PEOPLE & 



PLACES 



Quaker Influence 

 in Colonial Carolina 



By Erin Seiiing 



Lymmd UWou ////courtesy Perquimans Co. Library Courtesy of Friends Historical Collection, Guilford College, Greensboro. NC 



Friends established Belvidere Academy in 1834. Originally a board'mgschool, the academy became 

 one of Perquimans County's most important educational institutions. Faculty and students of Belvidere Academy 

 are shown in front of the second school buildingcirca 1910. The school operated until 1935, when fire destroyed the 

 building. Up River Friends congregate at their first meeting house, built in 1 875. The Piney Woods Meeting 

 founded in 1 723, is the oldest continuous Quaker congregation in the state. 



Detailed records of early Quaker 

 meetings relate that William Edmundson, 

 leader of the Quaker movement in Ireland, 

 held a religious service in Carolina near the 

 present-day town of Hertford in 1672. This 

 meeting is often cited as the first organized 

 religious service in the colony, although 

 historians note this detail is open to debate. 



The following winter. Fox preached 

 several times in the Perquimans vicinity. 

 The hard-working, humble Quaker ideals 

 appealed to many of the colonists. The Friends 

 soon organized the first Quaker Meeting in 

 Carolina, which remained the colony's only 

 organized religious body until 1701, according 

 to the group's records. 



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. is the season for excess — too much 

 food, too many presents, too many places to be 

 and not enough time to get everything done. 



But a glimpse of simpler, colonial-era holi- 

 days can be found in the history of the Quakers 

 of northeastern North Carolina, a religious group 

 with early influences in the state. 



"We get calls every year from people 

 wanting to learn more about a traditional Quaker 

 Christmas," says Gwen Erickson, librarian and 

 archivist of the Friends Collection at Guilford 

 College. "The thing is, there wouldn't have been 

 a Christmas." 



Colonial Quakers would have put in a full 

 day of work without pausing to sing carols or ex- 

 change gifts. "It was like any other day," she adds. 



LURE OF CAROLINA 



"The Carolina colony was different from 

 the onset," Erickson says. 



"Dissenters," as Protestant Christians 

 were called, left Virginia and other states under 

 the influence of the Church of England to join 

 the few Quakers and other "free thinkers" who 

 settled near the Carolina coast, she explains. 



The name "Quaker" was first used 

 in 1650, when George Fox, founder of the 

 Quaker movement in England, was put on trial 

 for blasphemy. According to Fox's journal, 

 the judge presiding over the trial "called us 

 Quakers because we bid them tremble at the 

 word of God." Many, including Fox, disliked 

 the name, but it stuck. 



Quakers have been known by many 

 names over the years, including "Seekers," 

 "Children of the Light" and "Friends." In the 

 18th century, the group adopted its official 

 name, the "Religious Society of Friends," 

 but is still commonly known as the Quakers. 

 Although not as strictly tied to Old World 

 traditions as the Amish, Quakers still 

 practice many traditions that have roots in 

 centuries past 



Colonial settlers unhappy with religious 

 intolerance were drawn to Carolina because the 

 colony had no formal religious organization, 

 Erickson says. Without an established tie to a 

 religious body, the Carolina Colony was ripe 

 for the influence of prominent Quaker evange- 

 lists that visited in the late 1600s, she adds. 



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its official 

 "Religious Society of Frie 

 I commonly known 

 ough not as strictb 

 aditions as the 



Stories of early Carolina Quakers are not 

 as common as those of the "lost colonists" of 

 Roanoke or the Moravians of Old Salem. But 

 during early colonial times, Quakers were cited 

 as the largest religious group in what would 

 become North Carolina. 



While many later left the state in protest 

 of slavery, the town of Belvidere in Perquimans 

 County retains a large Quaker population. 



CHRISTMAS PAST AND PRESENT 



In the 17th century, many Protestants 

 chose either not to observe the Christmas 



Continued 



Coastwatch I Holiday 2006 I vww.wc5eagranf.org 23 



