The following is extracted from the minutes of the proceedings of the first Superior Court held in Liberty County:

Sunbury, in the County of Liberty and State of Georgia:

The Superior Court was opened in the usual form on Tuesday, the 18th November, 1783. But a sufficient number of the officers not appearing for holding the same, on account of bad weather, the Court was adjourned to Wednesday, 19th.

Wednesday, the 19th, the weather still continuing bad, their Honors, George Walton, Esq., Chief-Justice, and Benjamin Andrew, Sen'r, Esq., Assistant Judge, present, ordered that the Court be adjourned to 10 o'clock to-morrow, and it was adjourned accordingly.

Thursday, 20th November, 1783, the Court met according to adjournment. The Grand Jury being empanelled and sworn, the Chief-Justice gave the following charge:

Gentlemen of the Grand Jury: -- The Circuit which I have lately rode, and which is now to be finished in your county, being the first since the close of the war, the best consequences may be expected to ensue from that good order and subordination which everywhere attended the courts, and which I doubt not will take place here. Nothing can contribute so much to confirm the blessings of peace as an invariable observance of the laws, which have, or ought always to have, for their sole object the general happiness of the people. In their execution, juries are the grand medium, and without their intervention, no citizens can be deprived of his rights. To you in particular is now consigned an inquiry into the nature and degree of those offences committed within the county jurisdiction against the peace of the State. In the prosecution of it, neither hatred nor malice, favour, nor affection, is to be admitted, but the culprit is to be punished, and the innocent discharged.

In congratulate you, gentlemen, on the news of a definitive treaty of peace, by which our freedom, sovereignty, and independence, are secured. The war which produced it was one of necessity on our part. That we were enabled to prosecute it with firmness and perseverance to so glorious an issue, should be ascribed to the protecting influence of the Great Disposer of events, and be a subject of grateful praise and adoration, while the result of the contest is so honourable and advantageous to us and to posterity. It is to be lamented that those moral and religious duties, so essential to the order of society and the permanent happiness of mankind, have been too much neglected. To recover them into practice, the life and conduct of every good man should be a constant example. Your temples, which the profane instruments of a tyrant laid in ashes, should be built again; for nothing tends to harmonize the rude and unlearned organs of man more than frequent meetings in the place of holy worship. Let the monument of your brave and virtuous soldier and citizen*, which was ordered by Congress to his memory, be erected on the same ground, that his virtues, and the cause in which he sacrificed his life, may be seen together by your children, and remembered through distant ages.

In the course of the conflict with an enemy whose conduct was generally marked with cruelty, the whole State has suffered, undoubtedly, more than any in the confederacy. The citizens of Liberty County, with others, have drunk deep in the streams of distress. Remembering these things, we should not lose sight of the value of the prize we have obtained. And now that we are in full possession of our freedom, we should all unite in our endeavours to benefit and perpetuate the system, that we may always be happy at home, and forever freed from the insults of petty tyrants commissioned from abroad.

*Judge Walton here refers to a monument which was ordered by Congress to be erected to the memory of General James Screven.

Source:
White, George, Rev. Historical Collections of Georgia, Pudney & Russell, New York, 1854, pp. 530-531

Submitted by Bob Franks