ut the lower house gave to its address a tone
of independence that was not at all pleasing to the King's officer. He
showed his displeasure, and placed a serious obstacle in the way of the
Liberty Boys by adjourning the General Assembly until the 9th of the
following May. The Assembly had met on the 18th of January, and was
adjourned on the 10th of February; so that the Liberty Boys, who made up
a majority of the lower house, had no time to appoint delegates to the
Philadelphia congress soon to be held, nor to take any official action
in behalf of the independence of Georgia.

Governor Wright's plans were certainly very shrewdly laid. His
adjournment of the General Assembly not only hampered the Provincial
Congress (or convention) that had met at Savannah simultaneously with
the legislature, but threw the delegates into confusion and disorder,
and was the means of causing the convention to adjourn without taking
such action as the friends of liberty hoped for. All that it did was
to elect three representatives to the Philadelphia congress. This
was something, but it was not enough. The Liberty Boys expected
the Provincial Convention to adopt all the measures and resolutions
suggested by the Continental Congress. They therefore felt mortified
when the convention adjourned, and left Georgia still outside the
continental association.

This event was a serious embarrassment to the other Colonies, and
aroused the anger of those friends of liberty who were unable to
understand the peculiar conditions that surrounded the movement for
independence in Georgia. The friends of liberty in South Carolina were
so indignant, that they denounced the Georgians "as unworthy the
rights of freemen, and as inimical to the liberties of their country."
Throughout the Colonies, the partisans of American independence were
deeply wounded by the apparent hesitation of the Georgians, while the
Royalists were delighted.

Though the Provincial Convention remained in session only seven days
before adjourning, the delegates of St. John's Parish had withdrawn from
the body. These delegates insisted on an emphatic indorsement of the
acts of the Continental Congress, and they retired as soon as they
found there would be some difficulty in bringing some of the hesitating
members to their way of thinking. They retired, and selected Dr. Lyman
Hall to represent St. John's in the Philadelphia congress. He took his
seat in that body, and although he cast no