en, grew up the remarkable men who have shed such lustre upon the
State of Georgia.

The great distinguishing feature of these men was that of the masses
of her people--stern honesty. Many families have been and continue to
be remarkable for their superior talents and high character;
preserving in a high degree the prestige of names made famous by
illustrious ancestry. The Crawfords, the Cobbs, and the Lamars are
perhaps the most remarkable.

Thomas W. Cobb, so long distinguished in the councils of the nation,
and as an able and honest jurist in Georgia, was the son of John Cobb,
and grandson of Thomas Cobb, of the County of Columbia, in the State
of Georgia. His grandfather emigrated from Virginia at an early day,
when Georgia was comparatively a wilderness, and selecting this point,
located with a large family, which through his remarkable energy he
reared and respectably educated. This was an achievement, as the
facilities for education were so few and difficult as to make it next
to impossible to educate even tolerably the youth of that day. This
remarkable man lived to see his grandson, Thomas W. Cobb, among the
most distinguished men of the State. He died at the great age of one
hundred and fifteen years, at the home of his selection, in Columbia
County, the patriarch pioneer of the country, surrounded by every
comfort, and a family honoring his name and perpetuating his virtues;
and after he had seen the rude forest give way to the cultivated
field, and the almost as rude population to the cultivated and
intellectual people distinguishing that county.

Thomas W. Cobb, in his education, suffered the penalties imposed in
this particular by a new country; his opportunities, however, were
improved to their greatest possible extent, and he continued to
improve in learning to the day of his death. In boyhood he ploughed by
day, and studied his spelling-book and arithmetic by night--lighting
his vision to the pursuit of knowledge by a pine-knot fire. This
ambition of learning, with close application, soon distinguished him
above the youth of the neighborhood, and lifted his aspirations to an
equal distinction among the first men of the land. He made known his
wishes to his father, and was laughed at; but he was his grandfather's
namesake and pet, and he encouraged his ambition. The consequence was
that young Cobb was sent to the office of William H. Crawford at
Lexington, to read law. He applied himself diligently, a