Sumter County was created in 1832. Long before this, its land had been traversed by European settlers, such as the Spanish, French, and English. One of these nationalities, the French, was so interested in its location that they erected a fort on the Tombigbee River, Fort Tombeckbee, in 1735. The first government factory for the Choctaws was located at Factory Creek, near the Tombigbee River. Fort Tombeckbee later passed into the hands of the English. By the Treaty of 1830 between the Choctaw nation and the United States, the Choctaws ceded the last of their country to the white man. Due to this treaty, some fifty settlers alone in the present Sumter County received sections of land, or parts thereof. The first official land entry was made in Sumter County in 1833 by John Cook. By 1834 practically half of the county was entered by settlers for the most part from North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia, in that order. What land was not entered in 1834 was entered in 1835, with the exception of the southwestern part, which was poor soil, and a wooded area. Generally speaking, the early settlers entered rich, river bottom soil, and in numerous cases were planters who brought their slaves with them. They were a literate group of people, as is evinced by the Census of 1840. By 1840 Sumter had become the most populous county in the state of Alabama with 29,937 persons.