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The chief action in the HOUSE, of general interest, relates to what is known as the Galphin Claim, the history of which is briefly as follows: Prior to the year 1773 George Galphin, the original claimant, was a licensed trader among the Creek and Cherokee Indians in the then province of Georgia.
His action in the final war with the French , when the Indian terror was raging, is typical. News came that four thousand Creek warriors, reinforced by French Choctaws, were about to fall on the southern settlements. At the risk of their lives, McGillivray and another trader named Galphin hurried from Charleston to their trading house on the Georgia frontier.
Leaving Eaton's battalion, the artillery, and the footsore men of the legion, to follow more slowly, Lee mounted a detachment of infantry behind his dragoons, and made a forced march to Fort Galphin. This point he reached on the 21st of May, 1781.
While the Administration was profligate in this abuse of patronage, the conduct of several of the Secretaries was such as to give the President great uneasiness as he became acquainted with what was going on. Old claims were revived, approved by the Secretaries, and paid. Prominent among them was the Galphin claim, the Chickasaw claim, the De la Francia claim, the Gardiner claim, and many others.
Lee captured Fort Galphin, twelve miles below Augusta, and then sent an officer to the latter post to demand its surrender from Brown. The summons was disregarded, and Lee, Pickens, and Clarke, commenced a siege. It lasted several days, and on the fifth of June, the fort and its dependencies at Augusta were surrendered to the republicans.
He remembered how often his father's courage alone had stood between those same people and the warlike Creeks. He could recall the few days in 1760 when Lachlan and his fellow trader, Galphin, at the risk of their lives had braved the Creek warriors already painted for war and on the march and so had saved the settlements of the Back Country from extermination.
From the Galphin claim Mr. Crawford, Secretary of War, received as his share one hundred and fifteen thousand dollars. The lawyers in Congress declared that the Secretary acted professionally, but others censured him severely.
Galphin applied to the state of Georgia for the payment of their claims, as Georgia had merely succeeded to the trusteeship of the King of England.
His posts in the interior had now everywhere fallen into the hands of the Americans. Augusta, with the three posts, Cornwallis, Grierson and Galphin, had just been yielded to the arms of Pickens and Lee. There were no longer any intermediate posts of defence, from Orangeburg to Ninety-Six, and the latter was now so thoroughly isolated, that prudence led to its abandonment.
The trust was accepted, commissioners were appointed, some of the lands were sold, and the proceeds applied to the payment of the expenses of the commission, but none was then paid to the claimants for whose benefit the trust had been created. The sum found due to George Galphin was £9791, for which amount a certificate was issued to him by the Governor and Council in May, 1775.
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