GA-005-20 The Great Seal of Georgia

Marker text: THE GREAT SEAL OF GEORGIA

When Federal troops entered Milledgeville in November, 1864, Georgia Secretary of State Nathan C. Barnett hid the Great Seal under a house and the legislative minutes in a pig pen 30 yards east of this point. Later they were returned to the Statehouse.

Again in 1868 Governor Charles J. Jenkins (Governor, 1865-1868) removed the Great Seal to thwart state fund payments which had been ordered by the United States military authority which inaugurated GeorgiaÕs carpetbag regime. Federal General George Meade replaced Governor Jenkins with United States General Thomas H. Ruger of Wisconsin (who served only part of the year 1868), the last of the Milledgeville governors. With the return of home rule in 1872 the Great Seal was returned to the new capitol in Atlanta.

Georgia Historical Commission, 1960