In the meantime, the legislature directed that the forthcoming election for the members of the General Assembly on October 13-14, 1794, be held at the house of Elias Earle, under the direction of Jesse Carter, James Seaborn, and John Thomas, Jr. Earle's plantation, the Poplars, was located near the center of the county just north of the Reedy River falls on what became Rutherford Road. A son of Samuel Earle, Elias had moved to Greenville in Saptember 1787, where he began to accumulate property eventually including some 7,000 acres of land and thirty-three slaves. Elias Earle had signed the petition for moving the courthouse and was no doubt a major proponent of locating it near the falls.
