[This is the map given by Robert Wright in his Memoir of General James Oglethorpe, London, 1867. There is a similar map in Harris’s Oglethorpe. Cf. Gay’s Popular History of the United States, iii. 156.—Ed.]
Encouraged by the development of the plantation, desiring a personal conference with the Trustees, and rightly judging that the advantage and security of the province would be materially promoted by taking with him to England some of the most intelligent of his Indian neighbors, that they might by personal observation acquire a definite conception of the greatness and the resources of the British empire, and, moved by the kindnesses and attentions which he was quite sure would be extended to them on every hand, imbibe memories that would tend to cement the alliances and perpetuate the amicable relations which had been so auspiciously inaugurated,—Oglethorpe, in March, 1734, persuaded Tomo-chi-chi with a selected retinue to accompany him to London. The reception accorded to these Indians in the English capital and its environs was cordial and appropriate. This visit of Tomo-chi-chi and his companions, and the interest awakened by their presence in London, materially assisted Oglethorpe and the Trustees in enlisting the renewed and earnest sympathies of the public, not only in behalf of the colonists, but also in aid of the education and religious instruction of the natives. Widely disseminated among the Indian nations was the knowledge of this sojourn of the mico of the Yamacraws and his companions in the home of the white man. The novel and beautiful presents which the Indians brought back with them afforded ocular proof of the liberality of the English, and produced a profound impression upon the natives, who, grateful for the kindness shown to members of their race, were encouraged in the perpetuation of the amicable relations existing between themselves and the colonists.
Through the influence of Oglethorpe the regulations of the Trustees prohibiting the importation and sale of rum, brandy, and other distilled liquors within the limits of Georgia, and forbidding the introduction and use of negro slaves in the province, received the sanction of Parliament. Commenting upon this legislation, Edmund Burke remarked that while these restrictions were designed to bring about wholesome results, they were promulgated without a sufficient appreciation of the nature of the country and the disposition of the people to be affected by them. Long and earnestly did many of the colonists petition for the removal of these prohibitions, which placed the province at a disadvantage when its privileges were contrasted with those of sister plantations, and beyond doubt, so far at least as the employment of slave-labor was concerned, retarded its material development.
The peopling and fortification of the southern confines of Georgia engaged the earnest thought of the Trustees. The Spaniards regarded with a jealous eye the confirmation of this new English colony upon the borders of Florida. Moved by urgent memorials on the subject, Parliament granted £26,000 for “the settling, fortifying, and defending” Georgia. Their treasury being thus replenished, and anxious to enlist colonists of acknowledged strength and valor, the Trustees, through Lieutenant Hugh Mackay, recruited among the Highlands of Scotland one hundred and thirty men, with fifty women and children. They were all of excellent character, and were carefully selected for their military qualities. Accompanied by a clergyman of their own choice,—the Rev. John McLeod, of the Isle of Skye,—this hardy company was conveyed to Georgia and assigned to the left bank of the Alatamaha, about sixteen miles above the island of St. Simon. Here these Highlanders landed, erected a fort, mounted four pieces of cannon, built a guard-house, a store, and a chapel, and constructed huts for temporary accommodation preparatory to putting up more substantial structures. To their little town they gave the name of New Inverness, and the district which they were to hold and cultivate they called Darien. These Scots were brave and hardy; just the men to occupy this advanced post. In their plaids, and with their broadswords, targets, and fire-arms, they presented a most manly appearance. Previous to their departure from Savannah in periaguas, some Carolinians endeavored to dissuade them from going to the south by telling them that the Spaniards from the houses in their fort would shoot them upon the spot selected by the Trustees for their abode. Nothing daunted, these doughty countrymen of Bruce and Wallace responded, “Why, then, we will beat them out of their fort, and shall have houses ready built to live in.” This valiant spirit found subsequent expression in the efficient military service rendered by these Highlanders during the wars between the colonists and the Spaniards, and by their descendants in the American Revolution. Augmented at intervals by fresh arrivals from Scotland, this settlement, although placed in a malarial region, steadily increased in wealth and influence.
At an early date a road was constructed to connect New Inverness with Savannah.
On the morning of Feb. 5, 1736, the “Symond” and the “London Merchant,” with the first of the flood, passed over the bar and came to anchor within Tybee Roads. On board were two hundred and two persons conveyed on the Trust’s account. Among them were English people, German Lutherans under the conduct of Baron von Reck and Captain Hermsdorf, and twenty-five Moravians with their bishop the Rev. David Nitschman. Oglethorpe was present, accompanied by the brothers John and Charles Wesley, the Rev. Mr. Ingham, and by Charles Delamotte, the son of a London merchant and a friend of the Wesleys. Coming at their own charge were Sir Francis Bathurst, with family and servants, and some relatives of planters already settled in the province. Ample stores of provisions, small arms, cannon, ammunition, and tools were transported in these vessels. The declared object of this large accession of colonists was the population of the southern confines of the province and the building of a military town on the island of St. Simon, to be called Frederica.
It was not until the 2d of March that the fleet of periaguas and boats, with the newly arrived on board, set out from Tybee Roads for the mouth of the Alatamaha. The voyage to the southward was accomplished in five days. So diligently did the colonists labor, and so materially were they assisted by workmen drawn from other parts of the province and from Carolina, that by the 23d of the month Frederica had been laid out, a battery of cannon commanding the river had been mounted, and a fort almost completed. Its ditches had been dug, although not to the required depth or width, and a rampart raised and covered with sod. A storehouse, having a front of sixty feet, and designed to be three stories in height, was finished as to its cellar and first story. The main street which “went from the Front into the Country was 25 yards wide. Each Freeholder had 60 Feet in Front by 90 Feet in depth upon the high Street for their House and Garden; but those which fronted the River had but 30 Feet in Front by 60 Feet in Depth. Each Family had a Bower of Palmetto Leaves finished upon the back Street in their own Lands. The Side towards the front Street was set out for their Houses. These Palmetto Bowers were very convenient shelters, being tight in the hardest Rains; they were about 20 Feet long and 14 Feet wide, and in regular Rows looked very pretty, the Palmetto Leaves lying smooth and handsome, and of a good Colour. The whole appeared something like a Camp; for the Bowers looked like Tents, only being larger and covered with Palmetto Leaves instead of Canvas. There were 3 large Tents, two belonging to Mr. Oglethorpe and one to Mr. Horton, pitched upon the Parade near the River.” Such is the description of Frederica in its infancy as furnished by Mr. Moore, whose Voyage to Georgia is perhaps the most interesting and valuable tract we possess descriptive of the colonization of the southern portion of Georgia. That there might be no confusion in their labors, Oglethorpe divided the colonists into working parties. To some was assigned the duty of cutting forks, poles, and laths for building the bowers; others set them up; others still gathered palmetto leaves; while “a fourth gang,” under the superintendence of a Jew workman, bred in Brazil and skilled in the matter, thatched the roofs “nimbly and in a neat manner.”
Men accustomed to agriculture instructed the colonists in hoeing and preparing the soil. Potatoes, Indian corn, flax, hemp-seed, barley, turnips, lucern-grass, pumpkins, and water-melons were planted. Labor was common, and inured to the general benefit of the community. As it was rather too late in the season to till the ground fully and sow a crop to yield sufficient to subsist the settlement for the current year, many of the men were put upon pay and set to work upon the fortifications and the public buildings.
Frederica, situated on the west side of St. Simon’s Island, on a bold bluff confronting a bay formed by one of the mouths of the Alatamaha River, was planned as a military town, and constructed with a view to breasting the shock of hostile assaults. Its houses were to be substantially built, not of wood as in Savannah, but of tabby. At an early period its streets by their names proclaimed the presence of men-at-arms, while its esplanade and parade-ground characterized it as a permanent camp.[842] Including the camp on the north, the parade on the east, and a small wood on the south which was to serve as a blind in the event of an attack from ships coming up the river, the settlement was about a mile and a half in circumference.