Pickens County, Alabama

Pickens County, Alabama
Pickens County Courthouse in Carrollton
Location in the U.S. state of Alabama
Alabama's location in the U.S.
Founded	December 20, 1820
Named for	Andrew Pickens
Seat	Carrollton
Largest city	Aliceville
Area
• Total	890 sq mi (2,305 km2)
• Land	881 sq mi (2,282 km2)
• Water	8.7 sq mi (23 km2), (1.0%)
Population (est.)
• (2015)	20,864
• Density	22/sq mi (8/km²)
Congressional district	7th
Time zone	Central: UTC-6/-5
Website	www.pickensalabama.com
Footnotes:   County Number 54 on Alabama Licence Plates

Footnotes:  

Pickens County is a county of the U.S. state of Alabama. As of the 2010 census, the population was 19,746. Its county seat is Carrollton. It is a prohibition, or dry county, although the communities of Carrollton and Aliceville voted to become wet in 2011 and 2012, respectively.

Pickens County is included in the Tuscaloosa, AL Metropolitan Statistical Area

Pickens County was established on December 20, 1820, and named for revolutionary war hero General Andrew Pickens of South Carolina. The county seat was relocated from Pickensville to Carrollton in 1830. The first courthouse in Carrollton was burned on April 5, 1865, by troops of Union General John T. Croxton.

It was developed for cotton plantations, worked by a large population of African-American slaves brought south in the slave trade.

A second courthouse was destroyed by fire on November 16, 1876, during the last months of the Reconstruction era. Though arson was suspected, no arrest was made until January 1878, after white Democrats had regained control of the state legislature. Henry Wells, an African American with some criminal history, was arrested as a suspect in the arson and locked in the garrett of the new building, which had been erected in 1877. According to legend, Wells was peering down from the north garrett window as a lynch mob gathered to hang him, not waiting for a court trial, although only white men were selected for juries.