St. Simons, Georgia
St. Simons Island is a barrier island and census-designated place located on St. Simons Island in Glynn County, Georgia, United States. The names of the community and the island are interchangeable, known simply as "St. Simons Island" or "SSI", or locally as "The Island". St. Simons is part of the Brunswick metropolitan statistical area, and according to the 2020 U.S. census, the CDP had a population of 14,982. Located on the southeast Georgia coast, midway between Savannah and Jacksonville, St. Simons Island is both a seaside resort and residential community. It is the largest of Georgia's Golden Isles. Visitors are drawn to the Island for its warm climate, beaches, variety of outdoor activities, shops and restaurants, historical sites, and natural environment.
In addition to its base of permanent residents, the island enjoys an influx of visitors and part-time residents throughout the year. The 2010 census noted that 26.8% of total housing units were for "seasonal, recreational, or occasional use". The vast majority of commercial and residential development is located on the southern half of the island. Much of the northern half remains marsh or woodland. A large tract of land in the northeast has been converted to a nature preserve containing trails, historical ruins, and an undisturbed maritime forest. The tract, Cannon's Point Preserve, is open to the public on specified days and hours.
Originally inhabited by the Muscogee, the Spanish, British and French contested the area of South Georgia which included St. Simons Island. After establishing the Province of Georgia in 1732, Anglo-American colonists established rice and cotton plantations worked by African slaves, who created the unique Gullah culture that survives to this day. The primary mode of travel to the island is by automobile via F.J. Torras Causeway. Malcolm McKinnon Airport serves general aviation on the island.
History
Pre-European contact
Cannon's Point, on the north end of St.Simons Island, is an archaeological site that includes a Late Archaic shell ring. The Cannon's Point site has yielded evidence of occupation by Native Americans since at least as early as the appearance of ceramics in the southeastern United States. Milanich lists the succession of periods at Cannon's Point as: Sapelo Period ; ceramics related to those of the Stallings culture of the Savannah River valley and Orange period of northern Florida; Refuge Period ; Deptford Periods ; Wilmington Period ; St. Catherine's Period ; Savannah Periods ; Pine Harbor Period, where European artifacts appear in the archaeological record in this period; and Sutherland Bluff Period, where Native American occupation of Cannon's Point seems to have ended during this period.Many scholars in the early 20th century identified the people of St.Simons Island as Guale. Hann cites evidence that the people of St.Simons, at least as early as 1580, were part of the Mocama people. Ashley et al. suggest that St.Simons may have been occupied by the Guale people when Europeans arrived in southeastern Georgia in the 16th century and that the original Guale population on St.Simons was displaced from at least the southern part of the island after the Guale rebellion of 1597, and replaced by Timucua speaking Mocama people.
Spanish mission of San Buenaventura de Guadalquini
The mission of San Buenaventura de Guadalquini was established on the southern end of St. Simons sometime between 1597 and 1609 and was the northernmost mission in the Mocama area. The Timucua language name for St. Simon's Island was Guadalquini. The Spanish called it Isla de Ballenas. Some Spanish documents called the island.Raiders from the Chichimecos, Uchise, and Chiluque and possibly other nations, aided and supported by the English in the Province of Carolina, attacked Colon a village of un-Christianized Yamasee to the north of San Buenaventura on St. Simon Island, in 1680. A force of Spanish soldiers and Native Americans from San Buenaventura went to the aid of Colon, forcing the raiders to withdraw.
In 1683, St. Augustine was attacked by a pirate fleet, and in 1684 missions along what is now the Georgia coast were attacked by Native American allies of the English. The mission of San Buenaventura was ordered to move south and merge with the mission of San Juan del Puerto on the St. Johns River. Before the mission could be moved, pirates returned to the area in the second half of 1684. On hearing of the presence of the pirates, Lorenzo de Santiago, chief of San Buenaventura, moved the people of his village, along with most of their property and stored maize, to the mainland. When the pirates landed at San Buenaventura, they found only ten men under a sub-chief who had been left to guard the village. The San Buenaventura men withdrew to the woods, and the pirates burned the village and mission. After the pirates burned the mission, the people of Guadalquini moved to a site about one league west of San Juan del Puerto on the St. Johns River, where a new mission named Santa Cruz de Guadalquini was established.
Fort Frederica
Fort Frederica, now Fort Frederica National Monument, was built beginning in 1736 as the military headquarters of the Province of Georgia during the early English colonial period. It served as a buffer against Spanish incursion from Florida.Nearby is the site of the Battle of Gully Hole Creek and Battle of Bloody Marsh, where on July 7, 1742, the British ambushed Spanish troops marching single file through the marsh and routed them from the island. This marked the end of the Spanish efforts to invade Georgia during the War of Jenkins' Ear.
It was preserved in the 20th century and identified as a national historic site largely by the efforts of Margaret Davis Cates, a resident who contributed much to historic preservation. She helped raise more than $100,000 in 1941 to buy the site of the fort and conduct stabilization and some preservation. It was designated as a National Monument in 1947.
Wesley brothers
In the 1730s, St. Simons served as a sometime home to John Wesley, the young minister of the colony at Savannah. He later returned to England, where in 1738, he founded the evangelical movement of Methodism within the Anglican Church. Wesley performed missionary work at St. Simons but was despondent about failing to bring about conversions.. In the 1730s, John Wesley's brother Charles Wesley also did missionary work on St. Simons. In the late eighteenth century, Methodist preachers traveled throughout Georgia as part of the Great Awakening, a religious revival movement led by Methodists and Baptists. A significant impact of the revival was to convert enslaved African-Americans in Georgia to Christianity.On April 5, 1987, fifty-five St. Simons United Methodist Church members were commissioned, with Bishop Frank Robertson as the first pastor, to begin a new church on the north end of St. Simons Island. This was where John and Charles Wesley had preached and ministered to the people at Fort Frederica. The new church was named Wesley United Methodist Church at Frederica.
American Revolution
In 1778 Colonel Samuel Elbert commanded Georgia's Continental Army and Navy. On April 15, he learned that four British vessels from East Florida were sailing in St. Simons Sound. Elbert commanded about 360 troops from the Georgia Continental Battalions at Fort Howe to march to Darien, Georgia. There they boarded three Georgia Navy galleys: Washington, commanded by Captain John Hardy; Lee, commanded by Captain John Cutler Braddock; and Bulloch, commanded by Captain Archibald Hatcher.On April 18, they entered Frederica River and anchored about from Fort Frederica. The next day the galleys attacked the British vessels. The Colonial ships were armed with heavier cannons than the British, and the galleys also had a shallow draft and could be rowed. When the wind died down, the British ships had difficulty maneuvering in the restricted waters of the river and sound. Two British ships ran aground, and the crews escaped to their other ships. The battle showed the effectiveness of the galleys in restricted waters over ships designed for the open sea. The victory in the Frederica naval action boosted the morale of the colonials in Georgia.
Cotton production
During the plantation era, Saint Simons became a center of cotton production, known for its long-fiber Sea Island Cotton. Nearly the entire island was cleared of trees to make way for several large cotton plantations worked by enslaved Geechee people and their descendants. The plantations of this and other Sea Islands were large, and often the owners stayed on the mainland in Darien and other towns, especially during the summers, because the Island was considered swamp lands. Still, enslaved Geechee people lived on the island and were not allowed to come to the mainland unless accompanied by an enslaver. This season was considered bad for diseases in the lowlands. These enslaved people were held in smaller groups and interacted more with whites. They were also confused with the Gullah tribe from South Carolina. An original slave cabin still stands at the intersection of Demere Rd. and Frederica Rd. at the roundabout.American Civil War and its aftermath
During the early stages of the war, Confederate troops occupied St. Simons Island to protect its strategic location at the entrance to Brunswick harbor. However, in 1862, Robert E. Lee ordered an evacuation of the island to relocate the soldiers for the defense of Savannah, Georgia. Before departing, they destroyed the lighthouse to prevent its use as a navigation aid by U.S. Navy forces. Most property owners then retreated inland with the people they enslaved, and the U.S. Army occupied the island for the remainder of the war.Postwar, the island plantations were in ruins, and landowners found it financially unfeasible to cultivate cotton or rice. Most moved inland to pursue other occupations, and the island's economy remained dormant for several years. Formerly enslaved people established a community in the center of the island known as Harrington.