Currituck County

It’s been a long time since we examined a county… just been a little busy. I reckon it’s time to return to our study. I thought this time we would look at the far north-eastern corner of the state – Currituck County.

Currituck County, which borders Virginia, was formed in 1668. The name Currituck is a local Native American word meaning “land of the wild geese.” Surprisingly, the county seat, also named Currituck, has (according to the Encyclopedia of North Carolina) never been incorporated. The county is largely surrounded by water, and the Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal cuts through the county. According to the 1860 census, there were a total of 7,415 people living in Currituck County. That included 2,524 slaves and 221 free persons of color. In the 1860 presidential election, Currituck County men cast 595 votes for Breckinridge and 66 for Bell. No one voted for Douglas.

In the 1861 vote to call a convention, Currituck County men voted 447 in favor of the convention, with 86 opposed. Henry M. Shaw was elected the convention delegate. Shaw, born in Rhode Island, had a varied career. He was a businessman, minister, medical doctor, and state senator. Shaw withdrew from the convention early on to accept the colonelcy of the 8th North Carolina Troops. Shaw served in the Army of Northern Virginia for a time. During the 1864 attack on New Bern, Shaw was mortally wounded.

Currituck County sent several companies into Confederate service. They include Company B, 8th North Carolina State Troops, Company E, 17th North Carolina State Troops, Company G, 4th North Carolina Cavalry, and Companies C and G, 68th North Carolina Troops. There were also several men from Currituck County who served in several different companies in different regiments of the United States Colored Troops.

During the war, Currituck County suffered much from raiding, guerrilla bands, and frequent incursions. Early in the war, the state of North Carolina established salt works. Federal soldiers from the 5th Rhode Island were sent at least once to search and destroy these works. On several occasions the Northern blockading fleet captured vessels off Currituck. On August 19, 1861, the USS Dale boarded the British bark Queen of the Lake, and about a month later the same sailors boarded the schooner Velma.

The site of the Court House in Currituck was visited numerous times throughout the war. On February 12, 1862 the 59th Virginia Infantry passed through the Hamlet. Many of the companies of the 8th North Carolina State Troops were recruited on the grounds of the Court House, and at another point during the war, Federal Troops were camped on the courthouse grounds. Mid-May 1863 local Confederates attacked and captured Federal mail-ship steamers Emily and the Arrow in the Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal. In August 1863 Confederate guerillas burned all of the bridges in Currituck and surrounding counties and in June 1864 Federals raided into Currituck County.

In 1918, a monument was placed on the grounds of the courthouse in Currituck to commemorate the county’s Confederate soldiers.

The buttons they wore.

I’ll tell you how I got on this topic before we go any further. I ordered and received a new dress jacket the other day for interpretation and re-enacting purposes. It is a Confederate colonel’s jacket that I will use to display, and for warranted occasions, like dress parades and balls. I was trying to decide what buttons to put on the jacket. That is how we arrived at this post.

So which buttons were used on the jackets that North Carolina’s soldiers wore? I did some research, and went through the online catalog of the North Carolina Museum of History in Raleigh, and through the book ­A Catalog of Uniforms from the Museum of the Confederacy. Most of the jackets I found were officers’ jackets, probably their dress jackets. It seems that most officers had one dress uniform, and then another suit of clothes that they wore every day. After the battle of New Bern in March 1862, Lt. William G. Morris of the 37th NCT wrote home, stating that he had lost everything when the Confederates were forced to retreat. "I have Nothing Except that is on my back. that is My Brown soote. I Did Not have on My uniform" he wrote.

Surprisingly, the majority of officers had United States Staff Eagle and Shield buttons on their coats. These coats came from a variety of sources. Until the end of the war, officers were expected, or required, to purchase their own uniforms. Some were made at home, others were made by tailors. There is no real way to determine where each jacket was manufactured.

So where did the Confederates get all of these yankee buttons? Something in the back of my mind says I know this story, but I cannot seem to place my hand on it. So, I’ll put the question to you: where did the Confederates get these buttons?

By the way, it was just not Tar Heels who had these buttons. The majority of surviving Confederate officer uniforms at the Museum of the Confederacy also have Federal staff buttons, including the jackets of JEB Stuart, Sandie Pendleton, John Hunt Morgan, and Patrick Cleburne

North Carolina Museum of History
William Branch – staff – US Staff
Thomas P. Devereaux – 43rd NCT – VMI buttons.
Alfred May -- 61st NCT – CSA
Charles W. Broadfoot -- Fayetteville Light Infantry – US Infantry
Lawrence Branch – Gen. – US buttons
Robert F. Hoke – Gen. – Confederate staff
James B. Gordon – Gen. – Standard Federal Button
J. Bryan Grimes – Gen. -- NC Sunburst
Rufus Tucker – 41st NCT – NC State seals
John T. Jones – Lt. Col. 26th NCT – US Staff
Henry C. Albright – 26th NCT – US Staff
Junius Daniel – 45th NCT - SC Palmetto Guards (when a major)
William H. Powell – 17th NCT – US Staff
Henry M. Shaw – 8th NCT – US Staff
Thomas Sparrow – 19th NCST – US Staff
James J. Pettigrew – Gen. – US Staff
Edmond Haywood - ? – NC Sunburst

Museum of the Confederacy
NC Drummer – Federal shield with a “R”
William D. Pender – Gen. - US Staff
Eugene Morehead – 3rd NCA- US Staff
John Hughes – 7th NCST – CSA on shield
Robert D. Johnston – Gen. -- US Staff
John A. Gilmer – 27th NCT/ Prisoner commander – Virginia state seal.
Peter G. Evans – 6th NCC – US Staff
David S. Davis – 66th NCT – US Staff

Greensboro
David Gouge – 58th NCT – Script I’s

Person County

Time for a look at another one of North Carolina’s great counties. Person County was formed in 1791, and named for Gen. Robert Person of Revolutionary War fame. The county seat of Roxboro was chartered in 1855 and named after Roxborough, Scotland.

In 1860, Person County had a population of 11,221, people, including 5,195 slaves and 313 free persons of color. In the 1860 presidential election, Person County cast 420 votes for Breckinridge and 483 for Bell, with only 9 for Douglas. In early 1862, Person County cast 593 votes in favor of calling a convention to consider the question of secession, while 167 people voted against the measure. John W. Cunningham, a local planter, merchant, state senator and member of the Council of State, was the county’s representative.

A local historian writes that Person County supplied between 800 and 1000 men to the Confederate army. Some of these men served in Company F, 17th NCST; Companies A and H, 24th NCT; Company E, 35th NCT; and Company A, 50th NCT.

Not much can be found about the role of the county during the war. One recent local historian writes that “Person County was a well-established plantation center before the Civil War. Crops included tobacco, cotton, corn, wheat, oats, fruits, vegetables, cattle, hogs and sheep…” A search of my standard sources – Johnson, Bennett, Trotter, Cromie, and others, did not turn up much.

Person County is the birthplace of Edwin G. Reade, a lawyer in Roxboro, a representative in the House of Representatives from 1855 until 1857, and a North Carolina Senator in the Confederate Congress (appointed by Vance). Reade was one of the Confederate senators who in 1863 advocated state commissioners from North Carolina meeting with representatives to reestablish North Carolina in the Union. Reade had the “unenviable job “ of opening that fall 1865 meeting of the Constitutional Convention in Raleigh. He is reported to have opened the meeting with “Fellow-citizens, we are going home…” Reade would go on to become a North Carolina Supreme Court justice. Reade was born in 1812 and died in 1894. He is interred in Oakwood Cemetery in Raleigh.

Person County has a Confederate monument, located on the grounds of the court house in Roxboro. The monument was erected by the United Daughters of the Confederacy in 1922. On top of the monument is a statue of Capt. E. Fletcher Satterfield, who was killed on July 3, 1863, while bearing the flag of his regiment, the 55th NCT, at Gettysburg. Not sure why he is holding a rifle, and not a sword.

Pitt County

I’ve been undecided about which county to do next in our little study. I was in Rowan and Cabarrus County on Tuesday, and there is a small write-up about Mitchell County in today’s Asheville Citizen. I finally decided to move a little further east and look at Pitt County.

Pitt County is located in the Coastal Plane area of eastern North Carolina. The County was formed in 1760 from portions of Beaufort County and named for the earl of Chatham, William Pitt. Prior to European settlement, the area was inhabited by the Tuscarora Indians. The county seat, chartered in 1771, was originally known as Martinsborough, in honor of North Carolina’s last royal governor, Josiah Martin. In 1786, the name was changed to Greensville in honor of Patriot general Nathanial Greene.

In 1860, the County had a total population of 16, 080 including 3,743 slaves. In the 1860 presidential election, Pitt County was practically tied. The residents cast 731 votes for Breckenridge, 710 for Bell, and eight for Douglass. While their presidential ideas were split, their belief in secession was not. When the vote came in February 1861, they voted 986 for, with 177 against the convention. Their representatives for the convention were Fenner B. Satterwhite and Bryan Grimes. Grimes resigned and was replaced by Pryton Atkinson.

Numerous Confederate companies came from Pitt County. These included Companies E, G, I, and K, 1st Battalion Local Defense; Company G, 8th NCST; Company C, 17th NCST (1st Organization); Company K, 17th NCST (2nd Organization); Companies E and H, 27th NCT; Companies C, D, and I, 44th NCT; Company E, 55th NCT, and Company F, 61st NCT. One of the first Confederate battlefield fatalities, Henry Wyatt (battle of Big Bethel, June 1861), had spent a number of years in Greenville. It was estimated by a local historian that 1,376 Pitt County men served in the Confederate army.

Military action came early in Pitt County. On June 5, 1862, “Col. Robert Potter [US], garrison commander at Washington, North Carolina, ordered a reconnaissance in the direction of Pactolus. The 24th Massachusetts under Lt. Col. F.A. Osborne, advanced to the bridge over Tranter’s Creek, where it encountered the 44th North Carolina, under Col. George Singletary. Unable to force a crossing, Osborne brought his artillery to bear on the mill buildings in which the Confederates were barricaded. Colonel Singletary was killed in the bombardment, and his troops retreated. The Federals did not pursue and returned to their fortifications at Washington.” Total losses on both sides were estimated at 40. You can read a fuller description of the battle here.

Two additional incursions took place in October 1862. The first was a raid toward Haddock’s cross road, resulting in the capture of several Confederates. The other raid was on Greenville itself, and the town was captured with the death of one Federal soldier.

In July 1863, Federal General Edward Potter raided through the area. You can read a full account here. There is also a driving tour, part of the North Carolina Civil War Trail Markers program, that you can view here. The raid was to disrupt Confederate supply routes in the area. Federal soldiers entered Greenville the afternoon of July 19. Local residents said that during their short stay, the Federals looted homes and destroyed Confederate supplies. At Otter Creek Bridge, near Falkland, a group of 150 Confederates, with artillery, stopped a portion of the raiders, and forced them to find another rout. Yet another small skirmish occurred at Scuffletown, on the Pitt/Greene County border.

In November of 1863, another raid took place through the county. The Federals involved were the 1st North Carolina Volunteers (African-American), which captured a portion of the 67th North Carolina Troops near Haddock’s Cross Roads. A fight, involving a portion of the Federal army and North Carolina and Virginia soldiers, took place at Red Banks Church on the night of December 30. Both sides retreated, with the Confederates losing a piece of artillery.

By 1864, most of the county had been raided, looted, and burned, and large-scale military action dropped off.

Following the war, a Confederate monument was erected on the courthouse grounds in 1914. Last year, an individual or two asked that the monument be removed. So far, the county commissioners have been unmoved.

Pitt County is doing a great job of marking and interpreting its Civil war sites. They have seven of the North Carolina Civil War trial markers, including three recently put up. You can learn more about the new markers here.

Where have all of the flags gone?

I had an email this evening from Russ Lane, a descendant of a member of the 17th NCT. He was asking about the battle flag of the 17th NCT. I pulled out Glenn Dedmondt’s The Flags of Civil War North Carolina and flipped to the page with a drawing of the Second National carried by the 17th NCT. Dedmondt’s book is considered the standard reference source on the subject.


I like the book. However, it lacks a lot. The information for the flag of the 17th NCT says that "There is little left of the 2nd National flag used by the 17th Regiment. The tattered remains are 55" along the hoist. The flag was hidden by Pvt. Able Thomas and taken home with him after the surrender." I want more. When was the flag made? When was it issued? Was Thomas the regimental color bearer? What battles did the flag see? When was it donated to the Museum of History in Raleigh?


I went to the Museum of History’s web page, but the flag was not listed in the artifacts search. I did find reference to the flag of the Pasquotank Guards, which would become Company L, 17th NCT. This flag, a fragment of which is pictured here, is not mentioned in Dedmont’s book.
All of this leads me to this: we need a detailed history of North Carolina’s war-time flags. I’ll give you three questions that I’ve yet been able to find an answer to. Maybe this will help uncover some more material.


One. Did the 37th NCT get a state issued flag, where is it, and what flag did the 37th NCT carry between November 1861 and December 1862, when they were issued the ANV battle flag with the white battle honors?


Two: Did the 58th NCT get a state issue flag and what happened to it?


Three: Were the 2nd and 3rd North Carolina Mounted Volunteers (US) issued flags and what became of them after the war?


I know that researching flags is not easy. I’ve researched these two regiments for a decade, and I’ve written about the 37th NCT, and I am currently working on a book about the 58th NCT. I understand how important a flag was to the men in a regiment. I just wish we had some more material concerning flags.