Wakefield is a ghost town in Washington County, Alabama, United States, most famous as the place where former vice president Aaron Burr was arrested in 1807.

The settlement was named by territorial judge Harry Toulmin after Oliver Goldsmith's novel The Vicar of Wakefield.

Fleeing from an arrest order issued by President Thomas Jefferson after being found innocent four times, on his way to Spanish West Florida, Burr was spotted by federal land agent Major Nicholas Perkins III[3] who reported the sighting to U.S. Army Lieutenant Edmund P. Gaines.

Gaines arrested Burr on February 19 near Wakefield, two miles below Colonel Henson's,[4] and detained him at Fort Stoddert.

[5][6] A marker placed by the Alabama Historical Association commemorates the Burr capture.