Ed Jackson and Charles Pou

Carl Vinson Institute of Government

The University of Georgia

January 18

1775 Whig delegates attended Georgia's first Provincial Congress to discuss opposition to Intolerable Acts. Delegates voted to urge the Commons House of Assembly -- the official legislative chamber for the royal government (and which was also then in session) -- to adopt strong resolutions.

1776 Even though the Whigs had voted to close Savannah to British ships five months earlier, several British warships arrived at the port. Royal governor James Wright told the Whigs the Royal Navy vessels were there simply to pick up provisions, and if allowed to proceed, nothing would happen. The Whigs, however, didn't believe this explanation and ordered the arrest of Gov. Wright and his council. Young Joseph Habersham volunteered to carry out the arrest. Marching past the guard at the governor's house, Habersham walked in unannounced and proclaimed to Wright, "Sir James, you are my prisoner!" Wright was then placed under house arrest, though within a month he would escape to a waiting British ship.

1861 At Georgia's secession convention, former state supreme court justice Eugenius Nisbet introduced a resolution calling for Georgia's secession from the Union and cooperating with the other seceded states to form a "Southern Confederacy." Nisbet also moved that a committee be appointed to draft articles of secession. Former governor Herschel Johnson offered a substitution resolution calling on southern states to send delegates to a congress to be held Feb. 16, 1861 in Atlanta to decide on a joint course of action. According to the substitute resolution, essential elements for Georgia remaining in the Union included: Congress taking no action to abolish or prohibit slavery in the territories, return of fugitive slaves, prosecution of anyone rescuing slaves, protection of slave property in the territories, admission of states as free or slave as determined by the residents of the state, and no blacks being allowed to hold federal office. Johnson's resolution failed, and that of Nisbet adopted. Following the vote, Nisbet was named to chair the committee to draft a secession ordinance for Georgia.

1888 Georgia-born Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar was sworn in as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court

1892 Early film star Oliver Hardy -- rotund straight-man of the comic duo of Laurel and Hardy -- was born in Harlem, Ga. During his career, he would appear in almost 200 movies (see list). Hardy died Aug. 7, 1957 in North Hollywood, Calif. [Click here for more biographical information on Hardy.]

1947 The "Three Governors Affair" became a two-governors rivalry on this day when M.E. Thompson took the oath of office of lieutenant governor. At this point, outgoing governor Ellis Arnall, who still claimed the office and refused to recognize the General Assembly's naming of write-in candidate Herman Talmadge, resigned as governor. With Arnall's resignation, Thompson claimed that under the state constitution, he now became governor. Talmadge, however, insisted that the legislature constitutionally had elected him governor. The case ended up in the Georgia Supreme Court, which on March 19 ruled in Thompson's favor.

1989 Georgia-born rhythm-and-blues singer Otis Redding was one of five musicians or groups inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. [See Sept. 19 entry for biographical information.]

In Their Own Words on This Day. . .

1736 John Wesley was thankful for deliverance from the previous day's storm, though he discovered more experienced sailors did not share his feelings:

"Sund. 18. We returned God Thanks for our Deliverance, of which a few appear'd duly sensible. But the rest (among whom were most of the Sailors) denied we had been in any Danger. I could not have believed that so little Good would have been done by the Terror they were in before. But it cannot be that they should obey God from Fear, who are deaf to the Motives of Love."

Source: [no author or editor cited], Our First Visit in America: Early Reports from the Colony of Georgia, 1732-1740 (Savannah: Beehive Press, 1974), p. 189.

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© Carl Vinson Institute of Government, University of Georgia

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