A fitting topic for the last week of Women's History Month is a study of widows' pensions claimed against their husbands service after the end of the Revolutionary War. These pensions contain  first-person testimony that often provide clues about location, circumstances, associates and family.  Source   I want to direct your attention to a fantastic collection that has been curated on the MosaicNC website .  (Mosaic is a digital dublishing venture of the North Carolina Office of Archives and History.) The series of profiles explores several roles filled by women as the men went to war including farmers, nurses, refugees, and family guardians. There are also special focus sections on Free Women of Color and Pension History.  Read the full story:  In Their Own Words: North Carolina's Widows of the American Revolution I was excited to find that the Free Women of Color section includes two women familiar to me through my recent research.  The first is...

It is very fitting to include this previous post in the Wake 250 series. Margaret and her husband"s (William Tryon Colonial Governor of NC colony) very presence and actions were pivotal in the events leading up to the Revolution. I am sure sentiment about them was mixed at the time. March is Womens' History Month! Let's start it off by recognizing the woman of  Wake - Margaret Wake Tryon . She may or may not have been the "Mother of Wake County", but our county was certainly named for her in 1770, by none other than Joel Lane, according to Wikipedia . source Margaret was reported to be a "fine accomplish'd lady" in her day, possessed of skills and interests not usually adopted by women of her era. This description at Wikipedia certainly supports that notion. Wake was described as an "accomplished" and "learned" woman who had a talent for playing the organ and  spinet . [3]  She was known to avoid women's company and prefer...

North Carolina was one of the last colonies to publish local newspapers. The first being established in New Bern in 1751. James Davis of Virginia came to New Bern in 1749 to print currency and official documents. He started the No'th Carolina Gazette  (original name) in 1751 from New Bern and published in various forms until his death in 1785.  The magazine version of Davis' North Carolina Gazette c. 1764 View at NCDigital Mr. Davis' paper was followed shortly by two Wilmington papers. The North Carolina and Weekly Post-boy published by Andrew Steuart from October 1764. Next was the Cape Fear Mercury published by Adam Boyd from October 1769.  Raleigh finally entered the newspaper game  in October 1799  when William Boylan relocated his Fayetteville Minerva to the capital city and rechristened it the Raleigh Minerva . It was joined that same year by the Raleigh Register published by Joseph Gales. Both of these local papers started well after the end of the R...

Imagine living in a time when it took months to know what was happening in your own "little corner of the world" as well as the Colonies at large. North Carolina did not have a dedicated newspaper until 1751. The first local newspaper, the North Carolina Gazette, was published in New Bern roughly weekly.  Imagine going through the chaotic times leading up to the Revolution with no timely account of the world, local or global. Colonists of NC had to wait weeks and sometimes months for updates from England and other colonies. Not knowing the events was difficult, but not seening the rising tide of dissent had to be disconcerting as well.  Events such as the French and Indian War and the Native raids against the western NC settlements that we talked about earlier took a toll on the general morale of the colonists. The punative decrees and regulations yet to come against the colonists as a result of their resistance to the King and his agents added a further layer of divisiveness...