Last ship of slaves landed on Jekyll

As Black History Month dawns I am reminded the past is full of things some would rather not talk about. Like slavery. If history is full of terrible things, it’s practically overflowing with terrible people.

One such person was Charles Augustus Lafayette Lamar, from Savannah.

In the late 1850s, Lamar joined forces with another awful human being, Charleston ship captain William C. Corrie, to import slaves from Africa, according to historical documents.

Federal law had prohibited importing slaves since 1808, but laws do little to deter those of a piratical nature.

Lamar and Corrie, like pirates, had a ship. A really nice ship.

The Wanderer, a 100-plus-foot luxury racing yacht was purchased by Corrie, with assistance from Lamar, in 1858, just a year after it had been built in New York. Newspapers at the time said the ship was so fast it might challenge America, the first winner of the America’s Cup sailing trophy.

Lamar, inspired by the “fire-eaters,” a group of pro-slavery extremists in the South, sought to reopen the international slave trade. He owned a cotton plantation and was a director of both a railroad company and a bank.

His uncle had been a president of Texas when it was a country. His cousin was a U.S. Senator and later a Supreme Court Justice. His aunt was the wife of a U.S. Treasury Secretary. His father was one of the wealthiest people in Savannah and had an office on Wall Street in New York City.

Unfortunately, with all his gifts, Lamar chose to finance America’s last documented slave ship.

Corrie converted the interior of the posh schooner to hold the maximum number of chained humans. Then, in October of 1858, he sailed 30 miles up the Congo River in west Africa and took on 490 people as cargo.

During the six-week voyage back to Georgia, almost 100 people died. On November 28, 1858, The Wanderer dumped 409 slaves ashore on Georgia’s Jekyll Island. Lamar shipped his cargo to legal domestic slave markets in Savannah, Augusta, South Carolina and Florida. Word soon spread of the Wanderer slaves. Southern politicians used the incident to demand an end to the ban of the Atlantic slave trade. Lamar and his business partners stood trial in federal court several times. But no jury would convict them.

Soon, the question of slavery was settled by the Civil War.

Lamar fought for the Confederacy and died after refusing to surrender.

The only physical reminder of this sad story is a small monument tucked off the road on the southwest corner of Jekyll Island.

The Wanderer Monument evokes the lines of sailing ships emanating from the Georgia soil. It is subtle, graceful. Like memory, it has the power to touch those who reflect upon it.

County employees in line for pay hikes

The way’s been cleared for Forsyth County employees to get merit pay increases averaging 5 percent.

While the increase was included in the 2017 budget process, the Board of Commissioners recently approved transferring the needed money into departmental and office budget lines now that a budget analysis has been done and exact amounts are known. Total cost of raises comes to $3,056,294 for Forsyth County employees and another $190,858 for county library system personnel.