Button Gwinnett
Button Gwinnett was born in England in 1732. His parents were respectable but not wealthy. Being a boy of promise they bestowed on him a good education. At his majority he commenced a successful mercantile career at Bristol in his native country. Surrounded by a large family he resolved on changing his location and came to Charleston South Carolina in 1770, where he pursued merchandizing two years. He then sold out his store, purchased a plantation on St. Catharines Island in Georgia, to which he removed and became an enterprising agriculturist.On the 2d of February 1776 Mr. Gwinnett was appointed to the Continental Congress and took his seat on the 20th of May ensuing.
When the proposition came before Congress for a final separation from the mother country Mr. Gwinnett became a warm advocate for the measure. When the trying hour arrived, big with consequences, he gave his approving vote and affixed his name to the important document that stands acknowledged by the civilized world the most lucid exposition of human rights upon the records of history; the Declaration of American Independence. In February 1777 he took a seat in the convention of his own state convened to form a constitution under the new government. He at once took a leading part and submitted the draft of a constitution which was slightly amended and immediately adopted.
Shortly after this he was elevated to the powerful postion of Presidency of the Provincial Council. Gwinnett was focused on becoming the head of military operations. At this time an acrimonious jealousy existed between the civil and military authorities. At the head of the latter was General Lachlan McIntosh against whom Mr. Gwinnett had run the previous year for Brigador General, and was unsuccessful.
The civil power claimed the right to try military officers for offenses that General McIntosh contended came only under the jurisdiction of a court martial. Mr. Gwinnett had planned an expedition against East Florida and contemplated having the command. General McIntosh conferred that position upon a senior lieutenant-colonel. The expedition was a failure. The General publicly exulted over his hated enemy and gloried in the misfortune.
Under the new constitution a Governor was to be elected on the first Monday of the ensuing May. Mr. Gwinnett became a candidate. His competitor was a man far inferior to him in point of talents and acquirements but was elected. General McIntosh again publicly exulted in the disappointments that were overwhelming his antagonist.
A challenge from Mr. Gwinnett opened a public duel on the streets of Savannah. Gwinnett and McIntosh met on the blood stained field of false honor, fought after four paces, and both were wounded. Mr. Gwinnett was wounded in the leg, and died several days later, on the 27th of May 1777.
The Last Will and Testament of Button Gwinnett was the first one to be published in the Chatham County Courthouse!
The Gazette of the State of Georgia on Jan 22, 1784,published a notice of the estate of Button Gwinnett who died from wounds in a dual with Lachlan McIntosh, in the streets of Savannah, Georgia.