McIntosh Sugarworks, McIntosh Sugarworks was built in the late 1820s by John Houstoun McIntosh
McIntosh Sugarworks is a ruined sugar mill in Camden County made of tabby concrete, a material combining lime, sand, and oyster shells. The site contains three main rooms where cane was crushed, juice was boiled, and sugar was crystallized from syrup.
These sugar works were founded shortly after 1825 by John Houstoun McIntosh, who settled in Georgia after conflicts with Spain and purchased large plantations in Camden County. After McIntosh died in 1836, the property passed to Col. Hallowes, who renamed it Bollingbrook and continued sugar and arrowroot starch production through the Civil War.
The name comes from John Houstoun McIntosh, who built this sugar operation. Walking through the ruins today, you can sense how sugar production shaped life and work in this region during the 1800s.
The ruins are located along Charlie Smith Sr. Highway in St. Marys and are accessible for visitors interested in local history and industrial heritage. Walk carefully through the site as the fragile structure requires caution due to its age and condition.
Surprisingly, people once thought this site was a Spanish mission rather than a sugar factory, a mistake that was corrected much later. This confusion reveals how important careful historical research is for understanding what buildings were actually used for.
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