Long Description:
From the Grave Addicts
"http://www.graveaddiction.com/wrightsq.html">web site:
Wright Square is supposedly haunted by the ghost of Alice Riley.
Alice Riley was an indentured servant who arrived in America in
December 1733. She was sent to work for William Wise, along with
her husband, Richard White. Mr. Wise was a horrible man to work
for, and each day he ordered the two servants to bathe and groom
him. In March 1734 Richard and Alice had all they could take. While
grooming Mr. Wise that day, they held his head in a bucket of water
until he drowned. They fled the house, but were eventually caught
while hiding on the Isle of Hope.
Both Alice Riley and Richard White were sentenced to death for
Mr. Wise's murder. They hanged Richard White first, but when it
came time to hang Alice, they found out she was pregnant with
William Wise's baby. They waited eight months before hanging
her...until after the baby was born. Alice was hanged on January
19, 1735. Her body was left hanging on the gallows for three days.
She maintained her innocence until death. Unfortunately, her baby
died only 45 days later.
Today many people, especially pregnant woman and mothers, see
her ghost running through the square, screaming and crying. When
they approach her spirit, she tells them she is looking for her
baby. When they turn around, she is gone. Also, many claim she is
the reason no Spanish moss grows around the spot of her death.
Legend has it that Spanish moss will not grow where innocent blood
has been spilled.
My visit: I did not see any ghost, but then I am neither
pregnant, nor a mother.
The Wright Square Historical Marker reads:
This Square, which was laid out in 1733, was originally named
for John Percival, Earl of Egmont, who played a large part in
founding the colony of Georgia. Its name was changed around 1763 to
Wright Square in honor of James Wright, royal governor of the
province of Georgia (1760-1782). In the Town Hall which was located
on the present site of the Chatham County courthouse George
Whitefield, Church of England minister at Savannah, preached to
large congregations in early colonial days.
In 1739 Tomo-chi-chi, the Chief of the Yamacraw Indians who
befriended the early Georgia colonists, was buried with ceremony in
the center of this Square. Gen. Oglethorpe acting as one of the
pallbearers. The monument to William Washington Gordon (1796-1842)
commemorates the founder and first president of Georgia's earliest
railroad, the Central Railroad and Banking Company -- an enterprise
which greatly promoted the economy of this State. Designed by the
distinguished architects, Henry Van Brunt and Frank M. Howe, the
handsome monument to Gordon symbolizes the progress and prosperity
of the world by means of commerce, manufacture, agriculture, and
art. It was completed in 1883.
From the Our Coast
"http://www.ourcoast.com/savannahcityguide/visiting/tours/savannah/wright.shtml">web
site:
When General James Oglethorpe, founder of Savannah, arrived in
1733 he had in mind a plan to create a city around a grid of
squares. Wright Square, on Bull Street between President and York,
was the second, laid the year that the colony was established. The
square originally was named for Lord Viscount Percival, who headed
the Trustees that supported the adventure to the New World.
However, the square took its permanent name in 1763, in honor of
Royal Governor James Wright, a man who took the Savannah stage at a
turbulent time in her history.
The governor came to Savannah in 1760 and was met with a mixed
response. The records of the time show him to have been an
effective and popular governor, but, though he was born on American
soil, his first duty was to king and England and he upheld the
crown's controversial tax policies. As a result, he drew the ire of
Georgia's Liberty Boys, a patriot group that advocated immediate
secession from England. The revolutionaries arrested Wright, but he
escaped and made his way to England.
Two years later the British took Savannah by force and Wright
returned in 1779, only to depart once more when the Americans
triumphantly entered Savannah at war's end. Wright is now interred
at Westminster Abbey.
If Johnson Square is the banking center of Savannah, then Wright
Square is her nexus of government. On the west side of the square
is the Federal Courthouse and Post Office. William Aiken designed
the building, which was constructed in 1898. Widely considered one
of Savannah's grandest structures, it's constructed of Georgia
marble (even the curs in front are marble) and is distinguished by
a series of arching windows and terra-cotta ornamental flourishes.
Its exterior can be seen in such movies as the original Cape Fear
and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.
Across the square stands the old Chatham County Courthouse.
Constructed in the Romanesque Revival style and completed almost 10
years before the Post Office across the way, it shares certain
superficial features with the Federal building. The courthouse
boasts arched entryways and windows and has a bell tower. Unlike
the Post Office, however, the courthouse is constructed of yellow
brick, a feature rarely seen in Savannah.
Next to the old courthouse is the Lutheran Church of the
Ascension. The congregation descends from Austrian Salzburgers, who
came to Savannah in 1734 to join the colony. Many of them moved
northwest and established the town of Ebenezer. Those who stayed
prospered under the leadership of the Reverend Johann Bolzius. The
current structure was completed in the late 1870s and serves as a
legacy to the Salzburgers, who were so diligent, thrifty and
temperate that Oglethorpe asked the Trustees to send more to his
fledgling colony.
The monument at the center of the square is in honor of William
W. Gordon, a former mayor of Savannah, who founded the Central of
Georgia Railroad. The railroad, initially stretching from Savannah
to Macon, opened a corridor to the interior and Gordon's vision
made him a wealthy and celebrated man. The Gordon family remained
illustrious. Gordon's son, Willie, served in the Civil War and as a
general in the Spanish-American War. Granddaughter Juliet Gordon
Low founded the Girl Scouts and the family home, one block south of
the square, is now a museum.
Gordon's daughter-in-law, vivacious Chicago socialite Nellie
Kinzie Gordon, arranged to have the granite monument to Tomochichi
placed in the square. Tomochichi was the chief of Yamacraw Indians
who lived on the site when Oglethorpe arrived to establish the
colony and he befriended the English. In time, the chief traveled
across the Atlantic to be presented to the royal court and it's
believed that he was buried in Wright Square.
