The area now called Old Town Plantation appears on maps dating to the early 18th century and was known as Ogeechee Old Town for the ancient Creek Indian town that Carolina traders visited before Georgia was founded in 1733. George Galphin of South Carolina received a royal grant of 1,400 acres there in 1767 and established an Indian trading post, cow pens, and plantation called Old Town. Under the Galphin, Forsyth, and Fitzsimons families, the plantation grew to 5,000 acres, but the extensive plantation complex was destroyed during Sherman’s March to the Sea in 1864. The land was jointly owned by Linton Stephens and W.W. Simpson from 1860 to 1876, when they sold it to W.D. Grant, who farmed the plantation with convict labor under the notorious Convict Lease System. In 1895, H.M. Comer, president of the Central of Georgia R.R., bought the plantation, and the extant buildings, including two main residences, 25 outbuildings, and a grist mill, were built by the Comers between 1895 and 1910.