USA > Georgia > Chatham County > Savannah > A history of Savannah and South Georgia, Volume I > Part 3
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Thackeray's visit and his account of city, 426
Thackeray, William M., 426
. Theatre described, 388
"The Republican and Savannah Evening Ledger," 314 "The Villas of the Ancients," 7
Thomas county. 322
Thomas, Daniel R., 642
Thomas, Edward J., 711
Thomas, James G .. 651
Thomas, Welcome H., 793
Thomasville. 522
Thompson, De Witt B .. 771
Thomson, Thomas F., 634
Thornton, George E., 1010
Thunderbolt. 199
Tiedeman, George W., 552 Tifton, 329
Tigner, Germaniens Y., 1025
Tigner, Wesley F., 1027
Tillman, Jerry D., 978
Timber Cutter's Bank, 478
Tinsley. Fleming D., 704
Tithings. 23. 28
Tomo-chi-chi, 31, 40; visit to England, 40; death of, 102; boulder in honor of. 312
Tomo-Chachi, Mico (portrait), 34 Toombs county, 524 Towns in Brooks county. 521
Towns in Toombs county, 524
Train, John K., 637
Travis, Robert J., 692
Trial of Wesley. 78
Trinity church, 495
Trosdal, Einar S .. 611
Troup, Governor, 427
Trustees against slavery. 67
Trustees for establishing the Colony of Georgia in America. 23
Trustees' garden, 63
Trustees' greetings to the Lower Creeks, 35 Tunno, Robert G .. 721
Turner county. - 523
Turner, Henry G., 1050
Turner, Lavinia M .. 1081
Two vessels escape to sea, 196
Union Society. 498
Union Station erected. 500
United Confederate Veterans, 488
United States Bank, 478
United States custom house, Savannah (view), 71
United States government takes Ogle- thorpe Barracks. 320
Unpleasant for royalists. 184
Unpopular colonial deputy, 65
Valdosta, 320 Varnedoe, James O., 781
Vashti industrial school, Thomasville (view), 524
Vidalia, 524 Vienna, 525
View Across the Square. Waycross, 520 Views-Old View of Savannah, 60;
United States Custom House. 71; Post- office. Americus, 127: Colquitt County Court House, Moultrie. 147; Agricul- tural School, Tifton. 187: Midway Church, erected in 1792. 262: City Ex- ehange, erected in 1799. 268; Glynn County Court House. Brunswick, 295; Scene in the Prison Park. Anderson- ville. 321; Historical Graves in Co- lonial Park, Savannah. 367; Beautiful Roads through the Pines, Tifton, 377; River Front. Savannah. 421; Governor Joseph E. Brown's Headquarters, 438: Carnegie Library. Americus, 444; Con- federate Monument. Savannah. 461; Naval Stores, Savannah, 474: Savan- nah Bank and Trust Company, 478; Cotton Yards and Docks, Savannah, 480: Telfair Academy of Arts and Sciences, 492: Chatham County Court House. 499; Government Building. Sa- vannah. 306: Jasper Springs, Savannah, 314; Chattahoochee in Harness, Co- Innbus, 517: View Across the Square, Waveross. 320; Postotlice and Court Ilonse, Valdosta, 321; Lowndes County
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INDEX
xxix
Court House, 522; Young's College, Showing Annex, Thomasville, 523; Vashti Industrial School. Thomasville, 524; Dodge County Court House. East- man, 326; Street Scene. Dublin, 327; Mansion at the Hermitage, Savannah, 528
Vigorous preparation for resisting Brit- ish attack. 279 .
Visit of Aaron Burr. 269
Visit of Ex-president Fillmore, 425
Visit of Ex-president Polk, 405
Visit of General Grant. 485
Visit of Jefferson Davis and his daugh- ter Winnie, 500
Visit of Monroe and Calhoun, 282
Wade, James D., Jr .. 1067
Wade, Peyton L., 789
Wade. William H., 5$1
Walker, John L., 887
Walker, William A., 972
Waller, Robert T., 628
War of 1812. 272, 274
Wards, 23, 28
WVards and tithings named, 23
Washington, George, 258
Washington Volunteers. 436
Washington's account of his southern tour, 262
Washington's visit to Savannah, 258 .
Waterworks. 392
Watkins, John E., 811
Wayeross, 519
Wayne, Anthony, 238. 247. 274
Wayne, Anthony, and his serviees, 247 Wayne, James M .. 449
Wayne. Richard, 427
Wayne's Georgia residence also short, 253
Wayne's terms for British evacuation, 238
Webb, John E., 954
Webb. William W .. 926
Webster, Daniel, eity's guest. 406
Weddington, Cornelins A .. 722
Welcome to Millard Fillmore, 410
Wellborn, Carlton J., 963
Wesley and his labors. 71
Wesley and Sophia (Hopkins) William- son, 75
Wesley, Charles, 70; departs for England, 82 Wesley. John, 70, 495, 498; tablet in honor of, 511
Wesley Monumental church, 495
Wesley's statement of the trouble, 76
Whaley, Ezekiel R., 808
Wheatly, John W., 1037
Wheatley, William II. C., 1038
Whitchard, James H .. 848
White. Erasmus D., 752
Whitefield, George, 68, 85. 93
Whitefield in favor of slavery, 68
Whitefield succeeds John Wesley, 84
Whitley, James, 1057
Whitney, Eli. 472
Whittle Francis M., 906
Wight, John B., 1034
Wileox county. 325
Wilcox, J. Mark. 739
Willett, Asahel A., 1034
Williams, Pratt A!, 898
Williamson, William W .. 659
Williford. Preston B., 925
Wilson. Horace E., 1048
Wilson, Joseph D .. 793
Wilson. William H., 839
Wimberly, Leon P., 779
Winfield Scott and David Porter, Savan- nah's Guests, 297
Woodmen of the World. 511
Woodward. Lucius L., 775
Wormsloe Quartos, 449
Worth county, 523
Wright dissolves assembly, 163
Wright forbids public meeting. 169
Wright goes to England and returns to Savannah, 199
Wright. James, 132, 145. 167. 231: fol- lows Ellis, 132: good traits, 145; alarm. 151; dilemma. 154: letter to British government, 184; pitiable mental eon- dition. 237
Wylly, Albert, 564
Yacht Wanderer. 429
Yellow fever epidemie, 1820, 289; 1854. 411 Yonng. Hubert O .. 645
Young Men's Benevolent 414 Association,
Young Men's Library Association, 431 Yonng. Silas M .. 756
Young's College, Showing Annex. Thon- asville (view), 523
Zeigler. Robert F .. 948 Zonberbuhler, Bartholomew, 133
History of Savannah and South Georgia
CHAPTER I
FOUNDING OF SAVANNAH
ORIGIN OF NAME-SAVANNAH TOWN FOUNDED-FORETHOUGHT OF OGLE- THORPE-HIS PRISON REFORM RECORD -- ORIGIN OF SAVANNAH.
When the illustrious founder of the Colony of Georgia set sail from England, had he chosen a name for the place he might select as the location of the first settlement of his people? This is an interesting question, and one very easily answered. IIe knew, of course, all about the boundaries of the territory described in the charter granted by George II to the Trustees, and that the said territory was "in that part of South Carolina, in America, which lies from the northern part of a stream or river there commonly called the Savannah," ete. The name Savannah, then, was not unknown to him, and it is a fact that he had determined, before leaving home, to name the capital of his colony after the stream which should thereafter separate Georgia from her friendly neighbor who willingly consented to the scheme so dear to the heart of that good man, now recognized as one of the foremost philan- thropists of the world. This is no mere conjecture therefore, as it is positively recorded, even before Oglethorpe left the shores of England, that the name of the first place to be settled was Savannah. The statement has been made, and is true, that he "marked ont the site of a town which, from the river which flowed by, he called Savannah." *
A little more than one month after the landing of the colonists, the South Carolina Gazette published an account of a visit made to the new settlement by some Carolinians, mentioning the arrival of the colonists "at Yamacraie,-a place so called by the Indians-but now Savannah in the Colony of Georgia." Judging from the language of all writers who have touched upon this point, it seems to have been the
* History of Georgia, by Chas. C. Jones, Jr., Vol. I, p. 11S.
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general opinion heretofore that Oglethorpe had found no name for the place until he began to build the town, but the truth of the matter, as divulged in the official records of the trustees, appears to have escaped the serutiny of them all. Fifteen days before Oglethorpe's departure from Gravesend, a meeting of the Trustees was held, when they "affix'd their seal to a Grant erecting a Court of Judicature for trying causes, as well criminal as eivil, in the town of Savannah. by the Name and Stile of the Town Court." (Colonial Records, edited by A. D. Candler, Vol. I. p. 83-Minutes of the Trustees, Nov. 2, 1732.) Again, the common council, on the 8th of November, 1732. ordered "That Mr. Oglethorpe do set out three hundred acres of land in Georgia in America to be appropriated for the use of the Church of the Town of Savannah and a site for the Church and the Minister's House in the Town and likewise a Burial Place at a proper Distance from the Town" (Candler's Colonial Records, Vol II, pp. 10-11) ; and that same body, on the 7th of November, 1732, took action "appointing Peter Gordon, William Waterland and Thomas Causton." Another item from the minutes of the trustees at a meeting held January 17, 1732-33, makes mention of the town, while the colonists were on their voyage, by ordering "That a letter be sent to Mr. Oglethorpe recommending Mr. Botham Squire to be settled in the Township of Savannah, under Mr. Christie's Grant, he paying the Expenses of his Passage himself."
ORIGIN OF NAME "SAVANNAH"
Seeing, then, that the name was chosen in advance of the coming to the territory to be occupied by the settlers, let us inquire how it came to be adopted. It was so called from the river Savannah; but how did that stream get its name? Hitherto there has been a ditfer- ence of opinion on that point, some holding that it is purely an Indian word, while others contend for a Spanish origin. Logan, in a foot- note on page 211 of Vol. I of his History of Upper South Carolina, makes this statement : "Isundiga was the Cherokee name for the ancient Keowee and Savannah. The present name of Savannah was derived from the Shawano or Savannah Indians. a warlike tribe that once lived on its western bank near the present site of Augusta. Some time after the settlement of South Carolina they removed be- yond the Ohio. Adair declares they were driven away by the foolish measures of the English."
SAVANNAH TOWN FOUNDED
The settlement mentioned in this extract was called Savannah Town, afterwards known as Fort Moore. For full information as to this matter the reader is referred to Vol. III, part II. of Collections of the Georgia Historical Society-" A Sketch of the Creek Country," by Benjamin Hawkins, pp. 16, 17, 21, 25, 34, 35 and 83.
Advocating its Spanish origin, the Hon. A. H. Chappell, in his "Miseellanies of Georgia" * says: "It is an interesting faet, refleet-
* Part I, p. 18.
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SAVANNAH AND SOUTHI GEORGIA
ing light on the first exploration of the State, and clearing up a part of its history otherwise so obscure, that so many of the Atlantic rivers of Georgia have the Spanish stamp on their names-as the St. Mary's, the Great and Little St. Illa, the Altamaha, and last, and, if possible, the plainest of all, the Savannah. For no one can ascend that stream from the sea, or stand on the edge of the bluff which the city occupies, or on the top of its ancient Exchange [now, alas! completely obliterated. and its site marked by the new City Hall] (which may fire and war, and tempest, and the tooth of time, and the felon hand of improvement long spare) and overlook the vast expanse of flat lands that spread ont on both sides of the river, forming in winter a dark, in summer a green, in autumn a saffron, contrast to its bright, interesting waters, without knowing at once that from these plains, these savannas, the river got its name, derived from the Spanish language and the Spanish word Sabana-and that it was baptized with the Christian. though not saintly, name it bears, by Spanish dis- coverers just as certainly as the great grassy plains in South America owed their names of savannas to the same national source."
It is undoubtedly true. and the statement is made by all the writers to this same effect. that Oglethorpe "marked out the site of the town which, from the river which flowed by, he called Savannah."# The question is happily settled by the Hon. Albert Gallatin, who, in "Archaeologia Americana Transactions and Collections of the Ameri- can Antiquarian Society." Vol. II, pp. 83-84, says: "In the year 1670, when English emigrants first settled in South Carolina, four tribes are mentioned near the seashore between the rivers Ashley and Savannah-the Stonoes. Edistoes, Westoes, and Savannahs. * * The name of Savannahs, most probably derived from that of the river on which they lived, and which is of Spanish origin, is there dropped."
FORETHOUGHT OF OGLETHORPE
It is hardly to be supposed that the founder of the eity left Eng- land without some definite plan for the laying out of the same. Gen. James Edward Oglethorpe was not that kind of a man. ITis purpose in providing a home for the unfortunates of a certain elass of his countrymen was made after a careful investigation of the eause of their condition, and the method of providing for their relief was carefully considered, so that when the time came to carry out his plan in that respect he was ready to answer satisfactorily any questions which might be put to him by skepties and to brush away all objee- tions which might be offered to his philanthropie scheme. So it was with every part of the intricate work which he set out to accomplish. When he set the colonists to work in building homes for themselves, after landing on Yamacraw bluff, those houses were built according to a well-prepared plan in the marking out of which he had spent many busy hours, and perhaps days. How can there be the slightest doubt of this in the mind of anyone who walks through the streets
* History of Georgia, by Chas. C. Jones, Jr., Vol. I, p. 118.
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and squares of the city which, unique under its systematic order of by-ways, lanes, and chain of parks, makes it so attractive to visitors from all parts of the world? There is no other city on the whole earth just like it, and the regularity of its lines and angles compels the wonder and admiration of everybody! Whence came the plan, and who suggested it to Oglethorpe? Some light may be thrown on this subject when we consider the first steps leading to the founding of Geor- gia and contemplate the life and education of one who, through what the world calls chance, crossed the pathway through life of the man we so much honor.
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The following endeavor to discover the source whenee the plan of the city was obtained is the substance of a paper read by the present writer before the Georgia Historical Society at a meeting held Sep- tember 7, 1885, entitled "A Suggestion as to the Origin of the Plan of Savannah."
OGLETHORPE'S PRISON REFORM RECORD
Entering parliament in the year 1722, and representing his con- stituents in that body for the long period of thirty-two years, Ogle-
JAMES EDWARD OGLETHORPE
thorpe's record there bears witness to the characteristic energy of the man in his efforts to secure the rights of the downtrodden and to lift up the fallen. In other ways. also, he faithfully performed the duties required of all who are chosen to make and uphold the laws of their country. From the beginning to the end of his life Oglethorpe was indeed, and in truth, a philanthropist. His attention was soon called to the shocking state of affairs in connection with the prisons of Eng- land, but especially to the treatment of that class of prisoners known as "honest debtors," that is, men who through misfortune could not
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meet their pecuniary obligations, and. in accordance with the then lawful custom, were sent by their creditors to prison in the hope that friends would provide the means to pay the debts of the creditors in order to secure the release of the latter. As the author of a motion "that an inquiry should be instituted into the state of the gaols of the metropolis," the motion having been carried, he was made the chair- man of a committee from the house of commons to investigate the methods of the prison keepers. The work of that committee in sernti- nizing the conduct of the most notorious of these inhuman wretches form the subject of one of best known and most touching of the pic- tures of the renowned artist. William Hogarth. Its title is " Examina- tion of Bambridge," and, as the mention of it in this chapter will be explained a little farther on, the description accompanying the en- graving of it in Hogarth's works, though rather lengthy, will not be out of place just here :
This very picture, Hogarth himself tells us, was painted in 1729 for Sir Archibald Grant, of Monnymusk. Bart., at that time Knight of the Shire for Aberdeen, and one of the committee represented in the painting; many of whom attended daily, and some of them twice a day. "That every other figure in the print is a genuine portrait there cannot be the least doubt; though at this distant period it is not possible to identify the particular persons, they are all, however, to be found in the following of the names of the committee:
"James Oglethorpe, Esq., Chairman.
THE RIGHT HON. THE LORDS :
FINCH, MORPETII, INCHEQUIN, PERCIVAL, LIMERICK. -
HON. JAMES BERTIE, SIR GREGORY PAGE, SIR ARCHIBALD GRANT,
SIR JAMES THORNHILL, GYLES EARLE, EsQ., GENERAL WADE, HUMPHREY PARSONS, ESQ.,
HON. ROBERT BYNG, EDWARD HOUGHTON, ESQ., Judge Advocate, SIR ROBERT SUTTON.
SIR ROBERT CLIFTON,
SIR ABRAHAM ELTON,
SIR EDWARD KNATCHBULL,
SIR HUMPHREY .HERRIES, CAPTAIN VERNON. CHARLES SELWYN, ESQ.,
VELTERS CORNWALL, ESQ., THOMAS SCAWEN, ESQ., FRANCIS CHILD, ESQ., WILLIAM HUCKS, ESQ.,
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.
STAMPE BROOKSHANKS, ESQ., CHARLES WITHERS, ESQ., JOHN LA ROCHE, ESQ., MR. THOMAS MARTIN.
" 'The scene,' says Mr. Walpole, 'is the Committee. On the table are the instruments of torture. A prisoner in rags, half starved, appears before them; the poor man has a good countenance, that adds to the interest. On the other hand is the inhuman Gaoler. It is the very figure that Salvator Rosa would have drawn for Iago in the moment of detec- tion. Villainy, fear and conscience, are mixed in yellow and livid on his countenance : his lips are contracted by tremor, his face advances as eager to lie, his legs step back as thinking to make his escape; one hand is thrust precipitately into his bosom, the fingers of the other are catch- ing uncertainly at his botton-holes. If this was a portrait it is the most striking that was ever drawn: if it was not. it is still finer.'
"This committee was first appointed February 25, 1728-9, to examine into the state of the Gaols within the Kingdom; and the persons here represented under examination were Thomas Bambridge, then warden of the Fleet prison, and John Huggins, his predecessor in that office. Both were declared 'notoriously guilty of great breaches of trust, ex- tortions, eruelties, and other high crimes and misdemeanors.' It was the unanimous resolution of the committee 'that Thomas Bambridge, the acting Warden of the Prison of the Fleet, hath wilfully permitted several debtors to the Crown in great sums of money as well as debtors to divers of His Majesty's subjects to escape; hath been guilty of the most notorious breaches of his trust, great extortions, and the highest erimes and misdemeanors in the execution of his said office ; and hath arbitrarily and unlawfully loaded with irons, put into dungeons, and destroyed prisoners for debt under his charge, treating them in the most barbarous and eruel manner in high violation and contempt of the Laws of this Kingdom.'
"Bambridge was in conseqnenee disqualified by Act of Parliament, and he cut his throat twenty years after.
"It was also resolved 'that John Huggins. Esq., late Warden of the Prison of the Fleet. did, during the time of his wardenship, wilfully permit several considerable debtors in his custody to escape; and was notoriously guilty of great breaches of trust, extortions, cruelties, and other high erimes and misdemeanors, in the excention of the said office ;' and he was for some time committed to Newgate, but afterwards lived in credit to the age of ninety."
Let this fact not slip the attention of the reader: that several of the members of this committee were afterwards associated with Oglethorpe as trustees named in the charter of the Colony of Georgia.
Dr. Thaddeus Mason Harris * asserts that the attention of Oglethorpe was first attracted to the prison conditions of England by the case of Sir William Rich, Baronet. It is certain that General Oglethorpe mm- bered among his friends Robert Castell, whose life was in some' respects
"Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe, " pp. 10 and 340.
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remarkable, and whose maltreatment at the hands of the same Bam- bridge, while a prisoner in the Fleet, is thus told by Robert Wright, in his "Life of Oglethorpe :'
"Though born to a competent estate, he became involved in debt and was arrested. Castell was first carried to a sponging-house attached. to the Fleet prison and kept by one Corbett, an underling of the warden. On giving security by virtue of presents,' as they were called, to the latter whose name was Thomas Bambridge, he ob- tained the liberty of the rules, but at length becoming no longer able to gratify the warden's appetite for refreshers, that insatiate officer ordered him to be recommitted to Corbett's, where the small-pox then raged ! Poor Castell having informed Bambridge that he had never had that disease, and was in great dread of it, earnestly implored to be sent to some other sponging-house, or even into the jail itself. But though the monster's own subordinates were moved to compassion, and endeavored to dissuade him from his purpose, he forced his unhappy prisoner into the infected house, where he caught the small-pox, of which he died after a few days, leaving a large family in the greatest distress, and with his last breath charging Bambridge as his murderer." It is asserted that Bambridge was twice tried for the murder of Castell, but was acquitted.
ORIGIN OF SAVANNAH
Just here we find the turning point in the life of Oglethorpe which led him into an investigation of the treatment of prisoners by their custodians and culminating in the founding of Georgia, and the building of the city which was the landing-place of the first colonists under his leadership. It was Castell's case that directed his mind to introduce his resolution in the House of Commons. In the year 1728, Robert Castell, a skilful architect, published a sumptuous work called "The Villas of the Ancients," richly illustrated, and containing matter certainly of interest, and very probably of utility to one who might have in view the founding of a town or planning the laying out of pleasure grounds. The author, in his preface, says: "The whole work consists of three parts. The first contains the description of a Villa Urbana, or country house of retirement near the city, that was supplied with most of the necessaries of life from a neighboring market town. The second sets forth the rules that were necessary to be ob- served by an architect who had the liberty to choose a situation and to make a proper distribution of all things in and about the villa; but particularly with relation to the farm house, which in this sort of build- ings, according to the more aneient Roman manner, was always joined to the master's honse, or but very little removed from it. In the third part is shown the description of another Villa Urbana on a situation very different from the former, with the farm house and appurtenances so far removed as to be no annoyance to it, and at the same time so near as to furnish it conveniently with all necessaries." It was usual at that time for books of an expensive sort to be sold by subscription, and a list of the subscribers was printed as an appendix to the work. The list so
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added to this publication shows that James Oglethorpe subscribed for two copies. His friendship for the author is thus shown, as well as in his visits to the author-prisoner in his confinement within the walls of the Fleet. Who can say what suggestions presented in that volunne were adopted by Oglethorpe in his plan of Savannah, or to what extent he was indebted to the author, either in conversation or in written eom- munication, for the same purpose? May not the bond of friendship which impelled the noble philanthropist to visit in prison the unfortu- nate artist, leading the former to plan an asyhim of refuge for "many of his Majesty's poor subjeets who through misfortunes and want of employment were reduced to great necessities" #. have also led him to take advice from one of these "poor subjects," well-equipped for the work, in so important a matter ?
Thus far, by way of introduction, an attempt has been made to ac- count for the name of the city whose history we are considering, and to show, by way of suggestion only, the probable source whenee Oglethorpe aequired and finally developed the general plan of the first settlement of his followers. having, to some extent, at least, an idea of its future growth in beauty and importance among the great cities of the world both from a commercial standpoint and otherwise. These two points have received our special attention here, for the reason that former writers have, whether through lack of knowledge or failure to see their importance, passed them by in silence.
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