“Preface” in “Georgia’s Charter of 1732”
PREFACE
The need for an accurate copy of the Charter of Georgia will become apparent to anyone comparing the printed copies in The Colonial Records of Georgia, Macdonald’s Select Charters, McEIreath’s Treatise on the Constitution of Georgia, and other sources that have been relied upon. There is considerable variation in the order in which the provisions appear in the various copies, and dozens of differences in phraseology. Not one of them gives an accurate list of the members of the Common Council of Trustees. Three dots indicate in some instances the omission of half a page.
The copy presented here is a facsimile of the Charter in the Patent Roll of the British Public Record Office (Tertia Pars Patentium de Anno Regni Regis Georgii Secundi Quinto, C.66/3586). In an entry of January 21, 1741, the Board of Trade refers to this copy in the Patent Roll as “an authentic copy … that has been collated with the original charter, communicated by Mr. Oglethorpe” (Journal, 367). I have been unable to locate the original Charter, even with the cooperation of Dr. Arthur Percival Newton, Editor of the Calendar of State Papers. But in any case the copy in the Patent Roll is the preferable one to quote as it would have constituted the official. document in case of conflicting provisions. There are several other manuscript copies preserved in the Public Record Office. The copy in C.O.5/670 seems to be the one followed by the Editor of The Colonial Records of Georgia. In the Board of Trade’s Entry Book of Commissions, 1740-1781 (C.O.324/49, pp. 81-115), appears a copy which, according to a statement at the end of it, “was examined and compared with the original Charter, received from James Oglethorpe … 8th Nov. 1732.” This copy was recently printed in the Calendar of State Papers … America and West Indies (London, 1939), but, regrettably, with a few abridgments.
The Crown officials seem to have had difficulty in transcribing the Charter. June 9th was officially accepted as the date for granting it, but in point of fact, it did not pass the seal until sometime in July. On July 3rd Lord Percival went to take the oath as President of the Georgia Corporation, but, records the entry in his Diary, “I learned that some mistakes happening in transcribing the charter, it is necessary they should be amended, and the seal put to it anew. I desired the charter when amended might be sent to my house on Tuesday next.”
As I have attempted an interpretative account of the genesis of the Colony of Georgia in two articles appearing in the September and December issues of the Georgia Historical Quarterly, 1940, a purely factual account of the steps involved in the granting of the Charter is presented here with a minimum of evaluating comment. This is followed by an analysis of the document.
For assistance in the preparation of this publication I am indebted to two persons in particular, Miss Virginia Bever of the University of California who without charge made the photographs of the Charter from the Patent Roll, and my sister, Mrs. Robert Hillyer Still, who is largely responsible for the tedious task of deciphering the document. The Lewis H. Beck Foundation has given financial support to the publication, and I am grateful to those associated with this Foundation for encouraging my efforts at research in the field of Georgia history.
A. B. S.
Athens, Georgia.
August, 1941.
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