“Notes” in “Georgia’s Planting Prelate”
NOTES
Bishop Elliott was speaking to a Georgia (and Southern) audience of the 1850’s and the people who composed this group knew the significance of his reference to the people, places and events of that period. Realizing that these references have no particular meaning to the average reader of the address in the 1940’s, I am including the following explanatory notes. I owe my thanks to Professor James C. Bonner, Head, Department of History, Georgia State College for Women, Milledgeville, Georgia, for valuable suggestions and assistance in compiling these notes; Mr. Robert W. B. Elliott, Sewanee, Tennessee, grandson of Bishop Elliott; and Mr. J. Freeman Hart, Macon, Georgia, the present owner of Montpelier, for information and source data.
H. B. O.
1 In August, 1846, a group of leading citizens of Georgia met at Stone Mountain and organized the South Central Agricultural Society in the belief “that great good may result to the planting interests of Georgia, Carolina, Alabama, and Tennessee from a personal interchange of the results of their experience, accompanied (when convenient) by an exhibition of the products of their farms and plantations.” The first four Fairs (exhibitions) of this Society in 1846, 1847, 1848, and 1849 were held at Stone Mountain; that of 1850 at Atlanta; and that of 1851 in Macon. The Secretary of the Society, in the published transactions for 1851, states “the meeting at Macon was the most brilliant of its kind in every respect ever held in the South.” The city of Macon gave the Society $2,000 to be used for premiums. In addition to this sum, $4,178.73 was realized as the amount of receipts for the Fair of 1851.
2 The prospectus of the school for the year 1849 shows that the Boys’ Department had been discontinued, and the name became the Montpelier Female Institute. It indicates that there were school rooms, music rooms, drawing rooms, painting rooms, chemical and physical laboratories, green-houses, and a chapel with a seating capacity of one hundred and fifty. The two largest buildings used as dormitories and class rooms, were Lamar Hall and Chase Hall. At a meeting of the Board of Trustees in December, 1855, it was unanimously determined to close the Montpelier Institute and thus ended Bishop Elliott’s connection with the school. After going into private hands it was operated for some years by Prof. C. B. Martin, later by Rev. Pryse, and finally by Prof. Ben Polhill. Prof. Polhill’s School for Boys is well remembered by people in Macon and middle Georgia today. The Professor died in 1876, and three years later the property was acquired by the Hart family. Lamar Hall, a two-story structure of twenty two rooms, became the Hart family residence. That building was destroyed by fire several years ago. Today Mr. J. Freeman Hart, of Macon, has a country home at Montpelier, built on the original site of Lamar Hall. The Chapel and the walls of Chase Hall still stand as reminders of Bishop Elliott’s stewardship of the school one hundred years ago.
3 Robert Nelson, a native of Denmark who came to Georgia in the 1840’s as a result of the revolutionary ferment in Europe. His father is said to have been “one of the most extensive, if not the largest practical farmer and stockholder on the European continent.” Robert Nelson was educated in European Universities and, despite his accent, he was much respected throughout the Lower South for his excellent conversation, good common sense, and horticultural skill. He acquired 95 acres of land near Macon and established the Troup Hill Nursery. By the time of the Civil War he had removed to Montgomery, Alabama, and was horticultural editor of the American Cotton Planter and Soil of the South.
4 Claude, or Claude Lorrain (1600-1682), whose real name was Claude Gellee. French landscape painter whose works, along with those of Poussin and Salvator Rosa, greatly influenced the development of the informal style of landscape gardening in England in the 18th and 19th centuries.
5 One-third of Georgia’s total area was taken from the Creek and Cherokee Indians between 1825 and 1838. The ceded area included the land between the Flint and Chattahoochee rivers and that portion of the Cherokee Nation in northwest Georgia. In 1844 the state announced the final disposal of all of its public lands.
6 In 1811, under the national plan for improvements, a “Federal Highway” was built from Milledgeville westward to the Chattahoochee river near the present site of Columbus. This road was extended westward to the Mississippi river and became the main route of travelers to the Southwest.
7 At this time no book dealing with landscape gardening or fruit growing in the South had been written. Elliott was undoubtedly familiar with works on these subjects by northern and European authors, i.e.: A. J. Downing, A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening (New York, 1841); Cottage Residences (New York, 1842); The Fruits and Fruit Trees of North America (New York, 1845); Patrick Barry, The Fruit Garden (New York, 1851), and others.
8 Agricultural societies did not come into existence in Georgia until after 1840. In the decade which followed, several were organized in Middle Georgia, the most prominent being the Hancock Planter’s Club at Sparta. In the same decade the Southern Cultivator was established at Augusta. This was the only southern agricultural journal which survived the Civil War, and it achieved a notable reputation throughout the country.
9 Elliott was probably referring to “Gloaming Nursery” at Clarkesville. Established in the late 1840’s by Jarvis Van Buren (1801-1885), it was said to be the first nursery in Georgia. Van Buren early recognized the horticultural possibilities of Georgia and he assembled the largest collection of southern seedling apples ever seen in the South. He was a prolific contributor to agricultural journals and did pioneer work in developing a commercial apple industry in North Georgia.
10 The Camellia (Camellia japonica), Tea Rose (Rosa odorata), Crape Myrtle (Lagerstromea indica), Azalea (Azalea indica), Oleander (Nerium oleander) and Gardenia (Gardenia florida) are native to Asia. The Oleander is also indigenous to the Mediterranean region of Africa and Europe, and one species of Gardenia is found in South Africa.
11 Louis LeConte (1782-1838), a planter and scientist who lived at Woodmanston plantation in Liberty County, Georgia. He developed a botanical and floral garden there which included many rare specimens of plants. His beautiful garden became celebrated all over the United States, and botanists from the North and from Europe came to visit it. He was the father of Joseph LeConte, an eminent professor and scientist.
12 Sir Joseph Paxton (1801-1865), an English architect and horticulturist who erected a great conservatory for the Duke of Devonshire at Chatsworth, Derbyshire.
13 These two roses were hybridized in the vicinity of Charleston and bear the names of their originators.
14 Charles Alfred Peabody was a pioneer in southern strawberry culture. Solon Robinson called him the most successful strawberry culturist in the world. By 1857 he was shipping the fruit from his farm near Columbus to every market town of importance in the United States where it arrived in advance of any other available supply. Unknown as a southern fruit before Peabody’s day, it soon threatened the monopoly of the Cincinnati growers. A prominent horticultural editor in Alabama and Georgia, Peabody also made some valuable contributions to southern floriculture and landscape gardening.
15 In 1857 Prosper Jules Alphonse Berckmans acquired Fruitland Nursery at Augusta where, with his father, Louis E. Berckmans, he began to popularize the growing of pears and plums in the Lower South. Born in 1830 at Arschot, Belgium, the younger Berckmans became one of the most noted horticulturists in the South. He was perhaps the disseminator of more original ornamental forms than any other Southerner. He was the only American to act as a judge at the Centennial of the Royal Agricultural Society in Ghent in 1908.
16 At this time Elliott and the general public were not aware of the potentialities of apple-growing in North Georgia. It was not until about 1854 that Jarvis Van Buren succeeded in convincing southern editors and others that the Appalachian foothills of the South possessed great commercial apple-growing possibilities.
17 Malthus A. Ward (1781-1863) of Salem, Massachusetts, was appointed professor of Natural History in the University of Georgia in 1831. During the two decades which followed he did more perhaps to introduce and disseminate fruits and flowers than any person in the state. He was responsible for the establishment of a botanical garden on the University Campus in 1833. It soon became one of the greatest attractions in Athens with more than 2,000 species of plants from every corner of the globe. As the garden grew in size, it became more expensive to maintain and finally, in 1856, when the trustees were unable to provide funds for this purpose, it was sold for $1,000.
18 James Camak (1795-1847) was one of the builders of the Georgia Railroad, the first president of the Georgia Bank, and editor of the Georgia Journal. He founded the Southern Cultivator which he edited until his death. While interested primarily in horticulture, he conducted many valuable experiments on field crops as well. The father of Dr. James Camak (1822-1892), of Athens. The younger James Camak was a matriculate in the Class of 1841 at the University of Georgia, later graduating from Princeton University. Listed in Hull’s Alumni Record (of the University of Georgia) as physician and horticulture editor. At the fifth annual Fair held by the South Central Agricultural Society in Atlanta, in August 1850, a year before Bishop Elliott made his address, Dr. Camak submitted the greatest variety of fruit in the Horticulture exhibit, for which he was awarded a silver cup. This exhibit embraced 45 varieties of pears, several varities of apples, and “three most superb varieties of plums.” The Committee on Horticulture reported that Dr. Camak cultivated the peach with great success, specimens of which were not submitted because of the distance of the orchard.
19 An agricultural journal published at Columbus, Georgia, from 1851 to 1857.
20 The Split rail fence commonly seen today in the North Georgia mountain area.
21 Elliott was the first president of the Central Horticultural Association organized at Macon in 1849. Others prominent in its organization were Simri Rose, Iverson L. Harris, Robert Nelson, and James A. Nisbet. While its name suggested regional ambitions, it was never more than a local organization composed principally of men living at Macon and Milledgeville. Other local horticultural societies were later established at Athens, Augusta, and Atlanta.
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: Bishop Elliott was married twice and had eight children. His first wife was Mary Barnwell. To this union were born: (1) Stephen, and (2) Mary Elizabeth, who was married to William Carmichael of Deptford Plantation, situated just outside of Savannah. His second wife was Charlotte Bull Barnwell. Their children were: (3) Robert Woodward Barnwell, first Missionary Bishop of Texas. He married Caroline Elliott of Savannah. (4) John Barnwell, a physician, who married Harriott Lucas Huger. (5) Esther Habersham (Mrs. Francis Asbury Shoup). (6) Robert Habersham, a civil engineer. (7) Sarah Bull Barnwell, authoress, and (8) Charlotte Barnwell (Mrs. Charles McDonald Puckette).
We use cookies to analyze our traffic. Please decide if you are willing to accept cookies from our website. You can change this setting anytime in Privacy Settings.