HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena — as catalogued
Scene of Georgia's first recorded mass murder—nine axe killings in one farmhouse on August 6, 1887.
Unincorporated Bibb County (approx. 12 miles west of Macon via US-80), Macon, GA 31052
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
Free
No admission; public road access only
Access
Limited Access
Rural roadside; no maintained path to the historical farmhouse location
Equipment
Photos OK
Georgia's First Recorded Mass Murder · 19th-Century Criminal Justice · Post-Reconstruction Georgia History
In the pre-dawn hours of August 6, 1887, nine people were killed with an axe in the Bibb County farmhouse of Richard Woolfolk, twelve miles west of Macon. The dead included Richard Woolfolk, his wife, and seven of their children and stepchildren. Thomas G. Woolfolk, Richard's son from a prior marriage, was the only household member to survive—found wounded in an adjacent field.
Thomas was arrested almost immediately. Despite his claims of innocence and an unknown attacker, the physical evidence, including blood patterns and his familiarity with the farm layout, pointed to him. The trial drew enormous regional attention. He was convicted and sentenced to death.
On October 29, 1890, Woolfolk was publicly hanged in Perry, Georgia, before a crowd estimated at 10,000 people. He maintained his innocence to the end, reportedly delivering a lengthy address from the gallows. The New Georgia Encyclopedia has documented the case as one of the most thoroughly covered criminal proceedings in 19th-century Georgia, noted for its early media saturation and the social spectacle of the public execution.
The original farmhouse no longer stands. The site remains in unincorporated Bibb County on private agricultural land, with no historical marker. Scholarship on the case has continued, with historians examining both the crime itself and the cultural moment it represented in post-Reconstruction Georgia.
Sources
The Woolfolk murder site does not have a well-documented paranormal tradition in regional ghost lore. The lack of a standing structure and the private nature of the land have kept it outside the circuit of organized ghost investigations. What draws visitors is the historical record itself—a single night in 1887 that Georgia historians consistently identify as the state's earliest mass-murder case.
The case appeared in newspapers from Macon to New York within days of the killings and continued generating coverage through the trial and execution. That media legacy means the story has persisted in popular memory through documentation rather than folklore. Some local accounts circulate about unease felt at the crossroads nearest the original farm, but no systematic investigation or verified witness report has placed a paranormal claim at the site with enough specificity to confirm.
Notable Entities
The Woolfolk farmhouse no longer stands, but the rural Bibb County landscape west of Macon preserves the general setting of Georgia's most documented 19th-century family massacre. Visitors with an interest in true crime history pass through via US-80 or nearby farm roads.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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