Note: The following is one of a series of articles looking at events in the history of Bulloch County.

Part I

In Bulloch County history, there have been 147 places that at one point were officially named throughout the county.

The first town, alphabetically, is Aaron. Aaron is located northwest of Portal on Highway 80. Aaron was settled by Charles Aaron in 1909.

The town of Aaron Station sat alongside the Savannah, Augusta & Northern Railway line. Charles Aaron ran the Aaron store, run by Charlie. He, and then his son Herbert, ran the Aaron post office.

The next community was Adelaide, five miles north of Pulaski. The postmaster was Everette Hendrix. Then there was Akin, a community north of Green and south of Jimps.

This was not Akins, located at the intersection of Arcola Road and Mud Road. Josiah G. Williams and C.B. Johnson were the postmasters. The next town was Alderman, along Wolfpen Branch near Lotts Creek.

Then came Anderson Mill, located on DeLoach Church Road at Anderson Pond. Another forgotten community was Anita, located southwest of Portal and northeast of Bloys. William Simmons was postmaster here.

The town of Arcola had had several names: first was “Briar Patch.” After Nicholas Anciaux was given 1200 acres on Mill Creek, he renamed it Arcola, after the Battle of Arcola won by France’s Emperor Napoleon.

The original Arcola store was opened in 1877, and the postmaster was Samuel Groover. There was a “New” Arcola, seven miles from the “Old.” New Arcola had a population of 50 people in 1900.

The McElveens set up a store and post office in their home, where the last postmaster was William McElveen. The hamlet of Arcola Station, two miles northeast of Arcola, sat alongside the Savannah & Statesboro Railroad line.

The town of Arlen, between Rufus and Proctor, had a population of 91 in 1900. Two-and-a-half miles north of Stilson, it sat alongside the Savannah & Statesboro Railroad line. Curtis Martin was Arlen’s postmaster.

The village of Bassett was halfway between Leeland and the town of Egypt along the line of the Shearwood Railway. One of the two first towns in Bulloch County, Bay Gall was located between Portal and Rocky Ford.

Bay Gall was the only village in Lockhart Militia District. After Oliver Finch settled here, his son Dave Finch opened a general store, and then the Mixons opened two stores. The town was named after the Red Bay shrub.

The settlement of Belknap was built around James Blitch’s general store near the Canoochee River along the Seaboard Air Line Railroad line. Belknap’s post office here opened after the Euphaupee post office closed.

It was either named after Morris Belknap, the superintendent of the Central of Georgia Railroad, or after John Harn Jr.’s Belknap Plantation established in 1764.

Harn was the English Colonial Government's Tax Assessor and Collector of St. Philip Parish. The town of Bellwood was created when George Heard opened a sawmill close to the Ogeechee River.

Heard shipped his lumber across the Ogeechee River on his railroad trestle to the Central of Georgia Railroad depot for trans-shipment. Bengal (or Bengall) was the other of the two first towns in Bulloch County.

Some say the name comes from the name Bay Gall, or Bay Gall Creek nearby. Others say it came from sugar cane brought from Bengal in Eastern India which came to Bulloch in the 1820s.

Located at the intersection of Blacksack Branch and Lotts Creek, Bengal sat on an Indian trail. This community of some 20 families was established in 1855 and had the second post office established in Bulloch County.

On Dec. 16, 1861, the Bengal to Reidsville “mail line” provided service from Bengal in Bulloch county "by the way of William DeLoach's mills in Bulloch (to) Brewton's mills in Tattnall (to) Reedsville.”

Roger Allen is a local lover of history who provides a brief look each week at the area's past. Email him at rwasr1953@gmail.com.