This work is now available in a second edition: 'Loyalists & Malcontents. Freemasonry & Revolution in South Carolina and Georgia'. Ric Berman examines the birth of freemasonry in South Carolina and Georgia and how the lodges at Charleston and Savannah gained status and influence through the prominence of their leading members. Although there were other clubs and societies that may have been more exclusive, none possessed the deemed antiquity and reputation of freemasonry. Indeed, the lodge carved out a position as the South's leading social forum to the extent that membership became self-reinforcing. Loyalists & Malcontents explores the cousinage of planters, merchants and lawyers that dominated the early Deep South and provides portraits of the patriots and loyalists that gave freemasonry its influence before and after the War of Independence. The book sheds a new light on the origins of American freemasonry and its close interaction with politics and society. The principal appendices offer an insight into contemporary attitudes towards slavery and the shift in American freemasonry away from the Grand Lodge of England towards the Irish-influenced 'Antients'.Please note that the first edition of this work has been retired and is no longer available.