#10: Savannah's City Hall
“For me, Savannah’s resistance to change was its saving grace. The city looked inward, sealed off from the noises and distractions of the world at large. It grew inward, too, and in such a way that its people flourished as hothouse plants tended by an indulgent gardener. The ordinary became extraordinary. Eccentrics thrived. Every nuance and quirk of personality achieved greater brilliance in that lush enclosure than would have been possible anywhere else in the world.”
—John Berendt
Savannah’s City Hall
Today, Atlanta is the capital of Georgia. But when Georgia joined with twelve other colonies in declaring independence from Great Britain, Atlanta did not yet exist.
When James Oglethorpe arrived in Savannah in 1733 to establish the Georgia Colony, the trustees were in charge of colonial governance. Around 1736, Savannah became the de facto capital of Georgia. But only when General Oglethorpe returned to England for good in 1743 did the trustees finally designate a ‘president’ of the colony, a man named William Stevens of Savannah.
In 1754, Georgia transitioned from its trusteeship to a Royal Colony and at last, Savannah was ‘officially’ designated as the seat of the colonial government in Georgia.
Eventually, Savannah became the center of an active movement in Georgia when its citizens demanded independence from Great Britain. The revolutionary government of Georgia operated from Savannah at the time of its statehood in 1776, and Savannah remained the state’s seat of government.
However, during the American Revolutionary War, Savannah fell to British forces just after Christmas Day in 1778. The British would occupy the city until independence was achieved by the colonies. The Second Battle of Savannah in 1779 was a valiant effort by American colonial troops, joined by 500 recruits (mostly soldiers of color) from Saint-Domingue, the French colony which later would become Haiti. The attack failed. The legislative assembly moved to Augusta during the occupation and later was forced several times to flee to other areas of Georgia during the revolutionary war years.
I painted City Hall while standing at the northern end of Johnson Square. Directly behind me looms the centerpiece of the square, a large stone pillar monument in honor of Revolutionary War hero General Nathanial Greene, who had been awarded the nearby Mulberry Plantation as a special gift for his valued military service. His remains, along with those of George Washington Greene, his son, are interred beneath the monument.
French Aristocrat and military officer, Marquis de Lafayette, a hero at the decisive Battle of Yorktown, came to Savannah and laid the cornerstone of this monument during his 1825 visit to the city.
The City Hall building marks the end of Bull Street where it intersects with Bay Street. The beautiful building was completed in 1906 and was designed by Hyman Witcover. The dome is gold-leafed; but that work was done only in 1987, which replaced a copper crown, painted in fairly bland patina-green. The cyclops-like clock is a gorgeous touch of craftsmanship.
As always, time marches on in this beautiful city of Savannah; but change — as John Berendt has so elegantly suggested — remains thankfully slow.
Luba’s Savannah City Hall painting in progress.
