Randolph Mott

Last updated
Randolph Lawler Mott
RLMott.jpg
from The Last Battle of the Civil War, 1915
Born(1799-08-09)August 9, 1799
Fauquier, Co., Virginia
Died(1881-07-19)July 19, 1881
SpouseMary Jeter

Randolph Lawler Mott (1799-1881) was an American businessman and Union sympathizer of Columbus, Georgia.

A native of Fauquier Co., Virginia, Mott was born on August 9, 1799. [1] He was the son of William Mott and Sally Lawler. Mott apprenticed as a tailor and pursued that occupation when he left Virginia for Georgia in 1819. He settled first in Augusta before relocating to Milledgeville.  Mott married Mary Jeter in 1821 in Milledgeville and entered a business partnership with John Mustain. Mustain married Mott's sister-in-law Julia Jeter in Macon in 1833.

Mott and Mustain operated a variety of business ventures including the Washington Hall hotel and a stagecoach line between Augusta and Montgomery via Macon. [1] The partners moved to Columbus Georgia in 1843 and expanded into railroads, mills and real estate. Mustain was elected to the Georgia Legislature two years later and Mott took over the operations of their business. Mott was elected to the Georgia State Legislature himself in 1857. [2] Mott also had a plantation in Russell County, Alabama.

Mott was indicted in 1859 for “holding an African negro boy” in the Wanderer Affair. [3] He had acquired one of the last African slaves imported into the United States from Charles Augustus Lafayette Lamar who brought him from Africa aboard his ship Wanderer. That slave was later identified as Frank Bambush. [4]

After the Union Army captured the city in the Battle of Columbus on April 16, 1865, Union General James Harrison Wilson commandeered the Mott house for his headquarters. Mott was a slave owner but claimed that his property had never left the union. [5] He said that he flew the American flag inside the home throughout the war. [6]

Despite his age, Mott remained active in both civic and business affairs after the war. He was a trustee of both the Milledgeville insane asylum and the Columbus Freedman's Bureau as well as mayor pro tem of that city.

Mott died on July 19, 1881, at a railroad station in Atlanta. [1] Graphic details of his death appeared in papers around Georgia after he fell under the wheels of a train while trying to get home from Atlanta. [7]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eufaula, Alabama</span> City in Alabama, United States

Eufaula is the largest city in Barbour County, Alabama, United States. As of the 2010 census the city's population was 13,137.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Milledgeville, Georgia</span> City in Georgia, United States

Milledgeville is a city in and the county seat of Baldwin County in the U.S. state of Georgia. It is northeast of Macon and bordered on the east by the Oconee River. The rapid current of the river here made this an attractive location to build a city. It was the capital of Georgia from 1804 to 1868, including during the American Civil War. Milledgeville was preceded as the capital city by Louisville and was succeeded by Atlanta, the current capital. Today U.S. Highway 441 connects Milledgeville to Madison, Athens, and Dublin.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Herschel V. Johnson</span> American politician

Herschel Vespasian Johnson was an American politician. He was the 41st Governor of Georgia from 1853 to 1857 and the vice presidential nominee of the Douglas wing of the Democratic Party in the 1860 U.S. presidential election. He also served as one of Georgia's Confederate States senators.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georgia Railroad and Banking Company</span> Historic American railroad and banking company

The Georgia Railroad and Banking Company also seen as "GARR", was a historic railroad and banking company that operated in the U.S. state of Georgia. In 1967 it reported 833 million revenue-ton-miles of freight and 3 million passenger-miles; at the end of the year it operated 331 miles (533 km) of road and 510 miles (820 km) of track.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Atlantic and Gulf Railroad (1856–1879)</span>

The Atlantic and Gulf Railroad was chartered in February 1856 by act of the Georgia General Assembly. It was also known as the Main Trunk Railroad. It traversed south Georgia from Screven to Bainbridge, Georgia. Construction began in early January 1859. Its construction was halted by the American Civil War. Construction began again after the end of the war and the line was completed to Bainbridge, Georgia by late December 1867. The route never reached all the way to the Gulf of Mexico as it had originally had intended. The company went bankrupt in 1877 and was bought in 1879 by Henry B. Plant and became incorporated into his Plant System. Its main line is currently operated by CSX Transportation. Throughout its history, the Atlantic and Gulf was closely associated with the Savannah and Albany Railroad Company and its successor the Savannah, Albany, and Gulf Railroad.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Central of Georgia Railway</span> Railroad constructed to join Macon, Georgia, and Savannah, Georgia

The Central of Georgia Railway started as the Central Rail Road and Canal Company in 1833. As a way to better attract investment capital, the railroad changed its name to Central Rail Road and Banking Company of Georgia. This railroad was constructed to join the Macon and Western Railroad at Macon, Georgia, in the United States, and run to Savannah. This created a rail link from Chattanooga, on the Tennessee River, to seaports on the Atlantic Ocean. It took from 1837 to 1843 to build the railroad from Savannah to the eastern bank of the Ocmulgee River at Macon; a bridge into the city was not built until 1851.

<i>Wanderer</i> (slave ship) American vessel, 1858–1871

Wanderer was the penultimate documented ship to bring an illegal cargo of enslaved people from Africa to the United States, landing at Jekyll Island, Georgia, on November 28, 1858. It was the last to carry a large cargo, arriving with some 400 people. Clotilda, which transported 110 people from Dahomey in 1860, is the last known ship to bring enslaved people from Africa to the US.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard F. Lyon (judge)</span> American judge

Richard Francis Lyon (1819–1893) was a Georgia attorney and jurist before and during the Confederacy. He was the mayor of Albany, Georgia, from 1858 to 1859 and an associate justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia from 1859 to 1865.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation</span>

The Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation is the United States' largest statewide, nonprofit preservation organization with more than 8,000 members. Founded in 1973 by Mary Gregory Jewett and others, the Trust is committed to preserving and enhancing Georgia's communities and their diverse historic resources for the education and enjoyment of all.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fall Line Freeway</span> Highway in Georgia

The Fall Line Freeway is a 215-mile-long (346 km) highway designed to span the width of the U.S. state of Georgia from Columbus at the Alabama state line to Augusta, travelling through several cities including Macon, Fort Valley, Sandersville, and Wrens. Though it is called a freeway, it is composed of both limited-access and high-speed divided highway portions. There are also two segments of the highway that are two lanes, separated by a center turn lane: a brief portion in west-central Washington County and another brief portion in northern Jefferson County. As of August 2018, the Fall Line Freeway is 100% open to traffic. Between August 2017 and July 2018, the highway was completed. The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) announced that the highway was officially signed as SR 540 on September 24, 2018, as the newest state route in the state.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georgia in the American Civil War</span> Overview of the role of the Confederate state of Georgia during the American Civil War

Georgia was one of the original seven slave states that formed the Confederate States of America in February 1861, triggering the U.S. Civil War. The state governor, Democrat Joseph E. Brown, wanted locally raised troops to be used only for the defence of Georgia, in defiance of Confederate president Jefferson Davis, who wanted to deploy them on other battlefronts. When the Union blockade prevented Georgia from exporting its plentiful cotton in exchange for key imports, Brown ordered farmers to grow food instead, but the breakdown of transport systems led to desperate shortages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of slavery in Georgia</span>

Slavery in Georgia is known to have been practiced by European colonists. During the colonial era, the practice of slavery in Georgia soon became surpassed by industrial-scale plantation slavery.

The following is a timeline of the history of Savannah, Georgia, United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charles Augustus Lafayette Lamar</span> Slave blockade runner, Army Confederate officer

Charles Augustus Lafayette Lamar was an American businessman from Savannah, Georgia, best known for his leadership in an investment ring to illegally import slaves from Africa on the ship Wanderer in 1858. The ship ran blockades and brought 409 surviving Africans from the Congo to the United States for sale. The ship was later impounded. Although Lamar and numerous other defendants were prosecuted, none of them were convicted.

The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Augusta, Georgia, USA.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William E. Holmes</span>

William Eve HolmesSr. was an American Baptist minister and educator and president of Central City College in Macon, Georgia, for 25 years. Before his term at Central City, he was a professor at the Atlanta Baptist Institute. He was also secretary of the board at Spelman College.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Ann Williams</span> American proponent of Memorial Day

Mary Ann Williams was an American woman who was the first proponent for Memorial Day, an annual holiday to decorate soldiers’ graves.

Ransom Montgomery was an American slave, the only slave owned by the state of Georgia, and the second black person to own property in Atlanta.

Floyd L. Griffin Jr. is an American politician who served as the mayor of Milledgeville, Georgia, from 2001 to 2005, and in the Georgia State Senate from the 25th district from 1995 to 1999, as a member of the Democratic Party. He sought the Democratic Party's nomination for Lieutenant Governor of Georgia in 1998 and Georgia Secretary of State in 2022.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Sad Scene". Daily Enquirer-Sun. July 20, 1881. Retrieved December 28, 2019.
  2. "Legislature". The Georgia Citizen. October 16, 1857. Retrieved December 28, 2019.
  3. "The Slaver Wanderer's Negroes". The Times-Picayune. April 21, 1859.
  4. Bellware, Daniel A. (Fall 2019). "Africans in Columbus". Muscogiana. 30: 13–23.
  5. Swift, Charles J. (1915). The Last Battle of the Civil War. Columbus, Georgia: Gilbert Printing. pp. 27–29.
  6. Wilson, James Harrison (1912). Under the Old Flag. New York: D. Appleton and Company. p. 267.
  7. "Death of R. L. Mott". The Weekly Constitution. July 26, 1881. Retrieved December 26, 2019.