Tattnall County was named for the governor who signed the legislative act creating it, Governor Josiah Tattnall.  It became the twenty-sixth county in order of creation in 1801, its land taken from Montgomery County and part of the original Washington County.  There was no town at all in the new county, so its creating act provided that county government should be conducted from the home of Zacharia Cox on the Ohoopee River, the western limit of the county.

 

It wasn't until 1828 that a legislative committee was charged with selecting a site near the geographical center of the county for a courthouse.  In 1832, a post office was officially designated for a community that was called Reidsville for Robert E. Reid, Superior Court judge and later territorial governor of Florida.

 

In 1936, the state selected a one thousand acre tract in Tattnall County for the central state penitentiary.