William Tryon, of Norbury Park, Surrey, England, arrived in North Carolina, at Cape Fear, on October 10, 1764, to become lieutenant governor of the province. His royal commission, dated April 26, 1764, made him assistant to royal Governor Arthur Dobbs, the third royal governor of this province. Three days after the death of Dobbs, he assumed temporary command of the government, on March 31, 1765. His commission as governor arrived December 20, 1765, and was opened before the council then meeting at Wilmington.
At that time there was no fixed capital for the provincial government. Forty-four sessions of the assembly were held between 1735 and 1764, and of these twenty-five were at New Bern, ten at Wilmington, six at Bath.
Following a tour of two months through the colony, Tryon's first recommendation to the Board of Trade at London was that New Bern, second oldest town of North Carolina, should be made the permanent capital of the province.
Since there was no suitable government house at New Bern, plans were made to erect one. At an assembly in New Bern on December 1, 1766, an act was passed by a large majority of the members, with the approval of the crown, entitled: "An act for erecting a convenient building within the town of New Bern for the residence of the governor, or commander-in-chief, for the time being."
A city block of twelve lots was selected as the site on the Trent River. The sum of 5,000 pounds proclamation money was appropriated for the construction work, this money to be paid out of funds appropriated for erecting public schools and purchasing church sites and to be replaced by an annual tax of eight pence on every taxable person for two years and two pence on every gallon of wine, rum, and liquor imported for two years except from Great Britain.
Contract for the capitol was signed January 9, 1767, by "His Excellency, William Tryon, Esquire, Captain General Governor and Commander-in-Chief in and over the province of North Carolina, of the one part, and John Hawks, of Newbern, architect, of the other part."
Hawks was engaged by this contract to design the building and superintend its construction, under the general supervision of Tryon, to whom the assembly entrusted "sole Direction and Management."
Completion of a two-story building, eighty-two feet in width and fifty-nine feet in depth, with adjoining "offices," by October 1, 1770, was specified in the contract, "unless delayed by deficiency of Money, unavoidable want of Workmen, or His Excellency's dismission of the said John Hawks from the superintendence." Hawk's salary of 300 pounds proclamation money annually was to start January 1, 1767.
Born at Dragby, Lincolnshire, England, in the year 1731, Hawks had accompanied Tryon to North Carolina to "superintend this work in all its branches." He had had architectural experience in England, and patterned the "palace" in the New World after some of the finest mansions in his native country.
In his first design Hawks proposed a noble front in three stories with a Venetian window in the center, and a pair of outbuildings or offices connected with the main building by curved colonnades. But, though broad, this structure would have been shallow and Governor Tryon desired more commodious accommodations.
The adopted plan, seven windows in breadth like the first design, gained an air of greater magnificence and beauty from a pediment spanning the center of the front. On it were displayed the royal arms. The central building was kept in the original dimensions, but its third story was eliminated. The two wings were increased in size, to measure thirty-nine by forty-nine feet each, with four windows instead of three across each front.
Final plans were submitted to the crown on February 23, 1767, and approval was received from England before the end of that year. The first brick was laid August 26, 1767. Next March Tryon reported, "The body of the house is already carried up to the plates." Probably during the first week of June, 1770, the governor moved into the unfinished Palace. It was completed by Christmas.
Members of the assembly met in the council chamber on the east side of the new capitol on December 5, 1770. In his official address to them, Governor Tryon praised the building not only as a "public ornament," but also as a sturdy structure which would remain for years as "a lasting monument to the liberality of the Country." He particularly complimented "the ability of the architect." Replying to his message, both houses of the assembly thanked the governor for his supervision and enthusiastically approved the "elegant and noble" buildings.
During January, 1771, provincial records were moved to New Bern from the office of the secretary of the colony at Wilmington. The assembly also moved its files to New Bern. Thus the new Palace became the first legally fixed capitol of North Carolina, with all provincial records centralized in New Bern.
The Palace was an imposing edifice (119k) of red brick, with marble trimmings. The courtyard between its two wings was 146 feet wide, while the entire structure measured 198 feet in width. It faced the town, but the rear was also attractively finished, "in the style of the mansion-house in London," overlooking the Trent River. A landscaped terrace with sloping lawns and a tall flagpole led down to the water. Formal gardens were arranged charmingly in front and at the side of each wing.
On the interior, the spacious rooms were grouped en suite around wide staircases (171k) in the middle. At one side was a council chamber (153k) or assembly hall, twenty-two feet wide and thirty-six feet long. At the back was a large dining hall (175k), with elaborate doors and windows. Hand-carved woodwork in simple motif was featured. On the first floor also were a library and servants' hall on either side at the front, and a parlor and housekeeper's room on the west side in the rear.
Cornices and chimney breasts for several of the rooms were of white marble. Mantels were imported from Europe, one of them being described by Tryon as follows: "A large statuary Ionic chimney piece, the shafts of the columns sienna and the frett on the Frieze inlaid with the same. A rich edge and Foliage on the Tablet; medals of the King and Queen on the Frieze over the Columns, the Mouldings enriched, a large statuary marble slab and black marble coverings."
The entrance hall (120k) had four niches for statues, and was lighted by the cupola on the roof. Over the vestibule door was a tablet with a Latin verse, written by Tryon's guest, Sir William Draper, "The Conqueror of Manila," to whom the Palace was dedicated. This verse was translated as follows by Francis Xavier Martin in his history of North Carolina :
An extensive basement was built under the central structure. Plumbing and drainage systems were installed by a Londoner, who used eight tons of lead. Huge brick sewers, unique for that period, led to the river. Many of the handsome furnishings (94k) in the Palace were imported.
On the second floor were seven large bedrooms (187k) for the governor-and his family, besides dressing rooms for Lady Tryon and Miss Tryon. Some of these rooms (191k) contained alcoves for beds, in the French style, later used by Thomas Jefferson in his home at Monticello in Virginia.
According to the original designs the east wing was intended for the secretary's office and laundry and the west wing for a kitchen and servants' hall. The change in plans made more rooms in each wing. The east wing was used by the governor's secretary, with the kitchen scullery and laundry also located there. The west wing was converted into the palace stables, with a coach house and servants' quarters.
This fine capitol cost much more money than had been anticipated. The assembly had appropriated an additional 10,000 pounds. At a council meeting in the Palace during June, 1771, Hawks submitted a financial report showing that only l40 pounds, 14 shillings, and three pence remained from the 15,000 pounds he had received and that this was needed for various unfinished details.
Taxes levied to pay for this expensive government house, the finest anywhere in the American colonies, helped fan the fires of resentment on the part of residents far upstate who considered the Palace a wasteful extravagance. For several years some of the people in the western areas had been in a state of unrest and dissatisfaction because of abuses by local officials in fee-taking and tax-gathering methods.
Judge Maurice Moore, in scorching letters signed "Atticus," charged afterwards that the later troubles in the impoverished colony were caused by the appropriations for the Palace; that to gratify his vanity and leave an elegant monument of his taste, at the expense of the public, Tryon had "changed the plan of a province-house for that of a Palace, worthy the residence of a prince of the blood, and augmented the expense to 15,000 pounds. Here, Sir, you betrayed your trust, disgracefully to the governor and dishonorably to the man."
Though Governor Tryon had previously written to England that Orange County had just cause for complaint, in that public officials often took "too high fees," affairs upcountry became so strained and disrupted with citizens organizing as "Regulators" to oppose strenuously what they considered illegal taxation and unjust burdens, Tryon appealed to the council and assembly in December, 1770, to provide for the raising and arming of a body of troops to go to the region of the insurgents and stop their lawlessness.
With the approval of council and assembly members, on April 23, 1771, Tryon began his march with North Carolina militia from New Bern to Orange County. At the Battle of Alamance, on May 16, Tryon was victorious and the War of the Regulation was checked. Soon thereafter he learned that he had been appointed governor of New York, then a less populous colony than North Carolina, and from 1771 to 1780 he held the latter office.
After he left this province, James Hasell, president of the council, became temporary governor of North Carolina. The new royal governor, Josiah Martin, arrived during August, 1771. With the assemblymen and other citizens he was less popular than Tryon.
As the seat of British authority in this colony, the Palace at New Bern became a center of revolutionary activities, with widening of the breach between the American colonies and their mother country. Determined to prevent North Carolina from sending delegates to the proposed Continental Congress in 1774 at Philadelphia, Governor Martin let it be known that he did not intend to call another assembly "until he saw a chance to get a better one" than the last one, which he had dissolved with friction between its members and himself over the question of courts.
Taking the matter into their own hands, a number of Cape Fear men decided to call a provincial congress, to be held independent of the government. Handbills were distributed by John Harvey asking the people of the colony to elect delegates to a provincial convention.
In defiance of Governor Martin's protest and opposition, the first provincial convention was accordingly convened on August 25, 1774, in the Palace at New Bern. The governor's chair was conspicuously vacant. Harvey was chosen moderator. This was the first popular assembly anywhere in America, called by the people and held in the presence of the king's officers, in direct disobedience to British authority.
A second provincial convention was held in the Palace April 3-8, 1775. In spite of the governor's orders to break up the "illegal" gathering, the members continued in session to ratify the work of the Continental Congress and to re-elect North Carolina delegates.
Declaring their allegiance to the king of Great Britain, the convention members asserted that they were ready at all times to assist approved governmental action, but disapproved heartily of the unconstitutional and oppressive measures of Parliament against the American colonies.
Shortly thereafter, on April 19, came the first clash of arms between the British and Americans at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts. Not until May did the news reach various parts of North Carolina.
Great excitement through the province was caused by the tidings. Military companies were organized. Resolutions were passed. Governor Martin had the cannon on the Tryon Palace grounds dismounted for fear they might be captured by the patriots. On May 23 a group of New Bernians led by Abner Nash, later governor of North Carolina, went to the Palace to protest against the dismounting of these six field pieces.
The governor said he had removed the cannon to repair their carriages. But this demonstration and the resolutions passed by local committees caused him to flee precipitously from New Bern. On May 31 he went by a circuitous route to Fort Johnston on the Cape Fear where he boarded the British war-sloop Cruizer. His family was sent by water to New York.
Four months afterwards a barrel containing about three bushels of gunpowder was discovered under a bed of cabbage in the Palace gardens, apparently hidden there by Governor Martin before his departure from town. Two quarter-casks of gunpowder were found in the Palace cellar, and also dug up from the Palace gardens were about 1,000-weight of new musket balls and a quantity of other ammunition.
The flight of the governor was regarded as an abdication of his office, and the third provincial convention the following August at Hillsboro proceeded to draw up a provisional government. The military organization was strengthened, and, on February 27, 1776, at the Battle of Moores Creek Bridge in Pender County it defeated the plan of British and Tories to join forces at Wilmington and invade North Carolina. This was the first American victory of the first organized campaign during the War of the Revolution.
Then came the movement for independence. At the fourth provincial congress held at Halifax, North Carolina's delegates to the Continental Congress on April 12 were the first in America to be instructed to "concur with the delegates of the other colonies in declaring independence and forming foreign alliances."
Next day a committee was appointed by the convention to draft a state constitution. A constitutional convention was called for the following November 12 at Halifax. There North Carolina's first state constitution was adopted on December 18. Richard Caswell was elected first governor of the independent state.
Although Caswell began to serve as governor at once, moving shortly after Christmas to Tryon's Palace in New Bern, which thus became the first capitol of the new state, he and the other first state officials did not take their oaths of office there until January 18. 1777. On that date in the Palace was held the first meeting of the council of state.
Assuming their offices with Caswell, to serve until the meeting of the first state General Assembly in April, were James Glasgow, secretary of state; and Cornelius Harnett, Thomas Person, William Dry, William Haywood, Edward Starkey, Joseph Leech, and Thomas Eaton, members of the council of state.
During February, 1777, the personal furniture and books of the former royal governor were sold at public auction as confiscated goods.
According to the provisions of the new state constitution, the first state legislators were elected in March. Each county was allowed one senator and two representatives; and every borough town, one representative.
On April 7, 1777, the first General Assembly of the state of North Carolina met in Tryon's Palace at New Bern. Samuel Ashe was elected speaker of the senate; and Abner Nash, speaker of the house of commons. Caswell was re-elected governor; and Glasgow, secretary of state.
Named on the council of state were Joseph Leech, Cornelius Harnett, William Haywood, Thomas Eaton, Edward Starkey, William Cray, and William Taylor. The last two took the places which had been held temporarily by Dry and Person.
A member wrote during the session: "We are all harmony, and a perfectly good agreement, as far as I can see, is likely to prevail in our houses of legislature." This unity of spirit was stressed in one of the senate rules: "No heats or animosities shall be permitted in the house."
Among the laws passed by this first General Assembly during its first session, which continued until May 9, were those concerning the following: state militia, taxes, crimes, treason, perjury, oaths, counterfeiting, domestic insurrections, hunting, town acts, appointment of county registrars, general assessments of property, and levying of ad valorem taxes on land, Negroes, and other property.
The second General Assembly met in Tryon's Palace during April, 1778. The following August the members moved to Hillsboro, perhaps because of the summer heat near the coast. The 1779 assembly met again in the Palace at New Bern. Caswell was re-elected governor in both of those years.
A new assembly was organized in the Palace on April 17, 1780. Caswell, completing his third consecutive regular term as chief executive, was no longer eligible for that position. He was made a major-general and elected commander-in-chief of the militia. Charleston, South Carolina, was being besieged by the British and a draft of 4,000 militia was ordered by the North Carolina assembly for the relief of that city. Caswell directed the eastern drafts to gather at Kinston.
Chosen to succeed Caswell as governor was Abner Nash of Craven County. This second governor of the state was the man who five years previously had led indignant New Bernians to the Palace grounds to protest against royal Governor Martin's dismounting of the cannon there.
Within a short period Governor Nash summoned quickly the town militia to aid the Continentals in defense of the city of New Bern from approaching British troops. Many members of the assembly joined the ranks of the defenders. Praising their action, the governor said:
Another meeting of the General Assembly was held the following September, but, probably because of the danger of an attack on New Bern, Hillsboro was again chosen for the session, which began on September 5, 1780.
It was on August 19, 1781, that New Bern was occupied by British soldiers in what was apparently a surprise move. General Caswell and his defense forces were not present. Thomas Burke of Orange County had then succeeded Nash as governor.
Major John Tillman wrote Governor Burke that the enemy took possession of New Bern on Sunday and left Tuesday evening, after destroying some vessels, salt, and other merchandise. He said that a few hours before their arrival he had the lead taken from Tryon's Palace where it could be spared without damaging the building. "The enemy took none," he added, "and there is a large quantity on the upper parts of the house."
Colonel Nicholas Long had written "to Mr. Bryant in New Bern to take all the lead from the Palace and send it to him," Major Tillman continued, "but as the enemy are not returning and the building will suffer exceedingly in case the upper part of the roof is removed, he will wait your orders by return of this express. Governor Burke, we are in great want of lead and no prospect of a supply. New Bern is so much exposed."
Upon the advice of Governor Burke, the council decided that the iron palisades, which were ornamental rather than useful, might be removed without injuring the building and utilized for ordnance but that "no more lead be taken from the Palace only in case of emergency."
The assembly reverted to its colonial policy of meeting in different places. Before 1794 eight towns held sessions of the state's itinerant legislators. These were Halifax, Hillsboro, Smithfield, Wake Courthouse (now Raleigh), Salem, Tarboro, Fayetteville, and New Bern. Tryon's Palace was the scene of legislative gatherings in 1785, 1791, 1792, and 1794.
On March 30, 1792, the commissioners appointed to locate and survey a site for a new capital purchased the Joel Lane plantation of 1,000 acres at Wake Courthouse. Another commission was named to supervise the erection there of a state house "sufficiently large to accommodate with convenience both Houses of the General Assembly, at an expense not to exceed 10,000 pounds."
The new capital, named for Sir Walter Raleigh, was surveyed in 1792, streets and parks were laid out, and lots were sold. Proceeds from the sale of lots were used to build the first state house, which was constructed on the site of the present capitol. The first legislative session in Raleigh as the state capital convened December 30, 1794, and lasted until February 7, 1795.
Tryon's Palace meanwhile fell victim ,to disuse and misuse. Appointment of commissioners in 1784 to rent rooms there seems to show that it served for some time as an apartment house. A coroner's jury verdict in 1790 reports the murder of William Hoboye in an apartment "at the Pallace Kitchin."
According to advertisements in local contemporary newspapers, a fencing school was conducted there in 1784; a dancing school in 1795; and a school for the teaching of French in 1796. When the New Bern Academy was destroyed by fire in 1795, the legislature gave the Reverend Thomas P. Irving, school principal, permission to hold the public school classes in the Palace. He and his family resided there on the upper floor.
As early as May, 1787, St. John's Lodge, Number 3, A. F. & .A. M., held two meetings at "The Palace," the Masonic minutes reveal. From then on, the lodge evidently met frequently in the Palace. After October, 1792, the lodge gatherings were held there regularly, for the minute books repeatedly make specific mention of the "Masonic Rooms in the Palace."
A notation in the lodge records for July 16, 1795, shows a motion that "the sum of five pounds be granted for the purpose of repairing the roof of the Palace which being half the sum necessary for that purpose. The Trustees of the Academy paying the other half."
The main building of the Palace was destroyed by fire on the night of February 27, 1798. Masons had met there earlier that evening. The flames started in the basement, reportedly caused when a Negro woman with a torch was looking for eggs in stored hay.
Before the end of that year, the General Assembly appointed commissioners to sell the Palace lots "and the bricks remaining of the Palace." They were disposed of by public sale in March, 1799. Although both wings had been saved from the fire by breaking the colonnades which connected them to the central structure, the east wing was probably torn down almost immediately, perhaps in order to sell the bricks along with those salvaged from the main edifice. The west wing still stands, but has undergone many changes on both interior and exterior.
The decline of the Palace marked the passing of royal authority in North Carolina, with the rise and spread of freedom, independence, and democracy. Its importance in the colonial, revolutionary, and early-state history of North Carolina is proved by its record, but as the state grew and expanded it could no longer serve effectually as a central capitol.
That it ranked as an architectural gem in its prime is conceded by both contemporary visitors and modern architects. Governor Tryon wrote: "Several persons who have passed through here from the other colonies esteem this house the finest capital building on the continent of North America."
Don Francisco de Miranda, the "precursor of the Independence movement in Spanish America," who may have had his spirit of freedom deepened by his visit to the Palace in 1783, declared that even in South America, a land of palaces, It had no equal. He referred to it as a building "which really merits the attention of a knowing traveler."
President George Washington, who was entertained at a banquet and ball in the Palace on April 21, 1791, described it in his diary as "a good brick building but now hastening to Ruins." During the two decades between Tryon's occupancy and Washington's visit vast changes had transpired in America, as evidenced by the fifteen toasts, each announced by a discharge of cannon, during the gala banquet there for the first President:
The historic Palace had been a center of many events and happenings which made possible Washington's message to the "Inhabitants of the Town of New Bern:"
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