1819 Town of Demopolis land grant - Samford University Digital Collections

Title

1819 Town of Demopolis land grant

Subject

["Demopolis (Ala.)","Marengo County (Ala.)","Vine and Olive Colony","Plantations -- Alabama","French -- Alabama","French -- Colonies -- Alabama"]

Form/Genre

["land grants"]

No. 681 This entitles A. S. Lipscomb or his assignees, to the sixteen-hundreed and eightieth part of the interest in the Company of the Town of Demopolis, ac- cording to the Constitution, Rules and Regulations of said Company, being the one-tenth part of an original Share. Commissioners of the Town of Demopolis. Walter Crenshaw Jo. B. Earle Jas. Childress [Count Charles Lefebvre Desnouettes?] Geo. S. Gaines April 21st, 1819

Document Details

Title

1819 Town of Demopolis land grant

Digital ID

m-d000100

Creator

["Company of the Town of Demopolis"]

Date

1819

Decade

["1810-1819"]

Description

Town of Demopolis land deed dated April 21, 1819. The deed was received by Abner S. Lipscomb. Lipscomb would later serve as Alabama Chief Justice from 1823 to 1834. At the time that this deed was issued, Alabama was still a part of the Alabama Territory, not becoming a state until December 1819. The commissioners that signed the deed were as follows: Walter Crenshaw: Born in Virginia in 1787, Crenshaw practiced law and moved to the Alabama Territory in 1817. He and his brother, Anderson Crenshaw, speculated in public lands. He died in Cahaba in 1830. Dr. Joseph B. Earle: Dr. Earle was a physician and land speculator. He lived in Clarke County, Alabama, which he represented in the State Senate in 1827. James Childress: Born in 1773, Childress was from Tuscaloosa and speculated in public lands in Marengo and Greene counties. Childress died in 1826. Count Charles Lefebvre Desnouettes: Born in Paris in 1773, Desnouettes served as a second lieutenant of dragoons in the French Army, and later as a captain and aide-de-camp to Napoleon Bonaparte at the battle of Marengo, Italy. He was later named by Napoleon as a count of the empire and a lieutenant general. He later became a leader of the society of French immigrants that founded Demopolis in 1817. In 1822, on his return to France, his ship wrecked off the coast of Ireland, killing him. George S. Gaines: Born in North Carolina in 1784, Gaines moved to St. Stephens in 1805. There he was appointed the federal government's agent to the Choctaw Indians. As chairman of the commission, Gaines is considered to have been the first mayor of Demopolis. In 1830, Gaines moved to Mobile where he was made president of the state bank. Gaines died in 1873. The Vine and Olive Colony was founded in 1816-1817 by Bonapartist French colonists. The U.S. Congress granted them land in the Mississippi Territory, and they settled primarily in Marengo County, Ala. The colonists attempted to raise grapes, olives, figs, and other fruits but the colony failed in the late 1820s.

Subject

["Demopolis (Ala.)","Marengo County (Ala.)","Vine and Olive Colony","Plantations -- Alabama","French -- Alabama","French -- Colonies -- Alabama"]

Form/Genre

["land grants"]

Language

English

Digital Resource Type

Text

Archival Collection

["McCall Papers"]

Repository

["Samford University Library, Special Collection Department"]

Rights

This digital object is the property of the Samford University Library and is intended for non-commercial use. Users of the image are asked to acknowledge the Special Collection, Samford University Library. For information about obtaining high-resolution copies of this or other images in this collection, please contact the Special Collection department at Samford University. (mailto:scdept@samford.edu)