Walter Clark—Fighting Judge and Women’s Rights Advocate

            Walter McKenzie Clark was the oldest child of Gen. David and Anna Maria Thorne Clark. He was born on August 19, 1846 at Prospect Hill in Halifax Co., NC, but spent most of his young years at Ventosa, the Clark plantation on the Roanoke River. 

http://www.carolana.com/NC/Courts/wclark.html

           At the age of 8, Walter was sent to school at Vine Hill Academy near Clarksville [later Scotland Neck] also in Halifax County. In a letter to his mother he wrote, “I go to Sunday School and church, and also clean my teeth every morning, and everything else you requested me to do.” In 1857, he was sent to Ridgeway School in Warren Co. and in 1859 to Belmont Select School in Granville Co., where he excelled in every subject. In 1860, at the age of 14, he was enrolled in Tew’s Military Academy at Hillsboro, Orange Co.

            Soon after NC seceded from the Union on May 20, 1861, Gov. Ellis called for volunteers to assemble at Camp Ellis, near Raleigh, Wake Co. He asked Col. Tew of the Academy to assign a cadet to act as drill master for the first contingent of raw recruits. Walter Clark—only 14 years old—was given the assignment.

            The Camp Ellis troops were organized into the 22^nd Regiment under the command of Col. J. Johnston Pettigrew, and Clark, known as “Little Clark,” was elected 2^nd lieutenant and drill master, where he served until November when he became drill master for the 35^th NC Regiment at Camp Mangum, also in Wake Co.

            In the summer of 1862, “Little Clark” became Col. Matt W. Ransom’s adjutant. The regiment joined Gen. Lee’s army and Clark saw plenty of action. He was present at the Second Battle of Manassas and took part in the capture of Harper’s Ferry. After that, the troops marched double-quick to Sharpsburg, where on Sept. 17, the bloodiest one-day battle of the war was fought.

            Clark later wrote an account of that day in which he told how he was pulled out of the line of fire: “All the mounted officers in the division instantly dismounted, turning their horses loose to gallop to the rear. It being the first time I had been so suddenly thrown in contact with a line of battle, and not noticing, with the smoke and uproar, that the others had dismounted, I thought it my duty to stick to my horse; in another moment, when the smoke would have lifted, I should have been taken for a general officer and would have been swept out of my saddle by a hundred bullets. A kind-hearted veteran close by peremptorily pulled me off my horse. At that instant a Minnie ball, whistling over the just emptied saddle, struck the back of my left hand which was still clinging to the pommel, leaving a slight scar… .”

      Gen. Ransom had a slightly different recollection. He said that a big mountaineer private ran up to Clark and pulled him off his horse, exclaiming, “Git off’n this horse, you darned little fool! You’ll git killed.”

            Later, when the regiment was in winter quarters near Richmond, VA with Gen. Lee, Clark wrote his mother asking for a pair of boots. The soles of his shoes had given away and his feet were partially on the ground. “I have thought my feet would freeze in these low shoes, for they keep no more water out than if I had none. It is folly to think that persons in the army can purchase at any time, anywhere, what they need.”

            At another time he wrote his mother, “ …we had to lie in an open ditch, the rain pouring down, without blankets or a mouthful to eat (and the enemy picking off every man who raised up to stretch his benumbed limbs) for two nights and a day …”

            Walter Clark resigned his commission in 1863 and enrolled at UNC. He graduated a year later, first in his class. He was reading law, although, as he wrote his father, “… I would not be entitled to plead until I am twenty one.” As soon as he graduated in June 1864, he returned to his regiment and continued to serve until he was paroled on May 2, 1865.

After the War

            When Clark returned to Ventosa, there was nothing left. The fields were a wilderness of weed. Federal soldiers had stolen the livestock and burned the mansion to the ground. David Clark’s health was ruined and Walter took over management of Ventosa and Riverside, near New Bern in Craven Co. He became the head of the family at age 18 and managed to rehabilitate Ventosa and keep his family—mother, invalid father and 8 siblings—together.

            In December 1865, at the age of 19, he wrote to the Raleigh Daily Standard: “The picture of abandoned farms, stagnated business, a dejected people and open lawlessness is fearful to contemplate. Gentlemen may go to Raleigh and legislate, but what does their collective wisdom amount to if the plow stands still in the furrow and the anvil rests on its block? …”

            In January, 1867, Walter Clark was admitted to the practice of law in Halifax Co. and opened his office in Scotland Neck. At 21, he was licensed by the Supreme Court. He soon moved his office to Halifax where his practice thrived.

“Miss Sudie”

            “[I] go up to Company Shops [Burlington, Alamance Co.] today for the purpose of seeing Miss Sudie Graham.” This was the start of Clark’s ardent 3 year courtship of “Miss Sudie” Graham. She lived in Hillsboro, Orange Co., far from Halifax, and Clark often told of catching midnight freight trains on his return trips.

            On Jan. 27, 1875, Walter Clark and Susan Washington Graham were married. Clark was a director and general counsel for the Raleigh & Gaston and the Raleigh & Augusta Railroads, and it was more convenient for him to live in Raleigh. The young couple had an inexpensive but comfortable house, and it was there they raised their family of 8—5 boys and 3 girls.

Stock Certificate

LaBarre Galleries:

 http://www.glabarre.com/item/Raleigh_and_Gaston_Railroad_Company/6029/p2

            Clark seemed to have boundless energy and enthusiasm. He and Gov. Holt purchased the Raleigh News, a daily paper which Clark managed for a number of years. He wrote an annotated Clark’s Code of Civil Procedure that was so well done every practicing lawyer had to have a copy. He compiled and edited the State Records of North Carolina (16 vols., 1886-97). He wrote a historical summary of Methodism in NC and represented the Methodist church at a number of national and international conferences. In addition, he found time to help his children with their lessons and take the boys swimming in Crabtree Creek.

Fighting Judge

            Clark was appointed to the Superior Court in 1885 and was elected, in 1889, to the NC Supreme Court where he served until his death in 1924. He was inflexible against all violators of the law. Recognized as a progressive, Clark was an ardent advocate for women, children and minorities. He had conflicts with such powerhouses as the American Tobacco Co. and several railroad companies, including the Atlantic Coast Line. He urged better child labor laws, once denying the right of an employer to plead that a child working with dangerous machinery assumed the risk incident to the employment, and when injured was barred from recovery.

Women’s Rights

            Walter Clark took an avid interest in woman’s suffrage, serving as legal adviser to the North Carolina League of Women Voters. He made his first speech favoring woman suffrage in 1911.

            In 1913, Clark spoke to the Federation of Women’s clubs in New Bern. He said, in part: “…The legal status of women under the common law … was simply that of a slave. A married woman under the common law owned no property, except after the death of her husband. She could make no contracts, not even for necessaries and not even with the consent of her husband. She could not will or devise her property. Upon her marriage the husband and the wife became one—and that one was the husband. He was master, the wife was a nonentity. The moment she married, he became entitled to all her personal property. He was entitled to the rents and profits of her real estate, which he could sell for his lifetime, or it could be sold for his debts. If she died, the husband still possessed the right to the rents and profits of all her realty for the rest of his life, while at his death she received only a child’s part of his personalty [personal property] and a life right, called a dower, in only one-third of his realty. … She could not appoint a guardian for her children, even when she outlived her husband.

            “As to her personal rights, the married woman came under the absolute control of her husband, who could chastise her if he saw fit, provided the chastisement inflicted no permanent injury. The reason given for this by Judge Pearson as late as 1868 was that it was the husband’s duty to ‘make the wife behave herself,’ and if he beat her without good cause it was held that the courts would not punish him, because it was too small a matter to take notice of, unless she was permanently injured. As late as 1868 it was held by our Supreme Court that if a husband whipped his wife with a switch no larger than his thumb he could not be punished.

 "Can this plaintiff discharge that duty when so authorized by an act of the Legislature and commissioned by the Governor? Or is she barred because she is a woman? Under the Constitution of the United States no one is debarred from holding any office from President down because of sex. What provision of the state Constitution will be shattered, and what detriment will the public welfare receive, if by legislative and executive authority a woman shall authenticate a certificate made by herself by impressing the seal upon a piece of paper? If the defendant were a man, he would not be debarred from holding this appointment unless he were an idiot, a lunatic, or a convict."

From a case heard by the NC Supreme Court in 1915

http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/notaries/notaries.html

            “The first improvement came in 1848 when a statute ‘provided that as to women married thereafter, their real estate could not be sold by the husband nor for his debts.’ In 1868, the new constitution contained a provision that was intended to emancipate married women by providing that ‘a married woman should own her property as fully as if she had remained single; that she might will it, and that she could sell her personalty, but it was still required that she must get the written assent of her husband to convey her realty. This last restriction still holds in this state … .’ Despite the new provision, “the courts placidly proceeded to hold that the earnings from her needle or cooking, or otherwise acquired by her labor should nevertheless become absolutely the property of her husband, and that she could not sue for it.” It was not until 1913 that women were granted the right to their own earnings.

            In 1916, Judge Clark spoke in Greenville, Pitt Co. on the subject of votes for women. He argued, although women could not vote, legally they could hold any state office, as the constitution did not specify that office-holders must be men.

            Walter Clark died on May 20, 1924.

           

[From The Connector, Newsletter of Tar River Connections Genealogy Society: Vol. 12, Number 3: Summer 2008.

Sources: Dictionary of N.C. Biography edited by William S. Powell; “Soldier, Planter, Judge” by Gene Dugan, Ramparts, Summer 1998; http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/clarkw/bio.html]

DIED

PHILEMON HAWKINS.

            At his residence, in Warren county, North Carolina, January 28, 1833, Philemon Hawkins, the last of the signers of the Constitution of the State of North Carolina in 1776. He was born on the 3d December, 1752; and, at the early age of sixteen, was sworn in as Deputy Sheriff for the county of Granville, and performed the whole of the duties of that office for his principal.

            He belonged to the troop of cavalry at the battle of the Allemance (sic), which was fought on the 16^th of May 1771, and for the distinction he merited on that occasion, was presented by the commander-in-chief, Governor Tryon, with a beautiful rifle.

            Before he was of age, he was elected a member of the general assembly for the county of Bute. [Bute County was subsequently divided into Warren and Franklin Counties.] He continued as a member of the legislature, mainly from the county of Granville, with the intermission of two years only, for thirteen years. The last term of his service was at Fayetteville [Cumberland County], in the year 1789.

            He raised the first volunteer company in the cause of American independence, that was raised in the county of Bute, and which consisted of 144 men. In the year 1776, he was elected a colonel of a regiment by the convention at Halifax, and in that command performed many services; but ultimately left the army, and continued to act as a member of the legislature.

            He was a member of the convention which ratified the Constitution of the United States, and frequently a member of the executive council. He was a man of strong mental powers, which he retained to the last, and possessed an accuracy of recollection, which enabled him to be the living chronicle of his times.

[The American Register by Joseph Blunt, 1835.]

[The Granville Whig (Oxford, NC) 26 June 1850]

Granville Free Lance (Oxford, NC) 2 Jan 1880

WHOLE TRAIN BURNED

__________

Disastrous Freight Wreck on the Oxford and Clarksville Railroad.

__________

TWO MEN WERE INJURED

_________

Dropped Through a Burning Trestle Over Neuse River.

________

WAS CONSUMED WITH BRIDGE

___________

Engineer Glenn, of Raleigh, Was Painfully Injured and Fireman 

Ferguson was Badly Burned.

            Sunday morning as the freight train was coming from Keysville over the O[xford] and C[larksville] road a most disastrous wreck occurred at the Neuse trestle, some twelve miles from Durham.

Early train at the Creedmoor, Granville County, station—one of 

the stops on the Clarksville and Oxford Railroad.

Found on the website of the City of Creedmoor:

 http://www.cityofcreedmoor.org/index.aspx?page=182

            Just beyond the long trestle coming from Keysville there is a short curve and a downward grade. Upon rounding the curve and when in a short distance away the engineer discovered that the trestle was on fire. The engine was reversed, but it was too late and before the man at the throttle had time for a moment's reflection the train was on the burning trestle. The engine and the entire train of cars went down to a depth of some twelve or fifteen feet below carrying destruction as they went. Miles Glenn, one of the best and bravest men on the road, stood firmly at his post to the last moment and the wonder is that he and his fireman were not instantly killed. Mr. Glenn was badly bruised, but his physicians say no bones were broken. His injuries were painful though it is hoped not serious. The fireman was pretty well shaken up, but his injuries are not so painful as those of the engineer's. Irwin Wood, one of the force suffered a severe sprain of the ankle in jumping from the rear end of the train.

            While the crew escaped the fire raged on until every part of the train except what was iron was consumed by the flames. Fortunately for the railroad the cargo was not a very large or expensive one. There were six loaded cars, one of which was marked to a Durham firm, that too, went up in smoke.

            It could not be ascertained what the probable loss to the railroad will be, but it will likely be several thousand dollars.

            Thus far everything seems to be in the dark as to the origin of the fire. Hands were at work re-building the trestle and there was a quantity of shavings scattered around. A spark might have been dropped from a previously passing train or it might have been the work of the mischief-makers. No one has been seen who could tell anything about this part of it.

            A large force was put to work Sunday clearing away the debris and replacing the burnt trestle and it will only be a short time until the trains will pass over as usual. Now the train goes out from Durham and passengers, mail and express are transferred at the river.

            Reports from the wounded are to the effect that all are doing well. Mr. Glenn's injuries were not serious and his physicians report him in a pretty fair condition.

[Taken from The News and Observer (Raleigh, NC) 4 Aug 1896]

CYCLONE STRIKES OXFORD

__________

Great Damage to Property

RALEIGH, N.C., May 3, [1896]. -- At 4 o'clock this afternoon the citizens of Oxford, [Granville County], a town about forty miles from this city on the Oxford and Clarksville [VA] Railroad, observed a heavy black cloud approaching from the southwest. The weather has been wet and blustery for three days. The cloud became blacker and denser, and just before 5 o'clock a roar was heard and all at once wind, rain, and hail dashed over the town.

The wind was terrific. Houses were blown down, trees were torn up by the roots, and the hailstones were much larger than usual and covered the ground to a depth of four inches and broke almost all the window panes in the town. The rain fell in sheets and torrents, so that the darkness was complete. The terrible rush of wind did not last longer than fifteen minutes, but the rain and hail continued for a much longer period.

It was soon ascertained that great damage to property had been done, and people who ventured out into the darkness, surrounded by the debris of houses, trees, fences, telegraph poles, and tin from the housetops. About 6 o'clock the rain and hail ceased, and there was a rift in the clouds, and the disaster could be seen.

The storm had swept from southeast to northeast across the town, leaving a mark about 400 yards wide. In this space the frame houses had suffered most. A number were blown down and the timbers blown away. The brick houses were unroofed.

A number of people are known to have been injured, one colored man fatally. The damage to property is estimated at $200,000. The track of the storm was from Oxford to Henderson, [Vance County], on the Raleigh and Gaston Railroad, and from there, north, down the railroad to Greystone [Vance County]. The distance from Oxford to Henderson is twelve miles, and the swath cut was from a quarter to half a mile wide. It presents the appearance of having been burned and swept. The trees have been torn up and the limbs blown off the trunks, and the pathway looks like a road that has been cleared of stumps and everything else.

The town of Henderson had the same experience as Oxford. Ten people are known to have been injured, four seriously. Greystone is a small railroad station. All the houses were blown down. There is a granite quarry there, and a squad of convicts have been worked. Three-quarters of the log houses were razed to the ground. A number of convicts were hurt.

It is learned that there was a second blow, but it knocked down the poles and wires, and no further news can be had to-night. There must have been another current of wind, because at sundown in this city the clouds had disappeared and the heavens appeared to be filled with leaves, and it was remarked that there had been a cyclone somewhere not very far distant. The blew a gale here, but did no damage.

[From a May 4, 1893 article in the New York Times.

The story is posted at the North Carolina Railroads website at: http://www.carolana.com/NC/Transportation/railroads/nc_rrs_oxford_clarksville.html]

Granville Under the Ground.

             Ten years ago I visited the “Gillis Copper Mine,” and, of course, Mr. Gillis, the noted geologist. I found the venerable Scotchman seated by a table covered with rocks; his books, hammer, and glass, were at hand. When he found that I was willing to hear him he told me where his rocks were found and how they got there. He told me where the waters flowed “before the mountains were brought forth,” and before the earth received its present shape. I listened with rapturous delight while he dwelt upon the wisdom and goodness of God in so wisely distributing wood, water, coal, rocks, and metals.

             On leaving him he said, “I am glad to find in Granville a young man who has a taste for geology, and feels an interest in the wealth under the ground. The present generation follows fame and fashion, and walks blindly over the riches which nature has placed so abundantly under our feet. Granville is rich above, but richer still below the surface. Our hills are swelling with ores—our streams are washing the precious stones—our sands are glittering with gold. God has not bestowed these bounties for naught. A change will come—you may see it. I cannot. My days are few, I am hastening to the grave. Farewell.”

            His words made a deep and lasting impression upon me. Mr. Gillis is gone to enrich with his body, that earth whose riches he so much admired. But is Granville, under the ground, as rich as Mr. Gillis supposed? Let the facts speak for themselves.

Copper Ore

            A bed of syenite* underlies the greater part of this county, and crops out on the hillsides. Many of the hill-tops are crowned with syenite bounders.—Gravels of syenite lie in abundance on the soil.—This rock drinks rain, dew and vapor, and the water freezes and thaws, gradually reducing the rock to powder. This powder contains a sufficiency of every element for ordinary crops, sulphur and lime excepted. Hence Granville land has the power of manuring itself, and if our farmers will throw up high beds in the fall, and apply “Plaster of Paris” in the spring, the same fields may be cultivated with success for several years in succession. High beds will promote freezing and thawing, “Plaster of Paris” will furnish the needed sulphur and lime. In this way syenite—our most abundant rock—is a “treasure hid” in almost every field.—Syenite, when kept dry, is also a good material for building. The Capitol at Raleigh is built of syenite, and not of granite, as some suppose. But Granville contains “brown iron sandstone,” both beautiful and durable.

            An excellent quarry is found on the Raleigh road, three miles from Oxford. If, therefore, a Granville man shall desire to build him a stone house, he will have choice of splendid material. At Lyon’s mill on Tar river, he may also find verd Antique marble to decorate his house and furniture.

            At Ramsey’s mill there is a mine of magnetic iron ore. Dr. Emmons found that the Chatham coal extends to Tar River on the land or Mr. W. B. Crews. The Gillis copper Mine has been described by Dr. C. T. Jackson. Copper ore is abundant. Tabb’s creek and its tributaries wash golden sands, and gold in small quantities is found from Salem to Kittrell’s. Soapstone for ovens, furnaces &c., is found in various parts of the county. I have found two kinds of marl in Granville. One kind excellent in quality, but very limited in quantity; the other kind is abundant on the lands of Dr. Lewis and Mr. J. H. Davis. With this marl I have made a single experiment, the result of which is so surprising that I am unwilling to publish it until confirmed by additional experiments.

            In the North-Western part of the country is also found an extensive bed of roofing slate of very respectable quality.

            But the wealth of Granville like “Old John Brown lies mouldering in the ground.” These underground storehouses are now waiting for enterprise to know at their doors, which are ready to open.

            Specimens from various parts of the county may be seen, at any time, in my cabinet, and at any leisure hour, it will afford me pleasure to accompany geologists to the various localaties.

J. H. MILLS

NOTE: The Gillis Mine was actually in Person County. It was in the north-east corner of Person, near the Granville line and only about five miles from the Virginia line.

* a coarse-grained gray igneous rock composed mainly of alkali ffeldspar and ferromagnesian minerals such as hornblende.

[Taken from The Daily Standard (Raleigh, NC) 29 Sep 1865]

Among the Country High Schools

(Excerpts From Principals' Preliminary Reports for the Fall Term, 1913.)

BEAUFORT COUNTY

Principal A. W. Davenport, Pantego High School.

     Library and office room added. Betterment Association has made about $20.00 and bought six new stools, cost $50.00. Prospects are very bright for good year.

BERTIE COUNTY 

Principal J. B. Thorn, Jr., Aulander High School.

     $12,500 worth of bonds voted for a new building to be erected next year.

     Prizes offered for best piece of needle work and also handicraft. Two literary societies. School in a flourishing, prosperous condition

CRAVEN COUNTY

Principal, W. G. Gaston, Dover High School

     We need a dormitory very badly and we expect to have on in the near future. This is a find location for a High School. We have a large field to draw from. With little effort the attendance could be increased 50 per cent., I believe. We have had to turn down numbers, because we have no place for them. Our present capacity is reached. Our school has never been in better shape. There is no finer school community in North Carolina than Dover.

Dover High School, Craven County
Wikimedia Commons
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rural_public_high_school,_Dover,_
Craven_County,_NC_(6797187875).jpg

EDGECOMBE

Principal L. L. Hargrave, Battleboro High School.

     Spelling, writing, drawing, nature work, and sight-singing are taught throughout school course. Twelve pupils take typewriting. Physical culture is given free to school.

     Three more recitation rooms have been added this fall, one of which is fitted up for science. Sixty-five dollars has been contributed for apparatus for science classes.

     Within two years the school has about doubled in pupils, has doubled in teachers, and has more than doubled in classrooms. We now have two flourishing literary societies. 

GRANVILLE COUNTY

Principal R. P. Crumpler, Knap of Reeds High School.

     We have a piano and a music department this year.

HALIFAX COUNTY

Principal John T. Cobb, Enfield High School.

     There exists the heartiest co-operation between the school and the community. The Betterment Association is an active factor here and does great good. The trustees have ordered the fourth year to be added to the high school course, making the school run as a four-year high school.

Consolidated School, Halifax County
Taken from Eastern North Carolina Where Prosperity is Perennial INVITES YOU! http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/ncencyc/ncencyc.html

JOHNSTON COUNTY

Principal S. E. Leonard, Kenly High School.

     School has use of dormitory free. Superintendent rents out rooms, employs a matron and runs a regular boarding house. He either makes or loses as the funds are his and not the school's. Five of the teachers and a number of pupils live in dormitory.

MARTIN COUNTY

Principal W. H. Mizelle, Robersonville High School.

     Since the close of school the latter part of April of this year, our trustees have added to the school building one new room, enlarged two others, tinned the roof of the entire building, painted the walls and ceilings of two rooms, put in seven coal stoves, furnished nicely the one new room, and done considerable general repair work. They have also improved the school ground.

NASH COUNTY

Principal Arnold W. Byrd, Mt. Pleasant High School.

     The dormitory is managed by a matron assisted by the principal and the assistant teachers.

     A Betterment Association has been organized and is doing valuable service for the school. Through its efforts we have secured a school farm.

Principal H. A. Nanney, Red Oak High School.

     The dormitory and mess hall are managed by a matron. Board is given at club rates, or at actual cost. A room rent fee of 50 cents a month is charged each student.

     We will vote on $10,000 worth of bonds Dec. 5 for the erection of a new school building. We hope to establish a Farm Life School next year in connection with the school. (Bond issue carried Dec. 5.

Principal J. I. White, Whitakers High School.

     Organized two literary societies, one for each sex. Have an excellent reading room. Increased our library. A very live Betterment Association, which employs and pays a music teacher. Attendance good. The first month we did not have any tardies and only seven absentees. Only eleven tardies last month.

Consolidated School, Nash County
 Taken from Eastern North Carolina Where Prosperity is Perennial INVITES YOU!
 http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/ncencyc/ncencyc.html

PERSON COUNTY

Mrs. J. A. Beam, Principal, Bethel Hill High School.

       We have had some work done on our building and have put in  some equipment, but we greatly need a dormitory. We could easily double our attendance if we had it.Several boarders are scattered through the neighborhood now.

Miss Allene Patton, Principal, Bushy Fork High School.

       The school building was painted during the summer.

WAKE COUNTY

Principal T. E. Story, Bay Leaf High School.

     The dormitory is run by Mr. H. P. Thompson, one of the trustees. The dormitory alone just cost $1,750, but the lot (4 1-2 Acres) and a storehouse that is on it all cost $2,750.

Principal M. B. Dry, Cary High School.

     Boys pay matron of boys dormitory $9.00 a month for table board, and they pay the school $1.50 for room rent. Girls pay $8.25 for table board and $1.75 a month for room rent in the girls’ dormitory.      We are putting up a new school building, which, together with the dormitories, will cost $33,000. The old school building will be converted into 40 rooms for dormitories for boys. We are now paying rent on the girls’ dormitory, but we are going to buy it and enlarge it so as to accommodate 60 or more girls.

     We have bored a 200-foot well on the campus which will furnish 20 or more gallons of water per minute.

WARREN COUNTY

Principal E. P. Dixon, Wise High School.

     We have a hotel here for dormitory, but we are not using it. We started to open it, but the county took the appropriation from us so we could not secure another high school teacher. We let it stop. The County Board promises to give us the appropriation this year. What will be done I do not know.

WILSON COUNTY

Principal C. O. Armstrong, Bock Ridge High School.

     We are now converting old school building into dormitory. A part of fund raised by private subscription, and for remainder an application was filed for a loan.

[Taken from The North Carolina High School Bulletin, Volume 5: edited by Nathan Wilson Walker. January 1, 1914: University of North Carolina]

CARRIE NATION VISITS

NORTH CAROLINA

__________

Raleigh, Oxford and Rocky Mount

__________

BEWARE YE ALL

CARRIE IS COMING

       

     This was the headline in the Raleigh Times on 24 July 1907. It referred to the expected arrival of the fierce prohibitionist, Carrie Nation. “’Good Morning Carrie’ will be the tune next Monday, when the invincible Carrie Nation, with her dangerous battle-axe, swoops down rough-shod upon this awfully intemperate town of Raleigh.”

Taken from Kansapedia at https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/carry-a-nation/15502

            Carrie had spent several weeks in western North Carolina and now she was headed east. The Times went on: “Carrie is coming in all her war-paint, and upon her arrival, will proceed to tell the jug-toters just what she thinks of them. It is rumored that certain red-nosed residents of this community have arranged for an extended fishing trip for next week, hence will be deprived of the illustrious visitor’s counsel.”

            In Raleigh, the temperance advocate was scheduled to speak twice at Pullen Park and to give street-corner lectures, not only about the evils of alcohol, but also the wickedness of tobacco and corsets.

“SMASHES” EVERYTHING IN SIGHT

was the headline in the News and Observer  on 30 July 1907 after Carrie’s arrival. The second line continued:  “Visited Pool Room and Dispensary—Spoke Twice at Park, Doing Her Revised “Smashing” Stunt to Saloons, Dispensaries, Tobac[c]o Factories.”

            When the train from Greensboro had pulled in and the stout, elderly woman with gray hair stepped down, the small crowd on the platform immediately recognized her. Promptly she began to speak about the 'good news.' Large amounts of tobacco had been destroyed in Orange County in a violent storm. “Rev. Mr. Carver had about forty thousand hills of tobacco…,” she read from a morning newspaper. “When the storm was over the tobacco stalks were left standing … .”

            “I consider the destruction of that tobacco as an answer to my prayers,” said Mrs. Nation. “North Carolina is cursed with a regular cancer in the American Tobacco Company. By the way, they are building a memorial church now to the old man Duke. I say they ought to put a memorial window in that church made of Bull Durham Tobacco and Duke’s Mixture.”

            Carrie Nation was especially well known for her habit of attacking taverns and saloons with a hatchet although she no longer did that. One way she raised money, however, was through the sale of miniature hatchets which she had ready on the platform in Raleigh. 

            As she waited for a street car or hack, she went on to say, “I am opposed to gay and expensive dressing, and I am opposed to balls—or hugging schools, I call them. I warn all boys against marrying ball room girls. I tell them if the girls practice hugging strange men before marriage they are likely to have the same taste afterwards.”

Interior view of a saloon wrecked by Carry Nation and her followers, Enterprise, Kansas.Taken from Kansas Memory at Kansasmemory.org

Carrie Nation on the Evils of Dispensaries

            In 1897, North Carolina had passed a law permitting the establishment of county dispensaries for the sale of alcohol. These dispensaries were a target of Carrie’s wrath. When asked if she was going to visit the local dispensary, she replied, “Yes, I am going there. … It’s a regular hell-hole. And these goody-goody church people put it here—so good that the devil loves them. They tell me that you have a church man, a Sunday school teacher managing the dispensary.” [This was a young man named Snelling.]

            Promising to visit the dispensary at three o’clock that afternoon, she went on to preach against distilleries: “The distiller is the worst murderer in the land.”

At The Park

            She had no set speech, but her theme was: “Carry A. Nation for the Home; Carry A. Nation for Woman.” She touched on sobriety, temperance, purity, virtue, true manhood and womanhood, and railed against the saloon, the dispensary, the pool room, the gambling den, and the places of impurity.

            Suddenly she exclaimed, “Look here, there is a man smoking.” Pointing her finger at him, she said sharply:  “Don’t you know better than to smoke in this audience, sir? They get into such a habit of smoking that they loose [sic] all their manhood and self respect.” Returning to the subject of the dispensary she described it as “a hellhole where rotten slop is dealt out to poison and damn men’s lives and souls and destroy the virtue and womanhood of woman.”

Nude Pictures On Display

            To a News and Observer reporter she told the story of her visit to Lewis’ pool room, giving it a verbal slap. There she saw on the wall a picture of women 'perfectly nude.'  Describing the results of viewing such profanity, she said, “They would bare woman of love, they would bare her of virtue, they would bare her of home, they would bare her of sons, they would bare her of clothing. O, this is a time of making women bare!”

Carrie Nation Hatchet Pin for sale on Ebay

Taxation Without Representation

            Carrie Nation even touched on the subject of women’s right to vote—which they didn’t yet have!  She noted that women who owned property were forced to pay taxes to support courts for the purpose of punishing crime caused by selling liquor which she [the woman] could not vote to stop. “This is taxation,” she declared, “without representation, and is unconstitutional.” She declared that women can’t vote because saloon men know that women would vote them out of business.

            Near the end of her speech, she told of going into the office of the Bull Durham tobacco factory in Durham. She asked ‘a man’ why nude women were pictured in cigarette advertisements, and wondered, if they were going to use pictures of nude women anyway, why he didn’t use pictures of his own wife and daughter. She was promptly ordered out of the office.

Carrie in Oxford in Granville County

            The Oxford Public Ledger reported briefly on August 2: The well advertised Carrie Nation, who is now taking in the North Carolina town ripping things up the back, struck Oxford Wednesday and lectured in the Courthouse at night to quite a good audience. She made her usual talk on whiskey, tobacco, cigarettes, and the dispensary. She jumped on the Oxford dispensary and said our nice granolithic sidewalks put down by dispensary money would not stand. Paid her respects to the tobacco trust, Teddy Roosevelt, Republican and Democratic parties, and was anxious to sell her little hatchet. The receipts were about $30.

And in Rocky Mount in Nash and Edgecombe Counties

            The Wilmington Morning Star noted on 6 Aug 1907—Rocky Mount, N. C., August 3: Mrs. Carrie A. Nation, who has been here for two days, left today for Lynchburg, Va., where she will continue her efforts for prohibition. While here she delivered lectures at the opera house, at Oakland Park and in every saloon in town. Her lectures were attended by very good crowds and aroused considerable interest, but not much enthusiasm.

North Carolina — First in Prohibition

            Prohibition had long appealed to many people in North Carolina. As early as 1852, a petition for prohibition was presented to the General Assembly and in 1881 a referendum was held on the subject, but neither passed and saloons and taverns continued to thrive. The Anti-Saloon League was organized in 1902 with J. W. Bailey, a Warren County senator as its chairman. Many towns were able to stop the sale of alcohol within their limits through special acts of the Assembly.

In 1907, the Anti-Saloon League began a strong push for prohibition. Perhaps that was why Carrie Nation was here. The Watts Act was passed in 1908 forbidding the manufacture or sale of alcohol. North Carolina was the first state in the union to have such a law. It was not until January 1919 that the Eighteenth Amendment was passed making Prohibition the law of the land.

[NCPedia at http://ncpedia.org/anti-saloon-league; Raleigh Times (Raleigh, NC) 24 Jul 1907; News and Observer (Raleigh, NC) 30 July 1907; Oxford Public Ledger (Oxford, NC) 2 Aug 1907; Wilmington Morning Star (Wilmington, NC) 6 Aug 1907]

Plea for Aid
Local Militia in Dire Straits

War of 1812

The following counties of the Detached Militia were called into service at Norfolk, Virginia by orders in September of 1814 - Bertie, Chatham, Edgecombe, Franklin, Gates, Granville, Halifax, Hertford, Johnston, Martin, Nash, Northampton, Orange, Person, Wake, and Warren. Those from Chatham, Orange, and Person were ordered to return to their respective homes before they arrived at Gates Court House, the place of rendezvous.

ADDRESS

To the citizens of the counties of Hertford, Bertie, Martin, Northampton, Halifax, Nash, Edgecombe, Johnston, Warren, Franklin, Granville and Wake, and to the patriotic citizens of North Carolina generally.

The undersigned take the liberty of addressing you in behalf of the volunteers and drafted militia, detached from the several counties above named for the service of the United States, and now stationed under your command at Norfolk. — It is known to you that these men were suddenly called from their homes, without being afforded an opportunity, and many of them not possessing the ability, to make the necessary preparations for a six months tour of duty at an unknown season. The United States do not furnish clothing to the militia in their service—most of your friends and neighbors, therefore, who have repaired hither, to the post of danger, are entirely destitute of the clothing necessary to protect them from the inclemencies of the approaching season. Already they have suffered much from the want of these conveniences which their situation required, and we take pride in saying they have born those sufferings with a cheerfulness, patience and constancy, highly honorable. It will be impossible for them, however, to withstand the rigor of the approaching season unless they are provided with blankets and comfortable woolen clothing.

The only means by which we believe the wants of these troops can be speedily and effectively supplied, is by the appeal which we now make to your benevolence, patriotism and humanity—an appeal which we are sure will not be made in vain. We cannot believe that your patriotism will suffer the brave men, who have marched with such alacrity to the post of danger, and who are willing to risk their lives in their country’s defense, to perish by the severities of the season for want of the common conveniences of life… when it can be so easily afforded—We seek voluntary contributions from you, therefore, either in woollen clothing and blankets, or in money, at your discretion. Let receivers be appointed in each county, and let them transmit, without delay, the amount received, together with the names of the generous donors, to one of the field officers, who will be responsible for its faithful distribution. You will thus enjoy the sweet reflection of having snatched from the grave many a suffering soldier, and of having performed your duty to your country, to your friends and neighbors, whose gratitude will follow you through life.

We are, with sentiments of the highest respect, Your obedient servants,

D. McDonald, Col. 1^st Reg. NCDM

A. Joyner, Lieu. Col.

Jos. F. Dickinson, Major

John C. Green, do. (?)

James Iredell, Captain

John J. Inge, Captain

John Bell, Captain

Harry Bryan, Captain

John Green, Captain

Isaac Watkins, Captain

John L. (?) Laughter, captain

John F. (?) Walker, Captain

H. G. Williams, Captain\

Cantonned near Norfolk, 20 Oct 1814

[Political Synopsis, 17 Nov 1814, Tarborough and North Carolina – The War of 1812 website: http://www.carolana.com/NC/1800s/antebellum/war_of_1812_military_units.html]

With No Regrets

Departed this Life, in the fiftieth Year of his Age, THOMAS LOW THIMBLE, after a long Series of Drunkenness. It may with Truth be said, that no Man ever died less regretted: The Sound of his last Trumpet gave a general Joy to all his Friends, as well as those who had the misfortune to be of his Acquaintance. Take Heed, ye Sons of Bacchus, that when Death comes with his Summons you may not be catched napping; as, you see, was the Case with Mr. Thimble.

GRANVILLE County, NC
February 10, 1773

This obituary appeared in the Virginia Gazette, April 1, 1773. It appeared in The Connector, newsletter of he Tar River Connections Genealogical Society, in the Spring 2005 issue.