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Caswell County Genealogy
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 1801 - 1876 (75 years)
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| Name |
Long, William [1] |
| Birth |
7 Mar 1801 |
North Carolina  [2] |
| Gender |
Male |
| Reference Number |
4399 |
| Death |
22 May 1876 [2] |
| Burial |
Family Cemetery, Hamer, Caswell County, North Carolina [2] |
| Person ID |
I4339 |
Caswell County |
| Last Modified |
13 Oct 2023 |
| Family 1 |
Johnston, Sarah Donoho, b. 12 Dec 1806, North Carolina d. 27 Apr 1851 (Age 44 years) |
| Marriage |
21 Oct 1828 |
| Reference Number |
33413 |
| Children |
| + | 1. Living |
| | 2. Living |
| | 3. Living |
| | 4. Living |
| | 5. Long, William Stephens, b. 1831 d. 1870 (Age 39 years) [Father: natural] [Mother: natural] |
| + | 6. Long, Frances E., b. 4 Dec 1837, North Carolina d. 24 Jun 1908, Nashville, Davidson County, Tennessee (Age 70 years) [Father: natural] [Mother: natural] |
| + | 7. Long, Marion, b. 13 Jan 1842 d. 18 Jan 1906 (Age 64 years) [Father: natural] [Mother: natural] |
| + | 8. Long, James Monroe, b. 6 Sep 1843, Caswell County, North Carolina d. 18 Dec 1919 (Age 76 years) [Father: natural] [Mother: natural] |
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| Family ID |
F1273 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Last Modified |
13 Oct 2023 |
| Family 2 |
Richmond, Margaret Anna, b. 1840 d. 25 Sep 1901, Caswell County, North Carolina (Age 61 years) |
| Marriage |
16 Jun 1872 |
Holly Springs, Marshall County, Mississippi [2] |
| Reference Number |
33172 |
| Children |
| | 1. Living |
| + | 2. Long, Willie Elizabeth, b. 29 May 1873, Milton Township, Caswell County, North Carolina d. 2 Feb 1950 (Age 76 years) [Father: natural] [Mother: natural] |
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| Family ID |
F2352 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Last Modified |
13 Oct 2023 |
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| Notes |
- William Long (1801-1876)
(for larger image, click on photograph)
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His home, Cherry Hill, was in the Hamer Community of Caswell County. In 1856 William Long built the plantation house on Cherry Hill Farm. He used his own water-powered sawmill to generate the lumber needed. Free black cabinetmaker from Milton, Thomas Day, provided some of the architectural details and furnishings. This includes the hall balustrade and the mantel for the parlor fireplace. A bill from Thomas Day in the possession of the family shows that the balustrade and mantel were delivered late and the price reduced by Thomas Day.
Source: The Heritage of Caswell County, North Carolina, Jeannine D. Whitlow, Editor (1985) at 362 (Article No. 452, "William Long, Sarah D. Johnston Long, and Margaret Anna Richmond Long" by Mrs. Currie Kerr Thompson).
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The house at Cherry Hill Farm, the Long House, is shown at page 129 of An Inventory of Historic Architecture: Caswell County, North Carolina, Ruth Little-Stokes (1979) along with the following text:
Photo 162. Long House. 1856. Unusual Boom Era type house with heavy Italianate details, including segmental-arched porch bays, paneled porch posts and corner posts, and bracketed eaves. Rest of structure is Greek Revival in style. Exterior end brick chimneys, one with a dated brick.
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Also in the Ruth Little-Stokes book is a photograph of the William Long Grist Mill (page 130) and the following commentary:
Photo 164. William Long Grist Mill. Late 19th century. Shell of a 2-story frame turbine powered grist mill on a stone foundation. The mill operated until ca. 1941. The turbine wheel and a mill stone are preserved at the nearby Long House.
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"At the first North Carolina State Fair in 1853, Y. and E. P. Jones of Yanceyville won $5 and a diploma for the best specimen of manufactured chewing tobacco, while W. & J. D. Long of Caswell County received a diploma for a fine specimen of tobacco. At the second State Fair in 1854, C. H. Richmond was awarded $10 for a tobacco press." Source: The Heritage of Caswell County, North Carolina, Jeannine D. Whitlow, Editor (1985) at 70 ("Tobacco" by W. Ernest Blaylock).
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The following is from When the Past Refused to Die: A History of Caswell County North Carolina 1777-1977, William S. Powell (1977) at 476:
"The Farmer's Journal, closely associated with the State Agricultural Society, published a paper in its April, 1854, number that had been read before the Caswell County Agricultural Society. In the paper, prepared by a committee composed of John A. Graves, N. M. Roan, E. P. Jones, Thos. D. Johnston, Thos. Bigalow, and S. P. Hill, a comparison was made between agricultural conditions in Caswell County and those in Columbia County, Pennsylvania. The superiority of the Pennsylvania county in value of land, value of farm equipment, and in other areas, was credited to the good work of an agricultural society. A clear call was made for scientific study and improvement at home. Reading the Farmer's Journal was recommended to planters and farmers in Caswell and E. C. (probably E. P.) and Y. Jones, A. Willis, and William Long were agents to receive subscriptions."
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The following is from Thomas Day: Master Craftsman and Free Man of Color, Patricia Phillips Marshall and Jo Ramsay Leimenstoll (2010) (various pages and footnotes):
In 1856 William Long paid [Thomas] Day $32 for two rocking chairs ($16 each), an indication that rocking chairs that Day priced at more than $10 were upholstered. See William Long Papers, North Carolina Office of Archives and History, State Archives, Raleigh.
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The owners of the homes in which Thomas Day's architectural woodwork is found constituted some of the wealthiest and most powerful individuals in the Dan River region: physician John Tab Garland, M.D., at one time the richest man in Caswell County (1850s and 1860s); banker and civic leader Thomas Donoho Johnston; machine shop, foundry, and sawmill owner Caleb Richmond; state senator James Kerr; merchant and tobacco factory owner John Wilson; planters William Long (also the owner of a sawmill and gristmill), Sidney Lea, George Williamson, Haywood Williams, Thomas Mumford McGehee, and William H. Holderness.
Family relationships among the planters enhanced the demand for Thomas-Day-made architectural trimwork. Thomas Donoho Johnston built Clarendon Hall in 1842 and tapped Day to embellish the interior; when his sister and brother-in-law, Sarah and William Long, built the Long House in 1856, they, too, turned to Day. Day provided the architectural woodwork for the house of Captain Carter Powell around 1848 and that of his son Henry Alexander Powell less than a decade later. Thomas L. Lea and his siblings Sidney S. Lea and Rebecca Lea (Mrs. George Williamson), his niece Elizabeth Lea (Mrs. Calvin Graves), and his daughter Ann Lea (Mrs. William Griffin Graves) provided Day the opportunity to do the woodwork on a law office and four of their five houses between 1840 and 1850.
The woodwork suggests the Carter Powell house was built around 1848 rather than the more often cited 1850. Day's machine-cut newels with tendrils date Henry Powell's house to 1853-1855. Day's work for Elizabeth Lea and Calvin Graves was not on their house, as it was built several years earlier, but on Calvin's law office, for which Day supplied the mantel. For a discussion of this family, see Whitlow, "Thomas L. Lea," in Heritage of Caswell County, 354.
Source: Thomas Day: Master Craftsman and Free Man of Color, Patricia Phillips Marshall and Jo Ramsay Leimenstoll (2010) at 134-135 and 246 (footnote 10).
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Beyond the letters documenting Thomas Day's work for the Dialectic and Philanthropic Societies at the University of North Carolina, few written records link Day to his architectural woodwork. A single reference to the deduction of $4 for "not finish of fire piece" in Day's account sheet for William Long directly connects Day to the woodwork at the Long House, but even this sparse record is unusual.
Source: Thomas Day: Master Craftsman and Free Man of Color, Patricia Phillips Marshall and Jo Ramsay Leimenstoll (2010) at 248 (footnote 32).
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"Hi Rick. I visit old grave yards and repair broken gravestones. Tomorrow I am replacing the stone of William Long my great great Uncle. Hwy 62 between Milton and Yanceyville. (1801-1876)." Source: Lee Brandon 23 October 2021 Post to RSF Facebook Page.
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Bright Leaf Tobacco Discovery Controversy
That bright leaf tobacco was discovered in 1839 by enslaved person Steven on the Blanch farm of Abisha Slade generally has been accepted as "history." See the North Carolina historical marker on the subject.
However, in 1876 Caswell County's William Long (1801-1876) took exception to this in his letter to the editor of "The Torchlight" newspaper (Oxford, NC):
Caswell Co., N.C., April 7, 1876
Dear Sir -- I delayed answering your inquiry as to who was the first man that cured yellow tobacco in Caswell, and I see you have learned that Mr. Abishai [sic] Slade was considered to be that man and more that it occurred in the year 1756. This is a great mistake.
I cured yellow tobacco myself as early as 1826, and I do not by any means claim to be the first man. Who the first man was I really do not know; but of this I am not mistaken as to the time. I married in 1828, and before I married (as above stated, in 1826), I cured yellow tobacco. The third curing I made after I was settled, namely, in 1831. I met W. N. Thomas of Pittsylvania County, Va., in the streets of Milton, and we both fell to bragging about our yellow. He went home with me, and as I had to cure my leaf that night, he went with me, and we cured it as handsomely as any I have ever seen.
The effort to produce this sort of tobacco was general among our planters at that time. The Slade family were the most prominent; they had very fine land, and their names were at the head of the list. I do not pretend for a moment to take away from those enterprising men the credit that is so justly their due, but write merely to set you right in the way of dates. If you could have recourse to the old warehouse books you would find that between 1830 and 1820 this fine yellow tobacco sold at figures as high as from $70 to $200 per hundred pounds.
William Long
Source: "The Torchlight" (Oxford, NC), 30 May 1876.
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On October 21, 1828, William Long (1801-1876) married Sarah Donoho Johnston (1806-1851).
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1850 United States Federal Census
Name: William Long
Age: 49
Birth Year: abt 1801
Birthplace: North Carolina
Home in 1850: Caswell, North Carolina
Gender: Male
Family Number: 79
Household Members: Name Age
William Long 49
Sallie D Long 43
Dixon Long 20
William Long 18
David Long 16
Thos Long 14
Francis Long 12
Mary A Long 8
Manroe Long 6
1860 United States Federal Census (unconfirmed record)
Name: Wm Long
Age in 1860: 59
Birth Year: abt 1801
Birthplace: North Carolina
Home in 1860: Caswell, North Carolina
Gender: Male
Post Office: Leasburg
Household Members: Name Age
Wm Long 59
F E Long 22
M A Long 18
J M Long 16
1870 United States Federal Census
Name: William Long
Age in 1870: 69
Birth Year: abt 1801
Birthplace: North Carolina
Home in 1870: Milton, Caswell, North Carolina
Race: White
Gender: Male
Post Office: Milton
Household Members: Name Age
William Long 69
Fannie Long 25
Monroe Long 26
James Long 21
Flora Long 12
William Long 7
Lilliam Long 6
Nancy Johnson 67
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1850 U.S. Federal Census - Slave Schedules
Home in 1860: Caswell, North Carolina
Name of Slave Owner: William Long
All Slaves Owned: Age Gender
60 Male
58 Male
53 Male
52 Male
49 Male
48 Female
43 Male
42 Male
40 Male
38 Female
33 Female
33 Female
31 Female
39 Female
35 Female
31 Female
23 Male
23 Male
21 Male
20 Male
17 Female
17 Female
15 Male
15 Male
15 Male
15 Female
14 Male
13 Female
12 Female
13 Male
12 Male
12 Male
12 Male
9 Female
9 Female
10 Female
12 Female
8 Female
7 Male
7 Male
7 Male
6 Male
6 Male
6 Female
5 Female
5 Female
11 Female
4 Male
4 Male
4 Female
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| Sources |
- Details: The Heritage of Caswell County, North Carolina, Jeannine D. Whitlow, Editor (1985) at 532-533 (Article #723 "Currie Kerr Thompson I, and Willie Elizabeth Long Thompson" by Hattie Mae Winstead Thompson).
- Details: The Heritage of Caswell County, North Carolina, Jeannine D. Whitlow, Editor (1985) at 362 (Article #452 "William Long, Sarah D. Johnston Long, and Margaret Anna Richmond Long" by Mrs. C. K. Thompson).
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