On a storm-soaked night in June of 1900, just outside McDonough, Georgia, a Southern Railway passenger train plunged into the flooded waters of Camp Creek, triggering one of the deadliest train disasters in Georgia history. Weeks of relentless rain, a washed-out trestle, and a fateful decision made under impossible conditions combined to turn a routine run toward Atlanta into a mass casualty event that would forever alter a small Southern town. In the hours that followed, Camp Creek became a scene of fire, flood, and unimaginable loss—while the courthouse square in downtown McDonough was transformed into a place of mourning, identification, and reckoning.

More than a century later, the wreck still casts a long shadow. The tragedy left behind unmarked graves, unresolved questions, and a legacy of local lore that continues to cling to the courthouse square and the historic buildings surrounding it. From contemporary newspaper accounts to the quiet persistence of ghost stories, this episode of Southern Gothic explores how a single night of disaster reshaped a community—and why some places never quite let go of the past.

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