The first substantial white settlement in what is now Gadsden was a tiny town called Double Springs. It was begun by a mixed Indian-white settler named John Riley when he built his house near two springs around 1825. It became a stagecoach stop on the Huntsville-to-Rome route. The original house still stands today as the oldest house in Gadsden.
Shortly thereafter, they began to purchase much of the land between Lookout Mountain, the Coosa River, and down to the mouth of Wills Creek. Their land, plus that of John S. Moragne and Joseph Rhea, became the first part of the city of Gadsden. Double Springs was transformed on July 4, 1845, when one Captain James Lafferty piloted the first steamboat to the area, aptly named the Coosa. He landed near the site of the current Memorial Bridge on that date. The Hughes brothers offered to name the town "Lafferty's Landing" in his honor, but Lafferty declined. Instead, the name Gadsden was chosen, in honor of Colonel James Gadsden of South Carolina, famous for the later Gadsden Purchase.