Georgia (British colony)

“ In a certain sense, Georgia may be included among the "company colonies." It was, however, originally conceived by the moving spirit, James Oglethorpe, as an asylum for poor men, especially those imprisoned for debt. To realize this humane purpose, he secured from King George II, in 1732, a royal charter uniting several gentlemen, including himself, into "one body politic and corporate," known as the "Trustees for establishing the colony of Georgia in America." ”

“ His plan was to have them released, provided they would emigrate to America. Others aided him, and in 1732 a company was incorporated and given the land between the Savannah and Altamaha rivers from their mouths to their sources, and thence across the continent to the Pacific. The new colony was called Georgia, in honor of King George II.
The site of the new colony was chosen in order that Georgia might occupy and hold some disputed territory, [17] and serve as a "buffer colony" to protect Charleston from attacks by the Spaniards and the Indians. ”

“ They are impowered to collect benefactions ; and lay them out in cloathing, arming, sending over, and supporting colonies of the poor, whether subjects or foreigners, in Georgia. And his Majesty farther grants all his lands between the rivers Savannah and Alatamaha, which he erects into a Province by the name of Georgia, unto the Trustees, in trust for the poor, and for the better support of the Colony. ”

“ The apparent tardiness and hesitancy on the part of the Colony of Georgia in casting her lot with her Sister Colonies at the inception of those movements which culminated in a declaration of independence, may be excused or accounted for when we remember that she was the youngest and the least prepared of all the Colonies, and recall the fact that Schovilites, leagued with Indians, were scourging her borders and awakening in the breasts even of the most patriotic and daring, gravest apprehensions for the safety of their wives and children. ”

“ The settlement of Georgia, in 1732, completed the southern line of colonization toward the Piedmont. Among the objects of the colony, as specified in the charters, were the relief of the poor and the protection of the frontiers. To guard against the tendency to engross the lands in great estates, already so clearly revealed in the older colonies, the Georgia trustees provided that the grants of fifty acres should not be alienated or divided, but should pass to the male heirs and revert to the trustees in case heirs were lacking. ”

“ Thus was Georgia colonised and defended; and when its founder and preserver, James Oglethorpe, approached his ninetieth year, he was able to look back to a good work, to a flourishing state—the boundaries of which he extended and established, and the spiritual and material life of which he was the founder, so that it well merited the praise that was given to it in England—“never has a colony been founded on a more true or more humane plan.” ”

“ The two volumes thus far issued embrace the aboriginal epoch, a narrative of discovery and early exploration, schemes of colonization, the settlement under Oglethorpe, and the life of the province under the guidance of the Trustees, under the control of the President and Assistants, under the supervision of royal governors, and during the Revolutionary War. They conclude with the erection of Georgia into an independent State. All available sources of information have been utilized. The two concluding volumes, which will deal with Georgia as a Commonwealth, are in course of preparation. ”

“ Georgia was made a crown colony, and a representative government was introduced simultaneously with negro slavery and Jamaica rum. 336
The social condition of colonial Georgia does not present many distinctive or striking features. In 1770 the population numbered about 50,000, of which perhaps one half were slaves. There was no town life. Rice and indigo were the principal crops, and there was a large export of lumber. Near Savannah there were a few extensive plantations, with fine houses, after the Virginia pattern ”

“ They are not peculiar in being slave colonies; there is no colony North or South in which slaves are not held under sanction of law. Georgia, in its early years, is to have the solitary honor of being an antislavery and prohibitionist colony. But the four earlier Southern colonies are unlike their Northern neighbors in this, that the institution of slavery dominates their whole social life. The unit of the social organism is not the town, for there are no towns; it is the plantation. ”

“ Our stock of cattle is pretty considerable, and appear to be in a flourishing condition. And, when once I am clear from all arrears, the Orphan-house will be supported at a very easy expence. The last parliament resolved to support the colony of Georgia: they have altered the constitution in two material points; they have allowed the importation of rum, and free titles to the lands. And if they should see good hereafter to grant a limited use of negroes, it must certainly, in all outward appearance, be as flourishing a colony as South-Carolina. ”

“ Mr. Oglethorpe, in a contemporaneous publication, [41] had [47] assigned, among the weightiest reasons for founding the Colony, the ample opportunity which would be afforded in Georgia for persons reduced to poverty at home and constituting a positive charge upon the Nation, to be made happy and prosperous abroad and profitable to England. The conversion of the Indians, the confirmation of the development and security of Carolina, and a lucrative trade in silk, rice, cotton, wine, indigo, grain, and lumber, were enumerated as additional inducements to the enterprize. ”

“ Instead of selling land to speculators, they wanted to keep it for themselves and children, or at least to get something like its real value.
The cotton gin had increased not only the demand for negro slaves, but also the demand for land; and indirectly it was the cause of the various troubles the State had with the Indians after the close of the War for Independence. The troubles with the Indians also led finally to serious misunderstandings between the United States Government and that of Georgia. In May, 1796, a treaty was made between the United States and the Creeks. ”

“ The Colonization of Georgia.—The country between the Savannah River and the St. John’s River in Florida, was claimed by the English; and when the Carolinas became royal provinces, this region was reserved as crown land. It soon attracted the attention of a noble-minded Englishman, James Oglethorpe. [46] He conceived the idea that it would be an excellent place in which to establish a colony to be composed of such persons as needed a new chance in life after having been released from the then crowded debtor prisons of England. ”

“ So that now the unfortunate will not be obliged to bind themselves to a long servitude to pay for their passage; for they may be carried gratis into a land of liberty and plenty, where they immediately find themselves in possession of a competent estate, in a happier climate than they knew before; and they are unfortunate, indeed, if here they cannot forget their sorrow." [79]
Subsidiary to this it was designed to make Georgia a silk, wine, oil and drug-growing colony. ”

“ But after the representation and memorial from the legislature of Carolina reached Britain, the nation considered Georgia to be of the utmost importance to the British settlements in America, and began to make still more vigorous efforts for its speedy population. The first embarkations of poor people from England, being collected from towns and cities, were found equally idle and useless members of society abroad, as they had been at home. An hardy and bold race of man, inured to rural labour and fatigue, they were persuaded would be much better adapted both for cultivation and defence. ”

“ Against the miasmatic influences of the swamps, Spanish perils, the hostility of the Aborigines, and the poverty and sometimes narrow mindedness of the Trust, did the Colonists grievously struggle in asserting their dominion over the untamed lands from the Savannah to the Alatamaha. Nothing indicates so surely the vicissitudes and the mistakes encountered during that primal period of development, as the Dead Towns of Georgia. ”

“ He can bring light out of darkness, and cause the barren wilderness to smile. This I trust will be verified in Georgia. Thanks be to God, that the time for favouring that Colony seems to be come. I think now is the season for us to exert our utmost for the good of the poor Ethiopians. We are told, that even they are soon to stretch out their hands unto God. And who knows but their being settled in Georgia, may be over-ruled for this great end? ”

“ The Spaniards regarded with a jealous eye the confirmation of this new English colony upon the borders of Florida. Moved by urgent memorials on the subject, Parliament granted £26,000 for “the settling, fortifying, and defending” Georgia. Their treasury being thus replenished, and anxious to enlist colonists of acknowledged strength and valor, the Trustees, through Lieutenant Hugh Mackay, recruited among the Highlands of Scotland one hundred and thirty men, with fifty women and children. They were all of excellent character, and were carefully selected for their military qualities. ”

“ And whereas we think it highly becoming our crown and royal dignity, to protect all our loving subjects, be they ever so distant from us; to extend our fatherly compassion even to the meanest and most unfortunate of our people, and to relieve the wants of our above mentioned poor subjects; and that it will be highly conducive for accomplishing those ends, that a regular colony of the said poor people be settled and established in the southern territories of Carolina. ”

“ To provide somewhere a refuge for the poor of England, and the distressed Protestants of other countries, the commission appealed to George II. for the privilege of planting a colony of such persons in America. A charter was issued giving the desired territory to a corporation, for twenty-one years, to be held in trust for the poor. In honor of the king the new province was named Georgia. The high-souled philanthropist who initiated and went steadily forward in this enterprise was James Oglethorpe. ”

“ Those who know them best have declared in a thousand ways that they never found in the red men any solid substantial, or agreeable quality. They were brave, but so is a bulldog.
There is no wonder that Georgia wanted to get rid of them as neighbors. The people showed their anxiety in this matter when, in 1802, they conveyed to the United States Government all the valuable lands that now form the States of Alabama and Mississippi; the consideration being that the General Government would secure from the Indians, and open up to settlement, the lands which they then held in the State. ”

“ North of the Creeks, Broad River being the dividing line, lived the Cherokees, a nation even more warlike than the Creeks. The impression made upon the Indians by Oglethorpe and some of his more prudent successors, made them the strong friends of the British. Of course, the red men were unable to appreciate the merits of the quarrel between the Georgia settlers and King George: but, even if matters had been different, they would probably have remained on friendly terms with the Royalists ”

“ All nations preserve traces of their origin, and receive a certain stamp from the men and the circumstances which determine the character of their youthful minds. This is quite natural. And it is easy to see a cause for the more free and fresh spirit which prevails in Georgia if we reflect upon the character of the first founder of the State, James Oglethorpe, and the colony which grew up under his protection. ”

“ That they needed all they had, for that they were becoming more and more agricultural, and progressing in civilization. One would have thought this not only a sufficient but a most satisfactory plea to a great nation by its people; but no, Georgia ceded to Congress territories for the formation of two new states, Alabama and Mississippi, and Georgia in part of payment receives the much desired lands of the Cherokees. ”

“ In 1808 the Cherokees asked the United States to allow them to examine the public land west of the Mississippi, and, if pleased, to settle on it. Permission was given, and the Cherokees sent a party to explore the lands. The country suited them so well that many of the Indians emigrated at once. The General Government thus had an opportunity to carry out the contract of 1802, but failed to do so. It had another opportunity in 1814, when the conquered Creeks sued for peace. The General Government had the right to demand of them the cession of the land they occupied in Georgia. ”

“ Many of them were lawless men, and continually harassed the colonists of South Georgia. They joined the British and Indians, and made plundering expeditions, sweeping down on the defenseless people, burning the houses, ruining the fields, and committing the most atrocious crimes.
Up to this time, Georgia had often sent food supplies to her countrymen in the north, but now food became so [63] scarce that the governor forbade the exportation of any kind of provisions.
Colonel Brown, who vowed to wreak vengeance on every American citizen, now fulfilled his vow to the uttermost. ”

“ The colony of Georgia owed its existence to James Oglethorpe, who, after serving a short time in the army, became a Member of Parliament and was placed upon a Parliamentary Committee to inquire into the state of the prisons, at that time conducted on barbarous lines. What he then learnt led Oglethorpe to propose the formation of a colony where [Pg 157] men might honestly work and better their position instead of pining away in the horrible debtors' gaols. ”