Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 24.djvu/9

 Southern Historical Society Papers.

Vol. XXIV. Richmond, Va., January-December. 1896.

"The University of North Carolina in the Civil War."

AN ADDRESS

Delivered at the Centennial Celebration of the Opening of the Institu- tion, June sth, 1895.

BY STEPHEN BEAUREGARD WEEKS, PH. D.

I. GENERAL INTRODUCTION.

" First at Bethel ; last at Appomattox." Such is the laconic in- scription on the new monument to the Confederate dead which was recently unveiled in Raleigh. There is an especial appropriateness in the erection of this monument by the people of North Carolina in their organic capacity, for these men died at the command of their State, and it was exceedingly proper that she should thus honor them.

The heroic in history but seldom occurs. It is not often that the life of nations rises above the monotonous level which characterizes the daily routine of duty. When such periods do occur they are usually as a part of some great national uprising like the lev en masse in France under the first Napoleon, or the Landsturm in Ger- many in 1813. Of the American States, none can show a fairer record in this respect than North Carolina. There is little in the Colonial or State history of North Carolina that is discreditable. The key-note to the whole of her Colonial history is unending op- position to unjust and illegal government, by whom or whenever exercised. Before the colony was well in its teens it had expelled one .of its governors from office, and a better man, one who was more in sympathy with the people, had taken his place; and before the colony was thirty, another governor, although one of the Lords Proprietors had been impeached, deprived of his office, and expelled the province. It was this fearlessness in what they conceived to be their rights that carried her people through the troublous period of the " Cary Rebellion," so called; enabled them to meet with a firm