William P. Redwine

September 20, 1890 William P. Redwine was laid to rest in the City of Fayetteville cemetery. Redwine came to Fayetteville in 1840 from the part of Fayette County that became Campbell County (and later Fulton County). He married Mary Grace Trimble in 1847 and they had nine children. He had served in the War Between the States as a Captain in the Fayette Rifle Grays. He served as a representative to the Georgia State Legislature after the war. When the Fayette County Commissioners of Roads and Revenue was established, he was appointed to the first Board by the State Legislature. Redwine and his son Morgan bought 400 acres on Whitewater Creek, this was the start of the Redwine farm. He was elected the first Mayor of Fayetteville in January 1889.

Sources: Cemetery Records Fayette County Georgia

The Fayette County Heritage Book

The History of Fayette County 1821-1971

Deborah Riddle

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John Tucker Day

John Tucker (Jack) Day was born in Milledgeville, Georgia September 7, 1907. He graduated Georgia Military College. Mildred Seawright, from Fayetteville, was attending Wesleyan College of Georgia in Macon and visited Milledgeville where she met Jack. Jack became a pharmacist. Mildred convinced him to take over the family pharmacy in Fayetteville. The Day’s Pharmacy was on the west side of square in Fayetteville. It was popular with the locals. Sheriff Hugh Stinchcomb had his radio routed to the drugstore and responded to calls from there. City and County business was handled at the drugstore. The soda fountain was popular with the high school students. Jack was elected to the Fayetteville City Council in 1950 and in 1954 elected mayor. He was known to help those in need of medicine, even if they had no money. Jack died October 25, 1964.

After he died the City named the Jack Day Park after him and the students at Fayette County High School dedicated two pages of the yearbook to him.

By Tony Parrott

Source: Cemetery Records Fayette County Georgia 1824-2000

The Citizen Wednesday October 22, 2003.

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Howell B. Parker

Howell B Parker lived in Jonesboro, with G C Looney, in the 1880 census, he is listed as a boarder, with 8 other men living in the Looney home. He was a teacher, but he is not found in later census records. He had great confidence in his teaching since he ran this ad in the Sept 28th issue of The Fayetteville News. He also ran the following ad:

“I will teach Arithmetic, for 20 days. The course will be Through and Practical. This is the opportunity for Married, as well as Single persons to obtain a thorough and Practical knowledge of Numbers. Your progress will depend upon your Natural Capacity. However, I am sure that I can teach as much in 20 days as is usually taught in ten months.

Tuition $2.50.

School will begin Monday. Nov 26 and close Friday Dec 21, 1888

Mr. Parker also posted a notice about school closing Oct 5th, 1888, and “earnestly inviting all the patrons and friends of the school” to come to the Academy (now the site of Fayetteville City Hall) and hear interesting classes and speeches.

Under the invitation to attend graduation, he had an advertisement asking that anyone who owed him money for tuition to pay promptly, if unable to pay it all, to pay part. “This is a letter to let you know that I need the money and am ready to receive it.”

By Jane Strickland

Source: Fayetteville News

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Elizabeth Echols

The first will recorded in Fayette County, Georgia was that of Elizabeth Echols. Her will was executed September 22, 1828 and probated November 3, 1828. In the will she mentions her mother, Elizabeth Smith to whom she leaves her entire estate. Her estate includes land in Fayette and Troup Counties, and eleven slaves (Sally and her eight children, a boy Julas and a girl, Rachel).

Elizabeth Echols was a sister of Anna Allen Smith Dickson and a sister-in-law of General David Dickson of Fayette County. Her mother, heir to her estate was Elizabeth Hendricks Smith, widow of Charles Smith of Jackson County, Georgia, who lived with the Dicksons. According to the Dickson family Bible, Elizabeth Echols departed this life on September 21, 1828 aged 58 years, 7 months, and 6 days. Elizabeth Hendricks Smith would die a year late on November 4, 1829.

By John Lynch

Sources: Fayette County Will Book “A”, page 1

Dickson family Bible

Find a Grave Memorial

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Death of Dr. Isaac Gray Woolsey

Dr. Isaac Gray Woolsey for whom the town of Woolsey Georgia is named for died of heart failure on September 11, 1902. His funeral was held on September 16^th at the Baptist Church there and was said to have been the largest ever attended in the history of Fayette County, with an attendance of over 2,000. Woolsey had been born in Cumberland, Kentucky and came to Fayette County about 1875 and bought the Gay family home, which is still standing. He had taught school, served as a doctor, and had fought in the War Between the States as a captain of the 8^th Tennessee Cavalry. He was wounded at the Battle of Chickamauga. After the War he was ordained as a Baptist minister, engaged in the mercantile business, and became a gentlemen farmer, all while tending to his medical practice. In his adopted town, he donated the land for the depot as well as the school, established a post office, ministered the Baptist Church, and helped charter the Masonic Lodge. Because of his benevolence and tireless efforts, the citizens of the community name the town “Woolsey” in his honor.

Sources: The History of Fayette County 1821 – 1971,

Fayette County Georgia Heritage Book,

Atlanta Journal,

Memoirs of Georgia

By John Lynch

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D.X. Gordy

Dorris Xerxes Gordy was born in Aberdeen (Fayette County) Georgia on September 28, 1913. His father was William Thomas Bellah Gordy, a well-known potter of Aberdeen who had previously worked a kiln in Alvaton (Meriwether County, Ga.) The elder Gordy’s pottery style had been influenced from pioneer potters that worked in Upson County, Georgia (“Jugtown”) and Edgefield, South Carolina, as well as those of his own father. After the death of their father in 1955, D. X., with his younger brother Bill, continued the pottery tradition. Both had quit school to help their father make pieces of crockery such as churns, flowerpots, bricks and jugs, some of which were sold at the gift shop at Warm Springs’ Little White House. D. X. became a well known and popular potter in his own right. He was once the pottery demonstrator at Westville in Lumpkin (Stewart County) and maintained a tourist shop in Primrose (Meriwether County) near his home. Some of his works are displayed at the Smithsonian Institute, The FDR Museum and Macon. Although he lived in Meriwether County, he always felt like Fayette County was his home. D. X. Gordy died on August 26, 1994

Source:                   The History of Fayette County 1821 – 1971

Brothers in Clay

Fayette Citizen

By: John Lynch

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Benjamin Brown files for Revolutionary War Pension

Benjamin Brown is buried in the Brown Cemetery in Peachtree City. The stone recently set shows born in 1758 and died in 1853. The other stone shows that he was a veteran of the Revolutionary War.

Brown served as a private in the war during three separate tours. The first was for five months, the second for two months, and the third for eighteen months. His service ended with the surrender of Cornwallis. When he volunteered, he was living in North Carolina. Private Brown was in the Battle of Brier Creek.

After the war, Brown moved to Blunt County, Tennessee, then to Oglethorpe County, Georgia, then McMinn County, Tennessee. It was while in McMinn County that he filed for a pension on September 4, 1832, was he was 74 years of age. In December 1852, he moved to Fayette County, Georgia.

By Tony Parrott

Source: Pension records of Benjamin Brown

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Arthur Arnold

Arthur Arnold was born on September 15, 1881, in a house just across Whitewater Bridge. His parents were former slaves, Henry Arnold and Nellie Dorsey. He had 10 brothers and sisters. As a child, he went to school at Flat Rock and Arnold Grove. The family farmed on land several years owned by the Blalock’s and the Dorsey’s.

In 1903, he married Arie Blalock. His father-in-law then taught Arthur how to be a blacksmith. He was a blacksmith for Fayetteville for more than 63 years, and he was Fayette’s last blacksmith. He said that he had “shod mules and horses and doctored cows in every pasture in Fayette County except two”.

He was the oldest living member of Edgefield Baptist Church until his death in 1986. He joined the church when it had only its second pastor. In the 1970s Deacon Arthur Arnold would stand on the “Founding Rock” to preach to the congregation. The church was established in 1870.

By Angela Pendleton

Source: Article by Carolyn Cary from Arnold file. (undated)

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