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Kirk-Holden War connections, 1870

Orange County actors in the 1870 crisis: Josiah Turner, Frederick Nash Strudwick and William A. Graham.

In briefGovernor Holden named Orange County in his October 1869 warning about Klan violence, Hillsborough men were named in a Klan plot against Senator T. M. Shoffner, and Kirk's militia arrested Josiah Turner Jr. at Hillsborough in August 1870. Orange men Frederick N. Strudwick, William A. Graham and John W. Graham then helped bring, prosecute and decide Holden's impeachment.

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4 works about Kirk-Holden War connections, 1870 are indexed here.

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Josiah Turner Jr., portrait published 1919
Josiah Turner Jr., portrait published 1919

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Episodes in this history, in date order. Each has its own page.

StorylineGovernor Holden’s impeachment and trial, 1870–1871December 1870–March 1871 · 20 events · Frederick N. Strudwick of Orange moved to impeach Governor William W. Holden on December 9, 1870. Article III charged the August 1870 arrest of Josiah Turner Jr. at Hillsborough; William A. Graham joined the prosecution, Turner and other Orange witnesses testified, and on March 22, 1871 the state Senate convicted Holden, 37 to 12 on that article, and removed him from office on the motion of Senator John W. Graham of Orange. StorylineThe congressional Ku Klux hearings, 1871January–September 1871 · 22 events · In 1871 two committees of Congress took sworn testimony on the Klan in North Carolina. Before the Senate select committee in January and February, Hillsborough constable W. G. Turrentine, clerk of court George Laws and editor Josiah Turner Jr. gave opposed accounts of the jail raid, hangings and whippings in Orange; before the Joint Select Committee that summer and fall, Dr. Pride Jones told of persuading the Orange Klan to disband in 1870, and William L. Saunders refused to answer.

Other events in this storyline, in date order. See these 49 dated events in the chronology →

  1. Forty or fifty masked riders pass through Hillsborough A large body of disguised riders, perhaps forty or fifty, rode through Hillsborough a year or more before February 1871, according to Josiah Turner Jr.'s testimony before the Senate committee. Turner said he was in Raleigh at the time, heard of it afterward and had no doubt they were masked; he gave it when pressed on whether he had reason to believe the Klan existed before 1870. Place: HillsboroughSearch the index · U.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 352
  2. The White Brotherhood, a Ku Klux order, appears in Orange County The first Klan-type order to reach North Carolina, the White Brotherhood, set up camps including one at Hillsborough. Its Orange County chief was Colonel Joseph C. Webb, followed by Frederick N. Strudwick. People: Frederick N. Strudwick, J. Cheshire Webb Place: HillsboroughLefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952 (1953), p. 116
  3. Klansmen whip William Husky, one of Governor Holden's detectives Members of the Klan order whipped William Husky in Orange County, according to Josiah Turner Jr.'s testimony before the Senate committee in February 1871. Husky told Turner he was whipped for his work as one of Governor Holden's paid detectives; Turner, a Conservative opponent of Holden, called him a rogue who had confessed to stealing the year before and said he never learned how severe the whipping was. Place: Orange County · Also named: William HuskyU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 350
  4. Black men from Orange who rode in disguise to retaliate are sent to the penitentiary Some Black men in Orange County who disguised themselves and went out, as they said, to retaliate against men they accused of punishing them were caught, tried and sent to the state penitentiary, according to the testimony of James M. Justice before the Joint Select Committee in July 1871. Justice said they were the only disguised night riders in the central counties he knew to have been convicted, and that Conservative speakers cited them to claim the only Ku Klux were Black. Place: Orange CountySearch the index · U.S. Congress, Joint Select Committee on the Condition of Affairs in the Late Insurrectionary States, Testimony: North Carolina (1872), p. 145
  5. Disguised men shave the heads of white women in Orange County Before March 1870, disguised men in Orange County shaved the heads of some white women and otherwise mistreated them, according to the testimony of Dr. Pride Jones before the Joint Select Committee on June 5, 1871. Jones gave no names or places and said he knew of no white men attacked. People: Pride Jones Place: Orange CountyU.S. Congress, Joint Select Committee on the Condition of Affairs in the Late Insurrectionary States, Testimony: North Carolina (1872), p. 4
  6. Governor Holden warns Orange County it may be declared in insurrection Holden's proclamation of October 20, 1869, named Lenoir, Jones, Orange and Chatham counties and said that in Orange the jail had been forced, two Black prisoners taken out and shot, and three other Black men hanged. He warned that he would declare those counties in a state of insurrection and use the whole power of the state if the violence continued. People: William W. Holden Place: Orange County · Also mentions: Orange and Chatham countiesDigitalNC: Goldsboro Daily Messenger, October 25, 1869, page 2
  7. Klansmen from Hillsborough ride to kill Senator T. M. Shoffner and turn back A Klan party coming from Orange County that included Hillsborough legislator Frederick N. Strudwick and A. Hedgepeth of Hillsborough gathered at a Bradshaw home in Alamance County to kill state senator T. M. Shoffner, author of the anti-Klan militia bill. Dr. John A. Moore, sent by James E. Boyd, told them Shoffner had gone to Greensboro, and they turned back. People: Frederick N. Strudwick Place: Hillsborough and Alamance County · Also named: A. Hedgepeth, T. M. Shoffner, John A. Moore, James E. BoydInternet Archive: Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States, Senate Select Committee, March 10, 1871
  8. A shot through the window of Josiah Turner Jr.'s Hillsborough house narrowly misses his wife Someone fired a gun or pistol through a window of Josiah Turner Jr.'s house in Hillsborough while he was away, missing his wife's head by about a foot as she stooped for a cup, according to Turner's testimony before the Senate committee in February 1871. Turner came home on a telegram and found bullet marks on the house and powder in her face; he said he did not know who fired but blamed the Union League, which he said had also fired on him and once gathered as a mob against him. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Josiah Turner Jr.'s house, HillsboroughU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 354
  9. Josiah Turner Jr. turns down a militia guard after shots are fired into his Hillsborough house After shots were fired into Josiah Turner Jr.'s house near Hillsborough while he was away, Colonel William J. Clarke wired that he was sending a guard of twenty men with orders to arrest every suspicious person, and Holden's private secretary, W. R. Richardson, asked Turner for particulars of the attempted outrage on Mrs. Turner. Turner replied from Hillsborough that the attackers were unknown, pointed to two Black men he said had been seen nearby, and said he had told Clarke the civil law was ample in Orange and he would have the militia arrested for trespass if they set foot on his land. Holden's defense put the exchange in evidence on February 18, 1871. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Josiah Turner Jr.'s house, Hillsborough · Also named: William J. Clarke, W. R. RichardsonTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1, p. 1007
  10. Orange representative Frederick N. Strudwick presses the repeal of the Shoffner Act In the legislative session of 1870-1871, Frederick N. Strudwick of Orange helped bring forward the bill repealing the Shoffner Act of January 1870, under which Governor Holden had declared counties in insurrection; the repeal passed and took effect at once. Justice Thomas Settle said so before the Senate select committee in February 1871, adding that Strudwick introduced the impeachment resolution against Holden and had been named in testimony as one of the party sent to kill Senator Shoffner. People: Frederick N. Strudwick Place: North Carolina House of Representatives, Raleigh · Also named: Thomas SettleU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. XVII
  11. Hillsborough men ask Governor Holden to commission Pride Jones against the Klan On March 5, 1870 six Hillsborough men, among them J. W. Norwood, James Webb and Henry K. Nash, recommended to Governor Holden that Pride Jones be made a militia captain to put down night riding. Holden sent the commission on March 7 and Jones accepted on March 9. The raids soon stopped, and Jones resigned after four weeks. People: William W. Holden, Pride Jones, George Laws, John Wall Norwood, Henry Kollock Nash Place: Orange County · Also named: James WebbTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 2, pp. 1158-1164 · Also: Lefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952
  12. Orange County Klansmen agree to disband after Pride Jones carries the governor's offer Starting on March 8, 1870, when he rode eight miles into the country, Captain Pride Jones went to men he suspected of leading the Klan in Orange and told them, on Governor Holden's word passed through John W. Norwood, that past offenses would be overlooked if they disbanded. By his sworn account in June 1871, several said they were tired of it, the klans disbanded within about four weeks, and after four to six weeks he wrote Holden that the county was quiet. People: Pride Jones, John Wall Norwood, William W. Holden Place: Orange CountyU.S. Congress, Joint Select Committee on the Condition of Affairs in the Late Insurrectionary States, Testimony: North Carolina (1872), p. 1
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  1. Governor Holden tells Captain Pride Jones he cannot promise the Orange Klan amnesty Writing from Raleigh on March 17, 1870, Governor Holden told Pride Jones, his new militia captain for Orange County, that the executive had no power to proclaim amnesty and could pardon only after a conviction. He told Jones to discourage secret political societies, above all disguised and armed ones, to back the Orange sheriff with a posse if process was resisted, and to arrest men who came into Orange from Alamance. The letter was read into Jones's testimony before the Joint Select Committee on June 5, 1871. People: William W. Holden, Pride Jones Place: Raleigh (instructions for Orange County)U.S. Congress, Joint Select Committee on the Condition of Affairs in the Late Insurrectionary States, Testimony: North Carolina (1872), p. 7
  2. Governor Holden reports fifty state troops posted at Hillsborough In a letter of July 20, 1870 asking President Grant for federal troops, Governor W. W. Holden counted his state forces and listed fifty white men at Hillsborough, with Kirk's 350 in Alamance and Caswell and others at Raleigh and in Gaston County. The letter survives here as a War Department abstract printed in the appendix of the Senate select committee's report. People: W. W. Holden Place: HillsboroughU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. XLV
  3. A squad of Holden's militia marches into Chapel Hill and camps behind the college During the Kirk-Holden war a squad of state militia under a Dr. Emery marched into Chapel Hill and camped behind the college, while some county men took to the woods and Frederick Strudwick and William L. Saunders hid to avoid arrest. Spencer wrote the next year that the militia had broken into the Philanthropic and Dialectic society libraries and taken books. People: Frederick N. Strudwick, William L. Saunders Place: Behind the college, Chapel Hill · Also named: George W. KirkHope Summerell Chamberlain, Old Days in Chapel Hill (1926), scan p. 211 · Also: Trial of William W. Holden
  4. Josiah Turner Jr. tells James E. Boyd at Hillsborough of a planned election-eve Klan ride At the North Carolina Railroad stockholders' meeting in Hillsborough in July 1870, Josiah Turner Jr. told James E. Boyd, then a Conservative candidate in Alamance, that he had heard the Ku Klux would ride the night before the August election and warn Black voters they would be met on the road home if they voted; Turner advised Boyd neither to back the plan nor speak against it. Boyd swore to the conversation in an affidavit taken by Colonel Kirk on July 19, 1870, and repeated it to the Senate select committee on January 28, 1871. Turner testified to the same committee on February 24, 1871; his reply is not on these pages. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Hillsborough (North Carolina Railroad stockholders' meeting) · Also named: James E. Boyd · Also mentions: North Carolina RailroadU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 21
  5. Josiah Turner Jr. dares Governor Holden in print to arrest him In a card dated at Hillsborough on August 3, 1870 and printed in his Raleigh Sentinel, Josiah Turner Jr. dared Holden to arrest him and charged that Holden's followers, stirred by talk of Turner as head of the Klan, had shot powder in Mrs. Turner's face and thrown a rock through her window near one of his children. Kirk's militia arrested Turner at Hillsborough two days later; Holden's counsel read the card at the impeachment trial on March 13, 1871 to show the spirit in which Turner had invited arrest. In a second letter dated at Hillsborough on August 4 and printed in the Sentinel on August 6, read by the House managers on February 18, he told Holden to come on with his chains. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: HillsboroughTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 2, p. 2183
  6. Captain Hancock at Hillsborough wires Burgen that he has news he cannot send without breaking orders On August 5, 1870, the day Josiah Turner Jr. was arrested at Hillsborough, Captain Hancock, commanding the state troops there, telegraphed his superior, Lieutenant Colonel B. G. Burgen at Company Shops, that he had a matter of great importance to report but could not do so without violating orders. Thomas Bragg, closing for the House managers on March 20, 1871, cited the telegram as evidence that Holden ordered the arrest and said the telegrams kept at the Shops were spirited away before they could be called for. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Hillsborough · Also named: B. G. Burgen, Thomas BraggTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 3, p. 2496
  7. Kirk's militia arrests Josiah Turner Jr. at Hillsborough On August 5, 1870, a detachment of Kirk's state militia seized Raleigh Sentinel editor Josiah Turner Jr. at the Hillsborough depot, took him by rail to Company Shops and then held him with Kirk's other prisoners in the Caswell County courthouse at Yanceyville. U.S. District Judge George W. Brooks ordered him discharged on August 19, 1870, on his habeas corpus petition. The impeachment article and the trial testimony name the officer as Lieutenant J. W. Hunnicutt, sent from Company Shops with about ten men by Lieutenant Colonel Burgen, and Judge Brooks ordered Kirk to pay the costs. People: William W. Holden, Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Hillsborough · Also named: George W. Kirk, John Hunnicutt, George W. Brooks, J. W. HunnicuttInternet Archive: Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina, vol. 1 (1871) · Also: Turner testimony: Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States; Trial of William W. Holden; Internet Archive; Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1
  8. Lieutenant Hunnicutt wires from Hillsborough that he has Turner under guard, and Burgen orders anyone who tries to free him shot On August 5, 1870, Lieutenant J. W. Hunnicutt telegraphed Lieutenant Colonel Burgen at Company Shops from Hillsborough that he had arrested Josiah Turner Jr., had him under the bayonet and wanted an extra train. Burgen answered that Hunnicutt should come up on the freight and shoot on the spot anyone who tried to release Turner. The telegrams, from the Hillsborough telegraph office, were read into evidence by the House managers at Holden's impeachment trial on February 18, 1871. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Telegraph office, Hillsborough · Also named: J. W. Hunnicutt, B. G. BurgenTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1, p. 1005
  9. State troops search Josiah Turner Jr.'s house outside Hillsborough and carry off his guns While Lieutenant Hunnicutt held Josiah Turner Jr. at the Hillsborough depot, two or three of his men went to Turner's house about a mile off to search for arms and came back with two pistols and two guns. Turner, testifying at Holden's impeachment trial on February 16, 1871, said one pistol came back only after he offered a $10 reward and the rest stayed with Kirk; a Sentinel editorial of August 9, 1870, read into evidence, said every room was searched without a warrant and his boys' shotguns taken. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Josiah Turner Jr.'s house, about a mile from the depot, Hillsborough · Also named: J. W. HunnicuttTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1, p. 893
  10. The officer holding Josiah Turner Jr. at Hillsborough says he will arrest anyone who brings a habeas corpus writ At the Hillsborough depot, Lieutenant J. W. Hunnicutt told Senator John W. Graham that he had arrested Josiah Turner Jr. by Governor Holden's order and that he had a general order, passed down through Colonel Burgen, to arrest anyone who came with writs of habeas corpus, Graham included. Graham gave this account under oath at Holden's impeachment trial on February 16, 1871, adding that Hunnicutt said Burgen had detailed him to take ten men to Hillsborough for the arrest. People: John W. Graham, Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Railroad depot, Hillsborough · Also named: J. W. HunnicuttTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1, p. 916
  11. An Orange County court indictment is found against Colonel George W. Kirk An indictment was found in the Orange County court against Colonel George W. Kirk, whose militia had arrested Josiah Turner Jr. at Hillsborough in 1870, according to Turner's testimony before the Senate committee in February 1871. Turner said he gave the capias and a bench warrant to the sheriff of Wake County, but the U.S. marshal, who held Kirk on a federal writ Turner had sued out, would not let them be served, and Kirk slipped out of Raleigh. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Orange County court, Hillsborough · Also named: George W. KirkU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 372
  12. Josiah Turner Jr. asks Justices Dick and Settle for a bench warrant against Holden, Kirk and Bergen After Kirk's men arrested him at Hillsborough, Josiah Turner Jr. filed an affidavit and applied to Justices Dick and Settle of the state supreme court for a bench warrant against Governor Holden and Colonels Kirk and Bergen. The justices had counsel argue whether a warrant could issue against the governor and whether the colonels could be taken outside the insurrection counties, with Mr. Bailey on one side and William H. Battle on the other, according to Battle's testimony before the Senate committee on February 13, 1871; he read his argument from the Daily Sentinel of October 7, 1870. People: Josiah Turner Jr., W. W. Holden, William Horn Battle Place: before the state supreme court justices (place not stated) · Also named: George W. KirkU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 162
  13. Sheriff Turner and armed men try to take Colonel Kirk off a train at Hillsborough Soon after his militia regiment was mustered out in late September 1870, George W. Kirk rode the North Carolina Railroad toward Raleigh under a protective arrest arranged with a federal marshal. At Hillsborough, by his account, Sheriff Turner waited with thirty to thirty-five men armed with shotguns and pistols to take him from the train; the marshal refused to give him up, and the men clung to the cars cursing until the train got under way. Kirk told this to the Senate select committee on January 27, 1871, and called the men Ku Klux, which he asserted but did not show. Place: Railroad depot, Hillsborough · Also named: George W. Kirk · Also mentions: North Carolina RailroadU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 6
  14. Orange County representative Frederick N. Strudwick moves to impeach Governor Holden Frederick N. Strudwick of Orange introduced the House resolution to impeach Governor William W. Holden, which the House adopted on December 14, 1870. On December 19 he chaired the Committee of the Whole that adopted the eight articles of impeachment and elected the seven House managers. People: William W. Holden, Frederick N. Strudwick Place: North Carolina House of Representatives, RaleighInternet Archive: Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina, vol. 1 (1871)
  15. Strudwick of Orange goes with two other members to impeach Holden at the bar of the Senate Frederick N. Strudwick of Orange, with Thomas Sparrow and W. P. Welch, was named by Speaker Thomas J. Jarvis to go to the bar of the state Senate and impeach Governor Holden in the name of the House and the people of North Carolina. The three did so on December 15, 1870, and Sparrow reported back that the Senate had received the message. People: Frederick N. Strudwick Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, Raleigh · Also named: Thomas J. Jarvis, Thomas SparrowTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1, p. 3
  16. Strudwick is kept off the impeachment managers because of his Klan reputation After guiding the impeachment resolution through the house judiciary committee and the full house, Strudwick was not chosen as a manager for the senate trial. It was feared that his widely known association with the Ku Klux Klan would make the proceedings look like a Klan prosecution. People: Frederick N. Strudwick, William W. Holden Place: Orange CountySearch the index · NCpedia: Strudwick, Frederick Nash
  17. Holden answers that he never ordered Josiah Turner Jr. arrested in Orange County In his written answer read to the Senate on January 23, 1871, Governor Holden denied ordering Josiah Turner Jr.'s arrest in Orange. He said he had told the militia officers to arrest Turner only if found in Alamance or Caswell, that any arrest in Orange was against his orders and without his knowledge, and that when told Turner was under arrest in Alamance he ordered him held there and in Caswell. Holden also said he believed Turner belonged to the secret organizations and was urging citizens to drive out the militia, a charge the answer states as Holden's belief. People: Josiah Turner Jr., William W. Holden Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, RaleighTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1, p. 45
  18. William A. Graham of Hillsborough joins the prosecution of Governor Holden The House managers announced to the impeachment court that former governor William A. Graham of Hillsborough, with Thomas Bragg and Augustus S. Merrimon, would act as their counsel. Graham argued points of evidence for the prosecution through the trial. People: William A. Graham, Thomas Bragg, Thomas Sparrow Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, Raleigh · Also named: Augustus S. MerrimonInternet Archive: Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina, vol. 1 (1871)
  19. Hillsborough constable describes Orange County Klan killings to a U.S. Senate committee W. G. Turrentine, a Hillsborough constable, told the Senate select committee in Washington that five Black men had been killed in Orange County and many people whipped, some for voting Republican. He described how, in August 1869, 75 to 100 disguised men forced the Hillsborough jail and shot a prisoner held on a barn-burning charge, who died. Place: U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C. · Also named: W. G. Turrentine · Also mentions: Hillsborough jailInternet Archive: Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States, Senate Select Committee, March 10, 1871
  20. Disguised men calling themselves Red Birds whip four people near Hillsborough Disguised men who called themselves Red Birds and dressed in red whipped two women and two young men of about twenty at a house about three miles from Hillsborough, tore off its roof, knocked down the chimney and set it on fire, according to the testimony of Hillsborough constable W. G. Turrentine before the Senate committee on January 31, 1871. Turrentine, who saw the wrecked house when he went to make arrests, said it was thought to have been aimed at a disorderly house. George Laws, testifying on February 15, described what seems to be the same affair five or six miles from town as neighborhood fathers breaking up a disorderly house, with the boys paddled and the roof torn off, and said it was not the Ku Klux. The one man arrested on Turrentine's warrant was discharged by a magistrate after his sister-in-law and a Dr. William Strudwick swore he had been too drunk that evening to sit his horse. People: George Laws Place: about three miles from Hillsborough, Orange County · Also named: W. G. Turrentine, William StrudwickSearch the index · U.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 44
  21. U.S. Senate committee hears Orange County testimony on Klan violence A Senate select committee created on January 19, 1871 took testimony in Washington on Klan violence in North Carolina. Orange County witnesses, including Hillsborough constable W. G. Turrentine, court clerk George Laws and editor Josiah Turner Jr., described the 1869 jail raid, hangings and whippings in the county. The committee reported on March 10, 1871. People: George Laws, Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Countywide · Also named: W. G. TurrentineU.S. Senate: Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States by the Select Committee of the Senate, March 10, 1871 (Internet Archive)
  22. Clerk of court George Laws testifies on Orange County before the Senate committee George Laws of Hillsborough, clerk of the Orange superior court and judge of probate, testified before the Senate select committee in Washington on February 15, 1871. A Conservative, he described the jail raid and three hangings of Black men, said no one had been brought to justice for them because no evidence could be had, credited the Ku Klux with checking thefts by freedpeople after the war, and said the county had been quiet for eighteen months and that a Black man could get justice in its courts. The committee majority quoted him as proof that Klan crimes in Orange went unpunished. People: George Laws Place: Washington, D.C.U.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 190
  23. Josiah Turner Jr. of Hillsborough testifies at Holden's impeachment trial about his arrest Josiah Turner Jr. told the Senate court that on August 5, 1870, armed men from Company Shops, eight or ten white men and two Black men, came to Hillsborough on a freight train, ran at him with guns cocked as he rode away from the depot, and held him there under Lieutenant Hunnicutt from about eleven until near three while Captain Hancock paraded his company before the depot. He testified for the House managers on February 16, 1871, and on cross-examination denied any tie to the Klan but admitted saying in private talk that the militia ought to be shot. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, Raleigh (witness of Hillsborough) · Also named: J. W. HunnicuttTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1, p. 892
  24. Hillsborough telegraph operator Joseph G. Cooley declines to produce the militia telegrams at Holden's trial Joseph G. Cooley, 24, the Hillsborough telegraph operator, told the impeachment court that he had been subpoenaed on January 30, 1871, to bring every telegram sent or received about the state troops at Company Shops, but that his superintendent had ordered him to answer no questions about them as confidential and the office manager, Mr. Starke, had sent the originals away. After argument the chief justice ordered the telegrams filed with the clerk, and they were read the next day. People: Joseph G. Cooley Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, Raleigh (witness of Hillsborough)Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 1, p. 925
  25. Impeachment court admits Holden's 1870 letters with Pride Jones on the Orange Klan The Senate, sitting as the court of impeachment, voted 25 to 19 to admit Governor Holden's March 1870 correspondence with Dr. Pride Jones of Hillsborough, which the defense offered to show that Holden tried peaceful means against the Klan in Orange before he used troops in Alamance. The managers objected that the court had already shut out evidence of Klan activity outside Alamance and Caswell; the presiding officer let it in as bearing on Holden's motive, noting Holden's answer that Josiah Turner Jr.'s arrest was justified by the excitement Turner had stirred in Orange. Holden's secretary John B. Neathery then read Jones's March 4 letter, the March 5 recommendation by six Orange men and Holden's March 7 commission. People: Pride Jones, Josiah Turner Jr. Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, Raleigh · Also named: John B. NeatheryTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 2, p. 1157
  26. Josiah Turner Jr. of Hillsborough testifies before the Senate committee on Southern outrages Josiah Turner Jr., Conservative editor of the Raleigh Sentinel, who kept his family home at Hillsborough, testified under oath before the Senate select committee in Washington on February 24, 1871. He said he had known nothing of the White Brotherhood until the habeas corpus hearings at Raleigh in the summer of 1870, put the toll in Orange at four men hanged and one shot, besides five whipped, and called the violence a war between two secret societies, the Klan and the Union League. Asked whether he had told James E. Boyd of Graham to let the Klan ride before an election, he denied it. People: Josiah Turner Jr. Place: Senate select committee, Washington, D.C. (witness of Hillsborough) · Also named: James E. BoydU.S. Senate, Select Committee, Report on the Alleged Outrages in the Southern States (1871), p. 349
  27. Ned Strowd of Orange testifies that disguised men whipped him in Alamance Ned Strowd, a Black man then living in Orange County with a Mr. Mebane, testified for Holden's defense that about three weeks before Christmas 1869 sixteen to eighteen disguised men called him out of his house on William Thompson's place in Alamance, broke his gun across a tree and made his family carry their goods out into the yard. They whipped him twenty to thirty licks while he hugged a tree and threatened to come back and kill him if he told. Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, Raleigh · Also named: Ned Strowd, William ThompsonTrial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 2, p. 1454
  28. Lucinda Morrow of Hillsborough testifies at Governor Holden's impeachment trial Called by Holden's defense, Lucinda Morrow, then living in Hillsborough, described disguised men breaking into her Cane Creek home in Orange County in the fall of 1869 and hanging her husband, Thomas Jefferson Morrow, together with her brother, at the time of fall oat sowing. She said she had not named the men at the inquest because she feared they would come back and kill her. Prosecution counsel William A. Graham objected to her evidence, and Augustus S. Merrimon argued it was irrelevant unless tied to Alamance County. People: William A. Graham, Jefferson Morrow, Thomas Jefferson Morrow Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, Raleigh · Also named: Lucinda Morrow, Augustus S. MerrimonInternet Archive: Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina, vol. 2 (1871) · Also: Trial of William W. Holden
  29. The impeachment court refuses to swear three Black Orange witnesses called on the jail raid On March 16, 1871, the Senate sitting as the impeachment court voted 28 to 18 against letting three Black men from Orange County be sworn so they could be paid for weeks of attendance; Holden's defense had summoned them to testify about the taking of Black prisoners from the Orange County jail. Defense counsel Badger told the court their evidence had been ruled out because the defense could not prove that the roads where the raiders' horse tracks were followed connected with Alamance County. Senator Graham of Orange first moved to pay every summoned witness on both sides, which failed 22 to 24, and then voted against swearing the three. People: John W. Graham Place: Senate chamber, Raleigh (witnesses from Orange County) · Also mentions: Orange County jailSearch the index · Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina (1871), vol. 3, p. 2313
  30. Senate convicts Holden on the article charging Turner's arrest in Orange County The state Senate found Governor Holden guilty, 37 to 12, on Article III, which charged him with the unlawful arrest of Josiah Turner Jr. in Orange County on August 5, 1870, and also convicted him on Articles IV through VIII. Senator John W. Graham of Orange then offered the order of judgment removing Holden from office and barring him from state office, which the Senate adopted. People: William W. Holden, Josiah Turner Jr., John W. Graham Place: North Carolina Senate chamber, RaleighInternet Archive: Trial of William W. Holden, Governor of North Carolina, vol. 3 (1871)
  31. Dr. Pride Jones of Hillsborough testifies before Congress on the Orange County Klan Dr. Pride Jones of Hillsborough, the militia captain Governor Holden had sent against the Klan in Orange, testified before the Joint Select Committee in Washington on June 5, 1871. He said four or five Black men had been hanged and several people whipped by disguised men in the county before his commission, that no one had been tried for it, and that the Klansmen were mostly Democrats who had disbanded in the spring of 1870. People: Pride Jones Place: Washington, D.C. (testimony on Orange County)U.S. Congress, Joint Select Committee on the Condition of Affairs in the Late Insurrectionary States, Testimony: North Carolina (1872), p. 1
  32. The congressional committee splits over making Pride Jones name Orange Klansmen Asked on June 5, 1871 to name the Orange County men he had approached as leaders of the Klan, Dr. Pride Jones refused, saying he had dealt with them in confidence as Governor Holden's agent. The Joint Select Committee divided 3 to 3 on a motion to excuse him and postponed the question, and no names appear in the rest of his testimony. People: Pride Jones Place: Washington, D.C. (testimony on Orange County)U.S. Congress, Joint Select Committee on the Condition of Affairs in the Late Insurrectionary States, Testimony: North Carolina (1872), p. 8
  33. A federal commissioner tells Congress the Klan is still at work in southern Orange A. Webster Shaffer, the U.S. commissioner at Raleigh who heard Ku Klux cases, testified before the Joint Select Committee in mid-1871 that disguised night riding continued in the lower part of Orange County, one of eight or ten counties from which complaints still reached him. He said the order had been campaigning in Orange since 1868 and that William A. Graham of Hillsborough could stop it there but tolerated it by saying nothing, though he did not think Graham a member. His account differs from Pride Jones's statement that the Orange Klan disbanded in the spring of 1870. People: William A. Graham, Pride Jones Place: southern Orange County · Also named: A. Webster ShafferU.S. Congress, Joint Select Committee on the Condition of Affairs in the Late Insurrectionary States, Testimony: North Carolina (1872), p. 41
  34. The congressional Ku Klux committee reports F. N. Strudwick for failing to appear F. N. Strudwick of Hillsborough was summoned in June 1871 to appear in Washington before the congressional committee investigating the Ku Klux. The joint congressional committee on the Ku Klux, meeting in Washington, reported F. N. Strudwick of Hillsborough and others who had been summoned but did not appear, asking the Senate to issue warrants for them as in contempt of Congress. People: Frederick N. Strudwick Place: Capitol, Washington, D.C.Hillsborough Recorder, September 27, 1871, p. 2
  35. William L. Saunders of Chapel Hill refuses to answer the congressional Klan committee Called before the joint committee on affairs in the insurrectionary states, Saunders, whom the book names as head of the Invisible Empire in North Carolina, declined to answer 53 questions about the Ku Klux. People: William L. Saunders Place: Chapel HillLefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952 (1953), p. 117-118 · Also: Hillsborough Recorder, September 27, 1871, p. 2
  36. Orange Superior Court dismisses the assault case against W. W. Holden under the amnesty act Judge Tourgee dismissed the indictment of former Governor W. W. Holden for the 1870 arrest of Josiah Turner Jr. by Lt. John Hunnicutt of the state troops, ruling it covered by the amnesty and pardon act of March 3, 1873; Turner, the prosecutor, was first denied an appeal and then granted one. People: W. W. Holden, Josiah Turner Jr., Albion W. Tourgee Place: Court house, Hillsborough · Also named: John HunnicuttHillsborough Recorder, November 5, 1873, p. 3
  37. Josiah Turner Jr. wins a jury verdict against W. W. Holden over his 1870 arrest A jury found for Josiah Turner Jr. in his long damage suit against former Governor W. W. Holden for his arrest and imprisonment during the Kirk-Holden War of 1870. The jury was out about an hour, and Judge Buxton refused the defense a new trial. People: Josiah Turner Jr., William W. Holden Place: Court house, Hillsborough · Also named: Ralph P. Buxton, W. W. HoldenThe Chapel Hill Ledger, April 5, 1879, p. 2

Places in this history

Buildings, schools, churches and other sites named in the dated events on this page, the most often named first. The map shows them all.

Map tiles © OpenStreetMap contributors. Site locations from the N.C. State Historic Preservation Office survey, Open Orange, Orange County GIS, OpenStreetMap and a few other published sources named on each site’s page; town and community pins show approximate locations.

All places and the county map →

Indexed works

Related works found in catalogs and archives across North Carolina. Each links to the institution that holds or provides it.

Willie Person Mangum papers,

Mangum, Willie Person,; Mangum, Arthur,; Mangum, Charity Alston Cain

Personal and political papers of Willie Person Mangum, the Whig senator from Orange County, together with papers of Arthur Mangum and Charity Alston Cain Mangum. Correspondents include Daniel Webster, William A. Graham, David L. Swain, John Chavis and Abraham Lincoln, and other topics include plantations at Hillsborough, the estate called Walnut Hill, state politics, agriculture and education.

Included because: The record names this subject alongside a heading for the county or its towns.

Library of Congress

Mary Claire Engstrom photographic collection, 1930s-1979 (bulk 1950s-1976).

Engstrom, Mary Claire, 1906-1997 · 1934

Photographs gathered by Mary Claire Engstrom (1906-1997), dated from the 1930s to 1979 with most falling between the 1950s and 1976, about 2,140 items in 4.4 linear feet in UNC's North Carolina Collection. Subjects include historic buildings in Hillsborough and Orange County, the Alexander Dixon House, the Nash Hooper Graham House, Bingham School, Nash and Kollock School, the Hillsboro' Military Academy, Carrboro views, and the Old Chapel Hill Cemetery.

Included because: The record names this subject alongside a heading for the county or its towns.

UNC

David L. Swain papers, 1807-1877 (bulk 1833-1868)

Swain, David L. (David Lowry), 1801-1868 · 1807

David L. Swain, 1801 to 1868, served as governor of North Carolina and then as president of the university at Chapel Hill. His papers span 1807 to 1877 with the bulk from 1833 to 1868. Subjects include Cornelia Phillips Spencer, Elisha Mitchell, W. W. Holden and Thomas Ruffin, and cover state politics, railroads, and records of enslaved people. Microfilm reels were made in 1949 and 1974.

Included because: The record names this subject alongside a heading for the county or its towns.

UNC

John Heritage Bryan (1798-1870) Collection

Bryan, John Heritage, 1798-1870 · 1716

Papers of John Heritage Bryan (1798 to 1870), New Bern lawyer, legislator and Whig congressman from 1825 to 1829, dating 1716 to 1907. His letters mostly follow social life in the towns and plantations of eastern North Carolina, chiefly New Bern and Raleigh, from the 1820s to the 1860s, and touch the university at Chapel Hill and the Hillsborough Academy.

Included because: The record names this subject alongside a heading for the county or its towns.

State Archives of NC

Start at OCPL

Books in OCPL’s Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection whose titles, catalog subjects, or descriptions match this storyline. The Friends’ recommended starting points are labelled. Books marked Wider context cover the broader subject rather than this storyline itself.

  • Foundational · NC 973.8 ZUB North Carolina During Reconstruction Zuber, Richard L. · 1969

    Published in 1969 by the State Department of Archives and History, Richard L. Zuber's short history follows North Carolina through Reconstruction after the Civil War. It runs 67 pages with illustrations, facsimiles, portraits and a bibliography, and was later reprinted by the Division of Archives and History.

  • Wider context · NC 973.8 TRI Trial of William W. Holden: Governor of North Carolina, Before the Senate of North Carolina, on Impeachment by the House of Representatives for High Crimes and Misdeameanors Holden, W. W. · 1871

    Proceedings of the 1871 impeachment trial of Governor William W. Holden before the North Carolina Senate, printed at Raleigh by the Senate's order in three continuously paged volumes. Holden, born near Hillsborough, was impeached in December 1870 over the Kirk-Holden war, his militia campaign against the Ku Klux Klan in Alamance and Caswell counties. Convicted on six of eight charges in March 1871, he was the first American governor removed by impeachment.

  • Foundational · NC 973.745 NOR North Carolinians in the Era of the Civil War and Reconstruction 2008

    Paul D. Escott edits nine essays on North Carolinians from secession through Reconstruction: Piedmont disaffection, Wild's Raid and guerrilla war in the northeast, African Americans under Union occupation, soldiers and the 1864 governor's race, the war's end as seen by Chapel Hill writer Cornelia Phillips Spencer, Zebulon Vance and university president David L. Swain, women and the law, divorce at the 1868 constitutional convention, the roots of Jim Crow, and Vance's memory. UNC Press, 2008.

Show 3 more
  • Influential in its time · NC 975.6 HAM Reconstruction in North Carolina Hamilton, Joseph Grégoire de Roulhac · 1964

    J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton, a Hillsborough native who taught history at the University of North Carolina from 1906, grew this political history of Reconstruction in the state out of his Columbia dissertation under William A. Dunning. Columbia issued the full text in 1914 (683 pages, with a folding map); Peter Smith reprinted it in 1964. Written from the Lost Cause outlook of the Dunning school, it went unchallenged for about fifty years.

  • Wider context · NC 970.004 EVA To Die Game: The Story of the Lowry Band, Indian Guerrillas of Reconstruction Evans, William McKee · 1971

    Henry Berry Lowry and his band of Lumbee guerrillas raided plantations and eluded posses in Robeson County through Reconstruction, after the execution of Lowry's father and brother in 1865; their fight ended in 1872, when Lowry vanished after a raid on Lumberton. W. McKee Evans tells their story in this history, published by Louisiana State University Press in 1971; 282 pages with maps and portraits.

  • Wider context · NC BIO HOLDEN HOL Memoirs of W. W. Holden Holden, W. W. · 1911

    Recollections of William Woods Holden (1818 to 1892), the North Carolina governor born near Hillsborough. They run from the Democratic rise of 1850 through the Civil War and his quarrel with the Confederate government to his governorship, his use of the militia against the Ku Klux Klan and his impeachment. Published at Durham in 1911 with an introduction by William K. Boyd, as volume 2 of the Trinity College Historical Society's John Lawson monographs.

Research sources

Sources and research tools for this storyline. Research guide: Follow an event across several accounts.

Background 6

Historic sites, markers, and maps

Records of the time 5

Collections and databases

Local help

Related themes

Schools & Education →UNC & Campus Life →Work, Labor & Industry →

Picture: Josiah Turner Jr., portrait published 1919. Public domain. Hamilton, J. G. de Roulhac (1919) History of North Carolina: North Carolina since 1860, III, Chicago & New York: Lewis Publishing Company, p. 131; via Wikimedia Commons

More to discover

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Illustration by Caldecott Medalist Matthew Cordell, gifted to the Friends 2026