Benton County

Benton County was created in 1835 from portions of Humphreys and Henry counties. Its eastern boundary is the Tennessee River, whose shoreline includes a part of Kentucky Lake. Benton County remains essentially a rural county with several small towns and villages and its county seat is Camden. The county also is the home of two tourist attractions with Nathan Bedford Forrest State Historical Area and Lakeshore, the United Methodist campground. Benton County has three Century Farms and the oldest farm is the E. A. Cuff Farm that dates to 1847. For more information on Benton County, please go to the Tennessee Encyclopedia of History & Culture website.

E. A. Cuff Farm

Stokes Wood Farm

W. C. Lockhart Hereford Farm


The following map is for a general geographical understanding. It  does not provide specific locations of the farms because of privacy reasons.

E. A. Cuff Farm

Terry E. Cuff

            Benton County is famous for its production of high quality sorghum molasses. The E. A. Cuff Farm is one of the oldest sorghum producers in the county. Located in the Beaver Dam community five miles northeast of Camden, the Cuff Farm dates to 1847, when Margaret Cuff of South Carolina acquired 200 acres of Benton County farmland. Margaret and her son Francis Asbury Cuff grew corn, sugar cane and cotton and raised cattle, swine and sheep. 

            Francis Asbury took control of the farm in 1861. A soldier of the Confederate army, he was captured during the Civil War and served in a Missouri prison camp. His wife Sarah Sykes Cuff and their eight children kept the farm operating throughout the war years.

            Upon returning to Benton County, Francis A. Cuff became a prominent member of the farming community. A trustee of Flatwoods Methodist Church and an active member of the Grange, he also was an “accomplished blacksmith or ironworker, making plows, hoes and other tools.” In addition, Cuff and his “family operated a sorghum mill, establishing it as a major Benton County crop.” 

            The family of Green Harris and Wilmoth Pafford Cuff was the next generation to own the farm. Continuing to operate the sorghum mill, the Cuffs also “installed and operated a community telephone switchboard from the house.” Allan Cuff, the great grandson of Margaret Cuff, received tracts of the family land in 1910 and 1941. With his wife Anna Holland and his two children, Allan continued to till the land, but also established a small dairy herd.

            Mr. and Mrs. Edgar A. Cuff were the fifth generation owners, acquiring the property in three separate parcels from 1940 to 1960. After the death of Mr. and Mrs. Edgar Cuff, their son, Terry Cuff, acquired the farm. Today, the farm mainly produces hay. 

Stokes Wood Farm 

Margaret Stansberry Stokes

            Located two miles southwest of Holladay, Tennessee, the Stokes-Wood Farm dates to 1900, when Jeff Stokes acquired the title to 115 acres. Jeff and his wife, Mary E. Wood Stokes had nine children and raised corn, cotton, hay, sorghum, cattle and hogs.  

The next owner of the land was Paul J. Stokes and his wife Vonelle Cain Stokes. Paul and Vonelle had one child, Margaret Stokes. They raised the same crops and livestock that the previous owner did with the addition of soybeans. Like many rural farms in Tennessee, the Stokes Wood Farm did not initially have modern amenities such as electricity. However, in the late 1940s, the farm along with the rest of the community acquired electricity.

            During the 1960s, the farm encountered many changes with the road near the farm being paved and the construction of a new farm house. Today, the farm is owned by Margaret Stokes Stansberry, the granddaughter of the founder and her husband, Jim Stansberry. 

W. C.  Lockhart Hereford Farm 

Virginia Lockhart Whitworth

            The early settlement history of Benton County is reflected through the development of the Lockhart Century Farm. The farm lies nine miles north of Camden. W. Crawford “Croff” Rushing, son of one of the early settlers of West Tennessee (his sister Lucinda is claimed to be the first white child born in the region), and his wife Sophia established the farm in 1865. Owning well over 1,000 acres, Rushing and his family of thirteen planted tobacco, corn and wheat and raised cattle and swine. Family tradition states that the farm possessed a “big smokehouse” where meat was prepared and stored. 

            After both parents died near the turn of the century, Sophia Ann Rushing Lockhart and her husband Samuel W. Lockhart inherited 58 acres of the farm. They continued to acquire more land throughout the twentieth century until the Lockhart Farm had several hundred acres. Samuel Lockhart was not only a farmer; he was also a teacher, postmaster and local merchant.