Statesville

aka Days Bend The settlement of Statesville dates from 1829. A commentator says that the place which once bid fair to become a "town of note, rose, reigned and fell with the founder ( George Goff)." About 1840 Major Stone took over the property, and since that time it has been a community but has not until the present time ever assumed the standing of a village. Tradition is that when Alabama was originally surveyed the two surveying parties, one working westward, the other eastward, met in the vicinity. They named the area Statesville. Whether a community existed there at the time is not known. It may very well have been just a loosely defined area of the piney woods. In 1846, when the State Legislature met in a joint session to choose a new capital for the state, Statesville was among seven places receiving votes. Ezell's Store was located, according to John Hardy's history, in the most densely populated neighborhood in the County. Some have called that area as Statesville. Others have referred to it as Mulberry Post Office, which was not a town or even a community. Instead it was simply a wide area that included Ezell's Store, Statesville, Kalmia and perhaps other communities. John Steel Home Shortly after 1829, Daniel Stone, a native of Staunton, Virginia, then living in Georgia, moved to Autauga County and settled at Statesville. His son-in-law was John Steele, who had married his daughter, Lucy, in 1826. Encouraged by the suggestion of Jefferson Davis, who while Secretary of War of the United States imported camels from the Sudan to haul military supplies, Steele imported six of these old world beasts of burden and used them on his Durant's Bend plantation, which he bought from William Smith in the 1840s. There once existed a community in the area known as Kalmia. Tradition hold that Kalmia Latifoliate is the name of a mountain laurel which grew profusely along the banks of Ivy Creek. The creek runs through the general area and it was from the plant that the community was named. Both the name and the place have disappeared and but few of the local citizens have ever heard of it. One of the more historic places that existed in the Statesville area was Ezell's Store. The Store was opened in 1819 when John Ezell brought into the county, using a one-horse wagon, a fine stock of goods from Charleston. In 1825 Ezell bought three buffaloes from a Mexican who brought a drove of western horses to the county. The experiment of raising buffaloes was not a success, as he could not keep them penned. They were eventually killed and used for food. In 1821, Ezell associated himself with Daniel Gordon, and Mobile became their market. They purchased a pole boat and for some years operated a freight service between that port and the few landings then established along the Alabama River. Gordon was the commander of the boat, and the crew consisted of Creek Indians. Another store was opened near Ezell’s location by Dosler and Richards. In 1828, Dosler removed to Mulberry P. O. In 1839, George Garrett opened a stock of goods in the immediate vicinity of Mulberry. A runaway Negro, from another county, was found in his possession, and Garrett was convicted and condemned to the penitentiary for 20 years. He was the first convict ever sent to the state penitentiary in the state of Alabama. George Garrett was eventually pardoned and released.