Echoes of the River Bend

About the Book

This work is a compilation of historic research, in the setting of a genre, best described as the sharing of this rich history, of all of the events and issues of the people through out time, by a non-existant witness, the River Bend. The title Echoes of the River Bend is a concise description of the genre in which this work is written. Echoes, of past events related to the River Bend Community, reminds the river bend, of those events as they are shared with the reader. Those events not in the scope of this work are considered to be the River Bend's secrets.

One of the continuous focal points of the River Bend Community has been the colonial town of Hardwicke. The town was located at the River Bend. The first Royal Governor of the colony of Georgia, John Reynolds, was responsible for a survey to establish the town, to replace Savannah as the capital of the colony. He named it Hardwicke for his cousin, the High Chancellor of England, the Earl of Hardwicke. The town never did fully devellop and finally vanished to become a ghost town of Georgia. The idea to resurrect the town came and went from time to time from 1733 through the Twentieth Century.

Local and national events are interwoven, in this work, so that the reader may understand some of the things that were on the minds of the people of the River Bend Community, as time went by. From this, the feelings of these people may be best felt, as national debates and local issues came and went, during the birth of our nation and thereafter. These feelings contributed to an interaction between the people and such historical events as the "southern cause" prior and during the Civil War. Another example through the same process, is how the freed slaves felt when they frist learned they were freed. Their question was, "What is this thing freedom?"

The work is divided into three sections. Each section contains the historic events and issues of a respective century. There is a time line for each oof the three centuries at the beginning of each respective section. This adds to the value of this book, as a reference source.

About the Author

The author, Jerry Rutland was born in Richmond County at the University Hospital in Augusta, Georgia on October 15, 1935. The origins of his education and heritage in the Midlands of South Carolina. He calls Aiken, S.C. his home town.

He graduated from the University of South Carolina in 1959, where he earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Civil Engineering. He spent thrity-five years, during the "Cold War" as an Aerospace Structural Integrity Engineer. His employees were Lockheed Aircraft Co., McDonnell Aircraft Co. and Gulfstream Aerospace Co. He retired from the latter due to health issues in 1993, ending a successful career.

Both of his parents were educators. His father, A.J. Rutland was a well known school administrator in the fifties and sixties. His mother, Blanche (King) Rutland was a career high school history teacher. Her unique aproach to teaching history and democracy was such that few, if any, of her students did not find history interesting and rememberable. Jerry's interest in history was thus kindled, resulting in his passion for history at an early age.

Jerry is a member of the Georgia Historical Society and the Richmond Hill Historical Society. He served as a past Board of Directors member, for the latter. He is a also a past member of Coastal Georgia Advisory Committee for Historial Preservation.

The author brings to his work in history the research skills from his engineering experience combined with his mother's unique process of making history alive and interesting. His first work, Sherman's March to The Great Ogeechee, depicts the approach of Sherman's Right Wing as it approached the site of its objective, the capture of Fort McAllister. His latter work, Hardwicke on the Great Ogeechee River, depicts a Colonial Village that became a dead town of Georgia.

He is married to Frances (Dyer) Rutland BSRN, originally from Gadsden, Al. The were married in 1961 and have three grown children, and five grandchildren. The Rutlands are members of the Richmond Hill Prebyterian Church.

The Editor, Buddy Sullivan, a natice of McIntosh County, is a recognized expoert on Coastal Georgia History. Among several books he has written are From Beautiful Zion to Red Bird Creek and The Darien Journal of John Giardeau Legare, Ricegrower.