Ed Jackson and Charles Pou

Carl Vinson Institute of Government

The University of Georgia

December 14

1793 Gov. George Mathews signed an act creating Screven County as Georgia's 14th county. Created from portions of Burke and Effingham counties, the county was named for Revolutionary War general James Screven.

1809 Gov. David Mitchell signed an act creating Twiggs County as Georgia's 37th county. Created from portions Wilkinson County, the county was named for Revolutionary War general John Twiggs.

1827 Gov. John Forsyth signed legislation creating Meriwether, Harris, Talbot, and Marion counties as Georgia's 71st, 72nd, 73rd, and 74th counties. Meriwether County, named for former congressman and Indian commissioner David Meriwether, was created from portions of Troup County. Harris County, named for Savannah mayor Charles Harris, was created from portions of Muscogee and Troup counties. Talbot County, named for Gov. Matthew Talbot, was created from portions of Muscogee County. Marion County, named for Revolutionary War hero Gen. Francis Marion, was created from portions of Lee and Muscogee counties.

1837 Gov. George Gilmer signed an act creating Macon County as Georgia's 91st county. Created from portions of Houston and Marion counties, the county was named for U.S. Senator Nathaniel Macon.

1859 Gov. Joseph E. Brown signed an act prohibiting any slave owner from providing for the slave's freedom in the event of the owner's death.

1861 Although Georgia's great seal then in use contained no reference to the United States, Art. 3, Sec. 2, Par. 9 of the Constitution of 1861 directed that the General Assembly to "by law cause the great seal to be altered." Accordingly, Gov. Brown signed an act appointing two commissioners to work with the Secretary of State in preparing a new state seal. Interestingly, the legislation contained no instructions as to the new seal's design or wording -- leaving the matter left entirely to the three officials.

1865 Georgia Supreme Court justice Charles Jenkins took office as Georgia's first elected governor during Reconstruction. Born Jan. 6, 1805 in Beaufort, S.C., he attended the University of Georgia but graduated from Union College. Coming to Georgia, he read law and was admitted to the bar in 1826. In 1830, Jenkins began a political career that would include terms in both houses of the General Assembly (including four years as Speaker), state attorney general, and superior court solicitor. Jenkins lost a close race for governor in 1853, but he was named to the Georgia Supreme Court in 1860. After the election of Lincoln as president, Jenkins attended Georgia's secession convention. After Georgia seceded, he supported Georgia and the Confederacy--though he continued to serve on the Georgia Supreme Court through 1866. Though a Democrat, he asked President Andrew Johnson for a pardon after the war in order for him to attend Georgia's 1865 constitutional convention. In Nov. 1866, Jenkins was elected governor, taking office Dec. 14. A year later, however, he was removed by Gen. Meade for refusing to authorize $40,000 to pay for a constitutional convention meeting in Atlanta in Dec. 1867. Before leaving office, Jenkins took $400,000 from the state treasury (which he deposited in a New York bank), many official books and documents, and the state seal. For over two years, Jenkins lived and traveled abroad, returning to Augusta in late 1870 with the state's money, documents, and seal. Subsequently, he retired to his home near Augusta, reemerging to chair the constitutional convention of 1877. Jenkins died in Augusta on June 14, 1883.

1898 U.S. Pres. William McKinley addressed a joint session of the Georgia General Assembly as part of a Peace Jubilee to celebrate the U.S. victory in the brief Spanish-American War. [See "In Their Own Words. . ." entry below.]

1939 Clarke Gable, director Victor Fleming, and many motion picture executives flew into Atlanta for the world premier of Gone With the Wind. Late that afternoon, the film stars rode in a parade through downtown Atlanta. That evening, the Atlanta Junior League held a gala ball in the city auditorium. Among those present was young Martin Luther King, Jr., who participated in the singing of spirituals with the Ebenezer Baptist Church choir. Also present was NBC, which broadcast the introductions of stars and officials to a nationwide radio audience.

1961 Governor Ernest Vandiver sent 150 National Guardsmen to Albany. Dr. William Anderson, president of the Albany Movement, asked former college classmate Martin Luther King Jr. to come to Albany to help. [Contributed by Dr. Lee Formwalt, Albany State University]

Georgia cities and towns first incorporated by acts approved on Dec. 14:

1815 Jacksonville (Telfair County)

In Their Own Words on This Day. . .

1734 Savannah court recorder Thomas Christie wrote to James Oglethorpe (who was then in England) about various problems being experienced in Georgia, including the murder a slave and of one of the colonists:

"I have often spoke to Mr. [Noble] Jones [the surveyor] to send you the plan and keep a journal of the lands that he runs out, which I could never obtain. Indeed . . . I believe little has been run out since your departure, 'till very lately. The people have greatly complained of late for want of knowing the bounds of their lots, for want of which they have neglected fencing, so that most of the crop that was sowed last summer have been eat up by the cows and horses. Another thing I must not forget to mention: the corn and seeds, that was in the Storehouse when you went away, was given to the people, was musty, damaged or spoilt, so that it never came up. And it was so long and late in the year before they got fresh seed that it balked some, and other did not sow it 'till it was too late in the year. . . . And indeed we have some people who never were masters of any land and whose heads are turned no way but to the alehouse, and others are so idle to think of nothing but selling and running away. . . .

"We raise the envy of the people of Carolina, by whom we suffer many aspersions and false reports although we serve them for a bulwark against the Indians, a curb to their Negroes, raise the price of their markets and the value of their lands. And they get all our money into the bargain. They are settling on the river May and all about us and, with the advantage of their Negroes, report that we need not sow any corn or rice for they will always undersell us. . . .

"[Indian trader Joseph] Watson has behaved very ill since your departure and hath committed several irregularities, has beat the Indians, presented a gun at Mrs. Musgrove's, proved very dissaffected to the colony and unfit for a trader.

"The Indian Skee offering one day to break open his storehouse in order to kill him, Watson escaped out backwards. And they, finding him gone, in their mad freak fell upon Justice, Musgrove's slave, and killed him. He is since gone up in the country full of malice. . . .

"The unfortunate Mr. Wise, his effects was sold except papers and manuscripts remaining in a trunk in the store . . . . The manner of this murder was thus, which you have no doubt been acquainted with. He lay over in the island a considerable time in a very weak condition and kept [to] his bed. He used to call for some water in the morning to wash himself and White used to assist him in combing out his hair . . . . Alice Riley [an Irish servant] by the direction and influence of White brought a pail of water which she sat down by his bedside. White came in also, pretending to assist him in combing his hair. He usually wore a handkerchief about his neck and while he was leaning over the bedside, instead of combing his hair, White took hold by that handkerchief, which he twisted 'till he was almost suffocated. Alice Riley at the same time took hold of the poll of his head and plunged his face into the pail of water and, he being very weak, it soon dispatched him. As to the rest I refer to the proceedings of the Court. . . ."

Source: Mills Lane (ed.), General Oglethorpe's Georgia: Colonial Letters, 1733-1743 (Savannah: Beehive Press, 1990), Vol. I, pp. 66-72.

1738 William Stephens,the Trustees' secretary in Georgia, was responsible for keeping the Trustees informed on what was happening in their colony. However, by this time, there were two Georgias -- the area around Savannah (where Stephens lived) and the military frontier to the south (where James Oglethorpe and his British regiment were stationed at Frederica on St. Simons Island). Stephens' journal entry for today showed his concern about Oglethorpe's absence:

". . . Indeed his Presence among us was much wished for now, as well on Account of this Representation so warmly carried on, as because our Stores were near exhausted, by Means of divers very large Quantities that had been drawn out, by several Creditors, who had it in their Option to take Provisions instead of Money, if they liked so to do; wherein they acted variously, as they were well or ill affected, or as their Necessities obliged them to support their own Credit: And there being yet no Appearance how the Stores would be recruited, gave a melancholy Prospect of what might happen. . . ."

Source: William Stephens, A Journal of the Proceeding in Georgia ([no city cited]: Readex Microprint Corporation, 1966), Vol. I, p. 356.

1864 From General Sherman's memoirs for this day:

"We still had in our wagons and in camp abundance of meat, but we needed bread, sugar, and coffee, and it was all-important that a route of supply should at once be opened, for which purpose the aid and assistance of the navy were indispensable. We accordingly steamed down the Ogeechee River to Ossabaw Sound, in hopes to meet Admiral Dahlgren, but he was not there, and we continued on by the inland channel to Wassaw Sound, where we found the Harvest Moon and Admiral Dahlgren. I was not personally acquainted with him at the time, but he was so extremely kind and courteous that I was at once attracted to him. There was nothing in his power, he said, which he would not do to assist us, to make our campaign absolutely successful He undertook at once to find vessels of light draught to carry our supplies from Port Royal to Cheeve's Mill or to King's Bridge, whence they could be hauled by wagons to our several camps; he offered to return with me to Fort McAllister, to superintend the removal of the torpedoes, and to relieve me of all the details of this most difficult work. General Foster then concluded to go on to Port Royal, to send back to us six hundred thousand rations, and all the rifled guns of heavy calibre and ammunition on hand with which I thought we could reach the city of Savannah from the positions already secured. Admiral Dahlgren then returned with me in the Harvest Moon to Fort McAllister. This consumed all of the 14th of December. . . ."

Source: Mills Lane (ed.), Marching Through Georgia: William T. Sherman's Personal Narrative of His March Through Georgia (New York: Arno Press, 1978), pp. 165-166.

1898 Pres. William McKinley came to Georgia to participate in a Peace Jubilee to mark the end of the Spanish-American War. His address to the Georgia General Assembly, however, was one of reconciliation over the Civil War:

"Sectional lines no longer mar the map of the United States. Sectional feeling no longer holds back the love we bear each other. Fraternity is the national anthem, sung by a chorus of forty-five states and our territories at home and beyond the seas. The union is once more the common alter of our love and loyalty, our devotion and sacrifice. The old flag again waves over us in peace with new glories and sacrifice. The old flag again waves over us in peace with new glories, which your sons and ours have this year added to its sacred folds. What cause we have for rejoicing, saddened only by the fact that so many of our brave men fell on field or sickened and died from hardship and exposure, and others returning bring wounds and disease from which they will long suffer. The memory of the dead will be a precious legacy, and the disabled will be the nation's care.

"A nation which cares for its disabled soldiers, as we have always done, will never lack defenders. The national cemeteries for those who fell in battle are proof that the dead as well as the living have our love. What an army of silent sentinels we have, and with what loving care their graves are kept! Every soldier's grave made during our unfortunate civil war is a tribute to American valor.

"And while when those graves were made we differed widely about the future of this government, these differences were long ago settled by the arbitrament of arms--and the time has now come in the evolution of sentiment and feeling under the providence of God, when in the spirit of fraternity we should share with you in the care of the graves of the Confederate soldiers.

"The cordial feeling now happily existing between the North and South prompts this gracious act, and if it needed further justification, it is found in the gallant loyalty to the Union and the flag so conspicuously shown in the year just passed by the sons and grandsons of these heroic dead.

"What a glorious future awaits us if unitedly, wisely and bravely we face the new problems now pressing upon us, determined to solve them for right and humanity."

Source: Atlanta Constitution, Dec. 15, 1898

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© Carl Vinson Institute of Government, University of Georgia

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