Commemorates Georgia’s Salzburgers
Location East Bay Street
Artist Anton Thuswaldner
Erected 1994
One of several of Savannah’s monuments commemorating the different ethnic and religious groups who migrated to the city in its early years can be found in a little park on Bay Street.
Salzburger Park, a tiny half-acre space on East Bay between Abercorn and Lincoln Streets, is home to the 1994 Salzburger Monument of Reconciliation, given to the city in that year by the State of Salzburg, Austria.
It recognizes the experience of the Salzburger people who settled in Savannah, having been exiled from their country for religious reasons in the 18th century. The monument also represents reconciliation between the Roman Catholic citizens of Austria and the Protestant descendants of the exiled Salzburgers.
Savannah’s Salzburger Monument is its first public monument donated to the city by a foreign government. A historic marker in Salzburger Park marks the site and explains the history of the monument.
If you want to learn more about the Salzburger people in Georgia, there is a small museum of their history near Rincon, 25 miles from Savannah. The Salzburger Society also hosts a celebration of Germanic heritage every Labor Day weekend.
See also:
– River Street
– River Street restaurants and bars
– Visiting Ebenezer Creek, near Rincon
– Wright Square
The Salzburger Monument of Reconciliation is a gift from the State of Salzburg in Austria, presented to the Georgia Salzburger Society and the City of Savannah by way of apology for its 18th century expulsion of the Protestant Salzburgers.
Twenty thousand Protestants were exiled from Salzburg in 1731, of whom 300 were invited by the Trustees of the Georgia colony to settle there. The monument marks the spot where the initial party of Salzburgers, numbering 37, arrived in Savannah on March 12 1734.
The Salzburg colonists were welcomed by James Oglethorpe upon arrival in Georgia. Staying briefly in the city, they soon moved to their longer-term settlements a few miles away from the main town at Savannah, founding the settlements of Abercorn and Ebenezer.
They later formed a different town of New Ebenezer, where they were joined by additional immigrants from Salzburg and other German-speaking parts of Europe.
In 1984 a visitor from Salzburg, Albert Winter, noted the lack of memorials in Savannah to its people of Germanic heritage (since then, the German Fountain commemorating German immigrants to Savannah has been placed in Orleans Square).
The Georgia Salzburger Society formed the Salzburger Monument Committee in the early 1990s. In correspondence with public officials from Salzburg, plans were drawn up for the Salzburger Monument of Reconciliation.
Hans Katschthaler, at the time the Governor of Salzburg, commissioned the well-known Austrian sculptor Anton Thuswalder to produce the piece.
The monument is carved out of a rough-textured piece of green serpentine stone, from the Hohe Tauern region of Austria from which the Salzburgers came. A bas relief carving depicts the people exiled from Salzburg, together with an inscription in both German and English. In German: “Weil Man Ihnen Ihr Gottesland Verwehrte, Mussten Sie Ihre Heimat Verlassen.” In English: “Denied their religious freedom they were forced to leave their homeland.”
In May 1994, the finished memorial was exhibited in Salzburg, Austria, in front of the Christ Lutheran Church on the Salzach River. Members of the Georgia Salzburger Society attended the ceremony and unveiling, which celebrated the reconciliation of Catholics and Protestants. Speeches also reflected on the parallels between the memorial and the Salzburger’s choice of name for their new settlement, Ebenezer, which means “I have erected a stone monument.”
After the citizens of Salzburg officially presented the monument to the Georgia Salzburger Society, it was shipped to the US. There it was dedicated to the Georgia Salzburger Society and donated to the City of Savannah. It was unveiled on Labor Day, September 5 1994.
A historic marker was dedicated at the site on February 9 1996, recounting the story of the Salzburgers’ voyage to Georgia and their history there.
The Georgia Salzburger Society requested that the city dedicate the as-yet-unnamed section of the Bay Street Strand as Salzburger Park. Council unanimously approved the Society’s request, and the park was officially dedicated on July 9 1996.
More Things To Do In Savannah & Nearby
– Events in Savannah
– First African Baptist Church
– Forsyth Park
– The Historic District
– Historic house tours
– Ghost tours
– African-American history sites
– Art galleries
– Beaches near Savannah
– Kayaking in Tybee Island
– Georgia food festivals
– Seafood festivals near Savannah