USA > North Carolina > History of North Carolina: North Carolina biography, Volume IV > Part 81
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JACOB H. ROZZELLE, M. D. Bending all of his energy to making a success of his chosen profes- sion, Jacob H. Rozzelle, a rising young physician of Salisbury, is fast winning for himself a prom- inent and honorable name in the medical circles of Rowan County. A son of William Durant Rozzelle, he was born on a farm lying near the south line of Iredell County, North Carolina, of German ancestry.
Thomas Rozzelle, the doctor's grandfather, was born in Germany, and came to America with his parents, who settled in the southwest corner of Virginia, near the states of Kentucky, Tennessee and North Carolina. On attaining man's estate he came to North Carolina to settle, and having bought a tract of land near Lincolnton was there engaged in farming with slave labor until the death of his wife when he went to Texas to spend his remaining days with a son. He married a Miss Hill, who, according to the state records, was the first woman in North Carolina to be operated on for cancer of the breast, the operation having been performed by a Dr. Rozzelle.
Born in North Carolina, near Lincolnton, Wil- liam Durant Rozzelle was reared on the home farm. Becoming a tiller of the soil from choice, he· sub- sequently bought land in Iredell County, near Davidson College, and was there engaged in agri- cultural pursuits the remainder of his active life. He spent his last years retired, in Charlotte, dying at the age of sixty-seven years. He married Mrs. Lettie Louise (Cathey) Potts, who was born in Duesse Township, Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, a daughter of Henry and Vina (Corne- lius) Cathey, and widow of Capt. Monroe Potts. She survived her husband, and is now living in Salisbury. By her first marriage she had one son, Monroe Potts, and by her second marriage she has six children, as follows: Charles H .; Marvin L .; Daisy, wife of Brevard Knox; Maggie, wife of Walter H. Wilson; Jacob H., the subject of this brief sketch; and Lily, wife of Herman Kenneble.
Jacob H. Rozzelle was fitted for college at the Cornelius High School, and afterwards took a two years' course at Davidson College. He then en- gaged in farming for three years, after which he
entered the North Carolina Medical College, from which he was graduated with the degree of M. D. in 1912. Immediately locating in Rowan County, Doctor Rozzelle practiced medicine at China Grove for a year, and then came to Salisbury, where he built up a highly satisfactory practice, his profes- sional skill and ability having been widely recog- nized. He volunteered in Medical Reserve Corps and received his commission July 6, 1917, as first lieutenant. Ordered to Camp Greenleaf, Chick- amauga Park, Georgia, January 10, 1918, for active duty, after five weeks' military instructions he was ordered to New York City for course of instruction at Vanderbilt Clinic and New York Post Graduate Hospital in Urology and Derma- tology, for two months before reporting at embarka- tion port for Europe.
Doctor Rozzelle is a member of both the Rowan County and the North Carolina State Medical So- cieties. Fraternally he is a member of Rowan Lodge No. 100, Knights of Pythias; of Rosewood Camp No. 1454, Modern Woodmen of America; of Chestnut Camp No. 625, Woodmen of the World; and of Salisbury Council No. 26, Junior Order of United American Mechanics. Religiously Doctor Rozzelle is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
ROBERT E. HOLLINGSWORTH, M. D. For many years the name Hollingsworth in Surry County has been synonymus with the medical profession. A number of the family have obtained high positions and have rendered conspicuous services in this pro- fession, and one of the present generation in active practice is Dr. Robert E. Hollingsworth of Mount Airy. Mount Airy is his birthplace.
The remote ancestry of the family goes back to an Englishman who came to America with William Penn. From Pennsylvania some of the family moved to Maryland, from there to King and Queen County, Virginia, and still later to Duplin County, North Carolina.
Joseph Hollingsworth, great-grandfather of Dr. Robert E., moved from Duplin to Stokes County and had a plantation which he operated with the aid of his slaves. He lived there until his death. He married a Miss Mathews, and they reared a large family.
James Hollingsworth, grandfather of Robert E., was born in what is now Stokes County and after reaching manhood he bought land on Tom's Creek in Surry County. He was a planter and farmer and slave owner, and lived in that community until his death at the age of sixty-one. He married Elizabeth Golding, who was born in Stokes County, where her people were pioneers. Her death oc- curred at the age of seventy years. Her five sons were named Joseph, Edwin, William R .; John and Isaac, and the five daughters were Mary, Eliza, Sally, Martha and Nannie. Three of these sons, Joseph, Edwin and William, took up the profession of medicine and their services dignified the calling.
William R. Hollingsworth, who was born on a plantation in Westfield Township of Surry County January 14, 1836, received his early training in the rural schools and in the Jonesville High School, and from high school he entered upon the study of medicine with his brother, Dr. Joseph Hollings- worth. He subsequently entered the Jefferson Medical College at Philadelphia and continued his studies until the outbreak of the war. He then returned home and accepted a commission as surgeon by Governor Ellis. During much of the war he was on duty in Surry and Stokes counties.
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When the war was over he resumed his studies in the Jefferson Medical College, was graduated M. D. in 1867, and at once began practice at Mount Airy, where he was an honored and successful physician until his death in 1901, his son, Robert E., having in the meantime begun practice, so that there is no break in this branch of the family's medical services for fully fifty years.
Dr. William Hollingsworth was married August 15, 1865, to Susan Eleanor Davis. She was born at Red Shoals in Stokes County August 18, 1842, and is still living at Mount Airy. Her grandfa- ther, James Davis, Sr., was a farmer and probably a life long resident of Stokes County. His planta- tion was on the Dan River. He married Margaret Dunlap, and both of them attained advanced years. Their remains now rest in the cemetery on the home farm. Their two sons were named James and William, who inherited the plantation. James Davis, Jr., father of Mrs. William Hollingsworth, erected a hewed log house on his part of the estate and for a number of years his family oc- cupied that domicile without change. It had a brick chimney and a huge fireplace, and his wife cooked her meals by the open fire. Slaves tended the fields and also carded, spun and wove the floss with which the entire family were dressed. James Davis, Sr., died at the age of eighty years and his wife at sixty-one. They had eleven daughters and two sons, named Margaret, Mary, Eliza, Eliza- betli, Jesse, Martha, Nancy, James, Rebecca, Emily, Sarah, Luretta and Susan. Of this large family Mrs. William Hollingsworth is the only survivor. She was the mother of six children: Kate, James, Sadie, Robert E., Frank and Margaret. Kate married S. Porter Graves, member of a prominent family elsewhere mentioned. Sadie married Ed- ward Ashley. Margaret is the wife of N. Glen Williams.
Dr. Robert E. Hollingsworth grew up at Mount Airy, attended the local schools and Guilford Col- lege, and finished his literary education in the University of North Carolina. Following the example of his father he took up the study of medicine, at first under his father's direction and subsequently attended lectures at the University College of Medicine, now the Virginia College of Medicine at Richmond. He was graduated there in 1898 and at once began practice at Mount Airy and serves many of the families who were his father's patients forty or fifty years ago. Doctor Hollingsworth now as always makes his home with his mother. He is a member of the Surry County and the North Carolina State Medical societies. He has been successful in a business way and is a stockholder in various corporations.
THOMAS FANNING WOOD. A few brief years have sufficed to give Thomas Fanning Wood an enviable place of prominence in the business affairs at Wilmington. In 1909 he engaged in the ship chandlery business, becoming a general contractor for the fitting out and supplying of vessels in the Port of Wilmington. His business grew until it was incorporated in 1914 as Thomas F. Wood, and Mr. Wood is president and treasurer.
He was born at Wilmington July 9, 1887. His parents are Dr. Thomas Fanning and Mary Ken- nedy (Sprunt) Wood. His father was an old and well known physician of Wilmington. The son was educated in the public schools and attended the University of North Carolina in 1906-07. Soon after leaving college he took up his present line of work, and besides the business which is incorpo-
rated in his name he is also a director in the Com- mercial Loan Bank of Wilmington. Mr. Wood takes an active interest in the welfare of persons engaged in the shipping industry and is secretary and treasurer of the Seamen's Friend Society. By appointment from the governor Mr. Wood is a mem- ber of the Board of Commissioners of Navigation and Piloting for Cape Fear River and Bar. He is a member of the Carolina Yacht Club and belongs to the First Presbyterian Church. On December 25, 1912, he married Miss Margaret MacDonald Smith, of Wilmington. They have one son, Thomas Fan- ning, Jr., born July 17, 1915.
ERASMUS ALSTON DANIEL, JR. Engaged in suc- cessful general practice as a lawyer at Washing- ton, Mr. Daniel is one of the able and popular young attorneys of his native state and his suc- cess and prestige are such as to justify most fully his choice of a profession.
Mr. Daniel was born in Halifax County, North Carolina, January 24, 1881, a son of Erasmus Alston and Temperance Winifred (Nicholson) Daniel. He spent his early life on his father's farm, attended the Warrenton High School, and took both the law and academic courses of the University of North Carolina, where he graduated in 1904 and was admitted to the bar in August of the same year. After qualifying for his pro- fession Mr. Daniel located at Washington, and has been steadily building up a reputation and a large business and general practice in that city. Since 1908 he has been a member of the Democra- tic State Committee and is an attorney in good standing in the North Carolina State Bar Asso- ciation.
November 11, 1908, he married Norfleet Bryant, of Washington, North Carolina. They have three children, Erasmus A., Jr. Norfleet Owens and Blake Nicholson.
CHARLES E. GODWIN. Courteous, conscientious, and painstaking, Charles E. Godwin, of Lexington, clerk of the Superior Court, has proved himself a very efficient public official, the affairs of his office being well and wisely administered. He was born on a farm in Johnston County, North Carolina, in Selma Township, which was the place of birth of his father, Perry Godwin. His grand- father, Simon Godwin, was a farmer, and was a life-long resident of Johnston County.
Finding the occupation to which he was reared both pleasant and profitable, Perry Godwin bought a tract of land lying eighteen miles from Burtons- ville, Johnston County, and with the help of slaves engaged in agricultural pursuits. At Burtonsville the last battle of the Civil War was fought, and that entire section of the country was overrun by both armies. His grain and stock were seized, his fences destroyed, and at the close of the con- flict he was forced to begin the battle of life anew, the only asset he had left being his land. Nothing daunted, however, he resumed his former occupation, and his efforts were crowned with success. In 1872 he removed with his family to Moore County, North Carolina, and there, among the long-leaved pines, he was engaged in the tur- pentine business a few years. Returning to Johnston County, he located in Clayton, where he remained until his death, at the venerable age of eighty-two years. He was active in public affairs, and for two or three terms served as mayor of the city.
The maiden name of the wife of Perry Godwin
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was Mollie Hare. She was born in Johnston County, North Carolina, and died, at the age of fifty-four years, in Sanford, Lee County. Seven children were born of their union, as follows: John W., living in Cypress, Florida; Conderry, a resident of Swann Station, Lee County; Charles E .; Cherry, wife of W. A. Barnes, of Clayton; Bettie died at the age of twenty years; Sidney G., an unmarried daughter, and Simon, deceased.
Charles E. Godwin was educated in his native county, attending first the rural schools, and later the Selma High School. As a boy of fourteen years, he began working in the turpentine business, and a year later was operating a still in Moore County. He continued thus occupied until 1883, when he removed to Dodge County, Georgia, where he continued in the same profitable occupation for eight years. Returning to North Carolina in 1889, Mr. Godwin embarked in the mercantile business at Thomasville, putting in a large stock of general merchandise and groceries. When the Thomasville Loan and Trust Company, now the First National Bank of Thomasville, was organized, Mr. Godwin was made cashier. That responsible position he retained until 1906, when he was elected clerk of the Superior Court of Davidson County. He has served as clerk of the court ever since, his many re-elections to the office proving his popularity with the people. In 1915 he removed to his present attractive home in Lexington, where he is held in high regard as a man and a citizen.
In 1886; Mr. Godwin was united in marriage with Ellen Merry. She was born in Alachua County, Florida, a daughter of Horace and Grace Merry. Politically Mr. Godwin has been an earnest supporter of the principles of the dem- ocratic party since casting his first presidential vote in favor of Grover Cleveland. He is a demitted member of the Masonic Fraternity; an active member of Lexington Lodge, Knights of Pythias; of the Patriotic Sons of America; of the Royal Arcanum, and Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks.
JOHN HENRY EMORY has been active in the knitting and hosiery mill industries of Durham for a number of years and has organized and managed several of the larger and more important enterprises of that kind.
His success is the product of experience and self training since he started life without capital and with no special influence to aid him. He was born in Wake County, North Carolina, July 19, 1886, on the farm of his parents Henry Clay and Frona (Leighton) Emory. Nearly all his education was acquired at home, and from the age of ten he began work which practically paid his way. For a number of years until 1913 Mr. Emory was con- nected with the Durham Hosiery Mills, part of the time as a mechanic. In 1913 he resigned to embark in the shoe business, but in 1915 organized the Banner Hosiery Mills, of which he became secretary and treasurer. He also organized the Bowling-Emory Knitting Mill, but sold out his interests in that establishment in September, 1916. He also organized Mill No. 2 at Youngsville, North Carolina.
Mr. Emory on April 17, 1910, married Ethel Thomas of Durham, North Carolina. They have three children, Lois Tulloch, John Henry, Jr., and Virginia Hill.
WILLIAM STAMPS HOWARD, a member of the Tarboro bar for twenty years, has also been
prominent in business and industrial affairs in that city.
He was born at Tarboro November 18, 1875, son of George and Anna (Stamps) Howard. His father was a well known attorney in this section of North Carolina. The son was educated in the Horner's Military School and in 1897 graduated from the University of North Carolina. In 1898 he took up the practice of law but soon became identified with the organization of the Runnymead Mills Nos. 1 and 2 at Tarboro and No. 3 at Wilson, and has been an active factor in these industries ever since. Mr. Howard served as state senator in 1907-08 and was county attorney of Edgecombe County from 1903 to 1907. He is an official member of the Presbyterian Church at Tarboro.
November 14, 1901, he married Miss Mary McPherson Ferebee, of Oxford, North Carolina. They have four children. - William Stamps, Jr., Nelson Ferebee, Romaine Smith and Mary Ferebee.
CLAUDE LEONARD PRIDGEN, M. D. From the time he graduated in medicine until about two years ago when he located at Wilmington, Doctor Pridgen devoted himsel_ almost unreservedly to the cause of the public health movement in North Carolina, and rendered a service of great benefit to the community and state, even though the material rewards were not those that come to the successful private practitioner.
Born at Kinston, North Carolina, April 14, 1877, a son of James Alexander and Mary Ann (Wright) Pridgen, his father a merchant, Doctor Pridgen was liberally educated for his chosen work. Through private schools, Wake Forest Col- lege, from which he graduated in 1892, and the medical department of the University of North Carolina, where he completed the course in 1899, he went steadily ahead to higher attainments in his special field, and in 1901 was graduated from the Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, and in 1907 went abroad for post-graduate experience in Edinburgh, Scotland. While for a number of years he has looked after a general practice, his work is more and more being specialized in diseases of the stomach and intestines.
He first opened his office in his native Town of Kinston, and while there served as superin- tendent of health of Lenoir County for ten years, and was also president of the Lenoir County Medical Society.
In July, 1910, Doctor Pridgen became asso- ciated under the State Board of Health with the Rockefeller Hookworm Commission and gave all his time to investigations and methods of eradi- cading this disease until 1914. In that year he removed to Wilmington, and has since applied himself to a growing and private practice. He is a member of the Hanover County and State Medical Societies, and is now serving with the rank of major in the Medical Corps of the North Carolina National Guard. He is also prominent in Masonry, having attained the thirty-second de- grce of the Scottish Rite, belongs to the Mystic Shrine, and also to the Social Order of Master Masons, known as the Grotto M. O. V. P. E. R. He was elected grand master of the Masonic Lodge for 1917. He is a member of the First Baptist Church of Wilmington, and is a teacher in the Sunday School. Even with the demands made upon him as a private practitioner he finds time to take the lead in movements for organ- izing more effectively to care for those whose private means do not afford them the best profes-
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sional services, and recently he called a mass meeting of citizens in Wilmington for the purpose of establishing the Baby Hospital. He was made chairman of the Board upon organizatior. Doctor Pridgen is a member of the Y. M. C. A. and the Cape Fear Country Club.
On July 28, 1910, he married Miss Ila Adele Roundtree, of Wilmington. They have one son, Claude Leonard, Jr., born September 20, 1913.
HON. JOHN DILLARD BELLAMY. Within the pres- ent generation there has not arisen in the Old North State a greater or more brilliant lawyer, a finer citizen or a more eminent statesman than Hon. John Dillard Bellamy, of Wilmington. Bear- ing the name of a family that has been honored for its achievements in America for many generations, he has added luster and brilliance to the family escutcheon and his personal accomplishments are indelibly written on the pages of his state's his- tory.
John Dillard Bellamy was born at Wilmington, North Carolina, March 24, 1854, a son of Dr. John Dillard and Eliza M. (Harriss) Bellamy. Bellamy is an ancient surname prominent in England as early as the twelfth century, when the family had for its coat-of-arms the following: Sable on a fesse or, cotised argent, threc crescents azure. Crest : An arm couped habited sable, cuffed argent holding in the hand proper a sceptre, on the top a crescent argent. The history of the Bellamy fam- ily in America goes back to the year 1670, when John Bellamy, with Sir John Yeamans and other associates, settled the Charleston Colony in South Carolina. John Bellamy, a native of London, was a youth at the time of the fitting out of the Plymouth Colony, and manifested great interest in this pilgrimage. After the occupation of the Bar- badoes Island by the British, in 1625, his venture- some spirit prompted him to join the Barbadoes Colony, and it was here that he met Sir John Yea- mans and became one of the grantees or charterers of the Yeamans Colony, which, in 1665, effected a settlement of English families from Barbadoes at Charleston, South Carolina. According to a map made in 1711, John Bellamy's plantation was be- tween the Ashley and Cooper rivers, and there he came to live about the year 1670. He died pos- sessed of great wealth. His son, John Bellamy, settled on the Santee River in South Carolina, and was a large planter. He had a son, also named John Bellamy, who was born in Saint George's Parish in 1750. This last named John Bellamy became the father of Dr. John Dillard Bellamy, mentioned above.
John Bellamy, born April 12, 1750, was a man of considerable wealth in slaves, real estate and vessel property. Physically of large, athletic build, he was a leader of men. Nothing mean or petty found lodgment in his nature, and he was famed for his lavish hospitality. He craved the . friendships that it was his royal nature to bestow, and among his closest friends was the late John Dillard of Rockingham County, North Carolina, for whom he named his son. John Dillard was the ancestor of the late Judge Dillard, of the Su- preme Court of North Carolina. He was a fre- quent visitor at the home of John Bellamy and joined him in his hunting excursions and in a cruise on one of his sloops.
Abram Bellamy, a brother of John Bellamy, was with General Jackson in the war with Spain, as a civil engineer, and moved to Florida about 1819, before that state was admitted to the Union, there
settling at and laying out the City of Jacksonville. He took with him his son, John Bellamy, who be- came a man of great wealth, and the progenitor of numerous descendants who have achieved dis- tinction, including the Baileys, Turnbulls, Lamars, Eppes, Parkhills and Mays, and of Maj. Burton Bellamy, in his life time the largest planter in Florida.
Dr. John D. Bellamy was born in All Saints Parish, South Carolina, September 18, 1817, and married at Wilmington, North Carolina, Miss Eliza M. Harriss, daughter of Dr. William James Har- riss, a prominent physician, a graduate of the University of North Carolina, who, when he died in 1839, was mayor of Wilmington. Educated at the College of South Carolina, and a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, Doctor Bellamy was a physician of great professional prominence. He came to Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1835. Politically he was a democrat, of the John C. Calhoun school, and an ardent secessionist. While he always refused public office, frequently ten- dered him, yet he was for twenty-five years chair- man of the democratic party in his county and saw it increase from only two literate whites in the Borough of Wilmington in 1837 to an over- whelming majority in 1850 to 1860. At the break- ing out of the Civil war he was one of the wealth- iest men of North Carolina, a director in several railroads and banks, and owning, in North and South Carolina together, on his several plantations, it was said, nearly 1,100 slaves. It was his pride and claim that he never sold or separated married slaves, but much of his increase in slave property was due to the purchase of others who had wedded among his own slaves. He had regularly employed, on an annual . salary, a Methodist minister to preach to them on the Sabbath and to perform their marriage and burial services. His home at Wilmington still stands, being owned by the fam- ily, and is one of the finest examples of southern colonial architecture extant, having immense Cor- inthian columns surrounding it. It became the headquarters successively of Gen. Alfred Terry, Gen. Schofield and Gen. Joseph R. Hawley, when Wilmington was captured by the Federal troops in 1865, near the close of the Civil war, and from the portico of this home Chief Justice Chase, then having presidential aspirations, made the first speech of reconciliation in the South after the war, contending that the Southern States were never out of the Union and that they were entitled to their electoral votes. The residence was withheld from the family for a number of years by the United States Government, until President John- son granted a special pardon to Doctor Bellamy, and restored him to his property rights.
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