Kudos to Samuel Joyner, who has published a volume detailing the “who, where, when” of more than seven generations of his Atkinson, Battle, and Farmer lines. These surnames that will be familiar to African-American Wilson County researchers. This 500+ page book is available via Amazon.com.
In an era in which black high schools were scarce, and schoolbuses even scarcer, many children in rural eastern North Carolina were forced to leave school after about seventh grade. When interest and resources aligned, however, families boarded their teenaged children with relatives or friends in larger towns.
Aurora is a tiny town in Beaufort County near the mouth of the Pamlico River. It is across and more than 30 miles down river from Washington, the county seat and location of the closest black high school. There was another high school in Pantego, which was closer as the crow flies, but direct travel there involved a ferry ride. Neither option was viable for a daily commute in 1941.
As the brief report below shows, Aurora’s black children dispersed as far as Wilson (90 miles) and Durham (160 miles) to pursue high school educations. Alvina Battle attended Darden High School. She and, apparently, her parents, were Beaufort County natives, so their connection to Wilson is unclear. Certainly, there were closer schools. I assume then, that a close relative had made the move and invited Battle to follow.
Alvina Battle does not appear on a roster of Darden High School graduates.
Journal and Guide (Norfolk, Va.), 4 January 1941.
Clarissa Williams, teacher and principal at Wilson Colored Graded School, died in October 1921. Her niece Mamie Battle Ford, daughter of her maternal half-brother Richard Battle, was issued letters of administration.
North Carolina Wills and Estates, 1665-1998 [database on-line], http://www.ancestry.com.
Williams’ estate consisted of a house and lot (at 605 East Green Street) worth about $3000 and an estimated $100 in personal property. Her heirs at law were her nieces and nephews Mamie Ford, Fanny Battle, Clinton Battle, and Glynn Battle.
The inventory of Williams’ property, prepared in June 1922, included two dressers, two washstands, four bedsteads, six trunks, a table and six chairs, two sewing machines, a writing desk, two stoves, four center tables, a safe, two bowls and pitchers, 11 bed quilts, eight pillows, two feather beds, three sets of springs, and two rockers.
Ford filed her final report on 24 March 1923. The sale of Williams’ personal property had netted what must have been a disappointing $77. Nearly half of that amount went to pay a tax bill and $15.oo went to pay medical bills, including five dollars to Henrietta Colvert for nursing services.
Wilson County, N.C., Property Settlement Records 1923-1931, http://www.familysearch.org.
Ford reported that she was “unable to give the bond for the proceeds of the house and lot sold by the mortgagee” and resigned as administrator. In her stead, the Superior Court appointed E.A. Darden, trust officer for Branch Banking and Trust, as the bank held the mortgage on Clarissa Williams’ house.
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In the 1920 census of Wilson, Wilson County: Clarcy Williams, 50; roomer Curtis Ford, 37, house carpenter; nephew [sic] Mamie Ford, 24; and roomers [sic] Lias L., 4, and Quincey B. Ford, 2.
On 1 January 1914, for $500, Ada G. Battle sold her brother Charles T. Battle a 28′ by 52′ parcel of land on Tarboro Street, “it being the identical lot on which was situated the black-smith shop of [their father] Charles Battle, deceased.”
Deed book 97, page 587, Wilson County Register of Deeds Office, Wilson.
On 9 August 1872, a Wilson County Superior Court judge ordered three year-old Adline Benton bound as an apprentice to Harrett Battle until she reached 21 years of age. She was to be trained as a house servant.
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United States Indenture and Manumission Records, 1780-1939, database at https://familysearch.org.
Wilson Advance, 12 November 1891.
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The 500 block of East Nash Street is justly remembered as the 20th century epicenter of Wilson’s African-American-owned businesses. However, in the late 1800s and early 1900s, Black entrepreneurs and tradespeople also operated across the tracks. As Wilson’s downtown experiences a resurgence, let’s rediscover and celebrate these pioneering men and women.
Check in each Sunday for the latest in the Historic Black Business Series!
Around 1912, Henry Moore and John Battle ran a soft drink shop at 217 South Goldsboro Street.
Photo by Lisa Y. Henderson, December 2024.
Washington Battle‘s death in 1909 was investigated and ruled the result of exposure.
Coroner’s Records, Miscellaneous Records, Wilson County Records, North Carolina State Archives.
On 15 July 1897, Charles and Leah Hargrove Battle sold Jerusha Peace Woodard a lot in Wilson for fifty dollars. The transaction piqued my interest because sales of East Wilson property from African-Americans to white people were unusual during that time. By the 1890s, the east side of the tracks, south of Crowell Street, was developing into a solidly Black residential area as white landowners divided up farms and other large parcels and moved to west of downtown. (See, for example, Anthony Nadal’s estate, Rountree place, and the Singletary subdivision.)
Deed book 45, page 125, Wilson County Register of Deeds, Wilson.
I do not know the precise location of this irregularly-shaped lot, but, for what they’re worth, the metes and bounds offer context clues:
In 1897, Pender Street did not extend south of Nash Street. (Below Nash, it was Stantonsburg Street, then Road.) The Masonic lodge is at the corner of Smith and Pender Streets. At the time, it shared a property line with the lot on which Charles H. Darden’s house stood. This would seem to establish one lot line.
In 1908, Clarissa Taylor Kearney lived a block away from the Masonic lodge at 531 Church Street, but it’s not clear where she was in 1897. Similarly, in 1908, John Boykin lived on Viola Street, near Vick, and Henry Rountree lived on Stantonsburg Road near the city limits, i.e. on the other side of Nash. None of this is very helpful. Sanborn maps do not cover Pender Street until 1908, so no aid from that corner.
