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From Aberdeen to Zebulon: |
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William Richardson Davie
From “Launching the Craft” by Thomas C. Parramore
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When Samuel Johnson retired from the office of Grand Master of North Carolina on December 11, 1792, his chair was filled by a 36-year-old attorney from Halifax named William Richardson Davie. In at least one respect, the young man who was to preside over the Grand Lodge for the next seven years was a most improbable choice.
He had been a Mason for only a little less than one year, having been apprenticed at New Bern December 24, 1791, and raised to the degree of Mark and Past Master on December 10, 1792, the day before his nomination as Grand Master!
Nor was he present at his own installation as Grand Master December 30, 1792.
To review William R. Davie’s earlier career is to discover at least some of the reasons why he had been chosen over James Glasgow, Solomon Halling and any number of extremely capable men whose Masonic antecedents reached back many years and whose services to the Craft were legion. Unquestionably a man of brilliance, Davie was an honor graduate of Princeton College. He had distinguished himself since the opening of his law practice in 1780 as one of the two or three most outstanding lawyers in North Carolina.
He also had a magnificent war record as a former cavalry colonel in the North Carolina Line, a wounded veteran of the battle of Stono Ferry and other key engagements. He had been a delegate to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787 when he was one of the warmest and most outspoken advocates of the Federal Constitution. He had also represented the borough of Halifax since 1786 in the state legislature where he proved his mettle as a political tactician and statesman.
It was not so much Davie’s career, exceptional though it had been, that chiefly recommended him as North Carolina’s leading Mason. It was in his personal qualities that he could be recognized as one of the foremost men of his day. A tall and elegantly polished individual, he had a fine voice and an enthralling oratorical style that is said to have “astounded and enraptured” those who were privileged to hear him speak. Nature, education and upbringing had conspired to make of Davie one of the most commanding and captivating personalities of his era.
Although he had shown no interest in Royal White Hart Lodge at Halifax during a full nine years before his initiation at New Bern in 1791, Davie was to demonstrate that he was an ardent champion of the Craft and a superb choice as Grand Master. That 24 lodges were to be established under his patronage—almost as many as in the entire history of Masonry in North Carolina up to the time he took office—is but one of the many telling indications of the progress of the order during his seven years.
When he received his Mark and Past Masters degrees at the Fayetteville meeting of the Grand Lodge in 1792, Davie chose as his Masonic Mark “a lion supporting a pillar.” For the next seven years Masonry would be the pillar, Davie the lion.
Grand Master Davie’s first official responsibility and initial public appearance in his new role was the laying of the cornerstone for Old East, the first building erected on the campus of the University of North Carolina in October, 1793. Davie has been known ever since that time as the Father of the University.
Strongly supported by Samuel Johnston, at that time both Governor and Grand Master, Davie had introduced into the state legislature in November, 1789, a bill to establish a state university for North Carolina. Over the stiff opposition of fiscal conservatives and others who feared that a university would burden North Carolina with a permanent aristocracy, the bill was pushed to enactment in December. Within a few days of passage, the Board of Trustees, appointed under the act, held its first meeting at Fayetteville and the University of North Carolina, an idea first advocated at the provincial congress in Halifax in 1776, at last began to take shape.
The composition of that initial board attests to the strong Masonic influence in the creation of America’s first state university. The 41 members of the body included many prominent Masons, among them Samuel Johnston, Stephen Cabarrus, Charles Johnson, Frederick Hargett, William Barry Grove, Adlai Osborne, John Macon and others. The land on which the university was erected was the enormous 20,000-acre gift in Orange County made by Colonel Benjamin Smith, Washington’s Brunswick County host in 1791 and afterward Governor of North Carolina. Many other Masons contributed money toward the realization of the project and helped in other ways to see it through to completion. As has often been pointed out, the ground plans for the original buildings, with the main building in the south and the north end open, duplicates the arrangement of a Masonic lodge room and was probably a reflection of Masonic influence upon the design.
The laying of the cornerstone for Old East on October 12, 1793, therefore, was a distinctly Masonic affair. As afterward reported in the Halifax newspaper, the ceremony opened with a procession from the house of James Patterson to the site of the building lot. “A large number of the brethren of the Masonic order from Hillsborough, Chatham, Granville and Warren attended to assist at the ceremony of placing the cornerstone…”
The Masons, according to the newspaper, “in their usual order of procession,” were followed by the commissioners, trustees, public officers and citizens of the vicinity. “On approaching the south end of the building, the Masons opened to the right and left, and the commissioners, etc., passed through and took their places. The Masonic procession then moved on round the foundation of the building, and halted with their usual ceremonies opposite to the northeast corner, where William Richardson Davie, Grand Master of the fraternity in this state, assisted by two Masters of lodges and four other officers, laid the cornerstone, enclosing a plate to commemorate the transaction.”
The Grand Lodge over which Davie assumed command at the end of 1792 was an organization that had not yet accurately determined its proper course and function. The fact that the new Grand Master had been raised to Masonry’s highest degrees at an “occasional” session of the Grand Lodge was an indication that the governing body was still unsure of its appropriate role and there were additional signs of vacillation in its early work. It yet remained to be seen whether Davie had the managerial talent and the strength of will to mold North Carolina’s wayward private lodges into a fraternal and functional whole.
Several conflicts within the Masonic brotherhood disturbed Davie’s first four years as Grand Master and his handling of them demonstrates the qualities that had stamped him as a leader of men in other capacities. The worst of these disturbances was one that emerged at the first session of the Grand Lodge over which Davie presided in December, 1793. The long-simmering conflict between Royal White Hart Lodge and St. John’s of New Bern over precedence, muted during Samuel Johnston’s regime, now burst forth to plague Davie and his fellow grand officers.
The decisive character of Davie’s Masonic authority was also evident in his handling of the situation at Unanimity Lodge. Upon assuming his office in 1792, Davie was apprised of the problem at Edenton where the lodge had not met since the summer of 1791. As soon as he could give his attention to the matter, the Grand Master instructed his Secretary to try to get the members of Unanimity to hold a meeting and to resolve among themselves either to comply with the laws of Masonry or else show cause why their charter, jewels, implements and papers should not be delivered to the Grand Lodge for safe-keeping. It does not appear that the Grand Secretary was able to bestir the dormant brethren at Edenton, but Davie’s action was an object lesson to sluggish lodges that they could no longer ignore their obligations with impunity. It was clear by now that the helm of North Carolina Masonry had been seized by a strong hand.
One of the most heartening aspects of Masonry in North Carolina during the exhilarating first years of Davie’s tenure in office was the growth and development of strong lodges in places where Masonry had previously ebbed and flowed without consistent vitality. A good example of this tendency was Warrenton’s Johnston-Caswell Lodge, now beginning to show a fine spirit after years of only spasmodic success.
The new mood at Warrenton is first apparent in the minutes for June 28, 1793. Some of the brethren had just returned from celebrating St. John’s Day with Hiram Lodge at Williamsboro. There was, perhaps, a new sense of the prospects for the future of Masonry in this part of the state. Having voted the thanks of the lodge to Brother Jacob Mordecai on June 28 for his gift of a “draught of an Entered Apprentices lodge,” the members resolved to order for their lodge “a chair elevated on three steps…for the Master & a seat for each of the Wardens, with a table, three pillars and a pair of long drawers…with as much expedition as possible…”
More than any other member, Jack Mordecai seems to have been the inspiration for the encouraging new efforts at Warrenton. A Jewish native of Philadelphia, Mordecai settled at Warrenton in 1787 as a 25-year-old merchant, later opened a famous female academy there, and reared a large family of exceptional children.
The foremost year of success for Davie’s administration—for 18th century North Carolina Masons—was 1797. In that year were added seven new lodges. There were Phalanx 31 at Charlotte, Stokes 32 at Concord, Freeland 33 at Forks of Yadkin in Rowan County, Unanimity 34 in Surry County, Beaufort Lodge in Carteret, St. John’s at Morganton and St Tammany’s 30 at Wilmington. Masonry now encompassed North Carolina from the ocean to the western mountains and from border to border.
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Produced by the public relations committee of the Grand Lodge AF&AM of Masons in North Carolina,
2921 Glenwood Avenue, Raleigh, NC 27628 MMVIII
Author/editor: Walter J. Klein wklein(at)carolina.rr.com
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