Land and Allegiance in Revolutionary Georgia

This history of the American Revolution in Georgia offers a thorough examination of how landownership issues complicated and challenged colonists loyalties. Despite underdevelopment and isolation, eighteenth-century Georgia was an alluring place, for it promised settlers of all social classes the prospect of affordable landand the status that went with ownership. Then came the Revolution and its many threats to the orderly systems by which property was acquired and protected. As rebel and royal leaders vied for the support of Georgias citizens, says Leslie Hall, allegiance became a prime commodity, with property and the preservation of owners rights the requisite currency for securing it. As Hall shows, however, the wars progress in Georgia was indeterminate; in fact, Georgia was the only colony in which British civil government was reestablished during the war. In the face of continued uncertaintiesplundering, confiscation, and evacuationmany landowners desires for a strong, consistent civil authority ultimately transcended whatever political leanings they might have had. The historical irony here, Halls study shows, is that the most successful regime of Georgias Revolutionary period was arguably that of royalist governor James Wright. Land and Allegiance in Revolutionary Georgia is a revealing study of the self-interest and practical motivations in competition with a periods idealism and rhetoric.