Darien

Darien: Waterfront Park

Darien, city, seat (1818) of McIntosh county, southeastern Georgia, U.S. It is situated near the mouth of the Altamaha River on the Atlantic coast, about 20 miles (32 km) north of Brunswick. The site, near Fort King George, was settled in 1736 by Scottish Highlanders under John McIntosh Mohr, who called the place New Inverness and established Fort Darien (named for Darién, the location of a former Scottish colony in Panama). After the War of 1812, the demand for cotton, rice, and lumber from upriver plantations and forests initiated an economic boom. The Bank of Darien, chartered in 1818, became one of the state’s largest banks. The economy slumped in the late 1830s, and the bank closed in the early 1840s.

During the American Civil War, Union forces burned the city to the ground in an amphibious attack in June 1863. The city was rebuilt after the war, the economy fueled by a demand for timber and the arrival of the railroad in the early 1890s. The city’s economy is now centred on fishing, seafood processing, and retail trade. Several wetland preserves and research facilities are located nearby on the coast, including Wolf Island National Wildlife Refuge, Sapelo Island National Estuarine Research Reserve, and the University of Georgia Marine Institute (also on Sapelo Island). Inc. town, 1816; city, 1818. Pop. (2000) 1,719; (2010) 1,975.