ar of 1812 the island was taken, and the slaves were offered their
freedom by Admiral Cockburn; but such was their attachment to the place
and their masters that but one availed himself of this opportunity to
escape. At Point Peter, where the main land of Georgia terminates in
the marshes of St. Mary's, a fight occurred, and there are yet the
remains of an earthwork thrown up by the Americans to repulse the
British fleet in its advance on St. Mary's.

The oldest inhabitant of St. Mary's, who is said to have scored a
century, old "Daddy Paddy"--a negro who bears in his face the tattooing
of his native Africa--participated in that fight. He lives in a little
cabin on a street by the wharf, and devotes his time to fishing, at
which he is very expert. Upon being questioned regarding the fight, he
seemed rather hazy as to dates, but was positive as to the time he first
saw America: "De wah ob de rebenue was jes' clar' peace when I land at
Charleston from Afriky. Was young man den, jes' growd. No, sah, nebah
saw Gin'l Wash'tun, but heah ob him, sah: he fout wid de British, sah,
an' gain de vic'try at New Orleans, sah."

"That was General Jackson, uncle."

"No, sah! Gin'l Jackson mout ha' ben thar, but Gin'l Wash'tun, he hab a
han' in it. Yes, sah, I'se de fust settlah, sah: was in St. Mary's afo'
a street was laid out [in 1787], an' 'twas all bay-gall an' hammock."

The Indian name of Cumberland Island was Missoe ("beautiful land"), and
this was changed when Oglethorpe visited the island, at the request of
an Indian chief who had received some kindness from the duke of
Cumberland. It is related in an old English record, of which I have seen
a copy, that the duke was so well pleased at this evidence of good-will
that he caused a hunting-lodge to be erected there, and named it
Dungeness, after his country-seat, Castle Dungeness, on the cape of
Dungeness in the county of Kent. From that time until the breaking out
of the Revolution it was "owned successively by peers of the British
realm."

The island is eighteen miles in length and from half a mile to three
miles in breadth. The soil is sandy, adapted to the culture of cotton,
corn, potatoes, etc.: pomegranates, olives, dates, figs, limes, lemons,
oranges and melons yield abundant crops. The great frost of 1835, which
extended over the entire peninsula of Florida, destroyed the fine groves
of orange trees: at one time this fruit was shipped in schooner-loads,
and from one