Happy Birthday, Georgia

My beloved homeland came into practical reality 240 years ago today, when Sir James Edward Oglethorpe landed on a high bluff and founded the Province of Georgia and its capital city of Savannah. The charter gave him all the land to the Pacific Ocean, but in practical terms at first it was just Yamacraw Bluff and what he could hold with his comrades. Georgia has since existed as a British province, a free and independent state, a state under the Articles of Confederation, a member of the United States of America, a member of the Confederate States of America, and was again brought back under the union. Nations come and go, but Georgia remains.

Oglethorpe founded the colony in part to defend British possessions from the Spanish in Florida, and so once he had established his city and militia, he sought out Scottish Highlanders to hold his southern frontier. These settled at the Altamaha river, under James MacIntosh Mohr (that is, "James MacIntosh the Great"). They fought the Spanish, and they fought the Indians, and they usually won -- especially at the Battle of Bloody Marsh. During one of Oglethorpe's expeditions home to recruit more Rangers, the '45 rising came up, and he had to turn to the business of fighting the Highlanders instead of recruiting them.

He had the same fate with the Americans, whom he had helped to found. After the Revolution, he was at home in Britain and went to visit John Adams, our first ambassador to the British. It's sad to think that our founder, a man of talent, insight and character, did not finally make his home here. We remember him with honor.