5. A STONE MILEPOST,

marked zero, surrounded by railroad ties beneath the Central Avenue viaducts designates the eastern terminus of the Western & Atlantic Railroad, which the State legislature authorized to be built in 1836 to connect Georgia by rail with Tennessee and the West. The original surveyor's stake driven in the fall of 1837 was probably somewhere near the Broad Street viaduct, and it was not until 1842 that the dense, swampy undergrowth was cleared and the track extended to the point where the marker stands.

On July 11, 1842, Samuel Mitchell, who owned Land Lot 77, donated five acres to the State for the use of the Western & Atlantic Railroad. When streets had been laid out, this tract, which came to be known as the State Square, was bounded by Alabama, Pryor, Decatur, and Loyd (Central Avenue) Streets. In 1844 the Georgia Railroad acquired a tract adjoining the State Square at Pryor Street, and in 1846 Mitchell deeded to the Macon & Western Railroad additional land adjacent to both the Georgia Railroad block and the State Square. These three tracts formed a plot two city blocks square in the heart of town, and thus the three railroads met at one point.

In the first years of Atlanta's existence as a city, the Western & Atlantic Railroad office stood on the northern section of the State Square between Decatur Street and the tracks. Sometime after the union passenger depot was erected early in the 1850's, this building was removed, and the city and State decided to convert the unused plaza into a public park. Since failure to use the property for railroad purposes might cause it to revert to the Mitchell heirs, a dummy track was laid into the middle of the plot. Sand walks were laid out, grass and shrubs were planted, rustic benches were placed under the trees» and a high white fence was built.

During the Battle of Atlanta, when the 11 hospitals were overflowing, this park was used for the care of the wounded. Large tables for surgical treatment were set up under the trees; the wounded were brought in and stretched out on the grass until Noel D'Alvigny and other overworked doctors could tend them. On the edge of the park General John B. Hood sat his horse in readiness for action while he received reports from the battlefields and gave orders to aides who dashed away on swift horses toward the sulphurous smoke clouds overhanging the eastern part of the city.

During the Reconstruction Era the Mitchell heirs sued on the grounds that the land was not being used for railroad purposes. By a compromise in 1870 the heirs paid $35,000 to the State and received title to the greater part of the property, and in the same year the park area was divided into city lots and sold.

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