The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-02-14
.OLO CAPITAL Is
 NOW DESERTED Time, Trade and Railroads Pass
 By St. Stephens AN INDIAN TRADING POST Nothing But Ruins Remain of a Once Busy Town and the Seat of Gov
 ernment of the State of
 Alabama.
AN INDIAN TRADING POST


 lost their grip on life, and returned to the wilderness whence they sprang Most striking or all these perhaps is St. Stephens, the first capital of Ala bama, built on a bold bluff of the Tom bigbee river, 70 miles above the modern metropolis of Mobile. Once it's streets were populous with people, there was state capitol, courthouse, land office (Where nearly all the good land in Ala pama territory was sold) public schools two hotels, bank, and theatre, but no church, as all accounts agree. although why there was none does not clearly appear. Now the place is wholly ruin ous, with mammoth live oaks in pub lie square and streets and parapet and bastions of the fort, and the one time state house Is traceable only by the fragments of its basement walls
 On May 6, 1899, came the centennial of the evacuation of St. Stephens by the Spanish, and large and representative company from Mobile, led by Philip Hamilton, historian of that city went u pthe river in steamboats and fittingly celebrated it amid her ruins. A space had been cleared in the grove of huge live oaks and cedars that covered the former fort on the summit of the bluff reflection was spread on improvised tables under the trees. There was his torfcal address by MT. Hamilton, a pa per read, which had been written by very old lady who had once lived In St. Stephens, and which described rs streets and houses, it's people, manners and customs in a sprightly and viva cious fashion.
 From these and other sources we learn that some very important and in teresting events took place at this out post in the wilderness For one thing. 1t marked the farthest advance north ward of the Spaniard. Here he was met by the pioneer hosts of the Anglo Saxon and forced back until hundred years later-179S-he lost his hold forever on the American continent The fort at St. Stephens was built about 17S9 by the Spanish to protect their Floridian territories from American settlers who had swarmed over the Alleghenies, and were then threatening them by way of the Alabama Tombigbee valley It was also meant as trading post with the Indians.
 Across the Boundary.
 Scarcely was the revolution over ere Andrew Ellicott, American surveyor gen eral, began running the southern bound ary line of the United States eastward from the Mississippi. Great Britain had fixed that boundary at 31 degrees north.
 
 tiate the dispute. worked long to no effect. but at length Spain, threatened by war with England agreed to it. Close behind Ellicott went Lieut. John MeClary, cut ting his well-known Trace" through from Natchez, on the Mississippi to the Alabama -Tombigbee basin. When the two men reached the Tombigbee. they set up slab of brown stone, still stand ing on its bank and found that the Span ish fort, St. Stephens, was north of the line full 30 miles, and, of course, within American territory. So the Spanish com mandant, Minor, evacuated the fort on May $, 1799-marching out with his troops while Lieutenant McCary and his Amer jeans marched in and hoisted the Stars and Stripes.
 From this time on settlers began pour ing into the Mobile valley by hundreds. from Georgia through the country of the Greeks, from the new west by the Big bee river. from Virginia and the Caro- linas by the Alabama and its tributaries. A federal road' was cut by the gen eral government from Georgia to the Mobile valley. Clearings appeared on every side. Agriculture became the one industry. Cotton was king, and but little else was raised. From time to tine treaties were made with the Indians at Fort Confederation, Hobuchintoopa and Mount Dexter, the settlers thereby ac- quiring new territory and the friendship of the Choctaws.
 Growth of St. Stephens.
 St. Stephens glory as an Indian trad ing post dated from 1S03 when Joseph Chambers, the then Indian agent there turned the old fort into a trading factory with Its bomb-proofs for storing skins and the blockhouses for storerooms. His successor, George S. Gaines of Tennessee, built above the fort a brick warehouse the first brick building in Alabama and in which, 1t Is said, the first sessions of the supreme court of Mississippi terri tory were held. In 1894 Washington coun- ty was made a separate judicial district In time McClarys troops built Fort Stod- dard, further down the Tombigbee, but St. Stephens was by no means abandoned A village grew up around it, houses of the trappers, couriers, attaches. traders and others About 1907 St. Stephens was formally laid out as a city on land once known as the Chastaing claim, which had been purchased by Gaines and his asso- ciates. Its plan has been lost, to the sor- row of local antiquaries but by 1S17 when Alabama territory was created, it had grown into a town of at least 5000 in habitants, with regular streets and squares, a park, market, two or more hotels, theatre and many shops and stores carrying large stocks of goods for lrdUlnS WllH lllt lIullHS ana the out country, On the corner was bank and opposite it the capitol of Alabama ter ritory, in which for several years the sessions of the territorial assembly were held. There was also governors house. and houses of other officials, and a cer- tain dignity of form and display of arms
 Chase of Burr.
 An historical incident that lends addi- tional interest to the former capital was the attempted Kidnapping there in 1907 of Col Aaron Burr, ex-Vice President of the United States. When Burr, his splendid dreams of empire shattered by the acts of his rival in Washington, learned that his arrest by the military power had been ordered, he fled East from the Mississippi. hoping, no doubt, to reach his son-in-law. Governor Aston of South Carolina, and through his aid escape from the country He came over the McClary Trace and spent night at St. Stephens at the house of an old political ally, who, however, was not at home. Toward midnight as the story runs, two men of the village having heard that Colonel Burr was in the town. and stimulated by the reward of 5000 offered for his arrest, determined to take him. They knocked at the door of the house where he was stopping. The lady