any human creature inhabiting it." This was Bath. The settlement was on the Pamlico river and its branches. "They have begun to build a town called Bath. It consists of about twelve houses, being the only one in the whole province." That settlement probably did not contain 500 inhabitants. In 1709 a few Huguenots removed from the banks of the James river and settled between Pamlico and the Neuse. It was about that time that Beaufort was laid out as a town, and a little later the Swiss located at New Berne.
Under these circumstances, with families far removed from each other--with religious disputes flagrant, and indeed all the politics of the colony turning on religious dissensions--it is easy to see why there was but little progress made in establishing schools. Yet we find that at Sarum, on the dividing line between Virginia and North Carolina, there was a flourishing school kept by a Mr. Mashburn; that a Mr. Griffin had a school in Pasquotank; "that the Quakers themselves sent their children to his school;" "that Mr. Adams took Mr. Griffin's place in Pasquotank and he went to Chowan." These schools are mentioned only incidentally. There were doubtless schools at Bath and elsewhere. In the colony there resided men of learning, culture and refinement; men of means who contributed to found libraries, to erect churches, and to promote the welfare of the people. Mosely, Hyde, Swann, Porter, Lillington, Harvey, Saunderson, Pollock, Lowe, the son-in-law of Governor Archdale, and others too numerous to mention, were men who were not indifferent to education. If the facts could be unearthed, it would probably appear that there were many good schools in the province.
Men of education and intelligence, who were influenced by the possession or prospect of office, were with the Regulators in principle and spirit, but not in measures, or not in their ultra measures, just because they believed that the people were not prepared for a conflict with the established government. See Life of Caldwell, pp. 140-41. Jones mentions Maurice Moore, Thomas Person, and Alexander Martin, as of this sentiment.
In the uprising of the Regulators, it is believed that Mecklenburg took a decided part. We extract from the "Life of Caldwell," (p. 136) by Caruthers, the following statement:
"As it had been found very difficult to punish any of the Regulators in their own county, the Attorney General was authorized to prosecute them in any Superior Court, or Court of Oyer and Terminer, in the Province; and on an indictment being found, the Judges were directed to issue a proclamation against the defendant, commanding him to surrender himself and stand his trial; and on his failing to do so, he was held to be guilty and outlawed, and his lands and chattels forfeited. The Governor was empowered to make drafts from the militia to enforce the execution of the laws; and any persons who were found embodied and in arms, with intention of opposing the military force, if they refused on command of a Justice or Sheriff to lay down their arms and surrender themselves, were to be treated as traitors. To diminish the strength of the Regulators by division, four new counties were established: one by taking a part from each of the counties of Orange, Cumberland, and Johnston, which, in compliment to Miss Esther Wake, a sister of Tryon's lady, was called Wake; another was formed from the counties of Orange and Rowan, which was called Guilford; a third was formed out of the southern part of Orange, to which the name of Chatham was given; and the northern part of Rowan was erected into a county called Surry."
"Mecklenburg seems to have had no confidence in the leaders of the Regulators, and a righteous disgust for many of their excesses. As Rev. Francis Cummins, the neighbor of Captain James Jack, has expressed it, "they wanted strength, consistency, a Congress, and a Washington at their head." Immediately after the
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