Historic Sites in Richmond County

The history of Richmond County

Richmond County is one of Georgia's eight original counties, organized in 1777 to replace the colonial parish of St. Paul, and it takes its name from Charles Lennox, the Duke of Richmond, a British nobleman who sympathized with the American cause. Its seat, Augusta, began in 1736 when James Edward Oglethorpe established a trading town at the head of navigation on the Savannah River, naming it for Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha. Fort Augusta guarded the settlement from its early years, two battles were fought in the county during the Revolution, and Augusta served as the state's capital from 1786 to 1795. Tobacco farming gave way to cotton after the invention of the cotton gin, and the Augusta Canal, begun in 1845, powered mills that processed the region's crops. The Army made a lasting mark as well, from Camp Hancock in World War I to Camp Gordon, established in 1941 and home to the Signal Corps since 1948. In 1883 educator Lucy Craft Laney opened the school that became Haines Normal and Industrial Institute, a leading school for Black students. In 1970, protests over the death of a Black teenager in the county jail became a riot in which police killed six Black men. Augusta and Richmond County merged their governments on January 1, 1996.

Sources: georgiaencyclopedia.orggeorgiaencyclopedia.orgen.wikipedia.org