The Trans-Oconee Republic was a short-lived, independent state west of the
Oconee River
The Oconee River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map Accessed April 21, 2011 river in the U.S. state of Georgia. Its origin is in Hall County and it terminates where it join ...
(in the state of
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States
Georgia may also refer to:
People and fictional characters
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). Established by General Elijah Clarke in May 1794, it was an attempt to head off the new
Federal government
A federation (also called a federal state) is an entity characterized by a political union, union of partially federated state, self-governing provinces, states, or other regions under a #Federal governments, federal government (federalism) ...
's ceding of lands claimed by Georgia back to the Creek. In September 1794, state and federal troops forced Clarke and his followers to surrender and leave the settlements. The armed forces destroyed the houses and forts.
Background
In February 1794, General Elijah Clarke, a popular veteran of the
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which Am ...
, resigned his current commission in the Georgia
state militia
A militia ( ) is a military or paramilitary force that comprises civilian members, as opposed to a professional standing army of regular, full-time military personnel. Militias may be raised in times of need to support regular troops or serve ...
in order to lead an expedition against the East Florida colony. Clarke had become involved in a French-supported scheme to invade East Florida, which was then controlled by the
Kingdom of Spain
Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...
.
When the invasion failed to develop, General Clarke and several hundred of his followers moved instead to establish an independent state west of the Oconee River —on hunting grounds reserved by the federal Treaty of New York (1790) exclusively for the
Creek Indians
The Muscogee, also known as the Mvskoke, Muscogee Creek or just Creek, and the Muscogee Creek Confederacy ( in the Muscogee language; English: ), are a group of related Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern WoodlandsGeorge R. Lamplugh, ''Politics on the Periphery: Factions and Parties in Georgia, 1783-1806'' Newark, University of Delaware Press, 1986, pp. 64-68, accessed 19 Nov 2010
Clarke's
frontier
A frontier is a political and geographical term referring to areas near or beyond a boundary.
Australia
The term "frontier" was frequently used in colonial Australia in the meaning of country that borders the unknown or uncivilised, th ...
smen made settlements on lands in present-day Greene,
Morgan
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* ...
Baldwin
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* Baldwin, York Regional Municipality, Ontario
* Baldwin, Ontario, in Sudbury District
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counties of Georgia. The settlers built several towns and forts over the next few months. They also wrote and ratified their own constitution, indicating the permanent intention of their endeavor. With little overt opposition from the Creek, they were taking control of the lands before the state or federal governments could react.
Conflict with the Federal government
The United States government viewed Clarke's actions as a violation of the Treaty of New York, which provided recognition of Creek lands in an effort to maintain peace and guarantee their neutrality. President
George Washington
George Washington (, 1799) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. As commander of the Continental Army, Washington led Patriot (American Revoluti ...
pressured the Georgia Governor, George Mathews, to remove the illegal settlers from the Creek lands. Mathews initially ignored the "unauthorized military expedition," because he shared the state's resentment of the treaty and was well aware of Clarke's popularity as a hero of the Revolution. He took only token measures to stop Clarke and his party, such as issuing a proclamation in July 1794 that went unenforced. It is unlikely that Mathews had enough public support to move against Clarke at that juncture, but the tide of public opinion eventually changed.
In late August, Judge
George Walton
George Walton ( – February 2, 1804) was a Founding Father of the United States who signed the United States Declaration of Independence while representing Georgia in the Continental Congress. Walton also served briefly as the second chief ex ...
issued a charge to an Augusta grand jury in which he condemned the actions of Clarke and his followers, and explained that they constituted a threat to the state and federal powers. He said Clarke and his followers were attempting to steal the western lands, "the richest jewel the state of Georgia possesses," before other Georgians had a fair chance to acquire title to them by legal state action. (Clarke had welcomed settlers to join the enterprise, intending to take control of the land from the Creek before the state and federal government could react. He had forbidden issuing large tracts of the land in the new republic to speculators or other investors who would not settle there.) In any case, Walton's charges changed public opinion to a degree that allowed the Governor to muster a sufficient force of militia to march against Clarke.
In September, 1,200 Georgia militiamen, led by General
Jared Irwin
Jared Irwin (1750 – March 1, 1818) served twice as elected Governor of Georgia (1796–1798) and (1806–1809). He first was elected to office as a reformer based on public outrage about the Yazoo land scandal. He signed a bill that nullifi ...
acting in conjunction with federal troops stationed on the Oconee, surrounded and isolated General Clarke's fortifications. After some negotiation, Clarke agreed to surrender, provided that he and his men would not face prosecution for their actions. Clarke and his followers departed, and the militia burned down the new settlements and fortifications.
Legacy
Clarke's establishment of the illegal settlements coincided with increasing interest in the state in the disposition of Georgia's western land claims, which at that time stretched as far as the
Mississippi River
The Mississippi River is the main stem, primary river of the largest drainage basin in the United States. It is the second-longest river in the United States, behind only the Missouri River, Missouri. From its traditional source of Lake Ita ...
. From 1785 on, speculators from other states had lobbied hard to encourage the sale of lands and extinguish Creek and other Indian land claims, despite their guarantee by federal treaty.
In late 1794, the Georgia General Assembly passed a bill allowing a portion of the lands west of the Oconee River, the same land which Clarke's followers had recently occupied, to be distributed among veterans of the Revolution and various Indian conflicts. A supplementary act (the Yazoo Act) attached to the bill provided for the sale of of western land to four private land speculation firms: the Georgia Company, the Georgia-Mississippi Company, the Upper Mississippi Company, and the new Tennessee Company, persuaded the Georgia state assembly to sell more than . As many of the firms' members included many political insiders, the whole enterprise was scandalous and came to be known as the Yazoo Land Fraud.
References
Further reading
* Edwin Bridges, "To Establish a Separate and Independent Government," ''Furman Review'' 5 (1974): 11-17.
* Edward J.Cashin, ''The King's Ranger: Thomas Brown and the American Revolution on the Southern Frontier'', Fordham University Press, 1999
* Louise Frederick Hays, ''Hero of Hornet's Nest: A Biography of Elijah Clark, 1733 to 1799'' (New York: Stratford House, 1946).
George R. Lamplugh, ''Politics on the Periphery: Factions and Parties in Georgia, 1783-1806'' Newark, University of Delaware Press, 1986
* Richard K. Murdoch, ''The Georgia-Florida Frontier, 1793-1796: Spanish Reaction to French Intrigue and American Designs'' (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1951).