#134: The Reverend Charles B. King Home on Monterey Square

"I have now finished my story. I am fully aware that what I have written will

bring a pang of sorrow to the heart, as well a blush of shame to the cheek,

of every Presbyterian who reads it. I wish it were otherwise. But the

historian is not expected to make history, but simply to write it."

—Rev. James Stacy (A History of the Presbyterian Church of Georgia—1912)

The Reverend Charles B. King Home on Monterey Square

Born in Georgia in 1823, the Reverend Charles Barrington King settled in Savannah to preach the Gospel as a Presbyterian Clergyman. When James Oglethorpe founded Georgia in 1733, Presbyterians were among the 120 souls aboard the first ship named Anne that sailed up the Savannah River.

To help provide military protection to the fledgling Georgia colony against the Spanish to the south in Florida, three years after he arrived off the bluff in Savannah, Oglethorpe established Fort Frederica on St. Simons Island. The military fort was named after the Prince of Wales, Frederick Louis (1702-1754).

Fort Frederica became the military headquarters for the Georgia colony, located about 60-miles south of Savannah off the Georgia coast. Presbyterians, who emigrated among a large group of Scottish Highlanders, established the town of Darrien, built at the mid-point between Savannah and Fort Frederica. Darrien provided Savannah with a secondary layer of defense against the Spanish.

Charles B. King's grandfather, Roswell King, moved to Darrien when he was fifteen. He became the manager for Major Pierce Butler's rice and cotton plantations on the coastal islands of Georgia. He was responsible for managing thousands of acres of land and overseeing hundreds of enslaved Africans.

Roswell King (1765-1844) later founded Roswell, Georgia's ninth-largest city, and together with his son Barrington King, built the Roswell Manufacturing Company, a successful cotton mill and industrial complex. Barrington King (1798-1866) was buried in the Roswell Presbyterian Church Cemetery. His son, Charles Barrington King, accepted the call to the Presbyterian pulpit in Savannah.

As early as 1755, records exist in Savannah that establish 'there were 43-persons marked as Dissenters from the Church of England and Professors of the doctrines of the Church of Scotland.' Granted land on which to build a church in the city, the Presbyterian’s structure survived until a fire in 1796.

Back in that day, many Presbyterian churches served mainly 'white' members, while several other churches were founded to serve 'colored' parishioners, most of whom were enslaved people.

In this Postcards from Savannah en Plein air series, I have painted two Presbyterian churches: from 1758, The Independent Presbyterian Church on Chippewa Square (see PFS-73), and from 1871, The Butler Memorial Presbyterian Church (see PFS-116). A History of the Presbyterian Church in Georgia by Rev. James Stacy, published in 1912, documents the long story of the onward march of Presbyterian churches across Georgia. As he tells it, the story, told truthfully, was not always a work of pride.

In 1857, The First Presbyterian Church of Savannah began building its house of worship on Monterey Square. With the severe interruption caused by the Civil War, that building remained uncompleted until 1872. The church moved to its current location on Washington Avenue in 1956.

The Reverend Charles B. King Home, located on Monterey Square at 11 West Gordon Street in the Historic District of Savannah, was built in 1858 and designed by John S. Norris, the most famous architect in Savannah in his day.

The Reverend Charles B. King, ordained in 1850, died in 1880 and is buried in Laurel Grove Cemetery.