As time goes on undoubtedly the real greatness, the constructive genius of Fort will become even more generally recognized than it is to-day. The value of his great service to the community will become more apparent in the future than it has in the past; and he, in the sphere of practical scientific achievement and agricultural and industrial development, will be given rank in history along with Sidney Lanier, in poetry; Alexander H. Stephens, in politics; and Le Conte in science.
PERSONAL REMINISCENCES
My father, Dr. Tomlinson Fort, was born in Burke County, Georgia, July 14, 1787. He was the son of Arthur Fort, who was a soldier in the Revolutionary War and a prominent man in the pioneer days of Georgia. My father studied medicine at the Philadelphia Medical College under the famous Dr. Rush to whose memory he was ever attached. He returned to Georgia settling at Milledgeville, then the capital of the State. He had a large medical practice, the most extensive in middle Georgia, which he kept up until ill health forced him to retire only a short while before his death in 1859. He represented his county twelve years in the State legislature, and his district two years in Congress. He was for years president of the State Bank and trustee of the University of Georgia. He then retired from political life. He served as a captain in the War of 1812, and was severely wounded while fighting against the Indians in Florida. Had he lived until the Civil War I am sure that he would have opposed secession. He was strong for the Union, and much opposed to negro slavery. I remember hearing him say that he could never look upon his slaves, which were about fifteen or twenty, with any degree of satisfaction. He was a quiet, grave man of great sobriety and learning. For general information I have never met his equal. He had the confidence of all that knew him, the love of family and friends. He was a most kind and sympathetic father. He was the greatest man I have ever known.
My mother, before her marriage in 1824, was Miss Martha Low Fannin of the Fannin family of Georgia. She was a woman of great charm and of great strength of mind and heart. She had a large family—thirteen children—nine of whom lived to be grown. Her household consisted of ten or eleven servants. Ours was an open house, friends and relatives always coming and going. Mother was a busy woman and a very economical one, knitting our stockings and making our cloth caps. She loved her children devotedly, which love was returned by them.
I was born in Milledgeville, August 16, 1841; there I passed my boyhood and youth. My early education was at a common school. The school was carried on under the principle of the lash. It was thought necessary to force knowledge by whipping. A child missing two words in a lesson was usually whipped. My first teacher was an Englishman named White. His invariable rule was to whip a pupil found not studying his lesson. In one of my first reading lessons I had to repeat "As high as the sky" in a peculiar singing manner, which I could not do to please him. He stood over me with a hickory; I was only a little boy, seven or eight, and I was frightened. At last I said it in a way that suited him. He then grabbed me up, put me on his shoulder, and marched around the room. Our next teacher, Little, also whipped for the slightest offense. One day after school hours several boys, among whom was I, went to the schoolhouse and for revenge broke up the furniture. Fights between the teachers and larger boys were the natural outcome of such system.
When a boy I was very fond of the woods and streams, and everything connected with nature. My father took great pains to instruct me in these matters, and in talking to him and asking questions, I obtained a large insight into nature—much more than is usual with boys of my years.
I was interested specially in birds. I remember that a couple of bluebirds built their nest in a hole in a mulberry tree that grew in the yard. One day I announced that the young had hatched, as I could hear their chirpings when the parent birds approached the nest. No one else could hear them and I was blindfolded to prove my statement, which I successfully did. I timed the visits of the old birds. On the average, once in twelve minutes a worm or some insect was brought to the young. At about that time I had a small collection of birds, which I had skinned and stuffed. These I kept in my room. One day an old gentleman, Mr. Armstrong, who was visiting in our house, when told of my fondness for birds, said to me, "Young man, I have never known any one with an interest in such things who ever amounted to anything." I was greatly mortified by this harsh criticism, and made a bonfire of my birds. My mind and temperament from childhood have been those of a naturalist.
Milledgeville is on the Oconee River at the mouth of Fishing Creek. Swimming was the favorite sport with the boys of the town. I was in the water a great deal and was a fine swimmer. To give an incident I remember well: A boyhood friend, Joe Bell, was drowning; I caught him by the hair and pulled him out, thus saving his life. At a later time he saved mine in the following manner: During the Civil War, in a mix-up in a swamp, we were fired upon by some of our own men. Just as one of them had his gun leveled on me, his officer, who was Joe Bell, recognized me and threw up the man's gun. We were quits.