Crime Scene and Trauma Cleanup in Clarkesville, GA

Clarkesville is the county seat of Habersham County in the Blue Ridge foothills of northeast Georgia.

Before white settlement, the site was the Native American village of Sak-yi, whose name survives in the Soque River — originally 'So-Kee' — that flows past the city.

Clarkesville grew up along the Unicoi Turnpike, an ancient Native American trail turned wagon road that carried goods between Tennessee and the Georgia coast.

Clarkesville was founded in 1821 as the Habersham County seat and was incorporated as a village on November 26, 1823.

The city was named for John Clarke, who was governor of Georgia at the time and the son of Revolutionary War hero Elijah Clarke.

In the nineteenth century Clarkesville's cool mountain summers made it a resort for wealthy families escaping the heat of south Georgia and the lowcountry.

During a feud over moving the county seat to Toccoa, the Clarkesville courthouse was blown up in 1898; Clarkesville kept the seat, and the dispute was finally settled by the creation of Stephens County in 1905.

The 2020 census counted 1,911 people in Clarkesville, up from 1,733 in 2010 and 1,248 in 2000.

Clarkesville had 792 households and 866 housing units at the 2020 census.

The city sits on the south bank of the Soque River, a stream unusual for rising and completing its entire course within Habersham County before joining the Chattahoochee River.