Elizabethtown tourist information
Elizabethtown, Kentucky, county seat of Hardin County, is situated in central Kentucky. It is centrally located within 44 miles of Louisville to the North and 131 miles of Nashville to the South and is located at the intersection of three major highways - Interstate 65, Bluegrass Parkway and the Western Kentucky Parkway.
Founded in July 1797, Elizabethtown is the Hardin County seat. In 1779, three early settlers, Capt. Thomas Helm, Col. Andrew Hynes, and Col. Samuel Haycraft, built forts with block houses to use as stockades for defense against Native Americans. The forts, being one mile apart, formed a triangle. At the time, there were no other settlements between the Ohio River and the Green River. Soon, however, other people came and settled around these forts. Hardin County was established in 1793 and named for Colonel John Hardin, an Indian fighter who had been killed by Native Americans while on a peace mission with tribes in Ohio. It did not take long for the settlement to become an active community. In just a few years, professional men and tradesmen came to live in the area. In 1793, Colonel Hynes had thirty acres of land surveyed and laid off into lots and streets to establish Elizabethtown. Named in honor of the wife of Andrew Hynes, Elizabethtown was legally established on July 4, 1797.
Thomas Lincoln was a resident of Hardin County and helped Samuel Haycraft build a millrace at Haycraft's mill on Valley Creek. He married Nancy Hanks in 1806 and they lived in a log cabin built in Elizabethtown. Their daughter, Sarah, was born there in 1808. Soon after, they moved to the Sinking Spring Farm where Abraham Lincoln was born. Thomas Lincoln took his family to Indiana in 1816. After his wife died in 1818, he came back to Elizabethtown and married Sarah Bush Johnston. Sarah had the privilege of rearing ten year-old Abraham.
The Louisville and Nashville Railroad was built in Elizabethtown in 1854. The opening of the railroad brought growth and prosperity to Elizabethtown. The community became one of the most important stops along the railroad and a strategic point during the Civil War.
The Elizabethtown City Cemetery was used by Confederate Forces under General John Hunt Morgan as the position for an artillery attack upon the Federal troops on December 27, 1862. Confederate cannons atop cemetery hill fired into the downtown area.
According to local folklore, one cannon ball from that battle is still embedded in the wall of a building on the Public Square.
From 1871 to 1873, the Seventh Cavalry and a battalion of the Fourth Infantry, lead by General George Custer, were stationed in Elizabethtown. The battalions were stationed in the community to suppress the Ku Klux Klan and Carpet Baggers and to break up illegal distilleries which began to flourish in the South after the Civil War. General Custer and his wife, Elizabeth, lived in a small cottage behind Aunt Beck Hill's boarding house, now known as the Brown-Pusey House.
Today Elizabethtown is still a growing community. With a population of over 20,000 persons, the community has a growing industrial and commercial economy. There are also many cultural and recreational opportunities in the area, including the summer concert series at Freeman Lake Park, organized sports, and the Heartland Festival. The City Seal, with the inscription "Elizabethtown, Strong and Growing Since 1779" still rings true today.
Bladen County was first settled by Highland Scots who came to the Cape Fear Valley in 1734, fleeing political and economic hardship in Scotland. There is little evidence that this exodus was due to religious persecution, as is often assumed (for more see Revolution and Aftermath and Causes of Immigration). By the year 1753, there were about 5,000 people living in the county. Of the 100 counties in North Carolina, 55 were once a part of Bladen County which accounts for the name "Bladen, The Mother County." The town of Elizabethtown was founded in March, 1773 and named the county seat. It is the fiftieth oldest town in North Carolina.
Elizabethtown aerial map
Please click on any icon on the Elizabethtown aerial tourist map, to find close by places, offering hotels and tourist information. You can zoom in and zoom out our touristical map as well as switch between satelite and map view of Elizabethtown.
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