25 May 2020

Freedom Seeker Cato, and a Bit about Joseph's Town, Georgia

Following from Thursday, 20 June 1765 Georgia Gazette (Savannah). [Note: f changed to s for easier reading.]
RUN AWAY from John Steven's plantation at Josephstown, a NEGROE MAN named CATO, formerly the property of Mr. Nicholas Lawrence. He had on when he went off a blue jacket, is a stout young fellow, and has a scar on his right arm. -- Whoever brings him to George Baillic, Esq. in Savannah, or to the said plantation at Josephstown, shall receive twenty shillings reward.
Joseph's Town was a military outpost designated as such by Oglethorpe, situated a few miles from Savannah. It was once populated by fighting and farming Scottish Highlanders who came to Georgia in 1735. Part of the original Joseph's Town became Mulberry Grove Plantation in the late 1730s. When Georgia lifted its ban on slavery in 1750, this plantation and others like it began to make rice cultivation its focus. As production expanded, so did the number of enslaved people brought on to work it.

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