ROWANROOTS-L Archives
Archiver > ROWANROOTS > 2004-06 > 1087249308
From: Myrna Madigan <>
Subject: OSBORNE, NESBIT/NISBET, CHAMBERS, CAMPBELL, CALDWELL
Date: Mon, 14 Jun 2004 16:41:48 -0500
In addressing issues and questions concerning the early Rowan families of:
Alexander Osborne
John Nesbit/Nisbet
Maxwell Chambers
John Campbell
David Caldwell
I believe the families of all the above were in Rowan County by ca. 1750,
intermarried in several instances and continued to do so for several
generations. I would appreciate response from listers, either by post to
the list or email, , relative to what you may know about the
spouses and children of any or all of the above.
Alexander Osborne was probably the father of Col. Adlai Osborne and
possibly of Rebecca Osborne who, about 1770, married Joseph Campbell of the
1805 Rowan will.
Maxwell Chambers was probably the grandfather of the Maxwell Chambers who
wrote a will, in 1854, at Salisbury.
David Caldwell was possibly the father of Judge David F. Caldwell (who
married Rebecca Nesbit) and Salisbury attorney A. H. Caldwell.
John Nesbit was the father of another John Nesbit plus James, William and
David Nesbit.
In addition to various court records, deeds, marriage records, wills of
Rowan County, University of NC Manuscripts Collections and other various
sources not included but regarding these same folks, following are some
gleanings...
From: "Carolina Cradle":
[CAPS are mine]
"JOHN NESBIT (or NISBET) was born in 1705 in either Essex or Middlesex
County, New Jersey. After reaching his majority, he went to Pennsylvania,
probably in the company of ALEXANDER OSBORNE, and settled before March,
1736, on a branch of Pequea Creek in Lancaster County. The Nesbit family
papers record his removal to North Carolina in 1750 although he may have
travelled southward the previous year with his friend Osborne. The
closeness of their association is reflected in the marriage of Nesbit's
son, John, to Mary Osborne, daughter of Alexander."
From: "The Rowan Resolves"
At a meeting of the Committee [of Safety, Rowan County, North Carolina],
August 8, 1774, the following resolves were unanimously agreed to:
[followed by the seventeen resolves]
Signed: [followed by 25 signatures, among whom were]
MAXWELL CHAMBERS
JOHN NESBIT
From: "The James Sprunt Historical Publications, 1917,
Published Under the Direction of The North Carolina Historical
Society"
In part--
By the year 1745 the Scotch-Irish had established themselves in the fertile
and well-watered area between the Yadkin and the Catawba, and previous to
1750 their settlements were scattered throughout the region from Virginia
to Georgia. The Scotch-Irish settled mainly in the country west of the
Yadkin. Among these immigrants were the NESBITs, Allisons, Brandons,
Luckeys, Lockes, McCullochs, Grahams, Cowans, Barrs, McKenzies, Andrews,
OSBORNEs, Sharpes, Boones, MeLauchlins, and Halls. The Scotch-Irish have
ever been known as a religious, brave, and liberty-loving people. Among
other families from the British Isles who appeared in Rowan at an early
date we find the names of Cathey, McCorkle, Morrison, Linville, Davidson,
Reese, Hughes, Ramsay, Brevard, Winslow, Dickey, Braley, Moore, Emerson,
Kerr, Rankin, Torrence, Templeton, Houston, Hackett, Rutherford, Lynn,
Gibson, Frohock, Smith, Bryan, Little, Long, Steele, Bell, Macay, Miller,
Blackburn, Craige, Stokes, CALDWELL, Dunn, Gillespie, and many others.
And--
Despite the fact that no titles to land could be obtained after 1763
settlers continued to move into the Granville tract....
And--
Much discontent arose among the inhabitants, some dreading the expected
reopening of the land offices because of the abuses of the agents, and
others being displeased because they could not obtain title to the lands
improved by their efforts. It was during this time that the Jersey
Settlement on the east side of the Yadkin, some nine miles from Salisbury,
was made by settlers from New Jersey.
And--
[concerning Salisbury]
The town commissioners were authorized to select and lay out a suitable
place for a market and other public buildings. William Steele, John Dunn,
MAXWELL CHAMBERS, John Lewis Beard, Thomas Frohock, William Temple Cole,
Matthew Troy, Peter Rep, James Kerr, Alexander Martin, and Daniel Little
were appointed town commissioners. They were to hold office for life.
And--
The members in the Provincial Congresses were William Kennon (August,
1774), Hugh Montgomery, and Robert Rowan (August, 1775), and DAVID NISBET
(April, 1776).
And--
Before the Revolution, Salisbury was the judicial center of Western North
Carolina... ... the court of pleas and quarter sessions met for the first
time somewhere in the county in June, 1753. The justices who presided over
the courts during the first year were Walter Carruth, Thomas
Lovelatty, James Carter, John Brandon, Alexander Cathey, Thomas Cook,
Thomas Potts, George Smith, Andrew Allison, John Hanby, ALEXANDER OSBORNE,
James Tate, John Brevard, and Squire Boone...
And--
The members of the Assembly and Provincial Congresses from Rowan were as
follows:
ASSEMBLY
1746 (47)-1754. James Carter and John Brandon
1754-1760. John Bravard and James Carter
1760. Hugh Waddell and John Frohock.
1761. John Frohock and ALEXANDER OSBORNE
And--
At the same session [January 1771] the General Assembly recognized the
urgent necessity of setting up new counties within the vast territory
embraced by Rowan. A bill was passed establishing Guilford County and Unity
Parish in the region lying between Salisbury and Hillsboro. Guilford, which
was named for Francis North, Earl of Guilford, and father of Lord North,
Prime Minister of George III during the Revolution, was composed of
territory taken from Rowan and Orange. The portion taken from Rowan was
that which now makes up the counties of Guilford, Rockingham, and
Randolph. John Pryor, Edmund Fanning, Alexander Martin, Matthew Locke,
John Dunn, Griffith Rutherford, and JOHN CAMPBELL were appointed a
committee with authority to run the lines and contract with workmen for the
building of the courthouse, prison, and stocks for Guilford County.
And--
...Thomas Frohock gave bond and qualified as clerk of the court for
Salisbury District. In 1772 ADLAI OSBORNE, of Mecklenburg, was appointed to
this position.
And--
...A typical term was that held in June, 1775, for Rowan, Anson,
Mecklenburg, Tryon, Surry, and
Guilford, the counties which then made up Salisbury District. Judge
Alexander Martin, of Rowan, presided. ADLAI OSBORNE was appointed clerk,
and Benjamin B. Boote took the oath as deputy attorney-general for the
district. William Kennon's name appears in the records as a practicing
lawyer. Many criminal cases were disposed of at this term.....
And--
[concerning the Presbyterian "Dissenters"]
There was a Presbyterian meeting house in eastern Rowan (now Guilford)
before 1768. In that year Adam Mitchel conveyed an acre of land to John
McKnight and William Anderson, "trustees for the Presbyterian congregation
on the waters of North Buffalo." This congregation belonged to the Synod of
New York and Philadelphia. The deed shows that a "meeting house and a
study house" had already been erected. The building designated as a "study
house" was probably a school. The inferior court of Rowan licensed the
North Buffalo meeting house soon afterwards. The church was situated near
the present site of Greensboro. In 1764 the Rev. Henry Pattillo, a
Presbyterian divine who labored in
Orange, established a church called Alamance about seven miles from
Greensboro. These two churches secured as their pastor Dr. DAVID CALDWELL,
a Pennsylvanian by birth, and a graduate of Princeton. In 1766 he married
Rachel, the daughter of the Rev. Alexander Craighead, of Sugar Creek
Church, in Mecklenburg, and settled with his congregations of Buffalo and
Alamance. Caldwell established a school in the neighborhood about
1767. This school obtained the name of the "Log College," and was the
means of training a number of the foremost men of North Carolina. At a
meeting of the Presbytery at Buffalo in March, 1770, DAVID CALDWELL, Hugh
McAden, Joseph Alexander, Henry Pattillo, Hezekiah Balch, and James
Criswell petitioned the Synod of Philadelphia and New York for the
organization of a new presbytery, to be called Orange. Their petition was
granted.
And--
[concerning problems of the Church of England, Episcopalian]
...Mr. Drage's efforts to establish the parish on a legal and permanent
foundation were less fruitful. At an election held Easter Monday, 1770,
the Dissenters, having control of a majority of the votes, elected a
vestry, all of whom were Dissenters and two of whom were elders. The vestry
refused to qualify. The same procedure had been practiced in the preceding
year. The voters declared that "their purpose in voting was not as to who
should compose the vestry, but that there might be none." The members of
the Church of England petitioned for a removal of their incapacity to vote
for want of deeds, but the Assembly did not grant their request. Mr. Drage
considered a petition of the Presbyterians praying that they might be
relieved from paying towards the support of the parish minister and that
their clergy might be permitted to perform marriages by the publication of
banns as "an act directly leveled at the Constitution." In theory he was
right. The mistake, however, was in striving to thrust an established
church upon an unwilling and headstrong people. The contest between Drage
and the Dissenters continued to grow warm. The unfortunate clergyman seems
to have received no salary and to have been dependent upon a few fees and
the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts for his
support. He found friends only in the Lutherans and in Governor Tryon. He
informed Governor Martin, Tryon's successor, that the clerk of court [ADLAI
OSBORNE?] encouraged the people who obtained marriage licenses to have the
rites performed by the magistrates in preference to him, and concealed the
number of licenses granted in order to deprive him of the fees to which the
parish minister was entitled. By February, 1773, the Dissenters succeeded
in expelling Drage by withholding his salary and thereby forcing him to
leave the parish. No other clergyman of the English church appeared in
Rowan before the Revolution.....
[if those licenses are still "concealed", then no wonder I cannot find some
of these marriages!]
And--
[concerning early means of education]
...In 1760, Crowfield Academy was established on the headwaters of Rocky
River, in the bounds of the Centre congregation, about two miles north of
where Davidson College now stands. This was a classical school where many
of the prominent men of Rowan and the near-by counties were
educated. Among them were Colonel ADLAI OSBORNE, the Rev. Samuel Eusebius
McCorkle, Dr. James Hall, and Dr. Ephriam Brevard. About the year 1767 Dr.
DAVID CALDWELL founded his famous classical "Log College" on the headwaters
of North Buffalo, near the present city of Greensboro. In 1773, G"ttfried
Arndt arrived, and for several years instructed the German youth around
Salisbury. The inhabitants of Western North Carolina before the Revolution
were dependent upon the old field schools and a few classical academies,
such as Caldwell's and Crowfield, for their education. Those who were able
often completed their schooling at Nassau Hall (now Princeton University)
under Dr. John Witherspoon."
Thanks for your time and thought!
Myrna Madigan
Tuscola, IL
'hiding out in the weeds and woods
of the wild and windy Illinois prairie"
This thread: