Scull Shoals Historic Mill Village, Greensboro, Georgia

“Where there is ruin, there is hope for a treasure.”

Rumi

Our drive through Georgia took us to the charming town of Greensboro, Georgia where we stopped and had a wonderful lunch at The Yesterday Cafe before heading north of town about 15 miles to see the historic site of Scull Shoals Historic Mill Village. I had seen pictures and was anxious to get a good look at them and learn about its history.

To get to this historic site, you have to drive about two miles on a deserted dirt road (Forest Service Road 1234) in the Oconee National Forest. As we traveled down this road less traveled, way in the boonies, the tall pines seemed to be reaching towards the heavens. Out of the blue, we saw an opening with bright green grass and spotted the ruins of the old historic textile mill. It was a pretty site but it was sad at seeing the muddy Oconee River breaching its banks flooding the area from the torrential rains we have had here in Georgia this February and March. When we pulled up, there was another couple just leaving. For a while, we walked around just the two of us enjoying the peace and quiet. Before we left, anther car pulled up with a gentleman with a camera got out to do just as we had just done.

Scull Shoals is the home of the first paper mill, water-powered sawmill, gristmill, and textile mill in the state of Georgia. Now, all that is left of this historic mill village is three partial brick walls of the warehouse and store and a couple archaeological sites. The other brick buildings have been dismantled and salvaged during the World Wars. There are still some piles of bricks on the site. The ruins looked beautiful with green growth on it and with the background of the Oconee River. There were a few picnic tables scattered around beneath the trees making it a nice spot to have a picnic.

This settlement began in 1782 when pioneers were rewarded land for their military service. After being raided by the Indians during the Oconee Indian war in 1793, the government gave Michael Cupp the task to build Fort Clark to help keep the settlers protected. This fort was manned by a local militia that called themselves “Phinizey’s Dragoons”. They protected the fort until the Creek Indians were moved towards the Ocmulgee River by the Treaties of 1802 and 1805.

Once Eli Whitney’s invention of the Cotton gin in 1793 became popular, the settlers decided to raise lots of cotton. The villagers first built a gristmill and sawmill and later added cotton gin. The first paper mill was built in 1811 and lasted only till 1815 as it went bankrupt after the War of 1812.

During the years of 1827 – 1868, the mills, boarding houses, stores, warehouse and store combination, distillery and toll bridge were all doing great financially with business booming. At that time when the mills were at their peak, there were over 600 people living at the village. Even when the fire of 1845 destroyed the wooden mill buildings, it was still going well with rebuilding fast. The workers rebuilt the buildings in Fontenoy Mills with bricks and it was soon back in operation in 1846.

When the mills were at its peak in 1854, the mill had 2,000 spindles and looms working 4,000 bales of cotton values at $200,000. They made yarn and cloth and did great until after the Civil War when economically the tide turned and they started not to do well. It was at this time, 1877-1878, they even used Penitentiary Company #3 convicts for laborers for a short time.

In 1887, there was a major flood that destroyed several hundred bales of cotton, and 600 bushels of wheat that sat in water for four days in the warehouse. The flooding occurred because of bad land management and erosion from cotton planting. By 1900, most of the people had moved on looking for work at other places and the mills closed for good. What was once thriving became a ghost town. All the machinery was scrapped for WWI and WWII to help with the war efforts.

In the 1930’s, this land was sold to the government and became an experimental forest funded by University of Georgia Department of Forestry. There mission was to see how fire worked in their forest, the development of wildlife habitat, how to control disease in the trees, and the regeneration of hardwood ecosystems of the southern Piedmont. In 1959, this land became part of the Oconee National Forest.

Now all that is visible at Scull Shoals are several archaeological sites and part of one brick warehouse. The day we arrived it was quite flooded so there may have been more to see but it may have been underwater. We observed how fast the Oconee Rivers was flowing when we were there. We really enjoyed walking around this historic site as it looked beautiful even with it being winter and there being flooding.

When we left and started driving out on the dirt road, we noticed an area where people could take there horses. The National park was pretty and I’m sure it was a great place to take your horses. We were glad we made the trip to see this historic site.

Till next time. Bye for now.