Duplin-Newhanover-Onslow County NcArchives Biographies.....Edwards, Jacob J. ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/nc/ncfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Bill Gibson bgibson@uncfsu.edu September 24, 2006, 7:35 pm Author: Bill Gibson, II "A Brief History of the Jacob J. Edwards Family" “The schooner Katie Edwards, a regular visitor at this port, being on the line between this city and Onslow county, was sunk in Bear Inlet, at Brown Sound, between Swansboro and New River, on Wednesday night last. She was loaded with turpentine.” Reported in the Wilmington Morning Star, May 15, 1883. --- Elizabeth P. Sheffield was the daughter of Lincoln Sheffield of Duplin County, NC. She married Jacob J. Edwards and they came to live in Wilmington, NC. In March of 1869, Jacob Edwards partnered with Benjamin Franklin Hall in a wholesale grocery and commissions business. The company was called “Edwards and Hall.” At one point, the company of “Edwards and Hall” had four “corn cracker” schooners that they used for coastal trading between Wilmington and Onslow County. One of these was the “Katie Edwards”, which had been named after Jacob J. Edwards’ oldest daughter. These ships carried produce, turpentine and other goods up and down the coast. The business prospered, surviving the “panic” of the early 1870s. About 1874, Jacob J. Edwards decided to open an extension of Edwards and Hall in Onslow County, at Tar Landing, near Jacksonville, NC. He also decided to attend to the “day to day” operations of the Tar Landing location, leaving B. F. Hall and Oscar Pearsall to oversee the Wilmington trade. His extension of credit to the post-Civil War poor of the region, jeopardized the profitability of the company. At the time of his death, the Onslow operation was about $4,000 in debt. Jacob Edwards attended the 1876 World Exposition in Philadelphia, PA. Upon returning to North Carolina, he became ill with Typhoid and, within two weeks, died leaving his wife and five minor children. Upon the dissolution of the Edwards and Hall business, $30,000 was provided to the widow and her children. B. F. Hall aided her in purchasing a small, but comfortable, home in Kenansville, NC. But, Elizabeth was in poor health and within a couple of years she followed her husband in death, dying of “Consumption.” Consumption being the illness we now call tuberculosis. The youngest child of Jacob and Elizabeth was James Conway Hiden Edwards. James Conway Hiden was a Baptist minister who had come to the Wilmington, NC area from Virginia after the War. It is this Elder J. C. Hiden, that performed the marriage of Jesse Wilder and Fannie D. Ellis in 1871. A couple of years after her mother’s death, Katy Edwards also died of Consumption. Upon suggestion, B. F. Hall sent the remaining children to California, in hopes that their health would improve. James Zwinglius died a few years after arriving in California. Jacob Ella “Jakie” Edwards apparently married, had children, and then died young. J. C. Hiden Edwards married Muriel Annie Wimple, the daughter of Emmett L. Wimple, a doctor. Hiden and Muriel Edwards had two sons, Sheffield, born 12 June 1902, and Emmett, born in 1905. Hiden’s profession was listed as “attorney at law” at the time of the 1910 Census. Hiden died in 1916, his son Sheffield being about 14 years old at the time. Muriel Edwards was an extremely competent provider, teaching, selling real estate & insurance, overseeing an 18,000 acre community farm in the Santa Ynez, CA area and eventually earning a Masters Degree in Education. At one point, while Sheffield was stationed on Oahu, HI, she came to visit and taught the children of officers aboard Post. Sheffield Edwards was accepted to West Point and graduated in 1923. He had a successful military career in the US Army. While still in the Army, Sheff Edwards, was outsourced to the CIA. At the height of the Cold War, Sheffield Edwards became the Chief of Security of the CIA. As Chief of Security, Sheff Edwards instituted an assassination plot to kill Fidel Castro. He provided a subordinate with a box of Castro’s favorite cigars. The cigars were tainted with a highly contagious form of botulism, which it was said that Castro would not have needed to smoke them to become infected. Because of the defeat of US backed forces at the Bay of Pigs, this assassination attempt was abandoned. Sheffield Edwards was also linked to a plot to kill Castro using Mafia contacts. It was also reported that he attempted to mislead Robert F. Kennedy, by implying that all assassination plots had been dropped by the CIA. Sheffield Edwards died in 1975 in Leesburg, Virginia. Additional Comments: I have no direct family ties to the Edwards family. However, those involved in the turpentine trade in the Wilmington area, of that era, were such a close knit group that it would be impossible to tell the story without weaving in their friends, family and co-workers. My research started with a distant uncle, Stephen H. Morton, originally from Swansboro, in Onslow County, who partnered with his brother-in-law, Jesse Wilder, in the turpentine trade. S. H. Morton later partnered with Benjamin Franklin Hall in the same type of business, calling the company, "Morton and Hall". After the death of S.H. Morton in 1886, the business was managed by George L. Morton, his son, and eventually dissolved amicably in 1890, becoming the "Geo. L. Morton, Company". B. Frank Hall had also partnered with Jacob J. Edwards in a wholesale grocery and commissions business, which ran schooners back and forth between Wilmington and Onslow County, NC. After Jacob Edward's death in 1876, B. F. Hall had made Oscar Pearsall a partner, and the business became "Hall and Pearsall". A few weeks ago while visiting the North Carolina Room of the New Hanover County Library in downtown Wilmington, I was fortunate enough to strike up a conversation with Beverly Tetterton, History Librarian. I happened to mention "Jesse Wilder", and she said, "Oh, you might be interested in this," pulling out two thick manila folders. I found that she was the chairperson of a committee which had done much research and was planning on reissuing a historical plaque for the "Wilder-Bulluck" House located in Wilmington. The following list of ownership of the "Wilder-Bulluck" house came totally from the research of the committee headed by Beverly Tetterton: Jacob J. Edwards sold the house to Jesse Wilder; Jesse Wilder sold the home to Oscar Pearsall; and, Oscar Pearsall sold the dwelling to George L. Morton. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/nc/duplin/bios/edwards12gbs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/ncfiles/ File size: 7.0 Kb