About Calhoun County
Benton County was established on December 18, 1832, named for Thomas Hart Benton, a member of the United States Senate from Missouri, with its county seat at Jacksonville. Benton, a slave owner, was a political ally of John C. Calhoun, another slaveholder and a U.S. senator from South Carolina.
Through the 1820s-1840s, however, Benton's and Calhoun's political interests diverged, with Calhoun increasingly using secession as a weapon to maintain and expand slavery throughout the United States. Benton, on the other hand, was slowly coming to the conclusion that slavery was wrong and that preservation of the union was paramount. On January 29, 1858, Alabama supporters of slavery, objecting to Benton's change of heart, renamed Benton County as Calhoun County.
The county seat was moved to Anniston after years of controversy and a State Supreme Court ruling in June 1900. An F4 tornado struck here on Palm Sunday March 27, 1994. It destroyed Piedmont's Goshen United Methodist Church twelve minutes after the National Weather Service of Birmingham issued a tornado warning for northern Calhoun, southeastern Etowah, and southern Cherokee.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 612 square miles, of which 606 square miles is land and 6.4 square miles (1.0%) is water.
Eireann Brooks, and I are the County Co-Coordinators
for the Calhoun County ALGenWeb Project.
volunteered for many genealogical libraries over the years.
My daughter Eireann and I have been creating and maintaining
County and Special Project webpages for the USGenWeb for 16 years.
Calhoun County families to this website, please let us know.
We will be happy to create a special page for your material
and include any photographs, scanned documents,
or other items you'd like to add to the page.
with dates and townships. We'll include a link back
so others researching your families can contact you.
take digital photographs of cemeteries and tombstones,
please let us know.
land records, tax rolls, school class rosters/photos, etc.,
we would be most grateful for any and all submissions.
in Alabama for the ALGenWeb Project,
adoptable counties can be found on the County Page,
or you may contact State Coordinator Ann Allen Geoghegan.
as we add new records to the page!
LaRae & Eireann