The General's Road

Front: Anderson’s Main Street follows the path of the General’s Road. References to the roughly 70-mile route date as early as the 1780s. The road was named for Gen. Andrew Pickens and connected his Tamassee plantation in present-day Oconee County with the town of Abbeville, passing through Pendleton. It mostly followed the future route of S.C. Hwy. 28. Upon the 1826 creation of Anderson County, this area along the road became the site of the new courthouse town, Anderson. Reverse: For much of the 1800s, the General’s Road was the most prominent thoroughfare in Anderson County and a valuable transportation artery for travelers across Upcountry S.C. Stagecoach drivers used the road to carry goods and people between growing towns and area plantations. Traffic likely declined after Anderson’s first railroad was built in the 1850s. Local residents continued to refer to the route as the General’s Road as late as the early 1900s.