USA > North Carolina > Biographical history of North Carolina from colonial times to the present; > Part 5
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JOHN CAMERON BUXTON
ruled his resolution out of order, as reflecting on a member of an- other house, to wit, the House of Bishops, still later in a speech, with words that carried conviction to every heart, he scathingly denounced the efforts of any one, preacher, bishop or layman, who tried to commit the church to the encouragement of saloons.
Mr. Buxton has never aspired to be called an orator, yet at times, in his powerful arraignment of facts and merciless exposure of crime and falsehood, he has risen to heights of sublimity and power to which few men attain.
The author of this sketch has reason to remember with grati- tude his power as a speaker, and still blesses him for his kind words. At the Democratic Convention of 1904 he was requested to place in nomination for Governor Forsythe's candidate, R. B. Glenn. His speech was the last of the many speeches made. This is the description that a hearer afterwards made of the speech: "It wasn't pretty; it wasn't eloquent ; it was simply powerful, grand, like the fearful onward rushing of mighty waters, sweeping all before it in its resistless force." The ap- plause it brought attested its power.
Mr. and Mrs. Buxton have had born to them four children : Cameron Belo Buxton, a graduate of Chapel Hill, and now hold- ing in Philadelphia a splendid position as traffic agent of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fé Railroad; Miss Caro Fries Bux- ton, a beautiful and accomplished young lady, a graduate of Bryn Mawr, Pa., now living with her parents; Miss Anna Nash Bux- ton, a splendid type of young girlhood, now attending Bryn Mawr College ; while little Jarvis, the idol of his parents, and loved of all, was taken when ten years old, while pure in heart, to be with God. Of all Mr. Buxton's life, his home life is the best. De- voted to home and family, he seeks his pleasures there, not at the club or lodge, and to know him truly is to know him at home. It
is one of the sweetest homes in which I have ever visited, sur- rounded by an atmosphere of love and a reign of peace.
That Mr. Buxton has faults, and has committed errors, none would admit more readily than he, but no one regrets his mis-
u ody
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takes or sorrows more over his faults, and this desire to profit by his failures has but insured his success.
Mr. Buxton is a large, strong type, physically, mentally and morally, of American manhood, with a heart as big as his body and a nature too true to be little. To sum up his strong per- sonality and character in a few closing words: He is a lawyer who is diligent, forceful and honest. In his political career he has always proved himself fearless, bold and above a suspicion of using questionable methods to secure his advancement. With his strength, however, there is also gentleness, for no one sym- pathizes more deeply with the distressed or lends a more willing hand to relieve suffering. As husband, father, friend, and citi- zen he fills each niche well, at home ruling through love, and in business succeeding by the strength of his intellect, using no un- certain methods.
Mr. Buxton is yet young, just in the prime of his manhood. The State in its present tide of prosperity needs such men to help de- velop its resources and direct its affairs, and it is earnestly to be hoped that John Cameron Buxton may yet be spared for many more years of usefulness for the promotion of right and the up- building of the State.
R. B. Glenn.
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LEWIS ALBERT CARR
A MONG the business men of Durham, a town whose remarkable development has been brought about by the joint efforts of her enter- prising citizens, there are but few equalling in excellence and usefulness Lewis Albert Carr, the subject of this sketch. Vast and varied are the interests that center in that growing and prosperous city, and for twenty years Mr. Carr has been among the foremost of her citizens in energy and in practical accomplishment, every year con- tributing through his enterprise and loyal devotion to her expan- sion and substantial growth.
Mr. Carr is by birth a native of Maryland, was trained as a busi- ness man in Baltimore, and has the fine manner of the polished gentleman of that metropolis and all the vigor and enterprise that have distinguished the successful men of that great mercantile and industrial centre.
His father, Lewis Carr, was a farmer, living in Howard County, Maryland, in a region remarkable no less for its salubrity than for the fine scenery of its broken landscape and for the fertility of its well-cultivated fields. It was an ideal country for farm-life, suf- ficiently near to good markets for all farm products, and thickly settled by a prosperous community.
Unhappily Mr. Carr, the father, died when only forty-six years
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of age, leaving a family of nine young children-six of whom were boys and three giris. The management of the farm and the rearing of the children thus devolved on the mother, Mrs. Jane M. Carr, who fortunately was a woman of exceptionally fine sense and judgment and well versed in the practical affairs of life. Neces- sarily the boys, as they became of sufficient strength, were em- ployed in the duties of their farm-home. Their work and pas- times, their labor and recreation, were not different from those of their neighbors. They followed the plow and harrow, cured the hay, housed the corn, and marketed the wheat ; and when the farm- work of the year was over they attended the country schools that were taught during the winter months.
The schoolhouse was some four miles distant from the Carr farm, and the boys during its session made the daily journey of eight miles or more, going and returning. This exercise and their farm-work in the open air had a beneficial effect in establishing fine constitutions and developing vigorous frames and well -. rounded mental equipments, in some measure dispensing with the necessity of the training afforded by higher school advantages.
At length at the age of seventeen the subject of this sketch, realizing that the farm no longer needed him, and having a man's ambition for a larger life, determined to seek a business career in the neighboring city of Baltimore. His education, while not a finished one, was far from deficient ; he was vigorous, the soul of energy, and prepossessing in manner and appearance. He soon obtained employment with Charles A. Gambrill and Company, a great house, owning extensive flouring mills,"renowned for the superior excellence of its flour and having an established trade. throughout the entire" South ; but being without experience, the compensation he at first received was only $5 per week.
Having gained a footing in that establishment, young Carr was never allured to other employment. He remained steadfast at his work and gradually rose in usefulness, meriting the confidence of his employers and receiving manifestations of their good opinion. Indeed he possessed those characteristics that were calculated to win his way in life and bring him fine success.
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For thirteen years he served Gambrill and Company, constantly growing in efficiency and developing his business qualities ; and then finding himself able to enter upon an independent career, in 1883 he formed a partnership with J. W. Wolvington, under the name of Wolvington, Carr and Company, and established a grain and flour business. A thorough master of every detail of the wheat and flour trade, he brought to the new firm ripe experi- ence, and its business was very successful.
On the 21st of November, 1878, Mr. Carr was happily married to Miss Clara Watts, a daughter of Mr. Gerard S. Watts, a pros- perous merchant of Baltimore. She was a sister of Mr. George W. Watts; and after his removal to Durham, Mr. and Mrs. Carr were drawn also to locate there. Thus it came about that in 1888 Mr. Carr sold out his interest in his Baltimore business and made his home at Durham. He came to Durham just as that town was recovering from some little backset in its general course of rapid progress, and he contributed somewhat to giving it the increased momentum that has ever since carried it forward in its remark- able development.
The Durham Fertilizer Company was then being formed. He made an investment in that enterprise and was elected secretary and treasurer of the company; and from that time his name has been closely associated with all the great enterprises and immense factories and vast interests that have sprung from that parent stock.
Active and zealous in promoting every enterprise that would tend to the advantage of Durham, he was interested in the con- struction of the Durham and Northern Railroad, and since. 1892 he has been a director of that company. So also he was a promo- ter of the Durham and Lynchburg Railroad Company, and was a director of that company until it was incorporated into the Nor- folk and Western. The benefit Durham has received from the construction of these additional railroad facilities has been beyond calculation, and the community is largely indebted to the vigor and enterprise of Mr. Carr for their accomplishment.
He was one of the organizers of the Citizens' Savings Bank of
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Durham, and for five years served as a director of that institution. His interest in the industrial welfare of the city led him to promote the incorporation of the Commonwealth Cotton Mills. Since 1899 he has served as a director of the First National Bank of Durham, and the value of his services in connection with finances has been well recognized by his constant re-election as Vice-President of that progressive and well-managed institution.
Besides his connection with these well-known companies, he has been interested in many other enterprises, not merely those of local interest, but others established in various parts of the State. Nor has he concerned himself exclusively with matters of busi- ness. Other lines of work also interest him-such as the Watts Hospital, of which he is a trustee.
Among his most notable enterprises was that of establishing the Interstate Telephone and Telegraph Company. Of this he was the originator, and he achieved a fine success in organizing and putting it into operation. It was the first independent tele- phone company organized in the South. The work engaged his close attention and called forth his best capacity, and it has been a large success and has conferred a great benefit on many communi- ties in North Carolina. It also has established exchanges in Mary- land and Virginia.
But as varied and important as have been the indefatigable labors of Mr. Carr in other lines, the chief work of his life is, by common consent, that arising from his connection with the fer- tilizer company. When the Durham Fertilizer Company had demonstrated by its great success the value of that line of business, it was determined to expand, and the Norfolk and Carolina Chem- ical Company was thereupon organized. Mr. Carr, who as secre- tary and treasurer of the parent concern exerted a powerful in- fluence in its affairs, was a chief factor in organizing the new company, which was owned by the plant at Durham. He was much employed in the construction of the large works at Pinner's Point, and was secretary and treasurer of the Norfolk Chemical Company until it was. merged in the Virginia-Carolina Chemical Company. So fine a field of industry was here opened that, with
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a comprehensive grasp of the business interests involved, Mr. Carr and his associates, in 1895, determined to bring the different properties manufacturing fertilizers in the State, and some else- where, under the direction of one management ; and the Virginia- Carolina Chemical Company was formed with that object. Mr. Carr, who had achieved such remarkable success in the manage- ment of the Durham Company and of the Norfolk and Carolina Chemical Company, now became Managing Director of the North Carolina Division of the Virginia-Carolina Chemical Company, and he held that important position until the reorganization in 1903. At that time various changes were made in the system of management, and to Mr. Carr was committed the very important work of Manager of the North Carolina Sales Department of the Company. In connection with the affairs of this great company, one of the largest industrial organizations of the world, Mr. Carr has been a director of the Southern Cotton Oil Company, and is a director of the Navassa Guano Company of Wilmington, and of the Charleston Mining and Manufacturing Company of Charles- ton, South Carolina.
In all the large duties of his several positions Mr. Carr has ex- hibited a comprehensive intelligence, a careful thought, a rapid determination, and an unwavering attention to business that have gained for him high rank as a manager of affairs and brought him fine reputation for administrative ability.
As a citizen he has ever been quick to join others in advancing the interests of his community, and has been among the foremost of those men who have placed Durham on her substantial basis of prosperity. While never seeking political preferment, he has, in order to be useful to his town, served four years as Alderman of Durham. In politics he is a Democrat ; and he is zealous for the advancement of his friends, while not caring for public applause or station for himself.
His religious affiliations are with the Presbyterians, and he is a member and a deacon of the First Presbyterian Church of Dur- ham, and contributes liberally, not merely to his church but gen- erally to all the charities that appeal to his benevolence.
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Busy as he is, he has but little leisure to pass in recreation, but he is very fond of the hunt and occasionally joins his friends in that sport.
Mr. Carr's home at Durham from the time of his first arrival has ever been a notable feature in the social life of his com- munity. But after twenty years of happy wedded life he had the misfortune to lose his first wife, who, dying on March 12, 1898, was survived by four children : one son and three daughters. The eldest of these daughters was married on November 7, 1900, to Mr. George L. Lyon, a grandson of the late Mr. Washington Duke. On May 2, 1900, Mr. Carr was married to Miss Jessie B. Carroll, a daughter of Mr. O. J. Carroll, of Raleigh, and one of the loveliest of her sex.
S. A. Ashe.
PETER CARTERET
N the death of Samuel Stephens, about the end of the year 1669, he was succeeded by Peter Carteret, who was probably chosen President by the Council at that time, and a few months later was appointed by the Proprietors in Eng- land. At the meeting of the Proprietors in January, 1670, Sir George Carteret named Peter Carteret as his Deputy, and probably they were of the same family. Peter Car- teret came to Albemarle in the Fall of 1664. In the first letter of instructions to Sir William Berkeley the Proprietors mentioned that they reserved the nomination of a surveyor and a secretary as officers particularly charged with taking care of their interests. They mentioned that Sir George Carteret had recommended Monsieur Lepreyrie for surveyor and Lord Berkeley had recom- mended Richard Cobthrop for secretary, who promised to be ready to go out within a month. These gentlemen, however, did not go, but instead, Thomas Woodward was the surveyor, and Peter Carteret the first secretary; and it appears that Carteret brought over with him the commission and instructions for Governor Drummond in the Fall of 1664. His office of secretary was of importance, as he kept the record of all the surveys, and it was upon his certificate that the Governor made the grants. Thomas Woodward says of Carteret in his letter of June 2, 1665 : "I make "no question but Mr. Carteret, our secretary, will answer all your
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expectations, for I assure you that he is diligent." It may be assumed that from that time onward Peter Carteret was the Dep- uty and representative in Carolina of Sir George Carteret. It is said that he was Speaker of the Assembly of Albemarle.
The instructions sent him as Governor in 1670 required him to put in force the grand model of Government as near as may be-"and not being able at present to put it fully in practice by reason of the want of Landgraves and Cassiques and a sufficient number of people, however, intending to come as nigh it as we can in the present state of affairs in all the colony of our said Province, you are therefore required to have the four precincts elect five representatives each, and then, the five persons chosen by us being added, and who for the present represent the No- bility, are to be the Assembly." The Assembly was to elect five persons, who, being joined with the five deputed by the Pro- prietors, were to compose the Council. The Governor and the five Deputies were to be the Palatine's Court. The Governor, with the consent of the Council, was to establish other Courts. The Assembly was to make the laws, which, being ratified by the Gov- ernor and any three of the five Deputies, were to be in force as under the Fundamental Constitutions.
It is to be noted that the changes in the polity required by these instructions, which supplanted and took the place of the Funda- mental Constitutions, were neither numerous nor important. There being no nobility, that element in government provided for in the Constitution found a substitute in the Deputies and in five other persons elected by the representatives of the people ; and this addition to the Council of persons chosen by the As- sembly made that body more responsive to the will of the people. In that respect the change was towards popular rights.
It is true that one of the provisions of the Constitutions was that the people should take an oath or affirmation to observe them and to abide by them; but yet the Constitutions had no vitality or operation beyond what was contained in the instructions to the Governors. Still they hung somewhat as a cloud over the people, and there are traces of popular discontent. During the Miller
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troubles some of the people raised the cry that "they did not want Landgraves and Cassiques," but the leaders in that affair quickly told them not to say that ; they were not quarreling with the Lords Proprietors.
There was, however, a matter of more vital import that caused dissatisfaction. Under the Great Deed the rent was a farthing an acre, payable in commodities ; while the Constitutions prescribed a rent of as much silver as is contained in a penny, thus increasing the rent fourfold and making it payable in money. This provision, however, was never enforced. When the Proprie- tors later gave instructions that such rents should be collected, the people demurred, and the Proprietors eventually recognized the validity of their agreement contained in the Great Deed.
So far as the changes inaugurated in Carteret's time were of interest to the people, they seemed rather to subserve the public convenience than to be a cause of irritation and discontent. The county was laid off into four precincts, and Precinct Courts were established and other changes were made that came naturally with . the growth and development of the colony. At the session of the Assembly in April, 1672, more than fifty-four Acts were passed, which, however, probably embraced all former laws then re- enacted.
While the administration of Carteret is thus historic because of the alteration in the system of government, it is also historic because it witnessed the introduction of the Society of Friends among the people. Both under the Concessions and the Consti- tutions there was absolute freedom of conscience and religious toleration. In 1672 Edmundson and George Cox both visited Albe- marle. The latter says that he found only one Quaker there, Phillips, who had not seen a Friend for seven years. The former mentions having borrowed a canoe and "with this boat we went to the Governor's. The Governor, with his wife, received us lov- ingly ; but a doctor there would needs dispute with us." From this it appears that Carteret was married and that he was a man of kindly disposition. Fox continues: "We tarried at the Gov- ernor's that night ; and next morning he very courteously walked
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with us himself about two miles through the woods to a place whither he had sent our boat about to meet us." The visits of these Quaker preachers marked the rise of the Quaker sect in the colony.
In 1672, during his administration, new navigation laws and customs duties were passed in England, and it was required by the Crown authorities that these laws should be enforced in Albe- marle, and they interfered with the established trade of the Col- ony. The new element introduced into the Council by the ad- mission of five inhabitants elected by the Assembly changed the attitude of that body toward public measures and brought it under the rule of the people themselves. The Council was no longer in harmony with the Governor. Carteret's efforts to compose differences were fruitless. He wearied of the attempt; and his three years' term being about to expire, he laid down his office and went to England, probably with the hope that he might suc- ceed in having the causes of dissatisfaction remedied. On the 25th of May, 1673, a Council was held at the house of Thomas Godfrey. Carteret had then sailed for home, and Colonel John Jenkins, the senior member of the Council, presided as Deputy- Governor. It does not appear that Carteret ever returned.
S. A. Ashe.
1.
Lo bave
GEORGE CATCHMAID
G EORGE CATCHMAID, the first Speaker of the Assembly of whom there is any particular mention, is an interesting character in our his- torical annals because of the events and inci- dents with which he was connected. Of his personal history but little is known. He is de- scribed in the grants made to him as being of the rank of "Gen- tleman," and "of Treslick." He came to Carolina in 1662; is said to have brought into the settlement sixty-seven persons ;1 was the Speaker of the Assembly at the session of the Summer of 1666;2 shortly afterwards he died, and his widow married Timothy Biggs. He left no children; and many years afterwards Edward Catchmaid, of London, claiming to be his nephew and heir, sought to obtain possession of his lands in Albemarle. This is a brief statement of the known facts of his life. But in connection with him several important matters relating to the settlement of Albe- marle and concerning the early inhabitants have been incidentally recorded.
Some writers have thought that the first settlement on the Chowan was under a grant to Roger Green, which was made by the Grand Assembly of Virginia in 1653, on behalf of himself and certain inhabitants of Nansemond River. This grant offered 10,000 acres of land to the first hundred persons who should seat
1 Bancroft, Vol. 2, p. 135.
2 C. R., Vol. I, p. 152 ..
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themselves on Roanoke River and on the south side of the Chowan River and its branches. It was made after Virginia had sub- mitted to Parliament and when there was not only no oppression of dissenters in Virginia, but when every freeman in the Old Dominion had the right to vote, and the Legislature elected the Governor and all other officers, and the only religious restriction was one forbidding the use of the Prayer Book in churches. There is no evidence that any settlement was ever made under this grant ; and Bancroft says particularly "that these conditional grants seemed not to have taken effect."1 It is to be further ob- served that the lands explored by Roger Green and mentioned in this grant were not on the shores of the Sound, but south of the branches of the Chowan, which was not in the limits of Caro- lina. The authorities in Virginia well knew that the territory south of the 36th degree of latitude had been long since granted by the Crown under the name of Carolina, and was not under their jurisdiction.
In a suit growing out of George Catchmaid's settlement in Carolina, the record of which is preserved by Doctor Hawks in his second volume, page 132, some account is given of those who first seated themselves on the shores of Albemarle Sound. From that record it appears that George Durant came in company with the "first seaters," but for two years he occupied himself with finding out the country and selecting a good location. Having done that, he purchased from the King of the Yeopim Indians a certain neck of land on Perquimans River, receiving his deed on the first day of March, 1661 ( 1662) ;" and from this it would ap- pear that the "first seaters" came in 1659 or 1660. George Durant, while beginning his clearing, encouraged Catchmaid to seat a tract of land adjoining his own, and Catchmaid sent in 1662 Richard Watridge with three hands to settle and seat the said lands ; and a month later Catchmaid, having come to Albemarle, informed Durant that Governor Berkeley had then lately returned from England, and had announced that the settlers at Albemarle should
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