Born
in Ohio in 1858, George Austin McHenry attended the University of Michigan
before opening a pharmacy in the town of Big Rapids. In 1889, McHenry (left) and his
wife Eunice (right), along with fifty-four other families, moved from Michigan to
Harrison County, Mississippi, where there was cheap land and plenty of
opportunity to make money from timber and railroading. McHenry may have already
been familiar with the area because he had also attended Tulane. Regardless,
the Michiganders settled in the northern part of the county alongside the Gulf
and Ship Island Railroad, which was still under construction. There, George
McHenry built a general store to serve the settlers and when a post office was
later established the place was called McHenry in his honor. At that point, it
would have been reasonable to think he would have settled down to work as an
entrepreneur and a pharmacist, but instead he went back to school to become a
doctor.
In
1893, George McHenry graduated with a medical degree from the Louisville Medical
College in Kentucky, now part of the University of Louisville. He then returned
to Tulane to become a surgeon. Two years later, he was back in Harrison County
where he and Una, as she was known, started building a house (and by this time
they had a four-year old son). Like many
other places in the pine belt, McHenry was a boom town for a time, with a bank,
two drugstores, a school, six churches and perhaps an equal number of
saloons. The town even had its own
newspaper, the McHenry News, edited
for a time by Una McHenry. For his part, George was heavily invested in the
McHenry State Bank (lower left) and the Majestic Hotel, in addition to his medical practice.
Plenty, in other words, to keep him occupied. In 1898, though, he decided to
join the army. 
Dr.
McHenry enlisted as a surgeon for service in the Spanish American War. Promoted
from captain to major, McHenry served in Cuba and witnessed the naval battle of
Santiago de Cuba on July 3, 1898, which resulted in the destruction of the
Spanish navy’s Caribbean squadron. While in Cuba, McHenry (seen here in camp) was in charge of the
Yellow Fever hospital and he developed a friendship with General Leonard A. Wood.
Wood, also a medical officer, commanded a brigade which included the famous
“Rough Riders” at San Juan Hill. He would later serve as Chief of Staff under
President Taft and then governor in the Philippines. As Chief of Staff, Gen.
Wood was instrumental in establishing military training camps around the
country. Because of his friendship with Dr. McHenry, one of the sites chosen
was south of Hattiesburg. It also helped that McHenry was a childhood friend of
Lois Irene Marshall, who just happened to be the wife of the Vice President of
the United States, Thomas R. Marshall.
Known as the “Second Lady of the United States,” young Lois and George
both attended school in Angola, Indiana. With connections to both the Chief of
Staff and the Vice President, it might seem appropriate to name the new training
camp for George McHenry. Instead (perhaps because there was already a Fort
McHenry, of “Star Spangled Banner” fame), they named it for Isaac Shelby, a Revolutionary
War hero and the first governor of Kentucky. Today, Camp Shelby is the largest
state-owned military training facility in the nation. Leonard Wood (above), meanwhile,
got a camp named for him. Located in Missouri, Fort Leonard Wood is the
training facility for military police, the Corps of Engineers and chemical and biological
weapons units. 
After his stint in Cuba and service
in the Philippines and travels to China, McHenry returned to his home in
Harrison County, where his wife had continued to manage his various business
interests during his absence. Not content to rest on his laurels, however,
McHenry next invested in the mineral waters found at Ramsey Springs, located east
of McHenry along Red Creek. For decades, folks had flocked to the area to take advantage
to the natural springs in hopes of curing a host of medical problems, including
ulcers, blood and bowel diseases and liver and kidney issues. In Cuba, Dr.
McHenry had become particularly adept at treating yellow fever victims, so he
was perhaps especially interested in the benefits of the mineral water at
Ramsey Springs. In 1920, McHenry and his business partner built a hotel near
the Springs. Filled with stuffed animals from the local forests, the hotel (above) featured a huge lobby with a cypress log ceiling and a large cobblestone fireplace.
Outdoors, the hotel included a swimming pool filled with water from the natural
springs. For many years, the resort was a favorite destination for Gulf Coast
residents. In 1929, however, McHenry lost a great deal of money in the stock
market crash and had to sell the hotel. By the end of World War II, the resort
had lost its appeal and the hotel was demolished in 1961. Today, little remains
to mark the resort site, which is owned by the State of Mississippi. 
Dr.
McHenry also managed to get into local politics late in his life. As one of the
early settlers of north Harrison County, McHenry vehemently opposed splitting
the county in two to form Stone County. Instead, he proposed created separate
judicial districts in Harrison County, with McHenry as the other courthouse
location. When Stone County was organized against his wishes in 1916, McHenry next
lobbied for McHenry to be the new county seat. He lost out to Wiggins, however,
and McHenry began to decline after suffering through several major fires which
destroyed the business district. Ironically, despite his opposition to the
formation of Stone County, Dr. McHenry’s
only child, Floyd Whitaker McHenry (also a pharmacist), served as Chancery Clerk
of Stone County. In 1926, George McHenry suffered a stroke. Lingering for
several years, he died in 1931 and is buried in the Oak Lawn Cemetery in
McHenry. Little remains of the old town except for the McHenry House (above), which was
enlarged in 1901 with the addition of a second story. Listed in the National
Register of Historic Places in 1998, the house has been occupied by members of
the McHenry family almost continuously since it was originally built, most
recently by a granddaughter of Dr. McHenry, who died in 2010.
Photo and Image Sources:
(1) (2) George and (2) Una McHenry: http://cillelitchfield.com
(3) Front Street: http://oldfirehouse.org
(4) Bank: http://en.wikipedia.org
(5) Cuba: http://oldfirehouse.org
(6) Leonard Wood: http://en.wikipedia.org
(7) McHenry House: http://cillelitchfield.com
