The Spanish on Jekyll Island

Spanish on Jekyll Island State Historical Marker, Jekyll Island, Glynn County, Ga.

 

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THE SPANISH ON JEKYLL ISLAND

 

Within sight and sound of St. Simons Island, Jekyll Island was

ideal for entertaining Spanish visitors to the settlement at Frederica.

Major William Horton, resident of the island, received the guests

while Oglethorpe on St. Simons, with cannon booming and his

few soldiers appearing and reappearing on the south beach,

professed a strength he did not have.

In 1736, Spanish Commissioners Don Pedro Lamberto and Don

Manuel d'Arcy, sent by Governor Sanchez of St. Augustine to

discuss rival claims to the Georgia coast, were feted on Jekyll.

On board the Sloop Hawk in Jekyll Sound, kilted Highlanders

from Darien with clanging broadswords, Tomo-Chi-Chi and

Hyllispilli with about 30 of their "chiefest" Indians in war

paint and regella loudly denounced the Spanish and helped

Oglethorpe impress the visitors with strength and good will

of the colonists. Agreeing to leave all questions to the

courts of Spain and England, the emissaries returned to St.

Augustine pleased with their mission. Angered by the decision,

Spain recalled and executed Governor Sanchez.

After the Battle of Bloody Marsh, the Spaniards burned the

buildings on Jekyll Island.

 

063-35 GEORGIA HISTORICAL COMMISSION 1959

 

Photo: Ed Jackson

© Carl Vinson Institute of Government, The University of Georgia

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