A history of Savannah and South Georgia, Volume II, Part 77

Author: Harden, William, 1844-1936
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1208

USA > Georgia > Chatham County > Savannah > A history of Savannah and South Georgia, Volume II > Part 77

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In 1872. Reverend Hurst settled at Cairo. He was one of the first settlers at the little town which then consisted in a business aspect of three stores, kept in log houses. He bought six hundred and fifty acres of land. including the ground on which the present magnificent courthouse now stands. He built a house upon the very site ocenpied by the courthouse, and made his home there for about seven years. He then built another honse a quarter mile east of the station and lived there until 1913. since which time he has come into town.

Reverend IInrst was married on May 6. 1851. to Ellen J. Ramsey. She was born in Americus, and was a daughter of William F. and Flora J. MePherson Ramsey. Her death occurred in 1911 on the twenty-ninth of November. The nine children in the family of Reverend Hurst are named: Charlie, Emma, William E .. Joshua Thomas. Sarah J .. James E., Tra L .. Carrie Belle and George W. Reverend Hurst served as worshipful master of his Masonie lodge until his ministerial duties com- pelled him to resign. He still has his heart in his religions work, and as strength permits employs it for the service of the Lord.

HORACE EMMET WILSON. A prominent member of the Savannah bar is Horace Emmet Wilson. He was born in Effingham county. Geor-

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gia, the son of Stephen A. and Tabitha A. ( Edwards) Wilson. The sub- jeet's great-grandfather, James Wilson, came from North Carolina to Georgia immediately after the Revolutionary war. He was the holder of land grants in Effingham and Wilkes counties. He was a Continental soldier in the Revolution and the records show quite clearly that he had the rank of captain.

Elihu Wilson, grandfather of Horace Emmet Wilson, was born in Effingham county, where he resided until his death. His son, Stephen A. Wilson, lived in the same county, and was ever loyal to the institutions of the South. He served in the army of the Confederacy throughout the war between the states. in which serviee he attained the rank of captain of Company I of the Forty-seventh Georgia Infantry. Captain Wilson was by oceupation a merchant and farmer.

Mr. Wilson, the subject of this brief record, was reared in Effingham county where he received his preliminary education. He graduated from the North Georgia Agricultural College with the class of 1880. and in the fall of the same year located in Savannah. Later he matriculated at the University of Virginia and graduated from the law department in the class of 1885, in which year he returned to this eity and began the practice of the law. In 1893 he formed a eopartnership with James M. Rogers, his brother-in-law, under the firm name of Wilson & Wilson. and this copartnership has continued until the present time. Mr. Wilson is interested in publie affairs, and has been an alderman, city attorney and captain in Savannah Volunteer Guards. He married Miss Tallulah (Lula) Rogers, a native of this city, and from this union a son, Rogers Murchison Wilson, has been born.

ROBERT MARK HITCH, of the Savannah bar. was born at Morven. Brooks county, Georgia. on February 14, 1872, the fourth son and sixth child of Dr. Robert Marcus Hitch and his wife Martha Serena ( Fall) Hitch. He was edueated at the Morven Academy and at Mereer Uni- versity, graduating at the latter institution with the degrees of Bachelor of Arts in the class of 1892; studied law under private instructors at Quitman, Georgia, was admitted to practice in the Superior courts of this state by Judge A. H. Hansell. at Thomasville, Georgia, November 3, 1892, practiced law at Quitman for the next several months, and in June, 1893, moved to Savannah, where he has since resided and prac- ticed his profession.

At the present time (1913) Morven is the junetion point to two local lines of railroad. In 1872, however, and for a mimber of years there- after, it was the country place of Dr. Hitch, at which was located the local postoffice. voting place and general store, a cotton gin, lumber plant and other establishments of minor importance. Near at hand was the publie school and in the immediate neighborhood were Methodist. Baptist and Presbyterian churches and a Masonie lodge. From this point radiated several of the most important public roads of the county and the surrounding territory was inhabited by an unusually thrifty and intelligent class of farmers. Dr. Hitch was prominent in the community as a physician, merchant, farmer and business man, was active in church and educational matters and in all movements of public inter- est. He was born in Laurens county, South Carolina, on June with. 1832. graduated at the Augusta Medical College, was married to Martha Si. rena Fall, danghter of Dr. Calvin JJ. Fall. in Fayette county, Georgia, April 27th. 1859, at which time he was a practicing physician of that section. At the outbreak of the Civil war he was active in the organi- zation of a military company in Henry, Fayette and adjoining counties; which afterwards became Company B of the Thirtieth Cirurgia Regi.

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ment. A history of that command has been recently written and pub- lished by one of its members, Mr. A. P. Adamson. Dr. Hitch served as captain of that company during a large part of the war and participated in numerous battles, including the battle of Chickamaugua and the bat- tles around Atlanta. Ilis services as a surgeon were necessarily required very frequently following engagements in which his command took part and during the latter part of the war he was detailed as regimental sur- geon for a considerable part of the time and at the close of the war was mustered out with the rank of major. In commemoration of his services as a Confederate soldier, his son and namesake, the subject of this sketch, was awarded a Confederate Cross of Honor by the Savannah Daughters of the Confederacy on April 26th, 1912. He died at his home at Morven, Georgia, on April 15th, 18SS, as the result of constitu- tional infirmities growing out of exposures to which he was subjected during the war.

The parents of Dr. Hitch were William Winder Hitch and his wife Nancy ( Hunter) Hitch, both of Laurens county, South Carolina. Wil- liam Winder Hitch was the son and oldest child of John Hitch. who was born February 4, 1773. in Somerset county, Maryland, lived there until he was of age, then moved to Laurens county, South Carolina, where he married Katharine Hanna, who became the mother of William Winder Hitch and a number of other children. John Hitch was county treasurer of Laurens county, South Carolina, for twenty years and over, and was well known in that section. He was a son of Louther Hitch, of Somer- set county, Maryland. who moved to Laurens county, South Carolina, in his latter years and died there at the age of eighty-eight. The Revolu- tionary annals of Maryland disclose the names of nine members of the Hitch family on the muster rolls of that commonwealth, including Lou- ther Hiteh and Captain Robert HFitch. Several members of the Hana family in South Carolina were likewise enrolled in the Revolutionary commands of that state. The Christian name of Robert has been handed down through many generations of the Hitch family and recurs with great regularity in the family records in England, particularly in the public records of Yorkshire, Gloucestershire, Berkshire, Worcestershire, Oxfordshire and Bedfordshire, where various branches of the family have resided for several centuries.

On the maternal side the grandparents of Robert M. Hitch were Dr. Calvin Jones Fall, born in Jasper county, Georgia, March 18, 1815. died at Senoia, Georgia. April 10. 1879, and his wife Sarah Battle ( Stroud) Fall, born in Clarke county, Georgia, September 21, 1818, died at Senora, Georgia, January 10, 1891. Dr. Fall and his wife were married in Clarke county, Georgia, November 21, 1839, by Dr. Alonzo Church, at that time president of the State University. Dr. Calvin JJ. Fall was a son of Dr. John Strader Fall, born in Guilford county, North Carolina. July 22, 1777, and his wife, Martha ( Barnett) Fall, born in Mecklenburg, North Carolina, July 19. 1780. Their marriage took place on October 27, 1812. Dr. John Strader Fall lived for a great many years at Decatur, Georgia, died May 3, 1863, and. is buried at Fayetteville, Georgia. Mar- tha Barnett Fall died February 19, 1851. and is buried at Decatur. Geor- gia. Apparently the Fall family were of Scottish origin. Dunbar. Seot- land, according to the best information, being the central point of the family in the old country. The Strond line appears to be purely Eng- lish, the family records indicating that the earliest settlers in America of that name came to this country shortly after the great civil conflict which grew out of the struggle between Charles I and the Parliament, and were either descended from or closely related to William Strond. of the English House of Commons, who with Hampden, Pym. Holles

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and Heselrig constituted the celebrated "Five Members" who led the anti-royalist forces in resisting the eneroachments of the Crown. Sarah Battle Stroud, who became the wife of Dr. Calvin JJ. Fall, was a daugh- ter of William Sirond, who was born in North Carolina and reared in Hancock county. Georgia, and of his wife Serena Ragan Battle, who was a daughter of William Sumuer Battle, of Hancock county. Georgia. but who was originally from North Carolina. William Stroud was a son of Mark Strond and Martha ( Strother) Stroud, of Orange county, North Carolina, and Mark Stroud was a son of John Stroud and Sarah ( Cou- nelly) Stroud. The Strouds. Strothers and Battles came to North Caro- lina from Virginia and were all of Revolutionary stock. William Sum- ner Battle was a member of the noted family of that name, which ap- pears to have been originally of Norman-French origin, and which in both England and America claims among its numbers a numerous and distinguished array of scholars, ministers, lawyers and statesmen. At the present time the family is most numerous in Virginia, North Caro- lina and Georgia, but various branches of it have achieved distinction in munerous other states North, as well as South. Eight generations of that family are buried in Hancock county, Georgia.

During the year or two immediately prior to his matriculation at Mercer University, Robert M. Hiteh was fortunate in having as his in- struetor Professor Howe, a graduate of Brown University .. Rhode Island. and a pure and noble type of Christian gentleman. Being a man of genial, gentle and kindly manners, superior mental endowments. wide reading and profound scholarship, the impression which he made upou his pupils was naturally of a most lasting and elevating nature. Euter- ing the freshman class at Mercer University in January, 1889, and being compelled to leave college in March, 1890, on account of illness, the record made by Mr. Hitch in the first two years of his college career was somewhat irregular. He secured a sophomore speaker's place. but was unable to take part in the speakers' contest at commencement because of illness. In his junior and senior years, however, he improved his reeord by making the highest average standing in his elass. In his junior year he also won the medal for oratory and was one of the cham- pion debaters of the Phi Delta Literary Society at commencement. In his senior year he was elected anniversary speaker for his society.

The first two years of his professional life in Savannah he spent in the offices of Garrard. Meldrim and Newman, where he received splen- did instruction under capable lawyers who enjoyed a large and varied practice. In the fall of 1896 he opened law offices on his own account and practiced alone until January, 1898. At that time he formed a co- partnership with the late A. L. Alexander. under the firm name of Alex- ander & Hitch. That co-partnership was continued until March. 1904. and at that time he entered into his present co-partnership with Dr. Remer L. Denmark, under the firm name of Hitch & Denmark.

Mr. Hitch was admitted to the Supreme Court of Georgia on Decem- ber 15, 1897 : to the United States Cirenit and Distriet Courts on Febru- ary 11, 1895; to the United States Circuit Court of Appeals on Angust S. 1901 ; and to the Supreme Court of the United States on January 31, 1908. Ile is a member of the American Bar Association and of the Georgia Bar Association. Mr. Hitch is a hard worker, a constant stu- dent, and a wide reader. He is general counsel and a director of a mm- ber of railroad and banking institutions and commercial corporations, some of state and some of national importance, besides representing a large miscellaneons clientage.

For several years Mr. Hitch was prominent in local military organ- izations. He first enlisted as a private in June, 1892, in the Quitman

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Grays, of Quitman, Georgia, remaining as such until his removal in the following year to Savannah. In January, 1894, he enlisted as a private in Company A of the Savannah Volunteer Guards and was pro- moted to the rank of corporal on November 7, 1894. Later he was ap- pointed sergeant. Upon the outbreak of the Spanish-American war he promptly volunteered and was largely instrumental in persuading the majority of his company to enlist in a body. The Savannah Volunteer 'Guards became merged with the Second Georgia Regiment, and Mr. Hitch served in the same as a member of Company M. first as a private and later as sergeant. Ile was stationed with the Second Georgia Regi- ment at Tampa, Florida. and at Huntsville, Alabama, and was honor- ably discharged from service at the latter named station after the sign- ing of the peace protocol by the two countries. On December 28, 1898, he was elected second lieutenant of Company A, Savannah Volunteer Guards, and served as such until June 8, 1900. During this term of service he was for several months recorder of the military examining board and from April 24, 1903, until October 24, 1904, he was captain of the Oglethorpe Light Infantry. .

Mr. Hitch was a member of the state legislature from Chatham county in the years 1900 and 1901, and as such gave excellent repre- sentation to his constituents. He was a presidential elector from Geor- gia on the national Democratic ticket in 1908, and he is and has been a prominent and active figure in polities and public life.

Mr. Hitch is widely known as an orator and speaker, and is fre- quently sought for alumni addresses, club and social banquets and anni- versaries, college and high school commencements, etc. Some of his addresses have been of a serious and thoughtful nature. discussing vital questions, and have been printed for general distribution by the several organizations before whom they were delivered. Among these may be mentioned his address on "The Power of Thought," the alumni address at Mercer University. in Macon. on June 1, 1909; the address on "Geor- gia Secession Convention of 1861 and its Causes," delivered before Francis S. Bartow Camp, United Sons of Confederate Veterans, Sa- vannah, January 21, 1903; and the address delivered at Midway, Liberty county, Georgia. April 29th, 1904, upon the occasion of the marking of certain graves of Confederate soldiers by Liberty Chapter, Daughters of the Confederacy.

Mr. Hitch is a member of a number of clubs and societies. He is past chancellor commander and a charter member of Chivalry lodge, Knights of Pythias, and a member of Live Oak lodge, Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Ile is a past master of Ancient Landmark lodge, A. F. & A. M. He was twice master of this lodge and at the end of his second term was presented by the lodge with a beautiful past-master's jewel. He is a Royal Arch Mason, a Knight Templar, a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and a Shriner.

Mr. Hitch was married at Cedar Spring. Spartanburg county, South Carolina. November 20. 1900. to Miss Virginia Eppes Walker, the young- est child and only daughter of Dr. Newton F. Walker, L. L. D., and his wife Virginia ( Eppes) Walker, of Cedar Spring. On both paternal and maternal sides Mrs. Hitch is related to a number of the leading families of South Carolina and Virginia. They have two children : Virginia Eppes and Robert M., Jr. In 1911 Mr. Hitch completed a handsome home on the southwest corner of Estill and Atlantie avenues, in Savannah, where he has since resided.

DANIEL FREDERICK DAVENPORT. Prominent among the successful business men of Sumter county is Daniel Frederick Davenport. for

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many years one of the leading druggists of Americus, where he is at the present time, in 1913. engaged in the insurance and real estate business. Ile was born in Ameriens, a son of Colonel Walter Davenport, a pioneer settler of this part of Georgia, and comes of Revolutionary stock, and of substantial Virginian ancestry. His grandfather. Ilon. Thomas Davenport. and his great-grandfather Davenport were both life-long residents of Virginia. His great-grandfather. a soldier in the Revolu- tionary army, took part in several engagements of the war, and on one occasion, when pursued by the British made his escape by running into a swamp. and burying himself, all but his head. in the mnd. For ser- vices rendered during the struggle for independence he received from the United States government a grant of land .. and though he seenred a tract of land in Georgia, he never assumed its possession.

Hon. Thomas Davenport. whose birth occurred in Halifax county. Virginia, became one of the largest landholders and tobacco raisers of that county, owning a large plantation, which he operated with slave labor. A man of strong personality, sound judgment and great inthi- ence, he was prominent in public life, and was tive times honored with an election to Congress, in which he served acceptably for ten years. He married and reared three children, two sous, George and Walter, and a daughter.

Walter Davenport was born in 1817. at Halifax Court House, Vir- ginia, and in his native state received a liberal education. Beginning his active career as an educator, he taught school for a few years, both in Virginia and in Tennessee. Coming to Georgia in 1842, he located in Sumter county, which was then in a state of comparative wildness. deer, wolves, bears, and other wild beasts of the forest being plentiful. often terrorizing the few inhabitants of that locality. There were at that time no railways, and all goods were transported by teams from either Macon or Savannah, the round trip to and from those places con- suming several days, and being especially hard when the roads were in a bad condition. Settling in Americus, then a mere hamlet, he was first engaged in the dry goods trade, and later in the hardware business. At the outbreak of the war between the states, he recruited a regiment, of which he was commissioned colonel, but having been appointed tithing agent he did not go to the front. Soon after the close of the conflict. Colonel Davenport established an insurance business, now conducted by two of his sons, and continued a resident of Ameriens until his death, in 1910, at the venerable age of ninety-three years.

Colonel Davenport married Mary Frederick, a native of Orange- burg. Sonth Carolina. Her father. Daniel Frederick, was born, reared, and married in South Carolina. Subsequently coming with his family to Georgia. he purchased a plantation in Houston county, and operated it successfully, with the help of slaves for a few years. Selling that prop- erty, he bought land in Macon county, and there lived until his death. when upward of eighty years of age. His wife, whose maiden name was Caroline Rmnph. died at the age of four score years. They reared a family of six children. as follows : Elvira : Ann ; Olivia ; Mary, who mar- ried Colonel Davenport ; Clara : and James D .. who served as a major in the Confederate service. Colonel Davenport's wife died several years before he did, passing away in May, 1892. They were the parents of nine children, as follows: Florence, wife of Benjamin P. Hollis; Vir- ginia. wife of A. W. Smith : Fanny, wife of Dupont Guerry : James .1 .. of whom a brief personal sketch may be found on another page of this work : Addie, who married D. J. Baldwin : Anna. a twin sister of Addie. married Thomas Dickson: Daniel Frederick, the subject of this brief sketch : Thomas Edwin ; and Leila, wife of Lawrence Stapleton.

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After leaving the public schools of Ameriens, Daniel F. Davenport further advanced his edneation by an attendance in an academy, and at the Agricultural and Mechanical College in Auburn, Alabama. On returning home, he became associated with his father and brother in the drug business, with which he was connected for twenty-eight consecu- tive years, having built np a large and lucrative patronage in that line. In 1910 Mr. Davenport embarked in the real estate, and the life and acci- dent insurance business. in company with his brother, JJames A: Daven- port. and in his undertakings is meeting with good success.

On November 21. 1890, Mr. Davenport was united in marriage with Miss Leila Crisp, who was born in Ellaville, Georgia, a daughter of Honorable Charles F. and Clara ( Burden) Crisp, of whom a brief ac- count may be found elsewhere in this volume. Mr. and Mrs. Davenport have two children, namely: Clara Belle, and Mary Ella. Both Mr. and Mrs. Davenport are members of the Methodist Episcopal church. Mr. Davenport is a member of the college fraternity, Sigma Phi Epsilon; and also belongs to the Woodmen of the World; and to the Patriotic Order Sons of America.

EUGENIUS A. NISBIT, attorney and prominent eitizen of Albany, Geor- gia, was born in Macon. on September 20, 1861. ITe is the son of James G. Nisbit, born in Madison county, on February 20, 1828, and his wife, Mary Winfield, born in Eatonton on August 18. 1837. The father en- listed in the Jacksonville Artillery and served three months. He was later appointed judge of inferior court of Maeon. James G. Nishit was the son of Engenius A. Nisbit, the first, who was at one time judge of the superior court of Atlanta.

Eugenius A. Nisbit, of this brief review. was edueated in Macon high school and Mereer College, graduating from the latter in 1880. He then engaged in railroad business and came to Americus with the old S. M. Railroad. IIe read law in the meantime, and in 1897 was admitted to the bar, sinee which time he has given his entire attention to the legal profession. In 1910 he was elected to the legislature by the Democratic party, to which he gives his political allegiance.

Mr. Nishit is a Mason of the Royal Arch degree. and has twiee been master of the blue lodge. IIe is a member of the Presbyterian church, and is not married.

JOHN BERON WIGHT, proprietor of Pecan Grove farm. nursery and orchard at Cairo has been a man of much prominence, and among the pioneers in the agricultural development of this state. He was one of the very first, some twenty-five years ago, to undertake pecan culture on a commercial basis. His accomplishments as a successful grower of pe- cans are now known all over the southeastern states. He has had a career of varied and valiable service. . Mr. Wight was born at Sofkee. in Decatur (now Grady) county. September 28, 1859.

His early life was spent during the decade of the Civil war and re- construction. From the mural schools he entered Emory College, gradu- ating with the degree of A. B. in 1881. For a brief while he taught in Sofkee: then in 1882 entered Vanderbilt University at Nashville, and spent two years preparing for the Methodist ministry, graduating from that institution in 1884. In the meantime he taught a year and a half at Cairo, and in December, 1886, joined the South Georgia Conference and served conseentively the Trinity eirenit, Darien Station, and the Eden eirenit. In 1888 he was chosen principal of the Macon District High School at Snow. He was there for one year, and then taught as principal of the Cairo high school for eight years.

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The professions of teacher and minister were not to keep him per- manently from his career as an agriculturist and pomologist. While at work in the school room he had become interested in farming and fruit growing. In 1887 he planted his first nuts for the cultivation of pecans on a commercial seale, and his first peean grove was among the pioneer groves in Georgia. In a paper read by Mr. Wight before the American Pomological Society, February 11, 1911, he gave the productive records of a tree. a budded Frotscher, which had been set at his home in Cairo in January, 1892. Mr. Wight explained that it was an ex- ceptional tree, by situation and care bestowed upon it, but its production is not less interesting as showing the possibilities of Georgia pecan eul -. ture. The first pound of nuts was gathered in 1897. In the ten year period from 1903 to 1912 inelusive, the average production of the single tree was one hundred and sixty-seven pounds, the largest seasonal yield, 352 pounds, being produced in 1909. The average value of the crop during the last five years has been one hundred dollars. The last three paragraphs of Mr. Wight's paper deserve quotation :- " The bugbear of overproduction has been haunting some who are afraid that more nuts will be produced than can be profitably marketed. With a product as nutritious and palatable as pecans, this generation nor the next will ever see a glut in the pecan market. As nuts become more plentiful, and consequently cheaper in price, there will not only be more consumed but those who are already eating them will use more. Furthermore, they will be introduced into the markets of the world, and hundreds of mil- lions of people will be consuming them where there are now only mil- lions. Our physicians and scientists are telling us that if more nuts and fruits were eaten and less meats, that we would be healthier, and if healthier, then happier. Pecans are getting to be more and more a staple produet. Future generations may see over-production; but when that far distant time is reached, wheat will be a glut in the market, and porterhouse steak will go begging for a buyer.

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A history of Savannah and South Georgia, Volume II, Part 77

Author: Harden, William, 1844-1936 Publication date: 1913 Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1208

Author: Harden, William, 1844-1936
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: Chicago, Lewis Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1208