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From: Roger Harvell <>
Subject: Re: [ARIZARD] SHERRILL - SIMPSON (Post 1 of 2)
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 2008 06:29:54 -0400 (GMT-04:00)


Peggy, I can't remember if we have exchanged information on the Sherrills, or not, but I thought you might like to have a copy of this...

This volume was lent to the Southern Historical Collection for filming on March 3, 1966, by Paul Thomas Williams, University of North Carolina student, from Route 2, Catawba, North Carolina. It is owned by some other member of his family.
{I have attempted to type the contents as is. The microfilm is of handwritten pages. ~ RDH}
Address of Rev. W. S. Sherrill at the unveiling of the Adam Sherrill Monument (pages 11 to 27 of handwritten text).
We are what we are because there has been to a past which we owe an everlasting debt. And to day in memory of the past, we are gathered to pay proper tribute and respect to our worthy forebear Adam Sherrill the Pioneer, who after a long life of self denial left to his children the Herittage of a good name, which is rather to be chosen than great riches. This huge marker erected to his memory and which we to day unveil is a fit expression of the character of an ancester who knew no fear and who always stood as solid as granite for principle and truth. Stones have always been the markers of the past. When Israel crossed the Jordan dry shod, Joshua left a pile of stones as a memorial of that marvelous deliverence. So when later the children's children ask the fathers What mean these stones They shall say Israel came over this Jordan dry shod, and when the Traveler in this day beholds that rocky pile, his mind runs back to Abraham and Joseph, and Moses and Joshua, and to the bri!
lliant part they had in shaping the history of mankind. As we look with admiration at the huge and lofty monuments to Washington we forget the beauty and imensity as we think of him whom it represents. We think of the boy who could not tell a lie, who loved and obeyed his mother, who early became a surveyor, than an officer of the Virginia Militia, then commander of the American Army, the undiscouraged leader in so many defeats but the final victor at Yorktown the great president of the nation. First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen.
And when our children's children in the generations to come shall pass this way and see this stone, they will think of the heroism and self denial of him whom we meet this day to honor. While we should look with hope toward the future, let us never forget the debt we owe to the noble and heroic man who prepared the way for us to Moses who gave us law and tought us how to oranize government. To Washington who did so much for human freedom, and to our fathers who overcame great difficulties and by heroic sacrafices and faith laid the foundation of the republic.
The original Setlers from Europe were reared in an atmosphere of civil and religeos concert, the masses had few privileges, and were dissatisfied with both church and government. At the time of the great religeous awakngening, many were persecuted and went to the stake for righteousness sake and their children longing for greater freedom braved the seas and found refuge in the wilderness of the Western world.
Here the wild beasts and savage men had to be conquered and the country made fit for settlement. These God fearing people Churchmen and divsenters brought to the Bible with them and planted the church near by their cabins.
They possessed rare courage and the primitive wilderness life they were forced to live, together with the perils and privations they experienced developed a spirit of Confidence and self reliance which so stengthened their faith in in the right to human freedom, that they had no sense of inferiority among Kings nor of superority among servants. They did not believe in an aristoeracy of oppertunity but for an even chance for every man for life, liberty and the prusuit of happiness.
In such a school of experience, in the fullness of time a new nation was born and it seems that Providence had made ready the vary way to lay the foundation on the bed rock of human rights, and religious freedom. Washington. Adams. Jefferson. Marshall. Edmond Randolph. Franklin and Hamilton developed in this back woods of America, all schooled in state craft, and all but Hamilton the product of pioneer ancestors.
Their fathers and our fathers with common experiences and common mode, were of Dutch. English and Scotch Irish decent many of whom first settled in the fertile section of Pensulvania, but many of there people being desirous of more space, and hearing of the fine climate and vast unoccupied territory in North Carolina, forged their way through the trackless wilderness until finaly they located in the Yadkin and Catawba Valleys. The early Sherrills settled on Long Island New York, but William Sherrill, father of Adam Sherrill the pioneer whom we this day honor, at early stages traveled southward and settled in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. It seems that they could not have desired a finer climate or a richer soil but later on his son Adam Sherrill who had married and was raising a large family. Eight of whom were sons, and no doubt a full quota of daughters too, had a yearning for the sunnier South. Then he with others like the Spies that sought out canewn(??), !
made a long and lonely journey to this community to see the land and determine as to the risk of moving to it. He returned to Virginia, made a favorable report and then later in 1747 He forsook the fertile lands he owned in Virginia, packed his scant goods and chattals and then with wife and eight sons and he with young John Perkins. Henry Weidner. Robinsons and some others traveled 400 miles to the Catawba river and crossed at the ford that bears his name.
It is great to do the thing first, Columbus crossed the sea first, many others have since he showed the way. Washington was the first president and it is a distinction to have been the first one though he was a great deal more than that. Lindberg the lone eagle made the long and perilous flight to Paris and now since he proved it possible many others have followed after him - and it clearly appears that Adam Sherrill the first white man to cross the Catawba river. Two years after his arrival, his William secured a grant dated April 5th 1749 to 600 acres of land. My departed friend the late Alfred Nixon of Lincoln County said John Beatty was the first pale face to set foot on Lincoln soil, that he crossed at Beattys ford in 1749 and that his land grant bears date of that year. The Henry Weidner land grant bears date 1750, and Jacob Forney settled in Lincoln County about 1752.
The late Judge M. S. McCorkle an authority on Catawba history said that John Perkins who came with Adam Sherrill married Catherine Lowrance, and Jacob Sherrill, son of William and grandson of Adam Sherrill the pioneer married Margaret Lowrance, sister of John Perkins wife. John Perkins became a notable man and the ancestor of many notable people in Catawba. Caldwell and Burke Counties, and later in life, carried the title of Gentleman John Perkins to distinguish him from numberous other John Perkins.
Judge McCorkle in an address delivered at a Whitener reunion at the old home of Henry Weidner the pioneer some 50 years ago stated that Henry Weidner came with Adam Sherrill the pioneer, and after they crossed the river, that Weidner with gun in hand called his dog and started all alone through the trackless forest Westward and settled on Henry river some distance south of the city of Hickory.
I like to think of this section discovered by those brave men. It was more than 250 years after Columbus came that the white man first beheld the beauty of the Catawba Valley and the hill country to the West of it.
>From the morning of creation it had been a wild waste, where the bear and the buffalo, the panther and the wolf contested for supremacy, with only the savage Indian to resist their right on title. Through the millenium the seasons had come in order and all the fruit wasted except the small portion consumed by wild beasts and wilder men.
The birds song the same songs that fell upon ears that knew not harmony, the fragrance of native flowers was wasted on the dsart while the streams fresh and pure from the heart of nature silently hastened to the sea. While only when an occasional savage halted by the shore to shake his thirst or catch a fish. Through the long centuries this virgin land seemed to have been reserved by Providence for a new and mighty people.
When the first setlers came to the river the sound of the English tongue for the first time broke the silence of this wilderness. When they approached the stream they found it clear as glass for the plow share had never opened a forrow in the hills above, and it was easier than now to avoid the rocks beneath because the floor of the river was planily to be seen, as were the fishes that swam against the current.
Methinks I can hear the splashing of the water as the thirsty cattle enter the stream, and the hoofs of horses slipping on the rocks as they turned on that wary journey across that stony ford.
When these sturdy people came to the Western side of the river, it was probably winter weather for it stands to reason that they would come early and in time to plant a crop.
Then it dawned upon them as never before that they had settled in a dreary howling wilderness. Their shelter was a wintry sky, with no friendly neighbor to give them welcome. That first night the cold stars looked down upon them without pity, and in loneliness they listened to the serenade of the howling wolves.
But these pioneers, brave and hardy men were entering upon the great task of planting a colony in this wilderness and were well aware of the perils which were before them, for they had counted the cost before they started. They had burned all the bridges behind them. There was no time for homesickness. Their faith was strong and they hopefully expected a better day to come. It was theirs to drive back the savages, to overcome the wild beasts, to fell the forests, to build rude houses, to endure hardships as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, to worship God, to teach their children to work, to Shout, to ride, to tell the truch and shame the devil coming into this primitive forest, they had shut out from their lives all the association of the past and all the seemingly great oppertunities which a more settled community offered.
Here they were absolutely dependent upon themselves and God.
There was nowhere else to look for help, the self-relient spirit under such circumstances was sure to grow. Their clothing must come from the backs of sheep and from the cotton patch.
The raw materiel must be spun into yarn the first cotton gins were human fingers and generaly womens fingers. They had no lamps, and during the long winter nights slowly they separated the seed from the cotton, and then with spining wheel and loom converted the cotton and wool into course cloth to keep their bodies warm. Often in the absence of cloth they made coats out of the hairry hides of wild beasts. They wore coon skin caps, and the women adorned their heads with plain sun bonnets or platted straw hats. Their bread was made from grain crushed by hamer or stone. They tanned hides and made rude shoes for the family. It was a two days ride to the nearest store and no stranger but the savage showed his face. It was primitive living. Books were rare, and there were no schools or newspapers or mails. They lived the natural life, but it all developed independence and self reliance. They had no doctors and suffered patiently when affliction came and they suffered for lack of m!
any things they deserved to have. While the men toiled and suffered, the women suffered more they bore the brunt of hardships as only women can, they worked at humble but neccesary tasks, uncomplaingly striving to do their part. In addition to unselfish toil, they bore large families with all the suffering and sacrifice incident thereto. They and their tears watered and their bodies enriched the soil in which they sleep and even yet the light of their faith shines from out the windows of another world.
We owe a lasting debt to these pioneers who were willing to be the mud sills upon which a mighty nation could be built. Let us strive in our day, to serve mankind with the same fearless and noble spirit which impelled these noble men and women to suffer and be strong in their day and generation.
While it was a desolate waste when these brave adventures arrived in 1747, and they were forced to live in primitive fasion, it was lonely and hard living but during that transition period, they discovered that necesity is the mother of invention and they made the best of conditions. It was not long until streams of new setlers came and heartened them by their presence and symphy. The Territory in 1747 was a part of Anson County, but Lincoln was orgainzed in 1779 and the population grew to 13, 662 including 1,523 slaves. In 1800 then all of (unreadable) and catawba and half of cleveland belonged to Lincoln County. What wondrous changes have taken place. The wilderness blossoms as the rose. But all of our developments has been made possible because far back in the earlier days the self relient spirit of the pioneer made a people honest, independant, frugal and God fearing.
In all their developement and growth our ancester whom we honor to day continued his full part. This rough boulder typathise the times in which he lived and is a fit symbol of his sterling character and couragous spirit.
In his day he stood out as a Christian man brave and true.

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