Image credit: Tom Stelling

Year Erected: 1962

Marker Text:  In June 1816 Lt. Col. D. L. Clinch and a detachment of the 4th U.S. Infantry set up camp one mile west of here, calling it Camp Crawford. They began construction of a fort on the site in September 1816, naming it Fort Scott. Need for a fort was prompted by the presence of restless Indians who had emigrated to nearby areas -- refugees largely composed of Seminoles and “Red Sticks” (a hostile faction of the Creeks). Prematurely evacuated December 1816 and almost immediately pillaged by hostile Indians, Capt. S. Donoho and his artillery company reoccupied Fort Scott in the Spring of 1817, reinforced later that year by additional troops of the 4th and 7th Regiments.

March 9, 1818, Gen. Andrew Jackson arrived here with his staff and troops of the Georgia Militia. He was joined by Kentucky and Tennessee militiamen, who had marched through Alabama. At Fort Scott Jackson concentrated troops for his march into Spanish Florida against Indians who had been raiding U.S. territory. He took with him the force at Fort Scott, excepting 60 men left as garrison. Following Jackson’s campaign the garrison largely consisted of companies of the 7th Regiment. Frontier peace and increase of malaria probably account for the abandonment of Fort Scott in September 1821.