USA > Georgia > A history of Georgia : from its first discovery by Europeans to the adoption of the present constitution in MDCCXCVIII. Vol. I > Part 26
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19 Gillies's Life of Whitefield. Philips's Life and Times of Whitefield. This latter work is full of errors, and its statements, at least many of them, can only be received with caution : e. g. p. 60, there is an anachronism of over ten years ; p. 63, " Such was the first specimen of a chaplain which the
Indians and colonists at Savannah had before their eyes," is altogether wrong, as Herbert, Quincy, Wesley, (John and Charles,) Whitefield, Morris, Or- ton, Dyson, &c., were in Georgia be- fore his ordination. There are various other mistakes which need not now be mentioned.
347
REACHES SAVANNAH.
ample amends for the roughness of the voyage.20 He here wrote to the Trustees, enquiring of them if they desired any change in his plans, since Wesley had returned to England ; for it so happened, that White- field had only sailed from the Downs to Georgia, in the Whittaker, the day before Wesley arrived there from Georgia in the Samuel. They, in reply, commis- sioned him to " perform all religious offices as Deacon of the Church of England, in Savannah and Frederica."21 Having taken in their complement of men, the Whit- taker sailed in March for Georgia. The voyage was full of incidents, some pleasing, some painful, but on the whole, furnishing him for many years after re- membrances of joy refreshing to his soul ; hoping as he did, that his labours among his " red-coated and blue-jacketed parishioners," as he called his military and naval congregation, were not in vain in the Lord.
The two friends landed in Savannah on the evening of Sunday, 7th of May, and were warmly welcomed by Mr. Delamotte, the catechist, and the authorities of the town. His induction to Georgia was a severe illness, and when he recovered, the desolate condition of the colony forced itself upon him. "However," he remarked, "that rendered what I had brought over from my friends (he had collected £300 for the poor in Georgia) more acceptable to the poor inhabitants, and gave me an ocular demonstration, which was what I wanted when the hint was given, of the great necessity and promising utility of a future Orphan House, which I now determined, by the Divine assist- ance, to get about in earnest." That no time might be lost in carrying into effect this scheme, originally
2º Letters, in edition of Works in 8
vols., London, 1771, i. 37.
21 Journal of Trustees, ii. 71.
1
348
RESOLVES TO FOUND AN ORPHAN HOUSE.
suggested by Charles Wesley and General Oglethorpe, after the pattern adopted by the venerable Professor Francke at Halle, and resolved upon before he left England ; it was determined by Whitefield and Haber- sham, that the latter should at once open a school for children eligible to such an institution, and bring them under a regular course of tuition and discipline ; while the former proceeded on a tour for the collection of funds to carry out the plan. The condition of these little sufferers, in Georgia, was at that time quite de- plorable, and is thus depicted by Whitefield : " When I came to Georgia, I found many poor orphans, who, though taken notice of by the Honourable Trustees, yet through the neglect of persons that acted under them, were in miserable circumstances. For want of a house to breed them up in, the poor little ones were tabled out here and there, and besides the hurt they received by bad examples, forgot at home what they had learned at school; others were at hard services, and likely to have no education at all."22
He remained in Georgia until August, visiting the various settlements, labouring in his clerical duties with great diligence, and endearing himself to his parishioners by his piety, generosity and zeal. “ Amer- ica," he writes,23 " is not so horrid a place as it is rep- resented to be. The heat of the weather, lying on the ground, &c., are mere painted lions in the way, and, to a soul filled with divine love, not worth men- tioning. The country, morning and evening, is exceed- ingly pleasant, and there are uncommon improvements made (considering the indifference of the soil) in divers
22 Works, iii. 464. " A Further Philadelphia, 1746, p. 53.
Account of God's Dealings with the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield," &c.,
23 Works, i. 44.
349
HIS DAILY LABOURS.
places. With a little assistance the country people would do well. As for my ministerial office, I can in- form you that God (such is his goodness) sets his seal to it here, as at other places. We have an excellent Christian school, and near a hundred constantly attend at evening prayers. The people receive me gladly, as yet, into their houses, and seem to be most kindly affected towards me. I have a pretty little family, and find it possible to manage a house without distraction. Pro- visions we do not want to feed on, though we are cut off from all occasions to pamper our bodies. Blessed be God, I visit from house to house, catechise, read prayers twice, and expound the two lessons every day ; read to a house full of people three times a week ; expound the two lessons at five in the morning, read prayers and preach twice, and expound the catechism to servants, &c., at seven in the evening, every Sunday. What I have most at heart, is the building an Orphan House, which, I trust, will be effected at my return to England. In the meanwhile, I am settling little schools in and about Savannah, that the rising genera- tion may be bred up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. The Lord prosper my weak endeavours for this blessed purpose."
In the meantime, Mr. Habersham, with character- istic ardour, had gathered around him a little flock " of precious lambs," as he affectionately termed them, whom he was diligently training up for the Orphan House, which Whitefield had gone to England to pro- mote.
He reached England after a most uncomfortable pas- sage, in the beginning of December, having been ab- sent nearly one year. As yet, he was only in deacon's orders; and to obtain priest's ordination was one of
350
COLLECTIONS FOR ORPHAN HOUSE.
the motives of his return. This he received from Doctor Benson, Bishop of Gloucester, Jan. 12th, 1739 ; the Trustees having previously, in anticipation of his admission to the priesthood, appointed him missionary of Christ Church, in Savannah, and directed the Rev. Mr. William Norris, who, the July before, had been appointed to succeed Wesley in Savannah, to go to Frederica when Mr. Whitefield should arrive in Sa- vannah.24 They also gave him five hundred acres of land on which to erect his Orphan House. In appoint- ing him to Savannah, they had annexed to the office the salary of £50, but he acquainted the common council in person that he declined the acceptance of any salary, as a minister at Savannah, or for the man- agement of the Orphan House in Georgia. In his mul- tifarious labours in England, he did not forget the Orphan House, but generally took up collections for it. So that by August, 1739, having obtained over £1000 for that purpose, he embarked for Georgia, via Phila- delphia. Travelling thence over land, he reached Sa- vannah on the 11th of January, 1740, and found that his faithful coadjutor, Habersham, had selected the five hundred acres grant about nine miles from town, being the best place he had seen for the Orphan House, and had begun to collect materials, and erected a dwell- ing. It was the original intention of Whitefield, before he left England, to take in only twenty orphan chil- dren ; but finding, on his second arrival in Savannah, so many objects of charity, he enlarged his design so as to include all the necessitous orphans, and many of the poor children of the province. He hired a large house in which to keep them and the school, permitted the poor people to send their children for instruction gratis,
24 Minutes of Common Council, ii. 187.
351
FOUNDATION OF IT LAID.
and gathered about him a family of nearly seventy persons. In addition to this labour of love, he also erected an Infirmary, and placed it under the care of Dr. Hunter, from Bristol, a pious surgeon who had ac- companied him, for love's sake, from England. Here between one and two hundred sick people were cured and taken care of gratis, during the succeding four or five years.
In this he permitted his benevolence to outrun his prudence. Encouraged in his noble attempts by the example of Prof. Francke, he yet forgot that the latter built his Orphan House in the populous city of Halle, while his was in a country ill supplied with provisions, and so badly governed, as to make it by far the most expensive of His Majesty's dominions. But he forcibly remarks, in view of these facts : " Had I received more and ventured less, I should have suffered less, and others more."
Urged forward, however, by that strong faith in the providence of God which marked his life, he began at once to develope his plans ; and on the 25th of March, 1740, laid the first brick of the central building, and named the institution " Bethesda," praying that it might ever prove to the orphans what its name im- ported, "A House of Mercy." In August, having in the meantime made a tour northward as far as New Jersey, in which he had collected, in money and provis- ions, over £500, he sailed for New England, and went as far east as Boston, preaching everywhere as he journeyed, and gathering carefully all collections for his Orphan House. He received upwards of £700, in goods, provisions, and money, for the Georgia Orphan House; and returned, in December, laden with the benefaction of New England's love to the tender lambs
352
ORFHAN HOUSE IN OPERATION.
of Georgia. He spent Christmas with his Bethesda family, now, with labourers, numbering over one hun- dred, and in ministering to the spiritual wants of Savannah. But on New Year's day, he again set out for England, via Charleston, where he arrived the fol- lowing March. He left his Orphan House affairs in the care of Mr. Habersham ; and such was the energy displayed by him, in the midst of difficulties which it would take many pages to recount, that on the 3d of November, 1741, the buildings were so far completed, that he was enabled to remove the children thither, though the progress of the main building was retarded by the Spaniards capturing a sloop laden with brick and other materials, intended for Bethesda.
The undertaking prospered under the wise adminis- tration of Habersham; the number of children increased, the labourers were faithful ; many who would else have been driven from Savannah by poverty were retained ; and the buildings reared by the hand of charity in a colony planted by charity, daily grew into shape and beauty, and gave hopeful promise of rich blessings to a far distant posterity.
At the close of 1741, the house contained sixty- eight children, the whole family numbering eighty-four persons, besides nineteen labourers employed about the premises. The routine of family duties is thus described by a young gentleman of Boston, who visited the Or- phan House in 1741 :25 " The bell rings in the morning, at sunrise, to wake the family. When the children arise, they sing a short hymn, pray by themselves, go down to wash; and, by the time they have done that, the bell calls to public worship, when a portion of Scrip- ture is read and expounded, a psalm sung, and the exer-
25 Whitefield's Works, iii. 446.
Whitefield's Orphan House, or Bethesda College.
353
PROSPEROUS CONDITION OF ORPHAN HOUSE.
cises begin and end with prayer. They then breakfast, and afterwards some go to their trades, and the rest to their prayers and schools. At noon, they all dine in the same room, and have comfortable and wholesome diet provided. A hymn is sung before and after dinner. Then, in about half an hour, to school again ; and be- tween whiles, find time enough for recreation. A little after sunset, the bell calls to public duty again, which is performed in the same manner as in the morning. After that they sup, and are attended to bed by one of their masters, who then pray with them, as they often do privately."
Such was its prosperous condition when the threat- ened invasion of the Spaniards, in 1742, nearly blasted these opening blossoms of future usefulness. Situated on the frontier of the Savannah settlement, at a distance from any fort, and with no means of self-defence, it was peculiarly exposed, and its occupants underwent many and painful trials of faith and patience. These are detailed by Habersham, (whom Whitefield had ap- pointed president,) in his letter to Governor Belcher, of Massachusetts, with much earnestness and minute- ness. The danger over, the exercises of the institution were resumed; but the depressed state of the colony, the wars and rumours of wars, the contentions of the magistrates, and the opposition which many of them showed to this institution, made its condition rather precarious, and, in the scriptural imagery which White- field loved to use, " the Orphan House, like the burning bush, has flourished unconsumed" amidst the fiery trials by which it was enveloped. "God willing," he exclaims, "I intend to carry on my design till I see the colony sink or swim." Indeed, his devotion to Bethesda was remarkably strong. "I think I could be
23
354
PARISH LIBRARY IN SAVANNAH.
sold a slave," he writes in one of his letters,26 "to serve the gallies, rather than you and my dear orphan family should want." Nor, while attentive to Bethesda, did he forget Savannah, but took every opportunity to minister there in sacred things, and diffuse among the sad-hearted and discontented people the soothing in- fluences of our holy religion.
Much, therefore, had been done for the spiritual benefit of the colony. Over £1,400 had been received by the Trustees to be applied to the support of mis- sionaries and catechists, and nearly £700 had been contributed towards building churches; but, with the exception of two small buildings at Ebenezer, none had been erected, though two had been contracted for; and religious services had been pretty constantly sustained at Savannah, Ebenezer, Frederica, and Darien.
Schools also had been established, both for Sunday and week days; and an attempt towards founding a parish library in Savannah was begun by the associates of Dr. Bray, who sent, June 2d, 1736, to Christ Church a parochial library, to which the Trustees added some few books, which were subsequently increased by the benefaction of the library of the Rev. Dr. Crow, late rector of St. Bartolph's, Bishopsgate, London. In one of the minutes of their proceedings,27 we find it ordered, that Plato's works, Greek and Latin, and his "Repub- lica," in French, be bought for the use of the mission in Georgia-a strange expenditure for such a colony ! for a Platonic Christianity is a refined deism; and a Platonized republic28 is but a body politic legalizing some of the most licentious crimes, and restricting some
26 Works, ii. 21.
28 Plato, De Repub., lib. v.
27 Minutes of Common Council, ii.
237.
355
NORRIS APPOINTED MISSIONARY.
of the surest sources of national wealth and glory. On the 28th of June, 1738, Rev. William Norris, who had been recommended to the "Society for Prop- agating the Gospel" by the Archbishop of Dublin and the Bishop of London, was appointed missionary at Savannah; the frequent absence of Whitefield render- ing such aid necessary.29 He arrived in Savannah on Sunday evening, October 15th, 1738, and appropriately began his ministry the following Lord's day by preach- ing a sermon from 1 John i. 5, 6, 7, which, says one of his hearers,30 " was a good practical discourse, such as every good man might improve by in making it a rule of life." He remained in Savannah until the beginning of November, 1739, not, however, without experiencing some of the opprobium and scandal which the more vile portion of the inhabitants cast upon all who ministered in the Gospel. On his return from Frederica, January, 10th, 1740, where he had spent two months, he met with Whitefield, who reached Savannah the day after, and who, showing his authority to resume his cure, began his duties there, Mr. Norris having been appointed minister of Frederica.
There was, however, but little harmony of feeling or sentiment between Whitefield and Norris. The tame and moralizing style of Norris's preaching did not suit the impetuous and zealous Whitefield; and as the theology of Norris was of the Tillotsonian school, White- field spared not in his almost rude anathemas. In March, Mr. Norris went to Frederica, where his life was made uncomfortable31 by the abusive treatment he met with
29 Journal of Trustees, ii.
kins's Mission of the Church of Eng- land, 100. Mr. Hawkins says Morris -it should be Norris ; he says 1740-
it should read 1738.
30 Stephens's Journal, i. 308.
31 Ib. iii. 141.
356
LEAVES GEORGIA.
from many of the young officers of Oglethorpe's regi- ment, who made it their pastime to ridicule him, until General Oglethorpe interposed and protected him. His conduct, indeed, as a man and a clergyman, was much impugned, and reports highly deleterious to his charac- ter were industriously circulated, and by a large party believed. Nor did his ultimate conduct tend to lessen the force of these reports ; even those who did not wish to believe all that was said against him, were compelled to shake their heads at the mention of his name, and indicate their fears by an expressive silence. He left Georgia, under a cloud, in the summer of 1741; and though he laid before the Venerable Society testimonials from high sources32 as to his blameless character, it is to be feared that there was too much occasion for some, at least, of the animadversions which were made upon him. During his ministry, he baptized one hundred and forty- two persons, of which number seventy-one were sol- diers. On his return to England, without waiting the leave of the Society, he addressed a long letter to the secretary of that body,33 setting forth his reasons for the course he had pursued. In this communication, he speaks in the severest terms of General Oglethorpe, saying, that "he not only several times seized and threatened to destroy me himself, but called, also, on others to fall on me, at a time when, by the most pressing invitations, under the sanction of friendship and colour of concern for the mal-treatment I had re- ceived from some of his officers and others, he drew me
32 Original Letters, Society for the This letter is in vol. iii., Original Let- Propagation of the Gospel, &c., vol. iii. Nos. 152, 154-6.
ters, Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, and is republished in "Church 33 Under date St. Martin's Street, Record," edited by Rev. Dr. Hawks, Leicester Fields, December 17th, 1741. i., No. 28, 293.
357
GIVES HIS REASONS FOR LEAVING.
to his apartments." He asserted that Oglethorpe, to show his contempt " of persons and things sacred," ap- pointed one of the " most profligate" soldiers "minister in his stead." "Being now," he writes, "declared degraded, and stripped of my gown, my fruitless appli- cations to justice, when I had been set upon and as- sailed by one Sinclair, when mobbed and abused by the General's servants, hunted and ferreted out of every house I lodged in by his officers, when my servants were seduced and detained from me, and frivolous prosecu- tions were made against me-these are the reasons which made my retreat from Georgia necessary. I con- tinued there till the laws of God and man were tram- pled on ; till vice got the victory, and was licensed by authority ; till my function and ministry was vilely treated, and virtue and innocence did but endanger me ; till it became a crime to entertain or converse with me, and everything dear to me was at stake. To greater provocations, or more perilous times than these, I am persuaded the Society would not expose me, nor have me wait for. My general silence on the injuries I received, and the temper with which I complained of them, did but give strength and confidence to the insolence I was treated with, and credit to their pre- tences for using me so."
But, on the other hand, it must be remembered, that if the crimes charged against Mr. Norris were true, such treatment was but the natural result of such grave offences. His testimonials of character from Georgia were signed mostly by the enemies of Oglethorpe, who gave them more to pique the general than to sustain the pastor. How far Oglethorpe was to blame is not known, as we have only the statement of Mr. Norris, which is, evidently, overcoloured by anger, and exag- gerated by revenge.
358
METCALF, ORTON, BOSOMWORTH APPOINTED.
Prior to the return of Norris, the Trustees, on the recommendation of Rev. Doctors Waterland and Hales, appointed the Rev. William Metcalf, of Lin- colnshire, missionary to Savannah; but though im- patiently expected at Savannah,34 he never reached there, as he died before entering upon his duties. The office vacated by his death was conferred, (July 25th, 1741,) upon the Rev. Christopher Orton, but his mission was soon terminated by his decease, which took place at Savannah in August, 1742. Their next appointment was one disastrous alike to the religious and political well-being of Georgia. It was that made on the 4th of July, 1743, when the Rev. Thomas Bosomworth was licensed to perform all religious and ecclesiastical offices in Georgia. He arrived in the colony in November, and soon proceeded to Frede- rica, "there being at that place and parts adjacent, near one thousand souls, (the regiment included,) des- titute of all manner of help and Christian knowledge, which I thought most immediately required my care."35 Here he officiated as the deputy of the Rev. Dr. Bur- ton, the chaplain of Oglethorpe's regiment, who held the office without performing its functions, deeming it more a place of honour than a post of duty. The ministerial services of Bosomworth were greatly in- terfered with by his unfortunate alliance with a Creek woman already noticed. He returned to England the following year, and wrote the Society, under date of 3d of September, 1745,36 a letter notifying them of his marriage, that vile means had been used to injure their reputation, and that the Indians had threatened to take
34 Stephens, iii. 160. pagation of the Gospel, &c., vi., No. 676.
35 Original Letters, Society for Pro-
36 Ib. No. 682.
359
SUCCEEDED BY ZOUBERBUHLER.
satisfaction in case justice was not done him. The Trustees revoked his clerical appointment, and sent over the Rev. Bartholomew Zouberbuhler as mission- ary to Savannah.37 This gentleman, originally from St. Gall, in Switzerland, emigrated while a youth to South Carolina, where his father was Swiss minister to the colony planted by Colonel Pury, at Purysburg. He received a good English and classical education at Charleston, and being desired by some of his country- men to become their minister, he went over to Eng- land, and at the recommendation of the Rev. Mr. Gar- den, the commissary of South Carolina, he was ordained deacon and priest, by the Bishop of London.38 A cir- cumstance which particularly recommended him to the Trust, was his ability to speak the French and German languages ; for the inhabitants of Vernonsburg, and villages adjacent, had in February, 1743, addressed a petition to the Trustees,39 " desiring a minister of Cal- vinistical principles to be sent to them," and recom- mended the Rev. John Joachim Zubli, of St. Gall, in Switzerland, as the person of their choice. The Trus- tees and Mr. Zubli could not agree upon proper terms, and the matter dropped ; but they were now pleased to have it in their power, while they supplied Savan- nah, to minister also to the spiritual wants of the sur- rounding villages. He sailed from England on the 4th of November, 1745, and reached Frederica on the 22d of January, 1746. He spoke English imperfectly, and his preaching was not well understood, yet the parish seemed to thrive under his labours. The peo- ple, he writes, were "in general religiously disposed,
37 Hawkins, 100, who writes his Georgia Trustees to the Venerable name erroneously Zouberbugler.
38 Memorial of the Secretary of the
Society. Original Letters, vi., No. 694. 39 Journal of Trustees, iii.
360
VISITS ENGLAND AND RETURNS.
but greatly divided by various opinions." The num- ber of those attached to the Church of England pre- vailed over the number connected with any other denomination ; but out of six hundred and thirteen inhabitants in Savannah, in 1748, three hundred and eighty-eight were dissenters.40 Zouberbuhler laboured diligently in his office under many discouragements, the number of communicants gradually increasing, and his usefulness daily acknowledged. At the expiration of three years he returned to England, "with ample testimonials of his good behaviour," and was warmly commended by the Earl of Shaftesbury to His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury.41 While in England he petitioned the Society for additional help; stating that " there are now about three thousand persons in Georgia, and no other minister of the Church of England in the province." He returned at the close of 1749, with recruited strength, and entered with renewed zeal upon his laborious duties. Up to this time, however, notwithstanding the frequent urgings of the Trustees, the church edifice was not completed, nor in a sufficient state of forwardness for occupation. It was begun on the 11th of June, 1740, " a few load of stones being brought and laid down in the place where it is intended to stand ;"42 but the war with the Spaniards, the low state of the colony, the want of zealous clergymen, and other minor causes, kept back its completion, so that six years after Stephens wrote that it was yet unfinished : " The roof of it is cov- ered with shingles, but as to the sides and ends of it, it remains a skeleton." 43 On reading this letter, the Trus-
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