Abraham Minis

Abraham Minis (1694 – January 13, 1757) was a European immigrant to the newly settled colony of Savannah, Province of Georgia, in 1733. Despite their not knowing if they would be received, General James Oglethorpe, founder of the Savannah colony, allowed Minis and his family entry and granted them land. Their descendants have lived in Savannah ever since.

Minis became a farmer and merchant shipper who supplied Oglethorpe at Fort Frederica on St. Simons Island.

He married Abigail, with whom he had two daughters, Leah (born 1726) and Esther (1731), prior to their emigration to colonial America aboard the William and Sarah. Neither Leah nor Esther had any descendants. becoming the first white male child born in the colony. He had no descendants.

Oglethorpe granted the family land, although it was in a swamp and was "so frequently under water" that he was unable to drain and farm it.

Abraham's name appears in the general conveyance of town lots and farms that was implemented in December 1733, which makes it one of the earliest deeds in the colony. in Savannah. He was 62 or 63 years old, and left widow Abigail with eight children to raise. He is interred in the former Bull Street Cemetery, a Jewish burial ground allotted in 1733 by James Oglethorpe at the northwestern corner of today's Bull Street and West Oglethorpe Avenue. A memorial, in the median of Oglethorpe Avenue, lists the twenty people known to be interred there. Abigail, who survived her husband by 37 years, is buried in the Mordecai Sheftall Cemetery, a Jewish cemetery in Savannah.