Annie Elizabeth Fitzgerald Stephens (December 23, 1844 – February 17, 1934) was an American landowner, businesswoman, and political activist.
She was the daughter of Philip Fitzgerald, an Irish-Catholic emigrant from County Tipperary who left Ireland with his family after the Irish Rebellion of 1798, and his American wife, Eleanor Avaline McGhan.
[2] Her father became a wealthy member of the planter class, owning a plantation of around 2,471 acres in Clayton County, Georgia, and enslaving 35 people.
[4] Stephens was politically active and strong-willed, pushing for legislation by assembling groups of women to petition elected officials.
[4] Marianne Walker, the author of Margaret Mitchell and John Marsh: The Love Story Behind Gone With the Wind, describes Stephens as "mean", a "hellion from birth", and "contentious, aggressive, domineering, and outspoken.
[4] A landowner, she was known to ride around Jonesboro on a horse to collect rent from her tenants and once sued the U.S. Federal Government for damages incurred to her property during the Siege of Atlanta towards the end of the American Civil War.
[4] During the war, she spent most of her time in Atlanta and stayed during General William Tecumseh Sherman's March to the Sea.