Month: January 2016

Wilson news.

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New York Age, 9 September 1922.

  • Mrs. Jasper Coley —  Laura (or Laurena) V. Coley, daughter of Isaac and Penny Coley, married Jasper Allison Coley on 6 June 1912 in Wayne County. A native of Pikeville, Wayne County, like her husband, Laura died 12 May 1923. She was a teacher. Jasper Coley was the son of Phillip R. and Annie Exum Coley. He is listed in Wilson city directories in the early 1920s as a carpenter, a plasterer and a bricklayer, and lived at 401 North Vick Street.
  • Mrs. William Hines — Ethel Cornwell Hines (1894-1983) was a South Carolina native.
  • Roberta Battle, Glace Battle, Georgia Burks and Henrietta Colvert
  • Mrs. B.P. Coward — Sarah Adelaide Brown Coward (1867-1946) was the wife of A.M.E. Zion minister Bryant Pugh Coward.
  • Mrs. Stattie Cannon — In the 1910 census of Wilson, Wilson County: Charles Cannon, 35, barber in a “white shop”; wife Statie, 34; and children Charles, 11, Ruth, 9, and Statie Benton, 13. In the 1922 Wilson city directory, Stattie Cannon is listed as a dressmaker and Charles Cannon as a carpenter; both resided at 724 East Green Street. In the 1940 census of Newark, Essex County, New Jersey: Charles Cannon, 44, mother Stattie Cannon, 65, brother-in-law Fred Langford, 29, and sister Ruth Langford, 33. All were born in North Carolina and described as “white.”
  • A.N. Darden — Arthur N. Darden (1889-1948) was a son of Charles H. and Dinah Scarborough Darden and worked in his father’s undertaking business.
  • John Clark
  • Mrs. C.L. Darden — Norma Duncan Darden (1895-1987), a native of Montgomery, Alabama, was married to Arthur Darden’s brother, Camillus L. Darden.
  • Rev. A.H. George
  • Mrs. S.L. Bowser — Burt Bowser, born in Halifax County, married Sarah Rountree, daughter of Peter and Lucinda Rountree, on 4 December 1888 in Wilson. Reddin S. Wilkins, A.J. Lindsay and James W. Parrington were witnesses to the ceremony. In the 1900 census, Burt L. Bowser is described as a bar tender and in 1910 as the conductor of a pool room. Sarah is described as a dressmaker. Burt Landers Bowser died in 1920; Sarah Bowser, in 1935.
  • John Spells — In the 1920 census of Wilson, Wilson County: on Pender Street, carpenter John E. Spell, 50, wife Martha A., 39, and son John E., Jr., 16. (John’s death certificate lists his middle name as Stephen.) Martha A. Spell, a native of Guilford County, died in Wilson in 1966.
  • Wesley Rogers — Per the city directory, in 1922, John Wesley Rogers lived at 548 East Nash Street and worked as a porter at Oettinger’s department store. His wife,  a native of Johnston County, was Mary Elizabeth Thomas Rogers (1878-1950). Rogers was born in Durham County in 1870 and died in Wilson in 1951.
  • Deby Harper — Deborah Harper Swindell was the daughter of Argent Harper. She was briefly married to Louis Swindell.
  • Dr. DuBissette
  • Dr. and Mrs. J.B. Darden — Pharmacist James Benjamin Darden was a brother of Arthur and Camillus Darden. After a brief partnership with his brother John W. Darden, a doctor in Opelika, Alabama, he settled in Petersburg, Virginia.
  • Mrs. A.B. Bowser — Astor Burt Bowser, born 1896, was a son of Burt L. and Sarah L. Bowser, above. He married Deloris Harvey of Alamance County on 17 August 1921 in Wilson. Rev. B.P. Coward officiated. In the 1930 census, the couple and their children, Astor B., Jr., and Sarah, are listed in Chicago, Illinois. Astor worked as an artist in his own studio and Deloris as a saleslady in a millinery. Astor died in Hennepin County, Minnesota, in 1981.

I think a school would be sufficiently supported.

Wilson Co schools

In a letter to Brevet Lt. Col. Charles E. Compton, Assistant Commissioner of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands (better known as the Freedmen’s Bureau), Israel Barden provided information about the state of education for freedmen in Wilson County. There were two schools, he reported, one at Joyners Depot (later Elm City) and one in Wilson, and support for a new school building would justify its expense.

Records of Assistant Commissioner of the State of North Carolina; Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands; Record Group 105, National Archives; Freedmen Bureau Records of Field Offices, 1863-1878 [database on-line], Ancestry.com.

Martha’s Choice.

The North Carolina Museum of History in Raleigh, North Carolina possesses two quilts made by women who were once enslaved. Mary Barnes of Wilson created “Martha’s Choice” between 1875 and her death in 1902.

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Mary Barnes, “Martha’s Choice”

Photo courtesy of the blog maintained by North Carolina Connecting to Collections, an outreach program of the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources. Please read their article on the myth of “slave codes” on quilts.

Map of Wilson, 1872.

This is the first known map of Wilson, copied from a drawing made in 1872 by E.B. Mayo:

1872_map

The orientation is odd, as the bottom of the page is north. (Or, more strictly speaking, northeast.) There, encircled at the edge, is the only reference to any of the African-Americans who made up just over a quarter of the town’s population in the early 1870s. It’s Lemon Taborn‘s barbershop.

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Here, roughly outlined, is that area of downtown Wilson today:

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Spring Street is now Douglas and Nash Street extends across the tracks (replacing “the Plank Road,”) but otherwise street names remain the same. There are, of course, no marl holes or wells or trees in the middle of roads. The railroad in the 1872 map is not angled enough; despite appearances, it does not parallel downtown streets. Today, Lemon Taborn’s location at Tarboro just past Vance Street is close to today’s Wesley Shelter, Wilson County’s domestic violence and sexual assault agency.

Dr. Woodard, root doctor.

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Raleigh News & Observer, 22 June 1913.

Benjamin Woodard was possibly the “negro quack” who created such an uproar among members of the Wilson County Medical Society in 1889. Though his credentials were questioned, and even mocked, in this news brief, in the 1896 edition of Branson’s North Carolina Business Directory, Ben Woodard is listed as the only African-American physician in Wilson County:

Ben Woodard BBD

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In the 1870 census of Black Creek township, Wilson County: farm laborer Benj’n Woodard, 32, wife Harriet, 31, and children Edna, 13, Frederick, 9, and Venah, 6.

In the 1880 census of Black Creek township, Wilson County: farmer, Benjamin Woodard, 42, wife Harriet, 39, children Frederick, 18, Maggie, 15, and Ruth, 10, plus a servant with neuralgia named Merrit Joyner, 23.

In the 1900 census of Black Creek township, Wilson County: “physician (herbal)” Benjamin Woodard, 63, and wife Harriet, 56.

In the 1910 census of Town of Wilson, Wilson County: on Moore Street, living alone, 73 year-old widower Ben Woodard, employed at odd jobs.

Benjamin Woodard died 14 December 1917 in Gardners township, Wilson County. His death certificate notes that he was born in June 1836 to Mary Woodard and Solomon Anders and that he worked as an herb doctor.

New A.M.E.Z. church.

WDT 5 19 1913 new AMEZ church

Wilson Daily Times, 19 May 1913.

St john dedication

Wilson Daily Times, 8 November 1917.

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Saint John African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, November 2015.

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Rev. Bryant Pugh Coward, here.

Lee A. Moore was one of the earliest agents of North Carolina Mutual and Provident Association (later, Insurance Company). Moore was born about 1863 in Black Creek township, Wilson County, to Lawrence and Vinnie Moore. He died in Wilson in 1948.

Cemeteries, no. 1: the Hilliard Ellis family.

Hilliard Ellis, born in slavery, was a successful farmer and landowner in Wilson township. He married Fereby Rountree circa 1848 and registered their 18-year cohabitation in Wilson County on 11 August 1866. As culled from census, marriage and death records, their children included: Louisa Ellis Rowe (1850-1924), Adeline Ellis Mitchell (circa 1853-??), Caroline “Carrie” Ellis Coleman Woodard (1854-1914); William Ellis (1856); George Ellis (1859-1941); Emma Ellis Bunn (1861-1937); Hilliard D. Ellis (1865-1924); Mary Anne Ellis(1866-??); Warren Ellis (1869-??); Phillis Ellis Barnes Hagans (1870-??); and Millie Ellis Smith Hunt (1874-??).

The Hilliard Ellis family cemetery is located just off Nash Street in the New Hope area, which is now within the extreme northwest limits of the city of Wilson. There are approximately 25 identifiable graves in the cemetery, including those of Ellis and his children Hilliard Ellis Jr., Carrie Coleman, Louisa Rowe, and Warren Ellis Jr.

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Hilliard I. Ellis, 6 Jan 1825-22 Sept 1900.

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Louisa Rowe, 1850-7 May 1924.

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Photos by Lisa Y. Henderson.

Write me that my title is good.

Wilson N.C.

Sept. the 5th, 1867

Maj. Compton,

Sir:

I proceed to address you on a particular subject, simply for your instruction.

There was a white woman living in my neighbourhood previous to, and during the rebellion.  She had a child (boy) that was colored, the woman was consumptive, therefore was aware that she could not live long.  This boy had been living with me two or three years, with so much satisfactory to himself, and mother, that she and he insisted, that she should give, and I accept the boy’s indentures in writing till he was twenty one years of age, which was done in ’61.  In ’63 the mother died.  The boy staied with me very well contented until sometime last winter.  He had been telling me sometime before he left, that some people (mostly of which were colored) were persuading him to leave, that he was free &c.  He appeared to be mad because they would tell him to leave, but he finally heeded their instruction.  I was good to the boy, and he seemed to be well contented as long as he stayed with me.  I took a good deal of pains in trying to teach him to conduct himself properly, which he done as long as he stayed.

I heard of him a few days ago in Johnston County, he was at court.  I suppose he is doing nothing, by the way I heard he looked.  I have deferred going after him until I heard from you, thinking, that if you should write me, that my title was good, I could tell him so, that he would not be running off any more.  The boy is between 17 & 18 years of age.

Please let hear from you concerning the above soon.

Yours verry respectfully                          E.G. Barnes

——

26 year-old student Elias G. Barnes, son of Burthany Barnes, is listed in household #297, Kirby’s District, in the 1860 federal census of Wilson County.  At #305 appears 42 year-old white farm laborer Elizabeth Taylor with her five children, Abia, 18, Bryant, 14, Jackson, 12, Kinchen, 10, and McDaniel, 7. Three were mulatto.  The boy referred to in E.G. Barnes’ letter may have been Elizabeth’s son Kinchen.

Records of Assistant Commissioner of the State of North Carolina; Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands; Record Group 105, National Archives; Freedmen Bureau Records of Field Offices, 1863-1878 [database on-line], Ancestry.com.

The last will and testament of Ephraim Watson.

In the Name of God amen I Ephraim Watson of the County of Johnston in the State of North Carolina being of sound and perfect mind and memory thanks be to almighty God for the same and calling to mind the mortality of my body and the uncertainty of this transitory life

Do make and ordain this my last Will and testament in manner and form following that is to say

I lend to my beloved wife Nanny Watson two hundred and thirty Acres of Land including the plantation whereon I now live bounded by James Watsons, Jesse Sillevents, Jacob Barnes’s and Stephen Watson’s lines and also by the fence of the plantation where I formerly lived which runs a North and South course from the Swamp to the Myrtle Branch continues the course to during her natural life or widowhood and at her second marriage or decease I give the said land and premises unto my son Amos Watson.

I also lend to said wife one Mare with foal the colt I give to to my son Amos if it comes living also two Cows and one feather bed and furniture also one Negro Woman named Becky and one Negro boy named Bobb ten year old hogs four head of sheep also all my household and kitchen furniture, except three feather beds with their furniture, and all my Plantation Tools, which property I lend during the natural life of my sd wife or widow hood as aforesaid and at her decease or marriage I give the above mentioned Negros to my Daughter Patsey and the remainder of the above mentioned property I give to be Equally divided between my Daughter Beady and my son Jesse and my son Amos and my Daughter Patsey

Item I give to my son Stephen Watson one Negro girl named Pheribey and one shot gun

Item I give to my Daughter Priscilia Sillivent one Negro girl named Sarah

Item I give to my Daughter Beady Watson one Negro boy named Jerry one three years old heifer and two head of sheep one feather Bed and furniture

Item I give to my son Jesse Watson one Negro Woman named Hannah my will is that the first living child said Hannah has should belong to my son Amos Watson I also give to my said son Jesse one hundred and fifty three Acres of including the old plantation where I formerly lived it being the remainder of my land one two year old colt one three year old heifer of a red colour no horns two head of sheep and one sow and pigs and one feather Bed and furniture

Item I give to my son Amos Watson one four year old heifer and one yearling two head of sheep one feather Bed and furniture one sow and Pigs

Item I give to my Daughter Patsey Watson one Cow one three year old Heifer and one two year old steer

Item I give to my grand son Willis Watson twenty dollars and one cow which Stephen Watson has now in stock

Item I leave one Bay Horse to be sold to the highest bidder and the value thereof to be equally Divided amongs all my living Children

Item I give to my two sons Jesse and Amos one pair of Mill Stones

And all the remainder of my property which I have not above mentioned I Desire should be Equally divided amongst all my Children that is living at this time

And I do hereby Constitute and appoint my trusty friends Henry Sasser and my Son Stephen Watson Executors to this my last Will and Testament hereby revoking disanuling and making voyed all former Wills and requests by me made and declaring this only to be my last will and testament in witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal this 25th day of December in the year of our Lord 1815      Ephraim (his mark “G”) Watson {Seal}

Signed Sealed in presents of us James (X) Watson, Amos Watson, Tobias (X) Watson

——

Ephraim Watson’s land was in what is now southwestern Wilson County.

North Carolina, Wills and Probate Records, 1665-1998 [database on-line], Ancestry.com.