THROUGH
MOUNTAIN MISTS
Early Settlers of
Their
Descendants...Their Stories...Their Achievements
Lifting the
Mists of History on Their Way of Life
By: Ethelene Dyer Jones
July 4 is
all about celebrating America’s independence from
England. We read anew how the fathers of
our country met in Philadelphia and poured over the terms of The
Declaration of
Independence drafted by Virginia’s representative to the Continental
Congress,
Thomas Jefferson, then aged 33 and among the youngest of the delegates. That paper is a highly valued document and
one that still inspires present-day patriots to appreciate the spirit
of
independence that is a trademark of American democracy.
We note July 4 as the birthday of the
Declaration of Independence. Actually,
it was on July 2, 1776 that this resolution was adopted in the
Continental
Congress: “These United Colonies are,
and of right, ought to be Free and Independent States…absolved of all
allegiance to the British Crown.”
After review and some changes, the
final version of the Declaration of Independence was adopted by the
Continental
Congress. Yet only two men actually
signed it on the famed date, July 4, 1776.
These were John Hancock, president of Congress, and Charles
Thomson,
secretary.
The Declaration was read publicly on
July 8, 1776 in Philadelphia.
Washington’s troops, then in New York, heard the document read
on July
9.
Except for Hancock and Thomson, the
remainder of the fifty-six signers added their signatures to the
document on
August 2, 1776. Great measures were
taken to keep the identities of the signers a secret to prevent their
arrest
and even death at the hands of the British and the American Loyalists.
Life was not easy for those who
pledged “their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor” because
they
believed in freedom. Several of the
signers were chased from farms and homes and had their property
confiscated. Other signers, along with
their spouses, were
imprisoned. John Martin of Pennsylvania
died from mental anguish when former friends shunned him.
Francis Lewis’s wife died in prison.
Dr. Benjamin Rush, a medical doctor
and social reformer and one of the signers wrote in a letter to fellow
signer
John Adams: “The 4th of July
has been celebrated in Philadelphia in the manner I expected…Scarcely a
word
was said of the solitude and labors and fears and sorrows and sleepless
nights
of the men who projected, proposed, defended, and subscribed the
Declaration of
Independence. Do you recollect your
memorable speech upon the day on which the vote was taken?
Do you recollect the pensive and awful
silence which pervaded the house when we were called up, one after
another, to
the table of the President of Congress to subscribe what was believed
by many
at that time to be our own death warrants?
The silence and the gloom of the morning were interrupted, I
well
recollect, only for a moment by Colonel (Benjamin) Harrison of Virginia
who
said to Mr. (Elbridge) Gerry at the table:
‘I shall have a great advantage over you, Mr. Gerry, when we are
all
hung for what we are now doing. From the
size and weight of my body I shall die in a few minutes, but from the
lightness
of your body you will dance in the air an hour or two before you are
dead.’ This speech procured a transient
smile, but it was soon succeeded by the solemnity with which the whole
business
was conducted…Let us, my dear friend, console ourselves for the
unsuccessful
efforts of our lives to serve our fellow creatures by recollecting that
we have
aimed well.”*
We sometimes fail to relate the events
of history to time lines in the history of our county and the state of
Georgia. Union County was formed in
1832. America’s freedom had been
declared only fifty-six years before.
Westward expansion had sent aspiring men with a pioneering
spirit to the
American frontier to settle. “Life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness” meant freedom from cities that
were
becoming crowded to places where family farms could be carved from the
wilderness. On new lands people could
exercise their bent for independence and make their own niche in the
annals of
history. Many of us can trace our roots
back to some of the citizens who were in Union County when it was
formed. Our forebears, almost as much as
the signers
of the Declaration of Independence, were fired with the spirit of
freedom and
saw it available for the taking in lands opened up for settlement. Life was not easy. They
faced the unknown and hard work. But then,
is independence ever easy? Is freedom ever
free?
On this 4th of July, it is
a good time to remember and be thankful for our legacy of independence. Jefferson believed that given the right
reasons, people could govern themselves and that educated citizens
could and would
safeguard democracy. These tenets are as
important today as they were in 1776.
[Ethelene Dyer
Jones is a retired educator,
freelance writer, poet, and historian. She may be reached at
e-mail edj0513@windstream.net;
phone 478-453-8751; or mail 1708 Cedarwood Road, Milledgeville, GA
31061-2411.]
Updated October 4, 2008
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