Civil War, Maternal Kin, North Carolina, Other Documents

I will henceforth faithfully support, protect and defend.

The war is over. The Union has won. There is nothing to do but accept it and move on. Two months after the Surrender, his enslaved son now free, John W. McNeely swore his allegiance to the United States.Half-way across the country, in Iron County, Missouri, William B. McNeely had not waited for the war to end and beat his brother to the punch by nine months.

[Sidenote: Compare the W, M and N in John and William’s signatures. They clearly learned to write from the same instructor.]

Oath of Allegiance. Union Provost Marshals’ File of Papers Relating to Individual Claims, National Archives and Records Administration.

Maternal Kin, Newspaper Articles, North Carolina

Uncle Julius gets bamboozled.

MILL BRIDGE, April 5.

Mr. Editor: — One day last week a well dressed gentleman of color, wearing a flashy, gold looking watch chain, with checks on the First National Bank of New York for $2500, put in his appearance at the house of Julius McNeely, one of our most trustworthy, hard-working darkies. Jule being of a hospitable nature did what he could to make his visitor comfortable. The said gentleman of color represented himself as Mr. Ed. Brown, a relative of Margaret (Jule’s wife), having left this country twenty-three years ago, that he had been in the U.S. Army and Navy, traveled over the world, made plenty of money and was now traveling in the interest of the Western Colored Emigration Society; he gave glorious descriptions of California and offered to furnish transportation free to all who would go with him to the land of milk and honey. Jule and Margaret listened with delight to the many wonderful stories he told of the outside world, and on last Friday morning prepared his breakfast and went to the field to work, leaving him reposing in bed. When lo! Upon returning they found he had skipped, taking with him Jule’s new double-barrel breach-loading shot gun that cost $25, a gold ring belonging to the school marm, worth $10, 50 cents in wash and a pint of Jule’s medicinal whiskey. He made his way to Cleveland, bought a ticket to Statesville with the stolen half dollar and boarded the 12 o’clock train with the gun and ring. Julius is sorrowing, and offers to pay $10 or any amount above that he can raise to anybody who will “cotch dat nigger devil.”

Said negro is of small stature, copper or ginger cake colored with a broad scar on the left side of his neck, a black spot on the upper part of his nose between his eyes and a mole on one of his cheeks. He is between 38 and 40 years of age and his hair is slightly mixed with gray. He was raised at Davidson College and came in the possession of Mrs. Kate Barnes, Dr. Kerr’s niece. He ran away from Charlotte, where his mother now lives, for stealing, and had been staying about Salisbury with Wylie Dodge and Harriet Brown previous to his coming out here. He left this neighborhood in 1866, at which time he was in the employ of a writer. He stole a gold watch from Mrs. Ray and sold it to William Stockton, of Salisbury. The watch was recovered, but Ed. Was not heard of since until he turned up at Julius McNeely’s, last week. He is a professional rogue, and the local papers will please hand him around. J.T. RAY.

The Carolina Watchman, Statesville, 11 April 1889.

Enslaved People, Maternal Kin, North Carolina

Juda’s children.

As noted earlier, Elizabeth Kilpatrick’s will seems to establish that Juda, an enslaved woman born perhaps in the 1790s, was the mother of at least two children, the Dave and Lucinda specifically referred to in Kilpatrick’s will. Under its terms, Dave’s ownership passed to son Robert Kilpatrick and Lucinda’s to daughter Mary Kilpatrick. Elizabeth’s estate file shows that her administrator sold Negroes Juda ($50.00), Matthew ($425.00) and John ($200.00) on 29 August 1829 and “Negro Kesy” for $74.75 on 30 October 1830. (Their buyers are not listed.) Assuming that Kesy, Matthew and John are the “children not disposed of” in the will, Juda was the mother of at least five children. Only Lucinda can be further accounted for.

In 1834, Mary Kilpatrick sold Lucinda and her children Alice, 3, and John, 1, to Samuel and John W. McNeely. John disappears from the record. However, Alice, known as “Allie,” bore at least one son, Joseph Archy, and probably several other children, including Alexander, Stanhope and Mary. All – save Alice, who perhaps had died – appear in J.W. McNeely’s Confederate tax assessment in 1863.

Lucinda herself gave birth to two more sons, Julius, about 1838, and Henry W., in 1841. Julius’ father is unknown, but appears to have been a black man. Henry’s father was John Wilson McNeely himself.

Maternal Kin, Newspaper Articles, North Carolina, Politics

The friends of prohibition.

Mt. Ulla.

A meeting of the friends of prohibition was held at Wood Grove, Mt. Ulla Township, on the 4^th instant. W.L. Kistler. Esq., was called to the chair and Rev. J. G. Murray, col. was elected secretary. The object of the meeting was explained by Dr. S.W. Eaton. The following resolution was offered by J.T. Ray and unanimously adopted after appropriate remarks from Rev. J.G. Murray and other.

Whereas, In consideration of the evil of Intemperance, caused by the sale and use of intoxicating liquors upon society, which promotes crime and other known vices, and thereby increasing taxation upon the citizens for the suppression, and also entailing injury in some or other upon all classes and conditions of our fellow men, Therefore

Resolved, That we do hereby heartily approve of the action of our County Commissioners in refusing to grant license for the retailing of intoxicating liquors to be used as a beverage in Rowan County.

Upon motion the chairman and secretary were requested to appoint a committee for permanent organization to meet on Saturday the 11^th inst., at 3 o’clock, P.M.

The committee for permanent organization are as follows: White – S.A. Lowrance, D.M. Barrier, J.C. Gillespie, J.T. Ray, J.K. Goodman, S.C. Rankin, S.F. Cowan, J.M. Harrison, M.A. File, R. Lyerly, J.K. Graham, Esq. Colered – W.W. Kilpatrick, Ransom Miller, Henry McNeely, Andy Gillespie, Amos Foster, George Miller, R.A. Kerr, James Rankin, Julius McNeely, Silas Gillespie, Gabriel Kerr.

Upon motion the meeting adjourned to meet on Saturday the 11^th inst., at 3 o’clock, P.M. W.L. KISTLER, Ch’m. J.G. MURRAY, Sec.

The Carolina Watchman, Salisbury NC, 9 June 1881.

Wood Grove, Rowan County, Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

——

Henry McNeely and his half-brother Julius McNeely were joined on the committee by Henry’s brother-in-law George Miller and his wife Martha’s brother-in-law Ransom Miller.

Civil War, Maternal Kin, North Carolina, Other Documents, Rights

The first registration.

Rowan County, North Carolina, 1866. The war is over. The 14th and 15th Amendments have not yet passed, but the county’s hopeful freedmen have come out en masse to register to vote, perhaps under the auspices of the Freedmen’s Bureau. Among them, my great-great-grandfather Henry W. McNeely, his half-brother Julius McNeely, and his future in-laws Ransom, George and Green Miller. Henry’s father John W. McNeely, Confederate allegiance renounced and U.S. citizenship restored, was also there — his world upside down.

Enslaved People, Maternal Kin, North Carolina, Oral History

Henry W. McNeely.

My grandmother said he looked a bit like a poet. Or so she was told:

See, I never did know Grandpa Henry. I didn’t know him. He died just as Louise was born. Mama had just had Louise, and it was real hot and all, and they told her she couldn’t go to the funeral because it was so warm and she would take cold. But I didn’t know him.

And:

Mama said he looked just like Walt Whitman. You know, he was, his father was white. I don’t know who his mother was. I don’t know if she was mulatto or what. But anyway, he was really light. And he lived on the same farm as his daddy. And he provided him, he provided for him as if he was his own child.

White child, that is.

Henry W. McNeely was 22 years old the year his father reported to the tax assessor that he was worth $1500. The tax list is his first named appearance in the record, and documentation of his life is relatively scarce thereafter. He registered to vote in Rowan County in 1868 and appears in his mother’s household in Atwell township, Rowan County, in the 1870 census. (He was described as a schoolteacher. Had his father taught him to read while he was enslaved? Or was he a quick learner in a Reconstruction school?) In 1872, he married 18 year-old Martha Miller and, in a daring gesture, named Wilson McNeely as his father on the license. The register of deeds did not blink and dutifully noted that all parties, except Wilson, were colored.

[Sidenote: “Louise” was Mary Louise Colvert Renwick, my grandmother’s sister, born in 1906. — LYH]

——

Civil War, Enslaved People, Maternal Kin, North Carolina, Other Documents

Total value: $7,600.

Rowan County, North Carolina, 1863. The Civil War is dragging on, and the Rebs need money. In 1861, the Congress of the Confederate States of America had passed a statute authorizing a tax (at 50 cents per $100 valuation) to help finance the war effort. Taxable property included real estate, slaves, merchandise, stocks, securities, and money, and later agricultural products and anything else they could think of. In the 1863 assessment, for the first time, the North Carolina General Assembly required taxpayers to list their slaves by name. Assessments for only eight counties survive. Rowan is one of them.

Look in the bottom left corner. J.W. McNeely identified his seven slaves for the tax assessor, who duly recorded: Lucinda, age 47, value $750. Julius, 25, $1500. Henry, 22, $1500. Archy, 14, $1200. Mary, 13, $1000. Stanhope, 11, $900. And Sandy, 12, $950. Total valuation of Lucinda, her sons, and grandchildren: $7600. Remember Alice, the 3 year-old that Sam and J.W. McNeely bought with Lucinda? She was Archy’s mother, and Mary, Stanhope and Sandy were probably her children, too. Alice herself is gone — dead or sold — and John is not listed, though that seems to be oversight. Julius was born a few years after the McNeelys purchased his mother. His father is unknown, but was probably an enslaved man on a neighboring farm. Henry, though, was John Wilson McNeely’s boy. His only child, in fact. And worth exactly $1500.

Enslaved People, Maternal Kin, North Carolina, Other Documents

How we came to be McNeelys.

Rowan County, North Carolina, 1819. Widow Elizabeth Kilpatrick is close to death. Her daughter Mary is to receive “one feather bed and all my beds clothing of every kind, all my dresser furniture, my chest, one pot, one dutch oven, one pot rack” and “my negro girl named Lucinda.”

Don’t forget Lucinda. She’s my great-great-great-grandmother, and you’ll see her again. And Juda? In paragraph 5? Probably Lucinda’s mother. “All her children (not disposed of)” suggests that Dave, who went to Robert Kilpatrick, and Lucinda, were Juda’s disposed-of children. Who were the others?

Rowan County, North Carolina, 1834. Mary Kilpatrick files a deed for the sale of “one negro woman named Lucinda aged about twenty years one negro child named Alice aged three years and one negro child named John aged between one and two years,” plus a few other sundries to Samuel and John W. McNeely, who are father and son. This is the Lucinda that Mary Kilpatrick inherited from her mother in 1819. Remember John Wilson McNeely. You’ll see him again, too.

Rowan County, North Carolina, 1843. Samuel McNeely‘s will. To his beloved son John W. McNeely, he leaves “a negro woman named Lucinda and all her offspring.” Lucinda, then, may have been the only slave Samuel ever bought, and she returned his investment handsomely.

One of Lucinda’s offspring was Henry W. McNeely, whose father was the very John W. McNeely who owned him. Henry, my grandmother Margaret Colvert Allen‘s maternal grandfather, was born in 1841 in western Rowan County and died in Statesville, North Carolina, in 1906.

Scuffalong: Genealogy.

Tag Archives: Rowan County