By Dr. Charles Pendley
Contributing Writer
Part one of this column was published in the June 16, 2021 edition.
The religious revival that swept across early America known as the Second Great Awakening was felt in Henry County too. In 1831, 100 1/4 acres of land was purchased by the Trustees of the Methodist Campmeeting Ground for $280.00.
Annual camp meetings lasted a week or longer, featuring sermons, singing, and close fellowship. Soul-winning and conversions were among the primary functions of the camp meetings, which stimulated several moral movements, including temperance and missionary societies. This campground later became known as “Shingleroof” when the primitive brush arbor was replaced by a covered pavilion, and small family cottages known as “tents” with roofs of wooden shingles.
By 1850, the county could boast of at least 30 churches, with the main denominations being Missionary Baptists, Primitive Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, and a few others. The number of taverns, grog shops, and stills is not known, but is expected to at least rival the number of churches. Some churches in the county expelled members for such offenses as public drunkenness, gambling, lax morals, domestic violence, and failure to support their wives and children.
By the late 1850s, divisive national and state politics over the question of slavery had begun to infect public sentiments in the county. Throughout much of the 1850s, most Georgians, and it can be assumed that most white residents of Henry County, either supported the Union or were apathetic toward the question of slavery. However, during the late 1850s, national and state politics became more divided, as represented by the positions of the Democratic and Republican parties.
In the last presidential election in 1860 before the outbreak of the Civil War, 1,235 (mainly white) males voted in Henry County. John Bell of the Constitutional Union Party, which was against seceding from the union because of slavery, received the largest number (53.3%) of the vote in the county, while the Southern Democratic Party received 42.3%. Stephen Douglas, of the national Democratic Party, received only 5.4 per cent of the vote. The Republican Party’s candidate, Abraham Lincoln, was not on the ballot.
Joseph Brown, a “progressive Southern Rights Democrat” from north Georgia, was elected governor in 1857 and served four terms until 1865. “Joe” Brown was an enthusiastic believer in and promoter of states’ rights, and influenced the state legislature to follow South Carolina to secede from the Union. He undertook recruiting drives to strengthen Georgia’s militia, and in early 1861, several military units were formed in Henry County, among which were the “Weems Guards” and “Zachry Rangers,” who drilled at Shingleroof Campground.
On January 2, 1861, Governor Brown ordered state troops to seize the lightly manned federal Fort Pulaski at the entrance to Savannah Harbor. Thus the die was cast for civil war. The next fateful chapter in Henry County’s history had begun.
