Spanish moss and crumbling columns: inside Alabama’s original capital

Nature’s reclaimed every street

Nine miles west of Selma, where the Cahaba River flows into the Alabama River, an entire town sits empty. Old Cahawba was Alabama’s first permanent state capital, and today Spanish moss hangs from its oaks while grass covers what used to be streets.

You can walk, bike, or drive over four miles of dirt roads through the ruins, past crumbling columns and old cemeteries where gravestones still stand. The Alabama Historical Commission runs the site, which landed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

What you find here is part outdoor museum, part nature preserve, and all of it is wide open.

Built on ancient ground in 1819

Governor William Wyatt Bibb picked the spot in 1819, and workers carved a town straight out of the wilderness.

The name Cahawba likely comes from Choctaw words meaning “water above.” Archaeologists later found that the town sat on top of a Native American settlement that may date back to the 1500s.

After the capital moved to Tuscaloosa in 1826, Cahawba reinvented itself as a cotton port and grew to over 3,000 residents by the Civil War.

Then came floods, the loss of the railroad, and war. By 1900, nobody lived here.

Grab a free bike at the visitor center

Start at the visitor center, a restored 1850s Greek Revival cottage on the corner of Beech and Capitol Streets. Inside, you can look through artifacts, old photographs, and displays about daily life in the town’s heyday.

The staff will hand you an Explorer’s Guide and a self-guided tour brochure so you can find your way around.

Leave your car and borrow one of the free cruiser bikes with a valid driver’s license. Restrooms and picnic areas sit right on site, so you can take your time.

Three lonely columns in an open field

You’ll see them before anything else. Three tall columns stand in a clearing, all that’s left of a mansion the Crocheron family built in the early 1840s.

The family came down from New York and ran steamship operations on the Alabama River. The mansion burned in 1920 and left nothing but those columns behind.

They also mark the spot where Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest and Union General James H. Wilson met near the end of the Civil War to negotiate a prisoner exchange.

A church torn apart and put back together

St. Luke’s Episcopal Church went up in 1854, built from plans by the well-known New York architect Richard Upjohn.

You can spot the Carpenter Gothic style right away: lancet windows, pointed arch doorways, and vertical board-and-batten siding.

When the town emptied out, workers took the church apart in 1878 and moved it to nearby Martin’s Station.

Then, from 2006 to 2008, Auburn University’s Rural Studio brought it back and reassembled it at Old Cahawba.

Most of the original timbers survived, including the large buttressed arches inside.

The slave quarters outlasted the mansion

Behind where a large mansion once stood, a two-story brick building still rises from the ground. Built in 1860 to house enslaved workers, it survived while the mansion burned in 1935.

After the Civil War, Confederate veteran Samuel Kirkpatrick bought the property and turned the dying town into a working farm.

Years later, a grandson added columns and a back wing to the slave quarters, converting it into a home for his bride. The Barker Slave Quarters is one of only a handful of structures still standing at Old Cahawba.

A cotton warehouse held 3,000 prisoners

In 1863, the Confederate army turned a cotton warehouse in the center of town into a prison for captured Union soldiers. Locals called it Castle Morgan.

The building was meant to hold about 500 men, but at its peak, more than 3,000 crowded inside. Conditions were rough, but the death rate stayed under 2 percent, among the lowest of any Civil War prison.

Between 142 and 147 Union soldiers died here. Today, interpretive signs mark the ground where the warehouse once stood.

Old roses still bloom in empty yards

Three cemeteries sit inside the park, and their gravestones read like a history of the town. The oldest cemetery holds graves of Union soldiers who died at Castle Morgan.

Scattered across the grounds, artesian wells still run freely after more than 150 years. The Perine Well, drilled around 1852, still pushes water to the surface, and you can walk right up to it.

In the spring, old-fashioned roses and bulbs planted generations ago bloom in yards where no house has stood for over a century.

Walk the same streets the legislators walked

The original grid layout of the town is still visible under the grass. Streets once carried names of trees and famous men.

Interpretive signs along the way explain what stood at each spot. You can see the ruins of a Methodist Episcopal Church from around 1848, its walls reduced to a few low remnants.

At the site of the original statehouse, a “ghost structure” frame outlines its size and shape so you can get a sense of the building.

The whole walk is quiet, with nothing but birds and wind.

A mile-long trail to a river bluff

The Clear Creek Nature Trail runs just under a mile and is wheelchair accessible. It starts at Beech Street, passes St. Luke’s Church, and ends at a bluff where Clear Creek meets the Cahaba River.

The thick understory along the path draws songbirds, woodpeckers, and other wildlife, so bring binoculars if you have them.

Two canoe ramps at the park give you access to a roughly three-mile paddling trip on the Cahaba and Alabama Rivers.

You can also fish, photograph wildflowers, or just sit on the bluff and eat lunch.

Over 650 plant species on 3,007 acres next door

Just north of the park, the Old Cahawba Prairie Preserve protects 3,007 acres of rare Black Belt prairie land.

More than 650 plant species grow here, including the Old Cahawba rosinweed, which exists in only three Alabama counties worldwide. About 11.6 miles of trails are open to hikers, mountain bikers, and horseback riders.

Birders come for wild turkey, great blue heron, Mississippi kites, and many species of warbler and woodpecker.

Ghost tours light up the ruins in October

You can arrange guided walking, bicycle, and wagon tours ahead of time any season. But October is when Old Cahawba comes alive, so to speak.

Haunted History Tours run on select nights, and you walk the ghost town after dark with costumed interpreters and archaeologists who share documented ghost stories at each stop.

The park gives free admission to active-duty military and their families from Armed Forces Day through Labor Day. Grounds open daily at 9 a.m. and close at 5 p.m.

The visitor center runs Thursday through Monday, 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Explore Old Cahawba Archaeological Park in Alabama

If you want to see Alabama’s first state capital for yourself, head to 9518 Cahaba Road in Orrville, about nine miles west of Selma. From Selma, take Highway 22 west, then turn onto County Road 9 and follow the signs.

Admission is $2 for adults and $1 for children. Wear comfortable walking shoes and bring sunscreen and bug spray.

Give yourself at least three hours to cover the major sites, and stop at the visitor center first so you can grab a map.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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