Ebenezer Townsite and Jerusalem Lutheran Church

Jerusalem Lutheran Church and the surrounding townsite of New Ebenezer sit on a bluff above the Savannah River east of Springfield, Georgia. Salzburger Protestant refugees moved the settlement here in 1736 after their first site, six miles away, proved unhealthy and infertile. Oglethorpe prescribed a town plan with 160 house lots, a marketplace, common buildings and mills. The Salzburgers opened an orphanage in 1738 and produced over half of the colony's silk after 1750. Nothing of the town survives except the church and cemetery. The one-story brick church, built in 1767-69 from bricks made on the premises, has English bond walls 21 inches thick and an interior balcony. British troops used it as a hospital and stable during the Revolutionary War, and Union soldiers occupied it in 1864. The congregation has been continuous apart from the British occupation. A museum, a Sunday School building and a relocated Salzburger dwelling stand nearby.