Robert C Jones

Colonial Georgia Robert C Jones

This book looks at the history of Colonial Georgia from 1732-1800. It includes the founding of Georgia as a colony by James Oglethorpe, its time as a Royal Colony under three Royal governors, the Revolutionary War, and its first years as a state of the United States. Along the way, we meet some interesting people, including the aforementioned Oglethorpe, his friend Chief Tomochichi, Mary Musgrove, the Empress of Georgia, John & Charles Wesley, who spent two (unsuccessful) years in Georgia, George Whitefield, and Johann Bolzius, pastor of the Salzburger congregation in Ebenezer, Georgia. And we'll examine Oglethorpe's invasion of Florida, and the Spanish invasion of Georgia in 1742. In Revolutionary War times, we meet the three signers of the Declaration of Independence from Georgia - Lyman Hall, George Walton and Button Gwinnett. We meet some great military leaders from Georgia, including Elijah Clarke, Samuel Elbert and Lachlan McIntosh. And one hero that is in a class by herself - Nancy Hart. We look at some significant Georgia battles, including Kettle Creek, Brier Creek and the Siege of Savannah. After the Revolutionary War, we'll watch as Georgia takes its first nascent steps towards self-government, as well as what is perhaps the greatest governmental scandal in Georgia's history - the Yazoo Land Fraud, when Georgia legislators took bribes to sell large tracts of land in Alabama and Mississippi to speculators.