in operation throughout most of the Civil War. The mills produced wool, cotton yarn and the processing it into cloth. It has also been stated that they manufactured meal, flour, lumber products, shoes and leather. During the Civil War, federal troops were ordered find the mills and burn them, but they were very hard to find in the hidden gorge on the Snake River. By the time the troops found the mills, all of the equipment had been moved to a location in the Carolinas. Hence because the mills were non working they were spared.
A nearby paper mill was originally established by Kellog and Company and sold later at a sheriff auction to U.B. Wilkinson of Newnan who reconstructed and renovated the mill. By 1889 the paper mill was producing 12 tons of wrapping paper each week.
The textile mill was acquired in 1982 by a new group of men headed up by Arthur Hutcheson and was manufacturing warp and bunch yarn. The following year the factory also began making cloth. After the paper mill burned in 1982, the Hutcheson charter was amended to authorize the manufacture of paper from wood pulp and the purchase of land and real estate establishing this site as one of the earliest pulp mills in Western Georgia.
By the time of his death in 1895, the mills were thriving owning 1300 acres of pulp and timberland as well as operating a textile mill of 5000 spindles, two pulp mills, a paper factory, grist mill and a saw mill. All of these mills were within a mile along Snake creek and all of the machinery was powered by water from a single dam on the Snake River.
The ruins of the mills are still present today. You can visit the old ruins on a walking trail or zip line tour at Historic Banning Mills.
For a detail accounting of the Banning Mills history please visit this online exhibit:
Banning Mills: An Online Exhibit - Sponsored by the Center for Public History and Banning Mill Enterprise
McIntosh Reserve
The 527-acre McIntosh Reserve on the Chattahoochee River is named for William McIntosh, Jr., a prominent Creek Indian leader and plantation owner. The plantation was known as Lochau Talofau, which in English means "Acorn Bluff." McIntosh lived in a modest home, a two-story log house with a central, open "dog run" passage on both floors. The house doubled as a tavern and an inn for travelers.
William McIntosh, whom the Creek Indians called Tustunugee Hutkee (White Warrior), was the chief of the Cowetas, a leading sub tribal group within the Creek Nation.
The McIntosh family and their tribal associates belonged to the Lower Creeks. Their adversaries, the Upper Creeks that lived farther west in Alabama and were a much more primitive part of the Creek Nation. While the Lower Creeks of Georgia were attempting to adapt and integrate the ‘white man’s’ ways to their own culture, the Upper Creeks were less receptive. McIntosh and his group thought that by better integrating themselves they would have a better chance. They knew that their best negotiating commodity was their land and learning the white man’s ways and language would bring them more at the bargaining table. The Upper Creeks however would rather fight and hold strong to all of the Old Indian customs.
McIntosh played leading roles in the Treaty of Indian Springs in 1821 as well as the treaty made at the same site in 1825. It was the Treaty of 1825 in which the lands that are considered Carroll County were directly involved.
McIntosh’s involvement in this treaty has been the cause of many a debate over the years as to whether he was motivated by personal financial gain or he was truly trying to make the best possible deal for the Creeks because he knew they would eventually loose their land and their fate was inevitable.
The other Upper Creek Chieftains were infuriated with the treaty and as a result of his involvement his death was ordered by the Upper Creek leaders. Near the end of April, 1825, Menawa, another Creek Chief, sent an execution party of about 200 braves to burn and execute William McIntosh and his family. William McIntosh was executed along with Etome Tustunugee and his home and outbuildings burned.
On that fateful night, due to weather, the Inn and Tavern had an unusually large number of white settlers staying at the tavern. The white settlers and the female members of the McIntosh Family were allowed to leave before the fighting began. Chilly, one of William McIntosh’s sons, who was the ‘Clerk of the National Council’ for the Lower Creeks was also staying on the property in another small building. He was able to escape and later make his way across the rapids of the Chattahoochee to safety. It was though him and one of McIntosh’s wives Peggie, as well as neighboring farmers, that accounting of the of the events were able to reach Governor Troup in Georgia and the President John Adams in Washington.
Today, William McIntosh’s reconstructed log home on the 527-acre McIntosh Reserve just outside of Whitesburg on the Chattahoochee River is open to the public year round for camping, trail riding, and hiking.
Also there is a fascinating chapter on the Earliest Inhabitants of Carroll County represented in a book by James C. Bonner, “Georgia’s Last Frontier – The Development of Carroll County”.
