The city of Savannah, Georgia, the largest city and the county seat of Chatham County, Georgia, was established in 1733, and was the first colonial and state capital of Georgia. It is known as Georgia's first planned city and attracts millions of visitors, who enjoy the city's architecture and historic structures such as the birthplace of Juliette Gordon Low (founder of the Girl Scouts of the United States of America), the Telfair Academy of Arts and Sciences (one of the South's first public museums), the First African Baptist Church (one of the oldest black Baptist congregations in the United States), Congregation Mickve Israel (the third-oldest synagogue in America), and the Central of Georgia Railway roundhouse complex (the oldest standing antebellum rail facility in America). Today, Savannah's downtown area is one of the largest National Historic Landmark Districts in the United States (designated in 1966).
History
Native settlers Although Savannah was the first permanent colonial settlement in modern-day Georgia, it was far from the first European encroachment into Yamasee/Creek/Guale lands. As early as the 16th century, Spanish missions and presidios (military outposts) were established all along the Georgia coast. Spanish missions such as Santa Catalina de Guale and Santo Domingo de Talaje, attacked and weakened by the Guale revolt of 1597, were finally abandoned by the 1680s as a result of continuous encroachment by traders from the Carolina Lowcountry. Hoping to capitalize on the power vacuum created by the Spanish withdrawal to Florida, the Crown allied itself with the native bands on the Georgia coast, such as the Yamasee, a relatively new Indian group made up of remnants of earlier groups including the Guale.
The Yamacraws, a Native American tribe, are the first recorded people to settle in and around Savannah. In the 18th century, under their leader Tomochichi, they met the newly arriving European settlers. The capital of the Guale may have previously been in the area although long since abandoned. Oglethorpe's arrival and the establishment of a colony Much has been written about Oglethorpe, his reputation as a reformer and his friendship with the Yamasee and Creek peoples. However, it should be stressed that the alliance between the Yamasee and the colonists was tenuous at best. Earlier in the 18th century the Yamasee, having become deeply indebted to Carolinian traders, were increasingly convinced that this debt would be paid through their enslavement. The Yamasee War of 1715–1717 left the Yamasee weakened and opened their lands to settlement; the conflict ultimately enabled the successful colonization of the Georgia coast.
In November 1732 the merchantman Anne, carrying 114 colonists (including General James Oglethorpe), set sail to the Americas. On February 12, 1733,O.S. February 1, 1732, according to the Julian calendar used in the British colonies until September 2, 1752. With the adoption of the Gregorian calendar, eleven days in the date were omitted and the modern New Year (January 1) replaced the Julian contemporary New Year (March 25), previously observed in England and Wales. The Gregorian date in 1733 is observed locally, just as Gregorian dates are used throughout the United States for this era. after a brief stay at Charles Town, South Carolina, Oglethorpe and his settlers landed at Yamacraw Bluff and were greeted by Tomochici, the Yamacraws, and John and Mary Musgrove, Indian traders. (Mary Musgrove often served as an interpreter.) The city of Savannah was founded on that date, along with the Province of Georgia. Because of the friendship between Oglethorpe and Tomochici, Savannah was able to flourish unhindered by warfare with Native American tribes that marked the beginnings of many early American colonies. In July 1733, five months after the arrival of the Anne, 41 Jews from the Sephardi community in London arrived in Savannah, the largest such group to enter a colony up to that time.
Growth of the colony
Prior to arriving in America, Oglethorpe developed an elaborate plan for the growth of towns and regions within the framework of a sustainable agrarian economy and the challenges presented by an often hostile frontier. Features of the plan, now known as the Oglethorpe Plan, especially as it relates to town planning, have been preserved in Savannah, as well as in Darien, Georgia and at Fort Frederica National Monument.Wilson, Thomas D. The Oglethorpe Plan: Enlightenment Design in Savannah and Beyond. Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 2012. Chapter 4.
Although religious toleration was beginning to emerge as a value during the Enlightenment, it was the pragmatic need to attract settlers that led to broad religious freedoms. South Carolina wanted German Lutherans, Scottish Presbyterians, Moravians, French Huguenots and Jews as a counter to the French and Spanish Catholic absolutist presence to the south, which was perceived by Georgian settlers as a threat to the freedoms they had traditionally held.Patricia U. Bonomi, "Under the Cope of Heaven. Religion, Society and Politics in Colonial America", Oxford University Press, 1986, p. 33
After Georgia became a royal colony (1754), there were so many dissenters (Protestants of minority, non-Anglican denominations) that the establishment of the Church of England was successfully resisted until 1752. These dissenting churches were the mainstay of the American Revolutionary movement that culminated in a war for independence from the British Crown. Through the patriotic and anti-authoritarian sermons of their ministers, these churches fostered and organized rebellion. Whereas the Anglican Church tended to preach stability and loyalty to the Crown, Protestant sects preached heavily from the Old Testament, with its emphasis on freedom and equality of all men before God, and the moral responsibility to rebel against tyrants.Bonomi, 1986, Chapter 7 'Religion and the American Revolution'
Over the next century and a half, Savannah welcomed numerous European immigrants; these included the Irish, the French, Greeks and others.
In 1740 George Whitefield founded the Bethesda Orphanage, which is now the oldest extant orphanage in the U.S.
Solomon's Lodge was founded in 1734 by James Oglethorpe, and it is considered to be the oldest continuously operating Masonic Lodge in North America. Originally called simply the Lodge of Savannah, it was officially renamed Solomon's Lodge in 1776.
Province of Georgia The great experiment came to an end after Savannah and the rest of Georgia became a Royal Colony in 1754. Entrepreneurs and slaves were brought into the struggling colony, and Savannah was made the colonial capital of Georgia. The low marshes were converted into wild rice fields and tended by skilled slaves imported from West Africa (where these strains of rice had been grown by European colonists, who brought rice from its native Southeast Asia. However, attempts to establish a rice industry in Africa failed). The combination of European agricultural technology, and African labor, proved to be of great benefit for the city.
Initially, Creek groups gradually ceded lands to European settlers. In 1763 the Creeks agreed to the first of several large land cessions. This first agreement gave Georgia the land between the Savannah and Ogeechee rivers, south of Augusta, along with coastal land between the Altamaha and St. Marys rivers. An additional two million acres (8000 km) of land between the Ogeechee and Altamaha rivers and the headwaters of the Oconee and Savannah rivers was ceded to Georgia by the Creeks and Cherokees in 1773.
Additional fortune came to the city in 1763 following the Treaty of Paris, which opened the interior of North America to economic interests in the American colonies. This was an important milestone in the development of Savannah, as it marks the beginning of economic ties to the interior. Trade, particularly the trade of deerskins, flourished along the upper Savannah River where skins were sent to Augusta and finally through Savannah for export to Europe. The establishment of a trading network on the Savannah River also curtailed Charleston's monopoly on the South Atlantic deerskin trade. Between 1764 and 1773 Savannah exported hides from 500,000 deer (2 million pounds), which established the city as a significant commercial port on the South Atlantic coast.
American Revolution For additional information you may also want to view the following articles: Siege of Savannah
In 1778 during the American Revolutionary War, Savannah came under British and Loyalist control. At the Siege of Savannah in 1779, American and French troops fought unsuccessfully to retake the city.
Late 18th/Early 19th century On January 27, 1785, members of the State Assembly gathered in Savannah to found the nation's first state-chartered, public university—the University of Georgia (in Athens). In 1792 the Savannah Golf Club opened within a mile of Fort Jackson, on what is now President Street. It is the first known American golf club. In 1804 Candler Hospital was founded, and is the second oldest hospital in America in continuous operation.
On January 11, 1820, a fire broke out and burned a large section of the city, bringing nationwide attention to Savannah.
A yellow fever epidemic struck Savannah in 1854, killing 650 residents. Another followed in the summer of 1876, believed to have originated from J. W. Schull, a sailor who was taken ill on July 23 and died seven days later.
American Civil War For additional information on Savannah and the American Civil War, you may wish to view the following articles: Sherman's Special Field Orders, No. 120 Sherman's March to the Sea Sherman's Special Field Orders, No. 15
In November 1864, two months after capturing the city of Atlanta, General William Tecumseh Sherman and his army of 62,000 men began the march south to Savannah. They lived off the land and, by Sherman's own estimate, caused more than $100 million in property damage in Georgia alone.Report by Maj. Gen. W.T. Sherman, January 1, 1865, quoted in Grimsley, p. 200 Sherman called this harsh tactic of material war "hard war" (in modern times known as total war).History Channel
Sherman and his troops captured Savannah on December 22, 1864. Sherman then telegraphed his commander-in-chief, President Abraham Lincoln, offering him the city as a Christmas present.
Late 19th century President Grover Cleveland and his entourage paid a visit to Savannah in February 1888. Cleveland visited the new Telfair Academy of Arts and Sciences gallery and officiated at the ceremony dedicating a monument of Revolutionary War hero Sergeant William Jasper. A 21-gun salute was given by the Chatham County artillery to honor the commander-in-chief.
As the 19th century progressed, Savannah's population increased slightly and its wealth exponentially, but its ranking among the largest U.S. cities steadily dropped. The city went from 41st most populous city in 1860 to 62nd in 1880 (the first year Atlanta exceeded Savannah as Georgia's largest city).
Savannah was the 86th-largest city in 1910, and by 1930 it was no longer ranked in the top 100 most populous U.S. cities. Savannah State University was founded in 1890 and is the oldest African-American public college in Georgia.Savannah, Georgia by Charles J. Elmore Ph.D. page 7
20th century
On 5 February 1958, during a training mission flown by a B-47, a Mark 15 nuclear bomb, also known as the Tybee Bomb, was lost off the coast of Tybee Island near Savannah. The bomb was thought by the Department of Energy to lie buried in silt at the bottom of Wassaw Sound.
In December 1986, an oil tanker docked at the port of Savannah caused an oil spill, resulting in approximately of fuel oil leaking into the Savannah River.
Original design