The following information was assembled from numerous sources and cannot be used directly as proof of Qualifying Service or Lineage.
It is considered a research aid and is intended to assist in locating sources that can be used as proof.
State of Service: GA
Qualifying Service: Colonel / Patriotic Service
No memorial record found in Find-a-Grave in May 2022
No gravestone, SAR marker only
Marker placed in joint marking sponsored by the Athens, Atlanta, Blue Ridge Mountains, Captain John Collins, Marshes of Glyn, Mount Vernon, and Robert Forsyth chapters of the Georgia Society SAR.
Photo displayed courtesy of K Scott Collina, GA SAR.
Directions to Cemetery / Gravesite:
Midway Cemetery on US Highway South in Midway, Georgia directly across the street from the church. Take I-95 to exit 76 - at end of the ramp turn west and travel 3.7 miles to U.S. 17 - Turn right and travel <1 mile to the Midway Church
SAR marker is located on the West side of the Stewart-Screven Monument
Photo: 1 of 1
Author: Kenneth Scott Collins
John Baker was born in 1722 in South Carolina. He was an early settler of St. Johns Parish.
Before the Revolution, he was commissioned as a Lieutenant of the Royal Militia. However, in 1774, he became a member of the Sons of Liberty. That same year, he was appointed to a committee to prepare a resolution to consider Georgia's actions against the British in 1774. Attended Georgia Provincial Congress. In 1775 and 1776, he served as a member of the Georgia Committee of Correspondence.
During the American Revolution, he was commissioned Captain and first commander of St. Johns Riflemen Militia, John Baker fought at the Battle of Rice Boats in Savannah in 1776. When the Georgia Whig government was established in 1776, he was selected to be a member of the Committee of Correspondence to communicate with other colonies and rally support for the cause of American Independence.
He served as Lieutenant-Colonel of the Georgia Continental Light Horse (Dragoons) during the Second Florida Expedition in 1777. Ambushed and routed by British and Loyalist forces at Thomas Creek in British East Florida in 1777. An angry and disgusted Baker resigned his commission due to the actions of his soldiers, many of whom he said: "simply deserted during the fight."
The following year, he became Colonel in command of the 3rd Georgia Regiment of the Liberty County Militia. He was wounded at Bulltown Swamp in 1778, fought at Hickory Hill in 1779, where he freed eight Patriot officers held as prisoners by the British, and was at the Second Siege of Augusta in 1781. There were many guerrilla warfare skirmishes in Liberty County between small groups of Patriots and Loyalists, both usually mounted, and victory was frequent with the Patriots. Colonel Baker continued to fight these Loyalists until the end of the Revolutionary War in 1783 when he was sixty-one years old. His service earned him a place on the King’s Treason Act of 1780.
As the war wound down in 1782 and 1783, he served as a Liberty County Representative to the Georgia House of State Assembly. Georgia's Baker County was named in his honor.
The Patriot died on 3 June 1792 in Liberty County, Georgia.
Sources:
Ross, Arnold and Hank Burnham, Georgia Revolutionary Soldiers & Sailors, Patriots & Pioneers; Volume 2,
A Georgia County-by-County Compilation of Revolutionary War Patriots Who Made Georgia Their Permanent Home and Died Here, Including Information on Service History, Birth Dates, Death Dates, and Places of Burial, Georgia. Athens: the Georgia Society Sons of the American Revolution, 2001.
Author: William Foye Ramsaur
John Baker (1722-1792)
John Baker was born on May 12, 1722, in Dorchester, South Carolina. Along with other members of the White Meeting House, his family moved to the Midway District in Georgia. His brothers were Richard and William Baker, and he was a nephew of William Baker, Sr. John Baker served the Royal Colony of Georgia as a Lieutenant in the King’s Troops. In July 1774, he was appointed a member of the Georgia Committee to discuss the British Port Bill. In addition to his extensive military service during the Revolutionary War, John Baker was a member of the Sons of Liberty, Committee of Correspondence, and the Provincial Congress.
He was fifty-four years old on January 8, 1776, when commissioned a captain in the Saint John’s Riflemen, a volunteer company of Militia, and served on the Council of Safety that same year. Assigned to the fort at Sunbury, he took charge and repaired the entrenchment around the fort. In less than three months, he fought British troops at Savannah and Tybee Island during the Battle of the Rice Boats. He was soon promoted to colonel commanding the 1st (Liberty County) Battalion, 3rd Regiment of the Georgia Militia, but later that year, he transferred into the Continental Line, along with most of his men. There he was commissioned as lieutenant colonel in command of the 1st Regiment Georgia Continental Light Horse, a position in which he served during the Second Florida Expedition. His brother, Major William Baker served under his command. Colonel Samuel Elbert planned to rendezvous on May 12, 1778, with Colonel John Baker in East Florida to retaliate for their raids into Georgia. Elbert’s Continentals skirmished with British troops at Amelia Island, and delayed their arrival. On the morning of May 17, British Major Marc Prevost ambushed Colonel Baker at Thomas Creek, a tributary of the Nassau River. This surprise led to a rout of Baker’s men, many of whom simplify deserted during the fight. Because of their poor behavior, John Baker resigned his commission.
In November 1778, British General Augustin Prevost dispatched his brother, Colonel Mark Prevost on a forging expedition into Coastal Georgia. Having rejoined the Georgia Militia, Colonel John Baker attempted to stop the British advance where the Savannah and Darien road crosses Bulltown Swamp in Liberty County. During the fight on November 20, Colonel Baker and others were wounded and had to retreat to a position near the North Newport bridge. The following day, John’s brother, Major William Baker was dispatched with dragoons to the bridge to reinforce the troops already fighting there. They were unsuccessful in their attempt to slow the British advance. Meanwhile, Colonel John White had concentrated one hundred Continentals with artillery, at the Midway Meeting House, and built a breastwork across the road over which the British must advance. On the morning of November 22, Colonel White and General Screven with his militia, he decided to advance one and a half miles south near the widow, Mrs. Spencer’s house. As Screven approached, he was ambushed by the Florida Rangers, mortally wounded and then captured. The British burned the Midway Meeting House which was a symbol of Georgia’s independent spirit. By June 1779, Baker again served as colonel in command of the 1st (Liberty County) Battalion, 3rd Regiment of the Georgia Militia, a position in which he served until January 1783.
After the Revolution, John Baker became a merchant in Sunbury, and served as Commissioner of Sunbury, He married Elizabeth Fiblin, and joined the Congregational Church at Midway in 1763. They had a daughter Mary Ann Baker who married John J. Maxwell, son of Captain Maxwell, also a Revolutionary War Patriot. After Elizabeth Fiblin Baker’s death, he married Mary Jones Lapina, widow of Captain Mathias Lapina, a Revolutionary War Patriot, at the Midway Church in 1784. They had a daughter, Sarah Baker, who married Michael Rudolph, the famous Revolutionary War Soldier. John Baker had three sons, named Stephen, Whitmarsh, and John Baker Jr. John Baker died on June 3, 1792, in Liberty County. His burial place is unknown, but possibly was the Midway Cemetery, since he was a member of the Midway Congregational Church, Baker County, in Southwest Georgia, was named for Colonel John Baker, in honor of his significant record during the Revolutionary War.
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