Fayette County, Tennessee

Fayette County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

County Seat: Somerville
Year Organized: 1824
Square Miles: 704

Court House:

PO Box 218
County Courthouse
Somerville, TN 38068-0218

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Named in honor of the Marquis de la Fayette (1757-1834), French nobleman, statesman and soldier who entered American service in the Revolutionary War and was commissioned major-general.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History of Fayette County

Created 1824 from Indian lands; named in honor of the Marquis de la Fayette (1757-1834), French nobleman, statesman and soldier who entered American service in the Revolutionary War and was commissioned major-general.

Fayette County was formed in 1824 from Indian lands
(Acts of Tennessee 1824, Chapter 36).

There was a fire at the Fayette County courthouse in 1925.

The Tennessee General Assembly established Fayette County on September 29, 1824, and named it in honor of the Marquis de Lafayette, French general and statesman. The county seat, Somerville, was named to honor Lieutenant Robert Somerville, hero of the battle of Tohopeka in Alabama. The first court proceedings took place at the home of Robert G. Thornton on the banks of the North Fork of the Wolf River on December 6, 1824.

Settlement began in the area as early as 1820, and by 1826 there were enough residents for the incorporation of the two oldest towns, Somerville and LaGrange. In both towns restored antebellum homes symbolize the wealth and culture of the plantation period. The entire town of LaGrange, named for Lafayette's ancestral home, is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Today there are nine incorporated towns in the county: Braden, Gallaway, LaGrange, Moscow, Oakland, Piperton, Rossville, Somerville, and Williston.

Religious zeal soon prompted the organization of the county's churches. Somerville's First Presbyterian Church dates to 1829. Immanuel Parish in LaGrange, established in 1832, is the oldest Episcopal church in West Tennessee. Nineteenth-century camp meetings live on at Joyner's Campground, where annual services are held each July in the open-air tabernacle built in 1893.

Find more from the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture: FAYETTE COUNTY

Neighboring Counties:

Haywood County (north)
Hardeman County (east)
Benton County, Mississippi (southeast)
Marshall County, Mississippi (south)
Shelby County (west)
Tipton County (northwest)

Cities and Towns:

- Braden	town	Incorporated Area
- Gallaway	city	Incorporated Area
- La Grange	town	Incorporated Area
- Moscow	city	Incorporated Area
- Oakland	town	Incorporated Area
- Rossville	town	Incorporated Area
- Somerville (County Seat)	town	Incorporated Area
- Williston	city	Incorporated Area

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resource Guide

Counties: US Map

The history of our nation can be seen as a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names we've given our counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of our country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."

Penn Foster High School

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