History UnderfootAtlanta
  • Institution
  • Early
  • December 9, 1822
  • DeKalb County

DeKalb County created (1822)

Created by the legislature on December 9, 1822, from parts of Henry, Gwinnett and Fayette counties. DeKalb included the land of the future Fulton County until 1853.

See it on the map All Early records

The record

The GHS marker says the county was named for Baron Johann de Kalb, a German-born officer who died a British prisoner after the Battle of Camden in 1780, and that most early settlers came from Virginia and the Carolinas. The Lithonia Historic District nomination lists the parent counties as Fayette, Henry and Gwinnett. Decatur became the county seat and was incorporated December 10, 1823 (NGE). Nearly all early county records burned with the courthouse on January 9, 1842 (DeKalb History Center). In 1850 the county, Atlanta included, had 14,328 people, 2,924 of them enslaved.

Today: Marker on the Decatur square.