George Michael Troup (September 8, 1780 - April 26, 1856) was an American politician who served as the Governor of Georgia during the mid-1820s. He was an ardent expansionist and supporter of the controversial policy of Indian removal. He was known later in his life as "The Hercules of State Rights." Troup was born during the American Revolution at McIntosh Bluff, on the Tombigbee River in what is now Alabama (then a part of the Province of Georgia). He was the son of George Troup and Catherine McIntosh, the Georgia-born daughter of Capt. John McIntosh, a British military officer and the Chief of the McIntosh clan. {Catherine McIntosh was of the Chiefs of the McGillivary clan lineage-her mother was a sister of the father of Creek Chief Alexander McGillivray; Catherine McIntosh was an aunt of Creek Chief William McIntosh}.
Troup graduated from the College of New Jersey in 1797. Two years later, he was admitted to the bar in Savannah, Georgia. He was a strong opponent of the Yazoo Claims. A Democratic-Republican, Troup served one term as a state legislator (1803-05) before being elected to the U. S. House of Representatives, serving until 1815. Along with fellow western Congressmen such as Henry Clay of Kentucky and John C. Calhoun of South Carolina, Troup was a part of the War Hawk movement and ardent supporter of nationalism.
He then became a United States Senator through the support of fellow wealthy plantation owners. He served as chairman of the Committee of Military Affairs. He was twice married and the father of six children. He primarily lived in Dublin in Laurens County. Troup's country estate, Val d'Osta, was named after the Valle d'Aosta alpine valley in Italy. In turn, the town of Valdosta, Georgia (formerly called Troupville) was named for Troup's estate.
Georgia political force William H. Crawford hand-picked Troup as his candidate for governor in 1819. However, Troup twice lost to Crawford's bitter rival, John Clark, who was supported by frontier settlers. In 1823, Troup ran again, as Clark was no longer eligible, and won. He advocated the removal of the Creek Indians from western Georgia. Troup wanted to move them to the Western Territory of the Louisiana Purchase, an idea first proposed by Thomas Jefferson in 1803. In 1825, in Georgia's first popular election, Troup won by a razor-thin margin. He negotiated the controversial Treaty of Indian Springs with his first cousin William McIntosh, a mixed-blood Creek chief. McIntosh and 49 other tribal leaders (predominantly from the Lower Creeks) ceded a large portion of Georgia, although they did not have the backing of the majority of the Creek Confederacy. He threatened an attack on Federal troops if they interfered with the treaty and challenged President John Quincy Adams, who conceded and allowed Troup to seize the remaining Creek land in Georgia.
During Troup's tenure as governor, he supported public education and the construction of new roads and canals. Troup County was created from former Lower Creek land in 1826 and named for him. Upon the expiration of his second term, Troup returned to the Senate as a Jacksonian Democrat, where he served on the Committee on Indian Affairs. He was a nominee for the Presidency at the States Rights Convention in January of 1852 in Jackson, Mississippi.
Troup died while visiting one of his plantations near the Oconee River in Montgomery County, Georgia (now Treutlen County). He was buried on the Rosemont plantation.
During the American Civil War, an Athens, Georgia battery was named the "Troup Artillery" in his memory.
