USA > North Carolina > History of North Carolina: North Carolina biography, Volume V > Part 4
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The County of Tyrrell (named for Sir John Tyrrell, at one time a lord proprietor), in North Carolina, is one of the oldest counties of English settlement in America. The State of North Caro- lina was owned by eight lords proprietors until 1729, when seven of them sold their share back to the Crown. North Carolina was originally di- vided into three counties, Albemarle, Bath and Clarendon. Tyrrell was one of the original pre- cincts of Albemarle and embraced the land now known as Dare, Tyrrell, Washington and a part of Martin Counties, embracing all the land imme- diately bordering on the south of Albemarle Sound. In 1719 Tyrrell Precinct had achieved such popula- tion and importance that it petitioned the lords proprietors to be created into a county. This re- quest was not granted until 1729, the same year that the proprietors sold the land back to the Crown.
The Alexander family in Tyrrell for a long number of years resided on what is known as the Pinner Place or Sound Side Plantation in a sec- tion known as Sound Side on the south side of Albemarle Sound. In the Alexander burial ground on this place Jesse Alexander and his son Joseph
Alexander and the latter's wife, Caroline, are buried, and their tomb stones are in a good state of preservation.
From traditional accounts which have been pre- served in the family to the present time, there was evidently some connection between the Alex- anders of Tyrrell County and those of Mecklen- burg County. It is said that the families in the two localities visited each other in the early days. That fact explains why Isaac Alexander and his wife, Zilpha, were not buried in the above ground. It is said that their remains were taken to Meck- lenburg for burial.
Isaac Alexander, the pioneer of Tyrrell County, died about 1780. An interesting document that has a curious interest of its own and also con- tains some account of the Alexander family is Isaac Alexander's will, recorded in Book 1 of Wills, page 144, in the office of the clerk of the Superior Court of Tyrrell County. It is given in its entirety as follows :
"IN THE NAME OF GOD, AMEN.
THE TWENTY-FIFTH DAY OF MARCH, 1780.
"I, Isaac Alexander of the County of Tyrrell, Planter, being very sick and weak in body but of perfect mind and memory, thanks be given unto God, therefore calling unto mind the mortality of my body and knowing that it is appointed for all men once to die, do make and ordain this my last will and testament, that is to say :
"Principally and first of all, I give and recom- mend my soul into the hands of God that gave it and my body I recommend to the earth to be buried in decent Christian burial at the discretion of my executors, nothing doubting but at the gen- eral resurrection I shall receive the same again by the Mighty Power of God:
"And as touching such worldly estate wherewith it hath pleased God to bless me in this life, I give, devise and dispose of the same in the following manner and form:
"Imprimus: I give and bequeath to Zilpha Alexander, my dearly beloved wife, the one-third part of all my movable estate wherever to be found during her natural life with the use of my planta- tion whereon I now dwell during her widowhood and then to be and remain as after specified.
"Item: I give and bequeath to my well beloved son John Alexander the now called Sound Side Plantation for two hundred acres of land as the sundry lines round the same will appear, with one good hunting gun.
"Item: I give to my well beloved son Joseph Alexander the black walnut land being two hun- dred twenty acres lying and being on the north side and near the head of Alligator Creek, with one good hunting gun and one feather bed.
"Item: I give to my well beloved son Abner Alexander one certain piece of land lying on the south side of the New Road commonly called the Woodyard as the sundry lines round the same will make appear with one good hunting gun and one feather bed.
"Item: I give to my well beloved son Jesse Alexander the plantation and land appertaining to the same whereon I now dwell as the sundry lines round the same will make appear, with one good hunting gun and one feather bed and fur- niture, and to have a good still, my own property, with one good cow and calf.
"Item: I give to my beloved daughter Mary Alexander one good feather bed and one chest.
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"Item: I give to my beloved daughter Eliza- beth Davenport one good feather bed now in her own possession.
"Item: I give to my beloved daughter Ann Alexander one good feather bed and furniture and one cow and calf.
"Item: I give to my beloved daughter Sarah Alexander one feather bed and furniture and one cow and calf.
"Item: I give to my beloved daughter Jamima Alexander one feather bed and furniture and one cow and calf.
"Item: I give to my beloved daughter Zilpha Alexander one feather bed and furniture and one cow and calf.
"Item: I give to my beloved daughter Millae Alexander one feather bed and furniture and one cow and calf.
"Item: I give to my beloved daughter Clarca Alexander one feather bed and furniture and one cow and calf.
"And as touching my negroes, I dispose of them as follows: One negro girl called Juda to be and remain in the possession and custody of my be- loved wife Zilpha Alexander during her natural life, whom I constitute and appoint executrix with my well beloved son John Alexander whom I con- stitute and appoint executor of this my last will and testament, and as to my other negroes that is now to say Rose and one negro woman Joan and Hester negroes to remain in the care and custody of my executors until the year 1790, and then to be equally or as near as possible divided or pro- portioned with increase to and among my before mentioned children and the remaining part of my estate not before left in legacies or mentioned to be equally divided at my decease, excepting my well beloved son Jesse Alexander who is to have no part of the said negroes or increase; to him I give the still in lieu.
"And I do hereby utterly disallow, revoke and disannull all and every other former testament, will, legacies and bequeath and executors by me in any ways before named and willed, and be- queathed, ratifying and confirming this and no other to be my last will and testament.
"In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal the day and date above written. "ISAAC ALEXANDER." [SEAL]
The immediate branch of the family here de- scribed is descended through Isaac's son Jesse, known as Colonel Jesse. He was born June 28, 1774, and died November 2, 1817. He is buried on Sound Side Plantation, now known as Pinner Place, five miles from Columbia, Tyrrell County. He was a very extensive and successful planter, and also a man of affairs. He represented Tyr- rell County in the House in 1803-04, and in the Senate in 1808 and 1810. He was also a colonel of the militia, and his death at the early age of forty-three resulted from wounds received in the war of 1812. In connection with his military service the following letter from Governor Haw- kins' "Letter Book," page 259, is of interest :
"His Excellency the Governor of North Caro- accept the appointment of Brigadier General of the Thirteenth Brigade of North Carolina Mili- tia." Signed Jesse Alexander, Tyrrell County, May 15, 1813.
Col. Jesse Alexander married Ann Hoylt Hos- kins of Edenton, North Carolina, January 1, 1801.
They had five children : Joseph, George, Thomas, Abner and Martha. Of these, George, who was born July 7, 1807, and died in 1835, married Ann Spruill; Thomas H., born June 12, 1809, and died in 1870, served as register of deeds for thirty years, and left a large family of children and grandchildren by his marriage to Mary Hardison; Abner, born September 12, 1811, and died in 1844, married Rhoda Alexander, but had no children; Martha, born November 10, 1813, married Col. Charles T. Spruill, who several times served as a member of the General Assembly from Tyrrell County.
Joseph Alexander, first son of Colonel Jesse, was born April 5, 1805, and died December 28, 1850. He was a planter and slave owner and lifelong resident of Tyrrell County. He married Caroline B. Spruill, who was born September 18, 1812, and died February 14, 1860. Her brother, Gen. H. G. Spruill, was one of North Carolina's historic char- acters represented Tyrrell in the Senate in 1836- 38-40-42, was a member of the Board of Internal Improvements, and as state senator advocated a system of common public schools, using funds of the state lands, and introduced one of the first bills for this purpose. Joseph Alexander and his wife had one son and three daughters. The daugh- ters were: Martha F., who married Dennis Sim- mons, founder and president of the Dennis Sim- mons Lumber Company of Williamston, North Carolina; Josephine, who married Dr. Edward Ransom, who was president of the constitutional convention of 1875-76; and Fannie, who married Capt. John D. Biggs, who served as captain of Company H, Sixty-first Regiment North Carolina troops.
Dr. Abner Alexander, son of Joseph and Caro- line Alexander, was born September 28, 1845, on the Alexander plantation already referred to. He enlisted in Company H of the Sixty-first Regiment, North Carolina troops, was commissioned first lieutenant, was in service to the end of the strug- gle, was wounded at Cold Harbor and surrendered with General Johnston near Jamestown, North Carolina, in 1865. His regiment was in Cling- man's Brigade, Hooke's Division, Longstreet's Corps. After the surrender he walked home, a distance of two hundred miles. He then took up the study of medicine, graduated from the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Baltimore, and returning to his native county practiced there and for many years had a clientage all over the county and the adjoining counties of Washington and Dare. He continued his professional work almost to the time of his death. He died in the City Hos- pital of Baltimore. where he had gone for treat- ment, on April 8, 1904.
Doctor Alexander was a member of the General Assembly from Tyrrell three times, 1895, 1897 and 1903, and chairman of the Committee on Health. The bulletin of the North Carolina Board of Health, March, 1895, speaking of his services: "We feel that it would not be making any invid- ious comparison to particularly mention our county superintendent of Tyrrell, Dr. Ahner Alexander, who was the representative of that county and who as chairman of the Committee on Public Health of the House proved indeed a faithful sen- tinel upon the watch-tower."
At the time of his death the Raleigh Post said: "One of Tyrrell's greatest men has gone to his reward. Doctor Alexander has worn himself out serving the people. It has been said of him that
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he never refused to visit the sick when called if it were possible for him to get there, no mat- ter what state of life, from the humblest to the most exalted, there was never any difference." It is said that his was the largest funeral ever held in Columbia.
Dr. Abner Alexander married Dora Spruill. She was born in Tyrrell County July 12, 1851, was educated at Kittrell Springs and Statesville Female College, both in North Carolina, and died August 2, 1916. She is buried beside her hus- band in the cemetery at Columbia. Her father was Eli Spruill, who was born January 12, 1818, and died September 2, 1887. He was a slave-owner, lawyer and planter, was a whig in early day poli- tics, represented Tyrrell County in the Secession Convention of 1861, and was one of the few who opposed secession, though he finally voted for the measure. Eli Spruill was a son of James Spruill, a prominent planter of Tyrrell County. The wife of Eli Spruill was Harriet V. P. Spruill, who was born May 11, 1828, and died June 22, 1902.
Dr. Abner Alexander and wife had two sons, Joseph Eli and Webster Spruill Alexander. Web- ster S. Alexander was born January 10, 1888, at Columbia, Tyrrell County, and is now a resident of Winston-Salem.
Joseph Eli Alexander, who may justly take pride in the long line of distinguished ancestors only briefly noted in the preceding paragraphs, was born September 6, 1874, on the Riverside farm near Columbia, Tyrrell County. He prepared for college at Columbia Preparatory School and in 1889 was a student in Williamstown Academy in Martin County under Dr. Sylvester Hassell. In 1895 he graduated magna cum laude from the Uni- versity of North Carolina. While in the univer- sity he attained membership in the honorary schol- arship fraternity Phi Beta Kappa.
Studying law in a law office, he was admitted to the bar in 1896. He then formed a partner- ship with Hon. A. E. Holton, United States dis- trict attorney at Winston-Salem. For fourteen months from January, 1897, to March, 1898, he was secretary to the governor of North Carolina and in that capacity was also military secretary with rank of major. After resigning as secre- tary he was appointed in 1898 aide de camp to the governor with the rank of colonel. This was during Governor Russell's administration.
He resigned as secretary to the governor to resume the practice of law with Mr. Holton under the firm name of Holton and Alexander. This firm continued until January 1, 1904, and since then Mr. Alexander has been a member of the firm of Alexander, Parrish & Körner, the other mem- bers being F. M. Parrish and Gilmer Körner, Jr. In 1915 the firm became Alexander & Körner.
Major Alexander has had a large and successful practice in both the state and federal courts and before the departments in Washington. He was the attorney who effected the consolidation of the then separate postoffices of Winston and Salem in 1898. He was chairman of the committee of the board of trade on consolidation of the two municipalities of Winston and Salem, and as such prepared the bill and plan for the consolidation of these two cities in 1913. He has found many opportunities to use his profession and his individual influence to forward important local movements. He has served as town attorney of the Town of Salem, city attorney of the City of Winston, and county attorney of Forsyth County. He is a member
of the North Carolina and American Bar Asso- ciations.
Major Alexander is a member and past exalted ruler of Winston Lodge No. 449, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks; member of Winston Lodge No. 167, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons; Winston Chapter No. 24, Royal Arch Masons; Piedmont Commandery of the Knights Templar, and Centerville Council No. 20, Junior Order of United American Mechanics. He is also an active member of the Twin City Club. His law offices are in the O'Hanlon Building and his home at 1120 West Fourth Street, Winston-Salem.
He has been twice married. Feburary 15, 1905, he married Miss Edith Kincaid Butler. She was born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, October 20, 1878, but before her marriage lived at Raleigh, North Carolina. Her parents were Henry Chase Butler, who was born January 6, 1840, at Kennebunkport, Maine, and now lives in Greensboro, North Caro- lina, and Lucy J. Ross, his wife, born at Great Falls, New Hampshire, March 2, 1840, and died 1910. Lucy Ross was a daughter of John and Abbie (Kincaid) Ross. Mrs. Alexander, who died October 19, 1910, was a graduate of Peace Institute of Raleigh and the Emerson School of Oratory at Boston.
On August 26, 1916, Major Alexander married Miss Lilla Young, who was born at Charlotte, North Carolina, May 20, 1877, daughter of Major John Graham Young and Lucy Winfield, of Win- ston-Salem.
DAVID GASTON WORTH was one of North Caro- lina's greatest men, whether measured according to the standards of business success or devotion to the public welfare and to those interests and activities which constitute the magnificent har- mony of human life. His career serves to ex- emplify the fact that the acquisition of wealth and power is not inconsistent with a high souled manhood and a practice of the fundamental virtues associated with the Christian religion.
He was the only son of Governor Jonathan Worth, whose career is a part of the general his- tory of North Carolina. Jonathan Worth was North Carolina's provisional governor for two terms and administered that important office until he was deposed during the rigid Reconstruction rule.
The family was founded in North Carolina by Daniel Worth, great-grandfather of David G. Worth. He came to North Carolina in the latter part of the eighteenth century. The family had been established in New England during the seventeenth century and the name became inter- related by marriage with many people of prom- inence. David Worth, father of Governor Worth, was married in Massachusetts to a Miss Gardner. She was a devoted member of the Society of Friends, and in that faith Governor Worth and his brothers and sisters were reared. Most of them in time united with the Presbyterian Church, but they always retained the simplicity of manner and taste that are characteristic of the Friends.
David Gaston Worth was born at Asheboro, North Carolina, December 17, 1831, and died at his home in Wilmington November 21, 1897, when nearly sixty-six years of age. His early education was acquired in his home at Asheboro. At the age of seventeen he entered the University of North Carolina, graduating as one of the first honor men in the class of 1853. In college and in after life he was associated with the Delta Kappa Epsilon
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
fraternity. Of his student career one of his old associates, Col. A. M. Waddell, has given the fol- lowing characterization : "Quiet, modest, manly, and kindly, he commanded the respect of faculty and students alike. He possessed more than ordi- nary ability and applied himself with diligence to his studies, while he conscientiously performed every duty. He had none of the vices or bad habits to which young men are so often inclined, although he was full of vivacity. The University never had a student of whom she could more justly be proud, and of late years has had few if any more generous benefactors." Among his class- mates at the university were Col. A. M. Waddell, Col. John D. Taylor, Col. K. M. Murchison, Col. William L. DeRosset, Dubrutz Cutlar and Walker Meares.
After his graduation from university Mr. Worth married Miss Julia A. Stickney. She remained his devoted companion through all the sunshine of prosperity and through the shadows of suffering and sorrow that clouded the last months of his life. Three of their children came to maturity : Charles W. Worth, who became associated with his father in business and is elsewhere referred to; Dr. George C. Worth, who became a medical missionary in China; and James S. Worth of Wilmington.
After his marriage Mr. Worth entered business in his native town of Asheboro, and in 1861 came to Wilmington as superintendent of the govern- ment salt works, a position he held throughout the war. At its close he engaged in the general commission business with Mr. N. G. Daniel under the firm name Worth & Daniel. With the death of Mr. Daniel in 1870 the firm became Worth & Worth. He developed the business of this firm to preeminent success and to a place where it could justly and easily rank with any of the greatest commercial houses of the South. More important than the volume of its business and the wide extent of its trade relationships were the qualities of justice and integrity which became associated far and wide as synonymous with the firm name.
Mr. Worth served as president of the Produce Exchange and the Chamber of Commerce of Wilmington, and while he was absolutely free from ambition for political honors, he rendered a serv- ice to his city and state far beyond the possibil- ities of any political position. For several years he served as a member of the board of aldermen, was a member of Wilmington Steam Fire Engine Company No. 1, and belonged to Wilmington Lodge No. 319, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. For many years he was a trustee of the University of North Carolina, and was one of the most liberal benefactors of the Wilmington Young Men's Christian Association. Through his church, the First Presbyterian, he gave an unexampled devo- tion. He transferred his membership to the church at Wilmington in 1864, was elected a deacon in December, 1868, and in November, 1891, became a ruling elder.
In the career of such a man the material achieve- ments and the positions he held may be passed over with brief comment. The important thing is to find the real significance and the meaning of his life and character. From out the mass of tributes paid him after his death by a host of friends and associates, all men of high position in the world's regard, only a brief quotation can be made, and of sentences that apparently come closest to striking the keynote of his life.
In the memorial exercises conducted by the
Chamber of Commerce, Mr. Iredell Meares said in part :
"The success of Mr. Worth was not the success of a brilliant hero. It was not the success of the statesman who has dealt with great state ques- tions. It was not the success of the publicist who has dealt with the great problems of finance and economics. He did not essay to influence the mul- titudes. He exerted it over the individual in the conduct of his early life.
"He was successful as a merchant, through honorable means, and accumulated a large fortune, but his highest success, apparently his highest aim in life, was the development of an ennobling indi- vidual manhood.
"It is not the admiration that the public pays to a great man who had occupied great positions and rendered great public services with which this community today has paid its respect to his mem- ory. It is a sentiment nearer and tenderer than admiration. It is the appreciation lovingly paid to one whose universal kindness has been experienced. and recognized in this community over a long period of years."
As an estimate perhaps the most impressive was that conveyed by Doctor Alderman in the memorial services held at the University of North Carolina. A portion of Doctor Alderman's address is as fol- lows :
"Well born, well reared, well endowed, well educated, David Gaston Worth entered upon life as one fit and worthy of success. He found his work immediately in what we are accustomed to regard, falsely enough, as the more toilsome and more mechanical employment of trade. For over a generation in the city of Wilmington he gave the strength of his brain, his energy, his character to the work of his choice, only laying it down under the stress of declining health.
"It was my fortune to know Mr. Worth much better perhaps than men of my age can usually know men of his. I knew him in his home, so clear, so just and withal so tender; I knew him in his great business, zealous, far-sighted, upright, honest as the day; I knew him in his church, humble, tolerant, heedful of every just cry of suf- fering or distress; I knew him in the counsels of this University, silent and sagacious, but with a touch of boyish love and sentiment for Alma Mater lighting up, as with a flame, the stern self restraint of his character; I knew him in society, modest, approachable, kindly, lacking in forwardness but instant in good action, and impelling a wholesome respect and a trifle of awe by reason of the native dignity of the man and a feeling that he had not uttered all of himself.
"Knowing him thus and having in mind also our great roll of distinguished men, I yet declare to you young gentlemen that this University has nourished on her broad bosom no worthier son, nor one who better used the time appointed him to live.
"The spell of the world and the glamor and pride of it did not fall across his path, neither did any fevers of ambition fret and waste his well ordered days. Wealth came to him honestly won, children grew up around him worthy of his name, friends multiplied about him, duties came with power, and were not shirked.
"Through the inevitable conflict of life upon which we enter so often full of hope and belief and faith, and out of which we drop so soon dis- illusioned and weary and bitter, he had the strength to keep the first bloom of his youth quite unas-
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sailed, and even the power, at last, to look with calm, untroubled eyes through the awful mystery of physical pain and anguish at the glorious, dis- tant scene. And this is why a whole state has watched with sympathy at the bedside of a simple gentleman adorning a private station, as a king might be proud to adorn his throne, and mourns the loss of one who illustrated in its highest form the dignity and majesty of republican citizenship.
"The thing most worthy to be learned from the life of our comrade is this-there is dignity and even glory in all upright life however hidden from public gaze, and any bit of good work into which heart and blood and nerve have gone is by that token immortal. If a man will but work, however various or lowly that work may be, whether upon the bare canvas, the unhewn stone, the human mind or heart, or merely rough labor of the hands, there shall come a splendor into his days and his work shall live.
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