Ed Jackson and Charles Pou

The University of Georgia

May 14

1729 James Oglethorpe's Gaols [Jails] Committee made its second report, this time dealing with conditions in London's Marshalsea and Westminster prisons. This time, the committee found extortion and cruely as bad as the practices at Fleet Prison detailed in the first report.

1733 James Oglethorpe had Tomochichi accompany him on a visit to Charles Town, S.C. The impressive reception the Yamacraw received was instrumental in Oglethorpe's decision to take Tomochichi to London in 1734.

1733 The British ship James became the first ship to unload at Savannah.

1830 Confederate general George Pierce Doles was born in Milledgeville, Ga., where he became a businessman and captain of Baldwin Blues militia unit. With the outbreak of the Civil War, Doles became a captain in the 4th Georgia, and a colonel by May 1861. He served in the battles of Malvern Hill (where he was wounded), South Mountain, and Sharpsburg. In Nov. 1862, Doles was promoted to brigadier general.

Doles commanded his own brigade in D.H. Hill's Division at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville. His brigade was transferred to Rodes' Divn and served at Gettysburg, Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and Cold Harbor, where he was killed at Bethesada Church, va. on June 2, 1864. His body was returned to Milledgeville, where he was buried in Memory Hill Cemetery.

1862 By General Order No. 1 of Gen. A. R. Lawton, commander of the Military Division of Georgia, Atlanta became a Confederate military post.

For more, see This Week in Georgia Civil War History.

1862 Confederate brigadier general John B. Gordon of Georgia was promoted to major general.

1864 The most intensive fighting of the Battle of Reseca occurred on this day. Click here for a summary of the battle on May 14.

See an enlargement of this color lithograph of the battle.

For more, see This Week in Georgia Civil War History.

1913 The Atlanta Constitution reported that an identification slip had been found in Mary Phagan's pocketbook. It read "My name is Mary Phagan. I live at 146 Lindsey Street, near Bellwood and Asby Streets." Hugh Dorsey, the prosecutor in the case, theorized that Phagan did this either because she had been threatened with violence previously or that she had a premonition of her death. Click here for a detailed accounting of the case.

1952 In the Braves' last season in Boston, pitcher Warren Spahn set a franchise record with 18 strikeouts in one game. However, the record came in a 3-1 loss to the Chicago Cubs in a 15-inning game for Spahn.

1973 In one of the most heinous crimes in Georgia history, three escapees from a Maryland prison, along with one of their brothers, brutally murdered six members of the Alday family in Donalsonville, GA. For more on this case, click here.

1998 Despite a come-from-behind win over the St. Louis Cardinals, the Atlanta Braves were unable to hit a home run, ending their quest for the Major League record of at least one home run in 26 consecutive games. Still, the Braves went into the record book, along with the New York Yankees and Detroit Tigers, as tied for the most consecutive home run games in Major League baseball – 25. Also, the 1998 Braves had established the best season start in the history of the francise.

In Their Own Words on This Day. . .

1785 From London, Jonathan Williams Jr. wrote his friend, Benjamin Franklin, in Philadelphia:

"I dined yesterday at Mr. Paradise's and was very much surprised at the activity & lively conversation of an old military man. He danced about the Room with gaiety, kissed & said pretty things to all the Ladies, & seemed to feel all he said as much as any young man could do. He put me in mind of your cribbidge old Lady when he talked of being an ensign in the Guards in Queen Anns reign. This youthful old gentlemen was General Oglethorpe whom I believe you know. He spoke of you with the strongest marks of esteem."

Source: Amos A. Ettinger, James Edward Oglethorpe: Imperial Idealist (no city listed: Archon Books, 1968), p. 325.

1791 On the third day of his visit to Savannah, Pres. George Washington recorded in his diary:

"Saturday, 14th. A little after 6 o'clock, in Company with Genl. [Lachlin] McIntosh, Genl. [Anthony] Wayne, the Mayor [Thomas Gibbons], and many others (principal Gentle men of the City,) I visited the City, and the attack and defence of it in the year 1779, under the combined forces of France and the United States, commanded by the Count de Estaing and Genl. [Benjamin] Lincoln. To form an opinion of the attack at this distance of time, and the change which has taken place in the appearance of the ground by the cutting away of the woods, etc. is hardly to be done with justice to the subject; especially as there is remaining scarcely any of the defences.

"Dined to day with a number of the Citizens (not less than 200) in an elegant Bower erected for the occcasion on the Bank of the River below the Town. In the evening there was a tolerable good display of fireworks."

Source: John C. Fitzpatrick (ed.), The Diaries of George Washington: 1748-1799 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1925), p. 177.

1796 Perhaps the most infamous episode in early Georgia history was the Yazoo land fraud case. Georgia Senator James Jackson became embroiled in the case, though he stedfastly maintained his innocence. The passions involved in the case are evident in a letter written by Jackson in Savannah to John Milledge, future governor of Georgia:

"Dear Milledge, . . . I am still fired at in the papers – abused in the Coffee houses & furnish Table talk for all Yazoo Scrip holders but I have the People yet with me. Mr. Watkins & myself have had another encounter – he insulted me during the Federal Court & I at him – the people interfered – would have tarred & feathered Watkins if they could have found him. . . . I was too much in a passion this last time & did not manage so well as I did at Louisville – It occasioned however no injury to either – a small scratch on the Face was all I got. . . ."

Source: Harriet Milledge Salley (ed.), Corresppondence of John Milledge, Governor of Georgia, 1802-1806 (The State Commercial Printing Company, Columbia, S.C., 1949), pp. 44-45.

1865 In Rockbridge, Ga., near Lithonia, Thomas Maguire wrote in his journal:

"May 14 – Sunday . . . the family all well and we still have a little to eat. It is said there are more Yankees coming this way. It may be so. I did not get to [church] meeting. I now think I will put away some more corn. If the Yanks should come they will take all I have. If I hide it they may not find it, but if they do I will be no worse off than if I leave it in the crib. . . . What a country we have at the present time! We have nothing that we can call our own. The vile Yankees take everything they please and go where they please. We are a powerless people, but by no means a conquered people. I have lost of yet gaining our independence. . . . "

Source: Franklin Garrett, Atlanta and Environs: A Chronicle of its People and Events (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1954), Vol. I, p. 677.

For more, see This Week in Georgia Civil War History.

1869 Many formerly wealthy southerners faced hard financial times after the Civil War, including Gertrude Clanton Thomas and her husband. The following entry recounts the failure of a store they tried to operate in Augusta:

"Friday, May 14, 1869 . . . I am willing for the children to enjoy themselves and was pleased to have Turner attend the picnic and the party tonight but I shrink from going into town – I am glad that the children having measles will be a good excuse to account for my absence. I would not like them to know the real reason but I wished the ninie days to have passed which people will take to discuss our failure! I was reading the Chronicle yesterday evening – and I read that attention was directed to the sale of glass ware and &c at the store of Thomas and Schaub 'where goods were being sold for half price.' I felt my face flush, and I did not recover from it for some time. . . ."

Source: Virginia Ingraham Burr (ed.), The Secret Eye: The Journal of Ella Gertrude Clanton Thomas, 1848-1889 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990), pp. 314-315.