The Remarkable Story of Elizabeth Dill - Fort Gaines, Georgia

One of the early settlers of Fort Gaines came to the community with a remarkable story.

Elizabeth Stewart settled at Fort Gaines after being rescued by the troops of Andrew Jackson during the First Seminole War. She was the sole female surv

ivor of the 1817 battle remembered as Scott's Massacre.

The wife of a soldier then stationed at Fort Scott in what is now Decatur County, Georgia, Mrs. Stewart was making her way to the fort with 6 other wives of soldiers and 4 children. The civilians had come up the Apalachicola River aboard supply boats destined for Fort Scott. When Lieutenant R.W. Scott of the 7th U.S. Infantry came downstream to assist the flotilla, its commander took 20 of the lieutenant's able bodied men and replaced them 20 of his own men who were severely ill with fever. He also asked Scott to take Mrs. Stewart and the other wives and children on to the fort in his faster vessel.

Scott and h

is passengers had no idea that war had erupted between the United States and an alliance of Creek and Seminole warriors as a result of the U.S. Army's unprovoked attacks on the Lower Creek village of Fowltown. The battles at Fowltown enraged the Seminoles and Creeks living along the Florida-Georgia border and they swarmed to the Apalachicola River intending to cut off the flow of supplies to Fort Scott.

As Lieutenant Scott's boat neared the confluence of the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers (today's Lake Seminole), the current of the river forced the vessel close to the east bank. Several hundred warriors opened fire from hidden positions in trees and brush along the bank. Scott and most of his able-bodied men went down in the first volley. The warriors then stormed the boat, killing the others.

Of the estimated 51 people on the lieutenant's boat, only 7 survived. Six of Scott's men, four of them wounded, escaped by leaping overboard and swiming away underwater. The other survivor was Eliza

beth Stewart. All of the other men, women and children on the boat were killed.

Mrs. Stewart was carried away as a prisoner and spent the next several months working as a slave of Peter McQueen's band of Red Stick Creeks. She was rescued by the Yuchi warrior Timpoochee Barnard during the Battle of Econfina Natural Bridge in 1818.

She went on to live in Fort Gaines and married John Dill, a local merchant and later a general in the Georgia M

ilitia. They raised a family in Fort Gaines and two of their homes still survive there. According to legend, Elizabeth built them with money she had collected while a captive of McQueen. As the story goes, the warriors returning from raids with wads of paper money that was of no value to them. They would simply throw it on the ground and Elizabeth would then collect it and stash it away.

To learn more of the remarkable story of Elizabeth Dill, please visit www.exploresouthernhistory.com/fortgaines4.

Fort Gaines, Georgia - The Forts of Fort Gaines

Fort Gaines began its history as a military post deep in the territory of the Creek Nation.

In the spring of 1816, Lieutenant Colonel Duncan L. Clinch moved down the Chattahoochee River from Fort Mitchell, Alabama, with a battalion of the 4th U.S. Infantry Regiment. His orders were to erect a new fort on the dividing line between U.S. territory and that of the Creek Nation as defined by the recent Treaty of Fort Jackson.

Clinch selected a high bluff on the east side of the river at its confluence with Cemochechoba Creek. There he and his men quickly built a rectangular log stockade with blockhouses on two diagonal corners. The soldiers had been accompanied by Major General Edmund Pendleton Gaines, a hero of the War of 1812, on their trip down the Chattahoochee so they named the fort in his honor.

Fort Gaines was briefly the southernmost post on Georgia's western frontier, but in May of 1816 Clinch and most of his men continued down the river to its confluence with the Flint where they built Camp Crawford (later Fort Scott).

Fort Gaines served a important role during the First Seminole War of 1817-1818. Although the fort itself never came under attack, it was an important supply point and rendezvous for soldiers moving south through Georgia to the Florida frontier.

The post was occupied for a brief time after the war before all troops in the area were consolidated at Fort Scott in around 1819. It then became the focal point for settlers who flooded into the area once the war had subsided. A second fort was built at Fort Gaines during the Creek War of 1836 and a third was erected by Confederate forces during the Civil War. Markers, a reconstructed blockhouse, and one of the surviving batteries of the Confederate fort remain today to remind visitors of the rich military history of the community.

To learn more about the forts of Fort Gaines, please visit www.exploresouthernhistory.com/fortgaines3.

Fort Gaines, Georgia - Frontier History on the Chattahoochee

One of the most beautiful and historic cities in Georgia is the small Clay County community of Fort Gaines.

Located atop a high bluff overlooking the Chattahoochee River, the community features an array of preserved historic sites and structures and is a gateway to one of the state's most popular areas for outdoor recreation.

The town dates its history back thousands of years. There is a burial mound of the Weeden Island era (A.D. 300 - A.D. 900) in historic New Park Cemetery and archaeologists and private collectors have found artifacts dating back to even earlier times along the Chattahoochee River and throughout the vicinity.

By 1814, when the leaders of the Creek Nation were forced to sign the Treaty of Fort Jackson at the end of the Creek War of 1813-1814, the bluffs were occupied by Lower Creeks. The treaty forced the cession of tens of thousands of acres to the United States and the dividing line separating the territory of the U.S. and that of the Creek Nation intersected the Chattahoochee River at its junction with Cemochechobee Creek at Fort Gaines.

To protect this boundary, to which many warriors and chiefs of the Lower Creeks objected, the U.S. Army moved in the spring of 1816 to establish a fort on the bluffs. It was named Fort Gaines in honor of Major General Edmund P. Gaines, a hero of the War of 1812.

Over the coming days I will continue to post about the history and historic sites of Fort Gaines. The next post will focus on the establishment of the original fort. To learn more until then, please visit www.exploresouthernhistory.com/fortgaines.