Union County is a county in the Northeast region of the U.S. state of Georgia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 24,632. The county seat is Blairsville. Union County was originally a core part of the homeland of the native Cherokee tribe. Mountainous and formerly one of the most remote and inaccessible parts of Georgia, the area became the objec…Union County is a county in the Northeast region of the U.S. state of Georgia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 24,632. The county seat is Blairsville. Union County was originally a core part of the homeland of the native Cherokee tribe. Mountainous and formerly one of the most remote and inaccessible parts of Georgia, the area became the object of desire for white settlers with the discovery of gold in the 1820s. While the gold rush didn't last long, a land lottery system opened up the area for settlement in the 1830s and Union County was formed in 1832, carved from part of Cherokee County. The newcomers formed political groups to force the Cherokee off their land, part of the removal of most of the southeastern native tribes in what is known as the Trail of Tears. The part that was Cherokee Removal occurred between 1836 and 1839. The Cherokee nation and roughly 1,600 of their black slaves were forced west to the Indian Territory in the then Western United States. The resultant deaths along the way and at the end of the movement of an estimated 4,000 Cherokee. The Union Party was a political group that supported removing the Indians and opening the area to white settlers, and is the probable reason for the county's name. The western part of Union County was annexed by Fannin County on January 12, 1854, and in 1856 the southern tip was given to Gilmer County and an eastern section went to Towns County. Many of the early white settlers of the area were Virginians or North Carolianians who came via various frontier roads. As a mountainous region not suited to plantation farming and settled by hardscrabble, independent farmers, Union County had relatively few slaves compared to other areas of Georgia. In the 1850 census, just 61 slave owners were listed, with a total of 278 enslaved people.
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