Side A: The Adams County Fairgrounds, established at this site in October 1853, on seven acres of land donated by Judge George Collings, was converted to a Civil War training camp named in honor of General Thomas Hamer, a Mexican War hero, of Georgetown, Ohio. The old stone Courthouse was made into a hospital to serve the camp. The 70th Ohio Volunteer infantry, organized in October 1861, trained on the old fairgrounds until Christmas day 1861, when it marched from Camp Hamer to Ripley. The 70th participated in the battles of Shiloh, Tennessee; Atlanta, Georgia; the siege at Vicksburg, Mississippi, and Sherman’s March to the Sea.
Side B: A short distance south of Zane’s Trace, West Union was established by an act of the Ohio Legislature on April 13, 1803, as the seat of Adams County. West Union was surveyed in the spring of the following year, and became an important stagecoach stop on Zane’s Trace. Thomas Kirker, an Adams County resident who would later serve as Ohio’s second governor (1807-1808), named West Union. The county commissioners first met here June 11, 1804. In later years, residents of the village became actively involved in the Underground Railroad.
Sponsors: The Adams County Historical Society, The Jenkins Family, The Philip Hawkins Family, The Ohio Historical Society
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