Liberty Hall

All the history books describe him as a small man, but the literature the state distributes at his home, Liberty Hall, lists his height as five feet and nine inches. While that is not very tall, it also is not very short, especially by the standards of the 19th century. No, the reason that Alexander Hamilton Stephens is described as "small" has to do with his weight. During his lifetime he seldom weighed more than 90 pounds, which, combined with his height, projected the image of a frail man. The image was right: Stephens was frail and sickly during most of his life.

Pick up any history of the period - James McPherson's Battle Cry of Freedom, for example - and you will find that Stephens was, in the words of the New Georgia Encyclopedia, "a near-constant force in state and national politics for a half century". His involvement with national politics spans the period from 1843 to 1882, the year before his death. He was, at various times, a member of the Georgia House of Representatives, the Georgia Senate, the U.S. House of Representatives, and the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States. In addition, he was Vice-President of the Confederate States of America, and, briefly, the 50th Governor of Georgia. It should also be noted that he was elected to the U.S. Senate, in 1866, but the body refused to seat him because of his association with the government of the Confederate States. He was, later, returned to the U.S. House of Representatives, where he was seated. His statue is one of two that the state of Georgia placed in the National Statuary Hall, in the U.S. Capitol. (His statue was carved by Gutzon Borglum, the fellow who carved Mount Rushmore.)

It is not possible to do justice to his biography in the short space of this blog. I do want to point to one connection I have to Stephens. After he graduated from Franklin College, which is now the University of Georgia, he began a short, unsuccessful teaching career. According to historical markers around my hometown of Madison, Georgia, both male and female academies have existed here since at least 1815. Stephens' first job out of college was a stint teaching in one of the academies in Madison. He did not like it very much. According to Myrta Lockett Avary, who wrote the introduction to Stephens' prison diary, "He then taught school in Madison for 'four months of misery.'" For the next two years he continued to teach, before giving it up for a career in law and public service.

His home, Liberty Hall, is in the town of Crawfordville, in Taliaferro County, Georgia. I have written about Taliaferro County before. Taliaferro County is only a couple of counties over to the east: just 34 miles of Interstate 20 separate the exits for Madison and Crawfordville. According to the 2010 census, Taliaferro County was the least populous county in Georgia, at 1,717 souls, and the second least populous county east of the Mississippi River (behind Issaquena County, Mississippi). That has absolutely nothing to do with this story, but I throw it in at no additional charge.

Liberty Hall is now a part of the A. H. Stephens State Historic Park, and given that it is not very far away, we decided one Saturday at the end of January to give the Arab's Friend a drink of petrol and head east to see what we could see.

The first thing we saw was the house itself, as shown at the top of this blog. The house is on the way to the visitor's center. The park complex includes the house and grounds, Confederate Museum ("one of the finest collections of Confederate artifacts in Georgia"), and the usual state park facilities: 1200 acres that include tent and trailer camping facilities, cottages, picnic areas with shelters, nature trails, two lakes, one stocked with bass and bream, the other with catfish, horse stalls, and equestrian trails. We were disappointed to learn, upon stopping at the visitor's center, that the house and museum were closed, and all tours of the house cancelled, courtesy of the Wuhan Flu. Still, the lady at the visitor's center invited us to stroll around the grounds, peek in the windows, and enjoy what we could.

The house offers a couple of unusual features. The first is the massive monument that is planted smack dab in the middle of the sidewalk leading to the house.

The second unusual feature is that Stephens is buried right there in the front yard, just a bit to the left of the monument. He is buried next to his half-brother, Linton.

These are not the only graves on the property. There are graves in the back of the house with the names William Bell, Sallie Bell, and Sarah Bell on tombstones. I have not been able to figure our who these people were. They may be previous owners, but that is not clear. I know that Stephens purchased the Liberty Hall from Williamson Byrd, a relative of his stepmother Matilda Lindsay. Perhaps the Bells were relatives of one or the other.

Stephens was a dog lover, and one of his loves was Rio, "a large, fluffy white dog". Rio, and other dogs, are buried in the back yard, their graves suitable marked with a plaque.

Stephens was a bookish man, as you would expect of an author. (His two-volume A Constitutional View of the Late War Between the States has been sitting in my Kindle for some time now: I am such a slow reader.) He had an impressive library built behind the main house. We could not enter the library, but I took the first two pictures below through the window. The third picture is from a Wikipedia article on Liberty Hall.

I took the following photos through the window next to the front door.

Next to the house on the right, just a few yards away, is the Crawfordville Baptist Church. It was the first protestant church in the area (originally called Bethel Church), and was founded by, among others Jesse Mercer, for whom Mercer University was named, and who is buried in Penfield, Georgia. The small house immediately behind Kathy is the dry storage house on the Liberty Hall property.

The cemetery immediately to the right of the church is on land donated by Stephens, in 1873.

It was a pleasant way to spend a part of a Saturday, even if it was a bit chilly (see the photo of the church above, to spot Kathy shivering in the cold). We had a late lunch at Nick's Place on Broad Street, and were able to get home and thaw out well before dinner.

This trip has set me to thinking. I don't know where I will eventually end up when I retire, nor do I know where I will be living when I depart this vale of tears. But I really do think that whole idea of being planted in the front yard next to a monument blocking the path to the front door is appealing.