The Brethren and Moravian Churches in Georgia - North American Colonies
Taken from The British Empire in the Nineteenth Century (1898) by Edgar Sanderson
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buffalo strength, qualities displayed by the new-comers in flying like birds over the vast sea, and in meeting hostile attacks. The soft eagle's feathers represented love; the warm buffalo's skin was a protection against cold. "Therefore," said the Indian, "love and protect our families." Further emigrations brought over members of the Church of the Brethren, a Protestant society, popularly known as the Moravians, claiming to represent the old Bohemian Brethren of the days of John Huss. These excellent persons gave examples of a pure and gentle Christian life. A number of sturdy Scottish Highlanders brought bone and sinew to the aid of the new colony. In 1738 the general took out a regiment of six hundred men, with whom he waged war against the Spaniards of Florida. In later days, a declension from the primitive purity of Georgian morals showed itself in the discontent aroused by regulations which excluded rum and the use of slaves. The rum had been exported from the West Indies in exchange for lumber and other products of the colony, and the loss of this trade was a real grievance. Oglethorpe left the colony finally in 1743, and nine years later the surrender of the charter to the British government made Georgia a crown colony until the final rupture.
The history of the thirteen Colonies, before the revolt, is mainly one of peaceful progress arising from tillage, manufactures, and trade. We find a spirit of independence shown in 1665, when the settlement of New Plymouth "declined to permit the king a voice in the appointment of a governor", and the "general court" of Massachusetts successfully resisted the royal claim to hear, in the courts at home, appeals from the colonial tribunals. At the same time, Massachusetts owned nearly two hundred vessels, mostly hailing from Boston. In 1671, Maryland lays a tax of two shillings a hogshead on exported tobacco, a clear proof of increase in that article of production. In 1687, the governor of New York invites the Iroquois Indians "to bring their trade to Albany". This powerful people was, at this time, harassing the French in Canada, and it was prudent for an English colony to keep them on friendly terms. The intellectual advance is shown in 1692 by the establishment, under royal charter, of the Williamsburg College in Virginia, endowed by government and by private funds, with a large grant of land, and a duty of a penny per pound weight of exported tobacco. In 1716, Yale College, named from its chief founder, … continue reading »