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Our Coast :: Savannah City Guide :: Visiting
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July 4, 2008
03:17 PM | |
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Courtesy of Best Read Guide
When General James Oglethorpe, founder of Savannah, arrived in 1733 he had in mind a plan to create a city around a grid of squares. Wright Square, on Bull Street between President and York, was the second, laid the year that the colony was established. The square originally was named for Lord Viscount Percival, who headed the Trustees that supported the adventure to the New World. However, the square took its permanent name in 1763, in honor of Royal Governor James Wright, a man who took the Savannah stage at a turbulent time in her history.
The governor came to Savannah in 1760 and was met with a mixed response. The records of the time show him to have been an effective and popular governor, but, though he was born on American soil, his first duty was to king and England and he upheld the crown's controversial tax policies. As a result, he drew the ire of Georgia's Liberty Boys, a patriot group that advocated immediate secession from England. The revolutionaries arrested Wright, but he escaped and made his way to England.
Two years later the British took Savannah by force and Wright returned in 1779, only to depart once more when the Americans triumphantly entered Savannah at war's end. Wright is now interred at Westminster Abbey.
If Johnson Square is the banking center of Savannah, then Wright Square is her nexus of government. On the west side of the square is the Federal Courthouse and Post Office. William Aiken designed the building, which was constructed in 1898. Widely considered one of Savannah's grandest structures, it's constructed of Georgia marble (even the curs in front are marble) and is distinguished by a series of arching windows and terra-cotta ornamental flourishes. Its exterior can be seen in such movies as the original Cape Fear and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.
Across the square stands the old Chatham County Courthouse. Constructed in the Romanesque Revival style and completed almost 10 years before the Post Office across the way, it shares certain superficial features with the Federal building. The courthouse boasts arched entryways and windows and has a bell tower. Unlike the Post Office, however, the courthouse is constructed of yellow brick, a feature rarely seen in Savannah.
Next to the old courthouse is the Lutheran Church of the Ascension. The congregation descends from Austrian Salzburgers, who came to Savannah in 1734 to join the colony. Many of them moved northwest and established the town of Ebenezer. Those who stayed prospered under the leadership of the Reverend Johann Bolzius. The current structure was completed in the late 1870s and serves as a legacy to the Salzburgers, who were so diligent, thrifty and temperate that Oglethorpe asked the Trustees to send more to his fledgling colony.
The monument at the center of the square is in honor of William W. Gordon, a former mayor of Savannah, who founded the Central of Georgia Railroad. The railroad, initially stretching from Savannah to Macon, opened a corridor to the interior and Gordon's vision made him a wealthy and celebrated man. The Gordon family remained illustrious. Gordon's son, Willie, served in the Civil War and as a general in the Spanish-American War. Granddaughter Juliet Gordon Low founded the Girl Scouts and the family home, one block south of the square, is now a museum.
Gordon's daughter-in-law, vivacious Chicago socialite Nellie Kinzie Gordon, arranged to have the granite monument to Tomochichi placed in the square. Tomochichi was the chief of Yamacraw Indians who lived on the site when Oglethorpe arrived to establish the colony and he befriended the English. In time, the chief traveled across the Atlantic to be presented to the royal court and it's believed that he was buried in Wright Square.
Many thanks to Roulhac Toledano, author of The National Trust Guide to Savannah, and to Ron Freeman, author of Savannah: People, Places & Events. Their books can be purchased in stores throughout the Historic District.
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