HERTFORD COUNTY IN 1830
Names and Locations of Her Postoffices With Sketches of Her Postmasters --
Many Well Known Names.
[For the Patron and Gleaner.]
In 1830 Andrew Jackson was President of the United States, having defeated John Quincy Adams in 1828,
and William T. Barry of Kentucky was his Postmaster General.
As you have already published, there were at that time the following five postoffices in Hertford county,
to wit: Ahoskey Ridge, Bethel, Murfreesboro, Pitch Landing and Winton, the latter place being then as now the county seat.
It is said that the P. O. then known as Ahoskey Ridge, was at the home of Dr. G. C. Moore so long and so favorably known
in all of the eastern country. Afterwards it was known as Mulberry Grove, and later on, it was moved to St. John's which name
it still bears. Of the postmasters at Ahoskey Ridge I have been unable to get any information. The venerable W. W. Mitchell,
now nearly ninety years old, could probably give me the data wished for, but unfortunately, at this writing,
he is approaching the end of life and it is impossible to gather up the historical facts that might be interesting to some of
your readers. The postmaster's name was Samuel Eure and no doubt there are many of his descendants living in that portion of the county.
Murfreesboro was then the most important town in the county, and its citizens would no doubt claim the same distinction for it now,
a claim I have no inclination to dispute. The P. M. of Murfreesboro in 1830 was John Wheeler, and for aught that I know to the contrary,
He was P. M. in 1832, the date of his death. His will, which is of record, was dated July 13, 1832, and probated at August term of the
county court the same year. So it would seem that his will was executed just a few days previous to his death.
The Wheeler family is well known in this part of the State -indeed it may well be said that it is known not only in North Carolina but in
many parts of the Union. John Wheeler left surviving him three sons -John H. Wheeler, the North Carolina historian, was the oldest and
deserves to be kindly remembered by the people of the State for his laudable efforts to preserve and record the history of his native State.
Having served his State in public office and by his historical writings, he removed to Washington City and died there, I think,
soon after the late war. He married well and gave a son each to the United States and the Confederate States, both of whom,
if my memory serves me right, survived the issue of that unfortunate unpleasantness.
Dr. Samuel Jordan Wheeler, the second son, was well known and is still remembered as the clerk of the Chowan Baptist Association
for a long term of years and was himself a pleasant and graceful writer. Some time in the fifties he published in the Murfreesboro Gazette
a series of sketches that he was pleased to call, "Murfreesboro and its Environs." They were well written and contained much valuable
information of men and matters in this county in the long ago. Besides those he wrote many article for the religious and secular
presses that were very readable and instructive. His only son, a young man of brillant parts and a ready writer, came home from Columbian College, D. C.,
in the early days of 1861, when the war fever was hot, joined a company of infantry in this county and in a short time died of fever at Ocracocke and was
brought back to Murfreesboro for burial. Dr. Wheeler had two accomplished daughters, one of whom is the wife of Col. D. Worthington, now of Wilson.
I think Dr. Wheeler died in Bertie county, where both of his daughters, a few years after the war.
Junius Wheeler, the youngest son of the 1830 P. M., went to Mexico as a mere stripling -where Scott and Taylor were making fame-
bore himself gallantly in the fore front of battle and won a fine reputation. After the Mexican war closed, my impression is that he was given an appointment
at West Point, of which military school he was, during the Civil war either the commandant or professor. At the time of his death,
it seems to me, that he was by rank a Colonel in the regular army.
Mrs. Julia Monroe Moore, for long years the wife of Dr. G. C. Moore and a woman universally loved and respected,
was a daughter of John Wheeler and left surviving her several sons and at least two daughters.
Major Jno. Wheeler Moore, the N. C. historian, whose services have been as valuable in the same channels as those of his uncle, John H. Wheeler,
still lives in Hertford county. Mrs. Moore's daughters, one of whom married Dr. R. T. Weaver, of Rich Square, and the other the wife of Samuel J. Calvert,
of Jackson, N. C., are both living.
Winton, pleasantly situated on the south bank of Chowan river, has been bravely struggling since 1865 to repair the damages inflicted by a fire in 1862.
The torch applied by the Federal troops left but one house standing. The courthouse was burred and with it nearly all the county records.
In 1830 no hostile fleet had ploughed the noble Chowan, and if such a thing as a bombardment of Winton had been suggested, the author of it would have been
at once voted a crazy man and confined in the county jail. At that time the people of North Carolina had not ever dreamed of an insane asylum.
James Pruden was the P. M. at Winton, and it is reasonable to suppose that his duties were not very onerous. There were no registered letters, postal notes
or money orders to demand his attention. He was at one time, for a number of years, the clerk of the Superior Court of this county. He married Miss Martha Boyette,
the sister of Mrs. Albert G. Vann, who was th[e] mother with other worthy sons and daughters, of Rev. R. T. Vann, of Scotland Neck. Seduced by the cry,
"go west, young man, go west," he moved bag and baggage -wife, children and slaves to Fayette county, Tenn.,
and at an advanced age died there an uncompromising Baptist and Democrat to the last.
There is no longer a P. O. at Pitch Landing but there was one there up to and during the war. The sceptre having departed from the little place on the
Wiccacon Creek, Bethlehem has fallen heir to its glories and now receives Uncle Sam's mails. In 1830 Mr. Watson Lewis, a successful merchant and planter,
a cotemporary of Jno. A. Anderson and Abner Harrell, wrote P. M. after his name at Pitch Landing. He died in 1868 and W. P. Shaw qualified as his administrator.
Lewiston in Bertie county was named for [o]n[e] of his sons who had settled there. He had two sons, one of whom, Dr. John W. Lewis, is dead and the other,
Dr. Daniel W. Lewis, is living in Martin county, N. C. One of his daughters, Mrs. Jane Sharp, is the mother of the wife of Hon. Thos. R. Jernigan.
Another, Mrs. Riddick, of Suffolk, Va., and still another the wife of Hiram P. Harrell of Bertie county. One of Mr. Lewis' wives was the sister of Major W. L. Daniel,
for many years the popular Register of Deeds of Hertford county.
The nice little town of Harrellsville was not known in 1830, but there was a P. O. some where near the present location of Harrellsville known as Bethel, and Jno. G. Wilson
was commissioned postmaster there. Sometime before the war Mr. Wilson went to Murfreesboro and was many years a merchant there, in a brick store. He owned considerable
property at one time but at the time of his death it had very greatly decreased in value. Mr. Wilson died in 1874 and if he left any near relatives in this section I have
been unable to ascertain their names. In his will he remembers a nephew, W. J. Wilson, in the State of Mississippi and a niece who married a man by the name of Butler.
At the proper place I forgot to note that in 1860 Samuel Jordan Wheeler was the P. M. at Murfreesboro and at the outbreak of the war
was holding that place under appointment from Presidence Buchanan in 1857.
There are at this time in the county of Hertford the following postoffices,
but I shall not name the postmasters as we shall soon see a change at many of them
-Agate, Ahoskie, Anneta, Bethlehem, Como, Earlys, Harrellsville, Latta, Mapleton, Menola,
Murfreesboro, Riddicksville, St. Johns Tunis, Union and Winton.
THOS[.] D. BOONE
Winton, N. C., Sept. 1897.
"The Patron and Gleaner", Andrew J. Conner, ed., Rich Square, Northampton County N.C.
Thursday, September 16, 1897 [Vol. 6, No. 37]
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