CARROLL COUNTY, GA - NEWSPAPER Hix Town Gold 1828 Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by: Dianne Crawford Georgia Table of Contents: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm The Atlanta Constitution, Friday, Oct. 27, 1950 'Gold in Them Thar Hills' --- And Also Lead by C.J. Holleran In 1828 gold was discovered in North Georgia. Tough and lawless prospectors and hoodlums poured in from the Carolinas and, quick to take advantage of the Georgia law prohibiting an Indian from bringing suit or testifying against a white man, they "took over" Cherokee lands by simply filling the rightful owners full of lead. Southern hospitality was slightly in the raw at that time and white men were treated the same if they were inclined to linger on another man's "claim". The first gold in the State was discovered at Hix Town in 1826, and mines there produced more than 20,000 pennyweights of the yellow metal. It is the oldest town in Northwest Georgia, having been incorporated in 1830. You'll probably know it better as the prosperous and progressive Villa Rica.