Savannah Tribune, 19 August 1893.
Wilson-born Daniel C. Suggs was captain and catcher for the Georgia State Industrial Institute’s professors’ baseball team in this exhibition game played at Savannah’s Bolton Street Park. Located between Bolton Street and Park Avenue east of the railroad tracks running parallel to East Broad Street, this ballpark was home to Savannah’s professional baseball clubs between 1885 and 1909.
I showed you here a baseball diamond in Daniel Hill discovered in a 1940 aerial photograph of Wilson. Within a few hundred yards of the Sallie Barbour School, just below Cemetery Street, here’s another captured the same year. Home plate appears to be at the lower right corner, and a well-worn path cuts across center and left field.
Look just above the diamond. That mottled wedge. Is that a cemetery?
Here’s another look, with an adjacent area also highlighted. Are these what was left of Oakdale Cemetery right before the city moved its graves to Rest Haven in 1941?
A contemporaneous news article refers to “dozens” of graves being moved, which always struck me as a low count for a 12-acre cemetery that had opened in 1896. However, maybe the site was not popular with families, especially once Rountree (1897 and 1906), Masonic (1900), Odd Fellows (1908), and Vick cemeteries (1913) were established. There’s also mention that the city had condemned Oakdale cemetery’s land in order to “build several roads through it.” Had the city sold off the condemned land? Certainly, it quickly filled with housing. I’ll do some sleuthing next time I’m in Wilson.
Wilson_CSP_6B_12, U.S.D.A. Photograph Collection, State Archives of North Carolina. Big thanks to R.L. for pointing out this wedge of land.
Winston-Salem (N.C.) Sentinel, 15 October 1923.
Claims of ages of one hundred or more raise my eyebrow. They are unreliable enough to warrant cross-checking with other sources.
Tracing Haywood Sauls proved an unexpected challenge. Available records reveal more than one man named Haywood Sauls in the area.
Lee H. Sauls claimed Haywood was born 17 February 1821 according to family records. (Do those records still exist???) Lee Sauls’ grandfather Etheldred Sauls (1801-1859) lived in the Nahunta area of northeastern Wayne County, but had close ties just across the county line in Black Creek township. Etheldred Sauls executed a will and died in 1859. The will named 19 enslaved people, including Haywood, whose age was not listed. Haywood was allotted to Etheldred’s son Lawrence J. Sauls for the benefit of daughter Elizabeth Sauls Becton.
On 29 August 1866, formerly enslaved Haywood Sauls and Fannie Newsome registered their four-year cohabitation in Wayne County, North Carolina. Another Haywood Sauls registered a 40-year cohabitation with Lidia Sherrard in the same county on 2 September 1866.
In 1868, James P. Hooks, son of Solomon and Sarah Hooks, married Mariah Sauls, daughter of Hawood and Silvey Sauls, in Wayne County. James P. Hooks changed his name to Patrick Sherrod by the 1870 census. He, Mariah, and a child lived next door to “Howard,” 80, and Lindy Sauls, 65, in Goldsboro, Wayne County, that year. I believe Howard and Lindy are the Haywood and Lidia who married in September 1866. By 1880, Howard/Haywood apparently was deceased, but Sidney Sauls is listed with Patrick and Maria Sherrod. Celia Williams may have been another of this Haywood. She died 20 November 1913 in Township #13, Edgecombe County. Per her death certificate, she was born 20 November 1851 in Wayne County to Hawood Sauls and Sidney Sherod. This Haywood Sauls does not appear to be the man referred to in the article.
In 1874, Haywood Sauls and his wife Fannie were named among the heirs of his father-in-law Elijah Cox.
In the 1880 census of Wilson township, Wilson County: wagon driver Haywood Sauls, 46, and wife Fannie, 56.
Fannie apparently died 1880-1890 and, on 12 April 1890, Haywood Sauls and Lishia Yelverton were married in Wayne County.
Lishia died soon after and, on 23 May 1893, Haywood Sauls, 50, of Black Creek township, and Bettie Saunders, 45, were married at Haywood Sauls’ residence in Black Creek.
In the 1900 census of Fremont, Nahunta township, Wayne County: farmer Haywood Sauls, 66; wife Bettie, 53; and daughter Delber, 15.
In the 1910 census of Black Creek township, Wilson County: farmer Haywood Sauls, 74, and wife Betsey, 60.
In May 1912, Betsey Sauls executed a will leaving her property to her husband Haywood Sauls and son Frank Sanders. [Betsey Sauls had received a significant settlement in a tort suit a few years prior. More about this later.]
Bettie/Betsey Sauls died within months, and her husband quickly remarried. On 5 September 1912, Haywood Sauls, 77, of Wayne County, married Frances Davis, 40, of Wayne County, in Fremont, Nahunta township, Wayne County.
In the 1920 census of Buck Swamp township, Wayne County, N.C.: farmer Marcellus Sauls, 53; wife Fannie, 46; and father Haywood, 83, widower. [Marcellus Sauls died 19 December 1937 in Cross Roads township, Wilson County. Per his death certificate, he was 70 years old
Over the next few years, a few human-interest articles appeared in North Carolina newspapers noting Haywood Sauls’ great age and revealing his penchant for baseball and the Tobs. One mentions Sauls selling photographs of himself at the 1923 Wilson County fair. (Do any survive??)
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 11 October 1923.
Wilson Mirror, 21 October 1924.
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 27 April 1925.
Greensboro (N.C.) Daily News, 29 April 1925.
Heywood Sauls died 8 January 1927 in the Wilson County Home, Wilson township, Wilson County. Per his death certificate, he was 101 years old; was a widower; and was buried in Wilson County.
Sauls’ death certificate places his birth in 1825, a few years after the February 1821 claim. However, census and marriage records indicate a birth year between 1834 and 1843, averaging 1836. This would have made Haywood Sauls actually about 90 when he died in early 1927, still an extraordinary age for a man who’d grown to adulthood in slavery.
Wilson Daily Times, 15 July 1949.
Though their longtime leader Ben Mincey was nearing death, the Wilson colored volunteer company, better known as the Red Hots, won top honors at the North Carolina colored fire association’s annual contest, securing silver belt.
The company:
The hose reel team:
The spectators:
Journal and Guide (Norfolk, Va.), 13 April 1935.
Rocky Mount native and Negro League great Buck Leonard brought the legendary Homestead Grays to Wilson for spring training in 1935.
During Black History Month two years ago, when they were still playing near Zebulon, North Carolina, as the Carolina Mudcats, the Wilson Warbirds highlighted throwback jerseys honoring the Raleigh Grays, a semi-pro Negro League team.
The Grays and the Raleigh Tigers, who played from the mid-1940s to early 1960s, had a Wilson connection — Johnie Brewington, who briefly managed both teams.
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 23 July 1941.
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 15 May 1946.
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 4 June 1946.
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 20 June 1946.
When necessary, Brewington stepped behind the plate to play catcher.
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 10 September 1946.
——
In the 1920 census of South Clinton township, Sampson County, N.C.: farmer Cnelus Brewington, 36; wife Emma, 26, retail grocery merchant; and children Norward, 22, Mabel, 6, and John, 3.
In the 1930 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 912 East Nash, rented for $24/month, Frank Williams, 50, building mechanic; wife Emma, 36, public school teacher; and stepchildren Norwood, 21, odd jobs laborer, Mabel, 16, and Johnie Brewington, 14.
In the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 309 Elba Street, rented for $20/month, widow Emma Williams, 45, public school teacher; daughter Mable Brewington, 25, public school teacher; son Johnie Brewington, 24, new worker; and lodgers Walter Holmes, 35, veneer factory laborer, and Alice Bryant, 33, household servant.
In 1940, Johnie Marion Brewington registered for the World War II draft in Wilson. Per his registration card, he was born 3 February 1916 in Clinton, N.C.; lived at 309 Elba Street, Wilson; worked for Imperial Tobacco Company, Wilson; and his contact was mother Emma Williams.
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 23 July 1941.
Even as he managed the Grays, Brewington played football at North Carolina College (now North Carolina Central University.)
News and Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 4 October 1941.
Johnnie Brewington enlisted in the United States Army on 26 January 1942 in Daytona Beach, Florida, and was discharged 4 August 1945, having achieved the rank of first sergeant in Company A, 184th Engineer Combat Battalion.
In the 1950 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 411 North Vick, John E. Dixon, 38, science teacher in city school; wife Mable E., 33, elementary educator in county school; sons John E. II, 6, and Levie, 4; mother-in-law Emma B. Williams, 50; and brother-in-law Johnie M. Brewington, 31.
Johnie Marion Brewington died 20 November 1964 at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Durham, N.C. Per his death certificate, he was born 3 February 1916 in North Carolina to Neal Brewington and Emma Moore; was never married; lived at 411 North Vick Street, Wilson; and was a merchant (“general work & sports”); was a World War II veteran; and was buried in Rest Haven cemetery. Emma Williams was informant.
A recent Facebook post by Wilson’s new Minor League baseball team, the Warbirds, reminded me of the city’s deep black baseball roots. Check out the links below.
homestead-grays-at-spring-camp
pop-eye-leonard-and-the-wilson-braves
homestead-grays-play-the-new-york-black-yankees-in-wilson
elm-city-negro-giants-were-not-boasting-but-we-believe-were-the-best
Chicago Defender, 29 December 1928.
The “Wilson school” was, of course, renamed C.H. Darden High School ten years later.
Journal and Guide (Norfolk, Va.), 23 November 1940.
Kinston Atkins High football players staged a mock funeral for the Darden Trojans ahead of Atkins’ 1940 homecoming game, but got the socks beat off ’em.
