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 MECKLENBURG DECLARATION 
 
 OF INTDKFENDENTCE, 
 
 Chmrhtte, Nf. C\, May ^Q, iS^S^- 
 
 Hon. JOHIS^ M. BRIGHT, 
 
 Of Tennessee. 
 
 
 •J" Wa 
 
 NASHVILLE, TENN.: 
 
 ROBERTS & PURVIS, BOOK AND JOB PRINTERS. 
 
 fci,-^^^ 
 
 1875. 
 
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 p<.*m((W>*''-^ 
 
 V. .V-*-' , 
 

Speech of Hon. Jno. M. Bright, delivered at Charlotte, N. 
 C, on the 20th of May, 1875, in honor of the Meck- 
 lenburg Declaration of Independence, 
 one Hundred Years Before. 
 
 My Countrymen : 
 
 Being a descendant, on one side of the house, from 
 the "Old North State," and having spent several years of my boy- 
 hood under her classic oaks in old Orange, my feelings kindle with 
 more than ordinary interest on this proud occasion. Thousands of 
 hearts, familiar with the cradle songs of Carolina, far beyond the 
 blue mountains in the "West, now pulsate in unison with your own. 
 
 Gladly have I come from the "Great Daughter, Tennessee," to 
 bear her kindly greetings, and to mingle her voice in your rejoicing. 
 The voice of her Legislature and Historical Society was but the 
 voice of the State, in the expression of her interest in this celebra- 
 tion. Children of Carolina ! Sons of Freedom ! Patriots of our 
 Common Country! This celebration is the festival of the heart 
 upon the glorious memories of the past. 
 
 That people have far sunk in degeneracy, and have become as the 
 dry bones in the valley, when they feel no stir of inspiration, as the 
 images of their illustrious fathers are passing before their eyes. 
 The heart, not the head of a nation, is the fountain of patriotism, 
 bravery and virtue. The emotional nature of a people, like the 
 fiea, contains the saline virtues which purify and preserve the State. 
 The living age is but a pensioner on the works and wisdom of the 
 past. It has been the custom of all civilized nations to celebrate 
 the ancestral deeds and virtues to stimulate the rivalry of the future 
 generations. The ancient Greeks erected monuments and statues, 
 instituted games and festivals, and awarded apotheosis to her heroes 
 and benefactors. Her Poets swept their country's lyre in their 
 praise, and her most renowned orators were chosen to extol their 
 -deeds at the national celebrations. Pericles pronounced the oration 
 in honor of the brave sons who fell in the first Peloponnesian war, . 
 and Demosthenes pronounced a similar oration in honor of those 
 who fell in the battle of Chseronaea. The whole line of Jewish 
 history was marked with memorial stones and altars, and with 
 sacrifices and jubilees. All their rivers, lakes, seas, mountains, 
 villages and cities became monumental. This day Ebal and Geri- 
 jzim, Sinai and Calvary, Bethlehem and Jerusalem, all rise fresh 
 
before our memories. Even the floods of praise which dashed from 
 the harp of David were but the memorial songs of his nation. 
 
 Then this celebration has a far nobler aim than the mere pastime 
 of an hour. And while we have gathered around these old altars 
 of freedom, and hoisted the flood-gates of our joys, we should not 
 fail to be inspired with the sublime virtues of our fathers. 
 
 The "Old North State" has treasures of history which, to the 
 outer world, have long been embedded in her own bosom, like the 
 rich ores of her mountains. And, while her historians have not 
 been idle in garnering up many of her deeds, yet they have not been 
 emblazoned to the world, nor the generations imbued with their 
 teaching. All the nurseries of the land ought to be made vocal with 
 Carolina's songs, and our juvenile orators ought to make them ring 
 in scholastic declamation, in the one hundred and forty thousand 
 schools and colleges in the land. 
 
 It is too true that all our Southern States have indulged in a 
 literary stupefaction, while other States have furnished our school 
 and nursery literature, in which, with excusable vanity, they have 
 painted the thrilling incidents of their own history. 
 
 It is time we were tearing the poppies from our brows, and 
 adorning them with the bays and the laurels. We have deeds and 
 heroes that are worthy the tongue of a Demosthenes, and the harp 
 of a Homer. 
 
 But I did not come to chide you, whose patriotism and gratitude 
 have risen to ecstasy on this occasion. Your sympathies are now in 
 electric communication with the past, and your hearts are warm 
 with its inspiration. 
 
 You are yearning to hear and will not be wearied with even a 
 repetition of some of the deeds of your fathers. 
 
 The news of the passage of the Stamp Act fell upon North Caro- 
 lina like a spark into a powder magazine. The explosion of indig- 
 nation shook the Colony to its center, while John Ashe, the 
 Speaker of the General Assembly, rang the articulate echo into the 
 ear of Governor Tryon, "this law will be resisted to blood 
 AND death." 
 
 When the sloop of war. Diligence, anchored in the Cape Fear, 
 with stamped paper for the use of the Colony, the brave men of 
 Hanover and Brunswick, headed by the heroic Ashe and Waddell, 
 prohibited the terrified Captain from landing the cargo. From 
 thence they marched to Wilmington, besieged the Governor's 
 palace, and extorted from him a pledge, and swore his Stamp Mas- 
 
ter, not to attempt the execution of the law. Here the King, Par- 
 liament and Viceroy were all defied. 
 
 Here we have an act far transcending in daring the Boston Tea 
 Party, who were disguised as Indians to escape identity; while here 
 the act was performed in open day, the parties were without dis- 
 guise and known, and it was because they were known that the 
 Governor capitulated in his castle. 
 
 And yet the feat of tumbling the tea into Boston harbor is knowii 
 to every school boy in the land, and the last celebration of the 
 event was held in the rotunda of the National Capitol. 
 
 All the histories of North Carolina concur in the fact that it 
 suffered more from the insults, extortions and oppressions of the 
 government officials than any other one of the American Colonies. 
 With but few exceptions, all the Governors, from Sir Wm. Berkley 
 to Josiah Martin, seem to regard the Colony but as a royal planta- 
 tion, the people but as serfs, the true object of government but a 
 source of thrift to its officials, and the "sword but a sceptre." 
 
 The clerks of the interior courts plundered the people by extor- 
 tion, while the tax-gatherers, in some instances, stripped the farms 
 of the work beasts, and the people of their apparel. Smarting 
 under such misrule, the people sought redress from the courts ; but 
 there they were met with mockery. They indicted Edmund Fanning 
 for extortion, but he being one of the minions of the Governor, and 
 through the over-awing presence of the Governor at the trial, was 
 fined only six cents, though convicted of the infamous offense. The 
 insult rolled like a burning wave over the people. All their efforts 
 had been baffled, all their expedients exhausted, save the God 
 given right to defend themselves. 
 
 They were familiar with the hereditary teachings, that the King 
 and Parliament were the sources of power; but they now resolved 
 to begin at the other end, and assert that the people were the true 
 sources of power. To meet the aggressions of the Governor and his 
 subalterns, according to the distinguished historian of North Caro- 
 lina, Mr. Wheeler, in April, 1768, a formidable body of the people 
 organized themselves into an association for regulating public 
 grievances, and the abuse of power. Hence the name was given 
 to them of "Regulators." 
 
 Clearly distinguishing between liberty and licentiousness, they 
 resolved "to pay only sifch taxes as were agreeable to law, and to 
 pay no officer more Jhan his legal fees." 
 
After three years of aggression on the one side, and of resistance 
 on the other, Governor Tryon marched with 1,100 men, with 
 artillery and banners, to meet the Regulators, about 2,000 of whom 
 had hastily collected on the banks of the Alamance. And here 
 was the first battle shock on the soil of an American Colony, in 
 resistance to British oj)pression. 
 
 The Regulators were beaten, after exhausting their ammunition, 
 leaving twenty dead and several wounded on the field. Of the 
 royal troops, sixty-one were killed, wounded and missing. The 
 Governor marched his victorious army through the country, confis- 
 cating property, burning houses, and administering forced oaths of 
 loyalty to the people. For this ignoble triumph of tyranny over 
 liberty, the Governor was applauded by the home government, and 
 he was rewarded by his promotion to the Governorship of New 
 York. Some of the Regulators were executed, some were pardoned 
 upon taking the oath, while others crossed the mountain, bearing 
 with them the unconquered love of liberty, and the undying hatred 
 of tyranny — destined to reappear upon another field and to exchange 
 the odium of the outlaw for the glory of the patriot. Fortunate it 
 was that they were defeated. Success then would have drifted 
 them into the horrors of civil war. Many good men and patriots 
 who did not comprehend the magnitude of their grievances, fought 
 against them. Besides, the other colonies were not then ripe for 
 revolution. Nevertheless, the fact is immortal, that theirs icas the * 
 first battle — theirs was the first libation of blood — theirs was the first 
 vicarious sacrifice offered on the altar of American liberty. Let not 
 a breath soil the fame of the patiots of Alamance. Their battle 
 stood upon as high ground of merit as the battles of Lexington and 
 Bunker Hill, and all other battles before the 4th July, 1776 — resist- 
 ance to oppression. They were the Hampdens and Sidneys of 
 America, and they deserve a monument heaven-high to their 
 memory. Let no one despise the day of small things. The pebble 
 in the brook may change the course of the river, which afterwards 
 bursts through mountain barriers and floats a nation's commerce. 
 So one bold resolve may change the course of empire. In a few 
 years all the Colonies were caught in the draught and were borne 
 along on the rushing tide of revolution. 
 
 I shall not offend your intelligence by going into the general details 
 of the American Revolution. The most of them are consecrated 
 by song, tradition and history. Passing over the discussion of the 
 stamp act, the fishery act, the tea duty and the Boston port bill, I 
 
5. 
 
 pause only to remark that, according to Mr. Bancroft, "American 
 independence, like the great rivers of the country, had many 
 sources, but the head spring M^hich colored all the rest, was the 
 navigation act." 
 
 Amidst the reigning discord preceding the revolution, the colo- 
 nial statesmen and patriots were too sagacious to be deceived by the 
 devices of the British Parliament and machinations of the Tory 
 Ministry of George the III. 
 
 George the III., with an obstinacy only equalled by his tyranny, 
 persisted in a policy which, according to James Otis, "cost one King 
 of England his head and another his throne," and, it may be added, 
 which cost George the III. his American Colonies. The ground 
 texts of the American Colonies were, "No taxation without 
 
 EEPRESENTATION." " RESISTANCE TO TYRANNY IS OBEDIENCE TO 
 
 God." All the Colonies were now burning with resistance. The 
 news of the battle of Lexington resounded from Nova Scotia to 
 Florida. It was borne by relays of heralds, day and night, all 
 along the coast of the Atlantic, and from the coast to the mountains; 
 the Alleghanies shouted it to the Cumberland, awakening the set- 
 lers on the Watauga, and sending echoes far beyond to the hunters 
 of Kentucky, who on receiving the news, named their camping 
 ground Lexington, now the site of a flourishing city, in memory of 
 the battle-ground which had been consecrated by the blood of the 
 patriots. 
 
 Upon receiving the news the patriots of Mecklenburg swarmed 
 from the "Hornet's Nest." They met in convention on the 19th, 
 and continued their session into the 20th of May, 1775; on which 
 day they gave to the world the Mecklenburg Declaration of 
 Independence. This declaration was not the child of a patriotic 
 frenzy, which was not expected to outlive the paroxysm which gave 
 it birth. It was the result of profound wisdom, sagacity and states- 
 manship. Casting their reflection beyond the irritating causes of 
 the hour, we can imagine some of the grave questions which pressed 
 upon their consideration. 
 
 For example : That the American Colonies were firmly planted, 
 as political governments, in a territory as large as the whole of 
 Europe, and that England could not fill up the territorial vacuum 
 in ages with her disposable population ; that there was ample room 
 for all the tides of immigration pouring in from England, Ireland, 
 Scotland, France and Germany ; that they all would be needed for 
 strength and protection, and such were their affinities of race, that 
 
when run through a common hopper, "they would come out Ameri- 
 cans in the grist ;" that the three thousand miles of Atlantic waves 
 that rolled Ibetween them and the Mother Country would prove an 
 impassable gulf to their equal rights as Englishmen ; that Europe 
 had been a battle-field for a century, and that those wars which 
 turned kingdoms upside down, drenched them with blood, and 
 impoverished the people, frequently extended their sweep to the dis- 
 tant colonies of the contending parties, and made them objects of 
 plunder and conquest. And fresh before their eyes was the bloody 
 history of the Spanish and Austrian succession, the war between 
 Peter the Great and Charles XII, and the seven years war 
 instigated by Maria Theresa, for the recovery of Silesia, involving 
 Austria, Russia, France, Sweden and Poland on the one side, and 
 Prussia and England on the other, and catching in the outer circle 
 of the vortex the colonial dependencies on the coast of Africa, in 
 the East and West Indies, and the Colonies in North America. The 
 frontiers of the American Colonies were still bleeding with what was 
 known as the French and Indian war, (being part of European war,) 
 which ra^-ed from the heights of Abraham to the Ohio. In the 
 line of the same reflection, they saw, as an outgrowth of this 
 European policy, which required so much blood and treasure to 
 support the royal felons in their diversions "with human heads and 
 cannon balls," that it would recoil on their respective gevernments 
 and culminate in oppressive taxation. 
 
 They saw that they were already pursued with the fierce avarice 
 of the Mother Country, and that the fruits of all their labor were 
 subsidized to support the extravagance of the home government, 
 with one hand reaching to her East India possessions and with the 
 other reaching to her American Colonies, for revenues, and by her 
 navigation act asserting absolute control over the commerce of the 
 Colonies. And when they looked into the breast of their own 
 Colony, they saw it lacerated and torn with the rugged harrow of 
 extortion and taxation; and in Governor Tryon they saw a scourge 
 and a tyrant, who had his counterpart in Warren Hastings, the 
 rapacious Governor of British India. Following the logical drift 
 of reflection to the end, they saw that if they stood still they would for- 
 ever remain provincial tributaries to the Mother Country, doomed 
 to political slavery, perhaps like Sepoys, farmed out to the rapacity 
 of an East India company. If they resisted without dissolving 
 their political bands, they M'ould be regarded by the nations of the 
 earth as in rebellion against the English government, and while 
 
they might enlist their sympathies, they could not gain their alli- 
 ance. Thus cut off from a national future — without guaranties for 
 life, liberty, property or domestic happiness — with no assurance of 
 foreign aid — with no star of hope, with no bow of promise painted 
 on the lowering future — they turned their eyes from this picture of 
 appalling gloom. 
 
 With faith in God, they saw no path of escape except that which 
 was illumined by the light which flashes from the patriot's sword. 
 They saw no sovereign remedy for their direful woes, except in 
 absolute and unconditional independence. And they were the 
 PiEST to reach the height of this great conclusion, and the first to 
 embody it in a high eesolve upon the American continent. 
 
 In full view of the gibbets of Alamance — with a full conviction 
 that they would have to toil up a path, slippery with blood, to the 
 grandeur of independence, yet their patroism and courage towered 
 and expanded before the danger, and burning the bridge behind 
 them, "they hung their banners on the outer walls." 
 
 All honor to the twenty-seven noble signers of the Mecklenburg 
 Declaration of Independence ! Eulogy can not over-draw their 
 praise, nor admiration surpass their merit. Let each name be con- 
 secrated to Freedom, and each find a sanctuary in every patriot's 
 heart. 
 
 But some would make the disparaging insinuation that their 
 Declaration was but the expression of a prevailing sentiment at the 
 time. The facts of history do not sustain the position. Washing- 
 ton "abhorred the idea of independence" when he took command 
 of the army, and he rolled the tide of war about one year before he 
 was committed to the idea. 
 
 Mr. Jefferson, in a letter dated 25th August, 1775, said he 
 ''would rather be in dependence on Great Britian, properly limited, 
 than on any other nation upon earth," but added, "rather than sub- 
 mit to the right of legislating for us assumed by the British Parlia- 
 ment, would lend my hand to sink the whole island in the ocean." 
 
 Joseph Galloway, at one time Speaker of the House of Pennsyl- 
 vania, on his examination before the House of Commons, in a Com- 
 mittee on American Papers, on the 16th June, 1779, said, "I do 
 not believe, from the best knowledge I have of the state of America 
 at that time, (the time when the people took up arms) that one fifth 
 of the people had independence in view." 
 
 In the Provincial Congress, AVatertown, Massachusetts, on the 
 26th of April, 1775, seven days after the battle of Lexington, "an 
 
address to the inhabitants of Great Britain" was adopted, contain- 
 ing the following passage : "They (the British Ministry) have not 
 detached us from our Royal Sovereign ; we profess to be his loyal and 
 dutiful subjects ; and so hardly dealt with as we have been, are still 
 ready, with our lives and fortunes, to defend his person, family, 
 crown and dignity; nevertheless, to the persecution and tyranny of 
 his cruel Ministry, we will not tamely submit." 
 
 On the 8th of July, 1775, every member of the Provisional Con- 
 gress signed a petition to the King, stating that they "have not 
 raised armies with the ambitious design of separating from Great 
 Britain and establishing independence." Other evidences might be 
 multiplied to the same effect. None of these had the ring of the 
 old Mecklenburg Declaration ; but they show the fact, that up to 
 4th of July, 1776, the continental war was waged for the redress of 
 grievances, and not for independence. Thus it is clear, that the 
 morning star of American independence first rose upon the field of 
 Mecklenburg. But some have gone so far as to doubt the main 
 fact of the Mecklenburg Declaration. The origin of this historical 
 skepticism is, perhaps, traceable to the letter of Mr. Jefferson, of 
 July 9, 1819, in reply to a letter of Mr. John Adams, in which he 
 says, "I believe it is spurious." Mr. Jefferson did not deny the 
 fact, but he did not believe it. However great his fame for states- 
 manship and knowledge, his incredulity should not be substituted 
 for fact. The same remark is applicable to Mr. Adams, who said 
 in his letter to Mr. Jefferson, "If I had possessed it I would have 
 made the halls of Congress echo and re-echo with it fifteen months 
 before your declaration of independence." But while Mr. Adams 
 would thus have "sung the glories of ISIecklenburg," his own Pro- 
 vincial Congress, as shown before, would have been singing loyalty 
 to the British King. 
 
 With but poor facilities for collecting and preserving the treas- 
 ures of our revolutionary history, no doubt many important facts did 
 not come to the knowledge of either Mr. Jefferson or Mr. Adams. 
 
 Mr. Adams, being a witness himself, in a note dated "Quincy, 
 January 3, 1817," addressed to the editor of Niles Register, said, 
 "In plain English, and in a few words, I consider the true history of 
 the American Revolution, and of the establishment of our present 
 constitutions, as lost forever." While this was his opinion, it was 
 also true, that facts buried to one generation, may be disinterred to 
 another. Archteologists are now recovering, from the detritus of 
 ages, the missing links in the chain of history. 
 
But some, in the face of evidence, will doubt the facts of history^ 
 Lord Byron said : 
 
 "I've stood upon Achilles' tomb, 
 And heard Troy doubted ; time will doubt of Eome." 
 
 If Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Adams could have seen the mass of tes- 
 timony which lay concealed below the crust of nearly a half century, 
 but since accumulated, they never would have doubted the Meck- 
 lenburg Declaration. Without going into elaborate details, it may 
 be stated that any doubt, as to the fact of the Mecklenburg Declara- 
 tion, is fully met and overwhelmed by the tradition of a century; 
 by the official testimony of Governor Wright, of the Province of 
 Georgia, and of Governor Martin, of North Carolina, copied from 
 the British archives under the supervision of Mr. Bancroft ; by a 
 contemporary publication in the Cape Fear Mercury; by the testi- 
 mony of Captain Jack, who bore a copy to the Continental Con- 
 gress ; by proof of copies of the original resolutions ; by the proceed- 
 ings of the Mecklenburg committee, on the 31st of May,. 1775, 
 which evidently derived their authority to act from the resolutions 
 of May 20th; by proof of witnesses, taken by authority of the 
 Legislature of North Carolina, who were present at the reading of 
 the resolutions, and heard the shouts of the enthusiastic multitude ; 
 by the able lectures of Dr. Hawks and Governor Swain ; by the 
 indorsement of the historians of North Carolina, Martin, Jones, 
 Caruthers, Williamson, Foote and Wheeler; by Ramsey and Put- 
 nam, historians of Tennessee ; by the historians, Holmes and Alex- 
 ander H. Stevens, in their histories of the United States ; by Gov- 
 ernor George R. Gilmer, in his book called the " Georgians ;" by 
 Dillon, the historian of Indiana, in his " Historical Evidence of 
 the Government of the United States," copying from the "Ameri- 
 can Archives;" by Chief Justice Nicholson, of Tennessee, in his 
 eulogy on the late President Polk ; by the Legislature of the State 
 of Tennessee ; by the great historian, Washington Irving, in his 
 life of Washington ; by the masterly array of incontrovertible facts 
 by Governor William A. Graham ; by the celebrations of a half 
 century; by the centennial celebration of this day, with the one 
 hundred rounds of the booming cannon and the tens of thousands- 
 present who give credence to the immortal fact. 
 
 With the expiring moments of the present century, let every 
 whisper of incredulity be hushed, and let the door of controversy be 
 forever shut on the subject. 
 
10 
 
 Let your lingering monument to their memory, under a new im- 
 pulse, soar to the overarching blue, and let it stand until it grows 
 gray with the centuries. 
 
 The patriots of Mecklenburg made absolute and unconditional 
 renunciation of allegiance to the King. They restricted their allegi- 
 ance "<o God and the General Government of Congress." Believing 
 that there was divinity in success, with sublime faith, they laid 
 hold of that God who goes forth with the armies of his people, and 
 who raises up one nation and puts down another. Without the 
 alliance of any of the nations of the earth, they sought the alliance of 
 Heaven. They knew that Heaven had fought for the people of the 
 ancient covenant, with the stars and the floods, the pestilence and 
 the tempest. With pious hands the Ark of Heaven was borne with 
 our armies, through all the dark vicissitudes of the revolution. 
 Thus Heaven-imbued the patriots prepared to meet the coming 
 storm. With active zeal they soon made the Colony ring with 
 martial sounds, from the coast to the mountains. 
 
 The Colonial Assembly and a convention of the delegates of the 
 people met at the same place on the 4th of April, 1775. The 
 Assembly, by resolution, approved the celebrated report made to 
 the Continental Congress in 1774, setting forth the grievances of 
 the Colonies, and the proper mode of redress. 
 
 Joseph Hewes, of North Carolina, was one of the most efficient 
 of the committee who made that report, which falls but little below 
 in dignity the Declaration of the 4th of July, 1776. But both the 
 Assembly and Convention had risen to such disorderly temper, in 
 the royal view, that Governor Martin quite lost his amiability, and 
 denounced the Convention as treasonable and the Assembly as 
 refractory, and on the 8th of April, 1775, he dissolved the Assem- 
 bly, being the last Royal Assembly in North Carolina. Soon 
 after this the Colony was all on fire, and he fled from the burning 
 soil. On board his Majesty's brig of war. Cruiser, the Governor 
 gave vent to his rage by cannonading his rebellious Province with 
 paper denunciations. 
 
 The patriots of Mecklenburg were now merged with all the 
 Colony in the common cause. The Colony pledged itself to share 
 ratably in the expenses of the Continental army. On the 16th of 
 September, 1776, the Continental Congress called for eighty-eight 
 battal lions to be enlisted for the war, and apportioned nine to North 
 Carolina, which were promptly furnished. The military record of 
 
11 
 
 North Carolina opened the 27th of February, 1776, with a splendid 
 and important victory at Moore's creek. 
 
 Governor Martin, burning with revenge and willing to regain 
 his lost authority at any cost, projected the plan of rousing the In- 
 dians to massacre on the frontiers, the negroes to insurrection, the 
 Scotch Highlanders and Tories to rally to the royal standard, while 
 reinforcements were to be sent from New York by Sir Henry Clin- 
 ton and from England under Sir Peter Parker; and with this com- 
 bination he was to sweep the Colony with desolation and fetter the 
 people with oaths of loyalty. Gen. McDonald, in execution of the 
 plan,had organized about 1,500 Highlanders and Tories, and attempt- 
 ed to form a junction with the expected forces at Wilmington. He 
 was intercepted at the bridge at Moore's Creek, by Colonels Caswell 
 and Lillington, with about 1,000 militia. They entrenched on 
 the opposite side of the' creek, "uncovered the bridge and greased 
 the sleepers with soap and tallow," and awaited the charge. 
 
 The enemy marched to the assault with claymores drawn, and to 
 music of the bagpipe and the bugle ; but they soon recoiled from 
 the galling fire which swept the bridge. In turn the patriots charged 
 across the creek. The work was short and the rout complete. 
 The loss of the enemy was 50 killed, wounded and missing ; 850 
 prisoners, including the general; |75,000 in money, besides a large 
 quantity of army stores. This blow frustrated the shocking con- 
 spiracy against liberty and humanity — fired the hopes and roused 
 the indignation of the people — broke up the formidable combina- 
 tion of Highlanders and Tories — sent the expected reinforcements 
 dejected and disconcerted to another destination. 
 
 But this was not all. The people now wanted no reconcilation 
 with a King who had shown himself destitute of humanity, by 
 sanctioning a scheme to give their women and children to the tom- 
 ahawk of the savage — their houses to the torch of the incendiary — 
 and who could "wash his feet in the blood" of his subjects. The 
 battle ground of Alamance now became holy ground, and the 
 blood of its heroes was sanctified in the affections of the patriots. 
 I have emphasized the battle of Moore's Creek, because it was a 
 pivot on which the fate of North Carolina was poised, and probably, 
 with her, the fate of all the Colonies. 
 
 But to proceed. The voice of Mecklenburg now became the 
 voice of the whole Colony, and the voice of the Colony soon became 
 the voice of the United Colonies, which proclaimed the United 
 Declaration of Independence to the nations of the earth. The Pro- 
 
12 
 
 vincial Assembly of North Carolina, on the 12th of April, 1776^ 
 was the first to instruct her delegates, in the Continental Congress, 
 "to concur with the other Colonies in declaring independence." 
 
 Virginia, that grand old State, menaced by a similar diabolical 
 scheme of massacre and insurrection, planned by Governor Dun- 
 more, next instructed her delegates to vote for independence, on the 
 15th of May. As remarked by an impartial writer: "No mem- 
 bers of that body (the Continental Congress) brought with them 
 credentials of a bolder stamp than the delegates from North 
 Carolina." 
 
 The war being fully opened, the Continental troops of North 
 Carolina followed Washington along the Hudson, through the Jer- 
 seys, into Pennsylvania, and suffered with their comrades on the 
 frozen sod of Valley Forge. They poured out their blood at Ger- 
 mantown and Brandywine. At Germantown fell the brave Gen» 
 Francis Nash, who was a captain of the "Regulators," and in honor 
 of whose memory the Capital of Tennessee was named. 
 
 Her troops also marched through the malarial swamps of South 
 Carolina, and fought at Camden, Hobkirk's Hill, Eutaw and the 
 siege of Charleston. They scaled the mountain with the brave Gen, 
 Rutherford, to chastise the savages on the frontier. In the lan- 
 guage of Governor Graham, "within a radius of forty miles of 
 this capitol (Charlotte) are situated the scence of the battles of 
 Hanging Rock, Buford's Defeat, Sumpter's Defeat, Rocky Mount^ 
 King's Mountain, Ramsour's Mills, Cowan's Ford, and the town of 
 Charlotte itself was the theatre of a well contested action, between 
 Davie and Tarleton's Calvary." 
 
 Indeed, a fierce partisan warfare raged all along her Southern bor- 
 der during the whole war. Nearly every creek, river, ford, bridge, 
 road and village was the scene of a struggle ; and nearly every 
 thicket concealed an ambuscade. 
 
 And h«r heroic women were not behind in the sacred cause. 
 They, too, made a Declaration of Independence, and pledged their 
 sacred honor to spurn every kneeler at the shrine of beauty who would 
 not defend his country against the ravages of the Scovilite Tories. 
 True to their devotion, in the darkest hours of the struggle, they were 
 pouring oil into the flickering lamp of liberty. In the first years 
 of the war, our arms had a gilding of success, but in the latter 
 years they were drooping with disaster. Charleston and Savannah 
 had fallen ; and Georgia and South Carolina were looked upon as 
 subjugated. Not a flag of resitance waved from Florida to the 
 
13 
 
 North Carolina border, except one displayed in the dash of a bold 
 Partisan. 
 
 Cornwallis had matured his plans for the subjugation of North 
 Carolina. Maj. Furguson's command formed the left wing of the ex- 
 tended line which was to encompass and crush the Colony. "While 
 the patriots were yielding to despair, an unexpected deliverance was 
 at hand. Hearing that Furguson threatened to cross the mountain 
 and swoop down upon the settlers of the Western waters, those 
 heroes of the wilderness, some of whom were fugitives from Ala- 
 mance, rallied to the standards of Colonels Shelby and Sevier, and 
 uniting with Colonel Campbell, of Virginia, they went out to meet the 
 foe — gathering in their march the detachments of Colonels Cleave- 
 laud and McDowell, of North Carolina, and Colonel Williams, of 
 South Carolina. Maj. Furguson, hearing of their approach, took 
 position on, what he supposed, the impregnable heights of King's 
 Mountain. The patriots quickly encircled the mountain, and, as 
 they ascended, like a contracting girdle of fire, I can imagine a 
 battle-cry broke from a part of the line, " Remember Alamance !" 
 The brow of the old mountain was soon blazing with a coronet of 
 flame: — next followed the surrender, and Alamance was revenged 
 and American Independence was assured. Here was the first turn in 
 the tide of our disaster. The patriots of the whole Colony were 
 enthused, the Tories paralyzed, the invasion of North Carolina, 
 for the time, abandoned, and General Greene had time to recruit 
 and reorganize his army. 
 
 Mr. Jefferson said of this battle, "It was the joyful enunciation 
 of that turn in the tide of success that terminated the revolutionary 
 war, with the seal of independence." 
 
 The campaign of 1781 opened on the 17th of January, with the 
 splendid victory of General Morgan over the insolent Tarleton, at 
 the Cowpens. On the 15th of May following, Greene and Corn- 
 wallis met at Guilford, and fought one of the most important battles 
 of the war. Greene retired, but Cornwallis was beaten. In three 
 days Cornwallis went staggering from the field, pursued by Greene. 
 Cornwallis refusing to fight, Greene carried the war into South 
 Carolina, to break up the enemy^s posts in detachments, while Corn- 
 wallis continued his retreat to Wilmington. 
 
 Finding the Colony too hot for him, he A\;as next seen bending 
 his way on a march of 300 miles towards Virginia — limping along 
 the coast like Milton's fallen spirit "over the burning marie" — with 
 his army flaggellated into shreds, in his own language, "his cavalry 
 wanted everything, and his infantry everything but shoes." 
 
14 
 
 He concentrated his army at Yorktown. Washington saw and seized 
 his advantage. Yorktown fell, and the sun of American liberty 
 rose resplendent in the heavens. The battle of Yorktown was only 
 the complement of the battle of Guilford. Thomas H. Benton said, 
 "the battle of Guilford put that capture into Washington's hands; 
 and thus Guilford and Yorktown became connected; the lesser 
 event was father to the greater." 
 
 It appears that the first Anglo-Saxon anchor which rested on 
 the Atlantic coast was in 1557, on the sandy beach of North 
 Carolina; that the first American manifesto against the encroach- 
 ments of power, was made in 1678, in North Carolina; that the 
 first battle which was fought in the cause of American liberty, was 
 on the 16th of May, 1771, in North Carolina; that the first Declara- 
 tion of Independence in any one of the American Colonies, was made 
 on the 20th of May, 1775, by the patriots of Mecklenburg, in North 
 Carolina; that the first instructions given to delegates to declare 
 for Independence, in the Continental Congress, were given on the 
 12th of April, 1776, to the delegates from North Carolina; that the 
 first blow which turned the tide of disaster, and "stamped the seal 
 of independence," was mainly struck by North Carolina ; and that 
 upon the soil of North Carolina, and partly by her own sons, the 
 blow was struck which "put the capture of Y)rkto\A-n into the 
 hands of Washington," and thus ended the struggle in a blaze of 
 glory. 
 
 All hail to the Old North State ! Let the pages of history be 
 crowded with the shining names of her heroes and patriots, and let 
 those names become songs of deliverance to the coming generations. 
 
 They taught us the value of liberty ; when to draw the sword, 
 how to use it, when to return it to the scabbard and how to pursue 
 the arts of peace. 
 
 Immortal be the names of the six Alexanders, and the names of 
 Brevard, Balch, Phifer, Harris, Kennon, Ford, Barry, Downe, 
 Graham, Queary, Wilson, Avery, Patton, McLure, Morrison, 
 Irwin, Flennegin, Reese, Davidson and Polk, signers of the Meck- 
 lenburg Declaration of Independence ; and the names of other revo- 
 lutionary patriots, Ashe, Caswell, Davie, Franklin, Forney, Hewes, 
 Harnett, Hooper, Jones, Lillington, Leach, Long, Macon, Moore, 
 McDowell, Nash,» Person, Polk, Rutherford, Waddell, and others 
 beyond number. 
 
 After the achievement of our independence. North Carolina, with 
 a generosity equal to her bravery, provided by law for the support of 
 the families of her sick and disabled soldiers. She adopted a scale for 
 
15 
 
 the purpose of ascertaining the value of her depreciated currency, 
 taking the Spanish mill dollar as a unit of value. This scale 
 shows the progress of depreciation at the end of the year 1777 as 
 1 to 3; in 1778, as 1 to 5J; in 1779, as 1 to 30; in 1780, as 1 to 200; 
 in 1781, as 1 to 725; and in 1782, as 1 to 800. Truly, the currency 
 had depreciated to a mere financial trash ; but it had performed its 
 mission. It was only as the shells left in the nest after the eagle 
 had hatched and flown — and this emblem bird of our nation took 
 its Western flight, with scarcely a pause, until it beat its wings 
 against the gates of the setting sun. 
 
 In default of money, the State lavished her Western lands in 
 military grants upon the brave men who had won them a& 
 a heritage by the sword. She not only honored the great soldier, 
 General Greene, with the name of a county, but she granted to him 
 25,000 acres of land on Duck River, in Tennessee, now worth 
 $1,000,000. She granted to each "private, 640 acres of land; 
 each non-commissioned officer, 1,000 acres; a subaltern, 2,560 
 acres ; a captain, 3,840 acres ; a major, 4,800 acres ; a lieutenant- 
 colonel, 5,760 acres ; a lieutenant-colonel commandant, 7,200 acres ; 
 a brigadier, 12,000 acres; each chaplain, 7,200 acres; each surgeon, 
 4,800 acres ; each surgeon's mate, 2,560 acres." 
 
 Moved by a like spirit of justice and generosity, the State ceded to 
 the United States all the territory now comprised within the limits 
 of Tennessee, with the view "of hastening the extinguishment of 
 the debts, and establishing the harmony, of the United States." 
 
 She now sprung forward in her illustrious career of civil develop- 
 ment, founding schools and colleges, and a noble university, the 
 equal of any other seat of learning in the country ; her sons adorn- 
 ing all the liberal professions, and her old Statesmen rising in com- 
 peting grandeur with the loftiest sons of other States. Her Macons, 
 Gastons, Badgers, Mangums, Stanleys and others, all left their 
 giant tracks in the Congressional walks of the nation. 
 
 Her distinguished living sons are too well known to need the 
 praise of a stranger's tongue. 
 
 But she did not enfold all her honors to her own bosom. Many 
 of her brave soldiers, to whom she granted lands, with other daring 
 sons, crossed the mountain to provide homes, and lay the foundation 
 of a great State. None but such hardy and heroic men could have 
 encountered the perils of the wilderness, and "lifted the axe" against 
 the old forest which had wrestled with the tempesteof a thousand 
 years. 
 
16 
 
 These 'men gave a heroic base to the population of Tennessee. As 
 if born with the impulse of their revolutionary fathers, at the first 
 blast of the war trumpet, they gave such magic spring to arms that 
 it won for Tennessee the proud distinction of the "Volunteer State." 
 The State is not only imbued with the jurisprudence, but in every 
 county may be found the sons, descendants and memorials of the 
 mother State. 
 
 The names of Sevier, Shelby, Robertson, Alexander, Polk, Bre- 
 vard, Bledsoe, Barry, Balch, Davidson, Hall, Haywood, Wilson, 
 Franklin, and a thousand others of North Carolina extraction, are 
 familiar names to Tennessee. Dr. Ramsey, the distinguished his- 
 torian of Tennessee, and Judge Thomas Barry, and the late Mrs. 
 Mary Hall, wife of Governor William Hall, of Tennessee, are the 
 blood relations of the Alexanders who signed the Mecklenburg 
 declaration. 
 
 In the early days of Tennessee arose a person with a proud and 
 stately form, with the eye of a bald eagle, with a martial bearing, as 
 if born to command, with a vigorous mind and iron will, with a 
 fervid patriotism and undaunted courage. He rallied around him 
 the brave volunteers of Tennessee, led them against the hostile 
 Creeks, crushed their power in the battles of Talladega and Tehop- 
 ka, quelled their ravages from Georgia to the Mississippi River, 
 met their more powerful allies on the plains of New Orleans, 
 where, with the volunteers of Tennessee and the "Hunters of Ken- 
 tucky," in the language of Felix Grundy, "he silenced the roar of 
 the British lion, and the American eagle took its loftiest flight and 
 uttered its loudest notes of exultant liberty." He astonished Eu- 
 rope with his victories, while his grateful country elevated him to 
 the highest pedestal of civil glory. 
 
 This man was Andrew Jackson, the " Hero of the Hermitage," a 
 native of old Mecklenburg, North Carolina. 
 
 Another person, in the same section of Tennessee, at a later date, 
 arose with a countenance as open as the day, with an eye as bright 
 as a star, a ripe scholarship, a mind clear, vigorous and comprehen- 
 sive, indefatigable industry, indomitable will, and with the courtly 
 art of persuasion, he rolled up the sky of his country's glory, like 
 the sun in his ascendant path. 
 
 He was member of Congress, Chairman of the most important 
 committee. Speaker of the House, Executive of Tennessee, and from 
 thence mounting to the Presidential Chair. He shed a lustre on his 
 administration unsurpassed by any other in the American annals. 
 
17 
 
 He settled the Oregon difficulty, acquired Texas, with American 
 artillery thundered "indemnity for the past and security for the 
 future" above the crown of the Cordilleras, acquired New Mexico 
 and California, and opened our broad ocean front on the Pacific. 
 Impartial history will weave a chaplet for his brow as fair as ever 
 worn by an American statesman. He never failed nor faltered in 
 a duty, and he fell, In the prime of life, a toil-worn martyr in the 
 service of his country. His tomb is visited daily by the citizen and 
 the stranger. His noble widow, the highest type of the American 
 lady, sits close by, the guardian angel of his tomb. Not a breath 
 has ever dimmed the burnished mirror of his fame. His name was 
 James Knox Polk, another son of old Mecklenburg. 
 
 And still another person rose from his mountain home in East 
 Tennessee, and he struggled up, by rapid strides, through all the 
 offices. State and Federal, to the Presidency of the United States. 
 But as he is still an actor on the stage, and belongs to the future, 
 lest I should violate the propriety of the occasion, I will merely 
 note the fact of his elevation. His name is Andrew Johnson, 
 another son of North Carolina. 
 
 Thomas H. Benton, the great statesman and historian from Mis- 
 souri; William R. King, the great statesman from Alabama; and 
 Meredith P. Gentry, the majestic orator and statesman from Ten- 
 nessee, were all natives of North Carolina. But I have not time for 
 further enumeration of the distinguished sons of North Carolina. 
 
 North Carolina and her Southern sister States have had their day 
 of trial and of tribulation. I hope it will not be out of place, when 
 T declare, as an act of justice to them, and to drop leaves of healing 
 on the future, that the Southern States, in the recent strife of the 
 sections, intended only to divide, and not to destroy, the common 
 heritage of our liberty. In separation they intended to write "miz- 
 pah" between the sections — "the lord watch bpjtween me and 
 
 THEE WHEN WE ARE ABSENT ONE FROM ANOTHER." They accepted 
 
 in good faith the arbitrament of arms. They nourish no latent 
 treason — conceal no fires of malice — desire no hereditary feuds — 
 seek no advantage of their sister States. They ask only an equal 
 })art and lot in the inheritance of their fathers. 
 
 They have many a self-sacrificing patriot now, who, as the Roman 
 Curtius of old leaped irt^ the gulf of the Forum, would leap iirthe 
 "bloody chasm" and have it close upon him forever, if, with union, 
 he could secure liberty, fraternity and justice. 
 
 The heroic affections of a jieoplc are the strongest political cords 
 
18 
 
 of a nation — affections sanftified and strengthened by companion- 
 ship in dangers, toils, sufferings, commingling of blood, and in the 
 achievement of a common liberty and glory. 
 
 Jn these affections arc iiivolve<l honor, magnanimity, charity, 
 and justice. 
 
 Whih' our rcvolutidiiary fathers lived, their heartstrings held us 
 together in union ; but as soon as their heads rested beneath the 
 clods of the valley, we Avitnessed the parting ligaments. Ha])py it 
 was fi)r tlu'm that tluy never looked u])on the land drenched with 
 the blood of their sous; and happy yet will it be, if that blood 
 sh(»idd become the seal of [K'rjtctual concord and justice. 
 
 Although the country is de|)rived of the c(U-ds and stays of the 
 heroiti affections of our fathers, yet there is virtue in their memory. 
 
 We are here this day to be imbued with the sublime lessons of 
 their exam])le. We are here, with ])ious gratitude, to remove "the 
 moss and lichen of neglect" from their tombs, and, like "Old Mor- 
 tality," with chisel and mallet, deepen their inscriptions. We are 
 here to collect, in the urn of memory, their immortal deeds, to be 
 passed down to succeeding generations, like the omer of manna by 
 the Children of Israel, along the highway of ages. Let all the sons 
 and daughters of the Old North State, and the pilgrim patriots of 
 all the land, meet from year to year, and from century to century, 
 on this consecrated ground, and view the memorials of their fathers, 
 as the ancient Jews gathered to their beloved Zion and obeyed the 
 command, "Go round about her; tell the lowers thereof. Mark ye 
 well her buhvarks, consider her palaces; that ye may tell it to the 
 generations following." 
 
 Let New England perpetuate her celel)rations, and from licxiug- 
 ton and the heights of Bunker Hill, shout to us her fraternal greet- 
 ings, and Mecklenburg will return the echo, as 
 
 ".Jura answers 
 Hack to the joyous Alps." 
 
 And let us all hope ibr the fruition of our splendid anticipations, 
 that all the land, from the frozen North to the (tuHj and from 
 ocean to ocean, shall be dedicated to Republican Freedom, and be 
 forever sheltered under the canopy of a just and benign govern- 
 ment. 
 
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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