An English gentleman and a Creek leader became unlikely allies in founding Georgia as last of the original thirteen colonies.
By Roger Harris
Looking back over the first 250 years of the founders’ “great experiment” in American democracy, nothing is more apparent than the constant need to redefine cultural traditions and ideas about identity within established borders. Time and again, what was once a largely homogeneous population evolved — for political, economic, cultural, or religious reasons — into a proverbial melting pot of backgrounds and traditions.
General James Edward Oglethorpe, an ambitious, Oxford-educated officer from a prosperous family, arrived on North America’s Atlantic coast in January 1733 after a crossing from England aboard the Anne that lasted nearly two months. He and some 114 other passengers brought with them the blessings of King George II and a spirit of adventure that would lead to the founding that same year of Georgia, the thirteenth of Great Britain’s original American colonies. Forty-three years later, in 1776, with the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the colony officially became part of the United States of America.
Oglethorpe, born in London at the end of the seventeenth century, was a member of Parliament and a man clearly captivated by the allure of the undiscovered. Demonstrating admirable ideals — among them a willingness to aid English citizens burdened by overwhelming debt — Oglethorpe strongly supported King George’s 1732 charter establishing the Province of Georgia. The charter prepared the way for a British outpost where indigent citizens could begin again in the New World.
King George and his supporters were also eager to establish Georgia as a buffer between Spanish-controlled Florida and South Carolina, which had become a royal colony in 1719. Georgia was planned as a refuge for settlers seeking religious freedom, and initially slavery, particularly involving enslaved Africans, was prohibited.
DETAIL FROM THE BRITISH COLONIES IN NORTH AMERICA . ENGRAVED BY WILLIAM FADEN , 1777. COURTESY OF BEINECKER ARE BOOK AND MANUSCRIPT LIBRARY, YALE UNIVERSITY.
Oglethorpe quickly befriended the Native Americans living along the South Carolina-Georgia border. Among them was Chief Tomochichi, the astute leader of the Yamacraw tribe of the Creek Nation. Already advanced in age by 1733, Tomochichi was evidently a man of great wisdom. Oglethorpe, then in his mid-30s, developed a rapport with the chief that proved essential to the founding of the colony. In fact, it was Tomochichi who made Native American land available to Oglethorpe for the creation of Savannah, the first English settlement in Georgia.
The Georgia Historical Commission marker placed near Tomochichi’s grave in Savannah’s Wright Square in the early 1950s attests to the respect shared by the two men. It reads in part: “Tomo-Chi-Chi, Mico of the Yamacraw, a tribe of the Creek Indian Nation, is buried in this Square. He has been called a co-founder, with Oglethorpe, of Georgia.” The marker also notes that Tomochichi died on October 5, 1739, and was buried in Savannah with military honors among his English friends.
