Names of Families in Habersham County Wills, Estates, Marriages, Newspapers
After the Creeks and Cherokees were removed from Georgia, a land lottery was held for the purpose of drawing land. In Habersham, the draw was for 250 and 490 acres. Many settlers came from Virginia, Maryland, and North Carolina. Ancestor Researchers should also search the records in Rabun, Banks, White, and Cherokee Counties. Thus, Habersham County was created in 1818 and was named for Joseph Habersham, Revolutionary War Soldier, and US Postmaster General, a direct descendant of the prominent James Habersham, the first settler to Savannah. It lies in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains in North East Georgia. The first white inhabitants inhabited lands that came from the Indian cessions of 1818 and 1819. They settled along the banks of the county’s four major rivers, the Chattahoochee, Soque, Tallulah, and Tugaloo. When gold was discovered in northeast Georgia, this resulted in the Cherokee removal of 1838. Parts of the original county lands were given to Banks, Cherokee, Lumpkin, Rabun, Stephens, and White counties, decreasing Habersham County to 278 square miles.
Online Images of Habersham County Wills 1824 to 1848
Testators: Adams, James; Allan, A. M.; Allan, Hannah; Allan, James; Askew, Josiah; Ayres, Nathaniel; Brewer, Henry; Brock, Moses; Burns, Martha; Carr, Kinchen; Cash, Howard Sr.; Davidson, Frederick; Deavors, George; Edwards, Enoch; England, Joseph; Freeman, Jeptha; Gazaway, Thomas; Hackett, Robert; Holcombe, Sherwood; Holeman, Henry; Horton, Edwin; Hughs, William; Hunter, James; King, John; Kinsy, Peter; Martin, Elizabeth; McIntyre, John; McKinney, Elizabeth; McKinney, Mordecai ; Mize, Zachariah;Morgan, Samuel Sr.;Morris, John ; Phillips, Fanny ;Popham, John ;Powell, Miriam ;Powell, Thomas; Russell, David; Starr, Elijah; Stephens, Hezekiah ; Wallers, Clement ;Wofford, James ;Wofford, William H.
- Habersham County Estates 1820-1850(abstracts)
- Habersham County Minutes 1842-1853 (abstracts)
Indexes to Probate Records
- Index to Habersham County Inventories, Appraisements, Sales, 1819-1928.
- Index to Habersham County Annual Returns, Vouchers, 1879-1957.
Marriages
- Habersham County Marriages from newspapers 1885-1886.
Online Images of Newspapers (select issues)
- The Democest
Traced Genealogie of Habersham County Families
- Brock
- Jarrard
- Meeks
The Chesser-Williams House
In May of 1848, a man by the name of Charles Lanman visited the Nacoochee Valley in Habersham County and wrote about it in his book Letters from the Alleghany Mountains by Charles Lanman (1849). He arrived on the back of a mule and his guide and companion were Edward Williams. It took about seven hours to ascend what they called Trail Mountain and the venerable gentleman expatiated at length on the superb scenery from the summit. Williams had just established a dairy on the mountain and between fifty to eighty cows and he had hired a young man from Vermont, Joseph E. Hubbard. Major Williams brought with him from Burke County, North Carolina cattle, sheep, hogs, goats, and chickens, arriving in the valley in 1822 with his family. Williams told Lanman that he was from New England and had been an exile from Yankee land for upwards of twenty years.