The Great Seal of Georgia

The Great Seal of Georgia is a Georgia historical marker in Baldwin County, dedicated 1960.

At the old courthouse, on West Hancock Street in Milledgeville.

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When Federal troops entered Milledgeville in November, 1864, Georgia Secretary of State Nathan C. Barnett hid the Great Seal under a house and the legislative minutes in a pig pen 30 yards east of this point. Later they were returned to the Statehouse. Again in 1868 Governor Charles J. Jenkins (Governor, 1865-1868) removed the Great Seal to thwart state fund payments which had been ordered by the United States military authority which inaugurated Georgia's carpetbag regime. Federal General George Meade replaced Governor Jenkins with United States General Thomas H. Ruger of Wisconsin (who served only part of the year 1868), the last of the Milledgeville governors. With the return of home rule in 1872 the Great Seal was returned to the new capitol in Atlanta.

TodayHistorical map

Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.

David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

Historical maps covering this location

1856 · Georgia. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1864 · Colton's Georgia (1864) (Barry Lawrence Ruderman Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1866 · Georgia. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1869 · Georgia. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1908 · Sanborn Fire Insurance Map — Milledgeville, Ga. (1908) (OldInsuranceMaps.net — Sanborn Map Collection)

Georgia, 1866, covering the location of The Great Seal of Georgia, with a pin at the marker's coordinates — Georgia, 1866, covering this location. David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries. The pin is ours, placed from the marker's coordinates.

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This historical marker is part of the Georgia Historical Marker Program and was erected by the Georgia Historical Commission. Marker texts and locations come from the Society's own marker database.

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