Ed Jackson and Charles Pou

Carl Vinson Institute of Government

The University of Georgia

June 6

1803 Former Georgia militia general, member of the Georgia House of Representatives, U.S. Senator, and Georgia governor Josiah Tattnall died at age 38. Born near Savannah,Tattnall's father took him and his family away during the American Revolution; his father being a loyalist. Josiah, however, favored the patriot side and ultimately returned to Georgia, reclaimed the family plantation, and became a military leader before entering politics.In the Georgia General Assembly,Tattnall was an important force in repealing the Yazoo Act. He was elected governor in November 1801, but failing health forced him to resign in late 1802. He traveled to Nassau to recover, but died while there. In 1801, the legislature created a new county and named it after him.

1838 The forced removal of Cherokees to the West began when a party of 800 Cherokees escorted by a contingent of U.S. Army soldiers under Lt. Edward Deas left Ross's Landing [see image] by riverboat headed downstream on the Tennessee River. Their trip would take them to the Ohio River, then westward to the Mississippi River, then southward to the Arkansas River, then upstream to the river's head of navigation. Here, they would transfer to wagons for the final leg of the journey to the Indian Territory west of Arkansas. [Though the Cherokees on this trip did not go voluntarily, this was not part of what came to be known as the "Trail of Tears" -- the massive removal that left late in 1838 and resulted in so many Cherokee deaths. Still, Gen. Nathaniel Smith was moved to write Gen. Winfield Scott, "It has happened to me here to witness more distress within the last two days than in all my life before."]

1861 Politician Joseph M. Terrell was born in Greenville, Ga. In 1884, Terrell was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives (becoming the youngest member elected to the Georgia General Assembly), and in 1890 to the Georgia Senate. Terrell then spent ten years as Georgia's attorney general (1892-1902), where he enjoyed unique success in arguing cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1902, Terrell was elected governor of Georgia. He served two terms, in which he championed more funding for education (especially agricultural education), saw the establishment of a state court of appeals, and fought for reform in child labor laws. Terrell retired briefly after his second term as governor, before governor Joseph M. Brown appointed him to fill the vacancy caused by the death of U.S. Senator Alexander Clay. Unfortunately, Terrell was able to serve only three months before suffering a stroke and being forced to retire permanently from public life. He never fully regained his health and died in Atlanta November 17, 1912.

1935 Noted novelist, essayist, and teacher Harry Crews was born in Bacon County, Georgia.

1962 Albany-born Ray Charles' version of "I Can't Stop Loving You" topped the popular music charts, eventually selling more than 3,000,000 copies earning Gold and Platinum Records.

1962 A memorial service for the Georgians killed in a plane crash June 3 was held at the American Cathedral in Paris. Mayor Ivan Allen, Jr. returned to Atlanta, where he praised the French authorities for their efficient, yet humane, handling of the tragedy.

1967 Bob Uecker, the Rodney Dangerfield of television advertising, actually played for the Atlanta Braves, as the Braves traded catcher Gene Oliver to Philadelphia for Uecker.

1970 Harold Ragsdale, who grew up in Clarksdale and Albany, reached the top of the national record charts with a song that used his daughters' school chorus. The Grammy-winning record--"Everything is Beautiful." In case you haven't guessed, Ragsdale's professional name is Ray Stevens.

1976 As the Atlanta City Council prepared to vote on a residency requirement for public safety employees, mayor Maynard Jackson announced the "alarming trend" that 74% of Atlanta's policemen lived outside the city.
 
 

In Their Own Words on This Day. . .

1739 In London, the Earl of Egmont recorded in his diary of two things that happened at this day's meeting of the Trustees of Georgia:

". . . A letter was read from Mr. Whitfeild [George Whitefield] of the 14th inst [i.e., May 14], acquainting our accountant Mr. Verelts [Verelst] that he had collected for erecting an orphan house in Savannah, £996, for building a church for the Saltsburgers £76, and for the poor in general £148.

". . .The draft of a letter to Mr. Oglethorp [sic] from the Trustees was prepared by us to be sent away next Friday, thanking him for advancing his own money for the Colony's service, and running that risk before could know the Parliament would give us money. . . ."

1771 James Habersham was a prosperous Savannah merchant, additionally owning three rice plantations on the Ogeechee River that encompassed 6,000 acres and required the labor of almost 200 slaves. The following letter from Habersham to London clergyman Cornelius Winter suggests his concern for religious instruction of Georgia's growing African population.:

"... I had raised my expectations of seeing a Church for Africans, and had fixed on you, as the instrument under God, to bring it about, and that you would have been the happy Man to present many of them to your Father and their Father, with, here am I, and the children thou hast given me. . . . You know however, that there are a few, and of no inconsiderable property, who would be glad to have their Black Servants become fellow Heirs, and partakers with them of an Inheritance undefiled, and that fadeth not away. Is it then possible that the Guardians and Fathers of our excellent Church should refuse Orders to a Man, every way qualified, amply provided for, unexceptionable in his moral Character and heartily desirous from a motive of Love to God, to engage in and promote, so ardous, so painful and difficult a Work as the Conversion of these neglected and benighted people from (what shall I call it) Prejudice. . . ."

1838 From Ross's Landing [present-day Chattanooga], Gen. Nathaniel Smith wrote to Gen. Winfield Scott about the status of the Cherokee removal. Sadly, his letter tells of the tragic consequences suffered by Georgia's Cherokees:

"At 9 o'clock this morning I started a party of near one thousand Cherokees for Arkansas, and there are now over 900 in camps and a thousand more expected within the next two days. I hope to start another party of a thousand on the 12th instant or before . . . .

"I fear great injustice has been done to very many of the Cherokees collected in Georgia. It has happened to me here to witness more distress within the last two days that in all my life before. There are several families now in camps at whose houses I have been and personally know them to have been possessed not only of fine stocks of every description but of a great abundance of household goods and other varieties of property requisite to the more comfortable living, who have not been suffered to bring along with them personal clothing sufficient for a change or bedding enough to accommodate at once half the family. These people assure me that the military so hurried and urged them away that no time was allowed at the time to gather up their effects, that, when after much entreaty they had been suffered to return (a day or more having elapsed) to look after their property, they found their houses stripped and robbed of everything left. In addition, I find many disserved families: mothers hurried away from their children and husbands and wives, in the scramble separated from each other. In reference to the dismembered families, I resolved at once and have retained here all such to be comfortably provided for and not removed from this rendezvous till the scattered members of the families shall be again satisfactorily reunited."

1865 From his home near Lithonia, Thomas Maguire wrote in his journal:

"Nearly all the talk now is of the Negroes going to the Yankees. They will see a hard time before long. Some of mine may go. It will be a disadvantage to me and a great misfortune to them."

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© Carl Vinson Institute of Government, University of Georgia

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