Confederate statues are coming down all over the country, and the one near me — in Rocky Mount, NC — starts getting moved today. The local newspaper said it will take five days and cost over $280,000. Ironically, the original cost to install the statue, in today’s dollars, was about $275,000. In my book Galvanized:…
Tag: local history
More info for the Indian Hole story from Memory Cards
In my first book, Memory Cards: Portraits from a Rural Journey, I wrote about the three girls who are buried on my parents’ farm, in a small plot near my house. The Winstead sisters, Mamie Harriet, 21; Mary Frances, 18; and Eula Pearl, 9 went swimming in the Tar River during a blistering July heat…
The last public hanging in Nash County 1900
By Michael K. Brantley Two convicted murderers met their fate on the gallows in Nash County’s last public hanging on March 15, 1900. The story of John Henry Taylor and Robert Fortune and the murder of Robert Hester is a tragic one. All that end in capital punishment are. It’s also a story of mistaken…
Gen. Francis Nash and the Formation of Nash County
Nash County was formed out of Edgecombe County — a significant center of wealth and influence in the antebellum era — in 1777. The new county was named for General Francis Nash, one of George Washington’s favorite commanders, who died at the Battle of Germantown (Pa.) on October 4, 1777. Nash was born in Amelia…
That Time Middlesex Tried to Secede from Nash County
By Michael K. Brantley On February 18, 1911, Nash County Representative J.L. Cornwell introduced a bill in the North Carolina General Assembly as “An Act to establish and provide for the organization of the County of Jarvis from the territory of Nash, Wilson, Johnston, Wake and Franklin Counties.” The bill was labeled H.B. 1229 and…