When Dr. Jacob Rhett Motte arrived at Franklinville, GA in the fall of 1836, he became perhaps the first surgeon in Lowndes County, GA, which then encompassed a vast area including most of present day Lowndes, Berrien, Brooks, Cook, Lanier and Echols counties. Motte was the first of the medical men anywhere in the vicinity of the pioneer homesteaders at the settlement now known as Ray City, GA. Dr. Motte, a U.S. Army surgeon detailed to serve under the command of Major Greenleaf Dearborn, had come to Franklinville, GA at the onset of the Second Seminole War.

1836 map showing relative location of Franklinville, Camp Townsend, Camp Clyatt, Squire Swilley’s, Warner’s Ferry and other locations. Source: A Journey into Wilderness

While encamped at Camp Townsend, Lowndes County, GA in 1836, Dr. Jacob Rhett Motte recorded many details of local folk life, which continued despite the threat of Indian attacks. In the fall of 1836 Dr. Motte  and Major Thomas Staniford were invited to a log rolling event held at the home of an unnamed Lowndes County resident.

A log rolling. Pioneers clearing the land.

Log Rolling was, according to Ward’s History of Coffee County, GA,

When a farmer decided to clear up a piece of land he split every tree on the land that would split into fence rails. The logs that would not split were cut up into pieces twelve or fifteen feet long to be burned at some convenient time in the fall or winter. The farmer gave a “log rolling, quilting and a frolic.” The neighbors were invited to a big dinner and a “log rolling.” The wives and daughters came to sew and to quilt.

As with many southern narratives, historical accounts of log rollings tend to ignore the role of enslaved African-Americans in the settlement of the southern frontier. Dr. Motte’s journal does not acknowledge the presence of slaves.  But slave narratives from Alabama recorded by the Works Project Administration relate, “When they had a log rolling on a plantation, the Negroes from the neighboring plantations came and worked together until all the jobs were completed.” After the log rolling the slaves were given “molasses to make candy and have a big folic.” For slaves, log rolling:

“was great times, cause if some of the neighboring plantations wanted to get up a house, they would invite all the slaves, men and women to come with their masters. The women would help with the cooking and you may be sure they had something to cook. They would kill a cow, or three or four hogs, and then have peas, cabbage, and everything that grows on the farm. And if there was any meat or food left they would give that to the slaves to take home, and just before dark the overseer or Ol’ Master would give the slaves all the whiskey they wanted to drink. Sometimes after the days work, they would have a frolic, such as dancing, and old time games.“

Cordelia Thomas, born into slavery on a Georgia plantation, shared the following memories of log rolling:

On our place they spent about two whole days cookin’ and gittin’ ready. Master asked everybody from far and nigh, and they always come ’cause they know he was going to give ’em a good old time. The way they rolled them logs was a sight, and the more good corn liquor Master passed ’round, the faster them logs rolled. Come night time, Master had a big bonfire built up and set lots of pitch-pine torches ’round so as there would be plenty of light for ’em to see how to eat that fine supper what had done been set out for ’em. After supper, they danced nigh all the rest of the night. Mammy used to tell us ’bout the frolics next day, ’cause us children was made to go to bed at sundown.

Irving Lowery, born into slavery on Puddin Swamp plantation, South Carolina, described the significance of log rolling in slave life:

A day was set on which the log-rolling was to take place, and then invitations were sent out to the neighboring planters, and each sent a hand. This work was returned when the others had their log-rolling. A log-rolling always meant a good dinner of the best, and lots of fun, as well as a testing of manhood. This testing of manhood was something that everybody was interested in. The masters were concerned, and consequently they selected and sent to the log-rolling their ablest-bodied men; the slave women were concerned: for they wanted their husbands and sweethearts to be considered the best men of the community. Then, too, the men took great pride in the development of their muscles. They took delight in rolling up their shirt sleeves, and displaying the largeness of their arms. In some cases, their muscles presented the appearance of John L. Sullivan–the American pugilist.

The woodlands of the South were covered with a variety of trees and undergrowth. Among the trees, were to be found the majestic pine, the sturdy oak, the sweet maple, the lovely dogwood, and the fruitful and useful hickory. When a piece of woodland was cleared up, and made ready for planting, it was called “new ground.” In clearing up new ground, the undergrowth was grubbed up and burned; the oaks, maples, dogwood, and hickories were cut down, split up, and hauled to the house for firewood; and the pines were belted or cut round, and left to die. After these pines had died and partially decayed, the winter’s storms, from year to year, would blow them down: hence the necessity for the annual log-rolling. These log-rollings usually took place in the spring of the year. They formed an important part of the preparations for the new crop.

On the appointed day, the hands came together at the yard, and all necessary arrangements were made, the most important of which was the pairing or matching of the men for the day’s work. In doing this, regard was had to the height and weight of the men. They were to lift in pairs, therefore, it was necessary that they should be as nearly the same height and weight as possible. The logs have all been cut about twenty feet in length, and several good, strong hand sticks have been made. Now, everything is ready, and away to the fields they go. See them as they put six hand-sticks under a great big log. This means twelve men–one at each end of the hand-stick. It is going to be a mighty testing of manhood. Every man is ordered to his place. The captain gives the order, “Ready,” and every man bows to his burden, with one hand on the end of the handstick, and the other on the log to keep it from rolling. The next command given by the captain is, “Altogether!” and up comes the big log. As they walk and stagger toward the heap, they utter a whoop like what is known as the “Rebel yell.” If one fails to lift his part, he is said to have been “pulled down,” and therefore becomes the butt of ridicule for the balance of the day. When the women folks learn of his misfortune, they forever scorn him as a weakling.

At 12 o’clock the horn blows for dinner, and they all knock off, and go, and enjoy a good dinner. After a rest, for possibly two hours, they go to the field again, and finish up the work for the day. Such was the log-rolling in the “days before the war.”

At a subsequent day the women and children gather up the bark and limbs of these fallen trees and throw or pile them on these log heaps and burn them. When fifty or seventy-five log heaps would be fully ablaze in the deepening of the evening twilight, the glare reflected from the heavens made it appear that the world was on fire. To even the benighted and uneducated slave, the sight was magnificent, and one of awe-inspiring beauty.

As an urbanite, Dr. Motte was unfamiliar with the frontier traditions of log rolling. According to Encyclopedia.Com,

A farmer chopped enough logs for a log rolling only when he had to clear acreage, so chopping frolics and log rollings primarily took place on the frontier. Work frolics derived from similar European and African traditions of communal agricultural labor. An individual, family, or community confronted with a task too large to complete on its own invited neighbors to help them. In return, the host provided refreshments and revelry. Work frolics composed a vital segment of the rural economy in America until the late nineteenth century. For over 200 years, the relatively low cost of renting or owning land in America resulted in a shortage of rural wage laborers. Faced with scarce labor and high wages for the few laborers available, farmers relied on the work frolic as a means for exchanging labor. Attendance at a work frolic granted neighbors the right to call on the host when they needed help. Besides meeting economic realities, work frolics contributed to the formation of communities by tying people into local networks of obligation.

Farmers called work frolics to accomplish a range of tasks, including corn husking, house (or barn) raising, quilting, sewing, apple butter making, chopping wood, log rolling, sugar (or syrup) making, spinning, hunting, and nut cracking. These events required planning and preparation [and followed] seasonal cycles of agriculture…To ensure farmers did not deplete their labor force by planning frolics on the same day, families collaborated to produce a frolic schedule. Hosts also finished preliminary tasks to allow visitors to focus on the large projects that the host family could not complete alone… Competition drove workers to accomplish their tasks quickly… Log-rolling teams strove to move the most wood. Obligatory reciprocity promised hosts that their neighbors would show up, but the party after the work served as a secondary lure. Most workers felt short-changed when hosts did not meet traditional expectations of decent food and alcohol. Entertainment at the parties consisted of music and dancing.

Ward’s History explains how the task was done in a competitive spirit.

The method of rolling logs was to take hand spikes, prize up the log, and put about three hand spikes under the log with two men to each stick, one on each side of the log. Many a contest in strength was made in lifting logs. If the log was very heavy, the men had to be very strong in their arms, legs and backs to lift. If the man at the other end of the stick was not likewise a very strong man, he could not come up with his end of the log and so he became the laughing stock of the crowd. It often happened that a small man was much stronger than a big man. I knew one little man who could lift as heavy a log as any man; the harder he pulled at his hand spike, redder and redder his face got, the veins in his neck bulged larger and larger. When a man claimed he was very much of a man and then wanted the light end of the load he would bluff the crowd by saying, ” I can carry this and then some. Jump on my end of the log and take a ride.”

While the men were busy rolling logs in the fields, the women and girls at home were busy making quilts and cooking dinner. One of the main dishes for dinner was a sixty-gallon sugar boiler full of rice and chicken and backbones. The largest dinner pot was full of greens and dumplings. When the greens were served on the largest dish a boiled ham was placed on top, while sweet potatoes, cracklin bread, potatoes, mudgen [lard] and cakes, two-story biscuits which were served in large quantities. When dinner time comes some one blows a big cow horn loud and long. All hands took a drink and went to dinner. All sorts of dishes are used on the table, broken cups, cracked plates, knives without handles, forks with but one prong, but they all had a good dinner and a bushel of fun while they ate.  When the log rolling and quilting is over and the sun sets into the West, old Bill Mundy, the colored man, came in with his fiddle. A lot of sand was put on the floor and everything is cleared for the dance. The dancers get on the floor with their partners, the fiddler starts up “the One-eyed Gopher,” and the frolic is on. The tune “One-eyed Gopher played by the fiddler was a repetition of the words, “Oh, the one-eyed gopher, he fell down and couldn’t turn over,” etc. He would play it high, play it fast, and play it slow. When the dancing was over, “They got Sandy Moore to beat the strings while he played “Squirrel Gravy,” and thus the frolic ended.

Dr. Motte wrote in his journal about the Lowndes County log rolling, which was held about six miles from Camp Townsend:

“[The host] and candidate for the legislature having given out that on a particular day he intended to have a log-rolling, quilting, and dancing frolic, and having sent an especial message to Major Staniford and myself to attend; our curiosity was excited to witness the originality of such an affair of which we had heard, but never witnessed; so we determined to go.

Thomas Staniford, major of the Regiment stationed near Franklinville, GA in 1836.

We had to ride six miles and arrived there about sun-set not caring much to participate in the log-rolling part of the entertainment; the [host] was busily engaged erecting a long table out of rough boards in the open air; while his wife was as busily engaged in cooking pork and cabbage in the kitchen, into which we were invited, being informed that it was the reception room. We there found the company assembled, and on entering would have removed our hats, to show our breeding in the presence of the fairer sex; on looking round, however, we noticed that such a procedure would not have been in conformity with the rules or customs of the company, and being decidedly outré would only have exposed us to their ridicule; so quaker-fashion we remained; and the fair angels whose gaze were fixed upon us, seemed by their approving smiles not to take our conduct amiss, – probably liked us the better for appearing to disregard their presence. The pork and cabbage were in due time dispatched, and a few of the gentlemen put to bed, in consideration of not being able to use their legs from a too free use of our host’s whiskey.

Then began preparations for the double-shuffle. There were three fiddlers; but unfortunately for the exercise of their united talents, only one fiddle; and that deficient in some of its strings. The three votaries of Apollo therefore exercised their functions successively upon the cracked instrument, and did not fail to produce such sounds as would have attracted the admiration of even the mighty goddess of Discord herself. Their chief merit seemed to consist in all producing a similar concatenation of sounds, which they persisted in dignifying with the appellation of tune; the name of which, however, was more that the brightest faculties could call.

The Major could not be induced to venture his carcase in the violent exercise of double-shuffle and cross-fling; so I had to support the credit of our camp by my own exertions; and so successfully, that the [host] was in raptures, and made an attempt to exhibit his admiration by embracing me before the whole company; but I could not stand such a flattering display, so bolted.

The intervals of the dance were filled up by the gentlemen handing round in a tumbler, what I thought was whisky and water, but which the Major asserted, from closer in inspection, was unadulterated whiskey; the younger ladies were generally satisfied with one or two mouthfuls from each tumbler, but as the same ceremony was to be gone through with each gentleman in rapid succession, the fairest of creation did not lose their proper allowance. The old ladies, who were veterans in the business, never loosened their grasp of the tumblers until their lips had drained the last drop of the precious liquid. As a necessary consequence it was impossible for them to sit up long, and soon all the beds were occupied by these ancient dames; the gentlemen who afterwards got into a similar predicament were compelled to lie wherever they fell.

At one o’clock fighting commenced, when the Major and myself, not being ambitious of distinguishing ourselves in the pugilistic art, made a retreat; and at two in the morning we were in our tents, after a bitter cold ride.

Related Posts:

• Dr. Motte Arrives at Franklinville, GA, 1836
• Dr. Jacob Rhett Motte: Army Surgeon
• Camp Townsend
• Final Report of General Julius C. Alford on Actions at the Little River and at Grand Bay, August, 1836
• Lowndes Grand Jury of 1833
• Levi J. Knight’s 4th of July Address at Franklinville, GA 1835
• Twistification
• Cane Grinding Time Meant Syrup, Candy and Cane Beer

Reverend Pledger Wilson Parker came to Ray City, GA in 1946 to preach in the Ray City Methodist Church. He was a veteran of World War II, and fresh out of seminary; Ray City was his first appointment. He brought his newlywed bride, Emily Britton Parker, to Ray City with him.  In addition to supporting the church, she taught in the Ray City School in 1947.

Reverend Pledger Wilson Parker, minister of Ray City Methodist Church, 1946-1947

Obituary

Pledger W. Parker, 92, of Macon, Georgia, went to his eternal home on Wednesday, July 16, 2014, after a short illness at McKendree Village in Hermitage, TN. Pledger was a retired United Methodist minister and a member of the South Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church.

He was born September 20, 1921, to George and Eulalia Parker at Camilla, Georgia. He served as a United States Marine during World War II. Upon his return to the States, he heard the call to preach and went to seminary at Candler School of Theology of Emory University. He served the following United Methodist congregations in Georgia: Ray City; Talbot Circuit; Duluth; St. Luke UMC in Columbus; Ocilla; First UMC in Swainsboro; Aldersgate in Savannah; Centenary in Macon, GA.

Pledger is survived by his wife of 67 years, Emily B. Parker; daughters, Giglia Anne Parker of Loma Linda, CA, Karen Parker DeVan (Jim) of McDonough, GA, Cherie Parker (Jack Keller) of Nashville, TN; grandchildren, Ben DeVan (Kartini), Allison DeVan (Justin Wienke), Juliana Parker Keller, Josh Parker Keller; great-grandchildren, Grace DeVan, and Caroline Wienke.

A Memorial Service will be held at Mulberry Street United Methodist Church on Tuesday, July 22, 2:00 p.m. The family will greet guests in the Fellowship Hall immediately following the Memorial Service.

Honorary Pallbearers are the ministers and spouses of the South Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church, and the members of the Interest Group Sunday School Class of Mulberry Street United Methodist Church.

In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to the Memorial Fund of Mulberry Street UMC, P. O. Box 149, Macon, GA 31202, or to your favorite charity.

Related Posts:

• A Brief History of the Ray City Methodist Church
• Fifty Years of Methodist Ministers ~ Ray City, GA
• Reverend Joseph Frank Snell, Pastor of the Ray City Methodist Church
• Reverend Robert H. Howren ~ Methodist Circuit Rider
• Liveoak Methodist Church
• Reverend John Slade of the Troupville Circuit
• Riders of the Troupville Circuit: Tillman Dixon Peurifoy

Grave of Henry Elmo DeLaney, City Cemetery, Nashville, GA. Image source: Searcher

Henry Elmo DeLaney, of Berrien County, GA, was among the WWI soldiers aboard the troop transport HMS Otranto on October 6, 1918 when it was fatally damaged in a collision with the HMS Kashmir off the coast of Islay, Scotland. The transport had sailed from New York on September 25, 1918 carrying more than 1,025 American soldiers and crewmen as part of a convoy headed for the fight in Europe. Delaney and most of the Georgia soldiers aboard the Otranto had trained at Fort Screven on Tybee Island, GA.

Delaney was below decks, just finishing breakfast when the collision occurred.

The seriousness of the situation was not immediately apparent to the men, who were told to remain where they were.  But within 15 minutes, every was ordered to go up on deck. The  ship was beginning to list, and the lights went out. The men emerged into a gale force wind and the footing was treacherous on the wet decks. Henry Elmo DeLaney emerged on the “B” deck with other men of his company and took a seat on a bench near the hatch.  He was seated next to Joseph Eden Hewell, a soldier from Woodville, GA when they observed the British destroyer HMS Mounsey coming along side the Otranto,  the destroyer looking tiny in comparison to the huge troopship.

When the destroyer maneuvered to get alongside, Capt. Davidson of the Otranto warned Lieut. Craven, commanding the destroyer, not to make the attempt. When it was seen that Craven would make the attempt anyway, The men were ordered to remove their shoes and heavy clothing…

Captain Craven, standing on the Mounsey’s bridge as the two ships came within leaping distance, used his megaphone to encourage the men on the Otranto. He shouted over and again, as loudly as he could, “Jump men! Jump.”

” As the Mounsey neared the side of the Otranto the men began to jump from thirty to forty feet from her decks…many of the men leaped too quickly and missed their reckoning and dropped between the boats. Some of these disappeared in the water, but others of them were caught and crushed to death between the boats and the lifeboats which had been lowered to act as buffers…Many of those who reached the decks of the vessel suffered broken bones or otherwise were hurt. Those who missed the deck of the destroyer went to almost instant death.

Delaney and Hewell stood at the rails of the doomed Otranto, and watched as their fellow soldiers leaped for their lives.

Delaney observed they had better jump, too. The rough seas were crashing the ships together and men who lept with ill-timing were crushed between the hulls or plunged through to the frigid waters below. First DeLaney then Hewell managed a safe landing on the deck of the destroyer, and were taken to Belfast, Ireland along with nearly 600 other survivors. Hundreds of others stayed behind with the Otranto and went down with the ship when she broke up on the rocks off the Isle of Islay.  Hewell later wrote a journal about the final voyage of the Otranto (see Hewell’s 1918 Journal.)

The overloaded Mounsey precariously made way with the survivors to Belfast, Ireland where the American Red Cross was  waiting for their arrival. Not knowing when or where the disaster would come, The American Red Cross had prepared in advance for disaster.  Of those who succeeded in leaping to the deck of Mounsey, some perished from injuries or exposure and were buried in Belfast, Ireland.

Many, many bodies washed ashore on Islay, Scotland and were buried in mass graves. Berrien men among the hundreds of Otranto dead  included  Benjamin F. McCranie, Jim Melvin Boyett, John Guy Coppage, Hiram Marcus Bennett, Lafayett Gaskins,  William C. Zeigler and other men.  Early Steward of Nashville, GA was among the very few who washed up on the rocky coast of Islay still living.   The lost Georgian soldiers would later be honored in the Georgia WWI Memorial Book, (SEE Also Ray City, GA Veterans of World War I), and Berrien County, GA would commission the first monument to commemorate American soldiers killed in the Great War.

After recuperation, Henry Elmo DeLaney was sent on to France where he was assigned on December 3, 1918 to Battery F, 57th Artillery, Coastal Artillery Corps.

WWI service record of Henry Elmo Delaney

Battery F, which had seen heavy fighting in the Meuse Argonne, had been “ordered back to Brest, France to prepare for embarkation back to America.”

1st Lt. Charles J. Foley, of the 57th Artillery reflected :

All operations having ceased, we were assigned to Doulevant to prepare for our return home. Property affairs were settled and the regiment proceeded to the camp at Brest for Embarkation. It might be well to state that we knew of no other ports from which we would prefer to sail, but not desiring to disappoint the A.E.F. officials by selecting any other route, we accepted their invitation and submerged ourselves in the mud of camp Pontenazen.

Camp Pontanezen was most likely where Henry Elmo DeLaney caught up with the 57th Artillery CAC. Camp Pontanezen  at Brest, France, was the point from which American soldiers were returned to the United States. Sergeant James L. Grace, Battery D,  57th Artillery CAC called Pontanezen “ a camp of mud and water. We were put into tents; where we remained until the 29th of December; 1918.”

WWI Camp Pontanezen at Brest, France

CAMP AT BREST

        Here we have a great port of embarkation for American soldiers. At times 80,000 men were camped there, the harbor crowded with shipping. In the early months after we entered the war, when everything had to be done with a rush and we were new to the job, conditions were very bad at Brest. As we see, it is a dismal, unattractive spot, cluttered with buildings, railway spurs, and raw, stark barracks. It rains most of the year at Brest, and the roads, firm underneath, are coated with slippery, semi-fluid mud which endless lines of motor trucks whirl viciously to every side. There is nothing to see but dismal wet barracks or soaked the bedraggled tents. At first, thousands of our boys had to camp in these tents, sleep on the damp ground, wade interminably through thick, sticky mud. One who had the misfortune to be at Brest in those days will never forget the place.
       But American energy and enterprise transformed Brest before the war ended. Enough barracks were built to accommodate everybody, board walks were laid everywhere. The camp was made as comfortable as a camp could be in such a moist climate.
       Brest is at the head of a magnificent, landlocked bay on the northwest coast of France. For centuries it has been a great port, Richelieu, in 1631, constructed the first wharves that were built there. It is the capital of one of the five naval arrondissements of France. There are gun factories, great workshops, magazines, docks and yards, employing thousands of men.

From the docks at Brest, the men were ferried by lighters out to the waiting troop transport USS Huntington.

Troops on board the lighter Amackassin, waiting to board Huntington for their passage home from France, 1919.

US Naval History photo of the USS Hunting underway, circa 1919. The cruiser USS Huntington was converted to a troop transport following the signing of the Armistice ending WWI.

The regiment embarked from Brest for New York on January 2nd, 1919, on the United States Cruiser “Huntington.” The Huntington had served on escort duty to defend convoys of transports ferrying the dough boys to Europe.

After the Armistice was signed Huntington was converted into a troop transport and assigned to Transport Force, Atlantic Fleet.  Huntington next sailed for France to bring home veterans of the European fighting. She departed New York 17 December, arrived in the harbor at Brest, France on 29 December 1918. On 2 January 1919 she embarked over 1,700 passengers the bulk of which was the 57th Artillery who had seen much action while in France, to New York [arriving] 14 January.

Divine services on USS Huntington’s quarterdeck, while transporting troops in 1919.

Henry Elmo DeLaney, of Berrien County, GA, was among the 1,700 passengers on Huntington‘s first voyage as a transport returning from France, January 1919. The ship made five more voyages to France and return, bringing home nearly 12,000 troops, and terminated her last voyage at Boston 5 July 1919.

Delaney’s voyage back from France was uneventful with only two days rough seas and the usual amount of seasickness among the troops of the 57th Artillery CAC. Lieutenant Foley observed, “As we caught the first glimpse of the Statue of Liberty and heard the shouts from the Mayor’s Committee of Welcome we decided that there is but one country on the face of this earth-The United States Of America.”

Hoboken, NJ welcome committee greets WWI troops returning from France.

Sergeant Grace recalled,

 We arrived safely the morning of the 14th of January; 1919; docking at 9:35 A. M. at Pier 5 Hoboken, N. J. We immediately disembarked and entrained for Camp Merritt; N. J.;

Americans glad to be home – awaiting trains for demobilization camp, Hoboken. This is the WWI Port of Embarkation now serving as the Port of Debarkation. U.S. Army soldiers are waiting to board a train. The men are just east of the Headquarters, apparently between piers 3 and 4.

These Americans, thousands of them, standing about holding aluminum drinking cups are waiting for their first meal on United States soil after a period of overseas service. Their packs are lying on the ground, all of them made up in the regulation fashion but for the present discarded until the much more “important” business of eating is over.

Behind that freight car which is being loaded with regimental baggage, you can see the Military Post Office of Hoboken and the low building next to it is the office of Headquarters, Port of Embarkation.

The building on the top of the hill is one of the Stevens Institute group, and beneath it you can see the side of the Hudson Hut, one of the Y.M.C.A. buildings that catered to the comfort and needs of the men just returned from overseas.

Before the Armistice only 15,000 men had been returned home, and a constant stream of men had been going overseas. The condition had to be reversed after the Armistice. This work of bringing back the men was carried on very expeditiously and in three months’ time more men had been brought back and mustered out of the service than the entire number mustered out after the Civil War.

WWI soldiers home from France arriving at Camp Merritt, NJ

Sergeant Grace continued,

Arriving there [Camp Merritt] at 2:30 P. M. and going into barracks for the time being. At 3:30 P. M. dinner was served and at 7:10 supper was served and at 8:50 P. M.  we went to the delousing station and all hands were deloused; and God knows we needed it. Delousing process completed about ten o’clock and we turned in for a much needed rest.

A few weeks later Battery “F” was demobilized at Fort Sandy Hook, New Jersey.

After discharge, Henry Elmo DeLaney returned to South Georgia.  In February, The Sparks Eagle reported he was taking up his previous position with the railroad.

The Sparks Eagle reports the homecoming of Henry Elmo Delaney.

By 1920, Henry Elmo DeLaney had relocated his family to Willacoochee where he continued to work as section foreman for the Georgia & Florida Railroad. The DeLaneys made their home on South Railroad Street.

By the 1930s, the DeLaneys moved to West Palm Beach, FL where Henry worked as a railroad inspector.

May 27, 1937 death certificate of Henry Elmo Delaney, survivor of the Otranto disaster of 1918.

Henry Elmo Delaney died of a stroke on May 27, 1937 at age 43. In death he returned to Berrien County, GA. He was buried Sunday, May 30, 1937 in the City Cemetery at Nashville, GA.

Obituary of Henry Elmo Delaney, SFB, June 3, 1937

Impressive funeral services for Mr. Henry Elmo Delaney, 42, were held last Sunday afternoon from the Nashville Methodist Church, conducted by the Rev. J.A. Rountree in the presence of a large number of relatives and a number of local people. The speaker paid a nice tribute to the deceased and impressed those present. Interment followed in the City Cemetery, with the Giddens Funeral Home in charge of the arrangements. Pallbearers were legionnaires members of Otranto Post and were as follows: Messrs J.R. Bennett, O.L. Tyson, Gus C. Vining, Buren Griner, A.E. Alexander and Mark Sutton. Mr. Delaney passed away Thursday morning in the Veterans hospital in Augusta, where he had been confined for several months. The body arrived in Nashville Saturday afternoon and was carried to the home of Mr. & Mrs. S.J. McLendon, parents of his widow.

He was born and reared at Swainsboro, GA, the son of the late J.N. Delaney, who was an engineer on the Georgia and Florida Railroad for many years. His father was born and reared in Ireland and came to this country as a young man.

Twenty-three years ago he was married to Miss Rose McLendon, daughter of Mr. & Mrs. S.J. McLendon of Nashville. At that time the McLendons were residing at Swainsboro.

Surviving besides his widow are two sons, Elmo, Jr. and Jack, also a half sister, Gertrude Evans of Miami, Fla. There are also three cousins, Messrs John, Mark, and Tom Hall of Swainsboro. Out of town relatives attending the last sad rites included Mr. & Mrs. W.H. Dorsey of Augusta, Mr. & Mrs. J.A. McLendon, Mr. & Mrs. W.D. McLendon, Miss Mae McLendon and James Underwood of Swainsboro; Mr. & Mrs. A.H. Martin Vegue, Mr. & Mrs. Fred N. Tittle and Mr. & Mrs. Dave Hughes of Miami, Fl.; Mr. & Mrs. J.A. Coleman, Miss Frances Coleman, Mrs. Ben Gunner, Mr. Robert Moxley, Mr. & Mrs. Wade Moxley of Valdosta.

–Nashville Herald–

Related Posts:

• The American Monument at the Mull of Oa
• An Otranto Funeral in Belfast
• Death Lurked in the North Channel
• Otranto Doctor Writes of Ship’s Final Hours
• Otranto Survivor Describes Disaster
• William C. Zeigler
• Berrien County Paid Terrible Toll on the Otranto
• Seeking Descendants of HMS Otranto Disaster Victims and Survivors
• HMS Otranto Sank Ninety-four Years Ago
• OTRANTO SUNK IN COLLISION
• Oct 12, 1918 ~ 372 U.S. Soldiers Lost in Sinking of Otranto
• October 13-15, 1918 ~ RECOVERING CORPSES FROM OTRANTO WRECK
• J.M. DeLoach Jumped from the HMS OTRANTO
• Ralph Knight ~ Otranto Disaster
• Shellie Loyd Webb – Lost at Sea
• The Long Trip Home
• Ralph Knight ~ Ray City Soldier ~ WWI
• Thomas Jefferson Sirmons Rests at Mount Pleasant Church Cemetery
• Alvin Claude Bozeman and the Sinking of the HMS Otranto
• Burial of the Otranto Victims
• Bivouac of the Dead
• Red Cross was at the Ready for HMS Otranto Survivors
• The American Red Cross and the Otranto Rescue
• Islay Remembered Otranto Soldiers at Christmas Time
• Let Us Unveil
• Hero of Otranto Rescue Shot Dead
• Armistice Day Memorial to Soldiers from Berrien County, GA Killed During WWI
• Ray City, GA Veterans of World War I
• On the Home Front, Ray City, GA, 1918
• Thomas Jefferson Sirmons Rests at Mount Pleasant Church Cemetery

Haints of Berrien County

Just in time for Halloween, another Berrien County ghost story. This one comes from Dr. James Rountree Folsom, father of Montgomery M. Folsom. James R. Folsom, who was a teacher in Berrien County, and later, Postmaster at Cecil, GA, wrote occasionally of Berrien County oddities.  Folsom was a member of Salem Methodist Church; The Church cemetery holds the marked graves of many of the Folsom family connection, among them the grave of Dr. James Rountree Folsom.

Tifton Gazette
December 1, 1893

Berrien County Ghost Story

       Dr. J. R. Folsom, of Cecil, in a letter to the Atlanta Journal under a date of November 26, [1893] recalls a strange story the scene of which is partly laid in Tifton. The facts were true as stated; the editor did not visit the house, but an attachee of the Gazette did and said it was absolutely true, and he was entirely unable to account for it. We do not know whether the disturbing element followed Mr. Bradler away from Tifton, but the same dwelling is now occupied and the ghost has not been heard there since the present occupant moved into it: ” A ghost story of chronic type is and has been going on for some time a short notice of which appeared in the Tifton Gazette some months ago is fresh “on the tap” this morning.
       As related by a gentleman who spent some time trying to unravel the mystery, the story is as follows:
During the first part of the year – in February or March – various noises began to be heard at the house of Mr. Rufus Bradler an engineer working for the Needham Lumber company, near Lenox, a small station on the Georgia Southern and Florida railroad in Berrien county.
      The sounds made at intervals, were like knocks on the floor and wall, rattling chains, and other sounds. Search was diligently made by the Bradler family and later on for the cause, without however, learning anything in regard to it. On one occasion, when the knocking seemed to be done by some one under the floor. Mr. Gillis attempted to shoot where the blows falling against the floor, but his efforts seemed at first to be of no avail. After having snapped several times with his revolver, it fired, but the ball scarcely penetrated the floor, and the knocking continued.
     These noises seem to be always near Mr. Bradler’s little twelve-year old daughter, and her health beginning to decline from the constant annoyance, strong effort were made to solve the mystery. Fires were built in a circle around the house at night the premises repeatedly searched but all to no avail, when Mr. Bradler gave up his job and moved to Tifton, where the annoying sounds followed him.
     After living there some time and the child’s health seeming to be still failing, he again moved to Valdosta.
    “Has the trouble stopped? We would like to know. Mr. Bradler, as said, is a locomotive engineer, and of a class not easily frightened. What can the matter be?

Tifton Gazette
December 22, 1893
The burning of Prof. Hendricks’ residence, corner of Eight street and Central avenue, recalls the Bradley ghost story. It was the house where that ghost made such wonderful displays of power, and had become known as the “haunted house.” As the house has gone the way of “smoke and ashes” it may not be amiss to enquire what became of the ghost?

Related Posts:

• The Ghost of Ben Furlong, Berrien County Desperado
• Ben Furlong’s Ghost Haunted Conscience of Berrien Residents
• The Haints of Berrien County
• More Haints of Berrien County

Tales of Old Troupville, GA

General DeLoach (1795-1884) was a resident of Old Lowndes county in the 1830s, later moving to Hamilton County, FL. DeLoach was among the characters who frequented Troupville, GA.

Back in the days when Troupville, GA was the county seat of old Lowndes County, the town had a notorious reputation, especially during “court week” when the Superior Court was convened.  Troupville then was the site of “much drinking and horse swapping, and for indulgence in cock fighting, horse racing, and other ‘Worldly amusements’. Indeed, among the Godly, it was regarded as a wild town – almost as wicked as Hawkinsville.” Troupville also had a notorious gaggle of pranksters who were ever ready to play a trick. Perhaps the most infamous prank perpetrated by “the boys” was the time they turned the Lowndes Superior Court into a menagerie. Among many hapless victims who fell into their clutches were General DeLoach, Carter Newsome, innkeeper William Smith, Robert Kendrick and Jesse Pipkins.   General DeLoach, who was alleged by Montgomery M. Folsom to imbibe freely, “once swinged his eyebrows off and loosened his front teeth” in an intoxicated mishap while playing with explosives. Deloach lived to the age of 87 and was said to have fathered 24 children.  Carter Newsome brought his family from Warren County some time in the 1850s to settle in the Clyattville district. Robert Kendrick was known for a prodigious appetite. Jesse Pipkins in 1855, according to Pines and Pioneers, was “accused of adultery, fornication or running a lewd house” with  Martha McDonald (1855 Lowndes census shows they were co-habitating), and had to get married to avoid conviction.

An 1885 Valdosta memoir reprinted in the Savannah Morning News recounted some of the Troupville pranksters’ more memorable exploits:

Savannah Morning News
May 18, 1885

Old Troupville.

How the Boys Got Rid of Drunken Characters – Rough Practical Jokes.

“Little River” in Valdosta Times.

         Among the odd characters who frequented old Troupville was old Gen. DeLoach. His rule was “red eye” first, business afterwards. The business was swearing that he could whip the best man in the State, getting down on his hands and knees, bellowing and pawing up dirt in imitation of a bull. The General was once put in jail for some offense. He was a stutterer. The boys gathered around the jail window to tease him, and says he: “B-boys, I c-can c-crow b-but I can’t f-fly down.”
        Another humorous character was Bob K. Uncle Billy Smith was noted far and wide for his excellent table. The boys had a habit of occasionally paying the fare for some famous eater like Carter Newsome and others to have them clean out Uncle B. Bob was on one occasion employed for this purpose. Well fortified with “red eye” Bob fulfilled their expectations, but the red eye and the feast proved too much for him, and Uncle Billy had to wash his floors. The next day he called on Bob for extra damage, which he settled under protest, and in retaliation sang at all the street corners the following:

“Old Billy Smith, that good old man,
I ne’er shall see any more,
He charged the Kendrick seventy-five cents
For spewing on the floor.”

        Jesse Pipkins would come to town and stay for days drinking. Finally the boys got tired of him, and one Sunday morning Jesse was found cooped up in a big crockery crate hanging to the limb of an oak 20 or 25 feet from the ground on the public square. He begged hard to be let down, and having got sober was afraid to make the least movement. Jesse declared that it was 50 feet to the ground.
        Another drinking character, Tom M., would remain in town for weeks together. Circumstances favored the boys in getting rid of him. One dark night Tom was talking with someone in from of Godfrey’s bar. A buggy was standing in the street nearby. It was only a short distance to the river, and there was a high and steep bluff close by the bridge, fringed at the water’s edge by stout trees covered with thick branches. The boys saw there opportunity. While the rest hid behind trees and houses, one of them called Tom off for a private talk and going towards the buggy for convenience they took a seat in it. Now a half dozen or more of the boys rushed from their hiding places, some got between the shafts and some behind the buggy, and a race for the river began. Tom was too drunk to jump out, but on the way his companion jumped out into a sand bed. Just before they reached the edge of the bluff all hands turned loose. On went the buggy. The shafts stuck in the group, capsized the buggy and threw poor Tom headlong on and through the branches of the trees into 10 feet of water. The buggy was left hanging and dry among the trees. All was quiet for a few moments and then Tom’s head was soon above the black waters for an instant only, and then disappeared with a gurgling sound. The frightful truth then flashed upon the boys that Tom could not swim, besides being too drunk to even float. Here the point of the joke was broken off and matters had become serious. Off with coats and into the cold black water plunged several of the boys, and they pulled out poor strangling Tom. He was never seen in Troupville again.

Tales of Old Troupville, GA in the Savannah Morning News, May 5, 1885

Related Posts:

• Map of Old Troupville, GA with Notes on the Residents
• Bowling at old Troupville, Georgia
• An Antebellum Trial at Troupville
• More About Troupville, GA and the Withlacoochee River
• Reverend William A. Knight at old Troupville, GA
• Reverend John Slade of the Troupville Circuit
• Riders of the Troupville Circuit: Tillman Dixon Peurifoy
• Judge Johnson of Jasper, FL had Troupville Connections
• A Plank Road for Troupville

Camp Northen, Griffin County, GA was one of several camps where Georgia troops mobilized for the Spanish American War. Camp Northen was the site where the 3rd Georgia Regiment, U.S. Volunteers was organized and mustered in.

Several men of Berrien County, GA enlisted in Company D of the 3rd Georgia Regiment including Walter A. Griner, Carl R. O’Quinn, Pythias D. Yapp, Zachary T. Hester, W. Dutchman Stephens, Samuel Z.T. Lipham, James M. Bridges, Charles A. Courson, Love Culbreath, George C. Flowers, James L. Jordan and George A. Martin.

Spanish-American War enlistment record of Carl R. O’Quinn, Nashville, GA

While the Third Regiment, U.S. Volunteers were training at Camp Northen numerous items were reported in state and local newspapers. A few clipping are presented below:

Atlanta Constitution
June 17, 1898

CALL ON THE WAY FROM WASHINGTON

Governor Notified That It Was Mailed to Him Yesterday

Five New Georgia Majors

Captain Willcoxon and Lieutenant Spence are Made Majors.

Griffin Soldiers Kick About Water

Soldiers Have to Boil It Before Using It for Drinking Purposes – Many Improvements

The call for Georgia’s third regiment of volunteers was issued and mailed from Washington yesterday and it will be received by Governor Atkinson today. The governor received telegraphic information that the adjutant general had given his assurance that the call would be mailed yesterday afternoon. The new regiment will consist of 1,336 men, rank and file…

Troops May not Go to Griffin
The Third Georgia Regiment may not be rendezvoused at Griffin. The water at Camp Northen is said to be impure and the soldiers, it is said, are complaining about it. Governor Atkinson is averse to sending the men to the camp unless better provision is made for their health and welfare, he says. The waterworks are at the bottom of a long slant, on which are situated the sinks for the various companies, and the officers say the water seeps through the refuse and gives the drinking water a bad taste. The governor stated yesterday that it is necessary to boil the water at Camp Northen before drinking it…

The Macon telegraph.
July 12, 1898

Quiet at Camp Northen
Recruits Are Coming in Slowly—News , From About Griffin.

Griffin, Go., July 11—Camp Northen is not presenting a very busy scene, although recruits have come in in squads daily. A number of them have stood the examination and the only waiting to be mustered in. The only incident of camp so far has been the reported loss of two watches, and steps have been taken to locate the offenders and secure the property if possible. The committee to secure an emergency fund for the boys in case of sickness was out today -under Mayor W. D. Davie, and met with good success in the short time they were canvassing. It is predicted that the fund will steadily grow. The recruits now in camp are a very quiet set and spend but little of their time in the city- Some few of them are beginning to feel a little home-sick on account of their inactivity.

Savannah morning news.
July 14, 1898

GEORGIA’S THIRD REGIMENT.
The Men at Camp Northen Gaining in Proficiency Daily.

Griffin, Ga., July 15.—A few moments spent at Camp Northen will readily convince one of the fact that Georgia will soon send another regiment of her sons to the front in the line of battle, or they will soon be ready for that duty. The men are now drilling from four to six hours each day, and when all are upon the parade ground in squads of twelve or twenty they show off to a decided advantage, and one can readily see front day to day the improvement. Camp has been established, and Col. Candler issues his orders for the day each morning to the adjutant. Of course the orders are not of the nature to command a regiment, but are strict and enforced. Guard mount is had each afternoon at 5:45 o’clock, when a detail from each company is accepted to serve guard during the night. Many of the men have never seen guard duty before, and interesting and laughable incidents are the result of their first lessons. A post office has been established upon the ground and those writing letters to the soldiers should direct them: “Third Regiment United States Infantry, Camp Northern” No complaint is heard from any source regarding the fare, and although the men have been on army rations for several days they knew before hand what they would have to eat, and are not kicking about it. New recruits are constantly arriving and it is hoped the regiment will soon be ready for mustering in. All the staff and the officers will soon be upon the ground, and then things will take a decided change for a more military appearance.

Thomasville Times
July 16, 1898

 Rev. D. H. Parker and family left last Tuesday, the former to assume his duties as chaplain of the 3rd Georgia Regiment of Volunteers (Immunes) and his family to reside in Thomasville during his absence in the army. Our city regretted to give up Dr. Parker and his family, and the best wishes of all go with them. – Bainbridge Search Light

Thomasville Times
July 16, 1898

The Duty of Georgians. Georgia has responded nobly and promptly, to the call for troops heretofore, and she will do now that another call is made. Southern Georgia, the Wiregrass region, has done her share, and it will continue to respond so long as there is a demand for troops. Lieutenant Pruett of the Third Georgia Regiment is recruiting in this section, and an opportunity is thus given all who are willing to enlist to do so. There may be plenty of fighting to do, or peace may soon be declared. In any event we hope this section will show up with its full quota. The third regiment, with Col. John Candler at the head, and a splendid line of officers, will make history for Georgia if called into action. There will be no better regiment in the army. We hope Lieut. Pruett will meet with the success he deserves in recruiting for the third regiment. He is engaged in a noble and patriotic work, and should be encouraged in every possible way.

Thomasville Times
July 16, 1898

WOUNDED SOLDIERS.

Santiago Survivors Pass Through Thomasville. Yesterday afternoon’s 2:25 train from Florida contained three survivors of the battle in front pf Santiago two weeks ago. They were Capt. Torrey and Lieut. Purdey, of the Sixth U. S. Infantry, and Lieut. Spence, of the Sixteenth U. S. Infantry. All were wounded in the terrible fight on San Juan heights. Capt. Torrey was shot through the leg, Lieut. Purdey through the thigh and Lieut. Spence had wounds in the leg and in the left hand. None of the wounds are serious and all of the officers were able to walk about.
Having been apprised of the coming of Capt. Torrey and Lieut. Purdey, a few of our patriotic citizens prepared a nice dinner for the gentlemen, added to which was some choice wines, fruits and flowers. Quite a number of people went to the depot to see the officers and as as the train stopped the Pullman in which they were riding was besieged by the crowd, all anxious to shake the hands of the gallant men who had made such a brave assault upon the Spanish stronghold. The officers, though surprised, were delighted at the attention bestowed upon them and were profuse in their expressions of gratitude. They were kept so busy shaking bauds that it was impossible to obtain an interview as to the situation around Santiago, but enough was gathered from their remarks to justify the statement that there is plenty of hard fighting to be done on the island yet, and many a brave American will yet be pierced with the deadly Spanish bullets.
Capt. Torrey and Lieut. Purdey, stated above, belong to the Sixth Infantry, from Fort Thomas, Ky., the first regiment that passed through Thomasville on the way to the front. It will be remembered that this regiment spent several hours in the city and that almost the whole town turned out to see them and the soldiers were fairly covered with flowers. On one of the cars was chalked the following sign: “The Fighting Sixth. We go to Avenge the  Murder of our Gallant Sailors.”
How well they have done this the story of the battle tells. The Sixth was in the thickest of the fight all the way through and lost more men probably than any other regiment. Capt. Torrey and Lieut. Purdey were on their way to Fort Thomas, where they will remain until they recover from their wounds, when they will rejoin their regiment.
The gentlemen who prepared the reception for Capt. Torrey and Lieut. Purdey regret very much that they were not apprised of the fact that Lieut. Spence was on the same train, so that they might have extended tho same courtesy to him.
Lieut. Spence is a South Georgia boy, a native of our sister county, Mitchell, and it is greatly regretted by the committee that they were in ignorance of his coming. It was not known by thorn that he was on board until after they had called upon the officers of the Sixth, by which time he had taken a carriage and gone up town. He remained here until the five o’clock freight left, on which he went to join his family in Camilla. During his stay here he was the center of attraction. Crowds followed him from place to place and if he answered one question be answered a thous and. He talked interestingly of the battle and the bravery of the American troops, but said he was glad to once more press American soil.
Lieut. Spence has recently been appointed a Major in the Third Georgia Regiment of Volunteers by Gov. Atkinson, and it is very likely that after he recovers he will remain here with his new command. He is a graduate of West Point and a fine officer.

Macon telegraph.
July 19, 1898

Recruits Come Into Camp Northern

Griffin, Ga., July 18.—The companies have all been mustered in at Camp Northen and the regiment is about half completed, with new recruits coming in each day.

Savannah morning news.
July 19, 1898,

COL. RAY’S IMMUNES.
Mustering in of Men Continues at Camp Northern
Griffin, Ga., July 18.—There is little of interest in Camp Northen now. The regular routine work Is accomplished each day with no difficulties. Mastering In recruits continues from day to day. There are about 100 men now in camp to be mustered in, but it will possibly lie some days before the necessary papers will be received. Most of these are minors, and Col. Candler will not consent to take any until full consent is given by their parents. Capt. Henry Kolshorn arrived this morning from Savannah, bringing several men with him. Capt. Kolshorn intends to have an ideal company, and there is no doubt of the fact that his intentions are sure to materialize, which will place his command at the top of the column. Capt. Gilbert of Albany has the largest company in camp, and is confident he will secure his full quota of men this week. He is a born gentleman, and a man of sterling integrity. His company is considered to be the best drilled one in camp, and strange to say, all except a very few were raw recruits who knew nothing of military life prior to their enlistment. The soldiers are being issued their uniforms as they are mustered in. They are not having the trouble in securing a good fit in clothing that the other regiments experienced.

Savannah Morning News. 
July 22, 1898

The case of Private Spence Hutchins of the Georgia Volunteer Artillery is not without a suggestion of humor. He was found guilty of the larceny of two lemons and a small quantity of sugar, probably taken in a moment of thoughtlessness and was sentenced to thirty days at hard labor. The sentence, however, was disapproved. The order is as follows: “Private Spence Hutchins, Light Battery A, Georgia Artillery, United States Volunteers, having boon tried by a general court martial convened at Camp Northern, Griffin, Ga., and found guilty of the larceny of two lemons and a quantity of sugar valued at 5 cents, in violation of the sixty-second article of war, was sentenced to hard labor for a term of thirty days. The sentence is disapproved. Private Hutchins will be returned to duty.”

Newnan Herald and Advertiser
July 22, 1898

Camp Northern

As Newman and Coweta county are quite liberally represented here, allow me a bit of space in your valuable sheet to give our friends at home an idea of how Uncle Sam’s pets, (the Third Georgia regiment, U. S. Vols are getting along. We have been in camp about two weeks, and the regiment now numbers something over 700 men. A few days ago the boys donned Uncle Sam’s war clothes, and a more ferocious set of Spaniard annihilators would be hard to find. The boys are becoming very anxious to get off to the war, but according to the best information obtainable it will be near the first of October before we leave Georgia. In the meantime we will undergo the seasoning process, which, according to military opinion, is so essential to the’making of a good, hardy soldier. It is surprising how the men are taking to military training. Most of our men, who knew nothing of the manual of arms when they came here, are now quite ‘proficient in the use of the gun. By the time the regiment fills up, (which will be pretty soon,) the men will be quite well drilled, and ready for the fray. We need about forty more men, and as Coweta and adjoining counties have furnished two-thirds of those we have, we confidently expect them to keep up the enlistment in the same proportion. We have many assurances from the farmer boys that they will join us as soon as they “lay-by” their crops. This, according to our judgment, is the proper thing to do, as they can make $18 per month, board and clothing included. With reference to board, clothing and bedding, they are good, and the boys enjoy them. According to newspaper reports we are not likely to see much campaign service, as they indicate an early ending of hostilities. In that event the probabilities are that our regiment will do garrison duty in one of the islands—Cuba, Porto Rico, or the Philippines. Our boys are fine specimens of prohibitionists. The “thirst parlors” here are conspicuous by their absence; and the “blind tiger” skulks in his lair since the advent of Col. Candler into these precincts. Col. Candler caught one of the brutes in flagrante delictu, and proceeded forthwith to put him through a course of sprouts.
Soldier Lad
Near Griffin, July 19th.

Americus Times-Recorder.
July 31, 1898

CANDLER OPPOSED TO PEACE.

Colonel of the Bloody Third is Anxious for Gore.
From indications at present there will be no need for the services of the regiment now organizing at Camp Northern, and the American soldier boys, as well as others there, may soon be ordered back to more peaceful pursuits if pending peace negotiations are pushed to a successful end. In the meantime, however, Colonel Candler, of the “Bloody Third” still sniffs Spanish gore from afar, and if correctly quoted is anxious that there shall be no end of the war until he can distinguish himself upon the field of death and carnage. The people of Georgia, however, will not coincide with Colonel Candler of the Bloody Third in his views. They are willing for him to achieve glory and fame, but not at the terrible cost of the lives of their sons who bravely responded to the call of arms to defend their country, now that there is no apparent need for such a sacrifice. Colonel Candler should curb his martial spirit, and if white-winged peace is to hover again over the land, resume the seat upon the bench which he failed to resign, and win additional laurels there instead of amid the blood and carnage of battle.

The Macon telegraph.
August 02, 1898

SOLDIERS TEAR DOWN FENCES.
Much Complaint Around Camp Northen—News Notes From Griffin.
Griffin, Ga., Aug. 1 —There Is considerable complaint by the citizens over what is claimed to be depredations by soldiers now stationed at Camp Northern. At first these were only such slight offenses as taking a few vegetables or fruit from where there was plenty. On good authority it is stated that panels of fence have been pulled down, and where this sort of vandalism could not be successfully accomplished, palings by the dozen were ripped off. It is impossible to locate just who the offenders are.

Savannah Morning News.
August 2, 1898

CANDLER’S RECRUITS.
Colonel Expects Regiment to Have Its Full Quota This Week.
Griffin, Gay, Aug. 1 —The heavy rains of the last few days have greatly interfered with the afternoon drills and dress parade at Camp Northern Sunday afternoon, as the troops were forming on the parade grounds, a heavy rain and thunder storm was an unwelcomed guest, and before the troops could be formed in line and dismissed by Col. Candler every man was wet through and through. But little complaint is heard about the rains, for they cool off the atmosphere and make things more comfortable. Many of the companies are filling up rapidly, and it is believed that all, except possibly one or two companies, will be full by Saturday. Capt. W. W. Davis’ will be the first company to muster in its full quota of men. He had ninety-seven men to-day, and more than twenty more arrived in the afternoon, who will be mustered In tomorrow. The band now has eighteen well-selected men. Col. Candler says the other six will be in camp before Sunday. Mr. Pollard, the band leader, is instructing the men under him, and is greatly encouraged at their aptness. Col. Candler has about completed arrangements to secure a set of fine band Instruments from the City Council of Americus, and expects them Wednesday. Several days ago nine men dropped out when they went to take the oath, and returned to their homes. This morning Col. Candler received a telegram from two of them asking to be taken back, stating they were under the influence of liquor before and now regretted their rash act. The officers won new laurels to-day at an elegant dinner. It was a most elegant affair and greatly enjoyed by a number of ladies. Capt. Kolshorn came up from Savannah Sunday morning, bringing several recruits with him. He returned home this morning, greatly encouraged with the progress being made by his men. Spalding county Superior Court was called to order at its regular session this morning by Judge M. W. Reck. Judge Beck has been fulfilling his duties in camp for several days, but is now holding court, which will probably not last longer than one week.

The Houston home journal.

August 04, 1898, Image 3

Lieut C. E. Gilbert spent last Sunday with the Third Georgia Regiment volunteers at Camp Northern, Griffin. The regiment lacks about 200 of being full, and Lieut Gilbert is still seeking volunteers, with headquarters at Fort Valley. The work of recruiting progresses slowly, and many of the volunteers have failed to pass the physical examination, ” which is very rigid. 

Savannah Morning News
August 09, 1898

LIEUT. SPENCE AT GRIFFIN.
Gallant Georgian Takes Up His Duties at the Camp.
Atlanta, Ga., Aug. 13.—R. H. L. Spence, the gallant Georgian who was wounded in the battle of Santiago, and who has been appointed major by Gov. Atkinson, entered upon his new duties to-day when the fourth company of the Third Georgia Regiment was mustered in at Camp Northern. Mr. Spence is a native of Georgia and married a Georgia lady, Miss Underwood of Camilla. He is a kinsman of Judge W. N. Spence of the Albany circuit. He graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1892, and his promotion from second lieutenant to major follows closely his first experience in battle. The Third Georgia is the only regiment in this state which has an officer who bears the scars of the present war. The acting adjutant general, Col. W. G. O’Bear, states that at the last reports there were 932 men in camp at Griffin. He thinks there are more than that number there to-day. The four companies which have been mustered into service are those of Capt. W. W. Davies, Capt. A. J. Burr, Jr., Capt. J. S. Powell and Capt. H. J. Stewart.

Savannah Morning News
August 9, 1898

GOOD WORK AT CAMP NORTHERN
Companies Making Good Progress in Their Military Duties.
Griffin, Ga„ Aug. 8  — Camp Northern is daily showing an improvement in its military discipline. The companies are fast filling up and being mustered in. Maj. Marcus W. Beck was to-day mustered in and took charge of his battalion. The Third Regiment band is fast filling up, now having 18 musicians enrolled. Prof. C. O. Pollard, chief musician, is busy instructing the men who are making a fine showing for the time they have been on duty. Edward Griggs of Dawson, has been appointed second principal musician and is sparing no pains in his effort to bring the band up to a high standard. H. P. Dane, principal musician, left this afternoon for Americus to purchase a set of instruments from the band there. There is not a man in camp who deserves more credit for the excellent work the regiment is doing that Adjt. W. O. D. Rockwell of Savannah. Lieut. Kimbrough of Capt. Burr’s company, also deserves special mention. He has been offered the appointment of adjutant of Beck’s battalion, and says he will probably accept. Capt. Joe Gilbert of Albany, was officer of the day and discharged his duty in a most satisfactory way, and received several compliments front the staff. 

Savannah Morning News.
August 18, 1898

DON’T WANT TO MUSTER OUT.
THIRD REGIMENT LIKELY TO BE FULL BY FRIDAY.
Grave Fears That an Order Will Be lssued Mustering Out the Men—A Midnight Meeting of Officers to Devise Some Plan of Holding Together the Regiment—Capt. Kolshorn’s Company to Be Mustered in This Morning—Strict Rules Enforced.
Griffin, Ga., Aug. 17.—Camp Northern now has the largest regiment of men ever encamped upon this beautiful site before. It is believed the Third Regiment will be full by Friday. The officers and men are evidently entertaining grave fears of the possibility of being mustered out of service, now that the war is over. Although every item is closely guarded against the newspapers, it is known that a called meeting of every commissioned officer in camp was held at Col. Candler’s quarters at 12 o’clock last night to discuss the proper course to pursue to prevent the order for disbanding the regiment. What was done at this meeting could not be learned, but it is known that Col. Candler was in communication with the war department all day and that recruits were being rushed to the camp as rapidly as possible. Many private consultations between the colonel and officers were held during the day. Some wished to petition the war department to be sent to Santiago, while others would go anywhere in the world rather than disband, but Col. Candler would allow no petition of any nature to be circulated. Only five men to each company are allowed passes from the grounds each day. This goes rather hard on the men, who have been in the habit of visiting our city each night and much complaining is heard. But that is the order and it must be obeyed. Seventy-two guards are now stationed around the grounds during the day and double this number during the night. This makes it next to an impossibility for one to run the lines. The men. however, are making the best of this, and always spend their idle moments In learning tactics in their company street. Tuesday afternoon the entire regiment went on a long march. They were headed by Col Candler and staff and marched to Experiment and back. The men stood the trip well, and are anxious for another. Capt. Kolshorn has been in camp several days from Savannah, and with his full company will be mustered in tomorrow morning. Capt. Gilbert has a company of well selected men, all of fine specimen and well-drilled. The regimental band is now furnishing the music for the regiment, and is doing remarkably well for a new organization.

Savannah Morning News
August 20, 1898

THIRD REGIMENT FULL UP
Mustering In Exercise to be Witnessed by  Gov. Atkinson.

Griffin, Ga., Aug. 19.— The Third Georgia Regiment has secured more than its quota of men and will he mustered into the service of the United States to-morrow, which will be an important day at Camp Northern. Gov. Atkinson and his staff will come down and be present when the regiment is mustered in. They will be accompanied by a delegation from the Ladies Relief Association and the Army and Navy League, who will present the regiment with two beautiful flags. Among the ladles who will grace our city with their presence will be Mrs. W. Y. Atkinson, Mrs. John S. Candler, Mrs. Lolie M. Gordon, Miss Ella Powell and Miss Jennie English, who will be most delightfully entertained by the officers at Camp Northern. Gov. Atkinson to-day appointed Troup Whitehead as second lieutenant in Company C of Savannah, which office was made vacant by the resignation of Lieut. Leaken. Private Slater, of Capt. Davies’ company, has received promotion and is now drum major for the Third Regiment Band. Sergt. Vason of Company F has been temporarily detailed as commissary sergeant. Lieut. Hastings of Capt. Sanford’s company has been temporarily detailed regimental commissary, and Sergt. Napier of Capt. Sanders’ company is temporarily serving as sergeant major. It is said that the ordnance stores for the regiment have berm shipped and will be here in a few days when the regiment will be thoroughly equipped.

Savannah Morning News
August 23, 1898

THE THIRD TO BE RETAINED.
SECRETARY OF WAR GIVES HIS PROMISE TO LIVINGSTON.
Where the Regiment Will Go Is Not Known, But Col. Livingston Is Pulling for Their Assignment to Manila—Thought That Many More Troops Will Be Wanted There, and Plans Are Being Made Accordingly. First and Second Alabama to Be Mustered Out—Third Alabama to Be Retained.
Washington, Aug 22.—The Secretary of War has given his promise that the Third Georgia Regiment “shall not be among those first mustered out. He did that this morning in response to the request of Col. Livingston, who came on to Washington in the interest of the boys of the Third.
The congressman from the Fifth district went to the war department bright and early this morning and at once enlisted in his cause Assistant Secretary Meiklejohn, with whom he served several years in the House, and who is his personal friend.
The assistant secretary took the matter up at once. Col. Livingston told him of the excellent personnel of the regiment and of the great desire of officers and men for service. They were willing, he said, to go anywhere—their only desire being to see service. Col. Meiklejohn at once laid the matter before the secretary. The matter was discussed with Gen. Alger for a few minutes, and when he was in possession of all the facts, he told Col. Livingston that he might telegraph Col. Candler that his regiment would be retained in the service.
Where the regiment will go is not as yet known. Col. Livingston has put in a strong bid for the regiment to be assigned to Manila. The impression is strong that a good many more additional troops will have to be sent to Manila before peace and quiet is restored there. This is the impression both at the war and navy departments, and plans are being made accordingly. In view of this there may be a good chance for the Third going out there.
It was stated at the war department this morning that the First and Second Alabama regiments are to be mustered out. The Third Alabama, a negro regiment, is to be retained.

Savannah Morning News
August 23, 1898

PRESENTED WITH COLORS.
Col. Candler Doesn’t Know What Will Be Done With His Men.
Griffin, Ga., Aug. 22.—During the greater part of to-day there were no sentinels on duty at Camp Northern. Only the prisoners were guarded by a small squad. This was the result of an order requiring the property of every man to be inspected and checked before going into the hands of the regimental quartermaster.
Lieut. T. F. Hastings will at once relieve Lieut. F. L. Palmer of the duties of acting regimental quartermaster, and Lieut. Palmer leaves in a few days for Atlanta, where he will finish his duties connected with the mobilization of the Third Georgia Regiment and thence return to his duties as first lieutenant Twenty-first Infantry, United States Army.
Some talk was heard regarding the moving of this regiment to Cuba at an early date. Col. Candler has reported to the adjutant general at Washington, but no orders have yet been received, and he does not know what will be done with his regiment. They are ready and willing to go anywhere in the world the authorities see fit to send them. This afternoon a committee of young ladies came down from Atlanta, and, in behalf of the Young Ladies’ Relief Association of that city, presented the regiment with a handsome flag. The young ladies were met at the depot by Col. Candler’s staff and escorted to the post, where all arrangements for the presentation had been made.
Every man in the regiment was at his post of duty, and a larger body of men was never seen on the grounds before.
Miss Jennie English, one of Atlanta’s fairest daughters, in a most graceful and becoming manner, presented the flag. At Col. Candler’s request, Maj. Spence, who had fought and bled for the colors, received them in a most appropriate way. His words of thanks showed his love for duty of his country. His tribute to the noble association presenting them with the handsome flag was a just one.
Sergt. Wooten, of Capt. Van Riper’s company, First Battalion, was /detailed as color sergeant, while Private Johnson of Capt. Davies’ company, Second Battalion, and Private Harp of Capt. Burr’s company, Third Battalion, were chosen guards to the colors.
Capt. Baker of the Second Battalion is color company of his regiment. Capt. Burr’s Company, Third Battalion, will act as escort to the colors.
The ladies of Atlanta are to present the regiment with another large and handsome flag in a few days.
Nine men were mustered in to-day, which were given to Capts. Sanders, Van Riper and Hodges, which fills their companies up to 106 men, the full quota.
Capt. Kolshorn of Savannah and Capt. Gilbert  of Albany have 101 men each, and say they could get fifty others before Saturday if needed.
Capt. Gilbert’s company is now the banner company in camp and its officers are working faithfully to keep it in the lead.

Americus Times-Tecorder
August 27, 1898

Georgia’s Military Muddle

An Atlanta special to the Savannah News discusses the status of the Georgia military and gives at length Gov. Atkinson’s views on the all important question. If the governor is quoted correctly the Times-Recorder applauds his bold, patriotic stand and hopes the war department will consider the feasible proposition of Georgia’s governor in the disposition of our military. The News’ correspondent says:
From all accounts there appears to be a pretty row on in the Third Georgia Regiment, now stationed at Camp Northen, over the reported desire of a large majority of the privates to be mustered out of the service at once, while the officers are trying to throttle this sentiment and keep the regiment that they may continue to wear shoulder straps and draw rations from the government crib.
Incidentally Gov. Atkinson, who has been appealed to by some of the men, is disgusted with the whole business and says that he wishes the whole volunteer army of this state would come up like men and, if it is their real desire, say in plain terms that they want to he mustered out.
The governor does not care to have much to say about the situation, and when questioned by the Morning News correspondent about it he was disposed to show impatience with the whole military establishment.
The Georgia boys enlisted to fight Spaniards, and he thinks that they did, and now want to go back to their business at home since there is nothing left to do but to perform police or garrison duty. The governor thinks they ought to say so without quibbling and thus settle the matter. It is said that the governor has suggested to the war department that all who desire to be mustered out in the three Georgia regiments be allowed to do so, and those who wish to serve be formed into a regiment. The idea is that if such course should be adopted enough men would be left who are willing and anxious to do garrison duty to form a complete regiment and thus all would be satisfied. Of course there would he a superfluity of officers, though it quite certain that some, at least of the officers, now in service with the governor’s regiments, including field officers, would prefer to quit rather than be sent off to some of our new possessions to do garrison duty.
While nothing positive is known as to their wishes it is said at the capital that neither Col. Lawton or Lieut Col. Garrard would care to continue in the service doing garrison duty.
Col. Oscar Brown is naturally anxious to continue, as war is his profession and the disbandment of his regiment of volunteers would mean that he resume his former rank as captain in the regular would service.
Col. John Candler of the Third Regiment also wants to serve his term, wherever his regiment may be sent, and from all accounts it seems that Lieut. Col. Berner is also stuck on his job and would be more than willing to go with the Third anywhere within the jurisdiction of the war department.  to make up one regiment of Georgians composed of those of the present three who want to continue in garrison duty in Cuba or other new possessions, the governor would probably designate the officers who would he retained.
Col. Candler wired from Griffin that he estimated that only about 10 percent of the men in his regiment were desirous of being mustered out. There are contradictory reports from Camp Northern, however, the other side claiming that but for the conduct of the officers in suppressing expression at least 75 per cent, of the men would openly declare their desire to be relieved of military duty, since they are not to have any chance to shoot Spaniards. If the war department should adopt the governor’s idea, that is to make up one regiment of Georgians composed of those of the present three who want to continue in garrison duty in Cuba or other new possessions, the governor would probably designate the officers who would be retained.

The Houston Home Journal.
September 01, 1898

Civil vs Military.

     There was a wordy conflict be tween civil and military authorities at Griffin last week, in which the military was victor.
     Several weeks ago a man giving his name as Ed Mallary hired a bicycle from a Fort Valley merchant to ride a few miles into the country, representing himself to be an officer going out to make an arrest.
Several days passed, and the bi cycle was not returned, then a warrant for larceny after trust was issued, Mallary was located, and when an effort to arrest him was made he escaped by running. The next heard from him was at Camp Northern, where he was a private in the Third Ga. Regiment.
     An effort to secure him by the Griffin Chief of police failed. Then Sheriff Cooper forwarded the warrant to the sheriff of Spalding county, writing that officer a letter explaining the circumstances upon which the warrant was based. Under the warrant Mallary was arrested, but an appeal to Col. Candler, in command of the regiment, resulted in his release and all expostulations to the contrary were futile.
To people under civil law this incident seems strange. It appears that military law is supreme when it affects Uncle Sam’s soldiers. If these soldiers are truly exempt from prosecution for violation of criminal law, then the fewer soldiers we have in these parts will be best for the country .—

The Macon telegraph

September 09, 1898

…Col. Candler has received orders, to move his regiment to Jacksonville, Fla., where they will report to Gen. Lee. This movement will probably be accomplished tomorrow, or just as soon as the cars necessary for transportation can be secured. Many of the soldiers are anxious to make the move, but others who have beard of the condition of camps at other places freely express a preference for remaining at Camp Northern Surgeon Major L. B. Grandy informed me that the health of the camp had been remarkably, good in spite of the wet weather. The greater portion of the men who were in the hospital were brought there by their imprudence in eating. No camp yet can show as clean a health record as Camp Northern.
The soldiers are deeply regretting the fact that the paymaster has not been in evidence and in speaking of the matter one of them said today: “It is embarrassing to many of us who are sadly in need of change. I know of many who have contracted small bills and enjoyed courtesies here that will leave feeling humiliated over the fact that they cannot discharge their obligations. Yet Uncle Sam, secure in the fact that he is good for his contracts, takes his own time and we are forced to acquiesce.”

Savannah Morning News
September 09, 1898

ORDERED TO REPORT TO LEE. THIRD REGIMENT TO MOVE AT ONCE TO JACKSONVILLE.

Col. Candler Receives His Orders Direct From Washington, and There Is No Possibility of a Fake — A General Howl Goes Up Among the Men and Two Commissioned Officers Send In Their Resignation. Thought That Other Officers Will Resign—A Hitch Likely to Occur Because of a Lack of Rations.

Griffin, Ga., Sept. B.—The Third Georgia Regiment, United States Volunteers, have been ordered to Jacksonville, Fla., and this time the order Is no fake, as it comes direct to Col. Candler from Washington.
About 7:30 o’clock last night Col. Candler received a telegram from Adjt. Gen. Corbin telling him to report to Gen. Lee at Jacksonville for duty and to be ready to depart in forty-eight hours.
As has been stated before, this order was preceded on Saturday inst, by a telephone message from Atlanta, stating they would be ordered away, but as no order came, many thought it was a fake, and men were rejoicing over the possibility of being mustered out In a short while. Many think It possible the regiment will break camps to-morrow and leave for their new encampment that night, but as the men will not be paid off until to-morrow morning, It is hardly probable they can complete arrangements and depart so soon. And again there is u hitch in the commissary department. The rations are running short and not enough is now on hand to furnish the men with a three-days’ or field ration. The new supply is billed to arrive Saturday. This may cause a delay of several days and it may be Monday before the regiment leaves. Col. Candler does not know himself when he will move. He will leave just as soon as possible.
When it was officially announced the regiment had been ordered away a general howl of complaint went up throughout the camp. Few of the men are desirous of doing garrison duty. They say they enlisted to fight Spain and not to guard property, as they have property of their own to look after.
As has been stated in the Morning News before, the commissioned officers were dissatisfied at the prospect of going to Jacksonville and threatened to resign their commissions should such be the case.
Two officers, Capt. Robert Hodges of Macon and Lieut. T. J. Ripley of DeKalb, sent in their resignations this afternoon and asked that the same take effect at once. It Is firmly believed at least a dozen other resignations will be handed in before the regiment departs. And yet some of these same officers think the men should remain In service for two years and do garrison duty.
Battery A will receive their pay and thirty days’ furlough to-morrow morning and leave at once for their homes.
Lieut. Brady [Bradley] and a squad of ten men will remain here to guard their property.
Camp Northern will again soon be deserted, unless the report now circulated that two Georgia regiments are soon to be brought here to be mustered out, is correct.

Savannah Morning News.
October 14, 1898, Page 2

DESERTER SHOT BY A SQUAD. H. H. DICKINSON MORTALLY WOUNDED NEAR LUELLA.
Corpl. Gossett Sent With a Detail to Take the Deserter Back to Northern and Dickinson and Two Others Resist—Appeared With Winchesters, and Private Marsh Fired on Dickinson in Order to Save the Corporal’s Life.

Griffin. Ga.. Oct. 13.—H. H. Dickinson [Henry H. Dickerson], a deserter from Company B, Third Georgia Regiment, was shot at an early hour this morning and will probably die from the effect of the wound. The shooting was done at Dickinson’s home, near Luella, while he was resisting arrest, by a squad sent to bring him back to Camp Northern The particulars of the affair were furnished by Corpl. R. W. Gossett, who was an eye-witness, and are as follows: At 1 o’clock yesterday morning a squad composed of Corpl. Gossett, Privates [Sam T. ] Jenkins, {William M.] March and LSim L.] Dallas, left this city for the purpose of arresting Dickinson, who was known to be at his father’s home near Luella.
It was 3 o’clock before the Dickinson place was reached and Corpl. Gossett placed his men around the house and awaited the coming of day when It was expected Dickinson would come out.
When the inmates of the house awoke they must have detected the presence of the determined guards surrounding the place for the door opened and Dickinson and two other deserters, Moore and Kitchen, stepped out heavily armed with Winchester rifles and pistols.
Corpl. Gossett recognized the men end called on them to surrender which command they disregarded. Some tried to make their escape, but Dickinson raised his Winchester to fire upon Gossett as soon as he could get a shot. A brother of Dickinson’s came out of the house and happened to get between Dickinson and Gossett and Gossett was unable to use his Springfield without shooting an innocent man.
Private Marsh saw the danger threatening his’officer and fired on Dickinson who fell mortally wounded. In the confusion that followed the other deserters fled to the woods and made their escape.
The corporal of the squad went to the fallen man and found him mortally wound ed. The bullet entered Dickinson’s neck just at the base of the skull and came out of his jaw, tearing one side of his face almost entirely away. At last accounts Dickinson was alive, but his chances for recovery are very slim.

THIRD GA., IN SAVANNAH.

Co. C. 3rd Ga., Reg. U. S. V. Inft’y.

     We have taken one step toward what we have for over three long months been so anxiously waiting. The 3rd Ga., broke camps at Camp Northern Monday morning [November 21, 1898] and boarded the cars for Savannah at 3:15 p. m. Col. Rob’t Lee Berner wired Macon and Savannah ahead, and plenty of good sweetened coffee was ready at Macon for supper and Tuesday morning at  4 o’clock we arrived here, drank our coffee, ate our hardtack and quietly rested on the cars till reveille.
      At the first call at 5 o’clock the cars were unloaded at the  Georgia Car and Manufacturing Co.’s sheds, which were within a few hours converted into a splendid camp.
       Company “C,” who are noted for their quiet energy, were, as they always are, among the first to erect tents and get everything in perfect order. All the boys are very anxious to “take in” the city but a guard line was the first thing to be established, and only five at a time are allowed out.

Col. Berner took the wise precaution to remind the men by sections as they lined up on the parade grounds at Camp Northern to march to the cars, that he wanted his regiment to break the record of all former regiments, who have passed through the country, for good conduct,

      A sergeant was put in command of each car, and through the diligent execution of duty, and the high state of refinement of the privates, of which we boasted we secured compliments from the people in all the places we passed through, with cheers and good wishes which were highly creditable to the regiment.

     Nothing official has been heard as to when we will proceed to Cuba. It is reported that two transports, one of them the Chester, have sailed from New York and it is the belief that the Chester will carry Georgia boys to their new post.

     The 3rd Ga., is in a very fine state of health; a few cases of a very mild type of measles, and some pretty sore arms from vaccination are all the complaints heard.

     I am proud to say, to the credit of the Dallas and Paulding county boys, that they have, with one exception, a splendid company record, and have the highest praises by the commanding officer for their obedience to orders and strict adherence to duty. If the editor will kindly publish this I will promise through your column to keep my good friends and loved ones posted as to what we are doing. With best wishes for the kind editor success to the New Era and all Dallas and all Paulding county.

     I am your friend,

     Serg’t

William Edward Hightower

Way back a hundred and eighty years ago, at Troupville, GA which was then still the county seat of old Lowndes county, there stood an old cypress tree. This old tree weathered many a Wiregrass storm and its roots held steadfast. Passing under its boughs, pioneer settlers like Levi J. Knight came to Troupville to conduct the governmental, commercial and social affairs of the county.  The town was built right in the fork of the Little River and the Withlacoochee.  “Troupville only suffered one inconvenience, wrote Montgomery M. Folsom. To get to town three-fourths of the population had either to cross the river of the east or the river of the west and half the time, during the winter and spring, these rivers were raging with freshets, the bridges were afloat and were frequently swept away.”

When the flood of March, 1841 inundated the town the residents noted the high water level by a mark on the old tree. 

The height of that flood, known as the Harrison Freshet, became the standard by which all subsequent floods were judged for a hundred years thereafter.   The flood was associated with William Henry Harrison, who carried the presidency in 1840, in an election which lasted 34 days. Levi J. Knight’s nephew, Henry Harrison Knight, was born November 17, 1840 smack in the middle of the election.

William Henry Harrison

There has come to be some confusion over which flood is properly known as the Harrison Freshet, some histories placing the so-named flood in 1840 and others in 1841.  Congressional records state the Harrison Freshet “occurred in 1841, lasting from the 11th of March to the 19th.” Newspapers all over the state of Georgia reported rising waters and washed-out bridges during this period, just days after the inauguration of William Henry Harrison as the ninth President of the United States. But parts of Georgia had also been awash in the  flood of 1840, which saw waters rise as high.

At Troupville, it was the same; The mark remained on the old cypress tree, and it was inspected at every freshet. The flood of 1897 precipitated such an inspection.

Troupville, GA flood of 1897 described in the New Orleans Times Democrat

New Orleans Times Democrat
March 28, 1897
Bridges Washed Away and Railroad Traffic Stopped.
Special to the Times-Democrat.
       Atlanta, Ga., March 27. – All of the streams running into the largest rivers of Southwest Georgia are flooded to such an extent as to have almost suspended travel on the east and west line of the Plant system, as well as on the Georgia and Alabama Railroad Line. The Georgia Southern Railroad is washed out in many places, and no trains have passed in the last twenty-four hours. In the neighborhood of Valdosta the floods have risen to such an extent as to cover almost the entire country. The Willacoochie rose at the rate of two feet an hour at first, and is still rising. It has covered all the railroad tracks from view, though the trestle is a high one, and half a mile long. All the bridges in Lowndes county have been carried away.
      At the old cypress tree at Troupville the high water mark of the Harrison freshet has been covered. The Allapaha river is also on a rampage, and every bridge on the Flint, from its source down to its junction with the Chattahoochee, has been carried away. The Central Railroad branch running from Columbia, Ala., to Albany is so largely under water that transportation has been abandoned. Americus also has been cut off by the overflowing of the Muckalee for a week, and travel is done by boats. It is the most general flooding that part of the country has ever received.

Of course, Troupville is gone now, but whatever happened to that old cypress tree?

Related Posts:

• Marsh’s Ferry, the Lopahaw Bridge and Tyson Ferry
• Tales of Old Troupville: The Pranksters
• Map of Old Troupville, GA with Notes on the Residents
• A Plank Road for Troupville
• Judge Johnson of Jasper, FL had Troupville Connections
• Riders of the Troupville Circuit: Tillman Dixon Peurifoy
• Bowling at old Troupville, Georgia
• An Antebellum Trial at Troupville
• Reverend John Slade of the Troupville Circuit
• Sheriff Swain and Legal Affairs in Old Troupville.
• Sheriff Swain and Legal Affairs in Old Troupville.
• Morz Swain was Innkeeper, Blacksmith, Sheriff & Jailor of old Troupville, GA
• More About Troupville, GA and the Withlacoochee River
• Reverend William A. Knight at old Troupville, GA

Thanksgiving During the Spanish-American War

During the Spanish-American War, the people of Georgia were anxious to show the valor of the southern soldier, and their patriotic commitment to the defense of the Union. Many commanders in the southern corps of the U.S. Army corps were reconstructed Confederate officers.  General officers from the south had honor guards of Confederate veterans.  Very few African-Americans were accepted to serve in the U.S. Army, and where they were allowed they were organized into segregated regiments.

On Thanksgiving Day, November 24, 1898, Berrien County men Walter A. Griner, Carl R. O’Quinn, Pythias D. Yapp, Zachary T. Hester, W. Dutchman Stephens, Samuel Z.T. Lipham, James M. Bridges, Charles A. Courson, Love Culbreath, George C. Flowers, James L. Jordan, George A. Martin, Aaron Cook , Luther Lawrence Hallman and William F. Patten were with the Third Georgia Regiment, U.S. Volunteer Infantry, encamped at Savannah, GA. The Third Georgia Regiment was awaiting passage to Cuba, where they would serve in the occupation force following the Spanish-American War.

Thanksgiving Day, November 24, 1898 was a beautiful Autumn day in the south. That morning, sermons were preached by local pastors in the assembly tents of the regiments. At noon,  in recognition of service to their country and courtesy of the ladies of Savannah, a Thanksgiving Dinner was to be provided to all U.S. regiments encamped at Savannah. At least for all the southern regiments. For the northern regiments, the cost of the meal was paid by the troops.  The Savannah ladies did offer to do the preparation and serving, but some northern regiments declined the courtesy.  Although some offense was taken by the ladies, the Colonel,”with the feeling that the money, once raised the serving would be a comparatively easy and pleasant task… made the preparation and the serving of the dinner a strictly regimental affair.”

Somehow, through an oversight or miscalculation, the ladies of Savannah were unable to obtain an adequate number of turkeys for the celebration and on the day of feast the Third Georgia Regiment had to make do with other fare.  There was provided, however, an abundance of fruit and cakes for the Third Georgia Regiment, for which the men were most thankful to the ladies of Savannah.

Meanwhile, the Savannah camps of the northern regiments feasted. At the encampment of the 161st Indiana Regiment, William Edward Biederwolf reported

“The boys did not have the ladies but they had warm turkey instead and plenty of it. One thousand one hundred pounds of turkey were furnished by Armour & Co., to be accounted for in surplus meat. There were ninety gallons of oysters that day; there were cranberries and celery and mince pies and other delicacies which appeal to the inner man and which go hand in hand with the day thus observed. An enlisted man, who having disposed of nine pounds of turkey, a quart of cranberries, two mince pies and other edibles in proportion kicked because his capacity for consumption went back on him at time so inopportune. Some of the officers dined with “the boys” at the noon meal then had dinner in the officers mess, “during which service the table fairly groaned under its load of good things.”

After the Thanksgiving dinner,

Thanksgiving Dinner was not always a southern tradition. During the Civil War by both Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln issued proclamations calling for “a day of thanksgiving. ”  In the south it was “a day of national humiliation and prayer“; In the north it was a day to be observed “with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience.”  But in New England, the day of thanksgiving had also been a feast celebration of the bountiful harvest.

The article below, published while the Berrien men were in the field in the Spanish American War, explains how Thanksgiving became accepted in the New South, and a truly national holiday in the United States.

The Jackson Argus
December 2, 1898

Thanksgiving Reverie
WALLACE P. REED

        Thanksgiving Day for nearly 250 years was a sectional holiday. It was observed in New England, and in some of the middle and western states, where New England ideas and customs prevailed.
The old south had no use for the day. Why should the people take a holiday in the latter part of November, when their festive Christmas followed only a month later?
       Prejudice had something to do with this view of the matter. The descendants of the Cavaliers and Huguenots would not tolerate anything that smacked of Puritanism. and it was enough for them to know that Thanksgiving day started with Governor Bradford and the Plymouth colony in 1621.
      So the old-time southerners jogged along in their own way, giving up Christmas week to good cheer, and devoting their days and nights to pleasure. They had their family reunions, social functions, hunting parties and other recreations, and in many things they closely followed the customs of their ancestors in Merrie England.

—

      Forty or fifty years ago a Thanksgiving proclamation from a southern governor would have been received with jeers, ridicule and severe criticism.
       The people living south of the Potomac were not willing to recognize the great religious and festal day of the Puritans. They did not believe that any custom or institution having its origin in the shadow of Plymouth rock was suited to the civilization which claimed Jamestown as its starting point.
       The two sections seemed to be for ever divided in sentiment in regard to this matter. Down south Christmas was the royal festival of the year, while in the north it passed with slight recognition, the Yankees preferring to enjoy themselves on the holiday instituted by their old Puritan governor.
       With the growing antagonism between the sections, the southern people become more determined than ever to hold fast to their mode of living, their customs, institutions, manners, dress and their principles and prejudices of a political and social nature.
      The tremendous shock of the civil war shattered systems and wrecked many time-honored theories and fondly cherished beliefs. It was no time between battles, when thousands of families were in mourning, for such a mockery as an official day of Thanksgiving in the sorely afflicted south, but as early as 1862 the people became familiar with days of fasting and prayer.
      The loss of Fort Pulaski in the spring of that year was so disheartening that Governor Brown issued a proclamation setting apart a certain day for “fasting, humiliation and prayer.” Here in Atlanta and in other cities and towns throughout the state, the citizens assembled in the churches to hear sermons suited to the occasion. All business was suspended and the day was solemnly observed.
        The southerners of that generation were old-fashioned in their religious beliefs and many who sneered at the New England Thanksgiving accepted very readily the idea of a day of fasting and prayer. Other governors followed Brown’s example and President Davis more than once issued a similar proclamation for the confederate states.
       It is quite likely that this wartime custom prepared our people for the acceptance of Thanksgiving Day, after the restoration of peace.

—

     After new state governments had been organized in the south the republican governors issued Thanksgiving proclamations, and in short time the new holiday grew in public favor to such an extent that when the democrats returned to power they followed the precedent established by their predecessors of the opposing party.
        The young people liked the change and their elders soon came to the conclusion that one more holiday was a good thing, and they were, readier to accept it when they found that the northern people had borrowed the southern Christmas and were celebrating it more generally every year. Many very old people now living remember that in then young days Christmas was almost ignored in New England, but in the course of a few years after the war for some mysterious reason, it leaped to the front as the most popular festive season of the year.
        The war worked many radical changes in the social, political, moral and industrial conditions which had prevailed in this region for many generations, the new south differed materially from the old south in many respects. In some directions there is a distinct improvement—a step forward—but in others the old timers say that there has been a retrograde movement.
       The millions of angry people who refused for more than two centuries to adopt the Thanksgiving holiday, and then accepted it, did not stop there. Having overcome the prejudices against this custom, they found it easy to allow other yankee ideas, methods and institutions to obtain a foothold in Dixie.
       The older readers of this article will agree with me that great changes have occurred in the southern mode of living m the past thirty years.
       There was a time when a man might have visited every restaurant and boarding house in a southern town without being able to find such articles as baked beans, Boston brown bread, doughnuts and codfish balls. These things followed the invading federal armies, and they came to stay. They are now recognized articles of diet among native southerners, as well as north settlers.
        We have adopted different foods, fashions and methods. Nearly every successful northern idea has been adopted here or is on trial in an experimental way.
       Many New England isms are making headway in the south. Once there were no Spiritualists here; now there are thousands. The female suffrage idea is spreading, and hundreds of callings are open to women in the south which were closed to them before the war.  A generation ago it was a rare thing to find Unitarian, Unaversalist and Congregational churches in this section, but now they are growing in every state.
       We also have Christian Science, the faith cure, divine healers, etc.
       We have become so tolerant that Mormon missionaries come and go, and preach among us without being molested.

—

      What has all this to do with Thanksgiving Day?
      A great deal. Any one who is familiar with our history can see at a glance the great revolution which has taken place in the south. Perhaps half unconsciously the new south has taken New England as a model, and is gradually shaping herself accordingly.
      In many ways the change is beneficial, but in others it is to our disadvantage. We can learn many valuable lessons from the north in finance, industry, economy, and in such matters as public schools, municipal ownership and commercial progress, but it would be wise to hold on to all that is best of the old south until we are absolutely certain that it will be to our interest in every way to embrace a new civilization.
       But Thanksgiving Day is all right, no matter when or where it originated, and our people will observe it in the proper spirit for all time to come. If we never borrow anything worse from New England we are not likely to suffer.

George W. Davis was an early circuit riding Methodist preacher in Lowndes County, GA.  He was sent from the Tallahassee District in 1832 to ride the newly created Lowndes (later Troupville) Circuit. This was when Lowndes County encompassed a vast area of south Georgia including much of present day Lowndes, Berrien, Brooks, Cook, Tift, Echols, and Lanier counties, and the county seat of government was at Franklinville, GA.

Methodist Circuit Rider in the early days. The history of Georgia Methodism from 1786 to 1866.

The privations of the early circuit-riders (as they soon became known) were such that the health of most of these vanguards of the Cross was soon broken.  Subjected to bitter cold and at other times to unbearable heat, oftentimes with the ground as a bed at night, fording impassable streams, long distances between settlers and between preaching points, no roads, no bridges, no churches (and even when some were formed they were too weak to afford any financial help to the pastor), with many natural enemies in addition to the lurking Indian, long absences from home and kindred, with the heavy spiritual care of a struggling mission work upon their shoulders, it was no wonder that many of the early pioneer preachers died in the prime of life, while others had to take enforced “locations” on account of broken health. It was thus that the first young preacher sent out on the newly established Lowndes Mission in 1832, died at the age of 24 years.

The loss of Rev. Davis weighed in the reflections of Rev. Robert H. Howren,  who would soon follow in this young circuit-rider’s footsteps round the Methodist churches of Lowndes County. In his memoirs Howren said:

Rev. George W. Davis, the first pastor of the Lowndes Mission, was born in Morgan County, Ga., in 1808, and was converted in 1824 in a camp-meeting near Monticello, Jasper County, [FL]. In 1828 he felt a call to preach and was admitted on trial into the Georgia Conference, later into the full connection. He was assigned to the traveling ministry in which he continued  with great fortitude and faithfulness despite hardships and trials, until his death. His first work in South Georgia was in 1830 when he served as Junior Preacher on the Liberty County Mission, Savannah District. The next year he was assigned to the Appling County Mission, a truly pioneer work. In January, 1832, he was assigned to the newly-formed Lowndes Mission but did not live to wind up the year, dying suddenly within two minutes on November 17, 1832 at the home of Joseph McBride in Florida. (From Conference Obituary).

†

Though his death was sudden, the righteousness of his life gives assurance that he died in the Lord. Being seated at the table in company with some of his brethren at the house of brother Joseph McBride, in Florida, he suddenly sunk down and expired in about two minutes, November 27, 1832, in the twenty-fourth year of his age.  -Minutes of the Annual Conferences of the United Methodist Church, 1840

Related Posts:

• Reverend Robert H. Howren ~ Methodist Circuit Rider
• Riders of the Troupville Circuit: Tillman Dixon Peurifoy
• Reverend John Slade of the Troupville Circuit
• The Old Log Church
• In Salem Church
• A Brief History of the Ray City Methodist Church
• A Brief History of the Ray City Methodist Church
• Fifty Years of Methodist Ministers ~ Ray City, GA
• Reverend Joseph Frank Snell, Pastor of the Ray City Methodist Church
• Liveoak Methodist Church

Ray City School, Third Grade, 1949

Special Thanks to Chris Clements for sharing Ray City School records.

1949 Ray City School 3rd grade

1949 Ray City School 3rd Grade Roster

• Harold Scarboro – Harold Duane Scarboro [Scarbrough] -born December 16, 1939, a son of Elmo Clifton Scarbrough and Ruth Martin. His father helped build Moody Air Force Base. The family home was a two-dollar-a-month rental place in the Lois community on the Ray City and Hahira Road. Harold’s grandparents, Lela and Charlie M. Scarbrough, rented the house next door, and uncle Paul Allen Scarbrough was nearby. His brother, Charles Scarbrough, was a Ray City Senior in 1949.
• Christine Akeridge
• Leon McCullers – Leon Franklin McCullers, born October 30, 1940, a son of Leroy McCullers and Verdy Martin.  His father was a farmer and a veteran of WWII. His siblings, Dorothy McCullers and James Wesley McCullers, also attended the Ray City School.
• Martha D. Flowers was a daughter of Ola Browning and James H. Flowers. Her parents were lodging with Lewis D. Browning in a home on the Ray City & Nashville Road in the Lois community. Her father worked as a farm laborer.
• Bob Cook – Robert Eugene Cook – born July 26, 1936, a son of Isaac Clayton Cook and Mattie E. Sirmans. His father’s occupation in 1940 was fishing. He was a brother of Betty Jo Cook and Bertha Nancy Cook.  The Cooks rented a house on Jones Street, Ray City, GA.
• Betty Burkhalter – Betty Madie Burkhalter, born March 4, 1938, a daughter of Phillip I Burkhalter and Edna Gertrude Brantley.  Her father was a farmer.  When she was a toddler her great grandfather, Gus Calhoun, lived with the family.
• Edward Carter
• J. D. Cone – John Dewey “JD” Cone, born May 27, 1940,  was the son of Dewey Lesley Cone and Velma Sowell Cone. In 1940, the family lived in the Lois community, just west of Ray City, on a rented farm. JD’s father worked as a laborer. By 1942, JD’s father took a job with Henry Gornto working on his farm about a mile and a half southeast of Ray City.
• Dorothy Skinner – Dorothy L Skinner, born July 23, 1940, a daughter of Payton Shelton Skinner and Mary E. Akridge Skinner.
• Wilmer Smith
• Bonnie Fountain
• Wendell Browning
• Deloris Barnard – Iris Delores Barnard, born August 19, 1939 in Ray City, GA, a daughter of Charlie Jackson Barnard (1909-1970) and Lola Lee Davis ( 1919-2009). She was the granddaughter of Andrew Jackson Barnard and Nettie Ray Barnard, residents of the Lois community just west of Ray City. She was the sister of Ann Barnard and Charles Barnard.
• Grace Carter
• Marion McKuhen
• Mary Justic
• Earl Warren
• Lawana Snipe – LaJuana Jean Snipes, born January 4, 1940, a daughter of Arthur Leonard Snipes (1907–1962) and Louise Elizabeth Garner Snipes (1909–1997), and a granddaughter of Asa Duggan Garner and Bessie Yopp Garner. She was a sister of Donald Dale Snipes (1943-2016). The Snipes lived in the Lois Community just west of Ray City. In the late 1950s the family moved just outside the Ray City city limits on the Adel Highway to a house built in 1909 for Ray City pharmacist Charles Oscar Terry.
• Willard Bates – attended the New Lois school by 1952
• Bobby Smith
• Earl Snipe
• Kenneth Griner
• Myrtle Myers
• Billy Sirmans – Billy Lawton Sirmans, born October 14, 1939, a son of John Abner Sirmans and Lettie Studstill. His father was a veteran of WWI.
• C. Fountain
• Gene Baldree
• M. Fountain
• R. Dampier –  Ronald Edward Dampier, born December 12, 1940 in Ray City, GA, a son of J W Dampier and Ardie Kent Dampier,
• Jan Moore was a daughter of Ferris Moore, who was the Ray City iceman.
• J. Jefferson
• C. Sirmans
• Johnny Wood –   He was a son of Jewel and Remer Wood.  His father was a smoke house operator. The family home was on Jones Street and the smokehouse was in the back yard. People would come by the house to buy smoked meat.  Johnny Wayne Wood later moved to Savannah. He came back to Ray City and worked as the Chief of Police.
• M. Smith
• Bobby Pevy
• Carol May
• Alvis Sauls – a son of Alvis Sauls (1914-1989) and Kathleen Warren Sauls (1917-1977)
• Bobby Green

Related Posts

• 1949, 1st Grade, Ray City School
• 1949, Second Grade, Ray City School
• Ray City School, Class of 1949
• History of Ray City School
• WWII Vets added Vocational Building at Ray City School
• Nashville High School, Class of 1949
• Charles Woodrow Schmoe ~ Ray City School Principal
• Mrs. Schmoe ~ Ray City Teacher
• Ray City School Teachers 1950-51, Ray City, Berrien County, Georgia
• Senior Class of 1951, Ray City School
• Ray City School Gets Lunch Room, 1941
• Ray City Girls Form Athletic Club, 1947
• Arlo Snead Taught at New Lois School
• Queen of the Harvest celebrated Ray City Gymnasium
• Jack Knight, Valdosta State Slugger

Margaret Rebecca Bullard, of Nashville, GA graduated in 1963 from Wesleyan College, Macon, GA.

Margaret Rebecca Bullard 1963 yearbook photo, Wesleyan College, Macon, GA

Margaret Rebecca Bullard
Nashville, GA
Psychology
Who is the girl to meditate over jokes and then laugh the Loudest? – Becky –
Who writes her “day by day” account of independent study one hour before it’s due? -Becky-
Who can pack cosmetics, hair dryer, and a hat or two in one traincase for a week-end trip to Atlanta -only Becky-
And who can manage a full academic schedule, ten hours a week of work in the alumnae office (with coffee breaks and perusals of the society page), nightly trips to the “Pig,” and frequent visits home to Nashville (the big city with two traffic lights)? -our own fun-loving and friend-making Becky.
She is a bubble of vitality, a portrait of true goodness, and a symbol of honor and truth which all could use as a model. Becky can have no unsolvable problems; for with the objectivity of a psychology major, the warm understanding of a person who loves people, and the eager anticipation of her all-white wedding and fifty years in a full nine-passenger Chevrolet station wagon, Becky has already found her way of life and living.

Wesley Fellowship 1, 4, treasurer 2, secretary 3; Town and Country 1, 2, 3, 4; French Club 1; Volleyball 1, 2; Dance Club; Soccer 2; Executive Stunt Committee 3, 4; Psychology Club 4.

Psychology Club, 1963, Wesleyan College, Macon, GA

“The objective of a study of PSYCHOLOGY is to understand the abilities, motives, thoughts, and actions of people. Understanding of self and of others is a primary goal. The study is designed to help a person in all areas of life, especially as a Christian, as a homemaker, and as a member of a civic and social group.”

Newspaper Staff, 1963, Town and Country, Wesleyan College, Macon, GA

“The name Town and Country dates back to the dates when the Wesleyan campus was in two locations, with the fine arts students in the conservatory in town, and the liberal arts students here at Rivoli. Since that time, of course, the entire school has been moved out to the present location, but the name of the newspaper has stayed with us.
The “T and C” is published by the students bi-monthly and endeavors to represent the entire student body in its news coverage and in its editorial policies. The staff is composed of volunteers with a special emphasis being given to any major requirements except for advanced staff positions. In spite of its lack of professional guidance however, the paper has proven to be of almost professional quality and has shown the maintenance of high standards throughout.”

The March, 1963 edition of Town and Country included the note, “A word to the wise: Let’s be careful about those trips to the “city” with three traffic lights, Becky Bullard! By the way, what’s that on your fourth finger, left hand?”

And the April 25 edition followed up with this:

TELL IT!!
by Hilda Jackson

All year I’ve told it— everything, that is, that wasn’t cut for one reason or another. And there’s one other important thing that I haven’t told — what are all there ring clad, pin clad, or the left out loafer and sack clad seniors going to do now that they have poise, personality, and an education?

This summer is absolutely terrifying filled with the clang, clang of wedding bells. Ann Hutchings is marrying her old professor Jack Bauer in June. Elaine Evatt and Ronnie are taking their infamous train early in June, also. Barbara Johnston will set up housekeeping in their plush chevy with the piped in music after June 23. Nancy Williams and Ned can save gas money this summer — ^they won’t have to drive back to the dorm at 12:00 each night — they’re getting married, too. Carolyn Akin, our future alumnae president, will become Mrs. John Henderson in June of 1963!

Diane Lumpkin stands alone in July unless Becky Bullard has chosen this month. (Becky was out with HIM when I wrote this). Diane and Dewitt have chosen July 6 to make that final payment on the king-size bed.

Related Posts:

Emily Britton Parker, Ray City Teacher

Reverend Robert H. Howren ~ Methodist Circuit Rider

Reverend John Slade of the Troupville Circuit

Isham Jordan worked in 1823 to open John Coffee’s Road from Jacksonville, GA to the Florida line, thus opening for settlement old Irwin County which then encompassed Lowndes and Berrien, and other counties of Wiregrass Georgia.  Isham Jordan, along with Burrell Henry Bailey and others had worked to survey and mark the first public roads in Irwin County.

When Coffee’s road was cut, Jordan and the other hunters who supplied meat to the work party were honored in the songs and stories of the Wiregrass pioneers. Some of these verses were passed down in the works of Montgomery M. Folsom (see also Pennywell Folsom fell at Brushy Creek), whom Folks Huxford described as “a sort of grandson of old Troupville,” Georgia.

“Yonder comes ole Isham Jordan,
That ole ‘onest huntin’ man.
Glorious tidin’s he doth bring,
Swain has kilt another turkey hent.

We’ll allow the New Convention;
We’ll all allow the rights of men;
We’ll allay the Injun nation;
The volunteers and the drafted men.”

Isham Jordan and John Coffee were among the early pioneer settlers of Telfair County, GA. Telfair was formed from Wilkinson County in 1807, and named for Edward Telfair.

When Pulaski County was created in 1808, the legislative act,

“Provided, That until the court-houfe fhall be erected the elections and courts for faid county fhall be held at the houfe of Ifham Jordan.”

1822 map detail of Telfair County, GA and Pulaski County, GA

The first term of Pulaski Superior Court held in 1809 at Isham Jordan’s house on Jordan’s Creek, presided over by Judge Peter Early.  Early, whose family had one of the largest slaveholding plantations in Greene County, was an outspoken opponent of any attempts to outlaw the importation of African slaves.

Unfortunately, the first three census schedules for Georgia (1790-1810)  are missing, thus there is no 1810 enumeration of Isham Jordan.  Legal actions indicate that Isham Jordan appeared in 1813 before Justice of the Peach, Josiah Cawthorn, in Telfair County, GA where a judgement was found against him in the amount of $25 in favor of Adam G. Saffold. Saffold subsequently assigned the debt to his attorney, Griffin Mizell.

Georgia, Jones County:
Know all men by these presents that I do by these presents constitute and appoint Griffin Mizell my true and lawful attorney so far as to take full and complete control of a judgement in my favor on a note of $25 against Isham Jordan in the Justice’s Court held before Josiah Cawthorn in the county of Telfair; receipt for and receive the same & apply the amount to his own use. May 5th, 1813
(Signed)
Adam G. Saffold.
Carter & Mizell Correspondence

Telfair County court records show legal actions were taken against Isham Jordan and Nancy Moore in 1817. Apparently, a bench warrant was issued for their arrest for failure to appear in court. They were hauled before the court and subsequently posted bond in the amount of $800 against their future appearance.

The State vs Isham Jordan & Nancy Moore, Fi Fa, 1817

A rule having been obtained for the Sheriff to return into court the above fi fa with his actings and doings thereon or show to the contrary and cause having been shewn ordered that said rule be discharged.
Petit Jury Sworn
  1. Richard Wooten
  2. William Studstill
  3. Wilkins Fulwood
  4. Arch McLeod
  5. Joseph Fletcher
  6. Jacob Cravey
  7. Meriden Messec
  8. Stephen Hubert
  9. Joshua McCann
10. William Moore
11. William Mooney
12. Henry Jones

The State vs Isham Jordan & Nancy Moore

          William Hendry [sheriff?] surrendered the principles in Court it is therefore ordered that the said be discharged from his recognizance.
         Isham Jordan and Nancy Moore and Andrew Posey aknowledge themselves indebted to the Governor and his Successors in office in the Sum of eight hundred dollars to be void on the condition that the said Jordan and Moore appear at the next Superior Court and not depart without leave thereof.

         his
Isham X Jordan
mark

          her
Nancy X Moore
mark

Andrew Jolly

In 1818, it was Isham Jordan who reported the Battle of Breakfast Branch, subsequently conveyed by letter to Governor William Rabun and published in the Milledgeville, GA newspapers.

JOURNAL OFFICE
Milledgeville, March 11, 1818.
Skirmish with Indians.

The following was received this evening by express to the Governor:

Hartford, March 10th, 1818.

Sir :—I have this moment received information through Mr. Isham Jordan, of Telfair County, which I rely on, of a skirmish between the Indians and some of the citizens of Telfair, on the south side of the Ocmulgee River, in the afternoon of the 9th inst., twenty or twenty-five miles below this.

On the night of the 3d inst., Joseph Bush and his son were fired upon by a party of Indians, the father killed, and the son severely wounded and scalped, but he so far recovered as to reach home in two days after. The citizens having received information of the foregoing facts, assembled on the 9th instant to the number of thirty-six, and crossed the river in the forenoon to seek redress. Finding considerable signs of Indians, they pursued the trail leading from the river some distance out, where they came in view of a body of savages, fifty or sixty, advancing within gun-shot. The firing was commenced by each party, and warmly kept up for three-quarters of an hour. A part of the detachment effected their retreat, bringing off one badly wounded; four are certainly killed; the balance of the detachment has not been heard from; Major Cothom, (commandant of the Telfair Militia,) is among the missing. Four Indians were killed.

From information, the citizens below this are much alarmed, and leaving their homes, I have thought proper to communicate the foregoing to you by express. I am your Excellency’s most obedient servant,

Richard H. Thomas, Lieutenant-Colonel.

In consequence of the foregoing, the Pulaski Troop of Cavalry has been ordered out by the Executive, to scour the frontier and afford protection to the inhabitants. – The Telfair detachment we fear, has suffered greatly and we shall rejoice, if all who are missing have not perished. It would seem, that the Indians confiding in superior numbers, had sought to draw out the militia, by permitting the young man whom they scalped to reach the settlement.

Another Milledgeville newspaper added:

Rumour says, that the part of the detachment who are spoken of as having effected a retreat, fled at the beginning of the action, leaving the rest, most of whom have since returned, to contend with the Indians. Mitchell Griffin, Esq., Senator from Telfair, was among the killed.

Battle of Breakfast Branch, March 9, 1818 -Georgia Historic Marker

Unfortunately, the attack on the Bushes and the Battle of Breakfast Branch helped to precipitate the Chehaw Massacre,  perpetrated by Georgia militia soldiers upon a village of Native Americans who were actually friendly to the American government.

By 1820, Isham Jordan and his family appear in the census records of Irwin County, GA.  The enumeration indicates Jordan was a neighbor of Burrell Bailey.

1820 Census enumeration of Isham Jordan in Irwin County, GA

At the first term of the Superior Court of Irwin County, held September 21, 1820, Isham Jordan was drawn to serve on the first Petit Jury. The court was held at the house of David Williams, on land lot 147, 4th District of Irwin County. His Honor Thomas W. Harris was Judge, and Thaddeus G. Holt was Solicitor. The only business transacted was the drawing of the Grand and Petit Jury for the next term of court. Among those selected as Jordan’s jury mates for the first Petit Jury were Sion Hall and Drew Vickers. Burrell Bailey, Willis King, Elijah Beasley and Ludd Mobley were among those selected to serve on the first Grand Jury.

At the second term of the court the Petit Jury was not called for duty, but Isham Jordan faced charges brought by the Grand Jury for alleged adultery and fornication:

The second term was held at the house of David Williams on March 29, 1821. Judge T. W. Harris presiding, T. G. Holt, Solicitor-General. The only business transacted was by the Grand Jury as follows:

“We, the Grand Jury, for the county of Irwin, at a Superior Court held at the house of David Williams on the 29th day of March, 1821, make the following presentment. We present Isham Jordon and Nancy Moore for living in a state of adultery and fornication in the county aforesaid on the 28th day of March, 1821 and before that time. We present Alexander McDonal and Barbary Kelly for living in a state adultery and fornication in the county of Irwin on the twenty-eighth day of March, 1821, and before.”
(Signed)
Samuel Boyd, Foreman; David Hunter, Thomas Burnett, John Sutton, David Callaway, Achibald McInnis, Elijah Beasley, Redding Hunter, Willis King, James Rutherford, James Burnett, Ludd Mobley, David Allen, David Williams, William Hall, Daniel Burnett, Nathaniel Statum, Green Graham.

It appears that Jordan and Moore stood trial for the charge of adultery and fornication.  An undated Court record provides the following

The State vs Isom Jourdon & Nancy Moore
Adultery & Fornication
Verdict
We find the defendants not Guilty
Thomas Fulgham, foreman

Irwin County court records show Jordan and Bailey served together as a road commissioners.

At the July term, 1821, an order was passed establishing a public road in Irwin County beginning at the county line at Ludd Mobley and continue a river road, crossing House Creek at David Calaway ford and continue to the upper line, and Ludd Mobley, Willis King and Murdock McDuffie were appointed to lay out and mark said road beginning at county line up to House Creek and Green G. Graham, Burrell [Henry] Bailey and Isham Jordan were appointed to lay out and mark said read from House Creek to upper line of county.

At July term, 1822, an order was passed appointing David Calaway, Isham Jordan and Nathaniel Statum, commissioners, to lay out and mark a river road beginning at David Calaway ford on House Creek and up to line of the county.

Isham Jordan subsequently appears in the 1830 census of Irwin County.

1830 Census enumeration of Isham Jordan in Irwin County, GA

Related Posts:

• Pennywell Folsom Fell at Brushy Creek
• Burrell Hamilton Bailey Sells Out in 10th
• Coffee Road Led to Creation of Lowndes County
• Coffee’s Road Passed Seven Miles West of Ray City

Montgomery M. Folsom in 1889 sketched a Christmas scene from in old Berrien County in which he reminisced about his boyhood desire for a “Christmas gun.”

Montgomery Morgan Folsom (1857-1899)
Montgomery M. Folsom was the eldest son of Dr. James Roundtree Folsom and Rachel Inman Swain. He was a grandson of Randal Folsom and great grandson of Lawrence Armstrong Folsom, one of the pioneer settlers of Lowndes County, GA. On his mother’s side he was a grandson of Sarah Wooten and Morgan G. Swain, early residents of Troupville, GA.

In the antebellum plantation Christmas, according Marion Harland in The Christian Union,

The ‘Christmas gun’ was a big tree -oak or hickory- a cavity of which, natural or artificial, was plugged with powder and touched with a match. Guns and pistols were discharged in quick succession; canisters and bottles filled with gunpowder were set off under barrels and hogsheads. Everything that could explode and reverberate was brought into jubilant action. ‘Christmas comes but once a year’ was a formula that palliated disorder and excused hubbub… [At] midnight of Christmas Eve…as the clock tolled twelve… the simultaneous roar of the Christmas gun and the scattering detonations of smaller artillery which were kept up until sunrise. 

Given Folsom’s birth date of 1857, this memoir appears to describe Christmas during the Civil War seen through the eyes of a young boy ignorant of the work required to prepare for such a celebration.  His mentions of African-Americans participating in the Christmas celebration are pejorative references to his grandfather’s slave “Uncle Mose” and to the young slave boys,  children of slaves, the Christian Union said, for whom “The nominal holiday meant, for the domestic and stable staff, a week of incessant occupation – cooking, serving, cleaning, much grooming, harnessing, and driving, infinite hewing of wood and drawing of water.”

Ragged Reminisences

How Grandpa Got Away With Me on the Christmas Gun.

Oh, I did want a Christmas gun so bad!

For weeks before Santa Claus had started on his rounds I was forever hanging round.

“Grandpa, how much do guns cost? Grandpa, can’t I buy a Christmas gun? Grandpa, get me a gun.”

The old gentleman must have got mighty tired of it, but I lived in hope if I died in despair.

In those days there were various ways of firing Christmas guns. Down at the shop Uncle Peter was able to make a pretty horrible explosion by spitting on the anvil, laying a piece of red hot iron on it and striking it a sharp blow with the big hammer.

I did not understand the reason for this at that time, but age and experience have informed me that it was the steam generated between the spittle and the hot iron. Now, if some other smart fellow would come along and explain to me just how comes steam to make a racket of that sort I shall be a wiser if a sadder man.

I guess it is on the same principle of a pop-gun, but I swear I’ve never correctly understood the principle of a pop gun, yet, I suppose like the Grecian philosopher, that with a gun long enough and a pusher strong enough, a fellow could make a tumultuous noise in the world.

Then there was another sort of a gun that was a rip roarer, but it was rather expensive. That was to bore an inch auger hole in a tree, drive a peg in the hole with a groove in it for the train, and put powder in the hole. The way we fired it was by laying a nice little train of powder, putting some shavings and scraps of cotton on it, setting the shavings afire, and then retreating to a safe distance.

This was a pretty good sort of a gun its own self, and it always reminded me of a story – a very funny story – that grandpa used to tell us about an Irishman who had an aching tooth.

The Irishman, according to grandpa’s version, put powder in the tooth, touched fire to it and ran.

With the full white light of modern research, and the gigantic strides of scientific investigation, I am led to believe that the Irishman was a myth and the whole story a hoax, but I believed it then, and I was happy.

I knew General DeLoach once swinged his eyebrows off and loosened his front teeth, fixing a train for one of those explosions, but the general had wet his eye so often that his vision was bad that day, so grandpa said.

I did want a gun so bad.

I made life exceedingly interesting for grandpa on the gun question.

But grandpa had some sense, and he waived the plea and I got no gun, although I got a good many other very nice things, among them a rag doll that affected my spirit sorely, for above all things I hated for anybody to suppose that I was not thoroughly masculine in all my preferences and predilections. I suppose I might have been a more useful citizen had I never changed my notions.

Old Christmas – you know that comes just twelve days after new Christmas – was a bright and beautiful day. On the night before I had sat on a log and shivered for half an hour to see if the sheep all got down on their knees, as folks said they did, on old Christmas eve. That is a superstition, you know, and they further allege that the black ones get up on their legs and the white ones kneel on the ground. I don’t know about that.

By sun up, and before the frost had melted from the woodpile, a dozen big fat hogs were being scraped and scalded, and we were busy getting the sausage mill ready, and preparing for a hog-killing time.

Then when they were swung up, we boys stood around and claimed melts and bladders. We wanted the melts to broil and the bladders to blow up. I laid siege to the big blue barrow, and stood guard over him for three mortal hours, getting in everybody’s way, and prancing around and cutting up generally, for fear of losing my rights.

It was royal fun to sharpen a twig and string a slice of melt on it and hang it over the glowing coals until it was done, and have it nicely seasoned with a pinch of salt.

I guess I could tackle one with undiminished gusto even unto this day. It was the lingering taint of the savage taste cropping out in our blood, and aided and abetted by the little negroes who were not far removed from the condition of their Hottentot ancestry, after all.

But after the feast was over we began on the bladders. It was a matter of personal pride with us to see who could blow up the biggest. We would blow and blow till our eyes stuck out like pot legs, and we would beat and bang them to make them stretch, and then we would brag about who had the biggest. I blew up the biggest bladder I ever saw that day. It was the big blue barrow that furnished me the material, and I was awful proud of it.

Grandpa, he kept eyeing it, and I noticed that the old gent was in high good humor. He held a conversation with Uncle Mose, and afterwards I could see that Uncle Mose was tickled half to death, and he would keep slipping, and sliding, and snickering around, and every now and then I would hear a half suppressed, “Jesus, Marster!”

They were plotting my downfall, but I, in my childish innocence, went on my way rejoicing.

John Exom had given me an old ramshackle of a flint and steel gun, with only a remnant of stock, and no lock at all. The old thing was rusty, and choked up, and looked like it had been lost in time of the Revolution.

I wanted to get the thing cleaned out, but in spite of all the washing and rubbing and scrubbing I could do, it remained plugged up. When I asked Uncle Peter about it he said I’d have to burn the rust out of it, and while they were finishing up the hogs I embraced the opportunity to clean out my gun. I thrust the breach into the dying embers, and left it while I worked at the bladder.

While I was tying it up securely Grandpa came up to me, whetting the big butcher knife.

“Well, my boy, you’ve got a big Christmas gun now.”

“Jesus, marster!” snickered Uncle Mose, who was standing near, with his back to us.

“Yes, sir, I’m gwine to save it till next Christmas.”

“Oh, no, I wouldn’t do that. To-day’s old Christmas, and that is just as good as new Christmas. Put it down and jump on it hard, now, and let us see what a gun you can shoot.”

“Oh, no, sir, I can’t,” said I.

“Jesus, marster,” whispered Uncle Mose under his breath.

“Why, yes you can. See here, do it this way,” He laid the bladder down near a puddle that had been made in scalding the hogs. He fixed his feet carefully, and went on to explain: “Now, draw in a long breath, place your feet carefully, jump away up—.—”

‘ Slam—bang!—splash!”

“Jesus, marster! Oh, I’m shot!” squealed Uncle Mose, as he jumped up and down and rubbed himself.

Everything was confusion, and as the smoke rose Grandpa picked himself up from the mudhole, with the remains of the bursted bladder clinging to his pants.

“What in the name of common sense is the matter, Moses? Was it loaded?”

Then he saw the old gun barrel smoking in front of the furnace, and the hot coals scattered all around, and he took in the situation.

Uncle Mose walked half bent longer than I did, though…

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In the Spanish-American War, a number of Berrien County men were serving with the 3rd Georgia Regiment, U.S. Volunteer Infantry when the regiment embarked for Cuba on Friday the 13th of January, 1899.

The Third Georgia Regiment sailed for Cuba aboard the steamer Roumanian, which had been acquired by the US Army Quartermaster’s Department in 1898. In March, 1899, the Roumanian was renamed US Army Transport Crook, photographed here clearing Savannah in June, 1899.

Among Berrien County, GA men of  Company D, 3rd Georgia Regiment were Walter A. Griner, Carl R. O’Quinn, Pythias D. Yapp, Zachary T. Hester, W. Dutchman Stephens, Samuel Z.T. Lipham, James M. Bridges, Charles A. Courson, Love Culbreath, George C. Flowers, James L. Jordan and George A. Martin.  Aaron Cook served as a private in Company E, Third Regiment, U.S. Volunteer Infantry. Other Berrien countians serving in the Third Regiment were Luther Lawrence Hallman and William F. Patten, both in Company B.

The Third Regiment had been organized at Camp Northen, Griffin, GA over the summer of 1898 and mustered into the service of the United States on August 24, 1898 with 43 officers and 1,243 enlisted men.  Assigned to Second Brigade, Third Division, Second Army Corps on October 7, 1898, the Third Regiment left Camp Northen on November 21 and arrived at Savannah, GA on November 22, 1898. There, the Third Regiment  encamped at Camp Onward, awaiting embarkation.  There were numerous delays in arranging transport passage for the regiment.  The original transport was to be the S.S. Chester, but the ship broke her propeller on the return from delivering the 15th US Infantry to Nuevitas, Cuba and had to be put in dry dock for repairs.

SS Roumanian being loaded with supplies for the trip to Cuba.

Former SS Roumanian (USAT Crook) photographed dockside in 1918.

The Roumanian had been purchased by the U.S. Government for $240,000 from Austin, Baldwin & Co. on July 12, 1898 and assigned to the U.S. Army Transport Service for duty as a troop transport.   The ship had a capacity of 1100 men, 45 officers, and 50 horses.

In spite of the efforts of the Quartermaster Department, the US Army Transports were less than excellent. The crowding, the heat, insufficient sanitary facilities, and the resulting stench made the transports anything but pleasant.  It was very uncomfortable as the vessels sat in the hot sun with inadequate sewage control and a build up of animal wastes.

A soldier who shipped aboard the Roumanian to Puerto Rico in 1898 was not in the least complimentary of the vessel:

“The sleeping quarters were at the bottom of the “black hole”, reached by a crude ladder that ran down through the port hatches, past two decks of houses, into the darkness. Hammocks were hung at night in double tiers between rows of upright posts, and so close together that elbows touched. The air was hot and stifling and the sight of the mass of legs and arms protruding in all directions, in the dismal half gloom from the lantern, recalled Dore’s pictures of the Inferno. The ship having been used for years as a cattle boat, the reminiscent odor combined with the smell of bilge water and stale provisions can convey no adequate appreciation by mere description. From the cracks in the boards that covered temporarily the rough bottom a dark slime oozed and made the footing insecure. One could hardly stay there without feeling giddy, but that is where the men were expected to sleep and eat. A soldier found on deck after taps had sounded was summarily ordered below, on penalty of arrest . . . Only the guard relief and the sick men were allowed to sleep on deck . . . The ship being shorthanded, soldiers were asked to volunteer for stoker duty. The reward was food: three portions of sailor’s stew a day. The temptation to get something beside weevily hard-tack, spoiled canned beef and rotten tomatoes, drew many a sturdy lad to the fire-room . . . Few of the soldiers could stand the test for more than one shift, although the promise of food was hard to resist . . . The water supply provided for the men was warm and polluted. The steward of the boat made a nice profit selling ice water at ten cents a glass and warm beer at half a dollar a bottle, till stopped by the commanding officer . . . The sanitary arrangements or disarrangements of the ship transcend all description. Let it be said in short that the “Roumanian” was considered the very worst transport that ever went out, and its faults were added to by the incompetence of the captain-quartermaster in charge, who it is a pleasure to say afterward went to jail, and by the indifference, to put it mildly, of a regular army martinet, who confessed no love for volunteers, but might have, if he chose, somewhat ameliorated their condition…”

Former SS Roumanian (USAT Crook) photographed dockside in 1918.

There was certainly a feud aboard the SS Roumanian, between the Steward and the Captain. The Atlanta Constitution, Dec. 21, 1898 reported the dispute:

Savannah, Ga., December 20 [1898] Steward lHugh] McClain, of the transport Roumania, was discharge by Quartermaster Wrigley upon the arrival of that vessel a day or two ago. McClain at one began circulating reports against Captain Wrigley, who is a former citizen of Rome, Ga. and a volunteer in the army service.
McClain’s charge was that Captain Wrigley had been feeding the men on the transport a very small amount, though allowed 75 cents a day, and that he had been pocketing the difference. Captain Wrigley says he has been feeding them on less than 75 cents, and so reported to the quartermaster general.
On account of the circulation of these reports Captain Wrigley will have a warrant sworn out in the United States court charging McClain with larceny of government property, it being alleged that he took certain silverware and that he made away with commissary stores by selling them to soldiers. McClain’s attorney does not object to this course being taken he said tonight and he threatened to swear out a warrant charging Captain Wrigley with embezzlement under the charge referred to above.
McClain had Captain Wrigley arrested this afternoon by a state officer on a warrant charging him with pointing a pistol at him.
Wrigley denied the constable’s right to arrest an army officer, and refused to submit. He went, however, to the justice court and entered a protest. The Justice let him go for the present and now has the matter under consideration.
The Roumania will leave the city in the morning with eight companies of the Sixth Missouri regiment under Colonel Letcher Hardeman and will return the early part of next week, at which time it is now anticipated that these cases will get into the United States court, as both parties declared their intentions today of swearing out warrants.

Steward Hugh McNair alledged that he and Captain Charles Wrighley had a deal to sell liquor to the troops on the ship.

◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

Atlanta Constitution
Sunday, January 16, 1899

The Third Georgia Leaves.

Transport Starts with the Boys for Cuba.

Thick Fog Detains Vessel at Mouth of River and She Anchors Over Night.

Savannah, Ga., January 14 -(Special.)- There will probably be a number of court-martials of the Third Georgia men when they are caught and carried to Nuevitas. Some fifteen or twenty members of Colonel R. L. Berner’s regiment who were on hand the day before failed to respond to their names when the roll was called on board the transport Roumanian this morning, and the vessel left shortly after 7 o’clock a. m. without them. Those who can be found in the city will be taken in charge by the provost guard here and sent to Cuba on the next available transport. A few of the boys were discharged before the regiment left and others were waiting for discharges in vain, so they decided to remain behind anyhow. On account of the early hour and the fact that the Roumanian was at the extreme eastern end of the docks, there was no crowd on hand to tell the Georgia boys goodby.

The embarkation point at Savannah was under the direction of Depot Quartermaster Ballinger, who gave “Time from Tybee Roads to Havanna of a ship making twelve knots, two days and two hours; ten knots, two and a half days.  Thus the Roumanian with the Third Georgia Regiment arrived at Nuevitas about January 19, 1899.  There being no wharf at Nuevitas the regiment had to be brought into port on lighters, the entire process consuming nine or ten days time.

In a letter written January 24, 1899 from Nuevitas, J. A. Morrow related the Third Georgia Regiment’s passage to Cuba. Conditions on the vessel seemed much improved.

Much could be said of the voyage from the shores of home to this Cuban port. Despite the sadness of departure, the Georgians soon became interested in the novelty of a sea trip and their faces brightened and their hearts grew light. But later there were many brave soldiers who fell as martyrs to their patriotic desire for service – as victims to that indescribable malady which surely deserves a harsher characterization than that brimstone laden definition of war by General Sherman. Scores of the men went right up against it. They did contortion acts, they tossed and tumbled but still the nausea pursued them and forced them repeatedly to the rail. It seemed that every rare and precious tribute was offered up, but the demon of seasickness was inexorable and heaped upon them tortures infinitely worse when they were bankrupt. Chaplain Warren and Lieutenant Brock, above all others, now know the effects of a tussle with Neptune. But at last Chaos ceased to rein in the stomach, the dismal brown taste left the month, the muscles responded to the will and life became more worthy of consideration. After this trip was one of complete pleasure.
     The United States transport Roumanian which brought the regiment over, is not noted as one of the finest transports, but its record in the service shows that it has been one of the most efficient. It has handled thirteen organization of troops without an accident. While in the service the ship is under the command of Captain Wrigley, of the quartermaster’s department who certainly proved himself a capable and faithful officer and a courteous and cultured gentleman. His thoughtful kindness, his unfailing consideration and his affable personality won the highest admiration of every man under his care on the voyage. And in return he was most highly pleased with the regiment and asserted that it excelled any of the regiments transported by the Roumanian in the courteous and soldierly bearing of its officers, the willingness and efficiency in giving assistance to the ship’s officers, as well as in the high character, patience and obedience of the men. It is no small tribute to the Georgians and they appreciate it highly. No ship ever had a more worthy and capable set of offices than the Roumanian, and every man of them won the esteem and gratitude of the Georgians.        To show their appreciation a detail of soldiers under the command of that popular and efficient officer, Lieutenant Chester Elliot of Company G, were immediately upon unloading put to the task of cleaning ship and the officers say it could not possibly have been done more completely, Lieutenant Elliot did not go ashore for four days in order to perform this work.

Soldiers on deck of former SS Roumanian (USAT Crook) photographed in Alaska in 1929

Following her service in the war, in 1899, Roumanian was used by the government to return the bodies of men who had died in Cuba and Puerto Rico during the war and afterwards. She arrived in late March in New York with the remains of  554 soldiers who were killed or died in Cuba, and 120 from Puerto Rico.

Former SS Roumanian (USAT Crook) at sea, date unknown.

Former SS Roumanian (USAT Crook) at sea.

Former SS Roumanian (USAT Crook) photographed in 1929

1

In 1886, when Berrien County desperado Ben Furlong overdosed on laudanum  some thought it was accidental, others thought intentional. By the time of Furlong’s death, the dangerous potency of patent medicine narcotics was well known.  In Georgia newspapers and elsewhere overdose deaths of adults were frequently reported as suicides.

But many victims were infants and children fatally overdosed with mislabeled narcotic patent medicines by their well-meaning parents. “Hints to Mothers,” in 1865 observed that “three-fourths of all the deaths that take place from opium occur in children under five years of age, and it has been alleged  that thousands of babies died from patent medicines which were eventually identified by the medical community as “baby-killers.”

For centuries parents had been told teething was a particularly dangerous period of childhood development, perhaps because teething  coincided with infant mortality from causes which were not at all understood.    Doctors routinely reported teething on mortality schedules as a cause of infant death. The anguish of teething infants was met with anxiety by 19th century parents. Marketers of patent medicine teething elixirs  preyed on the fears of parents and offered the promise of science and medicine to protect the lives of their children.

In the 1880 Berrien County  mortality schedule deaths of two white infants were attributed to “dentition” and “teething” by attending physician Dr. H. M. Talley.  Cause of death for a black infant attended by Dr. James A. Fogle appears to have been initially recorded as “Elixir of Joseph Bain,” but that notation was crossed out and replaced with “poisoned.” Elixir of Joseph Bain, one of the first cocaine-based patent medicines, was introduced after the Civil War. Cocaine drops were used in the treatment of dental pain.  Three children in Lowndes died of teething, two in Brooks County.

Among the most notorious of “baby-killer” patent medicines was “Mrs. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup” for teething infants.

From its introduction in 1849, Mrs. Winslow’s advertisements and testimonials appeared almost continuously in Georgia newspapers and elsewhere.  One 1880 testimonial published in the Columbus, GA Daily Enquirer claimed “Vast quantities of the Soothing Syrup are daily sold and used here [New York]. We think Mrs. Winslow has immortalized her name by this invaluable article, and we sincerely believe thousands of children have been saved from an early grave by its timely use and that millions yet unborn will share its benefits, and unite in calling her blessed. No mother has discharged her duty to her suffering little ones, in our opinion, until she has given the benefit of Mrs. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup. Mrs. Winslow’s claimed to contain “no narcotics, nor harmful ingredients of any kind.” But, like laudanum, Mother Winslow’s was in fact opium-based.

Mrs, Winslow’s Soothing Syrup

Elixirs were made of all kinds of narcotics. Patent medicines eventually recognized as “baby-killers” included concoctions like:

• Dr. Fahrney’s Teething Sirup – Alcohol, chloroform, and morphine
• Hodnett’s Gem Soothing Sirup – opium
• Dr. Winchell’s Teething Sirup – morphine
• Children’s Comfort – morphine sulfate
• Dr. Fehy’s Pepsin Anodyne Compound – morphine sulfate
• Dr. Fowlers Strawberry and Peppermint Mixture – morphine
• Dr. Grove’s Anodyne for Infants – morphine sulfate
• Hoopers Anadyne, Infant’s Brand – morphine hydrochloride
• Jadway’s Elixer for Infants – codeine
• Dr. James Soothing Syrup – heroin
• Koepp’s Baby’s Friend – morphine sulfate
• Dr. Miller’s Anodyne for Babies – morphine sulfate and chloral hydrate
  Dr. Moffet’s Teethina Teething Powders – powdered opium
• Victor Infant Relief – chloroform and marijuana

Mrs. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup was available for teething and colicky babies. The company claimed that this product would greatly facilitate the process of teething, allay all pain and spasmodic action, regulate the bowels, and “give rest to mothers and relief and health to infants.” However, Mrs. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup contained morphine and alcohol, and caused coma, addiction and death in infants.  – Food and Drug Administration

These were the days before the Food and Drug Administration. There were no laws regulating the sale of narcotics and medicines were not required to disclose what they contained…The children’s deaths did not go unnoticed. By the 1880s, doctors and journalists were starting to crusade against Winslow’s and its contemporaries…. In 1911, the American Medical Association added Winslow’s to its list of “baby killer” patent medicines.  A 2018 Smithsonian Magazine article called the era, “America’s first opioid epidemic.” In his 1998 book, “The Excruciating History of Dentistry,” James Wynbrandt called those days, “The golden age of drug abuse.” Fueled by doctors and journalists like Adams, Congress finally passed the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906. It required medicine labels to clearly disclose what they contained. Opiates weren’t actually regulated until the Harrison Act of 1914.- Baby-Killer Drug Invented in Maine

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During the winter of 1862,  the Campfires of the Berrien Minute Men were made at Camp Security near Darien, GA. A Civil War letter from Camp Security dated February 12, 1862 describes the prevalence of tonsillitis and measles among the men. This letter, signed Gussie, was probably written by Augustus H. Harrell, of the Thomasville Guards.

Camp Security, Darien Ga
February 12th 1862

Dear Cousin,
I received your kind letter yesterday and now hasten to respond. I am not well at present nor have been for three or four days. The health of our company is improving slowly. We have lost two men from this battalion since I wrote to you last. We have a disease here called Tonselital which is a swelling of the throat which is so severe with some that they cannot swallow any thing for three and four days and sometimes men choke to death. We have three hundred and forty or fifty men at this post and there is one hundred and fifty or seventy five able for duty. There is a great many that are not down sick but are unable for duty. I really though I wrote to you before I left home of the death of sister Jane ——. I wrote to several cousins of it.

We have been in service nearly seven months and have just succeeded in electing a Colonel Mr. Young of Thomasville. Ours is the 29th Georgia Regiment Georgia Volunteers, we are in the Confederate service and enlisted for twelve months service which time will expire the 27th day of next July. We will draw pay in a day or two. I was at home and was the cause of all that sickness you read of. I went home to see sister Jane and had the measles fever on me when I left camp and did not know it and I came very near dying two or three times as I had two cases and then a relapse. Every one in this place white and black had them, but were very near well when I left. I guess you could get in this company if you wished. I have a negro boy to wait on and cook for me and if you were here you could tent and mess with me. Give Uncle and Aunt my love and kiss Emma for me and write soon to us.
Ever your cousin
Gussie

I liked to have forgotten to tell you I am going (if I live to see next September) be married and if it will suit your indulgence I would like very much to see you down about that time. There is a probability of our being moved from here and sent to Ft Pulaski. None of the companies in Savannah would volunteer to go there and ours has done volunteered but have not heard whether we are accepted. Excuse all imperfections and write soon as it is a great pleasure for a soldier to receive a letter in camps.

Suppose you come down and join our company. You cannot get a gun but you can get a pike or spear as there is several in our company has them. There is about one hundred men in ours, Capt. C. S. Rockwells Company…

Civil War Letter from Camp Security, GA, probably written by Augustus H. Harrell

Civil War Letter from Camp Security, GA, probably written by Augustus H. Harrell

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In April, 1818,  Native Americans at the Chehaw Indian village of Au-muc-cul-le near present day Leesburg, GA were massacred by soldiers of the Georgia militia.  Aumucculle (meaning “pour upon me”) was located on Aumuculle Creek [Muckalee Creek], ten or fifteen miles above its junction with Kinchafoonee Creek  (meaning Mortar Bone Creek). Captain Obed Wright, commanding the expedition, claimed his militia justifiably shot or burned to death more than 40 people.

Lott Warren was the presiding judge on the Southern Circuit at the Lowndes County Grand Jury Presentments of 1833.

A young lieutenant, Lott Warren, led the burning of the Indian houses.  Warren later became the judge on the Southern Circuit Court of Georgia, and presided over superior court trials at Troupville, GA and other county seats across Wiregrass Georgia.

The fact that the massacred Chehaw Indians were friendly to the American government and to General Andrew Jackson only deepened the tragedy.

Just a month before Wright’s attack, General Jackson was back in south Georgia to put an end to Indian depredations…

General Jackson’s weary soldiers had sojourned in the Chehaw village while traveling from Tennessee to Florida. The local chief, known as “Major Howard” among the whites, fed and provisioned the men. Subsequently, many Chehaw warriors joined Jackson’s troops to help pursue the Seminoles. – Gilder Lerhman Institute of American History

The Lower Creeks had settled along the Chattahoochee River watershed after the defeat of the Creeks in the Yamasee War 1715-1717.  Among the villages they eventually established was Aumucculle (later known as Chehaw) on a tributary of the Flint River. However, there was  another Indian town in early historical accounts and maps also known as “Chiaha” or “Chiaja”, and sometimes called Chehaw, on the Chattahoochee River about thirteen miles below present day Columbus, GA.  This town is represented as “Chiha” on John Mitchell’s 1755 Map of the Southeastern United States. The town was known to early traders in the region, and when the colonial government of Georgia regulated the Indian Trade in 1761, Chehaw [Chiaha?]  was assigned to  George Mackay and James Hewitt. “Cha-hah” is mentioned among the six principal Creek towns in Adair’s 1775 History of the American Indian.  This town also appears to be the one William Bartram passed upon crossing the Chata Uche [Chattahoochee River] at Chehaw about January 4, 1788 as he was traveling to Augusta with a company of traders.  In the 1790s, this town was know for raiding white settlers to steal their slaves, and for harboring a community of “free and maroon negroes, from the Americans and a a few from Pensacola, [who were] forming a type of palisade. They number more than 110.”

Southeastern part of the present United States : from the Mitchell map of 1755, showing Chiha village on the Chattahoochee River. Full map image in the Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections.

Aumuculle, the site of the Chehaw Massacre, appears as Amohkali in John R. Swanton‘s study of the distribution and movement of the tribes and towns of the Creek Confederacy.

John R. Swanton map showing Amohkali (Aumucculle; Chehaw) near the Flint River.

Aumucculle (pour upon me) was described in 1799 by Benjamin Hawkins, General Superintendent of Indian Affairs:

Aumuccullee. On a creek of that name, 60 feet wide, on the right bank of Thlonotiscauhatchee [Flint River]. The village is 15 miles up the creek, on the left bank; it is 45 miles below Timothy Barnard’s. There are 60 gun men in the village; they belong to Cheauhau. The lands are poor; limestone springs in the neighbourhood. The swamps are cypress, in hammocs, some water oaks and hickory. The pine lands are poor, with ponds and wire grass. This creek is a main branch of Kitchonfoone [Kinchafoonee Creek], which it joins 3 miles from its mouth (pg 172)…Cheauhau Village, situated on the river a pine barren surrounding it. There is a ford here opposite the town (pg 172).

In  A Sketch of the Creek Country, Hawkins added the village “is in some places well fenced; they have cattle, hogs and horses, and a fine range for them, and raise corn, rice and potatoes in great plenty.”

During the Red Stick War (1813-1814), the Aumuculle chiefs had repeatedly demonstrated their friendship and loyalty to the U.S., and to the state of Georgia.

In August, 1814 , the Chiefs from Aumuculle warned white settlers on the Ocmulgee River of impending danger from hostile Indians, and gave assurances that neither their people nor the Hitchiti Indians were responsible for the trouble. The Chiefs reported that a party of hostile Indians had joined the British. A Chehaw man encountered four of the hostile warriors on August 1, 1814 headed towards Hartford, GA who admitted that they were on a raid to steal horses and commit mayhem. The Chiefs had set their men to try to recover any stolen property.  The Aumuculle Chiefs went on to warn that the British had landed “300 negroes as soldiers and 300 white troops” at the mouth of the Apalachicola River, and were building forts there and at the confluence of the Flint and Chattahoochee Rivers.  This intelligence was conveyed by letter from Timothy Barnard, an Indian trader and sometimes assistant agent to the Creek Indians:

Flint river 5th Augt  1814
Mr. Mumford
Sir

I write you this in consequence of some allarming news got late last Evening from two of the Aumauculle Cheifs. They say Mr Kenerd sent them on to bring me the information and also to request of me to write down Express to the Citizens of Hartford to put them on there gaurd and also that if any mischeif is done on Ockmulgee [river] that their friends the white people in that Quarter may not suspect the Aumuculle people or Hitchetaus for [illegible]. Its the report the Chiefs being [illegible] as follows – four men from the hostile partey that has Joined the Brittish was seen by a Chehaw man crossing Flint river at the old feild were the old Chehaw town
was formerly. The Chehaw man asked him were they were goeing. There answer was to ockmulge. They were asked if there business was to steal horses. There answer was that was not the whole they meaint to do. The man that saw them he sayes he Said Every thing he could to Stop them but to no purpose. They crossed the river and pushed [on].
Yesterday was the fourth day since they crossed flint river. Therefore I fear before this they have commited some murder or stole of some horses, perhaps both. The Aumauculle Cheifs  has appointed Sevin men to way lay the river and if they return back the same way and bring horses to take them from the robbers and have them Sent to Hartford.
It is time our Citizens on all our frontiers were better prepar’d to meet hostilities, as from the Brittish warriors we must Expect ravage and murders. The Chiefs here present also inform me that a red man that has been down at the mouth of these rivers — were the Brittish are landing Says they have landed 300 negroes as soldiers and 300 white troops wich he saw on the shore and that they are busey building a fort and are also comeing up to the Junction of the two rivers flint river and Chattahoche and build another fort there wich is 70 or 80 miles from the mouth of the two rivers. The Indian report is that they counted 70 Ships layeing near the mouth of these rivers and that they have landed Sheep hogs turkes geese ducks wich is a proof of they mean to trye to hold that countrey. I have give you here an account of Every thing I think necessary to put my friends in Hartford or on any parts of frontiers of Georgia [on] there gaurd wich appears to me to be too much Exposed in the present Situation of affairs. If you and the other Gentlemen in Hartford see cause you may send this information on to His Excly the governor of Georgia, as its rite he should know the present situation of his frontiers. If my Sons has not left you that went down with Mr Harris, plese send me a Quire or half a Quire of paper by them. If I hear any more bad news Shall rite you again

remin Sir your most Obdt Sert
[Signed] Timy [Timothy] Barnard

ps if any mischief has been done before you receive this plese write me T B

After finishing the talk the Cheif recolected something more that his Cheifs that sent him on here had told him to communicate wich is as follows —
That the Citizens of georgia from a few miles below Hartford on the west Side of ockmulge [Ocmulgee River] are setling thick from that down to the Allattamahau [Altamaha] and the woods full of cattle and hogs. Some White people the Cheifs say are also setled of[f] some distance from the river. The Cheifs say that they considered and heard by the conclusion of the treaty respecting the line that they, the red people, were to hold possession of all the land above the line they [therefore] beg of the goverment of the U. States to see justice done them as they say they have been alway freindly to their freinds, the white people, on the frontiers and neaver wish to doe them any injurye.

[Signed] Timy Barnard

In November 1814, the Aumuculle chiefs again provided intelligence on the actions of the British and the Red Stick Indians. The report was conveyed by Timpoochee Barnard to his father, Timothy Barnard, who relayed the information to Colonel Benjamin Hawkins, U. S. Agent to the Creeks

Timpoochee Barnard, son of Timothy Barnard, conveyed intelligence from Aumuculle (Chehaw) village on the movement of hostile Red Stick Indians.  History of the Indian Tribes of North America

Flint river 3d Novr 1814
Colo. B. [Colonel Benjamin] Hawkins

Sir

My Son Timpuge [Timpoochee Barnard] arrived here yesterd[ay] from his route to Chehaw and old — Kenerds. Old Kenerd told my Son that he had an Express come to him that the War Indians wer on there march wich allarmed him a good deal wich caused him to have an Express Sent on to you. Kenerd relates that the day after this happ[ened] five of the Aumanculle Cheifs that had been down at the mouth of the rivers were Perriman lives arrived at there [their] town and informed Kenerd that the war partey had stoped comeing on in consequence of wich Kenerd requested of my Son to proceed on up to Your house and give you the information. Catchaw micko hatke [Cochamico; Old Howard] of aumancule [Aumuculle] requested of my son to inform Colo [Colonel] Hawkins that all the people in his town take no part with the red Stiks [Red Sticks] but meain to hold the Americans there freinds [their friends] by the hand. Join the Cowetaws there [their] friends the red people. The Aumnucule [Aumuculle] Cheifs are all determined if the red Stick will begin to Spill blood that they meain [mean] to move there [their] Quarters up this way Somewer were [Somewhere where] they can Join there freinds [their friends], one thing the Catchaw micco says when he and his people moves they have large familyes and does not know what way he has to support them without his — freinds the white people will assist them —
One of the aumuculle Chiefs that went on to Perriman known by the name of hitchufulawa [Hitchiti Lawa?] wich I have always known to be a man of truth, if any of the [illegible] deserves the name in this land, was the man that stoped the red Stick from comeing on this Expedition wich has been a good thing.

It may give our frontier inhabitants time to be better prepard [prepared]. It seems the brittish officer that was up at perrimans at the time urging the red Stick on was much offended at the Red people not proceeding on the route he and perriman pushed on down to the Stores at the mouth of the river. Should not have Wrote you so much as my Son was goeing [going] up by request of the Chiefs to tell you all the news but Expected you might be gone in to fort Hawkins. Am still in so low a state am scarcely able to set up to rite or to walk aboute. My son can tell you aboute your runaway black. He says when he got down to Aumaucule that there was but very few red people in the town. The Wolfe Warrier at the time was laying very sick. The first and only news he could hear of them was that they were seen ten miles of[f] from the East Side of the river twenty miles below Obaunes. If you should be at home when my son gits up plese write me a few lines and if you have a late paper that you can spare plese send me one or two.

remain Sir with respect your most most Obdt &c &c
[Signed] Timy Barnard

A letter dated November 15, 1814 from Colonel Benjamin Hawkins, U.S. Agent to the Creeks, to Peter Early, Governor of Georgia (1813-1815), included extracts from other letters regarding appearances of “hostile” Creek and Seminole Indians along the Georgia frontier.  The excerpts  include testimony relating to the involvement of the British in inciting the Seminoles,  and information on the enrollment of “friendly” Creeks to fight against the Seminoles and “hostile” Creeks.

Information of hostile appearances among the Simenolies [Seminoles] and Hostile Creeks.

11th. novr.  from low down Flint river

“Two of the war or predatory parties had been turned back, one by the Aumucculle chiefs and the others by the chiefs in the neighborhood of Kinnards. The King of Micco Sookee dos what he can to restrain his young people. They are impudent and eager for mischief.  A man who called himself a British officer and Tom Perriman visited the King and urged him to war and to go out with the Warriors offering him 100 dollrs.  for every trader, cowbuyer or other American found in their country and the like sum for captured negros. The King answered, begin you first the war and you will then see what the Red people will do. The headquarters of the encouragers of mischief is Perrimans. Ten negros arrived almost perished from Pensacola and 100 expected to join the British.””

14 nov.  From three confidential people examined in presence of Colo. Jones, at Mr. Barnards, interprited by him

“The first movement of the Hostiles was from Perrimans. The Aumucculle Chiefs prevailed on them there to halt. A party of them came on and stole six horses from Mr. Barnard and family and four from the agency. The second ground movement was stoped  again on the adoption of a new plan which was to be kept secret under pain of death. This however has leaked out, from one in the secret, to his Uncle, who sent it to the agent.  When the Georgia army marched and shall have passed through to Jackson, they [the hostiles] are to attack and plunder the frontiers Eastward of F. [Fort] Hawkins for horses for the British officers who will want many, and for negros. When the Miccosookee King and the officer had the conversation related above, The latter said if the Simonolies would not go against the Americans as he had given them munitions of War for that purpose, he would take his negros and march through their country to St. Marys to mischief and bring the Georgians on them. He would give 40 dollrs. for the Scalp of every man brought to him. Where this second movement was charged two parties come on to mischief below fort Hawkins and about Mr. Barnards sons. One of them was stoped by the Aumucculle people and the other by Obaune.  A third party supposed to be one seen near Hartford must have gone round about; Its return trail was seen as supposed by one of the informants; a large one all moc,a,sin trailes [moccasin trails] no horse tracks and he thinks they were either called back by runners or that they discovered the scout of Horsemen coming out from Hartford, got alarmed and returned.”

In a “talk” dated December 27, 1816 from the Chiefs of the Chehaw Towns (Creek Nation) to David B. Mitchell, then Governor of Georgia (1815-1817), the chiefs complained of attacks made upon them by white settlers along the St. Marys River. They relate one incident in particular in which the settlers attacked a Chehaw hunting party, stole their horses, deer skins and other articles, and took one man prisoner. A similar attack was made on another party near the Okefenokee Swamp. The Chiefs remind the Governor of their long friendship with the white people of Georgia; and of their loyalty during the Red Stick War.  Despite these attacks on their people,  the Chiefs restrained their young warriors from seeking “satisfaction” from the settlers. Instead, they beseeched the governor to have their property restored and recover the man who was taken prisoner. The Chiefs also observe that white settlers are trespassing on Creek lands near the Altamaha [Ocmulgee] River. The letter is signed by Chefecksecoimmauthlau, as a representative of the Chehaw Chiefs, and Timothy Barnard, as interpreter.

Letter from Timothy Barnard esqr. dated 27th. Dec: [December] 1816.
Indian Affairs

A Talk Sent on by the Indian Cheifs who reside Sixty miles below this on flint river known by the name of the Chehaws to His Excellncy — David B. Mitchill,Governor and Commander of the State of georgia. Their talk is in consequence of depredations commited on them by the white people who reside on the river St maryes, Citizens of the United States. The Cheifs sent on to me three days past states there complaints as follows, that near two months past a party the red people were hunting near the St marys river at wich time a party of white people rushed on there camp and took on[e] red man a prisoner and took him of[f] and twelve hed of horses and Every thing Else that was movea[ble] at the dear Skins and many other articles. Since that not many days past a party of red people were in camp on the East side of the oconfenoga [Okefenokee] Swamp at wich time a party of white people rushed on them and robed [robbed] them of ten horses they say that they believe that if they had not run of[f] into Swamp that the white people meant to kill them as they were all armed — the Cheifs say they send this to his Excellency as freinds as its well known that they have neaver commited any hostile acts on the Citizens of georgia. The also say they neaver took no part with those called the red Sticks wich they say I know to be true and wich is true. They have been in all the last bad times in this countrey. They have behaved as well and better than any other tribe I know. The Chiefs therefore beg the favour of his Excellency as a freind to git there property restored to them and also the red man that was carrid of[f] a prisoner if he is Still liveing. The Cheifs say that a party of their young warriers had collected to goe down near were they were robed [robbed] and plunder property to the ammount of there loss but that they the Cheifs that Send this talk had Stopt them. They Cheifs therefore beg the favour of his Excellency as a freind to the red people to send them an answer to this communication directed to me that I may inform them if they may have any hopes of there property been [being] returned —

The above talk givein by the Cheif.
Sent on to me this 27th Decr 1816
Chefecksecoimmauthlau his X mark
Timy Barnard, Interpreter

After finishing [the] talk the Cheif recolected Something more that his Cheifs that sent him on here had told him to communicate wich is as follows —
That the citizens of georgia from a few miles below Hartford on the west side of ockmulgeare setling thick from that down to the Allattamahau [Altamaha River] and the woods full of cattle and hogs. Some white people the Cheifs say are also setled of[f] some distance from the river. The Cheifs say that they considered and heard by the conclusion of the treaty respecting the line that they the red people were to hold possession of all the land above the line. They beg the goverment of the U. States to see justice done them as they say they have been alway freindly to their freinds the white people on the frontiers and neaver wish to doe them any Injurye.

Thus it was that Aumuculle was well regarded as a friendly village and an ally, when Andrew Jackson came through the area in 1818 on his way to engage hostile Seminole Indians in Florida.

In early 1818, as he traversed the region, Andrew Jackson stopped at Aumucullee, now referred to as simply “Chehaw.” At this time, the town “consisted of fifteen or twenty cabins with a large Council house in the Centre” flying a white flag of peace ( GA Genealogy).  General Glascock reported there was a ferry over the Flint River opposite the village.

FORT EARLY

Brigadier General Thomas Glascock, Jr. constructed and commanded Fort Early in 1818. He later served as a Georgia member of the U.S. House of Representatives.

To defend the Georgia frontier and in preparation for Jackson’s campaign,  Brigadier General Thomas Glascock had been sent in January of 1818 to oversee the reconstruction of Fort Early on the Flint River. His militia bivouac on the Flint above Chehaw village was called Camp Cumming.  A soldier wrote from Camp Cumming, “We arrived here after a fatigueing march of 12 days from Hartford, 10 of which rained. The whole of our march has been through a poor, flat, pine-woods glades, where I have seen eight horses frequently to a waggon, which they moved with difficulty. This detachment has had constant, various and almost insurmountable difficulties to encounter. We have had many false alarms, but no fighting; nor need there be any apprehension of an attack. A hostile party however is scouting in the neighborhood, consisting of about thirty men, and have rifled the house of a friendly Chehaw chief ( Raleigh Minerva, Jan 30, 1818).”   On January 10, 1818, Glascock wrote from Camp Cumming about hostile Indians from Fowltown (called Totalosi Talofa by the Native Americans) threatening the safety of his men and effectively cutting off their supplies from the friendly Indians at Chehaw.

In a letter written January 18, 1818 Glascock informed General Edmund Pendleton Gaines that sixty of his men were erecting blockhouses, and that he intended to bring up the rest of his force up to complete the works.  The log stockade was built near the site of an earlier breastworks originally constructed in the War of 1812.

Augusta Herald Jan 30, 1818 reports construction of Fort Early

Augusta Herald
Jan 30, 1818

The LAST NIGHT’S MAIL from Milledgeville, brought us the following intelligence, being the latest received from the Georgia Troops now in service.

The Army.

An intelligent gentleman, who left the Army on the 18th instant, has favored us with the following particulars respecting the Georgia militia in service. The detachment is stationed on the east side of Flint river, 42 miles from Hartford, about 70 miles from Fort-Scott, and ten above the nearest settlement of Chehaw (a friendly Indian town) to which place a road has been opened. A new Fort is erecting on the site of old Fort-Early, selected by Gen. Blackshear, and considered very eligible—it is to be called Bloomfield. The adjacent country is open and glady, and the mud so extremely bad, that the troops have to be supplied by pack-horses. Boats are building at the Agency, to transport provisions down the river—they are to be shot-proof, and it is supposed are nearly finished. No difficulty is now believed to exist relative to crossing the Spanish line—and, it is understood, offensive operations, on our part, will soon be resumed—The army was expected to be reinforced in a few days, by three Companies of militia from the low-country, and 100 regulars. A party of thirty or forty hostile Indians were scouting about the lower part of Chehaw where they had rifled the house of a friendly Chief. When last beard from, they were only 12 miles from Camp, and were proceeding up the river to cut off a party that had been sent to Chehaw, which hastily and safely retreated. A volunteer corps was about forming to go in pursuit of them.
[Georgia Journal, Jan. 27. 

The new Fort Early would serve as a troop garrison, a bivouac point for federal troops and state militia, and as a depot for the shipment of army supplies from Hartford, GA to Fort Scott, sixty miles down the Flint River.

Style of blockhouse typically constructed along the Georgia frontier during the early 1800s.

During the construction, Glascock’s detachment ran short on rations, “The Contractor’s Agent having failed to comply with the requisitions of Gen. Gaines, for subsisting the United States’ troops and the Georgia Militia under Gen. Glascock.”

“We have now on hand about three days Rations of Flour, not more that two of meat, & scarcely any supply of corn. I am in expectation of procuring a further supply of meat from Chehaws, perhaps a little, but very little corn.”

Excerpt of Thomas Glascock letter to Edmund Pendleton Gaines, January 18, 1818.

On January 22, 1818 Glascock received word that hostile Indians had attacked supply wagons four miles east of Fort Early, killing two men – decapitating  one and scalping the other. The attackers were presumed to be from the Indian village of Fulemmy (Philema, GA). A few hours later word was received that Fort Gaines, approximately 80 miles west on the Chattahoochee River, was under imminent threat of capture by hostile Creek Indians. Settlers in the area had been scalped and the small stockade was crowded with soldiers, men, women and children.   The next day,  Major Thomas Simpson Woodward took a detachment of  22 men from Fort Early and 14 warriors from Chehaw  (Aumuculle) village, the Indian chief Major Howard among them, to reinforce Fort Gaines.  A few days later, Woodward’s company was relieved by federal troops and returned to Fort Early.

Portrait of Andrew Jackson by Charles Wilson Peale, 1819

General Jackson arrived at Fort Early about February 22, 1818, escorted by two companies of Kentucky militia.  But prior to  Jackson’s arrival, Glascock’s  Georgia militia men having completed their term of enlistment were discharged. Glascock went to Hartford to organize a new militia force called up by Governor Rabun.

Meanwhile, word had come from the commander of Fort Scott, GA that because of a lack of supplies and imminent threat of attack from hostile Indians gathering at Fowltown, he intended to abandon the post.  Jackson’s urgent mission was to “prevent such a disastrous movement.”  On February 25, 1818 General Glascock wrote of his return  to Fort Early with a fresh contingent of Georgia militia infantry and riflemen from Hartford, GA. The troops brought a drove of 1,100 hogs, but otherwise arrived without supplies, as excessive rains had made the roads impassable for their supply wagons. In a letter written from Fort Early, Jackson informed John C. Calhoun, Secretary of War, “Eleven hundred men are now here without a barrel of flour or bushel of corn. We have pork on foot; and tomorrow I shall proceed for Fort Scott, and endeavor to procure from the Indians a supply of corn that will aid in subsisting the detachment until we reach that place.”

The arrival of the militia and the urgency of the situation at Fort Scott, obliged Jackson to depart with the available force on February 27, expecting to supplement the swine with some provisions he hoped to secure from friendly Indians en route (M. A., vol. 1, p. 698). At Jackson’s order, Maj. T. S. Woodward of the Georgia militia, had sent a talk to the Chehaw town, proposing that their warriors join the army, to which appeal they promptly responded when the army passed by, unaware of the tragic fate in store for their town during their absence. … Some supplies of corn, potatoes, and ground peas were secured at this place [Chehaw]… –River Basin Surveys Papers

General Jackson’s force passed through Chehaw about February 28, 1818 marching south to Fort Scott.  At this time, the town “consisted of fifteen or twenty cabins with a large Council house in the Centre” flying a white flag of peace (GA Genealogy)  David Brydie Mitchell, United States Indian Agent to the Creek Nation and former Governor of Georgia, said of “the principal chief called Howard…There was not a better, a more friendly or a more intelligent Indian in the Nation.”  The old chiefs welcomed the Americans and provided them with corn and other supplies that could be spared (- GA Genealogy) . Capt. Hugh Young, topographer of Jackson’s army, credited Chehaw with “from 70-80 warriors under Old Howard or Cochamico, and rated them as friendly but unreliable. They were invited to furnish a force of auxiliaries to Jackson’s army and responded with enthusiasm. It is not known whether Young’s comment expressed a pre- or post-campaign opinion.” The chiefs sent Jackson off to Spanish Florida with forty of their young warriors to fight their common enemy – the Seminoles, fugitive Upper Creeks, and renegade Lower Creeks (- GA Genealogy)

General Glascock recalled, “In passing through that town, we not only obtained a large quantity of supplies for the use of the army, but had to leave some of our sick under the protection of these very people.”  Jackson later wrote of Chehaw village:

On my march from Hartford,[Georgia] to fort Scott, the necessities of my army were first relieved at the Chehaw village, and every act of friendship characterized the conduct of their old chiefs. The young warriors immediately entered, and were mustered into the service of the United States; and under the command of colonel [Noble] Kennard, were esteemed one of the most efficient corps of friendly Indians.  – Military Affairs, Vol 1, pg 776

A “Muster roll of friendly Creek troops raised during the First Seminole Waris held in the Andrew Jackson Collection at the Tennessee Virtual Archives includes It lists the names, ranks, expiration of service, and remarks for  68 Creek warriors under the command of Captain Powas Hanjo [chief of the Chehaw village of Eufala].  Since the 1818 Florida incursion was a US regular army operation, these native allies were likely being paid by the Federal government. Jackson as a military commander used Native American allies in nearly all of his military operations.”

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Georgia Telfair, born into slavery on a Georgia plantation about 1864, was interviewed in 1938 as part of the Federal Writers’ Project (FWP) of the Works Progress Administration, later renamed Work Projects Administration (WPA).  She talked about African-American folk life in the period after the war. In one passage she mentions how enslaved people cared for their hair,

“Ma combed our hair with a Jim Crow comb, or card, as some folks called ’em. If our hair was bad nappy she put some cotton in the comb to keep it from pulling so bad, ’cause it was awful hard to comb.”  – Georgia Telfair

The most common tool slaves relied on for combing out their hair were the cards used in carding wool. – Reenact This

Wool cards were used by African-Americans to comb out tangled hair. In this use they came to be known as Jim Crow combs. Image source: http://reenactthis.blogspot.com/2013/10/african-american-hair-wrapping-and-hair.html

Historical context and empirical findings on skin tone

In American history, slavery constituted a strict caste system that distinguished Black slaves by their skin tones. Lighter-skinned slaves were usually mixed-raced and favored by White slave-owners. These lighter-skinned slaves were frequently fathered by White slave-owners (typically from nonconsensual sexual relations with female slaves) and were, therefore, privileged (Brown, Ward, Lightbourn, & Jackson, 1999; Keith & Herring, 1991); unlike dark slaves, lighter-skinned slaves were spared physically strenuous, outdoor work and instead held domestic indoor jobs like housekeeping in closer contact to Whites. Over time, these privileges in the antebellum period allowed lighter-skinned Blacks to become more educated (Wirth & Goldhamer, 1944) and to own more property (Frazier, 1957). Furthermore, to maintain their elite status and privileges, lighter-skinned men engaged in social practices to exclude darker-skinned Blacks from entering their social circles; these practices included the “Paper Bag Test,” (which banned Blacks from joining fraternities if their skin tones were darker than a brown paper bag), the “Comb test,” (which banned Blacks with coarse, nappy African hair if combs could not glide through it) and the “Blue veins” society (which banned Blacks whose skin tones were too dark to see the blue veins on their arms) (Bond & Cash, 1992). These findings consistently indicated that light skin tone resulted in clear social and economic advantages.

According to historians Shane White and Graham White,

Interviews with former slaves also frequently describe African American hair-styling practices and reveal something of what those practices meant. African-American women’s hair, though probably shorter than in the previous century, could soon become tangled and unmanageable if uncared for. This problem must have particularly affected field slaves, whose typical labor regime, stretching each day from “can see” to can’t see” and often involving cooking and mending duties as well, made adequate care of the hair difficult, if not impossible. Only on Sundays, their day off, could slaves find the time for grooming and styling, with whatever implements they could locate. Former slave James Williams recalled for his W.P.A. interviewer how the “old folks” used continually to talk about how much harder the life had been before freedom came. “Said the only time the slaves had to comb their hair was on Sunday. They would comb and roll each others hair and the men cut each others hair. That all the time they got. The would roll the children’s hair or keep it cut short.” Removing tangles must have been a painful process. Jane Morgan explained that “we carded our hair ’cause we never had no combs, but the cards they worked better. We used the cards to card wool with also, and we just wet our hair then card it. The cards they had wooden handles and strong steel wire teeth.” (The cards referred to here were implements used to prepare washed fleece for spinning, to make the fibers lie evenly in one direction.) Recalling his childhood on a large South Carolina plantation, Jacob Stroyer told how, before each inspection of the slave children by the plantation owner and his wife, attempts were made “to straighten out our unruly wools with some small cards, or Jim-crows,” as they were called. On one such occasion, and old woman had attempted to comb his hair straight, but “as she hitched the teeth of the instrument in my unyielding wool with her great masculine hand, of course I was jerked flat on my back. This was the common fate of most of my associates.” Aunt Tildy Collins’ account of the preparation of slave children for Sunday school is equally graphic: ” Us children hate to see Sunday come, cause Mammy and Granmammy they wash us and near about rub the skin off getting us clean for Sunday school, and they comb our heads with a jim crow. You ain’t never seed a jim crow? It most like a card what you card wool with. What a card look like? Humph! Missy, where you been raise – ain’t never seed a card? That jim crow sure did hurt, but us had to stand it, and sometimes after all that, mammy she wrap our kinky hair with thread and twist so tight us’s eyes couldn’t hardly shut.” – Stylin’: African American Expressive Culture from Its Beginnings to the Zoot Suit

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The people of the Native American village of Aumuculle had a long history of friendship with the American government and white settlers in Georgia. Yet,  on the morning of April 23, 1818, soldiers of the Georgia militia massacred the village.

Captain Obed Wright, led the expedition.  Lott Warren was a young lieutenant in one of the companies under Wright’s command.  Warren’s memoir, published in 1853 in Portraits of Eminent Americans now Living: With Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Their Lives and Actions: Volume 2, provided  a brief sketch of the campaign against Aumuculle (Chehaw), “of which he [was], perhaps, the best if not the only living witness.” Warren later became the judge on the Southern Circuit Court of Georgia and presided over superior court trials at Troupville, GA and other county seats across Wiregrass Georgia.

Rise of Hostilities

The Chehaw Massacre followed on an escalating series of violent conflicts with factions of hostile Creek Indians who increasingly resisted the encroachment of white settlers on their lands, especially after the Red Stick War and the 1814 Treaty of Fort Jackson which ceded 22 million acres of Indian lands to the state of Georgia.

David Brydie Mitchell

The January 22, 1818  Treaty of of the Creek Agency ceded two additional tracts of land to Georgia, a northern tract between the Appalachee and Chattahoochee rivers and a larger tract south of the Ocmulgee River. Of the southern tract Indian Agent David Brydie Mitchell wrote, “The number of acres will probably not exceed half a million, neither is the quantity of good land considerable, yet it is of vast importance to Georgia, as it stretches all along the Ocmulgee River for at least sixty miles….”

January 22, 1818  Treaty of Creek Agency Signed
Creek Indians signed the Treaty of Creek Agency ceding to Georgia land south of the Ocmulgee River, plus land between the Appalachee and Chattahoochee rivers.

On the southern tract, Native Americans and encroaching settlers were soon in violent conflict.  On the afternoon of March 9, 1818 the Battle of Breakfast Branch was fought. It was “a skirmish between the Indians and some of the citizens of Telfair, on the south side of the Ocmulgee River,”  in which the Telfair militia was completely routed. The Battle of Breakfast Branch was reported by Isham Jordan, who in 1823 would assist General John Coffee in the construction of the Coffee Road opening Lowndes County for settlement.

Following the Battle of Breakfast Branch the situation quickly deteriorated:

Panic swept the area, and Major [Josiah D.] Cawthorn hastily penned a letter to Governor Rabun asking for assistance. Militia from Laurens county was dispatched to the area, and Rabun sent a request to Jackson that some of the militiamen under his command be released and sent to the Ocmulgee.

Receiving no reply, Rabun issued orders for Captain Obed Wright to lead Georgia militia companies in a reprisal raid on the Chehaw towns of Phillemmee and Hopaunee near the Flint river. However, on the way to the Flint, Wright received information that the raiding party came from the Chehaw town of Au-muc-cu-lee [and determined to punish that town contrary to his orders.]

Governor William Rabun’s Orders to Captain Wright.

Orders issued by the Executive to Cap. Wright.
Head Quarters, Georgia
Milledgeville, April 14, 1818

GENERAL ORDERS.

The executive having received information through sources which cannot be doubted, that the wanton and cruel murders so frequently committed on the frontier inhabitants of this state, and which are almost daily practised by the savages, ascertained to be the Phelemmes and Hoponnes, inhabitants of two small villages of their names, on or near Flint river, who have during the late hostilities endeavored to conceal their blood-thirsty and hostile disposition under a cloak of friendship- and the combined regular and militia force under Major Gen. Jackson being too far advanced into the heart of the Creek nation to admit of any speedy operations against them from that quarter; the commander in chief of the state deems it expedient for the safety of the frontier inhabitants, and to prevent further depredations by them, that a sufficient military force should be marched immediately against those towns, to effect their complete destruction; and for the speedy accomplishment of which, Capt. Obed Wright, commanding as senior officer of the militia stationed on the frontier, will order captains Dean [Elijah Dean] and Chiles [Daniel Childs], who are stationed at different points on the Ocmulgee, to proceed immediately with their respective companies to Hartford, or such other places as he shall deem expedient between that place and Point Early, with the exception of a small guard placed under the command of a subaltern or non-commissioned officer to defend the posts they now occupy; he is also authorized to receive such companies as may voluntarily join him. Cap. Timothy L. Roger, commanding a volunteer troop of light dragoons in Jones, and captain John Permenter, commanding a volunteer company of riflemen in Twiggs county, will join capt. Wright at Hartford. So soon as the respective companies shall have arrived at that place, capt. Wright will proceed with the whole to fort Early, where he is authorsed to call on captain Bothwell, or the commanding officer of that station, for the whole of his command, except so many as are actually necessary for its immediate protection.-
The utmost precaution will be necessary to the accomplishment of this important object, and to effect which, it will be necessary that a profound secresy should be observed, and the expedition prosecuted with the greatest possible dispatch, in order to take the Indians by surprise; as this is the only probably means of obtaining an effectual and decisive victory over an enemy who will not come into contact on equal terms.
By order of the commander in chief,
E Wood, Secretary

The Georgia Militia

Wright’s forces assembled at Hartford, GA: Captain Elijah Dean’s company of Laurens County Militia, with Lott Warren serving as Lieutenant;  and Captain Daniel Childs’ company of Wilkinson County Militia, with Henry Shepard as Lieutenant.  Dean and Childs had been stationed at  Hartford, Georgia, for the purpose of guarding supplies and military stores.  Joining the expedition there were Captain Jacob Robinson’s company of Laurens County Light Dragoons,  Charles S. Guyton and John Underwood serving as lieutenants; and Captain Timothy L. Rogers’ Company of Georgia Cavalry;    also two detachments under Lieutenants Cooper and Jones.

Seminole War service record of Lott Warren. Compiled Service Records of Volunteer Soldiers who Served During the Cherokee Disturbances and Removal in Organizations from the State of Georgia; (National Archives).

For this service, the state paid:  Captains, $1.87 per day;  1st Lieut, $1.53 per day; 2nd Lieut, $1.37 per day; Cornet, $1.20 per day; Sergeants, $0.86 per day;  Corporals, $0.80 per day; Trumpeter, $0.80 per day; Privates, $0.70 per day; Wagon & Team, $5.00 per day.

Leaving a third of the companies to garrison Hartford, Wright led the rest of his forces on a “secret expedition.”  Presented here are the available muster rolls of men serving under the command of Captain Obed Wright.  It is not known which of these men marched on the expedition against Chehaw (Aumuculle) and which remained behind at Hartford.

MUSTER ROLL OF CAPT. ROGERS’ COMPANY OF GEORGIA CAVALRY
ORDERED INTO SERVICE BY THE EXECUTIVE
FROM CAPT. HEAD’S COMPANY (Militia District) – Official History of Laurens County

MUSTER ROLL OF THE LAURENS TROOP OF LIGHT DRAGOONS, GEORGIA MILITIA,
COMMANDED BY CAPTAIN JACOB ROBINSON
AND ORDERED INTO SERVICE BY HIS EXCELLENCY THE GOVERNOR – Official History of Laurens County

CAPTAIN DANIEL CHILDS’ COMPANY GEORGIA MILITIA, WILKINSON COUNTY
*Compiled from Service Records of Volunteer Soldiers who Served During the Cherokee Disturbances and Removal in Organizations from the State of Georgia; (National Archives Microfilm Publication M907, 1 roll); Records of the Adjutant General’s Office, 1780’s-1917, RG 94; National Archives, Washington, D.C.

DEAN’S COMPANY OF GEORGIA MILITIA
*Compiled from Service Records of Volunteer Soldiers who Served During the Cherokee Disturbances and Removal in Organizations from the State of Georgia; (National Archives Microfilm Publication M907, 1 roll); Records of the Adjutant General’s Office, 1780’s-1917, RG 94; National Archives, Washington, D.C.

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