John Lawson - An Untimely Death

The Capture of John Lawson - North Carolina Archives and History

John Lawson - Explorer, naturalist and writer/illustrator of A New Voyage to Carolina began life in Scotland in 1674, but was schooled in England. He first traveled to Carolina in 1700, explored and recorded his extremely detailed impressions of Carolina - the land, the Indians, flora and wildlife. His writings are still appreciated today by historians, naturalists and readers like us. Lawson also participated in the founding of Bath in 1705 and New Bern in 1710.

Unfortunately, he met his fate much too early. Aware of the impending danger, he made out his last will and testament in 1708.

In September 1711 John Lawson and his associate Christoph Von Graffenried were captured by Tuscarora Indians while ascending the Neuse River. They held Von Graffenried prisoner but brutally tortured and killed Lawson - the one who had written almost admiringly about these Native Americans just a few years earlier.

The Death of John Lawson - Drawing likely by Christoph Von Graffenried

Von Graffenried wrote: ………"The day after the execution of Surveyor General Lawson the chief men of the village came to me with the report that they had it in mind to make war on North Carolina. Especially did they wish to surprise the people of Pamtego, Neuse, and Trent Rivers, and Core Sound. So that for good reasons they could not let me go until they were through with this expedition. What was I to do? I had to have patience, for none of my reasons helped. A hard thing about it was that I had to hear such sad news and yet could not help nor let these poor people know the least thing of it."

It was, thus, that tensions between Indians and settlers erupted into a bloody conflict known as the Tuscarora War - a turning point in not only North Carolina but American history.

Carteret County Coat of Arms

Original Carteret County Coat of Arms

• The silver (Argent) diamonds (Lozengy) on the shield are representative of the Carteret Family, as the original Carteret Coat of Arms consisted of four silver diamonds on a red (Gules) field. 
• The black (Sable) swords (Tridents) across (Saltire) the shield are three-pronged spears representative of Neptune. 
• The monster (Yale) on the top has curved horns with a body like an antelope with a lion’s tail. 
• The scallop (Escallop Or) is an ancient emblem of heraldry worn by Crusaders of old as a badge of honor. 
• The black whale supporters are additives, perhaps due to much of Carteret County being on the ocean. The "supporters" come from the practice of Knight’s aides dressing in various animal costumes to attract challenges at tournaments.

NOTE: The above terms in italics are French because the Angevin kings ruled England as heraldry became established.

In 1976, Miss Emily Loftin and Mrs. Thelma Simpson prevailed upon the Carteret County Commissioners to initiate a request that the College of Arms, London, England, “derive such Armorial Ensigns as may be deemed suitable”. The request was officially made by John Kenneth Newsome, Chairman of the Carteret County Board of Commissions.

The Coat of Arms was unveiled in 1977 at the Driftwood Restaurant in Cedar Island. The original hangs in the Carteret County Board of Commissioners Room in the Courthouse in Beaufort, North Carolina.

 

A smaller copy, in oil, hangs in the Carteret County Museum of History in Morehead City, North Carolina.

(Researched and compiled by the late Charles O. Pitts Jr.)

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     On August 8, 1722, Carteret Precinct was carved from Craven Precinct. Beaufort was designated as the seat, a courthouse was erected and a jail was built a few years later.
    The new precinct was named Carteret in honor of John Carteret, grandson and heir of George Carteret, one of the eight Lord Proprietors of Carolina, appointed by King Charles II in 1668. Carteret became a county in 1739.

USS Monitor-The Beaufort Link

Although Swedish inventor John Ericsson submitted plans to Napoleon III in 1854 for an “impregnable battery” that included a revolving cupola, it wasn’t until 1861 that Ericsson’s plans for such an ironclad ship were accepted by the US Navy Department.

USS Monitor was launched from Continental Iron Works in Greenpoint, NY on January 30, 1862. In October, Monitor spent several weeks at the Washington Navy Yard where it was repainted and modified. Battle damages were repaired with iron patches – each scar was labeled according to its origin: “Merrimac”- “Minnesota”- “Ft. Darling” and “Merrimac’s Prow”.

Shortly afterwards, on December 24, 1862, orders were issued for Monitor to proceed to Beaufort, North Carolina. On December 31 she encountered a severe storm several miles off the coast of North Carolina. Efforts by the crew were in vain and the ship slowly sank – four officers and 16 crewmen lost their lives.

Discovered in 1973

In Beaufort, a monument honoring John G. Newton, the Duke University Marine Laboratory team leader involved in the 1973 discovery of the long-sunken Civil War Union ironclad Monitor, was dedicated March 9, 2002, the 140^th anniversary of the historic vessel's battle with its rival Confederate ironclad Virginia (originally Merrimack before its capture and refitting).

Newton, who died in 1984 at the age of 52, led the group aboard the marine lab's former research vessel Eastward that discovered Monitor on Aug. 27, 1973, lying upside down in 230 feet of water about 16 miles off Cape Hatteras. That discovery was preceded by nearly a year of intensive historical research that narrowed the search to a 6-by-16 mile rectangle in what is known as the "Graveyard of the Atlantic" because of the frequency of shipwrecks.

"Before our first week was over, we had picked up 21 targets," Newton recalled in a January 1975 National Geographic article. The day the right target was found, he wrote, "the scientist on watch paid little heed to a slight echo" traced on the paper track of a sonar recorder. Fortunately, Newton added, Fred Kelly, the chief of Eastward's oceanographic party, passed by while wrapping up a bit of fishing from the ship's rail. 'Hey -- that looks like something,' Fred said, and suggested that Eastward reverse course to take a closer look."

It would take another five months of post-discovery study, plus a second site visit in April 1974, to unquestionably identify the wreck.

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Monitor was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in October 1974 as a resource of national significance. On January 30, 1975, Monitor became the first National Marine Sanctuary under Title III of the Marine Protection, Research and Protection Act of 1972.

Wool coat that sank with ironclad Monitor is nearly revived

The Union jacket is again recognizable despite 140 years submerged inside the Monitor’s turret, which was recovered in 2002. (Jonathon Gruenke / Newport News)

"Capt Jack" - An Early Entrepreneur

West end of Front Street. 

 

"Capt Jack - take you over and bring you back..."

 

John Winfield "Capt Jack" Willis (1875-1962) was the son of John Chapman Willis 1846-1910 (son of James Willis and Esther Piver) and Marinda Taylor 1842-1925 (daughter of William and Betsy Taylor of Craven County). 

"Capt Jack" and Daisy Elizabeth Whitehurst (1877-1953) were parents of Jack Miller Willis (1909-1977) and Robert Neal Willis (1917-2004). Neal and Ida Evelyn Jones had two daughters - Linda Willis Sadler and Judy Willis Peregoy. Jack Willis and Lydia Ann Noe were parents of Jack Willis, Jr., Joyce Willis Johnston, Michael Willis and Mae Willis Stevens. 

This Willis family can be traced to John Williston, born in Middlesex, Massachusetts before 1700 and died after 1780 in Williston, Carteret County. It is believed that John married Mary Martin in Carteret County about 1724; Mary was born in 1705, perhaps in Down, Ulster, Ireland. John Williston was a private in Col. Thomas Lovick's Carteret County Militia during the Spanish attack on Beaufort in 1747.

Thanks to documentation and stories collected by his family – the colorful history of "Capt Jack" lives on… 

According to Neal Willis’ book, Beaufort by the Sea-Memories of a Lifetime, John Winfield Willis was born on Mulberry Street and later moved to a house on Turner Street. He married Daisy Elizabeth Whitehurst in 1907 at Miss Emily Loftin’s house on Marsh Street.

 

Below are excerpts from Neal Willis’ book and newspaper interviews:

"He worked in the river fishing, oystering, clamming and for a time at the boat yard of Whitehurst & Rice…At one time he operated a steam-powered merry-go-round for a carnival...He would get up on many cold winter mornings before sunrise and then go out in the cold water in a pair of old leaky boots to pick up oysters barehanded. He had to row a boat five miles each way, then open the oysters and walk all over town trying to sell them for 25 cents per quart, often having to bring them home so we could eat them before they spoiled.

[In the 1920s] "Dad had a houseboat; really it was old sailing sharpie with an enclosure built on top. It was up on posts about six feet above the water at the foot of Moore Street and Front…There was a walkway from the breakwater to the front of the boat.

"He had a motor boat, with a cabin, named Capt Jack that was used to carry people to the Swimming Shoal and to Piver’s Island and for fishing parties. Since the Davis House and Manson House were just across the street, he got a lot of business from the tourists there.

"He had rowboats, fishing lines, bathing suits [ordered from Sears Roebuck] and crab scoops for rent. This was across from the Swimming Shoal where we had cleared the beach of shells and broken bottles. We charged 15 cents round trip…in rowboats…We [Dad, Jack and I] taught swimming and rowing.

"Later he moved everything to the west end of Front Street in a metal building owned by George Brooks, a local contractor, who had a speed boat Miss Beaufort housed in the building…After the building was destroyed in a storm, he built a wooden building at the same location. This too was destroyed in a hurricane...the Capt Jack was washed up on the shore. The rowboats were sold."

History tells us that Capt Jack was also looked to as a weather man as he either walked or rode a bicycle to and from his fishing camp. "He told us to look to the wind for weather signs. He could also look at the clouds and tell what kind of weather to expect for the next few days…He told me about the 1917 freeze and the influenza epidemic. The river across Gallants was frozen solid enough that cars could be driven across on the ice...He said he also witnessed the last hanging on Court House Square."

Neal Willis’ book goes on to tell us how his father’s birthday was always celebrated. "…Each year he had a watermelon cutting on the breakwater near his camp at the foot of Moore Street to celebrate. Tourists staying at the Davis House and Manson House were invited along with their children. Captain Kelly Gillikin, who operated a freight boat would pick up watermelons and bring them to Dad. Everyone had a great time."

"…When I was growing up, a lot of people went 'sheep heading,' especially Dad. It was nothing to catch a fish weighing 12 to 14 pounds. It was so big that you couldn’t scale it with a knife. Dad had what he called the ‘sheep head board’. It was a large board where he could drive a nail in the fish’s tail and scale it with a hoe. They were very good eating baked with onions and potatoes. The meat was white and very good. We used sand fiddlers for bait. They wouldn’t bite shrimp or fish. They ate barnacles and small crabs on the large posts and rocks. They were very strong and could bend a regular hook. Dad told Mr. Jones, the hardware manager, and he had the Pflueger Hook Company make a stronger hook. They named it the ‘Capt Jack Hook’."

Beaufort by the Sea - Memories of a Lifetime contains most of the above information, plus Neal Willis' memories of what it was like growing up in Beaufort. 

Photos provided by Linda Willis Sadler.

Atlantic Beach - The Early Days

Atlantic Beach, Beaufort.Morehead City, NC circa 1933

Just past the Beaufort Inlet, are the cresting ocean waves of the Atlantic Ocean. In the early days, through the Civil War, until the late 1880s, Bogue Banks was totally undeveloped and reachable only by boat. Jennie Coues, wife of Dr. Coues, stationed at Fort Macon after the Civil War, played with her daughter on the beach, and often galloped freely on horseback.

“Bogue Banks had its start with a fort [Fort Macon] on the eastern end and small fishing villages along the beach. From this small beginning came the beach resort of Atlantic Beach, which became a major tourist attraction.

"J.J. Royal and Winfield Chadwick built a small pavilion, one-story bathhouse and refreshment stand on Bogue Banks’ ocean beach in 1887. Boats for hire took people to the sound side of the beach, where they walked across the sand and dunes to reach the ocean for surf bathing. When the partners split their interests, Royal moved west to Money Island and built a two-story pavilion and bathhouse. Oxcarts carried supplies for the refreshment stand over the sand dunes. In 1916, Vaughn Bedsworth bought 100 acres including the Royal property and named it Atlantic View Beach. Many improvements were made and a successful 100-room hotel was built.

Greetings From Atlantic Beach circa 1949

"Tourists used the beach for years before Atlantic Beach was promoted as a separate entity. In the summer sharpies rigged with white sails bound from the Atlantic Hotel were an ordinary sight as most carried tourists to the ocean beach. The fare was 15 cents to be taken to Money Beach for swimming. Money Beach, which had a small bathhouse, was thought to hide pirate treasure in its dunes. Even after Atlantic Beach was developed for tourism in 1928, most swimmers continued going to Money Beach to avoid paying the $1 swimming fee.

"The building of the toll bridge by the Atlantic Beach Company in 1928 helped to create the resort of Atlantic Beach. The wood-planked turnstile bridge was built at 28th Street. It had a tollbooth with a pagoda-style roof. Tolls were 25 cents per car plus 15 cents per passenger. The toll was dropped in 1936 when the state bought the bridge.

"To promote the beach, they also built a dining hall, bathhouses and the Pagoda. These were constructed in an Oriental style and had green roofs with bright red exposed corners. The Pagoda was a large building where dances were held. Featured were such well-known orchestras as Paul Whiteman and Tommy Dorsey.

Pagoda Ball Room, Atlantic Beach, Beaufort. Morehead City, NC

Ocean King Hotel circa early 1950s

"Alfred Braswell Cooper is credited with having a vision for developing what many viewed as an island desert into the resort Atlantic Beach became. A few months after buying Atlantic Beach, A.B. Cooper built the three-story 70 room Ocean King Hotel (above)-opened for the 1946 season. The hotel was badly damaged by Hurricane Hazel in 1955 and reopened in 1956, only to be destroyed by fire. Cooper also built the Idle Hour Amusement Center. The Idle Hour, on the right leg of the amusement circle, had a 4-lane bowling alley, which grew to 24 lanes, juke box music and refreshments. During World War II, servicemen stationed at Fort Macon frequented the center…”

Have a Swim With Us - Greetings From Atlantic Beach, Morehead City, N.C.

The above text and postcards were taken from Carteret County - Postcard History Series, by local residents Linda Sadler and her son Kevin Jenkins. It is a collection of old postcards with descriptive histories under each card - of Beaufort, Morehead City, Atlantic Beach and Fort Macon. The images in the book are in black and white.

On the Front Cover: The Morehead City Boating Club was founded in 1934, sponsoring such races as the Shanghai Trophy, the Gib Arthur Memorial Trophy and the D.G. Bell Memorial Trophy. The flag, called Old Mullet, designed by D.G. Bell, distinguished the boats. The club also sponsored the Junior Boat Club. These clubs were active until World War II put a stop to pleasure boating.

Books can be ordered from Arcadia Publishing and Amazon.com

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Below is a 1929 poster advertising Atlantic Beach
(not included in the book)

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More Images...

USS Pevensey

The SS Pevensey, blockade-runner serving the Confederacy, was lost on June 9, 1864, run aground by the Union supply ship New Berne. The Pevensey’s crew caused the ship’s boilers to explode and then escaped to shore, where they were captured and taken to Fort Macon. One crewmember was apprehended aboard the doomed vessel. The Pevensey had successfully run the blockade at Cape Fear four times before she was lost. On the day she ran aground, the ship’s crew was disoriented, thinking they were much closer to Cape Fear than they actually were. The ship grounded about nine miles west of Federal-held Beaufort, at present Pine Knoll Shores.

The Pevensey, an iron-hulled sidewheel steamer, was typical of the type of vessel used to run the Federal blockade during the Civil War. The Pevensey had one deck, two masts, and was schooner rigged. She was built by Charles Lungley of London circa 1863 or 1864. Her machinery was manufactured by Northam Iron Works of Southampton, England. The wreck currently lies about one hundred yards off the beach. The remains of the hub of the portside paddlewheel are visible above the water at low tide. Consequently, the wreck has captivated beachgoers for years. Known locally as the “Iron Steamer,” the wreck gave name to the nearby Iron Steamer Pier and Motel (since demolished).

The NC Underwater Archaeology Branch (UAB) examined the wreck site in November 2000. The UAB noted that much of the ship’s machinery is visible underwater, but that more of the vessel could be buried beneath the sand bottom. It was also noted that Pevensey is less well preserved than other blockade-runner wrecks at Cape Fear due to its closer proximity to shore and exposure to stronger currents. It was determined that there was interest in preserving the pier (which had been damaged by recent hurricanes) as a platform for public observation of the wreck. The pier, however, has since been removed. The UAB recommended further study and collaborated with an avocational underwater archaeology group called Surface Interval Diving Company (SIDCO) on further study of the wreck.

The Pevensey site is similar to the wrecks of the Beauregard at Carolina Beach and the Ranger at Holden Beach. The Pevensey wreck also compares favorably with the clusters of wrecks off Cape Fear that were studied by the UAB and placed on the National Register in 1985. That people can actually see a portion of this Civil War relic from the beach makes it a special curiosity.

A historical marker is located on NC 58 ( Salter Path Road) at mile marker seven:
Blockade runner, iron steamer, chased ashore by Union ship
June 9, 1864. Remains lie offshore, 220 yards SE

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SIDCO is responsible for the entire archaeological
assessment of the 0001BBB wreck site.
Blockade Runner Pevensey

“Oysters are only 30 cents a bushel…” Jeannie Coues

View of Beaufort from Morehead City in the 1860s - Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper

 

Jane Augusta McKinney Coues, known as “Jeannie” to her family and friends, was the wife of Dr. Elliott Coues, the Fort Macon surgeon and a renowned naturalist who was assigned to Fort Macon in February, 1869. Initially, their living quarters were inside one of the Fort casemates. During their 20 months stay at Fort Macon, Jeannie corresponded frequently with her sister Louise. Here are some excerpts from those letters:

. . .I don’t know how to describe Fort Macon so that you will get my idea of it. It is built on a little island two miles out from the mainland. It is in the form of a hollow pentagon, and has a moat and a drawbridge. On the ramparts are cannons commanding the harbor and ocean called guns en barbette. The fort is turfed over and from the water looks only like high breast works, but in reality it is 40 ft. high. The entrance is called the sally-port and there is a guard of 10 or 15 men stationed there night and day.

 

. . .I go over to Beaufort nearly every day in a rowboat to market…Oysters are only 30 cents a bushel and almost everything else is cheap.

 

. . .It is very healthy here and nice places for Edith to play. In fact, Beaufort is the watering place for North Carolina...Warm days she is taken down to the beach and there she rolls over and over, fills her eyes and hair full of sand and makes little mud pies, though she hasn’t attained too much proficiency in the latter. Everything is so clean on the beach that I like to have her there. The sea comes up twice a day and washes away all impurities…I have been taking a hard gallop on the beach this evening, and my hand trembles so I can scarcely write.

. . .Elliott keeps two horses and we have splendid canters on the beach. Two days ago we went 10 miles away in a sailboat to see a whale that had been harpooned and was lying on the beach. It was 50 feet long, and when the roof of its mouth was cut off and placed on the beach it formed an arch high enough for me to stand erect under.

 

. . .Edith is the only child at the Post now and is fast being spoiled. Several of the officers keep a private paper of candy for her and she trots around to the different rooms and asks for “tan tan” every morning as soon as she is dressed.

 

. . .It is pretty warm here now, or would be were it not for the sea breeze. I ride my little pony every evening, when it is pleasant. I believe I told you we were keeping house…we had moved into a little row of cottages just outside the fort in consequence of Elliott’s being the second officer in rank. 

. . .One of the unmarried officers lives with us. Our dinner today is a pair of wart chickens, a large baked fish, stuffed with Irish potatoes and eggs, and garnished with slices of lemon, the usual vegetables, and grapes for dessert. My dinner is milk porridge. In a fishing excursion the other day I caught 7 immense blue fish just as fast as I could pull them in.

According to fort historian Paul Branch, Coues’ wife Jeannie included a hand-drawn floor plan of her “cottage by the sea” in a March 12, 1870 letter to her sister, showing their living arrangement. The front right room was occupied by an unmarried officer. The left front room was a common parlor. The rear room on the left was occupied by the Coues family. The right rear room was a common dining room.

Jacob Henry House circa 1800

Painting by Mary Warshaw

Though plaqued as the Easton House circa 1771, with the first houses plaqued in 1963, this house at 229 Front Street was built for Jacob Henry between 1794 and 1802.  

Jacob Henry was elected a member of the North Carolina Legislature in 1808. In 1809 he was challenged to step down because, as a Jew, he denied the Divine Authority of the New Testament. The debate, and Henry’s speech in his own behalf, was widely reported and important in the American fight for constitutional religious freedom.

 
Legend tells us that the cellar, constructed of large ballast stones, may have been used by Federal troops during the Civil War, as a prison for Confederate soldiers captured at Fort Macon. This is, however, not documented. This cellar does include a huge fireplace. When first built, meals were cooked here and passed up through a dumbwaiter into what is now the living room. It is said that the cellar was also used, at one time, for barrel making by a Beaufort cooper.

In 1835, the house was purchased by Marcus Thomas and remained in the Thomas family until 1959 when it became the home of John and Sara Jones. In 1900, Thomas descendant, Alonzo Thomas helped fund the purchase of Piver's Island so that it could be established as a U.S. Fish Commission marine laboratory.

At one time, a Mason-Hamlin organ was located in the living room; it was a gift to Emma Duncan upon her graduation from Greensboro Female Institute in 1859. Needlework samplers, dated 1846 and 1851, were discovered in an old trunk in the house.

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At a ceremony on June 11, 2012, Jacob Henry was honored 

with a N.C. Highway Historical Marker.  

 

MARKER TEXT:

Jacob Henry, the first Jewish representative in the North Carolina House of Commons, served in 1808 and 1809, a time in which people were bound constitutionally to affirm the “truth of the Protestant religion” before holding any public office or “place of trust or profit in the civil department.” A resident of Beaufort, he was elected to represent Carteret County. Although many details of his early life are lacking, it is known that he was the son of Joel and Amelia Henry, who moved to North Carolina from Charleston by the time of the 1790 census.         

Young Henry rose to importance in the state’s history not only as the first Jewish legislator, but, as such, he inadvertently became a defender of religious liberty. A Federalist, Henry was first elected in 1808, served the term without incident, and was reelected the following year. Hugh C. Mills, a newly-elected Republican representative from Rockingham County, took issue with Henry’s religious affiliation and, on December 5, 1809, introduced a resolution to vacate Henry’s seat. At issue were sections 32 and 12 of the state constitution (affirming the Protestant religion and taking a proper oath of office).  

     

The legislators decided to take up the resolution the next day, giving Jacob Henry time to prepare his defense. Without specifically mentioning Judaism, Henry gave a rousing speech in which he waxed about “natural and inalienable rights” and equalized religious sects with phrases such as, “the ruler of the universe would receive with equal benignity, the various offerings of man’s adoration if they proceed from an humble spirit and sincere mind.” 

One of Henry’s most ardent defenders was William Gaston, who, as a Catholic, had reason to be interested in the outcome of the debate. Gaston maintained that the religious requirements did not apply to legislative office, and therefore Henry had not violated the Constitution. Ultimately Jacob Henry was allowed to retain his seat. His inspiring and eloquent speech on December 6, 1809, has been published and quoted frequently ever since. It is considered a touchstone of religious rights and tolerance.    

Jacob Henry married Esther Whitehurst of Beaufort in 1801. The Federal era house that he built at 229 Front Street in Beaufort still stands. The Henrys had seven children before moving to Charleston around 1817. Henry did not engage in politics after the 1809 session. He died in 1847 and is believed to have been buried alongside his mother and wife in a “Hebrew cemetery” in that city. Tombstones have not been found. 

 

Much more on Jacob Henry and the house