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Topics Related to This Day in North Carolina History
On November 27, 1802, John Baptista Ashe, who was just elected governor, died before ever being able to take office.Born near Wilmington in 1748, Ashe’s early career was marked by military service in both the War of Regulation and American Revolution. After independence, he was elected to the General Assembly from Halifax, and quickly became popular in legislative circles. He was unanimously chosen as speaker in 1786.
On November 26, 1827, Governor Alfred Scales was born in Reidsville.Scales studied law at UNC and privately under William Battle, before winning election as today’s equivalent to the Rockingham County district attorney. He quickly moved up the political ladder, serving in the General Assembly in the early 1850s before being elected to Congress later that decade.
On November 25, 1784, Josiah Collins, a wealthy merchant and shipper from Edenton, entered into a verbal partnership with Dr. Samuel Dickinson and Nathaniel Allen to acquire a large body of land “surrounding and bordering upon” Lake Phelps.
On November 25, 1838, the Cherokee Indian known as Tsali was executed.
On November 25, 1864, a riot between Union prisoners of war and their Confederate guards broke out at the Confederate military prison at Salisbury.
On November 24, 1877, the USS Huron ran aground near Nags Head, en route for Havana from New York. Commander George P. Ryan chose to sail close to shore to avoid having to travel against the Gulf Stream or taking the time to plot a route beyond the strong currents.
On November 24, 2003, Governor Mike Easley proclaimed “Oscar Scott Woody Day.” The day honored a Roxboro native who died in the sinking of the RMS Titanic, a postal clerk named Oscar Scott Woody. Interest in Woody was spurred by a 1999 exhibit at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum on the five clerks aboard the ill-fated vessel.
On November 23, 1902, Walter Reed, head of U.S. Yellow Fever Commission in Cuba, died. During his time in Cuba, Reed conclusively demonstrated that mosquitoes transmitted the deadly disease. Reed called Hertford County home for much of his life before medical school.
On November 23, 1963, as the clock neared midnight in Raleigh, an attempt was allegedly made at the Dallas police department on behalf of Lee Harvey Oswald to contact one or two phone numbers in the 919 area code. It was the day after Oswald was arrested for the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
On November 23, 1925, Olive Dame Campbell and Marguerite Butler incorporated the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown. They named it after Mrs. Campbell’s late husband.