Jefferson Davis Memorial Park, Ben Hill County

Jefferson Davis Memorial Park, Ben Hill County is a Georgia historical marker in Ben Hill County, dedicated 1984.

US 129 at Central Avenue in Fitzgerald.

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On May 4, 1865, Jefferson Davis arrived in Washington, Georgia (178 miles E of the Park), where he performed his last duties as President of the Confederate States of America. Shortly thereafter, with a small staff and escort, he departed enroute to the trans-Mississippi Department where, supported by those Confederate forces not yet surrendered, he hoped to negotiate a just peace. After a difficult journey via Sandersville, Dublin and Abbeville, he camped a mile north or Irwinville (9 miles SW) in the present Jefferson Davis Memorial Park, unaware that, in Dublin, the 1st Wisconsin Cavalry [USA] had found his trail and begun pursuit. At dawn on May 10th, his camp was surrounded by men of the 1st Wisconsin and 4th Michigan cavalry regiments [USA] and he became a "state prisoner", his hopes for a new nation -- in which each state would exercise without interference its cherished "Constitutional Rights" -- forever dead. To visit the park, take State 107 from Fitzgerald to its junction with State 37, thence to Irwinville. To continue south after the visit, turn left in Irwinville on State 32 to its junction with US 129 in Ocilla.

TodayHistorical map

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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)
1865 · County map of Georgia, and Alabama (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1866 · Georgia. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
1869 · Georgia. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)

Georgia, 1869, covering the location of Jefferson Davis Memorial Park, Ben Hill County, with a pin at the marker's coordinates — Georgia, 1869, 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 Department of Natural Resources. Marker texts and locations come from the Society's own marker database.

More markers nearby

On the National Register nearby

Fitzgerald Commercial Historic District320 ft

Places within about 300 feet of this marker that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. A nearby listing is not always the marker's own subject.