- Flora MacDonald: “The Bright and Particular Star”
- Henry Berry Lowry Lives Forever
- Supplementary Readings: Mary Slocumb and Tsali
- Assignment 3
The following article appeared in Tar
Heel Junior Historian 39 (spring 2000), 9–11.
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Although Flora MacDonald lived in North
Carolina only a short time, her legend took strong hold within the Scottish
population here and has continued as an important symbol of North Carolina’s
Scots history. But who was this young woman whose legend spanned two continents?
 Courtesy of the Scottish Heritage Center, Saint Andrews Presbyterian College, Laurinburg. |
Flora MacDonald was born in 1722 in South Uist, Scotland, to a well-placed family in the MacDonald clan. She grew up hearing many stories about Scotland’s past, including the story of King James II, a Catholic king of England and Scotland, who was removed from the throne and exiled in 1688 by Protestants who feared the influence of a Catholic king. Many Scots remained hopeful that someday King James’s son would return to lead Scotland. This son, James Francis Edward Stuart (called the Old Pretender), tried to regain the throne but failed. The burden then fell to the Old Pretender’s son, Charles Edward Stuart, called Bonnie Prince Charlie. |
The Scots who wished for the return of a Scottish king called themselves Jacobites, in honor of King James. They talked about the day when Bonnie Prince Charlie would return to Scotland and regain the throne. You can imagine the stories and songs that young Flora MacDonald heard as some of her clanspeople looked forward to the day of young Prince Charlie’s arrival!
In 1745 Bonnie Prince Charlie did arrive in Scotland and quietly organized supporters. Some clans participated, and others waited to see what would happen. After a few successful battles, Prince Charles and the Jacobites suffered a horrible defeat in a bloody battle at Culloden. Following the battle, King George II of England issued orders to torture and punish those who had helped the prince. And Prince Charlie needed to get out of Scotland quickly before he was killed!
Flora’s family encouraged her to help get
the prince to safety. This was a dangerous but brave act. According to
legend, she and several other clanswomen secretly created a woman’s costume
for the prince. Then, Flora traveled with Prince Charlie, whom she disguised
as her maid, Betty Burke, through the Highland country and across the sea
to the Isle of Skye.
| The English king’s men followed
them closely and gave them no rest. The trip was dangerous, and they spent
many days tired, hungry, and soaking wet from the Scottish rains. Flora
could have left the prince and returned home, but she refused. After several
weeks, the prince continued on his own and found a ship that took him to
France. Flora returned home to her clan.
Once home, Flora was arrested by the English and taken on a long sea journey to London, where she awaited trial. Conditions on the ship were horrible, and Flora must have been very frightened and homesick. On board, however, she charmed the crew, and the captain of the ship wrote a letter requesting that Flora be kept out of jail, since she was such a nice and charming girl. The letter worked, and Flora was kept in a private home with several other clanspeople, rather than in a jail. |
Pasteboard of Bonnie Prince Charlie. |
In London, Flora charmed those who cared for her and made many friends among English Jacobites, who came to visit her regularly. The English Jacobites knew Flora’s story and felt privileged to spend time with such a brave young woman. Flora returned home two years later with many friends and a sizable fortune raised for her by the English Jacobites. She never stood trial.
After returning home, Flora married Allan MacDonald, also of the clan MacDonald. They lived in Scotland for many years and had seven children. The family went into great debt because of high land rents and bad weather that ruined their crops. Things were desperate for the MacDonalds and many others throughout Scotland. In 1774 Flora and Allan emigrated to North Carolina, where they believed they could begin a better life.
The MacDonalds arrived in Wilmington in the fall of 1774. There, they found a substantial Scottish population, most members of whom were aware of Flora MacDonald’s efforts to save the prince. In fact, Flora was quite a heroine in North Carolina among the Scots.
The MacDonalds soon learned about the growing conflict between colonists and King George III. Although they tried to stay out of the trouble, eventually everyone had to choose a side. Since Allan MacDonald had signed an oath of loyalty to England in order to receive a military commission, the MacDonalds decided to remain loyal to the king. This decision was the end of their joy in North Carolina.
In 1775 royal governor Josiah Martin tried to raise a small North Carolina Highland regiment to fight the Patriots, and he included Allan MacDonald. In February of 1776, a small unit of fewer than five hundred Highlanders, along with other Loyalists, departed for the coast to join the British army.
One legend of Flora tells of how she saw the Highland unit off. “On the public square, near the royal standard, in Gaelic, she made a powerful address, with all her power, exhibiting her genius she dwelt at length upon the loyalty of the Scots, their bravery, and the sacrifices her people had made. She urged them to duty, and was successful in exciting all to a high military pitch.” She then mounted her snow-white horse, bade her husband farewell, and returned to her plantation. No one knows for sure if this story is true, but it continues to be popular.
At Moores Creek Bridge in Pender County, the Highlanders encountered the Patriot forces, who had taken the planks off the bridge and greased the side rails. As the Loyalists tried to cross the bridge, Patriot soldiers shot at them and killed many. The entire ordeal lasted only a few minutes, but the Loyalists lost the battle. Flora MacDonald was devastated—her life in North Carolina had come to a close before it had really begun.
Following the defeat at Moores Creek, Allan MacDonald and one of Flora’s sons were jailed in North Carolina and, later, in Philadelphia. Flora had to face the anger and violence of local Patriots with the help of her remaining son. Their plantation was robbed, and she fled to her daughter’s home nearby. A disappointed Allan and Flora eventually left America for Nova Scotia.
The following year, Flora and Allan returned to Scotland to live the remainder of their lives. After living through glory and hard times, Flora MacDonald died in 1790 and was buried just two miles from the spot where she and Prince Charles reached safety in 1746. Her legend, however, continues today as a story of bravery, romance, and loyalty.
*Deanna Kerrigan is the former outreach programs supervisor at the North Carolina Museum of History.
The Legendary Flora
MacDonald
Read some of the legends
surrounding MacDonald’s deeds. Are they true? You decide.
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Family legend says that these shoe buckles came directly from Flora MacDonald. Shortly before she returned to Scotland, Flora gave the buckles to Jane Dunbidden. They stayed in her family until they were bequeathed to Flora MacDonald College. |
Flora MacDonald Web Sites
Crossing the Atlantic
http://www.archaeology.co.uk/the-timeline-of-britain/crossing-the-atlantic.htm
A description of the University of Sheffield’s
Flora MacDonald Project, which traces archaeological evidence of MacDonald
from Scotland to Nova Scotia.
| Flora MacDonald’s legend has been commemorated in song. Listen to and read the lyrics of the two best-known songs about her, “Flora MacDonald’s Lament” and “The Skye Boat Song.” |
The following article appeared in Tar
Heel Junior Historian 39 (spring 2000), 12–14.
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On a hot June day in 1999, a young Lumbee Indian man, Randall Oxendine, stood on the banks of the old millpond at Bear Swamp and yelled, “I’m gonna get you, Henry Berry!” Gabrial Cummings looked at him and asked what Randall would do if Henry Berry came floating down that swamp in his flat-bottomed boat with his rifle across his knee. Randall, Gabrial, and I all laughed nervously, wondering if or when Henry Berry Lowry would come paddling down that swamp. We all looked to see if he was there. . . .
Henry Berry Lowry was the legend of Robeson County even before he vanished in February 1872. He disappeared after he stole the safes from Pope and McLeod’s store and from the sheriff’s office in Lumberton. He broke open the sheriff’s safe and left it lying in the middle of a Lumberton street. In all, he stole $28,000. Three days later he vanished. The New York Herald published reports that Henry Berry Lowry had accidentally killed himself. An elderly Lumbee man, John Godwin, said that Henry Berry Lowry “had been trying to shoot the load off his gun for a long time. . . . The load went right up through here, my mother said, and blowed the top of his head off.” This and other local legends were recorded by Lumbee historian and teacher Adolph Dial in the 1960s and 1970s. The many legends differ in their account of Lowry’s disappearance. A ninety-six-year-old Lumbee man, Mabe Sampson, believed that Henry Berry Lowry escaped from the militia and the United States troops who were trying to track him down. Mr. Sampson said that “Henry Berry left here and was sent off by a white man, loaded right here at Moss Neck. He never was killed.”
Henry
Berry Lowry was one of twelve children in the family of Allen and Mary
Lowry. The Lowrys struggled, as did other Indians in Robeson County, through
the hard times that the Civil War brought them. During the war, the Confederacy
forced Lumbees to work on building the earthen Fort Fisher near Wilmington.
At home, the Home Guard accused Indians of harboring escaped Union prisoners
and Confederate deserters, hiding guns, and stealing meat from smokehouses.
The Home Guard supported the Confederacy and maintained law and order at
home while the war was being fought. Indian men had to resort to “lying
out”—or hiding—in the swamps to avoid being harassed and rounded up by
the Home Guard.
Henry Berry Lowry had had enough of being controlled and pushed around by the local Home Guard authority, so he struck back. He killed James P. Barnes on December 21, 1864, and James Brantley “Brant” Harris on January 15, 1865. The Lowry family had had ongoing disputes with both men. The Home Guard avenged the deaths of James Barnes and Brant Harris by accusing Henry Berry Lowry’s father, Allen, and brother William of various crimes. The Home Guard called an illegal court. They tried, convicted, and executed Allen and William in one day, March 3, 1865. Eighteen-year-old Henry Berry Lowry reportedly watched the executions from behind some bushes. He swore to take revenge for their deaths.
Henry Berry Lowry was a wanted man. He lay out in the swamps but was arrested (with no warrant) for murder by the Home Guard on December 7, 1865, at his wedding to Rhoda Strong. Mary Norment, author of The Lowrie History, says that after his arrest “he filed his way out of the grated iron window bars, escaped to the woods with handcuffs on, and made his way back to his wife in Scuffletown [Pembroke].”
Henry Berry Lowry had gathered around him other Indian men who had tired of taking the mistreatment of whites. Along with this group, two African Americans and one white “buckskin” Scot joined what became known as the Lowry band. The band robbed rich white landowners, and Henry Berry Lowry became the “Robin Hood” of Robeson County. The governor outlawed Henry Berry Lowry and the band in 1869, offering large rewards for them, dead or alive. The band responded with violence. In one ten-month stretch, ten Police Guard and Lowry band members died.
In 1871 Francis Marion Wishart became colonel of the Police Guard manhunt and had the wives of the Lowry band held hostage in prison. Henry Berry Lowry and other band members sent Wishart a letter demanding the release of their wives, or “the bloodiest times will be here than ever was before—the life of every man will be in jeopardy.” The wives were released, and Colonel Wishart and the government began to work out an end to the conflict. The killing soon stopped, and in February 1872 Henry Berry Lowry vanished. Colonel Wishart called the reports of his death “ALL A HOAX.” No one ever collected the $12,000 reward for his life.
Many years after he vanished, Henry Berry Lowry reportedly was seen in a church at a funeral for someone he knew. No one talked to him, and he talked to no one, but Robeson County resident Charlie McBryde says that “They said had you looked at his eyes good, you would have known it was Henry Berry.” Today, reminders of Henry Berry Lowry are all around the area, with a road named after him and a play portraying his life. Henry Berry Lowry has lived on in the minds and hearts of the Lumbee. If you are ever in Robeson County, go down to the swamps and be still. You can feel him, and if you look real close, you might even see him.
*Jefferson Currie is Lumbee. He has worked at the North Carolina Museum of History and constributed to the Henry Berry Lowry portion of the exhibit North Carolina Legends.
| Lowry Lives On
The legend of Henry Berry Lowry lives on in North Carolina’s Lumbee communities. Residents claim that the spirit of Lowry emerged time and again in the struggles of Lumbee people throughout the twentieth century. To fight back when threatened and to unite for a common cause: these are the goals that endeared him to his people. From Henry Berry Lowry College to an annual outdoor drama based on the Lowry legend, the Lumbee remember the Robin Hood of Robeson County. Baseball caps, T-shirts, and other items carry the message “Henry Berry Lowry Lives Forever.” |
Henry Berry
Lowry Legends
Henry Berry Lowry created a lasting legacy
of stories, especially among the Lumbee. People still talk about what he
did and why he did it. They recall the times their families helped him
out, and they wonder about his fate. Many people who grew up in Lumbee
country have stories about Lowry. Read some of them here.
Henry Berry Lowry Web Sites
Henry Berry Lowrie
http://www.lumbee.org/hbl.html
The Lowry legend from the Lumbee perspective.
Henry Berry Lowrie
http://www.uncp.edu/nativemuseum/collections/hbl/index.htm
A photograph of Henry Berry Lowry and
a brief summary of his infamous deeds.
Rachel Carson is legendary because she was an important environmental activist.
Other North Carolina Legends Who Defended
Their Communities
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Option 1:
Legends can be interpreted in many ways.
Choose one of the four legends presented in this session and analyze that
legend in an essay or outline in relation to the following statements:
- Legend telling is a socially accepted way to express fear. It also serves to warn others about real or perceived dangers.
- Legend telling is a way to open debate on social problems.
- Legends begin with a bit of truth, but time has blurred the line between history and fiction.
- Legends serve to bring a group of people—families, students at a college, residents of a town, etc.—closer together.
Option 2: (If you are seeking reading credits, choose this option.)
Create a reading list appropriate for your students focusing on one or more legendary figures who
defended their communities. (You may choose legends not associated with
North Carolina if they fit your curriculum.) Briefly discuss how you could use the materials to improve reading skills and boost students' interest in reading. Resources can include essays, nonfiction books, historical fiction, biographies, Web sites, government documents, diaries, letters, music lyrics, etc.
Submit your completed assignment via e-mail to: tricia.l.blakistone@ncdcr.gov.