Ellenton

Overview

The town that made way for the bomb plant

Ellenton grew up around 1870 as a station on the Port Royal and Augusta Railroad, later the Charleston and Western Carolina and today a CSX line. The tracks crossed the plantation of Robert Jefferson Dunbar, who gave land for the right-of-way, the depot and the streets. Local legend says the railroad's superintendent, Stephen Caldwell Millet, boarded with the Dunbars and named the stop "Ellen's Town" for their daughter Ellen. The stories disagree on her age: nine in the town's tradition, nineteen in SRS's telling, and 22 by the Savannah River Archaeological Research Program's reckoning for Mary Ellen Dunbar in 1870.

In September 1876 the country around Ellenton saw the Ellenton massacre, also called the Ellenton riot, one of several armed clashes in which white Democratic rifle clubs tried to suppress Black Republican voting before that year's election. Accounts of how it began differ. Wikipedia's Ellenton article says a white posse tried to serve warrants, issued by Black magistrate Prince Rivers, on two men suspected of breaking and entering; its article on the massacre traces it to an alleged attack on a white woman near Silverton on September 15 and a posse sent to arrest a Black man, Fred Pope. Hundreds of armed white men, many from Georgia, joined in, and the violence ran to September 21. The counts of the dead differ too: deputy US marshals recorded 25 to 30 Black men killed, a New York Times reporter as many as 100, and historian Mark M. Smith concluded one white man and up to 100 Black people died; the Ellenton article gives two white men. It came two months after the Hamburg Massacre of July 1876, also in Aiken County.

The town was chartered in 1880 and lived on cotton, trade and sawmills. By the early 1950s it had about 760 people, five churches, two schools including Ellenton High School, a cotton gin, a town hall and jail, and the railroad station. Wikipedia credits it with the first automatic telephone dialing in South Carolina.

On November 28, 1950, the Atomic Energy Commission and DuPont announced the Savannah River Plant, built to make plutonium and tritium for the hydrogen bomb on about 300 square miles of Aiken, Barnwell and Allendale counties. The government bought or condemned everything. About 6,000 people and 6,000 graves were moved, from Ellenton, Dunbarton, Hawthorne, Meyers Mill, Robbins and Leigh. A large share of those displaced were Black farmers and sharecroppers. Ellenton's families went to the new town of New Ellenton, to Jackson, Aiken, North Augusta and Augusta, and some hauled their houses along. What was left were the paved streets, curbs, driveways and walkways. A sign on the highway, quoted on the marker's HMDB page, spoke for the residents: "It is hard to understand why our town must be destroyed to make a bomb that will destroy someone else's town that they love as much as we love ours."

Timeline

Depot town to nuclear site

1. c. 1870The Port Royal and Augusta Railroad is built across Robert Jefferson Dunbar's plantation. Dunbar gives land for the right-of-way, the station and the town's streets.
2. 1873A post office opens, per the 1993 state marker.
3. Sept 15–21, 1876The Ellenton massacre, or Ellenton riot, in the area around the town. Counts of the dead differ: deputy US marshals recorded 25 to 30 Black men killed, a New York Times reporter as many as 100, and the white dead are given as one or two.
4. 1880Ellenton is chartered as a town.
5. 1920s–1930sFalling cotton prices after World War I and the Depression slow the farming, trading and sawmill town.
6. Early 1950sEllenton has about 760 people, about 190 homes, about 30 businesses, five churches, two schools, a cotton gin, a town hall and jail, and the depot.
7. Nov 28, 1950The Atomic Energy Commission and DuPont announce the Savannah River Plant, on about 300 square miles of Aiken, Barnwell and Allendale counties.
8. Early 1950sAbout 6,000 people and 6,000 graves are moved off the land, from Ellenton, Dunbarton and smaller places. Many Ellenton families move to the new town of New Ellenton, some taking their houses with them.
9. 1973Former residents hold the first Ellenton reunion. Wikipedia says it continues.
10. 1993The Ellenton Reunion Organization puts up the "Site of Ellenton" marker on SC 125.
11. 2024SRS pilots public walking tours of the townsite with the Savannah River Archaeological Research Program.
12. 2026SRS schedules Ellenton walking tours for March 31 and October 29 and historic Ellenton tours on October 6, 8 and 13.

What's left

Streets in the woods

The townsite is woods now, crossed by the old street grid. A 2014 report says nothing stands: there are house foundations, curbs and driveways under thick growth, shallow depressions where graves were moved out, and here and there trash piles and rusted car parts. A photo of October 31, 2019, posted by SRS and shown at the top of this page, shows new street signs for Dunbar Street and Center Street marked "Ellenton Heritage Trail" deep in the trees. After the first walking tour in spring 2024, the SRS historic preservation manager said visitors saw "the old streets and building foundations of the former residences and businesses," with an information board on the route. The SRS Heritage Foundation had begun tours of an Ellenton Trail before the pandemic stopped them.

By SC 125 at the Road 3 junction stand two markers, photographed in July 2008: "Site of Ellenton" (marker 2-13, 1993), which gives the 1873 post office, the 1880 charter and the purchase for the plant, and a marker dedicated on the plant's 50th anniversary to "families who originally lived on this property." The highway is public, but Wikipedia says stopping on it inside the site is allowed only in an emergency, and the townsite beyond the road is open only on SRS tours.

The 1920 and 1944 Ellenton sheets below show the town's grid of streets on the railroad near the Aiken–Barnwell county line, and in 1944 SC 28 running southeast out of town. The small-scale 1954 Augusta sheet no longer names Ellenton at the townsite, but still prints nearby Leigh, Robbins and Meyers Mill, three of the communities moved for the plant. On the 1964 Girard NW sheet the town is gone, leaving straight roads through blank woods; the 1982 sheet shows SC 125 and a substation.

• Old streets, curbs and driveways (2014 and 2024 reports)
• House and business foundations
• Depressions left by moved graves (2014 report)
• "Ellenton Heritage Trail" street signs (2019 photo)
• "Site of Ellenton" marker, 1993, on SC 125 (photographed 2008)

Visiting

How to see Ellenton legally

The only lawful way onto the townsite is an SRS public tour. These are free and run by Savannah River Nuclear Solutions, the site's contractor. SRS's tour page, updated October 12, 2026, lists for 2026 an Ellenton Walking Tour on Tuesday, March 31, and Thursday, October 29, and three Historic Ellenton Tours on October 6, 8 and 13 that go to the Ellenton town site, the SRS Curation Facility and C Reactor. The page says all tours begin at 12:30 p.m. at the SRS Badge Office, take about three hours plus half an hour for badging, and hold 32 people. On October 24, 2026, the page showed the October 6 and 8 historic tours struck through, and the registration page for the October 29 walking tour, the last on the 2026 schedule, said the tour was full and registration was closed. No 2027 dates were posted. SRS's December 12, 2025 announcement says public tours hold up to 34 and each historic tour up to 50; check the tour page when you book.

Registration is online, one person at a time, and closes a week before each tour. You must be a US citizen aged 18 or over, give your Social Security number when you register, and bring two original identity documents. You may book one historic tour a year. Phones, cameras and other recording devices stay in your car, and photography is prohibited on site. Wear closed-toe, low-heeled shoes. For help, SRS lists (803) 952-8994.

Without a tour, the SRS Museum in downtown Aiken tells the site's history; the tour page lists it as free and open Wednesday to Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. New Ellenton, the town built for the displaced families, lies just north of the site on SC 19.

Historic maps

Ellenton on USGS maps, 1920–1982

Crops from the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection, centered on the townsite. Each sheet shows what surveyors mapped that year; compare them with today's topo and aerial on this page.

19201:48,00019441:62,50019541:250,00019641:24,00019821:100,000

Map & directions

Getting there

The routes follow SC 125 (Atomic Road), the one public highway through the Savannah River Site, to where it passes the townsite. They show where Ellenton was, not a place to stop: Wikipedia says stopping inside the site is allowed only in an emergency. To walk the townsite, book an SRS tour, which starts at the SRS Badge Office.

Base map: USGS The National Map (public domain). Routes: OSRM on © OpenStreetMap contributors data (ODbL), computed October 2026. Times assume dry roads.

Photos

Ellenton in photos

Ellenton Heritage Trail signs at Dunbar and Center streets, October 31, 2019The Ellenton depot crossing before the clearing, and the crossing in an SRS photo posted in November 2010

Visitor reports

Been to Ellenton?

Been there lately? Tell the next visitor what you found: whether you could get in, the state of the road and what's still standing. Photos are welcome. We read every report before it appears here.

Thanks. Your report reached us, and we'll read it before it goes on the page.

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Nearby

Other sites near Ellenton

Straight-line distance from the townsite to other mapped sites in our South Carolina index.

• Meyers Mill8.4 mi SE · Barnwell
• Dunbarton11.3 mi E · Barnwell
• Hamburg22.2 mi NW · Aiken
• Celestia55.8 mi N · Saluda
• Corinth60.9 mi N · Saluda
• Bethel72.4 mi NW · Abbeville
• Purrysburg73.0 mi SE · Jasper
• Bookman73.1 mi NE · Richland

Sources

Sources and credits

1. Savannah River Site, Visitors & Tours, page updated October 12, 2026, read October 24, 2026: the 2026 tour dates and types, start time, length, capacity, eligibility, Social Security number and ID rules, one historic tour a year, registration closing a week ahead, no phones or cameras, photography prohibited, shoes, the help line, the SRS Museum's hours, the site's 198,046 acres and DOE ownership. SRS, "SRS Public Tour 21 - Historic - Ellenton Walking Tour", registration page for October 29, 2026, read October 24, 2026: the tour full and registration closed.
2. SRS, "SRS Tours and Protocol Office Announces Public Tours for 2026", December 12, 2025: two Ellenton walking tours, historic tours of up to 50 and public tours of up to 34.
3. SRS, Visitor Guide and Directions and Maps, read October 24, 2026: access restricted to badged personnel, the badge office on SRS Road 1 off SC 125 at a flashing yellow light.
4. Wikipedia, "Ellenton massacre": the rifle clubs and the 1876 election, the Silverton incident and Fred Pope, the Georgia men, the differing death counts (deputy marshals, the New York Times, Mark M. Smith), and the Hamburg Massacre of July 1876 in Aiken County.
5. US Department of Energy, "Savannah River Site Walking Tours Revisit Former Town of Ellenton", April 30, 2024: the pilot walking tours, "the old streets and building foundations," the information board, the SRS Heritage Foundation's earlier Ellenton Trail tours, the 1880 charter.
6. Wikipedia, "Ellenton, South Carolina" (revision of July 27, 2026): the railroad and Dunbar, the Ellen legend and the SRARP note on her age, the 1876 massacre, the 1880 charter, the early-1950s town, the telephone system, the 1950 announcement, the 6,000 people and graves, the other communities, where residents went, what remained, the 1973 reunion, and the town's coordinates in its text.
7. ghosttowns.com, Ellenton: fact sheet (Aiken County, climate, visits only with DOE permission) and a 2014 update on foundations, curbs, driveways, grave depressions, trash and car parts.
8. HMDB, "Site of Ellenton" (marker 2-13, 1993, photographed July 2008) and "Savannah River Site": marker texts and location on SC 125 at Road 3, and the highway sign of the 1950s quoted on the Ellenton page.
9. Wikipedia, "South Carolina Highway 125" (revision of May 18, 2025): the only public highway through SRS, 17.3 miles, no stopping except emergencies, federal patrols.
10. SRS, "The Spirits of Ellenton", photo of October 31, 2019, by P.J. Perea of the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory, and "SRS at 60 -- Ellenton", November 2010: the heritage trail signs, the depot, the nineteen-year-old Ellen, 600 Ellenton residents moved.
11. USGS GNIS, "Ellenton (historical)", feature 1235464: a point about 3 km southwest of the town shown on the old maps; we use the Wikipedia text coordinates instead.
12. Historic maps: USGS Ellenton 1920 and 1944, Augusta 1954, Girard NW 1964 and Barnwell 1982 sheets. Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 24, 2026.

Photo and map credits

• Ellenton Heritage Trail signs at Dunbar and Center streets, October 31, 2019: P.J. Perea, Savannah River Ecology Laboratory, for Savannah River Site, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0
• The Ellenton depot crossing before the clearing, and the crossing in an SRS photo posted in November 2010: Savannah River Site, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0
• Topo map, area base map and aerial imagery: USGS The National Map (public domain).
• Historic maps: USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection (public domain): Ellenton 1920, 1:48,000; Ellenton 1944, 1:62,500; Augusta 1954, 1:250,000; Girard NW 1964, 1:24,000; Barnwell 1982, 1:100,000.