USA > North Carolina > Wake County > History of Wake County, North Carolina, with sketches of those who have most influenced its development > Part 6
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It was a day's trip from Warrenton to Raleigh, a days' trip from Fayetteville to Raleigh. The passing of the stages was the event of the day, and reminds us of the ac- count in one of Mark Twain's inimitable books of the passing of the New Orleans packet up the river in his youth. If any one had wished to know the census of the able-bodied popu-
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lation of Raleigh, he could doubtless have stepped down from the stage and counted them. Not one would wish to be absent when the stage rolled in.
Of course people read newspapers in those days, and there were good ones, although the sheets were small, and had no sporting page, and no Sunday edition. The editorials were dignified and well written, and compare with- out disparagement with what we get today, and these weeklies were well read inside and out, as newspapers are not any longer read today, since the armistice.
The Whig paper of the earliest time was called the Raleigh Minerva, and was publish- ed by William Boylan, the first of the name to come to Raleigh. About six months earlier a paper of rival politics, a Democratic or Jeffer- sonian organ, was begun by Joseph Gales, an Englishman. He had been driven away from his printing office in Sheffield, England, be- cause of his sympathy with the French Revo- lution and its very radical developments, such ideas being hateful even to the very mobs, because of the excesses of the Terrorists. He was in some way connected with Doctor
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Priestley, who was driven away from Birming- ham by mob persecution, a man a hundred years ahead of his time, who also was forced to spend the last of his days in America.
Joseph Gales came to America with Doctor Priestley and was for a time in Philadelphia. Then he came to Raleigh early in the nine- teenth century, and the paper he edited here bore the same name as his former journal in Sheffield, "The Register." For many years Joseph Gales was state printer. Besides these two, there was a third sheet, The Star which often changed hands, although it was pub- lished for years.
As to books, the City of Raleigh in early days was poorly off. Of course some owned a few books, which were read and re-read, and learned almost by heart, to good purpose, and letters and papers of the time show that liter- ary style was far from bad. No books were printed in the state until years later, save a few law books. The list given in Doctor Battle's History of the University of North Carolina, of the College library of the first of the century past, will give some idea of the scarcity of all that we should call readable.
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Most of the works were heavy and solid enough to kill the largest rat when made into a dead-fall and allowed to drop upon him. Doctor Battle states that this was the use made of Saint Augustine's works in folio and other substantial volumes which were borrow- ed from the University library for this express purpose. However that may be, there was little to read in Raleigh then but law, classics and theology, with a very few novels which were heavy to hold if not to read. I have before me a copy of "Sir Charles Grandison," owned in Raleigh in 1813 or '14, which is as large as a family Bible, has two columns of rather small print, and seven hundred pages. This light work was a reprint from the seven volumes originally issued, and is dated 1810, printed in London.
The eating and drinking which built up life from its physical side was much like the food of today, and yet unlike in many ways.
Chicago beef was not to be had, nor was there an abattoir, nor an ice plant. Local sup- plies were all that obtained, and much more pork and bacon was used by all classes. Vegetables were raised the same as now, but
"CASSO'S TAVERN" AS IT LOOKED IN THE OLDEN TIME. IT WAS THE SECOND BRICK BUILDING IN RALEIGH, CORNER FAYETTEVILLE AND MORGAN STREETS
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the cow pea was considered food for beasts alone, and the useful tomato was unknown. Canning was a thing unpracticed, although dried fruit was plentifully used. A little "pound for pound" preserves for state oc- casions was kept on hand from year to year. Sugar was scarce and molasses of the home- grown sort took the place of it. The import- ed molasses was most delicious, being far better than it has been since, and was the ac- cepted sweetening for many foods. Hospitali- ty laid stress on one sort of refreshment that is but a sad memory to the thirsty. Imported and domestic wines and liquors were used in great variety, and every gentleman considered it his duty to have such things on hand for the chance guest, however he might prefer to abstain himself. Hence the mahogany cel- larets which still grace many old fashioned dining rooms, and the portly glass decanter's which are now set back on the china-closet shelves, but used to stand out within reach.
As regards the furniture that we are still carefully collecting, are we not sure that the things then bought and admired are still the most beautiful that are obtainable? Do we
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not regard thus all old sofas and desks and secretaires and what not?
Has there ever been more satisfactory silver- ware than the gracefully shaped spoons and pierced fruit baskets that we treasure with pride and buy now and then for great prices?
Household work was far greater then than it is now, and the notable housewife must be like Solomon's virtuous woman in her cease- less activities. Providing work and super- vision for the many and lazy servants made her rise early and be ceaselessly busy. Even Colonel Byrd, though not enthusiastic about the men, acknowledges that the women of early North Carolina were a thrifty race, and we may be sure that they knew how to sew and knit and dye and weave and embroider and care for meats and supervise all the varied domestic arts.
It is interesting to note that in the twenties and the thirties young folk were considered very mannerless and unmanageable.
The spinning of "street yarn" was much dep- recated, the extreme idleness of young men was censured in private letters and in the newspapers, and older folk were caused much
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anxiety by the strange tendency of the young girls to dress up and go out gadding when there was work for them to do at home!
All these many things, great and small, go to make up the tenor of the lives of our fore- runners. Sometimes the small are more impor- tant than the great in filling up the many de- tails which add most to the picture, and it is a picture that I am trying, awkwardly perhaps, but anxiously, to place before your eyes.
CHAPTER VI. Giants of Those Days
OLONEL WILLIAM POLK, coming from Mecklenburg County S to Raleigh very early in its history, was a figure of great prominence here, and would still have been were his adoptive city a far larger place. He came of that well known Polk family which lived in Mecklenburg before the Revolution, and was cousin to President Polk. In his youth he was an eye-witness to the signing of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independ- ence, and it is so stated in the Life of Leonidas K. Polk. He enlisted in the Continental Army when a mere boy and was in active ser- vice all through the Revolutionary War. He was twice wounded, very severely at the battle of Germantown. He suffered that sad winter at Valley Forge with Washington, and he was also present with him at Yorktown.
He was twice married, his first wife dying before he came to Raleigh. His second wife was a Miss Hawkins of Warrenton, in Warren
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County. She bore him nine children of whom the second was Leonidas K. Polk.
Colonel Polk came to Raleigh in the year 1799 to become the first president of the State Bank, serving without compensation. His home was a large house which used to close the end of Blount Street just as the Centennial School now closes Fayetteville Street. It was standing ten years ago, and was used for a while after the war for a girls' school.
The old State Bank where Colonel Polk presided is now used for the Rectory of Christ Church and is the third brick building which was erected in Raleigh, the first one be- ing the old State House, the second Casso's Hotel, now used for stores and some of the State offices, at the corner of Morgan and Fay- etteville, still sturdy and substantial. The State Bank building was much laughed at, in the early day, because it was considered queer architecture. One can still trace the newer bricks where the old Bank door was built up on the New Berne Avenue side. "Two porches, and a house between, like the ham sandwich."
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Colonel Polk of those days was a tall stately imposing figure, of old-fashioned formal man- ner, and ceremonious dignity, but capable of unbending genially on occasion. He was a citizen for everyone to be proud of, the man whom his neighbors honored and called upon to welcome distinguished guests and be the presiding genius of public meetings and toast- master at banquets on state occasions. In politics he was an old time Federalist, but in his youth he had a boy friend, a neighbor in Mecklenburg County whose name was An- drew Jackson.
The halo which surrounded this venerable Revolutionary figure grew brighter as time went on and thinned the ranks of his fellow soldiers and the story of their deeds became a sort of legend. At his death he was probably the last survivor of the Revolutionary officers in all North Carolina.
Colonel Polk, like other gentlemen of his time, was a convivial soul, as no one thought harm of being; but he was no vulgar roysterer and he took a firm stand against duelling, then an accepted way of protecting "honor" and settling controversies. On one occasion
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he wrote for publication a strong letter con- demning the practice, and this had great weight because it was from a man so well known to be of distinguished courage. This declaration was needed, as at least one duel had been fought about that time by a Wake County man.
Alfred Jones of White Plains was a party in a duel about 1820, and was badly wounded. He always declared that though he nearly died of his wound, he considered the mental anguish he suffered for a few seconds while looking down his opponent's murderous pistol- barrel was more grim and unforgetable than the physical pain of the wound. He felt his honor entirely less satisfied.
To return to Colonel Polk. He was one of those who owned great tracts of land in Ten- nessee, and was once making a trip into that state on business connected with his property, when he saw, leaning over a fence beside his road, a man whom he at once recognized, and whom he knew only too well. It was a Tory, who had formerly lived neighbor to his father in Mecklenburg, and who had taken an oppor- tunity while the men of the family were away
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in the army to wreck and plunder his father's plantation. The Colonel, knowing him for this deed and knowing that he had got off scot free, handed his horse's rein to his com- panion, and without one word, dismounted and fell like an avalanche upon the astonished man, giving him a horsewhipping that was en- tirely consoling to the giver, as well as fully satisfying to the recipient. State Treasurer Haywood was the authority for this anecdote.
Another story tells of his showing the young folk how to dance a minuet in the stately fashion of the eighteenth century, Miss Betsy Geddy of the statue-saving fame being his vis-a-vis and dancing partner.
When his son Leonidas, just graduated from West Point, insisted upon resigning from the army to study for the Episcopal ministry, Colonel Polk could neither understand nor be- come resigned to it. It is said that he spoke of it for some time with an oath whenever he mentioned it.
Cousin to one President of the United States, friend of another, Colonel Polk was the man who chanced to put a bit of bread into the mouth of a third. Jacob Johnson,
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father of Andrew Johnson, Lincoln's successor in the Presidency, was for many years porter and factotum at the State Bank, under Col- onel Polk, and afterward.
This man Johnson was absolutely unedu- cated, but Governor Swain describes his quick heroism in saving Mr. T. Henderson from drowning in Hunter's pond, according to ac- count by William Peace. It was at a picnic, and the canoe overset and Henderson was un- able to swim. Johnson lived in a small house near Casso's Hotel. Miss Margaret Casso nam- ed the future President Andrew Jackson, al- though he afterward dropped the middle name. A newspaper advertisement is still in existence offering a reward for the return of this Raleigh boy to his legal guardians, when he ran away from his apprenticeship at about twelve years of age.
Successor to Colonel Polk at the State Bank was William Boylan, the first of the name. He was editor of the Raleigh Minerva, some- time state printer, and he was also a rich planter, dying worth a million dollars at the time when millionaires were most unusual and money was far more valuable. Mr Boy-
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lan came originally from New Jersey, but had kin in North Carolina. His portrait shows a face of a very different character from the others of that gallery. He looks, among those great lawyers, like a sedate business man and his qualities of mind were the prophecy of coming times. Mr. Boylan was public-spirit- ed and progressive. He first saw the possi- bilities, and set the example of raising great quantities of cotton on the uplands of Wake. Whitney's cotton gin had made the growing of cotton profitable because the gin could re- move the seed from a thousand pounds of cotton in a day, which labor previously had to be done slowly and tediously by hand. Also the invention of the power-driven loom and spinning machinery made more cotton necessary to keep the looms of the world at work, and the development of the necessary inventions had built up a mighty industry. Mr. Boylan planted acres of cotton where square rods had been the custom before. He also became interested in transportation, and a heavy investor in our first railroads. He was at one time president of the Raleigh and Gaston Railroad. Governor Swain says of him that he was dignified and grave, and it
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also is sure that he must have been charitable, for he is responsible for the building of the first county poor-house in Wake. Before that the County poor were boarded out with the lowest bidder at county expense; a hard arrangement.
Doctor Kemp Battle, from whose centen- nial address many details of this old time may be gathered, tells a story of how Mr. Boylan sent loads of wood around to the poor, caught as they were without fuel in the time of the wonderful "big snow of '57." He states that one "son of rest" keeping warm abed that cold- est morning, humped up in his mound of bed- ding to inquire whether Mr. Boylan "had had that wood cut up to fit his fireplace before it was loaded on the wagon?"
Mr. Boylan lived in the Joel Lane house which he had bought from Peter Brown. But one undignified thing is told of him-that is his part in the fight which he and Joseph Gales, rival editors, fought about some politi- cal question. In this Mr. Gales was worsted, and brought suit for damages, which were awarded to the sum of two hundred dollars, which amount he donated to the Academy.
"WHITE PLAINS, " THE COUNTRY HOME OF THE JONES FAMILY OF THE SOUTHEAST SIDE OF THE COUNTY. A REMNANT OF ONE OF THE FAMOUS OAKS, OF WHICH THERE ONCE WERE FOUR DIVERGING AVENUES,
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The two worthy combatants were after- ward reconciled and shook hands in token of amity. Mr. Boylan died in 1859, his life thus spanning the whole time of industrial and material growth before the war.
Peter Brown, Esquire, was a lawyer and a bachelor. He came to Raleigh in the first years of its existence, but in his old age he wished to return to Scotland, or thought he did; so he sold his property, including the historic Joel Lane house as above, and went back across the water. He had contracted the Raleigh habit however, and matter of fact as he appeared, he let sentiment take him back to Scotland, and then bring him back again to North Carolina, where he died after all.
Peter Brown also took a turn at being presi- dent of the State Bank. He knew something of the Scotch ideas of banking, said to be the best at that time. He was a lawyer of ability as well as a financier, and was for some time the only practicing attorney in Raleigh. His oddity was great as his ability. Once he found occasion to move his law office, and when ready for business in the new quarters,
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he hung out the following notice: "Peter Brown, Attorney at Law, has moved from where he was, to where he now is; where he may henceforth at all times be found." No ambiguity in that!
Judge Seawell, nephew of Nathaniel Macon, was one of the legal lights of the time. He married a daughter of James Hinton, son of Colonel John the first, and his descendants live here still. He was a well-known lawyer and citizen representing this county in the Assembly several terms.
Moses Mordecai, the first of the family of legal and other prominence, came to Raleigh in time to buy a lot at the second city sale. Only recently has the great square, with the old mansion built far back upon it, been finally divided into smaller lots. Mr. Mordecai's first and second wives were sisters, Margaret and Annie Lane, daughters of Joel Lane. Many of their descendants are among us now.
One of the old time merchants was William Peck, who did a banking and mercantile busi- ness at the south-east corner of the Capitol facing Wilmington Street. He was a hatter by trade, a safe man and a good citizen. He
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admired the new Capitol as it gradually rose from foundation to dome and watched its progress day by day from his shop door, com- plaining mightily when the grading up of the square began, and because of the bank of earth in front of him he could no longer see the whole building in its entirety. Like Judge Cloud of State-wide fame, he disliked whist- ling as a means of self-expression, and of course all the small boys of Raleigh took care to make a long, shrill, ear-piercing effort, just as they rounded his corner on a dead run. A story is told of him, a legend which is a sort of classical myth of the days of private banks of issue, and which is printed in that old book, "Flush Times in Alabama and Mississippi," a story which may be true, but is at any rate a good parable, and runs this way :
A Mississippi horse-trader wanted to buy exchange on North Carolina, and bargained for a draft on Mr. Peck's banking institution. His exchange cost him ten dollars a thousand. Then the banker in Mississippi asked if his customer would do him the favor of carrying a small package with him to North Carolina to be delivered to his "old friend, Peck."
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The trader easily consented to do this. On arrival in Raleigh he presented his draft, and Mr. Peck was most positive that he owed the bank in Mississippi nothing, but would like to look over his books and make sure. As he turned to go, the trader handed the package to Mr. Peck, with the message, and when unsealed, it contained the North Caro- lina bills necessary to offset the draft. The trader had paid ten dollars a thousand for his exchange, and then had taken the risk of bringing his own money that long, dangerous way besides. This is a good story to illustrate the working of the banking methods in vogue before railroads and national banks were in existence.
Jokes are the most difficult things to trans- plant out of the time that gives them being, but there is an old joke which might be told here, connected with Mr. Peck. It is a true tale, well avouched this time. One night the great beaver, twice natural size, which swung over the door of his shop and was his sign, disappeared unaccountably. Next morning a student at the University appeared in chapel with this hat balanced on his head and further
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disguised with huge goggles and a long coat, with a cane in hand. This brought down the house and broke up prayers for that morning, as it might well have done with several hun- dred young scapegraces fairly pining for an ex- cuse for a demonstration. The naughty boy who stole the hatter's sign was named R. S. Tucker, and, in partnership with his brother, became a considerable merchant himself in after days. The father, Ruffin Tucker, had settled in Raleigh some years before this and was by trade a printer. Descendants of this man are among those successful in busi- ness of the city.
Dr. McPheeters, who has already been men- tioned as head of the Academy and as "Town Pastor," was a very interesting figure of old Raleigh. He took his calling in dead earnest, and ruled on week days and on Sundays con- tinuously, so that the boy who played hooky and went fishing on Sunday instead of to church and Sunday School, was made to regret his mistake when he reached day-school Monday morning.
Once Dr. McPheeters was about to visit the sins of his youth in this way upon the future Bishop of Louisiana, and Lonnie Polk
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THE BIRTHPLACE OF ANDREW JOHNSON, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. THIS SHOWS IT ON ITS SECOND LOCATION. IT IS NOW AT PULLEN PARK.
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broke away and ran for it. He was instantly pursued, caught, and birched by the Doctor who on that occasion laid down the law in an axiom which is old but by no means obsolete. "No boy," said Dr. McPheeters, "who is not old enough to behave properly when he knows he has been fairly warned, is too old to be whipped for misbehavior."
The Peace brothers were men of diligence and probity, successful merchants. William left a sum for the building of Peace Institute. They were both bachelors, and their name suited their character. One of the city streets is named after them.
Ihave mentioned Joseph Gales and his estab- lishing the first newspaper, also his connection by birth and association with the ferment of new thought in the manufacturing districts of middle England. After his printing office was wrecked and he was driven to emigrate, he came from Philadelphia to Raleigh. He was a man of resources, bringing some capital with him, and having the knowledge needful to start a paper mill to supply his press.
His wife, Mrs Winifred Gales, was highly educated and had ability. She wrote the
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first novel that was ever written and printed in North Carolina, although not many have been produced since. We have never caught the writer's itch; however, it may some day come to us. She is "the first that ever burst" into the "silent sea" of North Carolina author- ship. She died in 1839, her husband two years later. They lie buried in the old City Cemetery. Beside their graves are those of two grown daughters lost a few years earlier, victims to one of those recurring epidemics of malaria that took toll of so many who did not know that mosquitoes and a prevailing souther- ly wind over Hunter's pond on Walnut Creek were the combined cause of so much chills and fever in the town of Raleigh. The Gales have still descendants living in Raleigh and claim- ing the city as home.
David L. Swain lies buried in Oakwood Cemetery, and he lived his formative years here, although he was chiefly known by his later work as President of the University of North Carolina. Asa young man he came to Raleigh, and studied law with Chief Justice Taylor, who married the only sister of Judge Gaston.
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Although born in Buncombe County, and coming to Wake after he was a man grown, Swain was near akin to the Lanes and other families connected with them; his mother be- ing Caroline, sister of Joel Lane, and he being the son by her second husband, named as they say after the first, David Lowrie.
Not many educational advantages came to this lad in the western wilds, and young Swain had scanty schooling, and but four months of university instruction, before he went to Raleigh to study law. Every crumb of learn- ing that came his way he seized and assimila ted, and every book which he laid his hands upon he read, especially absorbing all obtainable history. Though his early life was not so sordid and pinched as that of Abraham Lin- coln, yet his education and development bear some likeness to that of Lincoln, because he was like him, a rough diamond, and took polish from all the friction of later life; and be- cause his education was in progress all during that later life.
When he had won his law license he return- ed to Buncombe, and was immediately sent to represent that county in the next Assembly.
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Here he attended to the important bill in- troduced by him, for building the French Broad Turnpike, leading west into Tennessee. In 1829, he received an odd compliment, be- ing elected Solicitor for the Edenton District because factional fighting had become des- perately bitter, and only a man from out- side the district could be tolerated. Next he was appointed Judge of the Superior Court, and was chosen over Henry Seawell, of Ral- eigh, a man of greater known distinction and a most excellent lawyer. His judgeship was but another step upward.
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