Fort King George in Darien, Georgia is an important historic site that has undergone reconstruction efforts over several decades. The site was originally occupied by Native American tribes before being used by Spanish missionaries in the 17th century. An English fort was later built there in the 1720s but was abandoned a few years later. In the 1960s, with the impending construction of a nearby interstate highway threatening tourism, local advocates pushed for reconstruction of the fort. Reconstruction began in the 1980s after national standards for historic reconstructions were established. However, long-term reconstruction efforts were limited by inconsistent government funding over the years.

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Sean Griffith
11/20/2015 Word Count: 3064
FORT KING GEORGE HISTORIC
SITE

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Why is Fort King George Important to Historic Preservation?
Fort King George, in Darien, Georgia, is a National Register site that is almost a full
historic reconstruction, also a site that has a long history with the interests of several different
groups involved. The site itself is a full historic reconstruction done in the latter half of the 20th
century after the passage of the famous National Historic Preservation Act that set off many new
preservation efforts across the country. Fort King George itself is possibly not the most accurate
name for the site because what is there today is not actually the original Fort King George. The
name also excludes Indian Tribes’ influence, French influence, and Spanish influence in the
history of the site. Everything that stands on the site today is a historic reconstruction that could
date anywhere from the 1970s to up to the first decade of the 21st century. Despite the negative
stigma that usually surrounds reconstructions there was not much choice in the case of Fort King
George because there was nothing left of the Indian, Spanish, or English occupation of the site.
The site known as Fort King George today fits into the historical contexts of the colonial power
struggle between the French, Spanish, English, and Indians as well as the push for new
preservation projects that came out of the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act.
These two factors put Fort King George among a select few that have some form of historical
significance for every century stretching from the 17th through the 20th, according to its
nomination to the national register of historic places.1
Historical Context of Fort King George
To begin some background on the important events and history associated with Fort King
George would be appropriate. The site was first occupied by a Guale Indian tribe, as far as the
archaeological record can show, before the arrival of Spanish missionaries in the latter half of the
17th century.2 The Guale, and Yamasee, Indian tribes are groups that splintered off from the
former Creek Confederacy, and they find their origins in the group of Indian tribes that are
related to the ancient Muskogean language.3 The Indian settlement on the site was quite
substantial, according to documentation put out by the site managers, with excavations revealing
1 Mitchell,WilliamR., 1971,National Register of Historic Places Nomination Form- Fort KingGeorge,
edited by Nancy O’ Hare and CaroleSummers: National Park Service.
2 Sheila Kelly Caldwell,2014, Archaeological Excavationsatthe Darien Bluff Site, 9MC10 1952-1953,in
University of Georgia Laboratory of Archaeology Series, edited by Mark; Jefferies Ed. Wi lliams,Richard;Scales,
Mary C, University of Georgia, 32.
3 George A. Broadwell,April 1991, "The Muskogean Connection of the Gualeand Yamasee," International
Journal of American Linguistics 57 (2):267-270, doi:http://www.jstor.org/stable/3519769.

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several wattle and daub constructions and Indian pottery shards scattered in several places.4 The
Spanish named them Guale for the native language that they spoke, and they were a nomadic
native group, which made it very difficult for the Spanish missionaries to subdue them. Guale
tribes occupied much of the coastal area of Georgia and Carolina when the Spanish arrived
around, and this coverage of territory was another reason that the Spanish missionaries had
trouble bringing the Guale under control.5 The political and social hierarchy of the Guale Indians
was also different from their interior ancestors because of their decentralized power structure.
The Chief was accountable to a group, or council, of prominent men in each village or area.6
The Spanish, arriving to the area around the year 1600, set about trying to carry out their
general plans for colonization that involved subduing the native population, converting them to
Christianity, and trying to get whatever value they could from the land. The goal was to make the
native population, in this case the Guale, into a task force of menial workers and foot soldiers
that would support a small Spanish ruling class in the area.7 Specific to the area around the Fort
King George site the Spanish were attempting to consolidate their land claims in Georgia and
Carolina by expanding their Mission system across the area. In 1595 a Spanish friar named
Father Pedro de Corpa attempted to establish a mission on the Fort King George site, known as
Tolomato then, to begin subjugating the local Guale population.8 According to tour information
distributed by the site managers the local Guale population did not like Father de Corpa due to
his lack of respect for native traditions in favor of new Spanish ones. Sheila Caldwell writes that
in 1597, when the local chief died, Father de Corpa insulted the tribe by installing a distant, and
more submissive, relative as chief instead of the former chief’s son. This insult pushed the local
Guale Indians over the edge, and they killed Father de Corpa while he was praying one morning
in 1597. This incident led to a revolt of Guale Indians, known as the Tolomato revolt, which
resulted in the destruction of several Spanish missions in Georgia and Carolina. The revolt was
eventually put down, quite brutally, by the Spanish military, but the damage to the Spanish
mission system in Georgia and Carolina was great.
4 Georgia Historical Commission,1965,“Welcome to Fort KingGeorge,” in Ashantilly Press Papers,
Hargrett Special CollectionsLibrary:University of Georgia, MS3395 Box 124 Folder 7.
5 Caldwell,27.
6 McEwan, Bonnie G. 2000.Indians of the Greater Southeast: Historical Archaeology and Ethnohistory.
Gainesville,FL: University Press of Florida.
7 Caldwell,28.
8 “Welcome to Fort KingGeorge”

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The Spanish never regained a solid foothold in the area around Fort King George, or in
the rest of the former Guale Indian lands, after they put down the Tolomato revolt. The former
Guale lands continued to be site of intermittent rebellion against the Spanish, and in general were
a sort of no man’s land, until the English began to push into the area in the early 1700s after
establishing themselves in Savannah.9 The English had the intention of establishing a series of
military fortifications on the southern edge of their territory, mostly southeastern Georgia, to
protect their land claims from potential Spanish aggression from the south. The English also
feared French incursions from the west due to that countries exploration down the tributary rivers
of the Mississippi River. Overall the Altamaha river area, the river next to the Fort King George
site, was a key strategic control point in the colonial power struggle between England, France,
and Spain in the early 18th century.10 In order to fortify control of the Altamaha River Carolina
colonial officials dispatched militia colonel John Barnwell to survey the area for potential
construction of a military fort in 1721. Barnwell came across a small bluff that overlooked the
river, and surrounding marshlands, that would be a very defensible place to put a fort.11 The bluff
location was presented to Carolina colonial officials, and in 1720 Fort King George’s
construction was approved to begin soon afterwards. Colonel Barnwell planned to build a
shallow triangular fort, surrounded by a moat and earthen fortifications, with barracks, supply
buildings, and a large blockhouse at the center for things like surveillance and storage.12
Administrative struggles between Barnwell and colonial officials delayed the beginning of
construction, but it finally got started in the summer of 1721.
Another major difficulty Barnwell had in Fort King George’s construction was finding
men to build and garrison the fort that were in good shape. At the time of the fort’s construction
the English put able-bodied soldiers to better use in other areas of the colonies instead of being
placed at a small fort on the southern edge of England’s colonial holdings. In order to garrison
the fort colonial officials sent Barnwell around 100 “invalids” mostly from hospitals in England
that were barely, if at all, in fighting shape.13 This led Barnwell to complain that many of his
men were sick, and that their sickness, and death in some cases, was holding up the construction
9 Caldwell,37.
10 Kim Purcell,2005, “Fort King George,” In New Georgia Encyclopedia:University of Georgia Press,
http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/fort-king-george.
11 “Welcome to Fort KingGeorge”
12 NGE Fort KingGeorge
13 Cook, Jeannine, 1990.Fort King George: One Step to Statehood, Darien,GA: Darien News.

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process. Stories of sickness and death spread among soldiers in Savannah and Carolina, and the
Fort King George construction project gained a bad reputation among the men for essentially
being a death trap.14 The administrative and staffing issues at the fort were not a good omen, and
frankly the fort itself was not very successful. Barnwell completed construction in 1722, and was
appointed commander of the fort, but only four years later the fort burned. Then in 1727 colonial
officials decided to abandon the fort completely, and to withdraw all troops and munitions back
to Port Royal in Carolina.15 The site would never be used militarily again, and the only human
inhabitants of the area would be Scottish Highlanders sent in the 1730s by James Oglethorpe,
who would settle the town of Darien that still exists today.
Preservation and Fort King George
The history of the Fort King George area is important in putting the events that occurred
at the site into a type of historic context, but another major factor in understanding the site are
how those historic events played into the preservation of the site in the 20th century. Before plans
came together in the mid-1960s to create a restoration/reconstruction plan for the site there had
been extensive archaeological inquiry performed to determine who had been on the site, and
what they had done there. One such example was the extensive report created by Sheila Caldwell
in the mid-1950s that detailed all of the different Indian, Spanish, and English remains at the site,
and why those remnants were important in a historical context. The issue faced by the Georgia
Historical Commission in the 1960s was what exactly to do with the convergence of important
groups in history at a site where there were no longer any remaining structures representing those
groups. In March of 1965 Bessie Lewis, of a local Darien newspaper, wrote a letter to a
representative of the Georgia Historical Commission asking for a plan to be created for the
restoration of the site, and noting that she was not sure what a good solution would be since there
was little existing guidance.16 Much of the Darien, Georgia populace wanted to see a historic
reconstruction on the scale of the famous Fort Ticonderoga, but it was impossible for a
consensus on methodology and planning to come together. The issue at the time was that the
National Historic Preservation Act had yet to be passed, and the Secretary of the Interior’s
standards dealing with historic reconstructions did not exist yet either. In a sense the decision to
14 One step to statehood, 29.
15 One step to statehood, 59.
16 BessieLewis to Sidney Jewett. Hargrett Special CollectionsLibrary:University of Georgia MS3395 Box
124 Folder 7, March 1, 1965.

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go forward with a historic reconstruction of the Fort King George site would create a situation
where there was no precedent to go by.
The primary motivation behind the preservation movement at Fort King George
beginning when it did, in the mid-1960s, was the approaching construction of Interstate 95 slated
to begin towards the end of the decade.17 The passage of the National Interstate and Defense
Highways Act in 1956 is one of the more important events in United States history because of its
impact on travel, but it was very damaging to preservation efforts. Thomas King writes that the
construction of the Interstate Highway system did “alarming damage” to all types of historic
structures and archaeological sites around the country.18 Damage to historic sites included their
destruction, compromising of their historical integrity, and the way that interstate highways
would draw potential tourists away from sites. This issue with the Federal Highway system’s
construction was one of the big drivers behind the passage of the National Historic Preservation
Act in 1966, and it helps to put the Fort King George site into a national context. In an April
1965 letter William Haynes, a journalist from Darien, Georgia, laid out the issues with the
construction of Interstate 95 to former owner of the site. Haynes says that Darien is feeling “a
little desperate” because the construction of the interstate was threatening to pull travelers off of
the coastal route 17 highway that runs through Darien.19 If those travelers are no longer coming
through Darien the undeveloped Fort King George site would lose a lot of exposure, so Haynes
is trying to ask for advice on how to combat this issue. The citizens of Darien, Georgia just
wanted to find a way to stay on the map in the face of a major threat to the revenue the town got
from tourism, especially of the Fort King George site. With the passage of the National Historic
Preservation Act, soon after the writing of the Haynes letter, Fort King George, and similar sites,
got a lot of the momentum they needed to combat what threatened them.
The hope in Darien was that the momentum of the national preservation movement
would assist in pushing politicians, private donors, and the local populace to fund a full
restoration of Fort King George. The parties involved with Fort King George did end up raising
17 Transportation,U.S. Department of. "Eisenhower Interstate Highway System - Interstate Density Map."
U.S. Department of Transportation,LastModified November 18, 2015 Accessed November 18, 2015,
https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/interstate/densitymap.cfm.
18 King, Thomas F. 1998.Cultural ResourceLaws and Practice:an Introductory Guide. Vol. 1. WalnutCreek,
CA: AltaMira Press.
19 Alexander Lawrence to WilliamHaynes.Hargrett Special CollectionsLibrary:University of Georgia.
MS3395 Box 124 Folder 8. May 10,1965.

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almost $200,000 dollars to begin restoration of the site, and the hope was that this would be
enough to completely rebuild the old Fort.20 However the Georgia Department of Natural
Resources, and the newly created Georgia State Historic Preservation Office, pushed a more
cautionary plan for the site. With the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act there was
more concern placed on deliberate survey and planning of historic sites, so the momentum
behind the Fort King George movement petered out slightly. Proof of a concern with surveying
is in the 1971 nomination of Fort King George to the National Register of historic places, which
the Director of the Georgia Historic Sites Survey prepared by working with local citizens.21
Another issue for Fort King George was that momentum for funding historic preservation did not
match that of the legislative aspect of the field in the 1960s and 1970s. The site managers were
able to construct an interpretive museum on the grounds of the site using the $200,000 dollars
raised for restoration, but that funding dried up quickly, and there was almost nothing behind that
amount for many years afterward.22
The trend of government regulation and control continued nationally, and locally for Fort
King George, into the 1980s when the site’s reconstruction finally began to get underway. The
most important event in the national preservation movement, in relation to Fort King George’s
reconstruction, was the Secretary of the Interior’s standards dealing with historic reconstructions
being codified in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Along with this event the Georgia Department
of Natural Resources finally set up a concrete plan for the reconstruction and interpretation of the
site in June of 198123. This plan would be worked into the Department of Natural resources
budgets for several years during the 1980s, and the overall objective was to interpret the history,
stabilize the site, and then begin to reconstruct buildings as accurately as possible. This plan was
a milestone for the Fort King George site because the desire of the local populace to do
something with the site was finally organized into an official itinerary.
The biggest limiting factor on the success of Fort King George’s preservation plan was
funding, which is an issue for the large majority of historic sites in the United States. Since the
20 Press,Associated."State Allots Funds for Altamaha Fort." Atlanta Journal Constitution, November 17,
1965.
21 NRHP Fort King George.
22 WilliamHaynes to Senator Glenn Bryant. Hargrett Special CollectionsLibrary:University of Georgia
MS3395 Box 124 Folder 10,February 4, 1981.
23 Norman Edwards to Sam Cofer. Hargrett Special Collections Library:University of Georgia MS3395 Box
124 Folder 10, September 5, 1980.

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state and federal governments were now taking a larger role in historic preservation a lot of the
money for preservation efforts would come from government budgets. The Department of
Natural Resources stressed that they could not make concrete funding plans for Fort King
George because funding for the site would vary from fiscal year to fiscal year.24 A rough
timeline showed that only a few projects per fiscal year could be funded for Fort King George.
For example in fiscal year 1985 there would only be enough money available to construct
museum exhibits on Indian and Spanish influence on the site. Funding became an especially
important issue in the later years of the 1980s because the site was drawing nearer to the planned
dates for reconstruction of the sit to begin. The Secretary of the Interior’s standards on
reconstruction, in terms of importance, cannot be stressed enough because they told the Georgia
Department of Natural Resources, and the populace of Darien, exactly how to plan and proceed
with the reconstruction.25 As a result of these guidelines the people involved with the site were
able to get a very accurate picture of how much they would need to begin reconstructing the Fort.
Eventually the site was able to secure sufficient funding for reconstruction of Fort King
George which began with the outer fortifications, then continued with the massive central
blockhouse, and finally onto smaller buildings like Barracks. Thanks to Federal standards, and
surviving plans for the original Fort, the reconstructed site is probably as accurate as it can be in
terms of design, materials, and location. The reconstruction project lasted from 1987-2004, and it
ended up requiring several periods of fundraising and investment by private business and the
state government. The task then presented to the managers of the Fort King George historic site
was how to make the site viable financially, and how to grow revenue produced from tourists
that came to visit. This is one of the more current challenges facing historic sites as a whole
because federal, state, and local governments are not as willing to invest money into a site if
there is not some reasonable return of revenue. At the same time tourism is a challenge for
historic sites because of the damage that it can cause to the integrity and character of a historic
site. Fort King George addresses this preservation challenge in their business plans pushing for
use of the reconstructed blockhouse, the interpretive museum, and other reconstructed parts of
24 Morton McInvaleto WilliamHaynes.Hargrett Special CollectionsLibrary:University of Georgia MS3395
Box 124 Folder 10, February 20, 1984.
25 Henry Struble to WilliamHaynes.Hargrett Special Collections Library:University of Georgia,MS3395
Box 124 Folder 10, January 24,1983.

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the fort, as the main tourist attractions and revenue sources.26 This is designed to protect what
little remains of the original buildings on the site, while also attracting tourists to the site that will
spend money and provide revenue.
Conclusion
In conclusion Fort King George is a site with a storied history and a unique set of
preservation challenges. The merging of Indian, Spanish, French, and English interests at this
one site in southeast Georgia is a rare thing among historic sites across the country, and that none
of those groups could truly conquer the site is more interesting still. A site as deteriorated as Fort
King George was at the turn of the 20th century, despite its rich history, probably would have
remained a local fascination unless it became popular at the right time. Fort King George coming
to the forefront of Georgia archaeology and preservation in the late 1950s and early 1960s set the
site up perfectly to ride the momentum of the National Historic Preservation Act. The
infrastructure that the Act, and other Federal standards and regulations, provided during and after
the late 1960s was essential for Fort King George being preserved and reconstructed in the most
accurate and efficient way possible. Overall the developments in the national preservation
movement in the 1960s, and onwards, organized support of restoration of Fort King George into
a solid and mostly well executed plan that produced the site we have today.
26 Georgia Department of Natural Resources.“Fort KingGeorge Historic SiteBusiness & Management
Plan.”2012.
https://www.gastateparks.org/Staff/Plans/D15material/Stakeholder/Plans/FortKingGeorgeBP_FinalizedApproved_
121812.pdf.

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Bibliography
Broadwell, George A. April 1991. "The Muskogean Connection of the Guale and Yamasee."
International Journal of American Linguistics 57 (2):267-270. doi:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3519769.
Caldwell, Sheila Kelly. 2014. Archaeological Excavations at the Darien Bluff Site, 9MC10
1952-1953. In University of Georgia Laboratory of Archaeology Series, edited by Mark;
Jefferies Ed. Williams, Richard; Scales, Mary C. University of Georgia.
Georgia Historical Commission. 1965. Welcome to Fort King George. In Ashantilly Press
Papers. Hargrett Special Collections Library: University of Georgia, MS3395 Box 124
Folder 8.
Cook, Jeannine. 1990. Fort King George: One Step to Statehood. Darien, GA: Darien News.
Norman Edwards to Sam Cofer. Hargrett Special Collections Library: University of Georgia
MS3395 Box 124 Folder 10, September 5, 1980.
William Haynes to Senator Glenn Bryant. Hargrett Special Collections Library: University of
Georgia MS3395 Box 124 Folder 10, February 4, 1981.
King, Thomas F. 1998. Cultural Resource Laws and Practice: an Introductory Guide. Vol. 1.
Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press.
Alexander Lawrence to William Haynes. Hargrett Special Collections Library: University of
Georgia. MS3395 Box 124 Folder 8. May 10, 1965.
Bessie Lewis to Sidney Jewett. Hargrett Special Collections Library: University of Georgia
MS3395 Box 124 Folder 7, March 1, 1965.

11. 10
McEwan, Bonnie G. 2000. Indians of the Greater Southeast: Historical Archaeology and
Ethnohistory. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida.
Morton McInvale to William Haynes. Hargrett Special Collections Library: University of
Georgia MS3395 Box 124 Folder 10, February 20, 1984.
Mitchell, William R. 1971. National Register of Historic Places Nomination Form - Fort King
George. Edited by Nancy O' Hare; Summers, Carole: National Park Service.
Press, Associated. "State Allots Funds for Altamaha Fort." Atlanta Journal Constitution,
November 17, 1965.
Purcell, Kim. 2005. Fort King George. In New Georgia Encyclopedia: University of Georgia
Press, http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/fort-king-george.
Georgia Department of Natural Resources. “Fort King George Historic Site Business &
Management Plan.” 2012.
https://www.gastateparks.org/Staff/Plans/D15material/Stakeholder/Plans/FortKingGeorg
eBP_FinalizedApproved_121812.pdf.
Henry Struble to William Haynes. Hargrett Special Collections Library: University of Georgia,
MS3395 Box 124 Folder 10, January 24, 1983.
Transportation, U.S. Department of. "Eisenhower Interstate Highway System - Interstate Density
Map." U.S. Department of Transportation, Last Modified November 18, 2015 Accessed
November 18, 2015. https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/interstate/densitymap.cfm.

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