Unitarian Universalist Church (Savannah, Georgia)

Troup Square is one of the 22 squares of Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located in the fourth row of the city's five rows of squares, on Habersham Street and East Macon Street, and was laid out in 1837. It is south of Colonial Park Cemetery, east of Lafayette Square and north of Whitefield Square. The square is named for George Troup, the former Georgia governor, Congressman and senator. It is one of only two Savannah squares named for a person living at the time (the other being Washington Square).A large iron armillary sphere stands in the center of the square, supported by six small metal turtles. The armillary has been the source of some controversy, as it is one of the few examples of modern sculpture in the squares.A special dog fountain is located on the west side of the square. The Myers Drinking Fountain was a gift from Savannah mayor Herman Myers in 1897 and was originally placed in Forsyth Park. When moved to Troup Square, its height was adjusted for use by dogs and has become the site of an annual Blessing of the Animals.The Unitarian Universalist Church sits on the western side of the square and is its oldest building, albeit not original to the square: built in 1851, it was moved a third of a mile from Oglethorpe Square nine years later. It is believed that James Lord Pierpont wrote the tune to "Jingle Bells" while he was the church's music director, but other sources claim he only copyrighted it when he was in the role, and that he wrote it in Medford, Massachusetts. The oldest building original to the square is the Lewis Cook Duplex, at 313–315 East Charlton Street, which dates to 1852. In 1969 Savannah landscape architect Clermont Huger Lee and Mills B. Lane planned and initiated a project to remove the central vandalized playground, close the fire lane, install an armillary sundial, and add new walls, benches, lighting, and plantings.

McDonough Row (also known as John McDonough Row) is a historic row house in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It stands at 410–424 East Charlton Street, in the southeastern civic lot of Troup Square. They are contributing properties of the Savannah Historic District, itself on the National Register of Historic Places. The properties were built in 1882 by John J. McDonough, future mayor of Savannah. Other similar-style row houses exist in Savannah's Gordon Row, the Jones Street Quantock Row, the Chatham Square Quantock Row, William Remshart Row House and Mary Marshall Row.

The Cathedral Basilica of St. John the Baptist is a Roman Catholic cathedral and minor basilica in Lafayette Square at 222 East Harris Street, Savannah, Georgia, in the United States. It is the mother church of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Savannah.

The John Schwarz House is a home in Savannah, Georgia, United States. Built in 1890, it is located at 302–306 East Jones Street.The building is part of the Savannah Historic District.The home was built for John Schwarz, the 41st mayor of Savannah.

The Hamilton–Turner Inn (also known as the Hamilton–Turner House and the Samuel P. Hamilton House) is a historic mansion in Savannah, Georgia, United States. Built in 1873, it is located at 330 Abercorn Street in the southeastern trust/civic lot of Lafayette Square. It is now a luxury inn. Virginia native Samuel Pugh Hamilton (1837–1899), colloquially known as the Lord of Lafayette Square, had the mansion built for his family. He and his wife, Sarah Virginia (née Stillings) (1836–1920), "created a social center for the city's elite" with their home.Sarah, his deceased brother's widow, was Hamilton's second wife, whom he married on June 10 1866; his first, Emma Sprigg, died around 1862, after having two children with Hamilton.Due to Hamilton's work with the Brush Electric Light & Power Company, the Hamilton's mansion was the first home in Savannah with electricity, for in 1883, lights were installed in its salon. The rest of the house was fitted with lights by 1886.The mansion survived Savannah's fire of 1898 that nearly destroyed the nearby Cathedral of St. John the Baptist. This was, in part, due to the Connecticut limestone roof, which prevented it from being engulfed by the flames.Hamilton died in 1899, in his early sixties. He and his wife, who survived him by 21 years, are buried in Savannah's Bonaventure Cemetery. In 1915, Dr. Francis Turner (1884–1961) purchased the mansion from the Hamiltons, and lived there with his family until 1926.The home was then opened for boarding and became a home for the nurses of the Marine Hospital in 1928, before the Turner family moved back in during the 1940s.The Turners sold the property to the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in 1965. The latter wanted to demolish the structure to make a playground for their nearby school, but the Historic Savannah Foundation stepped in, and the mansion was saved.The home is featured in John Berendt's 1994 book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil as the scene of raucous parties held by its resident Joe Odom. Nancy Hillis, on whom the book's character Mandy Nichols was based, later owned the property.Three years after the book's release, around the time of the film adaptation, Charles and Sue Strickland converted the mansion into luxury suites.

The Augustus Barié Property is a home in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located at 222 East Jones Street.The building is part of the Savannah Historic District, and in a survey for the Historic Savannah Foundation, Mary Lane Morrison found the building to be of significant status.It was built for Augustus Montfort Barié in (1815–1904) in 1857, and sold to George Dillon at year's end for $5,500. By 1859, Dillon had sold the property to John Cunningham, who kept it until 1873.

St. Vincent's Academy (SVA) is a private, Catholic, all-girls high school located next to the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in downtown Savannah, Georgia, United States. Founded in 1845 when Father Jeremiah Francis O’Neill brought six Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy from Charleston, South Carolina, the school operates within the Roman Catholic Diocese of Savannah and enrolls about 350 girls in grades 9-12.

Lafayette Square is one of the 22 squares of Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located in the fourth row of the city's five rows of squares, on Abercorn Street and East Macon Street, and was laid out in 1837. It is south of Colonial Park Cemetery, west of Troup Square, north of Calhoun Square and east of Madison Square. The square is named for Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette, the French hero of the American Revolution who visited Savannah in 1825. The oldest building on the square is the Andrew Low Carriage House, at 329 Abercorn Street, which dates to 1849.The square contains a fountain commemorating the 250th anniversary of the founding of the Georgia colony, donated by the Colonial Dames of Georgia in 1984, as well as cobblestone sidewalks.Adjacent to the square is the Roman Catholic Cathedral Basilica of St. John the Baptist. Given this proximity, Lafayette Square features prominently in Savannah's massive Saint Patrick's Day celebrations. Water in the fountain is dyed green for the occasion.In this area is the museum known as the Flannery O'Connor Childhood Home, which is open to the public.

The First Congregational Church is a church located at 421 Habersham Street in Savannah, Georgia, United States. It stands on the western side of Whitefield Square. The church is unique to Savannah in that it was born out of an educational institution. What was known as the Oglethorpe Colored Free School (established in 1865 and named for the city's founder, James Oglethorpe) became the Beach Institute. The institute fell under the auspices of the Colored Educational Association of Savannah, itself an offspring of the American Missionary Society of New York.The original Beach Institute building, erected in 1867 as its first school, still stands at 502 East Harris Street (now the Beach Institute African American Cultural Center). The Institute is named for Alfred Ely Beach — son of Moses Yale Beach and a descendant of Plymouth pilgrim William Brewster and Elihu Yale — who donated the land.In April 1869, thirteen men and women, along with the Rev. Robert L. Carter, founded the First Congregational Church of Savannah. Meetings were held at the Beach Institute, amongst other venues, over the next few years. In 1878, it acquired the lot at Taylor and Habersham Streets The first small-frame meeting house was replaced in 1895 with the present Gothic structure, which was renovated in 1968. The building's original steeple was destroyed in a 1940 storm, and it was not replaced until 1992.The Madeline V. Hanne Fellowship Hall was added onto the church, on land that was donated by the St Joseph's Hospital, in 1976.The church's first members were white missionaries and students of the school. Its first four ministers were New Englanders.

Whitefield Square is one of the 22 squares of Savannah, Georgia, United States. It is located in the southernmost row of the city's five rows of squares, on Habersham Street and East Wayne Street, and was the final square laid out, in 1851. It is south of Troup Square and east of Calhoun Square in the southeastern corner of Savannah's grid of squares. The oldest building on the square is at 412–414 East Taylor Street, which dates to 1855.It is named for the Rev. George Whitefield (whose last name is pronounced Whitfield), founder of Bethesda Home for Boys (a residential education program – formerly the Bethesda Orphanage) in the 18th century, and still in existence on the south side of the city. The square has a gazebo in its center.A notable building facing the western side of the square is the First Congregational Church. Other prominent, though 20th-century, buildings are the Rose-of-Sharon Apartments (which occupies the entire northwestern tything block) and, across Habersham Street, the Red Cross Building. The square, and its immediate vicinity, was once a burial ground for both negro slaves and free persons of all colors. The original 1805 burial ground included the northern end of today's square, a half block to the north and one block to the west, It was extended in 1812 to the northwest and in 1818 to the south, this time incorporating the southern end of today's square. Due to this connection, a movement was started in 2021 to rename the square Jubilee Square, after Jubilee Freedom Day, the day when General William Sherman arrived in Savannah in 1864 to begin enforcing Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation.Andrew Bryan, the founder of the First African Baptist Church, was buried in the square, as was Henry Cunningham, the minister of the Second African Baptist Church.

The Savannah Historic District is a large urban U.S. historic district that roughly corresponds to the pre-civil war city limits of Savannah, Georgia. The area was declared a National Historic Landmark District in 1966, and is one of the largest urban, community-wide historic preservation districts in the United States. The district was made in recognition of the Oglethorpe Plan, a unique sort of urban planning begun by James Oglethorpe at the city's founding and propagated for the first century of its growth.The plan of the historic portions of Savannah is based on the concept of a ward, as defined by James Oglethorpe. Each ward had a central square, around which were arrayed four trust lots and four tythings. Each trust lot was to be used for a civic purpose, such as a school, government building, church, museum, or other public venue, while the tythings were each subdivided into ten lots for residential use. The wards were oriented in a rectilinear grid with north–south and east–west alignment. In a typical ward, the trust lots were set east and west of the square, and the residential lots of the tythings were extended north and south of the trust lots and the square, each tything divided into two rows of five lots, separated by alleys. In the early years of the Province of Georgia, the ward organization was in part military, with each ward's inhabitants organized into militia units, and the central squares acting as a gathering point for refugees from outside the city walls.Each year, the Savannah Historic District attracts millions of visitors, who enjoy its eighteenth- and nineteenth-century architecture and green spaces. The district includes the birthplace of Juliette Gordon Low (founder of the Girl Scouts of the United States of America, see Juliette Gordon Low Historic District), the Telfair Academy of Arts and Sciences (one of the South's first public museums), the First African Baptist Church (the oldest African American Baptist congregation in the United States), Temple Mickve Israel (the third-oldest synagogue in America), the Central of Georgia Railway roundhouse complex (the oldest standing antebellum rail facility in America), Christ Church (the Mother Church of Georgia), the old Colonial Cemetery, Cathedral of St. John the Baptist, Old Harbor Light, and Factors Row, a line of former cotton warehouses, along its waterfront, some built from ships' ballast stones.Other buildings in the district include the Isaiah Davenport House, the Green-Meldrim House, the Owens–Thomas House, the William Scarbrough House, the Sorrel–Weed House, and the United States Customhouse. Notable green spaces in the district include Savannah's 22 squares, the 30-acre Forsyth Park (at the southern limit of the district), and Emmet Park, part of The Strand, near the city's riverfront, in what was known as the Old Fort neighborhood.

The Andrew Low House is a home in Savannah, Georgia, United States. Located at 329 Abercorn Street, in Lafayette Square, it was built by John S. Norris in 1849 and is part of the Savannah Historic District and of the Juliette Gordon Low Historic District. It is the oldest building on Lafayette Square. Andrew Low was the father-in-law of Juliette Gordon Low, the founder of the Girl Scouts of the USA, and he inherited the house when his uncle died. He and his wife, Mary Cowper Stiles, maintained it as their American residence. Its adjacent (to the west) carriage house, at 330 Drayton Street, served as the headquarters for the Girl Scouts until 1913.