On the last day of December, 1773, a band of Westmoreland County Virginians reached the primeval forest that stood on the present site of Washington, Wilkes County, Georgia, and on New Year's Day they began the arduous work of conquering the wilderness.  As a precaution against Indian forays, great trees were felled for a stockaded fortification which was called Fort Heard in honor of one of the Virginia families.

The Heards, reputedly descendants of William the Conqueror, had settled in Virginia in 1720 as neighbors of George Washington's family, from whom they had obtained Arabian horses.

JOHN HEARD, JR., with his wife and sons, BARNARD, JESSE, and STEPHEN, was included in the group that migrated to Georgia.   JESSE remained at Fort Heard, which stood just north of what is now the public square.   STEPHEN, who had done military service under GEORGE WASHINGTON, soon left and settled on Fishing Creek, eight miles away, where he built another stockade, this one called Heard's Fort.

Wilkes county produced a large number of distinguished men and women who have greatly strengthened and adorned the life of the state. Eleven Governors of Georgia were either born in Wilkes, or were for some time residents of this county. These were Heard, Mathews, Clark, Talbot, Early, Lumpkin, Rabun, Towns, Gilmer, Forsyth, and Stephens. Seventeen counties of Georgia have been named in honor of her distinguished sons.

 

STEPHEN HEARD moved from Westmoreland county, Virginia, in 1773, and built a stockade fort upon the present site of the town of Washington. He was a prominent figure in the councils of the state, and for a time during the Revolution, he acted as governor with his capital at his fort.

 

HEARD'S FORT.—According to the local historian of Wilkes, the first settlement on the site of the Town of Washington was made by n colony of immigrants from Westmoreland County, Virginia, headed by Stephen Heard, a pioneer who afterwards rose to high prominence in public affairs.  Two brothers accompanied him to Georgia, Barnard and Jesse, and possibly his father, Tolin Heard, was also among the colonists.  It is certain that the party included Benjamin Wilkinson, together with others whose names are no longer of record.  They arrived on December 31, 1773, and, on New Year's day following, in the midst of an unbroken forest of magnificent oaks, they began to build a stockade fort, which they called Fort Heard, to protect the settlement from Indian assault.

 

The Heards' were of English stock but possessed landed estates in Ireland.  It is said of John Heard that he was a man of explosive temper, due to his somewhat aristocratic blood and that, growing oat of a difficulty over tithes, in which he used a pitch-fork on a minister of the Established Church, he somewhat hastily resolved upon an ocean voyage, in order to escape the consequences.

 

Between the Indians and the Tories, the little colony at Heard's Fort was sorely harassed during the Revolutionary war period.  There were many wanton acts of cruelty committed when the tide of British success in Georgia was at the flood.  Stephen Heard's young wife, with a babe at her breast, was at this time driven out in a snow storm, to perish without a shelter over her bead.  His brother, Maj. Bernard Heard, was put into irons, taken to Augusta, and sentenced to be hanged, but fortunately, on the eve of the siege he made his escape, and took an active part in the events which followed.  It is said that among the prisoners rescued from the bands of the British was bin father, John Heard, an old man, who was on the point of exhaustion from hunger.

 

In the spring of 1780, Heard's Fort became temporarily the seat of the state government in Georgia.  Stephen Heard was at this time a member of the executive council; and when Governor Howley left the state to attend the Continental Congress, George Wells as president of the executive council succeeded him, while Stephen Heard succeeded George Wells.  The latter fell soon afterwards in a duel with James Jackson, whereupon Stephen Heard, by virtue of his office, assumed the direction of affairs.  It was a period of great upheaval; and, to insure a place of safety for the law-making power when Augusta was threatened, Stephen Heard transferred the seat of government to Heard's Fort, in the County of Wilkes, where it remained until Augusta was retaken by the Americans.

 

On the traditional site of Heard's Fort was built the famous old Heard House, which was owned and occupied for years by Gen. B. W. Heard, a descendant of Jesse Heard, one of the original pioneers.  It stood on the north side of the courthouse square, where it was afterwards used as a bank and where, on May 1, 1815, was held the last meeting of the Confederate cabinet.  Thus an additional wealth of memories was bequeathed to Heard's Fort, an asylum for two separate government pursued by enemies.

 

On April 25, 1770, the first court held in the up-country north of Augusta was held at Heard's Fort There were three justices: Absalom Bedell, Benjamin Catchings and William Downs.  To this number Zachariah Lamar and James Gorman were subsequently added.  Col. John Dooly was attorney for the state.  Joseph Scott Redden was sheriff, and Henry Manadue, clerk of the court.  For several years, the tribunal of justice was quartered in private dwellings.  It was not until 1783 or later that the county boosted a jail, and, during this period, prisoners were often tied with hickory withes, or fastened by the neck between fence rails.  Juries often sat on logs out of doors while deliberating upon verdicts.  It is said that when Tories were indicted, even on misdemeanors, they seldom escaped the hemp.  Says Doctor Smith: "Even after the war, when a man who was accused of stealing a horse from General Clarke was acquitted by the jury, the old soldier arrested him and marched him to a convenient tree and was about to hang him anyhow, when Nathaniel Pendleton, a distinguished lawyer, succeeded in begging him off."