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Oconee County takes its
name from an Indian word. It was formed in 1868 from Pickens County, and
the county seat is Walhalla. This area in the northwest corner of the
state on the edge of the Blue Ridge Mountains was home to several Indian
tribes, including the Creeks and the Cherokees, but the Indians gave up
their lands in treaties signed in 1777 and 1785. After the American
Revolution, settlers from other parts of the state began moving in,
including the Germans from Charleston who founded the town of Walhalla
in 1850. In 1856 work began on a tunnel for the Blue Ridge Railroad that
would have linked Charleston with Knoxville, Tennessee, but the Civil
War ended that project; the unfinished Stumphouse Tunnel can still be
seen today. Several Revolutionary War heroes moved to present day Oconee
County after the war, including Andrew Pickens (1739-1817), Robert
Anderson (1741-1813), and Benjamin Cleveland (1738-1806). |
