Chatham County GaArchives Biographies.....Minis, J. Florance 1852 - living in 1913
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Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 October 13, 2004, 2:41 pm

Author: William Harden
p. 577-579

   J. FLORANCE MINIS, a retired citizen of Savannah, Georgia, belongs to one of
the historic families of this state. The early record sets forth the fact that
his great-grandfather, Philip Minis, was the first white male child born in
Georgia.

   J. Florance Minis was born November 12, 1852, son of Abraham and Lavinia
(Florance) Minis. His father, a native of Savannah, was born November 4, 1820,
and died November 5, 1889, his death occurring in New York City. For many years
he was a prominent and successful merchant of Savannah. He had married in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, October 22, 1851, Miss Lavinia Florance, a native of
New Orleans, Louisiana, born May 26, 1826, daughter of Jacob L. and Hannah
Florance, and their family consisted of six children: Jacob Florance Minis;
Rosina Florance Minis, who died in infancy; Miss Maria Minis; Isaac Minis;
Lavinia Florance Minis, wife of Charles I. Henry of New York City; and Abram Minis.

   Isaac Minis died in New York City June 8, 1893. His wife, to whom he was
married in Savannah March 9, 1886, was before her marriage Miss Eugenia Myers of
Savannah; she survives her husband, and has two sons, viz.: Isaac M. and Carol
Minis. Mr. and Mrs. Charles I. Henry have two daughters, namely: Harriet and
Lavinia Henry. Philip Minis, an uncle of the subject of this sketch, married
Miss Sarah A. Livingston of New York, and their children are as follows: Mrs.
Alice Henrietta Poe of Baltimore; Annie, Charles Spalding, Philip Henry, John
Livingston, Mary Lela, and Augusta Medora Minis.

   The paternal grandfather of J. F. Minis was Isaac Minis, and he, although of
the Savannah family, was born in 1780, near Charleston, where his parents and
family fled from the British troops, which at that time were besieging the city
of Savannah. They returned to Savannah after the close of the Revolutionary war.
Isaac Minis married Miss Dinah Cohen of Georgtown, South Carolina, December 4,
1803; she being the daughter of Solomon Cohen of that place. She was born in
Georgetown, April 12, 1787, and died in Savannah, February 17, 1874. Isaac
Minis, her husband, had died in Philadelphia, November 17, 1856; he and his wife
were buried in the family lot in Laurel Grove cemetery in Savannah. Isaac Minis
served in the War of 1812 as a private in Capt. William Bulloch 's company of
artillery, First Eegiment of Georgia Militia, commanded by Colonel Johnston.

   Isaac Minis was the son of Philip and Judith (Pollock) Minis; Judith Pollock
being a member of one of the first families that settled Newport, just as her
husband belonged to a family that was numbered among the first settlers of the
colony of Georgia. An interesting fact, in this connection, is that Rhode Island
and Georgia were the only two of the colonies where Jews were not prohibited
from settling.

   Going back to Philip Minis, the great-grandfather of the subject of this
sketch, who bore the distinction of being the first male white child born in
Georgia, it is found that this important event occurred at Savannah, July 11,
1734, the year following the founding of the Georgia colony by Oglethorpe. In
substantiation of this fact, there are various authorities, among which is the
following notice that appeared in the Georgia Gazette of the issue of Thursday,
March 12, 1789, concerning the death of Philip Minis:

   "On Friday, March 6, 1789, departed this life Mr. Philip Minis, merchant, age
55 years. He was the first white male child born in this state. His remains were
buried in the Jews' burial ground on Sunday morning, attended by a large number
of respectable citizens* who by their solemn attention evinced how sensibly they
felt the loss the community has sustained in so valuable a man. He has left a
disconsolate widow and five children, together with an aged and venerable
mother, and five sisters to deplore their loss. He was an affectionate husband,
a dutiful son, tender father and kind brother; in short, he was in every sense
of the word a truly honest man.”

   Philip Minis gave active aid and support to the colonists in the struggle
with Great Britain, and on this account he was named in the Georgia Royal
Disqualifying Act of 1780.

   The founder of the Minis family in Georgia was Philip Minis' father, Abram
Minis, who, with his wife, Abigail Minis, and two daughters, Esther and Leah,
also his brother, Simon Minis, arrived at Savannah on a vessel from London, July
11, 1733, the year after Oglethorpe's-founding of the colony of Georgia. There
were thirteen Jewish families on this vessel, and the history of their
organization for the journey, in London, and their trials and tribulations, as
well as successes, after landing on Georgia soil in^ 1733, forms one of the
interesting romances of the colonization of the new world. Abram Minis died in
Savannah in 1757 and was buried in the first Jewish burial plot in the city. His
widow, Abigail Minis, in 1760 received a grant of land from King George III. She
died in Savannah October 11, 1794, at the age of ninety-three years.

   J. Florence Minis, the eldest of the children of Abraham and Lavinia
(Florance) Minis, was born November 12, 1852. In his early boyhood he attended
Prof. W. S. Bogart 's school at Savannah, and had as classmates Mr. H. H.
Gilmer, Judge A. Pratt Adams, Judge Samuel B. Adams, the younger members of the
Habersham family, the Owens boys and the Screven boys—all representatives of
prominent families in Savannah. When he was fourteen years old he entered
Washington College at Lexington, Virginia, of which Gen. Robert E. Lee was then
president, and which, later, in his honor, was named Washington and Lee
University. Of his own accord, Mr. Minis decided not to remain in college to
graduate, but instead he returned to his home at Savannah, and on November 12,
1870, he entered his father's office as a clerk. He afterward became a member of
the firm, the name of which was then changed to A. Minis & Son. In November,
1890, his father, Mr. Abraham Minis, died, and, Mr. Isaac Minis having
previously become a member of the firm, the name was then changed to A. Minis'
Sons. Upon the death of Mr. Isaac Minis in 1893, the business was continued by
Mr. J. F. Minis under the firm name of J. F. Minis & Co. In 1905 Mr. Minis
retired from active business, closed up the affairs of the old firm, and since
then has devoted his attention to his private interests. He divides his time
between his Savannah home, his country home “Rock-wood" at Clarksville in
Habersham county, and traveling in Europe.

   While in active busines, Mr. Minis served one term as president of the
Savannah Cotton Exchange. He is now a director of the Merchants National Bank,
director of the Savannah Trust Company, director of the Southwestern Railroad
Company, vice-president of the Savannah Brewing Company. In all the principal
clubs of Savannah he has membership, and he is a member of the board of managers
of the Georgia Historical Society and one of the curators of the Telfair Academy
of Arts and Sciences. He was appointed by Gov. Joseph M. Brown as a member of
the Oglethorpe Monument Commission, which had in charge the erection of the
Oglethorpe Monument in Savannah, which was dedicated on November 23, 1910.

   In 1890 Mr. Minis married Miss Louisa Porter Gilmer. Mrs. Minis is a daughter
of Gen. Jeremy F. Gilmer, a distinguished engineer, a graduate of West Point,
who, during the war between the states, was chief of engineers of the
Confederate government. Her mother, Louisa P. (Alexander) Gilmer, was a daughter
of A. L. Alexander of Washington, Wilkes county, Georgia.



Additional Comments:
From:

A HISTORY OF SAVANNAH AND SOUTH GEORGIA
BY
WILLIAM HARDEN

VOLUME I
ILLUSTRATED
THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
CHICAGO AND NEW YORK
1913


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