On this day 250 years ago the Committee of Safety of Rowan County, met in Salisbury, North Carolina, to adopt the Rowan Resolves. The Rowan Resolves were the first county resolutions adopted in North Carolina and comprised 17 resolutions similar to those adopted by counties in Virginia and the other colonies including:

RESOLVED, That the late cruel and sanguinary acts of Parliament, to be executed by military force and ships of war upon our sister colony of Massachusetts Bay and town of Boston, is a strong evidence of the corrupt influence obtained by the British Ministry in Parliament, and a convincing proof of their fixed intention to deprive the colonies of their constitutional rights and liberties.

RESOLVED, That the cause of the town of Boston is the common cause of the American Colonies.

RESOLVED, That it is the duty and interest of all the American Colonies firmly to unite in an indissoluble union and association, to oppose by every just and proper means the infringement of their common rights and privileges.

. . .

RESOLVED, That no friend of the rights and liberties of America ought to purchase any commodity whatsoever, except such as shall be exempted, which shall be imported from Great Britain after the General Association shall be agreed upon.

. . .

RESOLVED, That the African slave trade is injurious to this colony, obstructs the population of it by free men, prevents manufacturers and other useful immigrants from Europe from settling among us, and occasions an annual increase of the balance of trade against the colonies.

RESOLVED, That the raising of sheep, hemp, and flax ought to be encouraged.

RESOLVED, That to be clothed in manufactures fabricated in the colonies ought to be considered as a badge of distinction, or respect, and true patriotism.

. . .

RESOLVED, That this colony ought not to trade with any colony which shall refuse to join in any union and association that shall be agreed upon by the greater part of the other colonies on this continent, for preserving their common rights and liberties.

The members of the Committee of Safety all signed the Rowan Resolves and became the governing body of Rowan County during the Revolution:

James McCay, Andrew Neal, George Cathey, Alexander Dobbins, Francis McCorkle, Matthew Locke, Maxwell Chambers, Henry Harmon, Abraham Denton, William Davidson, Samuel Young, John Johnson, John Brevard, William Kennon, George Henry Barringer, Robert Bell, John Bickerstaff, John Cowden, John Lewis Beard, John Nesbit, Charles McDowell, Robert Blackburn, Christopher Beekman, William Sharpe and Morgan Bryan. Davidson, McDowell and Locke would go on to become generals during the Revolution and Dobbins, Sharpe and Johnson would serve as officers in the Rowan County Regiment in the Revolution.

Sources: https://www.ncspin.com/push-for-liberty-began-in-rowan; http://www.shallow-ford.net/rowanres.html

This Saturday, August 10, 2024, there will be a commemoration of the Rowan Resolves at the Rowan Museum in Salisbury, North Carolina. https://rowanmuseum.org/event/rowan-resolved-gala/

Also on this day 250 years ago Thomas Jefferson’s A Summary View of the Rights of British America was printed by Clementina Rind in Williamsburg, Virginia. Source: Robert L. Scribner, editor of Revolutionary Virginia 2, at 242.

On this day 250 years ago in Ohio, 400 frontier militia under the command of Major Angus MacDonald were marching back to Fort Fincastle, Virginia (now Wheeling, West Virginia) after destroying the Shawnee village of Wakatomika and nearby Shawnee and Mingo villages. MacDonald’s expedition spared nearby Delaware villages because the Delaware were not at war with the Virginia colonists. Despite skirmishing with Shawnee and Mingo warriors throughout the expedition to Wakatomika, there were few casualties on eiher side. MacDonald reported that he lost only two men killed and six wounded and the Indians similarly lost few warriors.

Major MacDonald and the company captains under his command — George Rogers Clark, Daniel Morgan, Michael Cresap, William Linn, James Wood, John Stephenson, Henry Hoagland, and Hancock Lee — would all continue to serve as militia officers or Continental Army officers in the Revolution. Clark and Morgan would become two of the most famous military officers of the Revolution.

Source:

Williams, Glenn F. , Dunmore’s War at pp. 184-193.

Also on this day 250 years ago, the 20-gun HMS Scarborough arrived at Boston Harbor to join the British fleet blockading the Port of Boston.

Click to access cors_get.php

On this day 250 years ago in Williamsburg, Virginia, the first Virginia Convention concluded. Among other actions, the Virginia Convention elected Peyton Randolph, George Washington, Patrick Henry, Richard Henry Lee, Richard Bland, Benjamin Harrison, and Edmund Pendleton as delegates to the First Continental Congress to be held the following month in Philadelphia. The Virginia Convention also adopted the “Association” which was a pledge to stop importing all goods from Britain, except for medicine, to stop importing enslaved people, and to neither consume nor import tea. 

Sources: https://founders.archives.gov/?q=%226%20August%201774%22&s=1111311111&sa=&r=1&sr=; https://www.colonialwilliamsburg.org/learn/deep-dives/the-first-virginia-convention/

On this day 250 years ago George Washington’s close friend Bryan Fairfax wrote to Washington expressing concern that the Fairfax Resolves were too radical. Fairfax tried to remain neutral during the Revolution and refused to pledge loyalty to either the Patriots or the British, but he remained friends with Washington until Washington’s death.

Source: https://founders.archives.gov/?q=%225%20August%201774%22&s=1111311111&sa=&r=5&sr=

On this day 250 years ago in Williamsburg, Clementina Rind reported in her Virginia Gazette on additional Resolutions adopted by Virginia Counties: “The Northumberland, Orange, King George, Amelia, Frederick, Lancaster, Mecklenberg, Lunenberg, Accomack, King William, Warwick, and a few other resolves, we have received, but couldn’t possibly insert them.”

Source: https://vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/672b0c83-5d0c-4bed-85f0-57599c7a60b1/content Glanville at pp. 73-75; https://www.8thvirginia.com/blog/the-dunmore-frederick-resolves

On this day 250 years ago, the Connecticut Committee of Correspondence named delegates to the First Continental Congress. Two months earlier the Connecticut House of Representatives had delegated responsibility to the Committee of Correspondence to name the delegates to the Congress. The three delegates who actually attended the First Continental Congress were Silas Deane, Eliphalet Dyer, and Roger Sherman. All three served Connecticut honorably throughout the Revolution with Roger Sherman distinguishing as the only person to sign the Continental Association of the First Continental Congress, the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution.

Source: https://www.americanhistorycentral.com/entries/connecticut-delegates-first-continental-congress/

On this day 250 years ago in Charleston, the South Carolina House of Commons electted Henry Middleton, John Rutledge, Thomas Lynch, Christopher Gadsden and Edward Rutledge as delegates to the First Continental Congress. All would continue in leadership roles for South Carolina and the United States throughout the Revolution.

Source: https://www.americanhistorycentral.com/entries/south-carolina-delegates-first-continental-congress/

On this day 250 years ago in Williamsburg the first Virginia Convention convened. Although the Virginia Convention met at the Capitol where the Virginia House of Burgesses (or Assembly) would usually meet, in contrast to the Assembly, the Virginia Convention was not officially sanctioned by the Governor or the King, but was instead organized and elected by Virginians at each county. The Virginia Conventions and the Conventions that followed it became the governing body of the Commonwealth of Virginia during the Revolution.

Source: https://www.colonialwilliamsburg.org/learn/deep-dives/the-first-virginia-convention/

On this day 250 years ago, Lt. Gov. William Bull of South Carolina (who would end up a Loyalist) wrote to Lord Dartmouth that South Carolina considered the dispute between the Colonies and the British Government to be a choice between “liberty or slavery”.

Source: https://www.jstor.org/stable/27567931

On this day the people of the Town of Biddeford, Massachusetts (now Maine) met at the First Parish Meetinghouse to adopt resolutions opposing the closure of the Port of Boston and the Intolerable Acts. The inhabitants of the town pledged their persons and fortunes to the Patriot cause and to hold as an enemy of the country anyone who refused to take the pledge.

Source:

Biddeford