Vernon, Troup County, Georgia History

The town of Vernon, which the promoters hoped would be the county seat of Troup County, was laid off in land lot 256 of the 5th district, and was on the river front of the east side of the Chattahoochee. The promoters were Wiley J. Sterling, John E. Gage, an Inferior Court judge, and Henry Faver. The number of citizens purchasing lots are not known, but the following secured deeds to lots in Vernon: John E. Gage, Wiley J. Sterling, James M. Rawson, Henry Faver, John Bostock, Josiah M. Bonner, Nancy Banks, John Lassiter, William A. Lyle, Robert Alexander, Robert Benton, James M. Ransom, Willis Benton, William D. Sherod, Willis Currey, Ira Allen, Abner C. Dozier, and perhaps others not recorded.

A church lot was deeded for the organization of a congregation; an academy was chartered as Vernon Academy; a ferry was put into operation, the approach to which can still be seen on the edge of the Meadors Camp.

Imagination alone can picture the transformation that the disagreement of five Inferior Court judges circumvented: the river transportation, the deviation of later railroads, and a host of other changes in the present Troup County, had Vernon been chosen as county seat.

Just north of the crossing of the A. B. & C. Railroad over the Chattahoochee River once was the site of the forgotten town of Vernon, and the only present reminder is the names of two militia districts, East Vernon and West Vernon, but the promoters and owners and the town are among the things gone and forgotten.

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