Revolutionary War: What happened to George McIntosh

General McIntosh ordered his friend, Colonel Habersham, to arrest the recruiting officer who had been detailed by the governor to take the prisoner, George McIntosh, to Philadelphia to trial. The general's orders were carried out summarily in defiance of the state authority. Governor Treutlen moved and designated a militia colonel to seize George McIntosh and take him to Philadelphia. The order, however, came too late. The younger McIntosh had already escaped and fled to the McIntosh strongholds in the swamps along the Georgia coast (Darien). There, on his own estate, he sat with his back to a tree and wrote letters that tell of his plight. His house had been burned, barns and out buildings destroyed, and his Negro slaves had been confiscated and sold. "They have taken possession of my estate", he wrote, "destroyed my crops, by turning their horses on them, killed and driven off my stock, of every kind, broken open my house, barn and cellar, plundered and carried off everything of value they could find, wantonly committing every act of waste and destruction." This letter was dated July 3. Two days later, he wrote: "I am just informed (that) one of my most trusty Negroes, on my indigo place, has been cruelly whipped, until he died in the rope, because he would not tell my hiding place." He added, "Excuse this handwriting, for it is done on my knee, and under a tree in the woods." Eventually George McIntosh was lured from his hiding place and taken to Philadelphia. Several committees were appointed to investigate the charges, and with insufficient evidence, released him to return home to the ruins of his plantation and start all over again.

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