Everything about Button Gwinnett totally explained
Button Gwinnett (baptized:
April 10,
1735 –
May 19,
1777), was second of the signatories (first signature on the left) on the
United States Declaration of Independence as a representative of
Georgia. He was also briefly the provisional
president of Georgia in 1777, and
Gwinnett County (now a major
suburb of
metro Atlanta) was named after him.
Button was born in 1732 in the parish of
Down Hatherley in
Gloucestershire,
England, to Welsh parents, the Reverend Samuel and Anne Gwinnett. There are conflicting reports as to his birthdate, but he was baptized in St Catherine’s Church in Gloucester on
April 10 1735. After attending
The King's School, Gloucester he started his career as a merchant in
Bristol, England. He then moved to
Wolverhampton in 1755 and married a local, Ann Bourne, in 1757. In 1762 the couple left Wolverhampton and moved to
America.
Arriving first in
Charleston, South Carolina, by 1765 they'd travelled to
Savannah, Georgia. Gwinnett abandoned his mercantile pursuits, selling off all his merchandise to buy a tract of land on
St. Catherines Island where he started a
plantation. He prospered as a planter, and by 1769 had gained such local prominence that he was elected to the Provincial Assembly. During his tenure in the Assembly, Gwinnett's chief political rival was
Lachlan McIntosh and
Lyman Hall was his closest ally. Gwinnett didn't become a strong advocate of colonial rights until 1775, when St. John's Parish, which encompassed his lands, threatened to secede from Georgia due to the colony's rather conservative response to the events of the times.
He was appointed commander of
Georgia's militia, but declined the position, and was elected to attend the
Second Continental Congress. He voted in favor of the
Declaration of Independence on
July 4 1776, and signed the famous parchment copy on
August 2 1776. After signing the Declaration, he was accompanied as far as Virginia by
Carter Braxton, another of the signers, carrying a proposed state constitution drawn up by
John Adams. During his service in the Continental Congress, Gwinnett was a candidate for a
brigadier general position to lead the
1st Georgia Regiment in the
Continental Army, but lost out to
Lachlan McIntosh. The loss of the position to his rival embittered Gwinnett greatly.
He served in the Georgia state legislature and in 1777 he wrote the original draft of Georgia’s first State Constitution mainly from the John Adams pamphlet. He soon became Speaker of the Georgia Assembly, a position he held until the death of the President
(Governor) of Georgia,
Archibald Bulloch. Gwinnett was elevated to the vacated position by the Assembly’s Executive Council. In this position, he sought to undermine the leadership of McIntosh.
He organized an invasion of
British East Florida. Due to the convening of the legislature, Gwinnett was unable to lead the troops himself and relied on a subordinate officer of McIntosh. The invasion ultimately proved to be a failure. Gwinnett's loss of an election for governor in May 1777 is most likely due to the failed expedition. At this time McIntosh, revelling in Gwinnett's embarrassment, openly criticized him for the failed campaign, although Gwinnett was cleared of wrongdoing. Gwinnett challenged McIntosh to a
duel, which was fought on
May 16 1777, at the small town of Thunderbolt, near Savannah. Both were wounded: McIntosh survived, but Button Gwinnett died three days later of gangrene resulting from having the bone of his leg shattered.
Signers Monument, a granite obelisk in front of the courthouse in
Augusta, Georgia, memorializes Gwinnett and the other two Georgians who signed the Declaration of Independence. The others were re-interred beneath the monument, but Gwinnett's burial place couldn't be found.
A fairly obscure historical figure, Gwinnett nonetheless does hold one claim to fame: his
autograph is among the most valuable in the world, a fact used to good effect by science fiction author
Isaac Asimov in his short story "
Button, Button." Valuations usually suggest an example of an original Gwinnett signature would be valued only behind the likes of
Julius Caesar and
William Shakespeare, making Gwinnett’s by far the most valuable American
autograph. Single examples of Gwinnett’s autograph have been sold for as much as $150,000. Its extraordinarily high value is a result of a combination of the desire by many top collectors to acquire a complete set of autographs by all 56 signers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, and the extreme rarity of the Gwinnett signature (there are less than 30 known extant examples, since Gwinnett was fairly obscure prior to signing the Declaration and died shortly afterwards). In the 1920s, five copies of his signature were owned by renowned rare bookseller
A.S.W. Rosenbach.
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