Memoirs of Georgia; containing historical accounts of the state's civil, military, industrial and professional interests, and personal sketches of many of its people. Vol. I, Part 22

Author:
Publication date: 1859
Publisher: Atlanta, Ga., The Southern historicl association
Number of Pages: 1294

USA > Georgia > Memoirs of Georgia; containing historical accounts of the state's civil, military, industrial and professional interests, and personal sketches of many of its people. Vol. I > Part 22

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CULTIVATION OF SILK.

In 1732 the colonists in Liberty county grew fine crops of rice, corn, peas, pota- toes, pumpkins, cabbage and indigo. Silk culture attracted considerable attention in South Carolina, and on Jan. 31, 1732, Sir Thomas Lambe certified that the silk produced in South Carolina possessed as much natural strength and beauty as the silk of Italy. Gen. James Edward Oglethorpe estimated that the cost of the produc- tion of silk in Georgia was twenty-five per cent. lower than in Piedmont. All seemed to agree in the belief that the production of silk was important to be considered and fostered. The production of raw silk was then begun in Georgia under flattering auspices. It became the fashion, and in 1735, upon the king's birthday, the queen illustrated the royal approval of the industry by appearing in a full robe of Georgia

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silk. In 1739 Samuel Auspourquer carried the raw silk from Georgia to England and it was pronounced by John Zachary, an eminent raw silk merchant, and Mr. Booth, the great silk-weaver, to be as fine as Italian silk, and worth twenty shillings per pound. At New Ebenezer, in 1741, twenty girls made seventeen pounds of cocoons, which sold in Savannah for eight pounds three shillings. In 1747, 800 pounds of cocoons were raised in Georgia, of which one-half was raised in Eben- ezer. In 1750, 1,000 pounds of cocoons and seventy-four pounds two ounces of raw silk were sold in Ebenezer for f110 sterling. In 1764, 5,514 pounds of cocoons were delivered in Savannah. In his official account of the reasons for establishing the colony of Georgia, the secretary of the board of trustees says: "The Italian, French, Dutch, Indian and China silks, imported, thrown and wrought only, may, on the most moderate computation, be reckoned to cost us £500,000 sterling per annum, which may all be saved by raising the raw silk in Georgia. The saving of this £500,000 sterling per annum is not all, but our supplying ourselves with raw silk from Georgia carries this further advantage along with it, that it will provide new or additional employment for at least 20,000 people in Georgia for about four months in the year during the silk season and 20,000 more people of our own poor here all the year round in working the raw silk."

Gen. Oglethorpe in his "new and accurate account" of the colony, says: "We shall be the market for great quantities of raw silk, perhaps for wine, oil, cotton, drugs, dyeing stuffs and many other lesser commodities. It must be a weak hand indeed that cannot earn bread where silk worms and white mulberry trees are so plenty. In Georgia the working hand will have the benefit of all his labor." He was very enthusiastic in his description of the climate, soil, productions and beauties of Georgia. To give an idea of the general climate he quoted the following lines as applicable:

"The kind Spring which but salutes us here, Inhabits there, and courts them all the year; Ripe fruits and blossoms on the same trees live, At once they promise, when at once they give. So sweet the air, so moderate the clime, None sickly lives, or dies before his time. Heaven, sure, has kept this spot of earth uncursed, To show how all things were created first."

Lucerne was planted in Frederica in 1735. Indigo was planted on Bermuda, now known as Colonel's island, and its culture was profitable until the invention of the cotton gin in 1792 stimulated the culture of cotton and consequently the culture of indigo was abandoned. The Salzburgers at Ebenezer, in 1738, made a limited experiment in growing cotton. The yield was abundant and the quality excellent, but at that time the trustees of the colony favored silk and wine, and did not give any encouragement to the culture of cotton. In 1749 the principal exports were pitch, tar, rice, deerskins and indigo. History is silent as to the individual who first introduced the seeds of the cotton plant into America. In 1736 cotton was cultivated as an object of horticulture in Talbot county, Md. The earliest and most decided proof of the practicability of raising cotton crops to advantage was first received in a letter from Mr. Leake of Georgia, to Gen. Thomas Proctor of Philadelphia.

THE SOILS OF GEORGIA.

The cession of a large part of her territory to the Federal government by Georgia left her in a compact form, strictly a southern state. Georgia lies between thirty degrees, twenty-one minutes, thirty-nine seconds and thirty-five degrees north lati-

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tude; her northern boundary is south of the lowest parallel of Europe-thirty-six degrees. The variety of soil and climate in Georgia makes the cultivation of almost any product a possibility. Georgia is essentially agricultural, but her resources are so abundant that she may be considered a variety state. Artificial agricultural progress is of very slow growth. Experiment and demonstration must precede development. Agricultural progress has been slow in Georgia, and necessarily slow when all its environments are considered. In considering the lines of progress in agriculture the quality and character of the soil is a factor worthy of attention, and in that consideration the geological formations of the state present themselves in the following order:

The Metamorphic, representing the archaean of middle and northern Georgia; the Paleozoic, in the Silurian, Devonian and the Carboniferous of northwest Georgia; the Cretaceous, lying south and east of Columbus, on the western bound- ary of the state, representing Mesozoic; the Tertiary and Quaternary of southern Georgia, representing the Cenozoic.

Middle and Northeast Georgia .- The Metamorphic covers the larger part of the agricultural divisions of middle and northeast Georgia. The southern limit of its exposure may be correctly defined by a line drawn on the map of the state from Augusta through Milledgeville and Macon to Columbus. North of this, with the exception of the ten counties of northwest Georgia, the formation covers all the country. Approached from south Georgia the change is from a rolling region of sandy lands to one of a more broken character, with a rocky or gravelly surface; from pine lands to lands covered with a growth of oak and hickory. In ap- proaching it from northwest Georgia there is a change from a region of parallel valleys and ridges that are usually continuous for long distances, to a generally broken country-from a limestone to a freestone. The topography is that of a broken region. The country gradually rises toward the north and is generally hilly, with few elevations rising to the proportions of mountains in middle Georgia, but becoming quite mountainous in some parts of north Georgia. The country rises to the very general level of 2,000 feet above the sea near the northern line of the state, with mountains from 3,000 to 5,000 feet. The soils of this division are red, sandy and clayey ; gray, sandy and gravelly, and granitic lands.

Under the designation of red lands are included both red, sandy and clayey soils, from whatever source they may be derived. The color and character of the soil are as varying as is the proportion of hornblende and associated minerals in the rock. The surface of the country occupied by these red lands is rolling or undu- lating, and often somewhat hilly, there being but few level areas, and then not in very large tracts. Very little is too broken for cultivation. The red lands are usually sandy for a depth of several inches and hence are rather easily cultivated, especially in dry weather. Decayed vegetation frequently gives to them a dark, "black" surface, but the subsoils and underclays are very red. The latter being in place and derived from the disintegrated and decomposed rocks, are variegated, showing different colored strata. They are generally difficult to till in wet weather, being sticky, and in dry seasons are very hard and compact. Except perhaps in southern counties these red clay lands are considered best for small grain, es- pecially oats, as they are cold and their cotton crops are late in maturing. A large portion, probably one-third of these lands under cultivation, is devoted to cotton. The disintegration of the quartz, feldspar and mica of the gray gneiss rocks produce a loose, sandy, gray soil, more or less clayey, and covered or mixed with gravel and loose quartz rock. The subsoil is usually a yellowish clay. The surface of the country covered by the gray lands is always more or less rolling and hilly, but has broad, level areas either on the ridges or in the valleys. The slopes of the

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ridges are so gradual as not to interfere with their successful cultivation, excepting of course in the more mountainous districts. Their light, sandy nature makes them very liable, when opened up to cultivation, to wash into gullies and flood the low- lands with sand. There is comparatively little of the gray lands too broken for cul- tivation outside of the Blue Ridge mountain region. The soils are coarse, gray and sandy, frequently colored dark for an inch or two with decayed vegetation, are more or less gravelly, from three to twelve inches deep and have a yellow, clayey subsoil. From this intermixture of the soil and subsoil in cultivation a yellow mulatto soil is obtained.

Of the gray lands under cultivation, from one-half to two-thirds is devoted to the culture of cotton. Though these lands are said to produce late crops of cot- ton, they are preferred to the red clays as being more productive and because they enable the stalk to stand the drought better. They are also easy to till, and a larger area can be cultivated than of the red lands with the same labor. Fresh lands yield from 500 to 700 pounds of seed cotton per acre, as do also old lands by the aid of fertilizers; without fertilizers the latter yield 250 or 300 pounds of seed cotton per acre. Large and small areas of gray, sandy soils, having out-cropping, under- lying granite rocks, are found in many counties of the Metamorphic region, but chiefly in the southern half and cover about 2,600 square miles. The surface of the country is generally rolling and broken, with sharply-defined and rounded hills in localities which have the granite boulders or rounded masses, and broad, level areas when only the flat rock underlies the land. The soil is often a coarse, gray or gravelly sand from three to six inches deep, with a subsoil of yellow or red clay more or less sandy, or sometimes a whitish, impervious clay. The soils are cold, but are easily tilled and well adapted to cotton culture. About two per cent. of the entire granite lands of the state are untillable, either from their broken character or because of the exposure of the granite or its near approach to the surface. The yield per acre on these lands is about 800 pounds of seed cotton when fresh and un- manured. Cultivation reduces the yield to 350 pounds of seed cotton per acre. A notable feature in the soils of the granite region is the increase of both potash and lime over that of other Metamorphic soils, both derived doubtless from the feld- spars of the granite.

In the high and mountainous districts of the Blue Ridge region, especially in Towns and Rabun counties, there is comparatively a small amount of the land suitable for tillage. The farms are small and are found principally along the water courses. In the entire group of ten counties the average of land under cultivation is only seventy-nine acres per square mile. The lands have a dark or red loam soil, very rich and durable; those of the Little Tennessee valley in Rabun county being especially noted for fertility and excellence; but in those counties which lie chiefly outside, or south and west of the mountains, the lands are gray, sandy and gravelly, with a yellow or red clay subsoil. Cotton is not cultivated because of the distance from market, want of transportation facilities, severe climate and short seasons. In the counties of Franklin, Hart, Madison, Banks, Hall, Forsyth, Cherokee and Pickens, south of the Blue Ridge counties, the acreage in cultivation is about thirty-eight per cent.

The lands north of the Chattahoochee river on the northeast have almost en- tirely gray, sandy soils with but few strips of red clay. The subsoils are almost universally clays. The yield per acre with fair cultivation is: Corn, twenty bushels; wheat, fifteen bushels; oats, twenty-five bushels; hay, two to three tons; sorghum syrup, seventy-five gallons. Tobacco, buckwheat and German millet can be grown with great success. The fruits adapted to this section are the apple, pear, cherry, grape, plum, peach, raspberry and strawberry. In that part of the

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Metamorphic region geographically called "Middle Georgia," cotton, corn, oats, wheat, all the grains and grasses and tobacco can be grown successfully. This division was settled after the coast country and has long been the most populous section of the state. The exhaustion of the soil by injudicious culture has reduced the yield, and the yield of the ordinary crops per acre is: Corn, twelve bushels; wheat, eight bushels; oats, twenty-five bushels; barley, thirty bushels; rye, eight bushels; sweet potatoes, one hundred bushels. In the northern counties, near the Blue Ridge, the acreage in cotton is naturally small. Southward the acreage increases rapidly, until it reaches the percentage of the total area of ten or fifteen per cent. on the east and fifteen to twenty per cent on the west, with Clayton, Pike and Troup above twenty per cent.

The Central Cotton Belt .- There are three distinct belts within the central cotton belt, differing very widely from each other. These are: First, the sand hills and pine belt on the north and bordering the Metamorphic region of the state; its sands also extending northward and covering some of its rocks. Second, the red hills adjoining the first belt on the south. Third, the sandy loam upland with clay subsoils, forming a transition belt from the red hills to the sandy wiregrass region of the south and gradually falling in elevation from the hills to the level lands of the latter.

The northern limit of the sand and pine hill belt extends from a very few miles north of Augusta and Thomson, a few miles south of Warrenton and Sparta, to Milledgeville, Macon, Knoxville, Geneva and Columbus, at which point the Metamorphic rocks are found outcropping in the beds of the streams, while the sand hills extend northward a short distance along the uplands. The southern limit is defined by the somewhat abrupt clay hills along its border. The area embraced in the sand hills is about 2,950 square miles. Its width varies greatly, but is great- est on the east and west, about twenty-five miles from each of the large boundary rivers. Between the Ogeechee and the Flint rivers it is rather narrow, but widens to the west to twenty-five miles or more in the counties of Marion and Taylor. On the Chattahoochee river its southern limit is near the mouth of Upatoi creek. The surface of the country embraced in this belt is high and rolling, and especially is this the case near its northern limit, where the altitude is from 500 to 600 feet above the sea and sometimes 100 feet or more above the metamorphic region adjoining. Southward the country falls to the foot of the line of red hills, which often rise abruptly from its limit. In other localities, as between the Flint and the Ocmulgee rivers, the lower part of the belt presents a broad plateau which gradually declines southward. In the western portion of the belt the transition of the red hills is gradual. The country is hilly and broken, with a height of from 100 to 150 feet above the streams, and is interspersed with deep gullies formed by the washing away of clays and sands. The lands of the sand hill region have a soil of white sand from six to twelve inches deep, and usually a sandy subsoil underlaid by variegated clays, and are not very productive except where fresh or highly fertilized. The yield of cotton after a few years of cultivation will not exceed 300 pounds of seed cotton per acre. The red hills region is characterized by a high, rolling or broken and well-timbered surface, covered with deep red clay lands, more or less sandy. The red lands are very generally associated with siliceous shell rocks and friable ferruginous sandstones, and are found in isolated areas over the entire yellow loam region. The beds have a thickness of sixty feet at Shell bluff on the Savannah river and fifty feet at Fort Gaines on the Chatta- hoochee, but between these two points they thin out to ten or twenty feet as they approach the central Atlantic and gulf-water divide.

The lands of these red and clay hills are usually somewhat sandy and have a

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depth of from twelve to twenty-four inches in the eastern counties and from six to twelve inches in the others. The subsoil is a heavy clay loam, deeper in color than the soil and more clayey, which sometimes overlies a variegated and plastic pipe- clay. The lands of this belt lying on the Savannah and Flint rivers are the best of this region, and not only occur in large areas, but are more productive and durable and easily tilled. The subsoil is stiff and tenacious and hard to break up. The lands yield from 800 to 1,000 pounds of seed cotton per acre when fresh, and 500 pounds after a few years' cultivation. After being in cultivation fifty years it yields 300 pounds per acre. These lands are preferred for small grain.

The yellow loam region forms a belt across the state between the Savannah and Chattahoochee rivers, and extends in width from the sand hills south to the pine barrens and wiregrass region. Its width varies greatly. Between the Savannah and the Ocmulgee it is narrow and confined almost entirely to the country south of the red hills from fifteen to twenty-five miles. Westward to the Flint river it is wider, and in Houston county the lands are found north of the red hills. On the west the area widens still more, one narrow belt extending southwest to Albany, while the lower limit of the rest of the region extends to the Alabama line, a few miles north of Fort Gaines, and the northern passes west to the Alabama line at the mouth of Upatoi creek. The entire area embraced by the yellow loam region, including the red hills, is about 6,650 square miles. The soils of the eastern part of the belt are gray and sandy, except on the immediate surface, where they are dark from decayed vegetation. Black, brown and yellow ferruginous gravel is abundant in some of the counties on the surface and mixed with the soil. The subsoil, at a depth of from three to nine inches from the surface, is either a yellow clay loam or yellow sand. Lands having the latter are poor and unproductive, except for a year or two, and the use of fertilizers is almost a necessity. The growth is almost exclusively the long-leaf pine. The better class of soils, with their clay subsoils and a mixed growth of long-leaf pine, oak and hickory, are easy to cultivate and well drained, and yield an average of 500 pounds of seed cotton per acre when fresh and 250 to 300 pounds after a cultivation of ten years. The upper counties, and those along the Chattahoochee river as far south as Clay county, are hilly and usually covered with a heavy deposit of sand. Underneath the sandy soil are the red and yellow clays over variegated and joint clays with cretaceous marls.

Southern Oak, Hickory and Pine Region .- The area embraced in this region is 2,317 square miles, comprising portions of the counties of Brooks, Decatur and Thomas, lying along and near the Florida line. The country for the most part is high and rolling, and is about 75 feet above the wiregrass country on the north or 130 feet above the river. It presents a bolder front to that region in Decatur county than in the other counties; the ascent from a point seven miles south of Bainbridge thence eastward to near Attapulgas and north- ward to Climax being quite abrupt. Eastward it gradually assumes the wire- grass feature and the line of separation is not so well marked. The surface of the country for the most part is very open, with a tall timber growth of long pine. The soil is very generally sandy, from six to twelve inches deep, with mostly a clayey subsoil, underlaid by white limestone. A peculiar feature of this region is the presence of a red clay loam in localities where the timber growth is oak and hickory. The yield is from 600 to 800 pounds of seed cotton per acre after four years' culti- vation.

Lowlands of the Central Belt .- The bottoms and hammocks of the streams and gallberry flats comprise the lowlands of the central belt. The bottoms of the larger streams are usually liable to yearly overflows and are, there-

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fore, but little in cultivation. Their width varies from 209 to 1,500 yards and even more in the sharp bends of the streams. The soil is a dark loam, more or less sandy, red in some of the streams and from one foot to six feet deep to a tenacious pipe-clay. On the Chattahoochee river there is but little bottom land proper, the uplands approaching to the water's edge and forming bluffs. Corn and oats are the chief crops, as cotton crops on all of the bottom lands are liable to injury from early frosts and rust. The gallberry flats are lowlands along the very small streams which have a light sandy soil and a dense growth of gallberry bushes about three feet high and a large growth of cassine and a few cypress. They are somewhat marshy and are not cultivated. The hammocks, or second bottoms of the larger streams, are very extensive. They are very level and have a growth similar to the bottoms. The soil is richi, sandy loam from twelve to twenty-four inches deep, with much decayed vegetation, and is considered the most productive lands of the belt. When fresh the hammocks yield 1,400 pounds of seed cotton per acre, and after cultivation for a few years from 800 to 1,000 pounds. Heavy clay underlies these lands, and as they are cold and ill-drained, they are not consid- ered the best for cotton, as that crop is liable to injury from early frosts and rust.

The alluvial lands of the Savannah river are very level and wide. The soil is fine, brown loam mixed with scales of mica, is from two to three feet deep, with a putty-like, tenacious pipe-clay which is hard to till and breaks up in clods. These lands are well adapted to cotton, corn and grain. On fresh land the yield is 1,500 pounds of seed cotton per acre, and after a few years' cultivation 1,000 pounds. Along the Chattahoochee river, south from Columbus to Georgetown, there are many level valleys of open prairie occupying a position similar to the second bot- toms of the other streams, higher but without their growth. In Muscogee county these valleys are very broad and open, and have a very fine, sandy, loam soil from five to twelve inches deep and a heavy clay subsoil. In the counties south, where the blue clay marls approach near the surface these prairie valleys are richer, the soil being darker and more tenacious. The sand and red clays of the adjoining hills enter more or less into its composition. In the southwestern part of Stewart county this valley is two or more miles wide. These lands when fresh yield from 800 to 1,200 pounds of seed cotton per acre, and after ten years of tillage from 600 to 800 pounds.

Long-Leaf Pine and Wiregrass Region .-- The region of the long-leaf pine and wiregrass covers a large portion of southern Georgia, south of the oak and hickory pine lands of the central cotton belt, extending from the Savannah river on the east to the Chattahoochee on the west, including in its area eighteen whole counties and large parts of others. The entire region is, as it were, a vast plain nearly level, except in the north, and covered with a growth of long- leaf pine. The surface of the upper and western portions of this region is some- what undulating, with a few long ridges or hills, and is elevated from twenty-five to fifty, or even seventy-five feet above the streams and from 200 to 500 feet above the sea.

The Lime-Sink Region .- The lime-sink region lies chiefly on the west of the Atlantic and the gulf-water divide. The soft limestone underlying this section, instead of sandstone, is accompanied on the surface and sometimes in beds, by masses of a siliceous and aluminous and often flinty shell-rock. The eastern limit is marked by a line of low ridges branching off southward from the main divide and separating the water of the Allapaha and Withlacoochee rivers from those of the Flint river. This line passes through the eastern side of Worth and Colquitt counties and southeastward into Brooks and Lowndes. The region embraces 7,020 square miles and includes the following counties and parts of coun-

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ties: Screven, except a strip along the eastern and northern side of the county; the lower part of Burke, the upper part of Bulloch, all of Miller, Mitchell, Colquitt and Worth; the southern part of Pulaski, Dougherty, Baker and Early; the northern part of Decatur, Thomas, Brooks and Lowndes; the eastern part of Dooly, Lee and Dougherty and the western part of Irwin, Berrien, Dodge and Wilcox. This is a better cotton-producing region than the pine barrens, and Decatur county was at one time the banner county in total production. Four per cent. of the land is irreclaimable swamp and twenty-six per cent. of the remainder has been cleared. The uplands, with their long-leaf pine and wiregrass, have a gray, sandy soil, which is from six to twelve inches deep and a red or yellow, sandy clay subsoil, and con- tains some ferruginous gravel. These lands are not as productive or as durable as in other sections and the country is so sparsely settled that the farms are located on the better classes of land. At first these lands yield from 500 to 800 pounds of seed cotton per acre, but after cultivation for eight or ten years without fertilizers the yield is reduced to 350 or 500 pounds. The bottom lands lying along the rivers and hammocks of the creeks have a dark, loamy soil with a clay subsoil at the depth of from ten to twenty inches. They are very durable and yield when fresh from 800 to 1,000 pounds of seed cotton per acre, and nearly the same after several years of cultivation.

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Memoirs of Georgia; containing historical accounts of the state's civil, military, industrial and professional interests, and personal sketches of many of its people. Vol. I, Part 22

Author: Publication date: 1859 Publisher: Atlanta, Ga., The Southern historicl association Number of Pages: 1294

Author:
Publication date: 1859
Publisher: Atlanta, Ga., The Southern historicl association
Number of Pages: 1294