St. Helena Memoir, St. Helena Parish, Louisiana
File prepared and submitted by Sherry Sanford (SSanf51819@aol.com)
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"Biographical And Historical Memoirs of Louisiana", Vol. II
The Goodspeed Publishing Company, 1892

The parish of St. Helena has a superficial area of 550 square miles 
or 352,000 acres.  
It is a piney-woods parish, the surface rolling, interspersed with 
numerous rivers, creeks and branches, the principal growth being 
pine, mostly long-leaf yellow, oaks of several varieties, gum, 
poplar, magnolia, beech, basswood, maple, hickory, dogwood, 
etc.  The quality of the soil is generally productive; the branch 
creek and river flats are composed of the cream of the uplands washed 
off by the rains; they are a dark sandy loam with good clay subsoil.  
The uplands are sandy with good clay subsoil and respond generously to 
fertilization.  The acreage in cultivation in 1891 was as 
follows:  In cane, 210 acres; cotton, 13,684 acres; corn, 6,890 
acres; oats, 150 acres; potatoes, 260 acres; meadow, 280 acres; making 
a total of only 21,474 acres cultivated in an area of 352,00 acres.  
The products of the parish in 1890 were 705 barrels of molasses, 6,822 
bales of cotton, 104,750 bushels of corn, 1,400 bushels of oats, 2,580 
bushels of potatoes.  The settlement of St. Helena was made early in the century, 
mainly by people from Georgia, the Carolinas and a few Virginians.  
These settlements began to be made in the northwestern part, drifting 
thence eastwardly.  The settlers invariably selected sites along some 
one of the numerous streams.  Ephriam Bates built the first mill in 
the parish, just below where the Liberty road crosses Darling's creek.  
Bates was also an early storekeeper and had his store near his mill. 
Dr. Leonard was another early storekeeper.  The parish is well supplied 
with churches and schools, having no less than fourteen of the former, 
the greater number being of the Methodist and Baptist denominations.  
There are thirty-eight public schools having an aggregate enrollment 
of 1,224 pupils; supplementing the public schools there are four private schools.

The parish of St. Helena was created in 1811.  The first seat of justice 
was Montpelier, about ten miles below Greensburg.  Though created in 
1811, the parish seems not to have been organized unitl 1813; no records 
prior to that date being extant.  In that year Shepard Brown became parish 
judge and opened the first court Monday, July 13. There were present besides 
the honorable judge William Spinks, Dempsey Kemp, Jacob Huber, 
Jacob Rheams, Thomas East, Ephriam Smith, Robert Rounceval, William McNabb, George 
Killison, Alexander Bookter, Dixon Wainwright, John Womack, Robert Yair, 
Jacob Cobb, Matthew Stewart, Stephen Williams, William Williams and Thomas Crittenden, 
who had been summoned to serve as jurors.  David Kemp was the 
first sheriff of the parish.  Judge Thomas Butler was the judge of the Third 
District court and D. Wright was clerk. After the division of the parish it 
became necessary to secure a new seat of justice. A committee was appointed 
by the police jury who selected the site of Greensburg as being centrally located.  
A frame courthouse was built.  A log jail was erected about 
the same time.  The jail now in use was erected soon after; it is a good 
brick structure with iron or steel cages.  The old frame courthouse first 
erected in Greensburg was torn down and replaced in 1855 by the commodious 
brick building now in use.  Greensburg was incorporated before the war and 
though lacking the advantages of a town situated upon a railroad or on a 
navigable stream it has attained considerable importance commercially.  
The population is between 300 and 400.  The town supports a chartered 
school controlled by a board of trustees.  The school is located in the lower 
story of the Masonic building and is conducted on the high school system.  
It was established in 1877, and bears the name Norvilla collegiate institute.  
There are two churches in the town, Methodist and Baptist.  Greensburg is 
connected with Clinton twenty-five miles west by a tri-weekly mail route, 
and with Tangipahoa on the Illinois Central by a daily mail route.