At the same time the Highlanders at New Inverness, who were exposed to danger, built a fort there, and twelve pieces of cannon were mounted on it.

Though the people at Savannah were not so immediately exposed to danger, they began to build a large fort at their town of pallisade work with bastions; but as the trustees perceived this took off the people from their cultivation, that the work would be very chargeable, and they had not money to support the expense, they found themselves under a necessity to put a stop thereto.

British.

32 whereof 32 and

Foreign Pro

testants.

Men.

and in 19

1044 whereof 742 and 302 and in 463

the five years 1076 whereof 774 and 302 and in 482 to the 9th June

1737, were

The lands granted in trust this year in order to be granted out in smaller portions in Georgia were three thousand acres, and in trust to be cultivated, with the money arising from private benefactions given for that purpose, in order to raise à maintenance for a minister and schoolmaster at Frederica, and other religious uses, three hundred acres.

The lands granted this year to persons going on their own expense were four thousand three hundred acres.

The money received this year pursuant to Act of Parliament, was £10,000, and in benefactions 36271. 18s. 7d., whereof in South Carolina the amount in sterling money 3331. 19s. 6d. and in England 32937. 19s. 1d. which the trustees applied, as also part of their former balance to the sum of 17,2391. 19s. 5d., of which they exhibited an account to the Lord Chancellor, and Master of the Rolls, pursuant to their charter, and carried the then remainder to their succeeding account.

From the 9th June, 1737, to the 9th June, 1738.

The Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina having acquainted the trustees by a letter dated from the Council Chamber the 7th February, 1736-7, that he had received

advice from Commodore Dent, of preparations made by the Spaniards at Augustine and the Havana, in order to make an attack on the colony of Georgia, and the trustees having in a *memorial to his majesty set forth the inability of the colony to protect themselves against such a force as was preparing at the Havana and Augustine, his Majesty was graciously pleased to order a regiment of six hundred effective men to be raised and sent to Georgia for the defence and protection of it.

And as an encouragement for the soldiers' good behavior, the trustees resolved to give each of them a property in the colony; they therefore made a grant of land in trust for an allotment of five acres of land to each soldier of the regiment to cultivate for his own use and benefit, and to hold the same during his continuance in his majesty's service; and for a further encouragement, they resolved, that each soldier, who at the end of seven years from the time of his enlisting in the regiment, should be desirous of quitting his majesty's service, and should have his regular discharge, and would settle in the colony, should on his commanding officer's certificate of his good behavior, be entitled to a grant of twenty acres of land.

The Parliament having taken into consideration the great expenses which the trustees had been at in making roads through the province, and the several fortifications in it, and the presents made to the Indians to engage them firmer in the British interest, and likewise the preparations which were making by the Spaniards in order to take or destroy the colony, and having granted this year a sum of twenty thousand pounds for the further settling and securing the colony, the trustees made another embarkation, which consisted chiefly of persecuted German Protestants.

By accounts received from the colony before the end of this year, there appear to have been one thousand one hundred and ten persons in Georgia, besides those at Tybee, Skidoway fort, Argyll, Thunderbolt and Augusta, in the northern part, and those at St. Andrews and Amelia in the southern part.

The lands granted in trust this year in order to be granted out in smaller portions in Georgia were three thousand acres. The lands granted this year to persons going on their own expense were one thousand acres.

The money received this year pursuant to act of Parliament was £20,000, and in benefactions, 9097. 19s. 10d. 2q. whereof the trustees applied 18,870l. 13s. 3d. 2q. of which they exhibited an account to the Lord Chancellor, and Master of the Rolls, pursuant to their charter, and carried the remainder into their succeeding account.

From the 9th June 1738, to the 9th June 1739.

As several merchants and captains of ships had for their own interest carried into the colony from New York and other places, large cargoes of provisions, &c., great part of which (to save the merchants from losses,) was taken in at the store without a proper authority from the trustees, and an expense created thereby which the trustees could not estimate, nor have ability to discharge, and for which certified accounts were returned to them; the trustees published an advertisement in the London Gazette, and ordered it to be published in the South Carolina Gazette, and to be affixed upon the doors of the store-houses at Savannah and Frederica that out of a due regard to public credit they had resolved, that all expenses which they had ordered or should order to be made in America for the use of the colony, should be defrayed and paid for in Georgia, in Sola bills of exchange only, under their seal; and they gave notice, that no person whatsoever had any authority from them, or in their name, or for their account, to purchase or receive any cargoes of provisions, stores or necessaries, without paying for them in the said Sola bills.

Upon the petition of one Abraham De Lyon, a freeholder of Savannah, in Georgia, that he had expended a great sum in the cultivation of vines, which he had carried from Portugal, and had brought to great perfection; and several certificates being produced of his improvements in cultivating them, and of the goodness of the grapes, and of their thriving in the most barren lands of the province, the trustees assisted him to proceed in his improvements.

The security of the colony being provided for by the regiment sent over by his Majesty, the Parliament gave eight thousand pounds for the further settling the colony. Therefore the trustees sent over an estimate of all the expenses they allowed to be made in the province, by which several military expenses, which they had been engaged in for the defence of the colony, and which were very great, were reduced.

The trustees this year sent over the Reverend Mr. Norris to reside at Frederica, with a salary of fifty pounds a year, ordered a house to be built for him, and another for the inhabitants to perform divine service in till a church could be built there.

The assembly of South Carolina having in the last year passed an ordinance for raising a sum to indemnify their traders in opposition to the act which was approved of by his Majesty in council for maintaining the peace with the Indians in the province of Georgia, upon a memorial from the trustees complaining of the said ordinance, and upon a petition of the council and assembly of South Carolina against the said act, there was a solemn hearing before the Lords Commissioners of Trade and Plantations, and afterwards before a committee of the Lords of his Majesty's Privy Council. Whereupon his Majesty was pleased to order, that the said ordinance of the assembly of South Carolina should be repealed and declared void, and was pleased to send an instruction to the trustees to prepare a proper act or ordinance for settling the trade carried on by the provinces of South Carolina and Georgia with the Indians, on such a footing as might be for the mutual benefit and satisfaction of both provinces. And his Majesty at the same time was graciously pleased to give an instruction to Samuel Horsey, Esq., Governor and Lieutenant General of South Carolina,

to recommend to the council and assembly there to pass a law for the like purpose in that province. But Samuel Horsey, Esq., dying soon after, and no other Governor having since gone to South Carolina, that affair remains unsettled.

The trustees immediately sent to Colonel Oglethorpe a copy of his Majesty's instructions, and desired that he would consult with Lieutenant Governor Bull, in South Carolina, that plans of proper acts might be prepared and sent over to the trustees for their consideration, in order to answer the purposes of his Majesty's instructions, and that in the meantime the commissioners of South Carolina and the commissioners of Georgia, might proceed in their respective provinces in concert with each other to carry on a mutual trade to the Indians in both provinces.

Mr. Stephens, Secretary in Georgia, having informed the trustees that the grand jury at Savannah claimed a right of administering oaths, and making inquiry thereon into all such matters as they should think fit, and the trustees having perceived that in a representation of the said grand jury they had pretended to such right, sent a letter to Mr. Stephens to acquaint him, that the trustees were sensible great mischiefs might be done by ill-designing men who might procure themselves to be put upon the panel, if this claim of the grand jury was allowed of, and therefore the trustees ordered him to acquaint the people that the grand jury had no such right, and that their claim was entirely illegal.

As the trustees both by their letters and instructions to the magistrates, had constantly exhorted and encouraged the people to a cultivation of their lands on which they were to depend for their support, and as they found that many (as well of those whom they had sent over as objects of charity, as of others who at different times had gone into the colony from other plantations for a temporary maintenance,) still continued in their idleness, and were a burthen upon the trust, they gave orders for striking off the store all such as having had time to cultivate their lands had neglected it. This carried from the colony many of those who had gone thither or joined it from any parts of America to gain a subsistence for a year or two, and of others who had not considered the hardships of attending the first settlement of. a country, and were tired of their labor.