A DOCUMENTARY SOURCEBOOK: A REVIEW OF THE AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMAN IN THE SAVANNAH RIVER VALLEY BEFORE THE CIVIL WAR— HISTORY, ANALYSIS AND 177 ACCOMPANYING DOCUMENTS A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF CLARK ATLANTA UNIVERSITY IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF ARTS BY FRANCINE MOORE KING DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY ATLANTA, GEORGIA MAY 1993 I I ? -7 ABSTRACT HISTORY KING, FRANCINE MOORE B.A. STILLMAN COLLEGE, 1967 M.A. ATLANTA UNIVERSITY, 1969 A DOCUMENTARY SOURCEBOOK: A REVIEW OF THE AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMAN IN THE SAVANNAH RIVER VALLEY BEFORE THE CIVIL WAR— HISTORY, ANALYSIS AND 177 ACCOMPANYING DOCUMENTS Advisor: Professor Alexa Henderson Dissertation dated May, 1993 The antebellum Savannah River Valley in Georgia is an excellent research area for African American scholars. The presented dissertation reflects the wealth of available information in the region. This sourcebook of the African American woman (slave and free) before the Civil War in the Savannah River Valley analyzes 177 documents relating to the woman's treatment and social conditions, social relationships, eco¬ nomic role and means of resistance. Furthermore, this re¬ search presents documents as they relate to established historical premises identified with the African American woman and recreates the humanness of her life in the idiom 1 2 of the times. Such a re-creation explores the African American woman's history in a diversity of voices, with special emphasis on her own. The African American free woman of color and the enslaved woman (in many instances) were aggressive and rebellious—destroying life, property and participating in overt rebellious acts in spite of the obstacles con¬ fronting them. These women nurtured the seeds of freedom, hope, and endurance, thereby ensuring through family and community relationships the survival of an African American people. (c) 1993 Francine Moore King All Rights Reserved TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter I. INTRODUCTION 1 II. TREATMENT AND SOCIAL CONDITIONS 19 III. THE ECONOMIC ROLE OF THE AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMAN IN THE SAVANNAH RIVER VALLEY 40 IV. THE AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMAN'S SOCIAL AND COMMUNITY RELATIONSHIPS 73 V. THE AFRICAN AMERICAN WOMAN'S RESISTANCE IN THE SAVANNAH RIVER VALLEY 121 VI. SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS 157 APPENDIXES Appendix A 161 Appendix B 206 Appendix C 271 Appendix D 330 SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 372 ll CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Throughout most of the eighteenth century the State of Georgia was confined to the territory between the Alta- maha and Savannah Rivers, the remainder of what is today the State being the hunting grounds and home of the Indi¬ ans, mainly the Creeks. By means of three treaties—1733, 1763, and 1773—desirable acres were acquired by the new inhabitants of the area. The Savannah River Valley is located in this region on the Coastal Plain of Georgia, a flat region extending inland from the ocean coastline for approximately 150 miles. The Savannah River Valley is located between the Savannah River on the east and the Oconee and Altamaha Rivers on the west, within the Coastal Plain area.1 Georgia was the last of the 13 British colonies founded on the Atlantic seaboard in 1773, on the site which is now Savannah (Chatham County). The founder of the colony was James Edward Oglethorpe who was concerned with the plight of the poor and debt-ridden in England. On June 9, 1732, King George II granted Oglethorpe and his friend John Percival (and others) a charter to start a colony in Georgia.2 There were three main reasons for establishing a colony in Savannah, Georgia: (1) Charity: to provide re- 1 2 lief for debt-ridden citizens of Great Britain. it would also absorb unemployed citizens of English cities. (2) Economics: to increase Britain's trade and wealth. Geor¬ gia could fit into the mercantile system, providing needed agricultural products and a market for British manufactured goods. (3) Defense: to provide South Carolina's needed buffer against attack by the Spanish in Florida and their Indian allies.3 Savannah began on a bluff about 18 miles upriver from the ocean. Oglethorpe laid out the town of Savannah according to a special plan. Open spaces called "squares" were one of its main features. Around each square were 40 house lots, each one 60 by 90 feet. Each square was to be a kind of neighborhood center where markets might be held. Special lots were set aside for churches and stores. In addition to a house lot, each settler received 5 acres for a garden on the town's edge and 45 acres fur¬ ther out in the country for farming. The colony was known as the great experiment.^ in the early days of the colony Savannah was made up of St. Phillip's and St. Matthew's parishes located in Savannah County, which comprised all that land north of the Altamaha River and south of the Sa¬ vannah River. The present area of Chatham County is made up from Christ Church and a small part of St. Phillip's and St. Matthew's parishes. In this small district of 370 3 square miles, most of the important agricultural and com¬ mercial enterprises were conducted by the early colonists. In the colonization policies, military security was man¬ dated, landholding was limited in size, blacks (free or slave) and Roman Catholics were excluded (to forestall the danger of wartime insurrection and of collusion with the enemy), and the Indian trade was strictly regulated, with rum prohibited to lessen the risk of Indian complications.5 However, only a few debtors were released from jail and sent to Georgia. Hundreds of needy tradesmen and arti¬ sans from England and Scotland and religious refugees from Switzerland and Germany were brought to the new colony. Though other settlers came to the region at their own ex¬ pense, newcomers overwhelmingly preferred to settle in South Carolina, where there were no laws against large plantations, slaves, and rum. Before the twenty-one years of the trusteeship were up, these restrictions were repealed, and after 1750, new settlers began to rush to the new colony at the site of Savannah.6 By 1766, Savannah had 10,000 white settlers and 8,000 blacks. Further extending the boundaries of Georgia, Gen¬ eral Edward Oglethorpe also established the province of Augusta.7 In 1735, two years after the settlement of Savan¬ nah, the province was established in honor of Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, wife of Frederick, Prince of Wales. Kennedy 4 O'Brien and Roger de Lacey are credited with being the first important traders in the new trading post of Augusta. In 1737 O'Brien built the first storehouse in Augusta at his own expense, which increased the Indian trade immensely.8 On March 8, 1739, Oglethorpe recognized O'Brien's contribution by recommending to the trustees of the colony of Georgia that he be granted 500 acres of land.9 The trading post prospered and in 1740 there were twenty houses built in the town. A fort on the banks of the Savannah River protected the colonists. In 1758, the colony of Georgia was made a province and divided into eight parishes. Augusta was named Parish of St. Paul. It extended from the northwest boundary of the Parish of St. George (now Burke County), southwest of the Ogeechee River, northwest to the Savannah. Despite pioneering hazards, Augusta enjoyed prosperity. In 1763, there were 80 log houses, a church and two wooden forts. The Indian trade was lucrative.At the beginning of the American Revolutionary War, February 5, 1977, the State Constitution adopted to abolish parishes in Georgia. St. Paul's Parish became Richmond County, named for the Duke of Richmond, who supported the colony in Parliament, and Augusta became the county seat in 1790. Augusta emerged from the Revolutionary War with a devastated economy and political system. Trustees of Augusta were appointed to 5 bring order to the town. Augusta became the state capitol from 1788 to 1795. The United States Constitution was signed in Augusta on January 2, 1788.11 Slavery emerged in both these founding colonies of Georgia which comprise the early Savannah River Valley and became the foundation of the economy. The farming methods in Augusta (Richmond County) and Savannah (Chatham County) were geared for African slave labor. Georgia's main cash crops, from plantation or farm, were cotton and rice. Rice and sea-island cotton were raised in the Savan¬ nah River Valley region. Enslaved Africans provided the needed labor for production of these crops. By 1825, Geor¬ gia led the world in cotton production, with 150,000 bales annually, much of which was produced in the Savannah River region. Georgia had ceased the foreign and domestic slave trade before 1800, but reopened the domestic trade in 1824. Illegal importation of slaves continued until the Civil War.1^ By 1830, the belief that slavery would disappear had changed, because of the increased economic value of slaves, the problems associated with freeing slaves, and the dissipation of Revolutionary idealism. There also ex¬ isted a general feeling that free Negroes were quite unde¬ sirable. Most Georgians had ceased to consider slavery an evil, many had come to consider it a positive good to "both Negroes and whites," and most were willing to go 6 along with the law that made it illegal for "freed Negroes" to remain in the state.13 Although slavery was officially sanctioned in Geor¬ gia from January 1751, it was not until the middle of the 1760s that the colony began to import slaves directly from Africa. Between 1751 and 1766, Georgia looked to South Carolina and the West Indies for the bulk of its settlers and slaves.