Colonials Collide at Bloody Marsh

On a sultry summer day in 1742, a handful of British and Spanish colonial troops faced each other on a Georgia coastal island and decided the fate of a colony.

By Thomas G. Rodgers

It was probably inevitable that the imperial claims of Spain and Britain would clash in what is now the southeastern United States. Spain's flag had flown over Florida for 200 years, during which time Britain had established a dozen fledgling colonies along North America's Atlantic coast.

In 1732, the southernmost outpost of British America was South Carolina, and its seaport of Charleston was already a bustling trade center. But Carolina was vulnerable to persistent Yamassee Indian raids from across the Savannah River to the south, encouraged by the Spanish. Also alarming was the growing threat from French Louisiana. Since 1715, the French had manned Fort Toulouse, where the Coosa and Tallapoosa rivers meet in present-day Alabama.

A solution to the problem was offered by a group of English businessmen. General James Oglethorpe, Sir John Percival, Dr. Thomas Bray and others had a vision of a vigorous buffer colony to protect South Carolina from enemy attacks.

Oglethorpe, the 36-year-old son of an influential English family, had seen combat in Europe in the service of Britain. As a member of Parliament, he learned of a friend's death in a squalid debtors' prison and spearheaded an investigation of the British prison system. He regarded the American project as a way to provide a refuge for England's debtors and poor, as well as German and Scottish refugees, who would all settle the colony.

The project was soon implemented. A board of trustees consisting of 20 English businessmen was formed to oversee the colony, and Oglethorpe, a leading board member, agreed to accompany the colonists to America.

The trustees envisioned a military colony between the Savannah and Altamaha rivers, to be populated by white yeoman farmers doubling as ready militia. Slavery was outlawed, as was liquor. Each colonist was to be given 50 acres of land.

After securing a royal charter from King George II, for whom the new colony would be named, the trustees began recruiting colonists. They screened applicants to weed out those not of good character. Few debtors actually signed on.

On January 13, 1733, 113 colonists arrived in Charleston on the sailing ship Anne after spending two months and one week at sea. They were warmly welcomed by the Carolinians, who were anxious to see a buffer colony to their south. Carolina's governor, Robert Johnston, offered military assistance. Oglethorpe discovered a suitable site for the initial settlement about 18 miles up the Savannah River on a high bluff, well positioned for defense. On February 12, the first colonists landed there. At Yamacraw Bluff, the Georgia settlers built their principal town and seaport, Savannah.

The first few months of the Georgia settlement were harrowing. About one third of the original colonists died from malaria and other diseases. By March 1734, however, 91 log houses had been built, and the little colony thrived thereafter.

Oglethorpe saw that winning the goodwill of the Indian tribes was essential to the success of the colony. Fortunately, he won the friendship of Tomochichi, the 90-year-old Yamacraw chief, whose dwelling lay near Savannah. Tomochichi was impressed by Oglethorpe's fair and open manner and by his tolerance for Indian ways. The two men became good friends, and Tomochichi remained a stalwart British ally all his life. Tomochichi also wisely advised Oglethorpe to make contact with the Creeks, the major tribe in the area. In May 1733, some 56 Indians from the Creek towns, including eight chiefs, arrived in Savannah for a peace conference. The meeting was cordial, and the conference ended with an agreement of friendship.

Much of England's success in Georgia stemmed from Oglethorpe's energy, self-confidence and enthusiasm. The hot-tempered general was called egotistical and overbearing--he had once killed a man during a drunken brawl--but he was fair-minded and insisted on a type of frontier equality that won over colonists and Indians alike. And he willingly shared the same hardships as his colonists.

Oglethorpe ate Indian food, respected their practices, and observed that they were "of an excellent temper." Rum and revenge, he remarked, were the Indians' greatest weaknesses.

The general courted the friendship of the Cherokees of northern Georgia, as well as the Chickasaws, who lived in what is now Alabama and Mississippi. The Chickasaws rumored Oglethorpe to be part red man; Oglethorpe responded that indeed he was "an Indian, in my heart, that is I love them; do they love me the worse for that?"

Oglethorpe intended to build military outposts to secure the southern frontier. To accomplish that, he depended on a handful of ranger companies recruited from the toughest veterans of the frontier. The rangers braved the steaming heat of Georgia's coastal lowland, the pesky sand fleas and mosquitoes, and the fear of death from unseen enemy muskets. They built a string of wilderness forts from present-day Augusta on the Savannah River, southward to Fort King George on the St. Johns River, and westward to Fort Okfuskee on the Tallapoosa.

The general depended on men like Patrick Mackay, a down-on-his-luck Scottish gentleman who came to Georgia with his wife, his infant daughter and three brothers in September 1733. Oglethorpe commissioned him captain of a company of rangers in March 1734 and gave him the task of building an outpost in the Creek Country. It was Oglethorpe's hope to cement a lasting peace with the Creeks, and he intended Mackay to regulate the civilian traders operating out of Carolina. That caused some friction with South Carolina--especially when Mackay later chastised and expelled some of the traders from the Georgia country when he caught them selling rum to the Indians.

Carolina merchants accused Mackay of overstepping his authority and refused to cooperate with him. Their hostility made it difficult for Mackay to purchase horses and supplies. Nevertheless, the rangers built and garrisoned Fort Okfuskee on the Tallapoosa River, not far from the French Fort Toulouse.

Having already antagonized the Carolina traders, Mackay aroused friction with Spain as well. In May 1735, he provoked an unauthorized raid by pro-English Indians on a Spanish outpost on the St. Johns River. There was retaliation a month later. A Yamassee war party from Spanish Florida surprised a group of Yamacraw on the Altamaha and killed seven of them.

The Spanish had claimed the Georgia region, which they called Guale, since the 16th century, when their missionaries first penetrated the area. The Florida-Georgia frontier was vital to Spanish interests and helped protect Spain's valuable naval supply link with Mexico.

Alarmed at the prospect of provoking a war with the Spaniards, the trustees instructed Oglethorpe to remove Mackay from his post, and in February 1736, Oglethorpe reluctantly complied. He retained the rangers, however, expanding them to five units similar to Mackay's--a total of 50 men--to provide security for the southern frontier and to man additional outposts south of the Savannah.

Darien, a small village on the north bank of the Altamaha, was settled and garrisoned by Scots led by Hugh Mackay, brother of Patrick. More than 170 men and women arrived there, dressed in their picturesque Highland garb, in January 1736.

Colonists from London built and settled Fort Frederica on the northern end of heavily wooded St. Simons Island. Fort Frederica was square in shape, measuring 124 by 125 feet, surrounded by a moat and flanked by a bastion on each corner. Its walls were constructed of a hard material called "tabby," a mixture of lime, seashells, sand and rock. The settlement was named for Frederick, Prince of Wales, the eldest son of King George II.

Oglethorpe encouraged his men to bring their families, and some did. There was a small village adjacent to the fort, and Frederica at its height had 1,000 residents. The general's only real home in Georgia was at Frederica, a modest cottage that he called "The Farm." Tomochichi and his nephew and adopted heir, Toonahowi also joined Oglethorpe at Frederica, pledging their loyalty.

Oglethorpe built a narrow military road, just wide enough for two to walk abreast, connecting Frederica to a smaller outpost, Fort St. Simons, at the southern end of the island. The general established additional outposts to protect Frederica and Darien. He sent rangers and scouts to construct two forts on Cumberland Island, 20 miles to the south of St. Simons. Fort St. Andrew, a 65-by-130-foot earthen fort in the shape of a four-pointed star, with a bastion on each point, was soon finished. Fort Prince William was built on the southern end of the island. Even farther south, Amelia Fort, on Amelia Island, was built and garrisoned by a small party of Highlanders.

In May 1733, a contingent of red-coated British regulars arrived in Savannah--the 42nd Regiment of Foot, heavily Scottish at first, composed of recruits enlisted for seven years. Oglethorpe encouraged the soldiers to bring their wives and families to Georgia, subsidizing them with free transportation, one year's subsistence, and grants of land.

Despite some initial friendly overtures between Oglethorpe and the Spanish in Florida, hostilities broke out in September 1739, when Spain declared war on England. In October 1739, Tomochichi died at age 97, following a lengthy illness.

The War of Jenkins' Ear between Spain and Britain was a naval and colonial extension of the war of Austrian Succession in Europe. The claim by a British merchant seaman named Jenkins that Spanish officers had cut off his ear--later found to be the work of freebooting pirates, not Spaniards--gave the conflict its name.

Hostilities in North America began in November 1739 with a dawn raid by a Yamassee war party on the Highland outpost on Amelia Island. The warriors surprised and shot two Highland settlers who had left the safety of the fort to gather firewood. They cut off the victims' heads and carried them off as they withdrew to the south. Two weeks later, there was another raid.

Oglethorpe reacted to those incursions by going on the offensive. In January 1740, he led about 200 of his rangers, regulars, militia and Indian allies on a retaliatory foray across the St. Johns River into Spanish Florida. His troops surprised and burned one Spanish outpost at Fort Picolata and captured another of at Fort Pupo, 21 miles north of St. Augustine. Leaving a small garrison at Fort Pupo, he returned to Georgia to prepare for a major offensive.

Oglethorpe then went to Charleston to request troops. He had assurances of cooperation from British naval vessels in the area, and he was confident that with a sufficient land force he could capture St. Augustine. He even hinted that Havana, Cuba, could be the next target.

Charleston's response was not as enthusiastic as Oglethorpe had hoped. South Carolina provided a regiment of 500 men, a troop of rangers, and an armed schooner. About 200 Indians, mostly Cherokee, participated in the invasion. Despite the Creeks' apparent eagerness to support Britain, they were not willing to be drawn into a major European conflict, and few of them joined the expedition. Oglethorpe commanded about 400 men of his own 42nd Regiment, as well as several troops of English and Highland rangers, for which he himself paid most of the cost.

In May 1740, Oglethorpe, with his invasion force of about 2,000 men, advanced on St. Augustine. He planned a joint land and naval operation against the Spanish settlement. Gracia Real de la Teresa de Mose, a fort garrisoned by free black militiamen that protected the outskirts of St. Augustine, was overrun by the British invaders, who began to encircle the town.

Oglethorpe faced an able opponent, Don Manuel de Montiano, who had become governor of Florida in 1737. Traditionally, governors of that remote Spanish colony exercised much military and political independence. In early 1740, Montiano had only about 600 troops to defend St. Augustine, but his main fortress, the imposing Castillo de San Marcos, was a strong position, defended by 50 cannons.

Montiano had regular Spanish troops as well as Florida militia at St. Augustine, and in July 1740, reinforcements arrived from Cuba. The settlement had been attacked before, in 1728, so the Spanish were prepared for a siege. The Castillo withstood 38 days of bombardment, which did little damage to the massive fortress due to the distance of the British guns.

On June 15, Spanish troops made a daring surprise attack on Fort Mose and recaptured the outpost. Meanwhile, Oglethorpe's Carolina troops were threatening to return home, since their term of enlistment had expired and many of them were ill with malaria. Seeing that his bombardment of St. Augustine had proved fruitless, Oglethorpe, himself ill with a fever, lifted the siege and withdrew his forces. He returned to Georgia bitterly disappointed and critical of the Carolinians, whom he accused of refusing to obey orders.

Oglethorpe himself came under scathing criticism for the failure of the St. Augustine expedition. His credibility was damaged and the security of the Georgia colony jeopardized. His supporters among the trustees were despondent, the South Carolina government was hostile, and Parliament began to regard Georgia as an expensive liability.

True to his aggressive character, Oglethorpe soon returned to the attack. Once he had recovered from his fever, the general began drumming up support for the Georgia colony, since he realized that Montiano would probably begin preparations for a counteroffensive. He raised the terrifying specter of Spanish-instigated slave revolts from Carolina to Virginia if the Georgia colony should fall. Despite his vigorous efforts, however, by autumn of 1741 it was clear that Georgia was on her own and could expect very little help.

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