Tryon's Return to Newbern.—Prevalence of Quiet.—New Outbreaks.—Riots at Hillsborough.
ered as the principal leaders. * By this act of apparent clemency he hoped to pacify the disturbed public mind. Satisfying himself that quiet would now prevail, he returned to his palace at Newbern, neither a wiser nor a better man.
For almost two years comparative quiet prevailed; not the quiet of abject submission on the part of the people, but the quiet of inactive anarchy. The sheriffs dared not enforce their claims, and the evident impuissance of government made the Regulators bold. Finally, many unprincipled men, who espoused their cause in order to benefit by change, committed acts of violence which all good patriots deplored.
The records of the Superior Court at Hillsborough show evidence of a lawlessness, in 1770, quite incompatible with order and justice; and yet, from the character of some of the men engaged in breaking up the court at the September term of that year, it must be inferred that sufficient cause existed to warrant, in a great degree, their rebellious proceedings.5 An excited populace gathered there at the opening of the court, and committed acts which Husband and Howell, and their compatriots, would doubtless have prevented, if in their power. But reason and prudence are alike strangers to a mob. Not content with impeding the course of justice by driving the judge from the bench and the advocates from the forum, the Regulators severely beat a lawyer in the street, named John Williams, and dragged Fanning out of the court-house by his heels, beat him with rods, and kept him in confinement dur-
* The names of these "outlaws" were James Hunter, Ninian Bell Hamilton, Peter Craven, Isaack Jackson, Herman Husband, Matthew Hamilton. William Payne, Malichi Tyke, William Moffat, Christopher Nation, Solomon Goff, and John O'Neil. These were some of the "Sons of Liberty" of western North Carolina.
** While in Hillsborough, in January, 1849, 1 was permitted by the Clerk of the Superior Court, to make the Blowing extracts from the old records: "Monday, September 24th, 1770. Several persons styling themselves Regulators, assembled together in the court-yard, under the conduct of Herman Husband, James Hunter, Rednap Howell, William Butler, Samuel Divinny, and many others, insulted some of the gentlemen of the bar, and in a riotous manner went into the court-house and forcibly carried out some of the attorneys, and in a cruel manner beat them. They then insisted that the judge (Richard Henderson being the only one on the bench) should proceed to the trial of their leaders, who had been indicted at a former court, and that the jury should be taken out of their party. Therefore, the judge finding it impossible to proceed with honor to himself, and justice to his country, adjourned the court till to-morrow at ten o'clock, and took advantage of the night, and made his escape." The court, of course, did not convene on the next day, and instead of a record of judicial proceedings, I found the following entry: "March term, 1771. The persons styling themselves Regulators, under the conduct of Herman Husband, James Hunter, Rednap Howell,*.. William Butler, and Samuel Divinny, still continuing their riotous meetings, and severely threatening the judges, lawyers, and other officers of the court, prevented any of the judges or lawyers attending. Therefore, the court continues adjourned until the next September term." These entries are in the handwriting of Fanning.
* Rednap Howell was from New Jersey, and was a brother of Richard Howell a patriot of the Revolution, and governor of that state. Like his brother (who wrote the ode of welcome to Washington printed on page 245), he was endowed with poetic genius, and composed about forty songs during the Regulator movements. He taught school somewhere on the Deep River, and was a man of quite extensive influence. Like Freneau, at a later day, he gave obnoxious officials many severe thrusts, he thus hits Frohock and Fanning: