USA > North Carolina > Craven County > New Bern > History of the Presbyterian church in New Bern, N.C. : with a resume? of early ecclesiastical affairs in eastern North Carolina, and a sketch of the early days of New Bern, N.C > Part 8
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TRYON'S PALACE.
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TRYON'S PALACE, NEW BERN.
The main or centre building is the Palace. By contract it was to be two stories high, of brick, eighty-seven feet front, and fifty-nine feet deep. The building on the right of the picture was the secretary's office and the laundry, while that on the left served for kitchen and servants' hall. Some say that the left wing was the private residence of the Governor, and the right was the laundry and servants' quarters. Covered curved colonnades, of five columns each, connected wings and Palace. In the main building were the legislative halls and public rooms for government use. "Between these buildings, in front of the Palace, was a handsome court. The rear of the building was finished in the style of the Mansion-House in Lon- don." Ebenezer Hazzard, Postmaster-General of the United States, visited it in 1777, and says, "Upon entering the street- door you enter a hall in which are four niches for statues." Lossing states that the chimney-breasts for the council cham- ber, dining hall and drawing-room, and the cornices of these rooms, were of white marble. The chimney-breast of the council chamber was the most elaborate, being ornamented by two Ionic columns below, and four columns with Composite capitals above, with beautiful entablature, architrave and frieze. Over the inner door of the entrance hall, or ante-chamber, was a tablet with a Latin inscription, showing that the Palace was dedicated to Sir William Draper, "the conqueror of Manilla;" also the following lines, in Latin, which were written by Draper, who was then on a visit to Governor Tryon:
" REGE PIO, FELIX, DIRIS INIMICA TYRANNIS, VIRTUTI HAS AEDES LIBERA TERRA DEDIT. SINT DOMUS ET DOMINUS SAECLIS EXEMPLA FUTURIS, HIC ARTES, MORES, JURA, LEGESQUE COLANT."
Judge Martin in his history translates thus:
"In the reign of a monarch, who goodness disclos'd, A free happy people, to dread tyrants oppos'd, Have, to virtue and merit, erected this dome ; May the owner and household make this the loved home, Where religion, the arts and the laws may invite Future ages to live, in sweet peace and delight."
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TRYON'S PALACE, NEW BERN.
Judge Martin adds that the building was superior to any- thing of the kind in British North America; and that in 1783 he heard the renowned and unfortunate Don Francisco Miranda, when visiting the palace with him, say it had no equal in South America. It is said in New Bern that the third story, shown in the plate, was omitted, and that the roof had parapet walls with a balustrade around it; was made flat for a prome- nade, and had an aquarium on it. At present only the right wing is standing.
The contract was signed with the private seal of Tryon, and his signature and that of the architect. A fac-simile of seal and signatures is here given, as made by Mr. Lossing.
Gryon,
John Nawho
Morse's Gazetteer of 1798 has this account, which was fur- nished by Mr. Wm. Atmore, of New Bern, and originally ap- peared in Morse's first edition in 1789, in Elizabethtown, N. J., then in his American Geography of 1792, published in Picca- dilly, London: "The palace was erected by the province be- fore the Revolution, and was formerly the residence of the governors. It is large and elegant, two stories high, with : two, wings for offices, a little advanced in front towards the town; these wings are connected with the principal building by a circular arcade. It is much out of repair; and the only use to which this once handsome and well furnished building is now applied is for schools. One of the halls is used for a school, and another for a dancing room. The arms of great Britain still appear in a pediment in front of the building." In 1795 the Academy was burned, and the Legislature allowed
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TRYON'S PALACE, NEW BERN.
the Palace to be used for this school, of which Rev. Thos. P. Irvine, an Episcopal minister, was principal. He kept wood and hay in the cellar or basement under the Council Chamber, and resided with his family in the upper part. In 1798, a negro woman went to look for eggs in the hay .* She carried a lightwood torch, and some sparks falling on the dry hay kindled a fierce blaze. Unfortunately a hole was cut in the floor above, through which to pour water; but it acted as a flue, and the flames became uncontrollable. Only the right or west wing was left, though the burnt foundation walls still re- main. That wing has been used as a stable. There General Washington's war-steeds were stabled when he visited New Bern in 1791. For a long time it was used as a storage room
* After diligent search I failed to find any contemporary record of the time when Tryon's palace was burned, or any person who could fix the date. It has been erroneously stated as 1800. I have been able to discover the year, but not the month of the burning thus. While teaching in the palace, Mr. Irving sent the following rhyming order :
" PALACE, NEW BERN, Nov. 11, 1797.
"MESSRS. GEORGE AND THOMAS ELLIS :
"I send you, sirs, a little boy To buy me neither robe nor toy, Nor rum, nor sugar, nor molasses, Coffee, tea, nor empty glasses ; Nor linen cloths, nor beau cravats, Nor handkerchiefs, nor beaver hats ; Nor anything, or less or more Of all that constitutes your store, Save only this, a noon-day taper, And one thing more, a quire of paper. Of these pray send the exact amount, And charge them both to my account ; And rest assured my prayer shall be, Kind sirs, for your prosperitee.
"THOS. P. IRVING."
On December 3 and 4, 1797, the Senate and House of Commons considered a bill appointing commissioners to sell the palace and building. But in 1798 an act was passed, reciting the fact that "the palace in New Bern had been destroyed by fire," and appointing commissioners to sell the "lots, and the bricks remaining of the palace." It must have been burned in 1798.
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TRYON'S PALACE, NEW BERN.
for hay, grain, etc., by Mr. Frederick J. Jones. The United States troops during the late war tried to pull it down for the brick but the cement proved so strong, I am told, that they could not get whole brick, and therefore left it. It has since been repaired, and used by the Episcopal Church for a parish school-house and a chapel for a short time, but is now unused. Sundry relics of the Palace and Tryon are preserved in New Bern, such as a fine clock, a silver tea-kettle, a curious child's chair, a marble and rosewood table, Governor Tryon's writing desk, dresses worn at the Palace balls, etc.
Its Situation.
It was charmingly located. The statements and traditions of aged citizens long dead, the careful researches and memo- ries of Colonel John D. Whitford and others, restore the scene. From the rear of the Palace a fair terrace sloped down to the Trent River. One sauntering along the guarded prome- nade on the roof, in the Autumn when the work was finished, would look through the hazy veil of Indian Summer upon the Trent, with its cultivated fields between masses of virgin forests, its broad marshes dotted with green and brown trees, and wild "flowers on a green carpet, stretching up to Cleremont, the home of the Moores and the Spaights ; beyond it the home of the Bryces and Gastons, with the division of a creek only, Pembrooke, the home of the Nashes." On the left the Trent, three-quarters of a mile wide, joins the Neuse, expanded to a width of one mile and a half, and the wharves on both streams are filled with vessels, and bustling with active labors, and cheery songs of hardy steve- : dores. Like a line of silver, the Neuse runs through the land- scape as far as the eye can reach.
" Fair river not unknown to classic song - Which still in varying beauty roll'st along, Where first thy infant fount is faintly seen, A line of silver 'mid a fringe of green ; Or where, near towering rocks, thy bolder tide, To win the giant guarded pass doth glide, Or where, in azure mantle, pure and free, Thou giv'st thy cool hand to the washing sea."
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TRYON'S PALACE, NEW BERN.
Beneath laid the town of New Bern, nestled amid its grand old trees, glowing in autumnal tints beyond painter's skill. From its homes are beginning to twinkle the lights, betokening loving reunions after toils of the day. From the North front of the Palace runs George street, called after the king. It is eighty-two feet broad, and passes-a splendid avenue-chiefly through the original forest for more than a mile to Core Point Ferry on the Neuse. Here was a splendid drive, continued through the "string of woods " (as this body of primeval growth was called, that the late war destroyed), along the charming Neuse and then beside the Trent, in a circuit of three miles, back to the Palace. "At this season the maples and ash would there be glowing with purple and gold. The myrtle, too, loved this shore, and the red berries would be peeping through the bright green foliage of the holly, while the darker green pines were there, ever waving their tops and sighing in the gentlest winds." The flitting and the song of tuneful tenants of field and forest gave life to the peaceful sylvan scene. "Imagine a long stately row of cypress trees towering above a snowy belt of sand, and back of them cedars, darker green, shading the grass reaching from the sand up the slope fifty or sixty feet, and back to a footpath skirting the enclosed fields,-they checked off with rows of cedars,-beyond oak groves, and the river roll- ing on in front one mile and a half in width, and you have some idea of the Neuse shore as it was in the olden time." Upon this scene, partly unchanged when in his boyhood Rev. M. D. Hoge, D. D., lived with his uncle, Dr. Lacy, he then looked with pleasure, and of it writes, "The blue Neuse, the sandy white shore, the old-fashioned houses, the kind hearted people, all dwell in my memory and make a beautiful romance, colored with the rosy light which the imagination of boyhood throws around the happy past.
"My old friend, Tom Watson, wrote a little poem on New Bern while I lived there, in which he described the river as lingering fondly beside the town, which it was unwilling to leave, the last lines running thus :
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THE NEUSE.
" Regretful waves, well may you weep and sigh For this bright Eden as you pass it by, For wander where you may, you ne'er will kiss A shore so bright, so beautiful as this."
Here was the focus of a royal display, and illusive fashion- able dissipation. Atticus, or Judge Maurice Moore, satirized Gov. Tryon for "the arrogant reception you gave to a respect- able company at an entertainment of your own making, seated with your lady by your side on elbow chairs, in the middle of the ball-room." He charged that all the existing mischiefs in the impoverished colony, which could not afford such an outlay, were caused by the appropriations for this Palace; and that Tryon merely gratified his vanity, and made an elegant monu- ment of his taste and political influence, at the expense of the interest of the province, and of his personal honor in changing the plan of a province-house to that of a Palace, worthy the residence of a prince of the blood.
The balance of the poem on the Neuse, to which Dr. Hoge refers, is as follows. It was written by his friend Tom,-now the Rev. Thomas Watson, of Dardenne, Mo.,-about 1838, in his 17th year :
THE NEUSE.
" I've been where the waters are sparkling and pure, I've watched them roll gallantly on to the sea, And I loved their sweet murmuring voice, but I'm sure I never as Neuse thought them lovely to me.
"I've stood on the breast of a hill-shaded vale, And listened with joy to full many a rill, That sported around me all sparkling and pale, And then have I said, Neuse is lovelier still.
. "I've gazed, when the moon lent her magical light, On a field of clear waters, all tranquil in rest,
With a mirror of heaven, as blue and as bright, And then bave I vowed that I loved Neuse the best.
"Thy waters, fair river, have flowed by the shore Where my fathers are sleeping, since first thou were free
From the kind hand of Nature, that never made more So bright, so enchanting, so lovely as thee."
NEW BERN IN 1819.
" 'T THE American Universal Geography" for 1819 says : "The public buildings are three houses of religious wor- ship, for Episcopalians, Baptists, and Methodists ; a handsome court-house and jail, all of brick; a theatre, an academy, and two banks. The houses formerly were almost wholly of wood, and indifferently built; but since the destructive fires,* which have happened here, the new buildings are of brick, and handsome. The town is thriving, having increased in the last eighteen years from 2,500 to 6,000 inhabitants. It owns and employs in a brisk commerce about 5,000 tons of shipping; which carries to market lumber, tar, and other naval stores, pork, corn, etc. A steamboat intercourse is established between New Bern and Norfolk. A passage from the latter by the former to Charles- ton, S. C., a distance of 800 miles, is now easily performed in seven days." There is some error here as to the population. By the census of 1850 it was only 4,681, and 6,445 in 1880. Worcester's Universal Geography for 1817 gives it as 2,167, and the tonnage in 1810 as 7,413; but his estimate may be that of 1810 for inhabitants. About the latter date its prospects grew bright, and its trade was large with the West Indies and interior of the State. One of the oldest citizens has told me that he remembered when one hundred and ten vessels were owned here. Its citizens, John and Asa Jones, brothers, were among the first to introduce the distilling of turpentine into the town and State. Scrapers were not then used on the pine-trees, but they were hacked with the hatchet.
* I have read an account, in an old newspaper,-the Raleigh Register of Sep- tember 15th, 1808, -of a destructive fire in New Bern, in which the brick building of Mr. Isaac Taylor was with difficulty preserved, and Maj. George Ellis was mortally wounded, in the blowing up of one of the bouses, by & window frame falling on him. He died the next day.
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NEW STREET.
An account in 1818 says: "There are three houses of pub- lic worship in New Bern, and at present three congregations supplied with pastors. The Episcopalians, who are a numer- ous and respectable body, have a decent brick church, at pre- sent supplied with a clergyman. The Methodists, the most numerous society of Christians in the place, have a very large and convenient chapel, and are supplied with a regular succes- sion of able and evangelical preachers. The Baptists have a meeting-house, at present out of repair. They have no regu- lar preacher. Besides these, a Presbyterian congregation meet at the Academy for public worship." Upon the advent of the steamer Norfolk on our waters in 1819, some enthusiasm and rivalry in building began, and some substantial edifices were erected.
Many of the great inen of North Carolina and the United States were born or lived here. This fact, with its previous history and influence, gave to New Bern the honorable soubri- quet, " The Athens of North Carolina."
new Street.
This street, whose name was recently changed to Neuse, be- gins on the Neuse, and was one of the most famed as the resi- dence of men of distinguished talent. Here were the man- sion of Hon. William Blackledge, the house and law-office of Judge William Gaston, the residence of the younger Gov. Richard D. Spaight (the Mitchell House), and opposite to it the imposing house of John Stanly and his law-office. In the Stanly building, begun before the Revolution, but not com- pleted, were fitted up rooms for the entertainment of General Washington, when here in 1791. A notable public reception was given him in the Palace. Mr. Stanly also here enter- tained General Nathaniel Greene, when his army was famished and half naked, and General Greene knew not what to do. Then Mr. Stanly patriotically loaned him forty thousand pounds for his suffering heroes. Hon. Edward Everett, when here to deliver his celebrated oration on Washington, on pass- ing this house, lifted his hat, and said, " Once the home of pa-
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WASHINGTON'S LETTER.
triots and statesmen." On the square beyond the Presbyterian Church (which stands opposite to the Stanly Building) is the Academy, already mentioned, with its modern additions. Next to it is the Roberts' House, formerly occupied by Hon. J. L. Taylor, Chief Justice of the State. His law-office was on John- son Street, parallel with New, in a small building opposite Mr. John Lane's carpenter shop; but recently it has been enlarged to a dwelling-house. At the beginning of New Street lived Judge M. E. Manly, also on the Supreme Court Bench. His residence was the noted "Emory House," where Presiden Monroe and Hon. John C. Calhoun were entertained when visiting the city.
Washington's Letter.
While he was in New Bern, the citizens addressed a letter of welcome to General Washington, to which he returned the following reply :
"TO THE INHABITANTS OF THE TOWN OF NEW BERN.
" GENTLEMEN: I express with real pleasure the grateful sentiments which your address inspires. I am much indebted, in ever personal regard, to the polite attentions of the inhabitants of New Bern, nor am I less grati- fied by the patriotic declarations on the situation of our common country. Pleasing indeed is the comparison which a retrospect of the past scenes affords with our present happy condition-and equally so is the anticipa- tion of what we may still attain, and long continue to enjoy. A bounti- ful Providence has blest us with all the means of national and domestic happiness ; to our own virtue and wisdom we are referred for their improve- ment and realization.
"That the town of New Bern may eminently participate in the general prosperity, and its inhabitants be individually happy, is my sincere wish.
G. WASHINGTON."
PRESBYTERIANISM IN NEW BERN.
1800 to 1817.
N 1800 there could not have been enough Presbyterians here to organize a church. Dr. Elias Hawes was here in 1798, perhaps earlier; and Robert Hay, a staunch Scotch Covenanter, settled here about the opening of the century. Both of these gentlemen were afterwards ruling elders in this church. Mr. Hay worshipped with the Methodists, but de- clined to connect himself formally with those brethren, though he was solicited publicly from the pulpit to do so. About 1806 or 1807, it is probable that James K. Burch was teaching a school here for boys and girls in the office of Hon. John Wright Stanly across the street from the present Presbyte- rian lecture-room.
In this work he was assisted by Benjamin H. Rice and Wil- liam Leftwich Turner.
Benjamin H. Rice, D. D.,
Was born in Bedford County, Virginia, 29th November, 1782, and converted under the ministry of Rev. James Turner. He pursued his classical course and theological studies for six years under his distinguished brother, Rev. John H. Rice; came to North Carolina and taught school in New Bern, then in Raleigh; was licensed by Orange Presbytery in 1810, in Raleigh; in 1811 sent by the General Assembly to the sea- shore of North Carolina as a missionary ; ordained by Orange Presbytery 4th April, 1812, and sent as commissioner to the General Assembly; dismissed September 23, 1812, and went to Petersburg, Va., where he organized a church, of which he was pastor for seventeen years, and to which [ preached a short time; in 1829 he was Moderator of the General Assembly.
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W. L. TURNER .- JAMES K. BURCH.
After some other changes, he took charge of College Church, Prince Edward County, Va., where he was attacked by paraly- sis while in the pulpit, January 17, 1856, and died 24th February following.
1. T. Turner
Was the son of Rev. James Turner, Bedford, Va. His early history and the time of his ordination are unknown to me. He was principal of the academy and pastor of the church in Raleigh for some time; went to Fayetteville in 1809, and taught school, as well as preached. His pastoral services there were greatly blessed; but on the 18th of October, 1813, in his thirtieth year, in the midst of usefulness, and the tears of an affectionate people, he died. He was a man of marked talents and character, unaffected piety, and beauty of life.
James K. Burch
Was a native of Albemarle County, Va. He was received by Orange Presbytery, as a candidate for the ministry, at Ala- mance, 25th September, 1806. He presented his certificate of classical and scientific attainments from Rev. Geo. A. Baxter, D. D., principal of Washington Academy, now Washington and Lee University, Va. On 24th September, 1807, at Buf- falo Church, he was licensed, by the same Presbytery, to preach the Gospel; and at Buffalo Church, Moore County, N. C., on Thursday, 7th April, 1808, the following minute occurs in the records of Orange Presbytery :
"Mr. James Burch received a call from New Bern, and the Rev. Messrs. Stanford, Turner, Robinson, and Murphy, were ap- pointed an intermediate Presbytery to meet in New Bern, on Friday, the 27th of May next, to ordain Mr. Burch.
"The Rev. Wm. L. Turner to preach the ordination sermon, and Mr. Stanford to preside, and give the charge.
"Mr. Burch is ordered to prepare a lecture on the 23d Psalm, and a sermon on Luke 18: 13, and be examined on theology, chronology, and church history, previous to ordination."
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PRESBYTERIANISM IN NEW BERN.
This order was carried out, as we learn from the Minutes of Presbytery at its seventy-seventh session, at Alamance Church, 29th September, 1808 :
"The Minutes of the Intermediate Presbytery appointed to meet at New Bern were read, and are as follows:
"NEW BERN, May 27th, 1808.
"Intermediate Presbytery met according to appointment, viz., the Rev. Messrs. Samuel Stanford, Wm. L. Turner, and Murdock Murphy. The Rev. Samuel Stanford was chosen Moderator, and Murdock Murphy, Clerk.
"Mr. James Burch delivered a sermon and lecture on the subjects assigned him by Presbytery, and was examined on chronology and church history, which were sustained.
"The Rev. Wm. L. Turner preached the ordination sermon, and Mr. Burch having answered the questions our Form of Government requires in such cases, he was ordained to the holy office of the ministry, by the laying on of the hands of the Presbytery, and prayer, and a charge was given suitable to the occasion.
"Concluded with prayer. "MURDOCK MURPHY, Clerk."
In 1809 Messrs. Burch and Turner were appointed commis- sioners to the General Assembly. The following record is copied from the Presbyterial Minutes of September 27, 1810: "The Rev. James K. Burch applied by letter to be dismissed from his pastoral charge, and also from this Presbytery, to join the Presbytery of Philadelphia. Said charge informed Pres- : bytery by their representatives of their willingness that Mr. Burch should resign his pastoral charge. The Presbytery ac- cepted his resignation, and he was also dismissed to join the Presbytery of Philadelphia."
Dr. Gillett, in his "History of the Presbyterian Church," says, "The church at New Bern was gathered but a short time previous to 1809, and in that year James K. Burch was its pastor. For a long time subsequent it must have remained in
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A SUBSCRIPTION.
a feeble state, even if it retained its organization." He says that Mr. Burch preached for some time at New Bern, and af- terward at Washington. The Minutes copied above, however, seem to show that there was an organization in New Bern be- fore April, 1808, as a call was given and presented to Presby- tery for pastoral services in April. Nothing in the Minutes of Presbytery warrants the statement that Mr. Burch preached in Washington, as on the dissolution of his relation to New Bern he went to Philadelphia. This transfer seems to have been through the influence of Dr. Alexander. Mr. Burch's name stands in the Presbyterial Minutes opposite to New Bern in 1808 and 1809, under the heading "names of congrega- tions;" but under the head "communicants," New Bern is marked " unknown." Dr. Gillett says that Mr. Burch was "a man of more than ordinary eloquence, but greatly lacking in stability, he was quite unfitted to secure the confidence in him- self or his measures which was necessary to build up a prosper- ous congregation." He died about 1859-'60.
From an old copy of "The Morning Herald" of New Bern, in 1808, the following is copied, which shows activity and zeal. on the part of the Presbyterians:
A SUBSCRIPTION, For the purpose of Erecting a PRESBYTERIAN MEETING-HOUSE,
Has lately been fet on foot in the town of Newbern, and a number of names obtained.
Papers are left at the Bank, Printing Office, Book Store, and in the hands of feveral gentlemen in the Town and Country, of which the following is a Copy :- Christians of every denomination are refpect- fully invited to yield their aid.
THE Subscribers severally promise to pay the sums of money op- posite their respective NAMES for the purpose of purchasing a Lot in Newbern with such improvements thereon as may be converted into a Presbyterian Meeting-House, and for the completion of the same, or for purchasing ground and erecting thereon a suitable building for such Meeting-House-or for purchasing or otherwise acquiring an in- terest in a House or other building, or part of such building to be-
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