Born on the level! Born on the square!
BIOGRAPHY OF WILLIAM MECKLENBURG POLK 1758-1834
Life in Tennessee

That same year Polk was appointed by the NC Legislature as Surveyor General of the Middle District. Today it’s called Tennessee. He lived at French Lick Fort. Today it’s called Nashville. And today the Polk name is as honored in that state as anywhere in North Carolina. He stayed there to be elected twice as a member of the House of Commons from French Lick Fort, Davidson County, until 1786. (Bear in mind there was no independent state of Tennessee until 1796.)

Returning to Mecklenburg in 1786, he represented his home county in the NC House of Commons in 1787, 1790 and 1791. In that year he was the Federalist candidate for Speaker of the Assembly and was regarded as among the leading Federalists in the state. Will was not hesitant to say what he thought of the North Carolina Assembly:

“There are among the members composing the Legislature several very respectable characters; but speaking of them as a Body, I will venture to assert that there never was so much ignorance collected in a Legislative capacity since the days when Laws were enacted prohibiting the frying of Pancakes on Sundays.” –Polk’s Folly, p.143

On October 15, 1789, he married Griselda (Grizel) Gilchrist of Suffolk, VA, a granddaughter of Robert Jones, Jr., colonial attorney general under NC Governors Arthur Dobbs and William Tryon. The couple had two sons, Thomas Gilchrist born in 1791 and William Julius born in 1793.

Hostile Indian activity kept him from success in his profession as a surveyor. Happily, President Washington chose him to be NC Supervisor of Internal Revenue in March, 1791. The position lasted 17 years. The Murphey Papers of The North Carolina Historical Commission include this comment on Will Polk’s fiscal integrity during those 17 years: “From his strict attention to the duties of his office, his method of doing business, and selection of character to fill the office of Collectors, it is remarkable and much to his credit that during this term of seventeen years in which a revenue of upwards of two millions of dollars was collected and passed through his hands, the Government sustained a loss of less than $400.”

An interesting footnote of history relating to Will Polk’s financial status lies in letters from him to Tench Coxe of Philadelphia dated 1796-1798 relating to a sale by him of 20,445 acres in Mecklenburg County. Twenty thousand acres, then or today, would be the size of a fair-size city. Will’s father Thomas had died in 1794. This transaction may have been liquidation of his estate. It surely was the end of an era for Charlotte. Thomas’ great nephew James Knox Polk would not become US president until 1845.

After the death of Griselda in 1799, Will Polk married Sarah Hawkins, daughter of Colonel Philemon Hawkins, Jr. from Pleasant Hill, NC, on January 1, 1801, and they soon moved to Raleigh. Nine more children were born of that union. They included Lucius, 1802-1870, Leonidas, 1806-1864, Andrew J., 1824-1867, Dr. William, 1793-1860, daughter Mary who married US Senator George E. Badger, daughter Susan who married Kenneth Rayner, and George, 1817-1892. Lucius Polk married Mary Eastin, grandniece of Andrew Jackson. They had four children: Sarah, Mary, Will and George. Leonidas Polk was an Episcopal bishop and a lieutenant general in the Confederacy. His grandson Frank Polk, 1871-1943, was acting Secretary of State under President Woodrow Wilson. Lucius Polk’s great great grandson Lucius Burch, 1912-1996, was a noted conservationist and civil rights leader.

Military leadership continued in the family also with Colonel William Gale, Colonel Harding Polk and General James H. Polk.

Thanks to William Polk’s 100,000-acre reward, some of his eleven children became early settlers of Maury County, TN. We have Will’s bill dated October 11, 1806, for $14.75 for surveying two plots totaling three square miles in Maury County, Tennessee.

From 1811 to 1819 he served as director and then president of the State Bank of North Carolina. He resigned to devote attention to his Tennessee property. In 1812 President James Madison appointed him a brigadier general in the Regular Army. But he declined the honor on political and personal grounds, being a Federalist and disagreeing with administration policy.


read more | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8

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