Lincoln County, Tennessee

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

County Seat: Fayetteville
Year Organized: 1809
Square Miles: 570

Court House:

112 Main Ave S Ste. 102
County Courthouse
Fayetteville, TN 37334-3032

Etymology - Origin of County Name

Named in honor of Benjamin Lincoln (1733-1810), American Revolutionary officer, US secretary of war, commander of forces that suppressed Shay's Rebellion in 1787 and lieutenant governor of Massachusetts.

Demographics:

County QuickFacts: Census Bureau Quick Facts

History of Lincoln County

Created 1809 from Bedford County; named in honor of Benjamin Lincoln (1733-1810), American Revolutionary officer, US secretary of war, commander of forces that suppressed Shay's Rebellion in 1787 and lieutenant governor of Massachusetts.

Lincoln County was formed in 1809 from Bedford County (Private Acts of Tennessee 1809, Chapter 48).

Lincoln County is located in southern Middle Tennessee, with most of the county in the Central Basin and the remainder on the Highland Rim. The Elk River runs through the county from the northeast to the southwest, dividing the county into two nearly equal parts. The Cherokees and Chickasaws ceded the land that comprises Lincoln County in 1806. Settlers arrived almost immediately, although surveyors and prospective settlers came as early as 1784 to establish boundaries for Revolutionary War land warrants. Some of the first settlers included Drury Abbott; Ezekiel Norris; Joseph Alexander and Andrew Greer; William and Thomas Edmonson; Robert Farquharson; and James Bright. The county, which contains 520 square miles, was established by an act of the general assembly in 1809 and named for Revolutionary War hero General Benjamin Lincoln.

Commissioners John Whitaker Sr., Wright Williams, Eli Garrett, Littleton Duty, and Jesse Woodruff were appointed to purchase 100 acres near the center of the county to establish a county seat. Ezekiel Norris sold the land near the Elk River that became the town of Fayetteville, and the commissioners laid off town lots, which were sold in 1810. The first court was held in the home of Brice Garner, the first county clerk. In 1811 the first courthouse was constructed of logs. The present Colonial Revival-style courthouse was built in 1970 and is the fourth one in the county's history.

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

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 571 square miles (1,478 km²), of which, 570 square miles (1,477 km²) of it is land and 0 square miles (1 km²) of it (0.07%) is water.

Neighboring Counties:

Bedford County (north)
Moore County (northeast)
Franklin County (east)
Madison County, Alabama (south)
Limestone County, Alabama (southwest)
Giles County (west)
Marshall County (northwest)

Cities and Towns:

- Ardmore	city	Incorporated Area
- Fayetteville (County Seat)	city	Incorporated Area
- Petersburg	town	Incorporated Area

County Resources:

Enter County Resources and Information Here

County Resources

The history of our nation was a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names given the counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of this 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."