Austin Dabney was always popular with those who knew of his services in
the Revolutionary War. Governor Gilmer says that he was one of the
best Chroniclers of the stirring events of that period. His memory was
retentive, his understanding good, and he had a gift of description
possessed by few. He moved to the land the State had given him, taking
with him the family of the man who had nursed him. He continued to serve
them while he lived, faithful to the end, and when he died left them the
property he had accumulated.
THE YAZOO FRAUD
Some writers on the early history of Georgia have been under the
impression that the speculation known as the Yazoo Fraud had its
beginning in the efforts of General Elijah Clarke and his followers to
settle on the Indian reservation lying west of the Oconee River; but
this is not the case at all. General Clarke's movement was the result
of an enterprise which was aimed against the Spaniards; and, though the
facts have no real connection with the Yazoo speculation, they may
be briefly told here, especially since Stevens, in his "History of
Georgia," turns them all topsy-turvy.
Genet was the first envoy sent to represent the wild and revolutionary
republic of France,--the republic of Robespierre and the Jacobins. He
represented, as well as any man could, the ideas and purposes of those
who had wrought such havoc in France. He was meddlesome, wrong-headed,
unreasonable, and bold with it all. He sailed from France in a
ship which he commanded himself; and instead of going straight to
Philadelphia (then the seat of government), where his business called
him, he landed at Charleston in South Carolina. War was then pending
between France and Spain; and Genet, after landing in Charleston, found
ready sympathizers in the French Huguenots of South Carolina, and indeed
in all those who had fought for American liberty. There were two reasons
why the fiery appeals of Genet to the people of Carolina to take up
arms against Spain were received enthusiastically. One was, that the
Spaniards in Florida had been at constant war with the people of Georgia
and Carolina, and had committed many crimes and depredations. The other
was, that the people felt grateful to France for the aid she had given
the American Colonies in their efforts to shake off the yoke of Great
Britain.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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