The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1894-04-06
A TOWN SOLD FOR TAXES.
An Slave Buys the Former
Capital of Alabama.
Once the Center of Opulent Slave
Holding Arjstocracy But Sold for
tho Price of an Ordinary
Town Lot.

The irony of fate was never more
strillingly exemplified than at Selma
few days since when the town site of
Cahaba, once the capital of Alabama
and the center of an opulent slave
holding aristocracy, was sold for taxes
and bought in by Henry Freeman, an
ex-slave, for five hundred and fifty
dollars. On the property are dozen
or more houses, two or three brick
stores being among the number, but
these will be torn down.
Situated as it was at the confluence
of the Cahaba and Alabama rivers, Ca
haba was at one time one of the most
important inland towns in the south.
1t is said to have been most beauti-
full village. Surrounded by the beau
tiful and fertile plantations that lay
along the banks of the stately Ala
bama, Cahaba was the home of the
mobiles of the state. Here they built
their lovely dwellings in the archi-
lecture of the south of that day, with
broad verandas, wide halls and a null
titude of windows. Extensive grounds
surrounded each. The choicest flow
ers bloomed in the gardens. Magno-
lias, oaks and stately cedars fringed
the entrance to the grounds. Cape
jasmine and myrtle grew into trees in
the flower gardens Hundreds of do
mestic fowls scratched and clucked
and crew in the poultry yards. Blood
ed horses neighed and pranced in and
about the stables. 1t was ideal living
these good worthless had. Speaking of
their manner of living recent news
paper writer thus discourses:
''Some of the wealthier reared piles
of brick after the fashion of the villas
of old England, and few others yet,
whose incomes were princely, dwelt in
veritable palaces of stone and marble,
in the midst of parks, with winding
drives bordered by semi-tropical
flowers, wet with the spray of flash
ing fountains. Here lived the proudest
families in the state, famous in the
history of that day, and some of whom
are yet powerful in the affairs of the
new era-the Morgans, the Craigs, the
Pettuses, the Dawsons and others of
greater or less celebrity. William L.
Yancey's home was in Lowndes coun-
ty, just across the river, and his was
familiar figure on the streets of the
town"
Such was Cahaha when the confed-
eracy was born at Montgomery, one
hundred miles or so up the river. Ca
haba's men went to the front to fight
and her women wept at home. The
capital had been removed to Tusca-
loosa shortly before. In it's place a
tall, grim stockade was erected, it be-
ing the southernmost prison OF the
confederacy. The battle of Selma, a
few miles away, was the nearest that
actual war came, but nevertheless the
war was death blow to Cahaba.
When the strife was over the mer-
chants and business men restoolsed the
empty shelves of their stores, daily
newspaper was issued and everything
possible was done to restore the old
town to this former Importance, but
Selma, her rival, had railroads and
river, too, and the trades people and
their cotton hoated on to that city. At
last, by a popular vote, the county seat
was transferred thither and q hegira
soon followed Many of the costly
mansions were torn down and recon
structed in the successful city. Most
of the balance were left tenantless.
Year by year the population was dimin-
ished by death and removal until grad
ually the old town was deserted and
finally obliterated from the face of the
map by the auctioneer's hammer.
The dear, dead old town will, how
ever, never be forgotten, and in that
brier and weed grown cemetery there
is dust that viii ever remain sacred to
every true Alabamian.