Wake County, NC - Governor Samuel Ashe, 1795-1798

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Remarks of C.F.W. Coker at Ashe Cemetery Dedication

April 16, 1967 LADIES AND GENTLEMEN

It is an especial pleasure for me to be here this beautiful afternoon, 
as a representative of your State Department of Archives and History, 
at the rededication of the grave of one of the foremost men in the 
History of North Carolina and the nation. No words of mine can add or 
detract from the honor which this man earned for himself and his family, 
but it is nonetheless appropriate for us to reacquaint ourselves with 
some of the details of his life.

Samuel Ashe is a man of whom we have no portrait or other likeness. Our 
knowledge of his early life and education is scant. We do know, however, 
that he was born sometime in 1725 in or near Bath Town in Beaufort County, 
the second son of John Baptista Ashe and Elizabeth Swarm Ashe. His father 
was a prominent lawyer and public official in the young colony; and 
through his mother, Samuel was related to Colonel Maurice Moore and to 
Edward Mosely, two of the most influential men in North Carolina.

Samuel Ashe's elder brother, John, served with great distinction in the 
War of the Regulation and in the American Revolution, and he attained 
the rank of major general in the North Carolina Militia.

His sister, Mary, married George Moore, son of "King" Roger Moore of 
New Hanover County.

In 1727, John Baptista Ashe, his wife Elizabeth, and their three small 
children moved from Beaufort County to the region which became New 
Hanover County two years later (and, of course, became Pender County 
still later). The father received grants of land on Rocky Point and 
higher up the North east River, and apparently he was a man of 
considerable means. Mrs. Ashe died in 1730 or 1731, and her husband, a 
few years later, in November, 1734.

For reasons which are not entirely clear, the elder Ashe appears to 
have willed almost all of his considerable estate to his second son, 
Samuel, who was nine years old at the time. He made provision for the 
education of all of his children, however, asking his executors, in 
these words (and I quote): "Let my sons be taught to read and write, 
and be introduced into the practical part of Arithmetick, not too 
hastily hurrying them to Latin and Grammar, but after they are pretty 
well versed in these let them be taught Latin & Greek. I propose that 
this be done in Virginia; After which let them learn French, perhaps 
Some French man at Santee wile undertake this; when they are arrived to 
years of discretion Let them study Mathematicks. To my Sons when they 
arrive at age I recommend the pursuit & Study of some profession or 
business (I could wich one to ye Law, the other to Merchandize). [But 
in any case]. . . Let them follow their own inclinations."

"[Further]. . . I will that my daughter be taught to write and read & 
some femanine accomplishments which may render her agreable; And that 
she be not kept ignorant as to what appertains to a good house wife in 
the management of household affairs."  [End Quote.]

The three orphaned children, John, Samuel, and Mary, were left to the 
care and guidance of their maternal uncle, Samuel Swann, who had 
succeeded his uncle as leader of the populist party, and who served as 
speaker of the General Assembly for twenty-five years.

Of the youth of Samuel Ashe we know almost nothing. Some of his 
biographers state that he received his education in the north; others 
state more specifically that he attended Harvard College. In any event, 
it is apparent from subsequent events that he was trained in the law. 
In an atmosphere of republican (as opposed to royal) sentiment, and 
among kinsmen who had steadily opposed crown prerogratives and 
maintained the liberties of the people, Ashe grew to manhood. One of 
his descendants remembers him as "a man of large frame, strong 
physically as well as intellectually; . . . self-reliant, independent 
in his views and sturdy in maintaining them."

Samuel seems to have intended to enter public service, following in the 
traditions of his forebears. As assistant Attorney for the British 
Crown in New Hanover County before the beginning of the Revolution, he 
won the respect and admiration of the last Royal Governor, Josiah 
Martin, who in 1775 wrote to the King that Samuel Johnston and Samuel 
Ashe were the only men of integrity among the members of the 
Revolutionary Provincial Council of North Carolina. But whatever 
loyalty that Ashe might have had before 1774, he certainly had none 
once it had become apparent that the people demanded independence. He 
was one of eight members of the Committee appointed in New Hanover 
County on July 21, 1774, to prepare an address to the people of North 
Carolina to call a Revolutionary Convention for the following month. 

The next January—1775, he was appointed a member of the New Hanover 
Committee of Safety, and later, a member of the Provincial Convention 
of North Carolina—that body which ruled the State between the 
nullification of British authority and the adoption of the first North 
Carolina Constitution late the following year. He served for a while as 
president of the Provincial Council, the chief executive agency during 
this period; and in 1776, he was instrumental in the framing of the 
first Constitution for the state—just as fourteen years later he was to 
play a prominent role in the North Carolina Conventions at Hillsborough 
and Fayetteville which were called to consider the ratification of the 
United States Constitution.

With the convening of the first General Assembly of North Carolina 
under the new State Constitution, in April, 1777, Samuel Ashe was 
elected to the Senate by New Hanover County, and then, by the Senate, 
to the office of its Speaker. In this position he served for the 
remainder of the session.

Besides his many public commitments, he had acquired several family 
commitments by this time. A few years before, he had married a cousin, 
Mary Porter, by whom he had three sons: John Baptista II, Samuel, Jr., 
and Cincinnatus Ashe. After the death of Mary, he married another 
kinswoman, Elizabeth Merrick, and this union produced a son Thomas. Of 
these four sons, Cincinnatus was lost at sea during the Revolutionary 
War. The other grown sons served with distinction during the war; and 
all of them followed in the family tradition of public service.

One of the most significant factors in the events which took place in 
North Carolina between the cessation of English control and the firm 
establishment of popular rule was the absence of any duly-qualified 
judicial system. Courts continued to sit, of course, in local disputes; 
but their jurisdiction and authority was, to say the least, a matter of 
question. As Samuel Ashe remarked some years later: "At the time of 
separation from Great Britain, we were thrown into a similar situation 
with people ship-wrecked and cast on a marooned island, without law, 
without magistrates, without government, . . . [and without] any legal 
authority."

The new Constitution of 1776, which Ashe had helped to frame, provided 
for Supreme Courts of Law and Equity, and in 1777, Ashe was appointed 
one of the justices in the new court system. For the next eighteen 
years he served in this capacity, earning for himself a great 
reputation for integrity and legal authority. In 1785, Ashe took part 
in one of the most significant cases in American jurisprudence.  

In the decision in the case of Bayard vs. Singleton, part of an act of 
the General Assembly which called for the confiscation of Loyalists' 
property was declared unconstitutional by Ashe and the other two 
justices of the Supreme Court. Although several other states contend 
for the honor, this decision may have been the very first in history 
where an act of a legislature under a written constitution was 
nullified by a court. Such a concept was and still is unheard of under 
English Common Law, but since the more famous decision of Chief Justice 
John Marshall in 1803 in the case of Marbury vs. Madison, such a 
concept has been recognized as a basis of American law. Samuel Ashe and 
North Carolina deserve much recognition in this regard.

Ashe served ably on the court until 1795 when he was elected Governor. 
As was the practice in North Carolina between 1776 and 1835, the chief 
executive was elected by the General Assembly for a one-year term of 
office. Ashe had been recognized as a strong Jeffersonian or Anti-
Federalist since 1788-89 when he opposed North Carolina's ratification 
of the United States Constitution. When the Jeffersonian party became 
the dominant force in the General Assembly of North Carolina in the 
mid-1790s, it was natural that this group would select a man of Ashe's 
calibre as its leader.

Re-elected twice, Ashe served for three full terms, from 1795 to 1798, 
even though he was in his early seventies by this time. During his 
administration, probably the most important event was the discovery of 
the Tennessee land frauds which had been perpetrated by James Glasgow, 
the Secretary of State. The Governor called together the remaining 
members of the Council of State, announced, "An angel has fallen," and 
set about with his usual judicial deliberateness to bring the matter to 
rights. When Glasgow and his cohorts attempted to burn the Capitol in 
Raleigh in an effort to destroy the records which would prove the 
fraud, Ashe succeeded in detecting and foiling the plot. The culprits 
were brought to trial and convicted.

The Governor retired to private life in 1798 when he was 73 years old. 
He spent the remaining fifteen years of his life on his plantation at 
Rocky Point or at his summer home near Hawfields in Orange County. He 
died on February 3, 1813, in his eighty-eighth year.

It behooves us here this afternoon to pay grateful and humble respects 
to this man, his predecessors, and his successors. In my conclusion, I 
would like to quote two sentences by Stephen Beauregard Weeks, one of 
North Carolina's most eminent historians: "There have been few families 
in North Carolina which, by reason of inherent ability, have produced 
in each generation some member who has risen above the level of his 
time and continued unimpaired the best traditions of his ancestors. In 
this respect, no family in North Carolina has a more marked record than 
that of ASHE."

Source:
Elizabeth Reid Murray Collection
"People" - Box 1 of 3
Olivia Raney Library

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This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by
Elizabeth Reid Murray
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