The Drowning of Rev. Moses Allen

From a prison ship in Charleston, South Carolina

Midway Congregational Church in Liberty County, Georgia

Note: I visited this old church many times. The British destroyed the original church. However, it was rebuilt and stands today. I suggest reading the book “Children of Pride: Letters of Dr. Colcock Jones. These letters reflect the mood of a period in the history of well-educated and literate farmers. If you have heard the expression “keep up your letters,” - the meaning is to not only stay in contact with relatives and friends but to remain educated and well practiced in the lovely colonial writing of the times.

Rev. Moses Allen

Moses Allen was born in Northampton, Massachusetts, on September 14, 1748. He graduated from Princeton College and later became the pastor of the church in Midway, Georgia.<br><br>

The settlement at Midway, Georgia, originated in Massachusetts when Puritans migrated to St. John's Parish from Dorchester, South Carolina, in 1752. The Council of Georgia granted them 31,950 acres of land. They were primarily rice planters and developed a robust agricultural community, added by 1,500 slaves they brought from South Carolina.

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When the British came to Midway in 1778, they destroyed the meeting house and most of the private dwellings.<br><r>

Mr. Allen, the chaplain of the Georgia brigade, went to Savannah, where he was taken as a prisoner onboard a prison ship in Charleston, South Carolina. The cruelties of the British Army included starvation, beatings, and locking in chains. <br><br>

Allen attempted an escape by swimming to the shore and drowned on February 8, 1779. It was a chance that many prisoners of the Revolutionary War were willing to risk!

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Source: The Sages and Heroes of the American Revolution by L. Carroll Judson; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midway,_Georgia; https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/91429734/moses-allen; https://www.amazon.com/Children-Pride-Selected-1860-1868-Abridged/dp/0300040539

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