Carolina Cradle: Settlement of the Northwest Carolina Frontier, 1747
CAROLINA CRADLE Settlement of the Northwest Carolina Frontier, /;'47-1762 On the eve of All-Souls' Day I heard the dead men say Who lie by the tottering tower, To the dark and doubling wind At the midnight's turning hour, When other speech had thinned: "What of the world now?" The wind whiffed back: "Men still Who are born, do good, do ill Here, fust as in your time: Till their years the locust hath eaten, Leaving them bare, downbeaten; Somewhiles in Springtide rime, Somewhiles in summer glow, Somewhiles in winter snow:— No more I know." —Thomas Hardy CAROLINA CRADLE Settlement of the Northwest Carolina Frontier, 1747-1762 ROBERT W. RAMSEY The University of North Carolina Press Chapel Hill © 1964 by the University of North Carolina Press All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America ISBN 978-0-8078-0934-1 ISBN 978-0-8078-4189-1 (pbk.) Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 64-22530 12 II 10 09 08 IJ 14 73 12 II To my father, whose profound understanding of the history and people of piedmont Carolina helped make this work possible This page intentionally left blank INTRODUCTION The records of Rowan County, North Carolina, date as far back as 1752. These ancient land grants, deeds, wills, mar- riages, and church and cemetery records contain the history of the northwest Carolina frontier, the doorway to the South and West. Rowan County originally included practically all of central and northwestern North Carolina and extended westward to the Mississippi River, having no western boundary line. While the vast amount of public and other records are in existence in this region, there is no information here to indicate whence these settlers came and why they came.
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