Camden

History

What is now Camden was established on property donated by Thomas Dunn from his plantation holdings in order to have a new town founded on the site in 1833 to serve as the county seat. Dunn's Federal style house, built in 1825, is the oldest documented house in the town. The first county seat was in the community of Canton Bend. The county seat was moved in 1833 to Barboursville, later renamed Camden. It had been named Barboursville in honor of United States Congressman Philip P. Barbour of Virginia. Incorporated in 1841, Camden was renamed by local physician John D. Caldwell in honor of his hometown of Camden, South Carolina. The area depended on cultivation of cotton as a commodity crop, which was worked by numerous African American slaves. The earliest documented industries in the town were a brickyard, sawmill, and window fabricator. The Camden Phenix was the town's earliest known newspaper. The red-brick Greek-Revival style Wilcox County Courthouse, also listed on the National Register of Historic Places, was completed in 1857. It replaced an earlier wood-frame structure. During the American Civil War, many in the community joined the Confederate cause. The county courthouse was ransacked by Union forces in 1865, but advance warning allowed county officials to remove the county records to a safe place (legend claims that they were buried in a coffin) prior to arrival of Union troops. Already devastated by the Civil War, Camden suffered fires during 1869 and 1870 that destroyed about two-thirds of the town. The town began to recover during the 1880s, with the first bank incorporated in 1894. Camden benefited economically during the mid-20th century with the construction of a paper mill at Yellow Bluff and of the Millers Ferry Lock and Dam, a hydroelectric…

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the town had an area of , of which is land and 0.24% is water. According to the Köppen climate classification, Camden has a humid subtropical climate (abbreviated Cfa).

Race & ethnicity