John Dooly - The Creditors Last Attack

The Creditors Last Attack

Creditors, including Thomas Waters (in exile in England after finding sanctuary with the Cherokees) made claims against Dooly's estate, leaving little money for the family. In spite of the poverty, John's last surviving son, John Mitchell Dooly studied law and would also have the distinction of becoming well known in Georgia literature.(n63) He quite likely used the considerable influence he later gained as an important judge and politician, along with John Dooly's notoriety as published in McCall's history, to encourage the state legislature to create a county named for his father in 1821. That recognition, however, came years after the legislature authorized counties honoring Elijah Clarke, John Twiggs, Button Gwinnett, James Jackson, and many of his father's other contemporaries. Dooly County suffered several Creek Indian attacks in its early years, an irony considering the career of its namesake. Even the honor of having a county named for Dooly dimmed when, in 1840, a novelist portrayed a fictional Dooly family as Loyalists. Judge Dooly's widow viewed this work as an insult to the memory of her father-in-law and his brothers. An old veteran was consulted on the matter and stated of John Dooly: "Why truly he was a real Liberty man I know it as well as I know anything; for he saved my father's life once … he was the only one in his family who was not his brothers were tories."(n64)