The first and largest of Savannah's 22 squares, Johnson Square was laid out in 1733 and named for South Carolina's governor Robert Johnson. A tall obelisk at the centre marks the grave of Nathanael Greene, a Revolutionary War general. Christ Church, the oldest congregation in Georgia, faces the square from the east.
It sits at the commercial heart of the historic district, surrounded by banks and offices rather than the residential streetscapes you find further south. The result is a slightly more businesslike atmosphere than the quieter residential squares, but at midday the shade is welcome and the scale of the original city plan becomes legible: you can stand here and understand how Oglethorpe's grid was supposed to feel.