The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1904-09-23
THE GEORGIA CRACKER"
His Alleged Unsavory Origin.
The Influence Of Environ
ment and Geographical Posi-
~tion---Wnmington Light In
fantry.
For The Messenger.

E0E "a 14CScIASeA
few days ago a very interesting
~.r,tc,s ,.ppeared in the Wilmington
Messenger, disSpssing the a~nteceden-s
of tie Georgia "Cracker,' suggested
by the recent brutal lynching at states
boro. He Is charged with being q lin
cal descendant OF some very bad peo-
pie, who were dumped on these shores
from the CromwelIian civil war even
UP tc the reign OF William III.-5ail
birds. expatriated law breakers. brok-
IN down c~haplains and attorneys. and
needy adventures. many of whom are
credited to old Gen. O~glethorpe's cole
nization schemes. Their descendants.
and occupy the poor lands Of Georgia
today. The following Is an extract
from The Messengers article:
The S~tatesboro tragedy has slim
ulated discussion Of that peculiar eie-
ment of the southern population wide
ly known TO fame as crackers" A
writer in the Boston Transcript makes
a notable contribution to the Sympo-
STUN p~icturing Very fairly on the whole
the virtues and vices of the cracker"
but. in opinion, extending the ap-
plication Of that title too far. Moreover
h Picture is vastly overlaid with TO-
mance and Imagination. AS a matter
Of fact. the term cracker" was origi-
nallv applied by the southerner, who
invented ii, to the low class which
inhabited the sand hills OF South Caro-
lima, Georgia and Florida, whereas the
corresponding class. inhabiting the
highlands of North Carolina, Tennes-
q ~ Nfr0tnino 4n1 KanttrNEv u-nfa
almost invariably called mountaineers.'
No doubt, excepting some few and
comparatively Insignificant instances
they have a common origin, to wit:
The criminals first sent over here by
the London Company. by Oglethorpe
and other pioneers OF English occupa-
tibn."
There Is something in his and the
points are We'll put; but 1 cannot help
thinking that the accident of ~geograph-
zeal position has no little to do with
the difference between the Georgian,
yes, and the North and South Caro-
linian, of the hills and their compa-
triots of the lowlands and the coast.
While the lowlanders of Scotland were
learning the classics and the humani-
ties in the high schools of Edinburg.
and Glasgow, and Aberdeen. and were
plying a lucrative with the
rest of the world in the produce of their
labor and h finished material Of their
manufacture, their brethren of the
highlands were living in semi-barba-
rism. The followers OF Cluny Nc
Pherson, and Ich Ian Fergus McIver.
and Rob Roy McGregor levied tributa
to the farms and standings of
the valleys with the capacity
of the rowing Bedoins of
the desert, and BLACK" Colin Camp
bell. before he donned the scarlet uni
form of George III was as arrant a
cattle ~''lifter" as the worst of them.
The Massacre of Glencoe in the last
part of the seventeenth century, n
black stain on the reign of William II.
and a cruel, cold deliberately planned
crime on the part of James Dalrymple,
grew directly out Of uncomfortable High
land savagery. lawlessness and vio-
lence.
Even as late as the middle Of the
reign of George III the highlands of
Scotland were to the average n
owner, the land Of fable broken by
fearful precipices and hideous abysses:
upheaved by rugged and impossible
mountains, yelled in fog and mist; peo-
pied by implacable savages, trained to
theft and Injured to murder. But CIV
ilization was more powerful than the
barriers of mountain and chasm and
enlightenment of the past century and
a half shed its radiance through the
dark and gloomy passes of the high
lands. made the locks to glisten hke
mirrors Of FURNISHED silver, and strip
ped from the SUBMITS Of the lofty
hills their unsightly night-caps of fog
and mist.
Perhaps it has lost as the land of
rude romance, aye, and of deep TRACE
dy. There are no Flora McIvers and
Rose Bradwardines to turn the head OF
an impressionable and vaccillating Wa
verify: no Alice Bean to set out a syl-
van breakfast by a brawling stream.
| But neither is there a widows son 20
| shoot his comrade-in-arms down or
| his own threshold, or a Robin dig to
plunge his knife to the heart of "a
| friend in the village ale house. The
Highlands of Scotland are now the
| paradise of the tourist. which seem to
outvie all the rest Of the world in
showing how incomparably beautiful
God. with his handmade. nature, can
make the earth. 1t is very doubtful
that Nichol Jarvis could now find a
'fClachan OF Aberfoil," from John
| O'Groat's to Lands End" p
And So it has been in the past.
though in less degree with two pop
ulations in the sout hs~eparated by q
sharp line OF geographical demarka-
ton. This, 1t must be remembered.
counting by the g OF the rest of the
world. Is still a new country; but the
time Is coming, and coming rapidly,
When the crackers OF hweSte
Georgia and the "mountaineers" OF
western North and South Carolina will
be as up TO date, as up TO snuff," as
their lowand enighbors woh have for
them a covert sneer.
During the Civil war I served in a
command which had in its ranks SOL
diers from the coast Of North Carroll
ma TO Wautauga county. n the west
ern men were as different from tn
eastern men as the northerner is from
the southerner. A private from Edge
comb county brought TO the field with
him his beautiful coal black horse,
with a skin like satin, and a body-ser-
ant TO groorn the horse, n wait On
h master. Another had a casket,
protected by a chamois sheath, TO KEEP
his jewelry in All these east CaroIina
soldiers had extra suits Of clothes &c
go visiting in and the command would
not more than get into camp before
they were paying their devoirs TO al