A small band of Hurricane Matthew evacuees found shelter in Gwinnett

Nearly two dozen evacuees fleeing the wrath of Hurricane Matthew found refuge in Gwinnett County over the weekend, officials said.

The county opened a shelter Friday night at Snellville United Methodist Church, welcoming in 23 people when all was said and done. The shelter closed Sunday afternoon and those who had been housed there either returned home or were relocated to another facility closer to their homes, Gwinnett County spokeswoman Heather Sawyer said in an email Monday.

Gwinnett's office of emergency management, police department animal welfare unit, health department and department of family and children services also provided assistant during the storm, Sawyer said.

Six "highly skilled firefighter-paramedics" from Gwinnett also dispatched over the weekend to a hospital in Brunswick, where they "were instrumental in moving patients from the hospital to a safe location away from the storm's project path," Sawyer said. They helped evacuate a nursing home in Savannah as well.

Matthew was a Category 2 hurricane when it swept up the Georgia coast early Saturday, killing at least three people in the state. Officials were unsure if a fourth reported death was caused by the storm.

At least eight people were killed in North Carolina, and six more in Florida.