1. Life in Trustee Georgia August 25, 2015

2. Trustee Georgia ▪ Georgia was founded on 3 principles: charity, economics, and defense ▪ Charity: helping former convicts and debtors start a new life ▪ Economics: producing goods and raw materials to export to England ▪ Defense: acting as a buffer colony between Spanish Florida and the rest of the English colonies ▪ In keeping with those principles, the motto of the new colony was Non sibi sed aliis, which is Latin for: Not for self, but for others ▪ Many Georgia colonists found life in the new colony difficult ▪ New settler groups arrived as the years passed ▪ Many colonists were unhappy with James Oglethorpe’s rules and regulations ▪ The constant threat of attack from the Spanish in Florida was stressful for many settlers

3. A Settler’s Life ▪ The first group of English settlers to arrive in Georgia in 1733 faced daily hardships ▪ Out of the original 114 settlers, nearly 50 of them did not survive the first year ▪ The humid, hot climate was too harsh for people used to the cooler climate in England ▪ Early farming did not produce many crops causing many to go hungry ▪ Medical care was almost non-existent; people who got sick often died and women died while trying to have babies ▪ Most of the settlers, including children, spent their days working in their gardens and working on their farms ▪ There was no education system ▪ Boys might be taught to read and write at home ▪ Girls were often only taught “home” skills: cooking, sewing, gardening

4. New Settlers ▪ In March 1734, a group arrived from Germany called the Salzburgers ▪ They were granted a piece of land about 25 miles from Savannah ▪ They called their town Ebenezer ▪ However, Ebenezer’s soil was too swampy to grow crops so they had to move ▪ They moved to a new spot in 1736 and named it New Ebenezer ▪ In 1736, Oglethorpe traveled to Scotland to recruit new settlers ▪ Scottish people who lived in the Highland area of Scotland had a reputation for being good soldiers ▪ He recruited a group of about 175 Highland Scots to move to Georgia to help defend the colony from Spanish threats in Florida ▪ They established a town south of Savannah called Darien ▪ They were hard workers that raised cattle and harvested trees to help the colony survive

5. War with Spain ▪ England and Spain had been arguing over land claims in North America for many years ▪ Once England colonized Georgia, the arguing got worse ▪ In 1739, the Spanish colonists in Florida tried to invade Georgia ▪ The Georgia colonists defeated the invasion, but several more attempts were made as the years passed ▪ Oglethorpe, as directed by King George II, continued the conflict with Spanish Florida ▪ The colonists, however, were unhappy with having to fight a war that they didn’t want to fight ▪ The conflict was finally settled in 1748, but the damage had already been done with angering the colonists

6. Unhappy Colonists ▪ In 1736, Oglethorpe made several new rules ▪ No Rum, no trading alcohol with the Native Americans, and no slaves ▪ These were not popular among the colonists ▪ The ongoing war with Spanish Florida also caused anger among the colonists ▪ Many things were also going wrong with agriculture ▪ The Mulberry trees were the wrong kind so silk worms weren’t producing, and they were not allowed to grow many other things they wanted ▪ Their neighbors in South Carolina, who had all the things Oglethorpe banned, were doing really well ▪ Many Georgia settlers left Georgia for different colonies that had less restrictive rules ▪ These people formed a group called the Malcontents (a person who is dissatisfied and rebellious)

7. Oglethorpe leaves Georgia ▪ In 1743, Oglethorpe was called back to England after the Malcontents wrote to King George complaining about the rules in the colony ▪ While in England, Oglethorpe met the woman that he decided to marry ▪ His new wife didn’t want to live in Georgia so Oglethorpe decided to remain in England ▪ A new leader of Georgia was named, Williams Stephens ▪ Oglethorpe continued to act as a trustee of Georgia, but he no longer lived there

8. William Stephens ▪ Stephens had lived in the Georgia colony since 1737 ▪ After the Trustees appointed him leader of the colony, he began to reverse Oglethorpe’s rules ▪ The ban on rum was lifted ▪ Slavery was allowed in the colony beginning in 1751 ▪ Many of the Malcontents and other colonists who had left the colony began to slowly return and the population grew

9. The End of the Trustee Period ▪ As the population grew, the colonists demanded to have a voice in the running of the colony ▪ The Trustees, instead of giving in to the colonists’ demand and working with them, decided to turn over the running of the colony to the King ▪ Even though the original Charter of 1732 was set to expire in 1753, the Trustees returned it early in 1752 ▪ After this, Georgia was known as a Royal Colony and was under the direct leadership of King George II.