Brunswick, Georgia
----and----
Glynn County
1895

            This little phamphlet is intended to give some facts relative to BRUNSWICK, GLYNN COUNTY, GEORGIA, and its surroundings.  Fanciful sketches are avoided.  The visitor to Brunswick will find things just as stated, and, perhaps, a little better.  Brunswick needs no flattery, it speaks for itself.  We invite the world to come and visit us.
            Correspondence cheerfully answered when addressed to any of the following organizations, viz:
            CITY COUNCIL—H.F. Dunwoody, Mayor.
            COUNTY COMMISSIONERS—J.S. Wright, Chairman.
            BOARD OF TRADE—C. Downing, President.
            YOUNG MEN’S BUSINESS LEAGUE—H.W. Reed, President.

PRESS OF H.A. WRENCH & SONS, BRUNSWICK, GA.

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BRUNSWICK, GEORGIA.

……LOCATION……

            Latitude 31 – Longitude 81 ½.  The most westerly point on the Atlantic Coast of the United States, 280 miles southeast of Atlanta, on the east bank of Turtle River, an arm of the sea that reaches for several miles into the country.  Situated on a beautiful bluff of white sand, from 8 to 12 feet above high water, and on the extreme end of a peninsular, with deep water on either side, its natural location is healthy.
            Five hundred miles nearer to Kansas City than is New York.

……NATURAL ADVANTAGES……

            The finest land-locked harbor on the South Atlantic Coast.
            Twenty0three feet of water on the outer bar at ordinary tides, constantly deepening under Col. Goodyear’s work, will reach twenty-five feet within six months.
            Thirty-eight miles of deep water frontage.  No obstruction to navigation.

……CLIMATE……

            Healthful and pleasant the year round.  Mean temperature the six “winter months,” October to March inclusive, (1894) 59 degrees.  Remaining six months, (1894) 77 degrees.  Lowest mean, January, 47 degrees; highest, August, 82 degrees.  Temperature rarely exceeds 90 degrees, and is seldom lower than 30 degrees.  Hottest day, August 17^th, 96 degrees; coldest day December 29^th, 12^th [sic].  Humidity higher than at any other point in Georgia.  In 1894 there were 56 rainy days, 117 cloudy days and 189 perfectly clear days.

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……HEALTH RECORD, 1894……

            Deaths from all causes, white, 66—colored, 130—total, 169.  Deduct from above, stillborn and accidental, white 15; colored 105; leaves a total of 64.  Number of deaths per 1,000 population—white, 11.33; colored, 10.90; average for whole, 15.06.
            Brunswick is out of the path of destructive cyclones.  While the coast north of us has been repeatedly devastated by cyclones, noted scientist assert that we will continue to be exempt from such damages.
            Pure air, pure water and pure soil are things all cities strive for but few attain, yet these have reached perfection here.

……SEWERAGE AND SANITATION……

            Brunswick is supplied with the finest sewerage system to be found in any southern city.  This system was put in last year under the direction of Col. Geo. E. Waring, the eminent sanitary engineer.  The city and surrounding country have also been supplied with a thorough system of surface drainage.
            The quarantine system of the port of Brunswick is a matter of much importance from the fact that vessels from all parts of the world come here at all seasons.  The United States Marin Hospital Service has entire charge of this service and it is needless to add that there is no danger of infectious disease coming in from other places.  Thus, within and from without, our natural location and the highest sanitary precautions of man are present to insure immunity from epidemic diseases.
            When it is remembered that New York, Baltimore and other northern cities were repeatedly ravaged with yellow fever and cholera, until they had learned to apply the necessary sanitary preventives, it will be seen that Brunswick, following their example, will be likewise free from danger.

……OTHER ADVANTAGES……

            Nature has provided, and the genius of man brought to light a wonderful yield of pure artesian water, from a depth readily accessible.  Our artesian wells are bored to a depth of from 400 to 600 feet and yield an unfailing supply.  The analyses

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of these wells disclose the medicinal value of the water as well as their purity for all domestic and manufacturing purposes.  Here is one of them:
                        Carbonate of Soda………………..8.083
                        Sulphate of Soda…………………3.864
                        Sodium Chloride…………………1.457
                        Potassium Chloride………………0.085
                        Sulphate of Lime…………………1.324
                        Sulphate of Magnesia…………….0.615
                        Silica……………………………...0.068
                        Organic matter……………………1.256
            There are many of these wells throughout the city, flowing from 122,000 to 1,000,000 gallons per day, each.
            All the popular secret societies are well represented in Brunswick, among them being lodges of F. & A.M., I.O.O.F., and K. of P.
            The only company of Volunteer Naval Militia in Georgia is located in Brunswick.  There is also one company of infantry.
            During the winter months some of the best theatrical companies in the country visit us, and society welcomes newcomers.
            Our boulevards and drives are the finest in the south.
            Fishing and hunting are excellent.

……SCHOOLS……

            Brunswick and Glynn County have a thorough system of graded public schools on the most improved modern plan.  Thus the educational facilities are of the highest order, and pupils who graduate from the high school may go direct to the State University at Athens.

……CHURCHES……

            There are seventeen churches in Brunswick as follows:  White—Episcopal, 2; Methodist, 2; Baptist, 1; Catholic, 1; Presbyterian, 1; Jewish, 1; Second Advent, 1.  Colored—Methodist, 4; Baptist, 3; Episcopal, 1.

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……INDUSTRIAL……

            Brunswick has besides the foregoing:  10,000 population, three banks with ample capital, two daily and one weekly newspaper, three cypress saw mills, three pine timber saw mills, three wood-working establishments, one cotton mill, one moss factory, one shoe factory, one mattress factory, largest cotton compress in the world, system of water works, gas works, electric light plant, two ice factories, two barrel factories, one oyster canning factory, one marine railway, two machine shops, efficient fire department with electric fire alarm, splendid parks, paved streets and boulevard, lowest port charges of any port on the South Atlantic coast, crematory for city offal, The Oglethorpe (see cut) a splendid tourist hotel, hotels, boarding houses and business houses of all kinds, including several wholesale firms.  A large knitting mill is in process of erection.

……BRUNSWICK’S WANTS……

            Brunswick wants cotton buyers, phosphate dealers, one hundred thousand population, manufacturers of various kinds, particularly cotton and cigar factories, a coaling station, tanneries, etc., for which unequalled inducements are offered.
            Brunswick offers to the factory investor splendid sites and free taxes for a term of years, and the right hand of good fellowship by a progressive people.

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……SHIPPING……

            From less than $500,00 export and coastwise business in 1891, we have grown until the banner year of 1892 reached over $11,500,00.  The panic of 1893 and low price of cotton cut business down to less than $6,000,000, but the following speaks for itself and the comparative statement of shipping tonnage will show the importance of Brunswick as a growing port:

            When the general trade depression and low prices is considered, it will be seen that Brunswick about recovered her best year’s exports, that of 1892, in the past year.  It is confidently believed that the present year’s business will largely overcome in tonnage all previous records.

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……RAILROADS……

            The “Plant System” and the “Southern” Railroads have important terminal property in Brunswick, and afford direct lines to the north, east, west and south.  Cotton, naval stores, lumber, cross ties and phosphate rock are the principal articles of export, although there is a rapidly growing business in the shipment of the products of the great northwest.  Other railroads are projected to Brunswick, and the South Brunswick Terminal Railroad will, within a few months, have a connection with some of the largest saw mills in the pine regions.

……WATER LINES……

            The Mallory Line of Steamships plies directly between this port and New York.
            The Brunswick Terminal Co. has a direct line of splendid steamships to Liverpool, Hamburg and other foreign ports.
            We have also steamboat lines to Fernandina, Fla., Savannah, Darien, Jekyl, Cumberland and St. Simon Islands, and to points on the Satilla and Altamaha rivers.

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GLYNN COUNTY

“Oh, what is abroad in the marsh and the terminal sea;
My soul seems suddenly free
From the weighing of fate and the sad discussion of sin
By the length and the breadth, and the sweep of the marshes of Glynn.”—LANIER.

            Glynn Count is one of the oldest counties in Georgia, having been first settled by Oglethorpe, who lived at Frederica, on the beautiful Island of St. Simon.  In this county are many beautiful and historic spots calculated to impress both the eye of an artist and the heart of a poet.  It is not with the beauty of scenery, nor romantic spots, nor many tales of historic lore, that we have to do in these few pages, but with its soil and climate, and adaptability for trade and the pursuit of profit.
            The soil of this county is almost as varied as the different timbers of its forests.  The light sandy soil, so well suited for the root crops, such as potatoes, (particularly Irish potatoes,) beets, turnips and other small vegetables.
            The black hammock lands, on which corn grows like it does in Illinois, Iowa, Missouri and Kansas.
            The low lands, which are capable of easy drainage, and when so drained are inexhaustible in fertility.
            The rice lands, which afford an independent income to their owners, and which are particularly adapted to the culture of celery, cabbage, etc.
            The old palmetto fields, that to the casual observer are worthless, has a clay sub-soil that makes them, with reasonable fertilization, a veritable paradise of fruit, which grows to perfection, peach, pear, plum, apricot, grape, and, even orange and banana, though the last two are not profitable.
            The visitor here will be shown places, that, with but slight effort have produced great results, and our people are beginning to engage in these lines, hitherto unknown.
            No lands in the south are more cheap, nor yet more capable of production or responsive to the touch of labor and fertilization.
            No lands in the south are more cheap, nor yet more capable of production or responsive to the touch of labor and fertilizations.  Lands can be had in large or small tracts, at from $3.00 to $25.00 an acre, according to improvements.

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            300 bushels of Irish potatoes, 400 bushels of sweet potatoes, and more than 1000 large head of cabbage have been known to come from one acre of ground in one year under a high state of cultivation.
            Three crops can be raised on the same ground every year.  When it is remembered that 11% of all truck shipped in the United States in 1894 was shipped from Norfolk, Va., and that Brunswick is from 14 to 21 days earlier, on account of season, than is Norfolk, and has fine transportation facilities, there is no doubt it must soon become and important trucking point.  Especially adapted to this branch of industry are the numerous islands and the hammock land along the salts.

……TIMBER……

            The wealth of undeveloped timber resources of this county constitutes it one of the richest in the state.  The timbers found in marketable quantities are:  Yellow pine, black, or loblolly pine, white oak, red oak, water, or turkey oak, hickory, ash, gum, cypress and palmetto.  There are many other varieties of woods, but they cannot be considered as in marketable quantities.
            The immense saw mills get their timber mostly from the interior along the rivers which empty into St. Simon Sounds.

……SEA ISLANDS……

            Nowhere on the Atlantic Coast can there be found such charming Island resorts as those adjacent to Brunswick.
            Jekyl Island, the property of the Jekyl Island Club, a wealthy New York corporation.
            Cumberland Island, the burial place of “Light-Horse” Harry Lee, and the present home of the Carnegie’s.
            St. Simons Island, the principal headquarters of Gen. Oglethorpe in the early settlement of Georgia, are all points of interest to the student.
            On both these islands are splendid hotels and hundreds of cottages, where the people of the south go to spend the heated term.  These resorts are now open from May to September.  Another large hotel is in contemplation for St. Simon next season.

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            Fishing is unexcelled, and game abounds in great quantities.  Deer, turkey, duck, quail and snipe.
            This section has rapidly come into prominence as a winter resort or northerners, as well as a summer resort for the south.
            A fair investigation is all that is asked of any one, and a letter addressed to either the Secretary of the Board of Trade, or of the Young Men’s Business League will receive prompt and careful attention.

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……HISTORICAL……

            MY DEAR MR. REED:—You have done me the honor of asking if I would not write something of the early history of Glynn County, St. Simons and the adjacent Islands.  I must premise by saying that St. Simons was settled long before the balance of the county, and was a thriving and comparatively populous colony when the rest of the neighboring country was but an Indian hunting ground.
            Frederica was formed in 1736, and in 1738 became the headquarters and seat of government of the Colony of Georgia.  Glynn County was laid out into the two parishes of St. Patrick and St. David’s in 1765, and not until 1778 were these two parishes united into the County of Glynn, so named in honor of John Glynn, a warm supporter of the cause of the Colonies and a member of the English Parliament.  Of the old town of Frederica, as Mrs. Kemble says “this is a very strange place,” it was once a town and the metropolis of the state, but its life was “but for a span,” born in 1736, in 1760 it was already in decay, and in 1778 taken by the British and virtually destroyed.  Of it there scarcely remains even a memory, yet, in its short two score of years, it had seen the dream of Spanish dominion over both North and South America fade in the light of the 7^th of July, 1742, and had nursed noble thoughts into noble needs.  Says Bruce in his life of Oglethorpe, “it is difficult for us to appreciate the intense hatred and fear felt in the eighteenth century for the Spaniard,” but when we realize that their flag then waved over all the New World, from Cape Horn to Vancouver’s Island, we can measure how strong the foe, for, though Florida did not number many thousand, she yet leaned upon Cuba, “the ever faithful Isle,” and through Cuba, upon all the prestage of the Spanish empire.  Inverness, Fort Howe and Frederica were the picket pests in the approaching clash of arms between the Anglo and Spanish forces, and from the latter Oglethorpe watched the encroachments of the Catholic power.
            In front of the “water battery” there now lies an old and rusty eighteen pounder.  Compared to modern ordinance it is as David’s sling to the Columbiad, that a triumph in the sixties.  Yet, in the days of its prime, before it fell, never to arise, the spectre of foreign invasion, and the echo of its discharge was the practical assertion of the “Monroe doctrine.”

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            Probably I can do no better than to quote briefly from Gen. Oglethorpe’s letter to the Duke of New Castle, in regard to this engagement.  He says, “on the 7^th I attacked the enemy at a point distinguished by a marsh, drove them back to their fort on St. Simons Sound, under cover of the guns of their vessels.  They numbered 4000.  On the 11^th their great galley with two smaller ones came up the river towards the town.  We fired from our water battery, and so warmly that they retired, and I followed in boats, cannonading them until they got under the guns of their ships, which lay in the sound.  On the 15^th the enemy took to their ships and retired by way of Cumberland.
            Bruce says:  “For two years the Spaniards were preparing in Cuba an armada, huge for those days.  It consisted of 40 ships, and carried 5000 soldiers, caommanded by Don Monteano.  Its mission was to wipe off from the North American coasts all traces of heretic settlements.  Slowly the news of it floated northwards; meanwhile the armada was at the mouth of the St. Mary’s.  Fort William, which Gen. Oglethorpe had built at the south end of Cumberland, held out well, until, Oglethorpe fighting his way in boats through the Spanish vessels, could reinforce it.  Then with no more than 700 soldiers he threw himself into Frederica.  Two hundred Spaniards were slain at Bloody Marsh, on July 7^th.  A panic fell upon the army; on the night of the 14^th they put to sea with Oglethorpe at their heels.  On the 24^th of July, 1742 a general thanksgiving was ordered for the end of the invasions.  Such are the single heroic facts.”  Writes Whitfield at the time:  “The deliverance of Georgia is such as cannot be paralleled but by some instances out of the Old Testament.”
            Charles Wesley first set foot on St. Simon on the 9^th of March, 1736.  On Sunday he “preached with boldness.  He had persuaded Oglethorpe to make a law against Sunday shooting.”  On the 18^th Gen. Oglethorpe set out with the Indians to hunt the buffalo upon the main,” and “in the afternoon M.W. discovered to me the whole mystery of iniquity.”  Of course there was a woman in it.  Poor Charles Wesley, only twenty-seven, retired to meditate on the mystery of iniquity.  He sends Mr. Inghan to fetch his brother, John Wesley from Savannah.  John Wesley comes, and makes things worse by meddling.  On May 15^th, 1736 at four a.m., “I set out for Savannah.”  On the 26^th of July, 1736 he left Savannah, and he says in his diary,

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the concluding words of the lesson were, “let us arise and go hence,” and I took my final leave of Savannah.
            In the grave yard, for many years an old oak has been pointed out as the tree from under which Charles Wesley “preached with boldness.”  Nearly a century has passed since that Sunday in ’36.  The sermon is forgotten; if it ever bore fruit we have no note of it, since Frederica annals show no puritan spirit to have been grafted on the fervid Celtic nature, but at this day there is no place to me, so solemn, so peaceful, so calm, as that old church yard.  The shadows flit before you, from under you, as you walk from tree trunk to tree trunk; they glide, now you are in a shadow, now you are in light, like our life; now in sorrow, now in gladness, till at once we stand in front of the restored church, with its cross pointing higher, higher than any shadow can reach, and there we rest.  CHAS. S. WYLLY.

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[This photo was blurry even in the book.]