10

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL MATTERS 1775 - 1782

BESIDES military and political opposition, the revolting colonies used economic weapons against Britain. Non-importation, which had been used first at the time of the Stamp Act troubles, was an obvious weapon in the early days of colonial opposition. Georgia did not adopt the Continental Association until July, 1775, seven months after it was adopted by the Continental Congress, and many Georgians hoped that they would be allowed to export their 1775 crop.¹ The evidence indicates that after adoption the provincial congresses and council of safety tried to enforce the association, but because of insufficient policing or exceptions made by local committees, some rice and other items were exported. Some contemporary accounts for late 1775 and early 1776 say that all exports had ceased; others say that Georgia produce was being exported.²

Rice exportation was reported stopped in September, 1775; and on January 8, 1776, the council of safety, agreeable to Continental regulations, prohibited the exportation of rice until March 1. When South Carolina urged that Georgia continue non-exportation beyond March 1 until the feeling of Congress could be ascertained, the Georgia Council of Safety replied that there was great pressure among Savannah merchants to allow exportation to be resumed. However, because British war vessels at the mouth of the Savannah River were attempting to secure provisions, non-exportation was extended. Throughout the summer vessels leaving Savannah were required to abide by the resolves of the Continental and Georgia congresses.³

In the fall small vessels were transporting provisions from south Georgia plantation landings to St. Augustine. Georgia and South Carolina authorities tried to stop such traffic, but they did not have sufficient naval forces to do so. East Florida had been accustomed to getting food from south Georgia, and apparently some Georgians were quite willing to sell their produce to East Florida, regardless of attempts to prevent them. Such exportations continued, at intervals anyway, throughout 1778 despite the fact that Georgia agreed to continue the embargo on the export of provisions as recommended by the Continental Congress.⁴

The disruption of normal shipping and supply channels created shortages in imported items and surpluses in local produce in 1776. Abundant supplies of leather, rice, and indigo were reported in Savannah in November, with little trade going on. A packet boat instituted by the Continental Congress between Savannah and Philadelphia carried freight and helped the situation slightly.⁵

By the spring of 1777 Savannah was free of British vessels and was building up trade with the French and Dutch West Indies, which sometimes acted only as an exchange point for goods on the way to or from Europe. There was coastal trade with Charleston and the ports to the north. Throughout 1777 and 1778 the volume of this trade was small, but the profits were considerable for anyone with sufficient capital who cared to take the risk.⁶ Georgia merchants were perfectly willing to re-export scarce imported goods if a profit could be made. Several proclamations were issued against this practice and against the exportation of provisions when the supply was short.⁷

The government, as well as the Savannah merchants, was aware that trade was necessary to the economic and military life of Georgia. To increase foreign trade, the state bought vessels and carried on trade itself, appointed John Wereat commissioner of public trade, and set up an insurance office to insure cargoes of Georgia traders. General Howe, while military commander of the Southern Department, urged the state to undertake more state trade to help its economic life.⁸ Often the state either exported local produce itself or licensed individuals to do so as a means of securing funds to purchase needed military stores.

The rapidly growing Indian trade of Augusta was hurt by the war because Superintendent Stuart tried to divert all Southern Indian trade through Pensacola. Stuart succeeded in persuading at least one Augusta Indian trader to remove to Pensacola, although he was soon back in Augusta. In the early years of the war, the Whigs were divided as to the desirability of continuing the Indian trade and were able to get few trading goods anyway. During the British occupation of Augusta, 1780-1781, an attempt was made to revive the Indian trade, but little was accomplished. Augusta’s great days as an Indian trading center ended during the Revolution.

Tied directly to the commerce of colonial Georgia was its agricultural production. Most of Georgia’s large plantations that produced crops for export were located on the coast, and many of them were owned by loyalists who left by 1777. Although the state government tried to operate these plantations to secure an income, it accomplished little in the attempt. After the return of the British, there was never a planting season when large amounts of territory did not change hands, at least temporarily, between Whigs and Tories. Raids from the sea and from East Florida also accounted for considerable disruption of plantation routine. Partisan warfare in the back country brought considerable destruction there. Anything movable was carried off, and buildings and growing crops were often damaged or destroyed. Abandonment and neglect damaged or ruined many plantations, especially the irrigation systems so necessary in rice planting. Before the fighting began, Georgia had exported from 20,000 to 25,000 barrels of rice a year, and had consumed a good bit locally. In 1780 Governor Wright said that not over 2,000 barrels would be put on the market and that none of this would be available for export.⁹

One of the greatest damages the war brought to plantations was the disruption of the slave labor system. Slaves disappeared because of the absence of owners or overseers or because of military operations in the area. Regaining runaways was difficult under war conditions. Slaves became camp followers of both armies, joined or were carried off by the Indians, or escaped and set up Negro communities of their own. Both armies used slaves to work on fortifications and for supply, transport, and housekeeping functions. Ownership was confused by these conditions, by the attempts at confiscation of property by both state and provincial government, and by the general and legal confusion of the war years. Many Whigs took their slaves into South Carolina or other states. The state government’s use of slaves as bounties or for payment of its obligations during the last two years of the war removed many from their accustomed locations. Importation was stopped during the war, and several thousand slaves were taken out of the state at the time of the British evacuation. Without slaves plantations could produce nothing.

Since Georgia’s founding, the lack of good currency had been a problem that created confusion and hurt business. With the closing of the normal trade channels, this problem became worse. The state government issued paper bills of credit to care for the needs of the troops and to serve as a circulating medium. But Georgia currency was never accepted outside the state; it depreciated in value rapidly, and was a constant source of complaint from businessmen and soldiers paid in it. Continental currency and South Carolina paper currency were also used in Georgia and were worth considerably more than Georgia currency.¹⁰

A few illustrations of inflation will give point to these complaints. In 1781 a horse cost more than £30 in state certificates to be redeemed in four months. Office fees for signing land grants were $16, and the signing of a marriage license cost $80.¹¹ The paper currency bothered not only Georgia Whigs, but Tories and British also were worried with it after their return to Georgia.¹² By 1781 state paper of various sorts was of so little value that even the state government stopped trying to use it and turned instead to making payments in kind. Land bounties for army enlistments and service had been given since 1776. Now horses, cattle, clothing, and Negroes from confiscated estates were used as well. As the British were pushed out of the state, any movable property, especially Negroes, which they left behind was seized by the state to pay its obligations.

Army supply was another matter that worried both the state government and the troops operating in Georgia. Before 1779 the state furnished more of the supplies used than did Congress. By 1780 Continental troops, state troops, and militia got what supplies they could where they could, often without formal purchase. Congress supplied considerable munitions and clothing to state troops and militia. Most of the provisions used by all troops operating in Georgia were supplied by the state. With most of the state overrun by the British, Georgia could secure little locally and was begging for whatever she could get from Continental sources.¹³ In 1782 she could not supply the small contingent of Continental troops under the command of General Wayne.¹⁴ The state made attempts throughout the war to encourage the manufacture of guns, gunpowder, and other military supplies, but little was actually produced.¹⁵

One of the main arguments among the British for the recapture of Georgia was the valuable trade she could supply to the rest of the empire. Hence on January 15, 1779, two weeks after the capture of Savannah, a proclamation was issued there allowing exports to Britain, Ireland, the West Indies, and the loyal North American colonies. Savannah merchants were allowed to trade with all in the colony who took the oath of allegiance to the King. Two weeks later Governor Tonyn opened trade between East Florida and Georgia.¹⁶ By summer trade was going full blast between Georgia, New York, and the West Indies. Early in 1780 full trade was allowed between Georgia and Britain in compliance with a royal proclamation of March 24, 1779, and Georgians were urged to send needed items to the British West Indies.¹⁷ In that year over 100 vessels cleared from Savannah, many loaded with lumber and naval stores.¹⁸

In economic matters the British tried to return to the pre-war conditions, even to the re-establishment of the public market at Savannah under its old regulations. But the war made for changed conditions, some good and some bad. The British army and navy secured and paid for in gold and silver considerable supplies for use in other parts of America. The provincial government imposed embargoes frequently to safeguard provisions in short supply. At least one incident of price fixing is recorded when cost of provisions seemed to be getting out of hand.¹⁹ Throughout the period that Georgia was split between colony and state, there were commercial and financial dealings between both parts of Georgia and South Carolina with or without the approval of the provincial and state governments.²⁰

From all available evidence it seems there were fewer professional people and tradesmen in Savannah during the British occupation than had been there before 1779, and the assumption is that there were similar decreases in the rest of Georgia. Not nearly so many advertised in the Gazette; and apparently immigration from Britain and other parts of Europe was slowed down or cut off by the war. A few doctors, lawyers, and musicians advertised their services to the public. About thirty-six mercantile concerns advertised in the Gazette for the years 1779-1781, fewer than had existed before the outbreak of war. Savannah had her usual assortment of tavern keepers, hatters, tailors, shoemakers, hairdressers, saddle makers, gunsmiths, painters, and other tradesmen.²¹ Some people who had been in business in 1775 remained throughout the British period and after the Americans returned, and others came and went depending upon which government controlled. Peter Tondee, the tavern keeper and early Revolutionary leader, died in 1775, but his wife continued to operate a tavern under American, British, and returned American governments.

To give any exact information about population changes during the fighting years is impossible. The upcountry, especially the Indian cession of 1773, continued to gain population except for the period 1780-1781 when most of Georgia was controlled by the British. The total white population seems to have increased in the back country, but there may have been a decrease along the coast.

From the time the revolutionary troubles became serious until the return of the British in 1778, many loyalists left and went to the Floridas and the West Indies. Some of them left their families in Georgia, and many returned in 1779 and 1780. Loyalists from other Southern colonies came into Georgia at the same time, some of them taking up lands and settling “permanently.” Others came from West Florida after its capture by the Spanish in 1780-1781. Probably most of these recent arrivals left when the British evacuated the province in 1782.

Whig refugees began to leave Georgia with the British capture of Savannah in 1778, and they continued to do so as the British gained control of more and more of Georgia throughout 1779 and 1780. Probably most of them went to Whig areas in South Carolina, but others went into North Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland, where they were well treated. North Carolina excused them from tax payments or militia duty. Virginia allowed them to bring their slaves into the state, despite a law that forbade further importations, and did not tax such slaves the first year they were in Virginia.²² In July, 1781, Congress recommended that subscriptions and loans be solicited in the states not overrun by the British for the relief of South Carolinians and Georgians driven from their homes by the war. Collections are known to have been taken in New Jersey and Massachusetts, and were no doubt taken elsewhere.²³ Perhaps some Bostonians remembered the relief sent from Georgia when the Boston Port Bill was in effect, and wanted to reciprocate. When the British were driven out of the Georgia upcountry the Georgia executive asked the states in which Georgia refugees were living to cooperate in helping them to return to Georgia.²⁴ Refugees began to return to the upcountry in 1781, and most were back in all parts of the state by the end of 1782.

For about a year after the capture of Augusta from the British in June, 1781, the state government was faced with a major relief problem to feed and care for refugees who returned to Georgia without resources and could do little to support themselves until the 1782 crops could be planted and harvested. The executive secured rations for such people and for the troops and militia operating in the state. Often civil officials, even the executive itself, and families of people absent with the army had to be fed. Sometimes food had to be bought outside the state to carry on these relief activities. By the spring of 1782 the food situation had become so desperate that corn was impressed when its possessors refused to sell it to the state.²⁵

Salt supply was a persistent problem from the beginning of the war. Most salt had been imported in the colonial period, and there is no record that Georgians tried to produce this vital commodity in appreciable quantities during the fighting. Consequently salt was in constant short supply. As early as 1777 the executive forbade the exportation of salt, and took up much time throughout the war with the procurement and distribution of salt. At various times salt was ordered issued only on the personal order of the governor, was issued on the basis of one quart per family, and was used as a reward for satisfactory militia service.²⁶

The provincial government, as well as the state government, had its relief problems. After its initial occupation of Georgia the British army appointed an inspector to take care of refugees, but discontinued such help by March, 1781, because most of the refugees were able to support themselves.²⁷ But when the British lost the upcountry, many refugees were driven into the Savannah area, and it was necessary for the government to feed them. Special church collections, lotteries, and dramatic performances were all used to secure funds for relief purposes.²⁸

Besides its impact on the here and now, the war had a considerable effect upon the organization concerned with the hereafter—the church. The denomination most changed was the Church of England. When the fighting began, there were five Anglican priests in Georgia: Haddon Smith, Christ Church Parish; James Seymour, St. Paul; James Holmes, St. George; John Rennie, St. Philip; and William Piercy, superintendent of Bethesda Orphanage. Smith and Rennie were Tories and soon left.²⁹ Holmes evidently remained in Georgia and became a Whig, but no positive knowledge of his wartime activities has been found. Piercy joined the Whigs but was soon lost sight of, until 1784, when he appears in England.³⁰ He apparently never returned to Georgia.

Seymour had by far the most interesting and unusual story. He remained in Augusta after colonial government ended and said that he was allowed to continue his clerical duties without molestation, except from the more vulgar, for about two years. Then, because people who attended his services were called Tories by their neighbors, he discontinued public worship but remained in Augusta and carried on his other pastoral duties. He welcomed Lieutenant Colonel Campbell to Augusta with the British troops in February, 1779, and was arrested by the Whigs when Campbell retired. As a prisoner Seymour said he was well treated by express order of General Andrew Williamson, and he was soon released. Upon his release Seymour went to Savannah for a few weeks but returned to Augusta because of sickness in his family. Again he was well treated until the siege of Savannah in September. During the siege the church and glebe were used by American forces in Augusta; so Seymour and his family moved to his farm a few miles out of town. With the British occupation of Augusta in 1780, Seymour had the chance to conduct public worship again in his damaged church. The parsonage and glebe were returned to him, but he soon gave up the parsonage, for use as a military hospital. When the Whigs laid siege to Augusta, a fort was built in the churchyard; so services were held in a private house. After the Whig capture of Augusta, Seymour, considering himself unsafe on his farm, removed to Savannah but left his family in St. Paul. In Savannah he served in the provincial assembly for St. Paul’s Parish, assisted the acting rector of Christ Church, and taught school. He remained in Savannah as a school teacher until the evacuation and then went to St. Augustine.³¹

After the return of the British in 1779, an attempt was made to revive the Anglican Church. In March, 1780, James Brown, who had been a Georgia schoolmaster before he left in 1777 because of his loyalist sympathies, returned to be missionary to St. George’s Parish for the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. Governor Wright did not think it safe for Brown to go to St. George’s because of rebel activity there; hence, he remained in Savannah, where there was no Anglican clergyman, and carried out the rector’s duties. The rector, Haddon Smith, drew the salary in England but the assembly allowed Brown a small salary, and he secured the rector’s fees. In the fall of 1781 Smith sent a curate to Savannah who took possession of the parsonage and forbade Brown to say services in Christ Church. Brown’s payments from the assembly stopped, and seeing that his presence in Savannah only created clerical confusion, he soon went to Charleston.³²

To turn from Anglicans to dissenters, the first clergyman who comes to mind is the Reverend John J. Zubly, of the Independent Presbyterian Church in Savannah. Zubly’s early Whig leadership and opposition to separation from Britain have already been related.³³ After Zubly’s return from the Continental Congress in late 1775, he continued his political sentiments and religious activities unmolested for some time. When he was called upon to take the oath of allegiance to the United States in the fall of 1777 he refused to do so, offering instead to take an oath to Georgia. Finding it impossible to remain in Georgia an unsworn neutral, Zubly retired to Black Swamp in South Carolina where he remained until 1781, when he returned to Savannah. Zubly, now worn out physically and mentally, died three months later, “still praying for his king and country.”³⁴

At Ebenezer, the Reverend Christopher F. Triebner, the Lutheran pastor, welcomed the British in 1779, took the oath of allegiance to the King, and actively supported the restored provincial government. Triebner could not carry all his congregation with him. His church and the town were considerably damaged by British army use and the ravages of war. Triebner left with the British army in 1782, apparently at odds with much of his congregation.³⁵

The Congregational meeting house at Midway, in St. John’s Parish, was burned by the British during the invasion of November, 1778. Little is known of the specific activities of the congregation or church during the war years, but an organization must have continued because it was active immediately after the fighting stopped. Moses Allen, the young minister of Midway, became the chaplain of the First Georgia Continental Battalion when it was raised. He was captured by the British at Savannah in 1778, imprisoned on a prison ship there, and drowned while attempting to swim ashore.³⁶

The Baptists had begun to come into upcountry Georgia in the 1770s; and there were at least three churches, of which Kiokee in St. Paul’s Parish was the most important, when the war broke out. Strickland identifies six Baptists (Daniel Marshall, Saunders Walker, Abraham Marshall, Edmund Botsford, Silas Mercer, and Alexander Scott) among the eleven Georgia chaplains in the American army. Botsford left during the fighting, but Marshall remained at Kiokee during the hard days of partisan fighting there.³⁷ The Baptists suffered less in church organization and ministerial recruitment from the war than most other denominations. The denomination seems to have taken no specific stand on the Revolution but left such matters to individual members, most of whom were probably Whigs. Relatively speaking, the Baptists were in better shape in 1782 than they had been in 1775.

Religious influence on the Whig-Tory split in Revolutionary Georgia has been best summed up by Strickland, who says,

There was less educational than religious activity in Georgia during the war years, as had been the case in the colonial period. Private schools continued in Savannah under whichever government controlled the city, but there seemed to have been fewer than formerly. Fees ranged from twenty shillings a quarter for reading and writing to ten pounds per year for Latin, Greek, French, or mathematics.³⁹ Not much is known about education outside Savannah, but it is extremely doubtful if there were many, if any, schools on plantations or in other towns after 1778. The parochial school at Ebenezer was abandoned when the British arrived, and there was no chance for any formal education in the upcountry.

Like religion and education, organized recreation declined during the war. Early in the troubles, the Whigs attempted to curtail recreation and to devote themselves to more serious things. Horse racing was frowned upon, and commercial recreation fell off. The few traveling entertainers who had come to Georgia in the colonial period were stopped by the war. Little record of Whig amusements has been found, but it is logical to assume that the colonial pattern was resumed as nearly as possible once the immediate urgency of 1775 and early 1776 had passed.

After the return of the British, little commercial recreation is evident until the middle of 1780. By 1781 there was an attempt in British Georgia to return to “life as usual” as it had been before 1775. Plays were presented in Savannah by “Gentlemen of the Garrison” for the benefit of public charity, though some had to be postponed when the actors went out of town on military duty. Dancing assemblies were held, with civilian and military managers. The St. Andrew’s Society met on St. Andrew’s Day and elected officers as formerly. The Ugly Club was revived, but nothing about the nature of its activities was divulged. The King’s Birthday was celebrated, as was “The Glorious Ninth of October,” the day on which the French and American attack on Savannah was repulsed.⁴⁰

Little evidence of amusements outside Savannah has been found. There is no reason to believe that the pattern of frontier amusements, the creation of people living in the area and not dependent upon outsiders, changed, regardless of which government controlled an area. Military action in the upcountry did somewhat interfere with recreation. Undoubtedly sophisticated entertainment in Augusta declined during the war years.

All phases of ordinary life for most people—recreation and work, joys and sorrows, religion and education—went on about the same as formerly except when military activity at a distance took away men to fight, or when fighting in the immediate vicinity upset the economic and social pattern and made the old life impossible. Life was changed less for the poor frontier families; but all suffered, hoped for better days, and worked to support themselves and to compensate for the changes brought by the war.