The New Georgia Encyclopedia is supported by funding from A More Perfect Union, a special initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
David Emanuel Twiggs, a U.S. Army general, surrendered U.S. forces to Confederate authorities in Texas when that state seceded from the Union in 1861. He was the son of prominent Revolutionary War general John Twiggs and nephew of Georgia governor David Emanuel.
Three companies of the British Sixtieth Regiment of Foot were sent to the Georgia colony in 1763 by King George III to strengthen the defense of colonial garrisons against attack by the French and Spanish.
Courtesy of The Company of Military Historians
Henry Alexander's lithograph Infantry: Continental Army, 1779-1783 depicts the uniforms and weapons used by the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War.
Courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
Nathanael Greene was one of the most respected generals of the Revolutionary War and a talented military strategist. As commander of the Southern Department of the Continental army, his leadership was the catalyst that turned the tide toward American victory in Georgia.
Courtesy of Independence National Historical Park
During the 1730s, Scottish settler Patrick Tailfer led a group of colonists, knowns as the Malcontents, in protest of various laws and policies enforced by the Georgia Trustees. His 1740 tract, entitled A True and Historical Narrative of the Colony of Georgia, was read in influential circles but failed to make a substantial impact on the circumstances of the Malcontents.
From A True and Historical Narrative of the Colony of Georgia in America, by P. Tailfer
Connecticut native and, later, Georgia resident David Bushnell invented the submarine. He created the first prototype of a manned submarine, called the "Turtle," in the 1770s. His design was used in the Revolutionary War against the British.
Courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
The inventor of the cotton gin, Eli Whitney lived in Georgia for just a year, on Catharine Greene's Mulberry Grove plantation near Savannah. After learning of the difficulty planters had with separating seeds from fibers in upland, or "short-staple," cotton, he set out to create a machine that could perform such a task more efficiently. His invention, the cotton gin, revolutionized the southern economy.
Courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
An original model of an Eli Whitney cotton gin (circa 1800) is on display in Washington, D.C., at the National Museum of American History.
Image from National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution
Eli Whitney's cotton gin revolutionized the southern economy. Within only a few years, cotton replaced indigo and tobacco as the region's major cash crop. This 1940 postage stamp commemorates Whitney and his invention.
Courtesy of the Smithsonian National Postal Museum
Count Casimir Pulaski was one of Georgia's most notable military heroes during the Revolutionary War. A Polish nobleman, Pulaski was killed while leading an unsuccessful charge against the British during the 1779 Siege of Savannah.
Courtesy of Georgia Historical Society, Foltz Photography Studio (Savannah, Ga.), photographs, 1899-1960, #GHS 1360-25-13-14.
Fort Pulaski, situated on Cockspur Island at the mouth of the Savannah River, was built in the 1830s and 1840s to defend Savannah. During the Civil War, Union forces captured the fort on April 11, 1862, and controlled it for the remainder of the war.
Photograph by Brooke Novak
This drawing by a British officer details the failed attempt by American and French forces to recapture Savannah from British troops on October 9, 1779.
Courtesy of Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of Georgia Libraries, Rare Maps Collection.
General Casimir Pulaski, featured on this 1931 U.S. postage stamp, joined American forces in the Revolutionary War. Fort Pulaski, near the mouth of the Savannah River, bears his name.
Courtesy of the Smithsonian National Postal Museum
Austin Dabney, an enslaved Georgian, earned freedom in exchange for his service in the patriot army. Dabney was banned from participating in the land lottery open to Revolutionary War veterans in 1819, but the legislature granted him acreage in Washington County in 1821.
From The Black Presence in the Era of the American Revolution, by S. Kaplan and E. N. Kaplan
John Milledge, a veteran of the Revolutionary War, served as the state attorney general and in the state legislature before being elected governor of Georgia in 1802. Milledgeville, which served as the state capital for much of the nineteenth century, was named in his honor.
Courtesy of Georgia Capitol Museum, University of Georgia Libraries
Sarah Gibbons was born into one of the wealthiest families in the Georgia colony. In 1774 she married Edward Telfair, a prominent planter and merchant in Savannah, and the couple had seven children who survived infancy. Portrait by unknown artist, oil on board (8 1/4" x 7"), date unknown.
Courtesy of Telfair Museums.
John Clark, a Revolutionary War veteran, was the governor of Georgia from 1819 to 1823. During the war, Clark served under the command of his father, Elijah Clarke, at the battles of Kettle Creek and Musgrove Mill.
Courtesy of Georgia Capitol Museum, University of Georgia Libraries
After writing the charter for the University of Georgia, Abraham Baldwin served as the college's first president from 1786 to 1801. In 1787 he was chosen as one of four Georgia delegates to the Constitutional Convention. During his long political career, Baldwin also served in the Georgia General Assembly, the U.S. House of Representatives, and the U.S. Senate.
Courtesy of University of Georgia Photographic Services
An early sketch, circa 1850, of the University of Georgia in Athens depicts the Franklin College quadrangle as seen from the southwest across Broad Street. The architecture of the campus was modeled after that of Yale University in Connecticut, the alma mater of Abraham Baldwin, UGA's first president.
This 1985 U.S. postage stamp commemorates the life of former senator Abraham Baldwin, founder of the University of Georgia.
Courtesy of the Smithsonian National Postal MuseumÂ
This sketch of Stephen Heard, a Revolutionary War veteran and early state legislator, mounted on his horse, Silverheels, appears in the 1913 collection Grandmother Stories from the Land of Used-to-Be, by Howard Meriwether Lovett.
According to Revolutionary lore, Nancy Hart famously outwitted a group of Tories who had invaded her home. She served them wine and, once they were drunk, filched their weapons, which she used to shoot two of the men and hold the rest captive until help arrived. Painting by Louis S. Glanzman.
Courtesy of National Geographic
A replica of Revolutionary War patriot Nancy Hart's cabin stands near its original site in Elbert County. Hart is renowned for capturing and killing several Tories at her cabin during the war.
Courtesy of Elbert County Chamber of Commerce
The Kettle Creek Battlefield Historic Monument commemorates a Revolutionary War battle that took place on February 14, 1779. Famed patriot Nancy Hart was reportedly present during the conflict.
Courtesy of Thomas Hammack Jr.
Hand-colored lithograph of Major Ridge, a Cherokee leader who helped establish the Cherokee system of government. The soldier, politician, and plantation owner is remembered for signing the Treaty of New Echota (1835), which ceded Cherokee lands to the U.S. government and authorized Cherokee removal.
From History of the Indian Tribes of North America, by T. McKenney and J. Hall
Catharine Greene was the noted wife of Revolutionary War general Nathanael Greene and later a supporter of Eli Whitney, the inventor of the cotton gin. This painting of Greene (oil on panel, 32 3/4" x 25 3/4"), dated circa 1809, is attributed to James Frothingham.
Courtesy of Telfair Museums.
A monument to Revolutionary War general Nathanael Greene stands in Johnson Square, in Savannah.
Image from sfgamchick
Soldiers from Fort Screven stand in formation during the 1902 reinterment of Revolutionary War general Nathanael Greene in Savannah's Johnson Square.
Courtesy of Georgia Archives, Vanishing Georgia, #
ctm257.
Nathan Brownson served as Georgia's governor in 1781-82, toward the end of the American Revolution. He also was elected to the state legislature and was a member of the convention that ratified the U.S. constitution as well as the convention that rewrote Georgia's constitution in 1789. He was the first physician to serve as governor.
Courtesy of Georgia Capitol Museum, University of Georgia Libraries
The burning of the Yazoo Act, which resulted in the Yazoo land fraud of 1795, took place on the grounds of the capitol building in Louisville. Louisville served as the state capital from 1796 until 1806, when the legislature moved to Milledgeville.
In 1787 William Few Jr. represented Georgia at the constitutional convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Subsequently, Few was a signer of the U.S. Constitution. Etching by Albert Rosenthal (1888) from family miniature.
The leading Jeffersonian Republican in post-Revolutionary Georgia, U.S. senator James Jackson resigned his seat and returned home to handle the Yazoo land fraud scandal in 1795. The following year he led a successful effort in the Georgia legislature to pass the Yazoo Rescinding Act, which nullified the corrupt land sales.
Dilapidated houses from the Goose Pond community, which was founded in the late eighteenth century, still remained when this photo was taken circa 1964. Today the post office is the only extant building from the original community, located in present-day Oglethorpe County.
Courtesy of Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of Georgia Libraries, Andrew Horace Sparks Papers.
John Wereat served briefly as de facto governor of Georgia in 1779 and is best known for his attempt in 1795 to thwart the Yazoo land fraud, a corrupt deal between the state legislature and land speculators.
Courtesy of Georgia Historical Society, John Wereat letter to John Gibbons, #GHS 0854-AF-006.
In February 1777 Treutlen, Button Gwinnett, and George Wells were on the drafting committee of Georgia's first constitution.
Image from Dsdugan
John Treutlen was a leader in Georgia during the American Revolution and helped to write Georgia's first constitution. In 1777 he became Georgia's first elected governor.
Image from Internet Archive Book Images
John Houstoun served twice as the governor of Georgia, as well as the mayor of Savannah.
John Houstoun was twice governor of Georgia, the first mayor of the city of Savannah, and an early supporter of independence from Britain.
Courtesy of Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of Georgia Libraries, Georgia Photo File.
Noble W. Jones was prominent among Georgia's Whig leaders before and during the American Revolution, serving in both the provincial and state legislatures and in the Continental Congress. Portrait by Charles Willson Peale, circa 1781.
Courtesy of Telfair Museums, Courtesy of the Wormsloe Foundation.
An honored Revolutionary War soldier turned politician, John Martin was governor of Georgia from 1782 to 1783. It was during his term of office that Georgia retook Savannah from the British and the Revolutionary War in Georgia came to an end.
Courtesy of Georgia Capitol Museum, University of Georgia Libraries
In December 1778, British troops under Lieutenant Colonel Archibald Campbell captured Savannah as part of their campaign to restore the colony of Georgia to British rule. This drawing details the town of Savannah at the time of the British invasion.
Courtesy of Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library, University of Georgia Libraries, Rare Maps Collection.
Through his 1778 Georgia campaign, particularly his capture of Savannah and Augusta, Archibald Campbell achieved one of the few unqualified British successes in the American Revolution.
Image from Wikimedia
One of three Georgians to sign the Declaration of Independence, George Walton served in numerous capacities for the state of Georgia after the American Revolution, including governor of Georgia in 1779.
Lyman Hall was one of three Georgians to sign the Declaration of Independence. He served as a representative to the Continental Congress and as governor of Georgia from 1783 to 1784.
