The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-08-02

| St. Stephens had a remarkably rapid growth for those days. Settlers. for the town fiocked in. They came in, greater portion of them, from the north. They | were in the main merchants and trading people. Indian traders and Indian coun- trymen drifted in and made the new | town their headquarters. Lawyers, doc- tors and men with federal commissions increased it's citizenship.
 l A bank was established, the second n the State. An academy was built. a theater erected, a good hotel, for those days. put up, blocks of brick stores were built and the main street was paved with brick.
 Its high tide of prosperity was reached in 1877. In that year the territory of Ala bama was carved out of the big Missis- sippi territory, although the act. of Congress did not become effective until the latter part of year. l St. Stephens was made the capital and l seat of government for the new territory. St. Stephens was then perhaps the chief | town of Alabama. It claimed population | of 4,000, a claim that was hardly well 1 founded. The town had a large trade with the Indians and keel boats piled the | Tombigbee In it's interests and the St Stephens Steamship Company, which was later chartered by the legislature of the l state or AidDdIndp ndQ US HeduQudTte here.
 | The Legislature of 1918. The two sessions of the Alabama Legis- lature of ISIS were held there. There was | no pacltol building. The lawmakers held their sittings in the second story of i | brick building opposite the Tombgbee Bank on High Street. For only two years the seat of the government remained al | St. Stephens. Huntsville, was by act Oi | the legislature, made the temporary seat of the State Government
 The withdrawal of this honor did not destroy the town upon the Tombigbee. It held its own for many years after wards. The trade of the Indians and the neighboring white settlements continued and the town had apparently many years of prosperity and usefulness before it.
 The end of it's prosperity and the be- ginning of its decline began perhaps in 1886. The reasons for its decline were plainly economic. Mobile it's sturdier rival drew away the major part of its trade Other white settlements spranG un and prospered along the Alabama and Tombigbee Rivers.
 Agriculture nourshed in Alabama. IL became the chief industry of the new State Its domain was in the middle | portions of Alabama. The growth of the agricultural interest of the State carried no prosperity to St. Stephens. The rich agricultural lands that lay to the south west of the town were undeveloped. | Mobiles progress, chief of all. under mined the prosperity of St stephens As Mobile grew. St. Stephens decayed. Judge Huriusco Austill. the son of the famous pioneer Jeremiah Austil. rccounts n story often told by his father which bears upon the downfall of the old town. Jeremiah Austil in 1886 standing upon Il bluff of the river fifteen miles be- low St. Stephens, saw Pushtamaha. the old Indian chief. speeding his canoe down the river with long and sweeping strokes Pushtamaha was friend of Austilrs and of many white people about St. Stephens where he did his trading
 Austill saw the Indians canoe loaded to the sides with the skins of animals The white man hailed the Indian chief from the high bluff in the vernacular of his tribe. "Pushtamaha cutta muscf minta?" 'Pushtamaha. where are you going?" The Indian held the paddle momentarily out of the water, as he call ed back ,"Mobila, ma lala.' ITO Mobile my friend" The incident was significant of St. Stephens rapid decline. Within few years 1t had been practically de serted. Before the outbreak of the wal between the States, much of the old towI was standing, but the houses were de serted gray with age and decaying. Tn, old brick bank building which stood or the Main Street, was standing as lat, as 1862. As early as 1SiO St Stephens doom was sealed.
 The Ministers Curse.
 To this day there are those who be,iev that gcdlessness destroyed old St. Steph ems. By some religious people 1t is look ed upon as a Sodom or Gomorrah. de stroyed because of the evil of it's chil dren Old legends are recounted of it wickedness. Romance has gilded tn ruins and memories of the old town. an the old tales of Its godlessness. while little superstitious, are none the less in teresting.
 Like the historic cities of Europe. de