On this evening 250 years ago in Savannah, Royal Governor Sir James Wright was arrested by the Georgia Council of Safety. Earlier in the day Governor Wright had summoned Joseph Clay and Noble Wimberly Jones, the leaders of the Council of Safety, to his Executive Mansion to deliver a threat: the British fleet anchored off Tybee Island at the mouth of the Savannah River had orders to “destroy their towns & property” but the Governor would ask the Navy not to destroy the town if the Council of Safety agreed to let the Navy purchase provisions. After a meeting shortly thereafter of the Council of Safety a few blocks away at Tondee’s Tavern (which used to stand at the northwest corner of Broughton and Whitaker streets), Major Joseph Habersham led a small party of militia to the Executive Mansion (which is no longer standing but was on the site of the modern Telfair Academy on Telfair Square, then called St. James’s Square). Habersham entered the mansion during a dinner meeting of Wright’s advisers and placing his arm on Governor Wright’s shoulder, declared “Sir James, you are my prisoner.”
The Council of Safety initially placed Wright under house arrest but then gave him parole on the condition that he not leave Savannah. A few weeks later, Wright would break his parole and flee to the protection of the Royal Navy ships, thus ending Royal rule in Georgia.
Joseph Clay and Noble Wimberly Jones were both immigrants to America from England. Jones would become a colonel in the Continental Army. Jones became Speaker of the Georgia Assembly and then a member of the Continental Congress. Joseph Habersham became a lieutenant colonel in the Continental Army, and after the War, Speaker of the Georgia Assembly and eventually Postmaster General of the United States.
Sources: https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=63711; https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=6497; https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=5361; https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=64444; https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=5364; https://www.facebook.com/Wormsloe
On This Day In The Revolution 