Robert Hett Chapman

Life and Orange County connections

Dated events connected with this person, earliest first. See these 5 dated events in the chronology →

1. 1812 to 1816 Robert H. Chapman leads the organizing of a Presbyterian church at Chapel Hill Kemp Battle credited Robert H. Chapman, president of the university from 1812 to 1816, as the chief factor in organizing a Presbyterian church at Chapel Hill; Chapman required students to study the Bible as a textbook, and the tutor James E. Morrison credited him with a moral change in the university. Cornelia Phillips Spencer wrote that the village's first church organization was Presbyterian, under either Chapman or Caldwell, and that Orange Presbytery's records for 1812-1827 had burned, so the church's first record is from 1827.Search the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. I (1907), p. 240
2. December 12, 1812 Robert H. Chapman is elected president as Caldwell returns to teaching mathematics Caldwell asked to give up the presidency to finish his geometry and study astronomy. The board accepted his resignation, elected the Presbyterian minister Chapman president at $1,200 a year and kept Caldwell as professor of mathematics at $1,000. People: William Hawkins, Robert Hett ChapmanSearch the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. I (1907), p. 231
3. January 1814 Caldwell takes students before a justice of the peace over attacks on President Chapman's property After night raids on Chapman's stable, cart and gate, and tar and feathers on his gatepost, Caldwell asked justice Pleasant Henderson for a general warrant. Refused, he named five students, and a hearing questioned the student body under oath. People: Pleasant Henderson, Robert Hett ChapmanSearch the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. I (1907), p. 233
4. September 18, 1816 Senior William B. Shepard speaks forbidden political passages and sets off a student revolt Chapman had struck Republican passages from Shepard's oration and ordered him to sit when he spoke them anyway, but students cheered him on and the next day met in the chapel to back him. The trustees expelled Shepard and George C. Dromgoole, others were suspended, and most of the rest signed apologies. People: Robert Hett ChapmanSearch the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. I (1907), p. 235
5. November 23, 1816 Robert H. Chapman resigns the university presidency At the first board meeting after the Shepard affair Chapman resigned, saying he wished to give himself to the ministry. The trustees made it effective at once, paid him half a year's salary and let him keep the president's house to the end of the session. People: Duncan Cameron, Robert Hett ChapmanSearch the index · Documenting the American South: Kemp P. Battle, History of the University of North Carolina, vol. I (1907), p. 239