Ed Jackson and Charles Pou

Carl Vinson Institute of Government

The University of Georgia

December 16

1714 Anglican minister George Whitefield (pronounced and sometimes spelled "Whitfield") was born in Gloucester, England. He attended Oxford University, where just prior to graduating in 1736, he was ordained as a deacon in the Church of England. At the encouragement of friends John and Charles Wesley, Whitefield came to Georgia in 1738 and began preaching to colonists in Savannah. Three months later, he decided Georgia needed an orphanage so he returned to England to raise the necessary money. In 1739, Whitefield returned to America by way of Philadelphia, where he began preaching with a charismatic style not associated with the Church of England. From New England to South Carolina, Whitefield had a tremendous impact on audiences. In 1740, he gave up his Savannah ministry to reach a larger audience in America, though he did succeed with creation of the Bethesda Orphanage on 500 acres granted by the Trustees near Savannah. Though his religious impact extended far beyond Georgia to both sides of the Atlantic, Whitefield maintained his interest in Bethesda Orphanage until his death in on Sept. 30, 1770 in Newburyport, Massachusetts. In recognition of Whitefield, the Georgia General Assembly created Whitfield County in 1851 (with the name spelled to reflect its pronunciation).

1769 Prominent Baptist clergyman Jesse Mercer was born in Halifax County, North Carolina. The oldest of eight children, Mercer came to Georgia in 1773 with his family. Following in his father's footsteps, he was ordained a Baptist minister in 1789. Mercer was an eloquent and moving speaker, and soon was noted throughout the region for his original sermons. He worked with the Georgia Baptist Association, primarily to encourage foreign missions. He was influential in the founding of the General Baptist Association for the State of Georgia, which later became the Georgia Baptist Convention; Mercer helped write the organization's constitution, and was its first and only moderator until his death. Mercer brought the organization's official news organ, the Christian Index, to Georgia from Philadelphia and served as its editor for seven years. Mercer also authored two volumes, a hymnal entitled A Cluster of Spiritual Songs and A History of the Georgia Baptist Association. Mercer remarried in 1827 ( his first wife and two infant daughters had died) to a wealthy widow. Through this inheritance he helped establish the Mercer Institute in Greene County in 1833. Largely through his work and financial donations, the school attained university status in 1837. Later, Mercer University was relocated to Macon and still exists as a testament to Mercer's faith and generosity. He died September 6, 1841, and his body was laid to rest in a cemetery adjacent to the old university campus. [Click herefor more biographical information.]

1847 Gov. George Towns signed legislation authorizing erection of a state deaf and dumb school and asylum in Floyd County. That facility subsequently was built at Cave Spring.

1853 Gov. Herschel Johnson signed an act creating Kinchafoonee County as Georgia's 104th county. Created from portions of Stewart County, Kinchafoonee County was named for the main creek that ran through the area. Criticism of the name, however, led local residents to seek to have the county's name changed. On Feb. 21, 1856, Gov. Johnson signed an act redesignating the county as Webster County. The new name honored former U.S. Secretary of State Daniel Webster, who as a U.S. senator had helped bring about the Compromise of 1850.

1860 Politician and former Georgia governor and state supreme court justice Charles J. McDonald died in Marietta. [See July 9 entry for more biographical information on McDonald.]

1861 Until this day, Georgia law prohibited a wife from having a bank account separate from her husband. However, this was changed when Gov. Joseph E. Brown signed an act allowing married women to have their own bank accounts so long as the total deposited was less than $1,000. In 1866, the law was amended to double the amount a wife could have in her own account.

1897 Gov. William Atkinson signed an act designating June 3 -- the birthday of Jefferson Davis -- as an annual state holiday.

1961 On the steps of Albany's city hall, 263 blacks, led by Martin Luther King Jr., Ralph David Abernathy, and Albany Movement President William Anderson, along with one University of Georgia white student were arrested as they knelt to pray for the release from jail of the hundreds of demonstrators. King, Anderson, and Abernathy were taken to the Sumter County jail in Americus. The jail was run by Sheriff Fred Chappell, referred to by King as "the meanest man in the world." [Contributed by Dr. Lee Formwalt, Albany State University]

1967 North Carolina State beat Georgia 14-7 in the Liberty Bowl.

1976 President Carter announced his intention to name Georgia Fifth District Congressman Andrew Young as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. Formal appointment, which required Senate ratification, did not come until Jan. 29, 1977.

Georgia cities and towns incorporated by acts approved on Dec. 16:

1859 Blackshear (Pierce County)

1861 Summerville (Richmond County)

1895 Alto (Banks and Habersham counties), Battle Hill (Fulton County), Jakin (Early County), and Pinehurst (Dooly County)

In Their Own Words on This Day. . .

1777 Savannah merchant Joseph Clay wrote to some fellow merchants in another colony of a successful attempt to run the British blockade of Savannah, and his hopes of more such attempts in the future:

". . . I am in hopes the Proceeds of the Cargo he brought in will repay us the Outfit & send him to sea again clear of any advance, tho' cannot be certain as his being so long out has made his Disbursements run high the Men of Warr that lay constantly of [off] Bermuda kept him in port, they at last quit for want of Provisions & repairs & he push'd out. We have several Cruisers on our Coast tho mostly off Charles Town notwithstanding which we have more Vessels get safe in than falls into their hands & as the winter sets in (w'ch has been remarkably mild with us hitherto) the Chance will be much more in our favour shou'd they even remain on our Coasts w'ch I think tis probable they may not . . . ."

Source: Collections of the Georgia Historical Society, Vol. VIII, Letters of Joseph Clay, Merchant of Savannah, 1776-1793 (Savannah: Georgia Historical Society, 1913), p. 62.

1863 From Columbus, John Banks -- who by 1864 would have seven sons fighting for the Confederacy -- wrote about two of his sons in his journal:

"On the 25th November (ultimo) we had a verse at Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge. Got badly whipped. Eugene was in it and thinks we ought to have handled the place but our men failed to sustain themselves as they did at Chicamauga. It has given us quite a backset and inspirited the enemy. Willis has not returned to his command. His physician advised him not to go back yet."

Source: John Banks, Autobiography of John Banks, 1797 - 1870 (Austell, Ga.: privately printed by Elberta Leonard, 1936), p. 30.

1864 From outside Savannah, Sherman wrote Grant on the hopeless situation of Confederate Gen. William Hardee, who was in charge of Savannah's defense:

". . . If General Hardee is alarmed, or fears starvation, he may surrender; otherwise I will bombard the city . . . . I think Hardee, in Savannah, has good artillerists, some 5,000 or 6,000 infantry, and it may be a mongrel mass of 8,000 to 10,000 militia. . . . There must be 25,000 citizens -- men, women, and children -- in Savannah that must also be fed, and how he is to feed them beyond a few days I cannot imagine, as I know that his requisitions for corn on the interior counties were not filled, and we are in possession of the rice fields and mills which could alone be of service to him in this neighborhood. He can draw nothing from South Carolina, save from a small corner down in the southeast, and that by a disused wagon road. . . ." [For full text of letter, click here.]

Source: U.S. War Department, The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1893, reprinted by The National Historical Society, 1971), Series I, Vol. XLIV, pp. 726-728.

1864 Located northeast of Atlanta, Forsyth County had escaped the destruction of Sherman's Atlanta Campaign. Nevertheless, it suffered from a different type of predator -- bands of lawless renegades (likely draft dodgers and Confederate deserters) roaming the countryside and stealing from defenseless citizens. From Cumming, Ga., F.M. Hawkins wrote Gov. Joseph E. Brown asking for help. But, his letter ended with a plea for Brown to get Georgia out of the Civil War:

". . . There are bands of armed men calling themselves 'scouts' who are constantly ranging through this county foraging on the citizens, stealing horses and mules and committing other depredations, causing great distress and fearful apprehensions and tending to alienate the feelings of many from the Southern cause. This is a dreadful state of things, and if these evils are not suppressed, the whole country will be desolated and the people utterly ruined. Some driven to desperation by these outrages mutter threats of vengeance, others in a state of almost hopeless despair contemplate with trembling and dismay the dreadful alternative of 'bushwhacking.' Fearful thought! What is to become of us? The darkest gloom hangs over the future. What can be done? surely something should be done looking to the suppression of at least the checking of these great evils and something promising protection and security for the future.

"Can nothing be done to bring about cessation of hostilities? Stop the effusion of innocent blood, stay the hand of the destroying angel, open the way to negotiation and expedite peace. Shall men continue to be blinded by passion and urged on by unholy, towering ambition to prosecute this unnatural war until the last flickering spark of freedom is extinguished in the blood of our sons and brothers and the heaven-given boon of self-government, with all the inestimable blessings of liberty, shall be buried forever in the vortex of revolution? Will ambitious aspirants continue to grovel in human blood for place, power and wealth until all that is desirable to free men is lost and lost forever? Forbid it, mercy, forbid it! Heavens, if the American people do not end -- and that speedily -- this fraticidal conflict, ruin, fearful ruin, to our whole people will be the inevitable result.

"Sir, cannot something be done to avert [this] direst of all human calamities? Cannot something be accomplished by conventions? Cannot the states in their sovereign capacity do something in this way? Suppose you take the initiative. Many of your friends who regard you as the greatest champion of state rights think that you should move in this matter, by calling a convention of this state or in some other way."

Source: Mills Lane (ed.), Georgia: History written by Those who lived It (Savannah: Beehive Press, 1995), pp. 178-179.

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