Concord in Rutherford County is so small that I missed it during my first two visits to North Carolina. It was a bittersweet moment discovering this Concord. I always like adding to my list, but I didn't want to make a third trip, so I left it until the final major tour of miscellaneous Concords in the fall of 2024.
We started the morning in Yorktown Virginia and headed to a Concord crossroads in Brunswick, Virginia. We dipped south into North Carolina and headed to a second crossroads labelled “Concord” in Randolph County. It wasn’t a township, but it was listed as an “Unincorporated historical community.” Other than that, there was no further information about the history of this "historic community."
The road twisted and rolled as we sped through small semi-rural, semi-suburban Piedmont communities. It was a warm autumn day with no one to be seen except a heavyset man in a white tee shirt and jeans sawing up a downed limb in a front yard festooned with TRUMP signs.
We started the morning in Yorktown Virginia and headed to a Concord crossroads in Brunswick, Virginia. We dipped south into North Carolina and headed to a second crossroads labelled “Concord” in Randolph County. It wasn’t a township, but it was listed as an “Unincorporated historical community.” Other than that, there was no further information about the history of this "historic community."
The road twisted and rolled as we sped through small semi-rural, semi-suburban Piedmont communities. It was a warm autumn day with no one to be seen except a heavyset man in a white tee shirt and jeans sawing up a downed limb in a front yard festooned with TRUMP signs.
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The town center had once been a gathering spot. There had been a couple of stores, a tavern, and a post office, but now it was reverting to being an empty crossroad. The post office had been closed for some time but someone had tried to maintain the building.
I drove through town looking for someone to talk to. The Farmer Fire Station may or may not have been. I had a nice chat with two volunteer firemen. Unfortunately, the file of the recording was corrupt, so the only name I remember is Jolene, the dog.
On our way back out of town, we stopped off at the house of with the fallen limb. An older couple was having a drink on their porch. When I parked and approached, the woman leapt up and scrambled into the house. Either she was fearfully shy or she was getting the shotgun.
Bill Malone, was up from south Texas. He had lived in Rutherford County for six years. He corrected me when I said we were in "Concord Township." This "unincorporated historical community" designation threw me off and again I didn't get a recording of my two standard questions. I thought he had a great face, so I focused on getting a portrait.
This was meant to be a classic drive-to, drive-through, drive away Concord. There was nothing about this Concord. They did proudly display this sign outside the old post office.
One of the joys of these trips is discovering some bit of local history. Researching this marker sent me down a rabbit hole. What was the Catawba War? Who was “Gov Tryon?”
The Catawba people along the Catawba River had occupied the Piedmont region of Virginia, South Carolina and North Carolina for over 6000 years. Their first contact with Europeans was when Hernando Desoto first came looking for gold in the 1500’s. They had little contact with the Jamestown settlers until the mid 17th century when Europeans pushed inland.How did they react to frontier expansion? Sources are contradictory. Some say they were peaceful traders, while other sources tell of their fierce reputation in defense of their homeland. It does seem that they tried to adapt and accommodate the newcomers, but like all eastern Native Americans, they were decimated by disease. Repeated waves of smallpox swept through the Catawba and their allies. In 1759, smallpox killed approximately half the population. Warfare and disease continued to reduce their numbers. They leased their farmlands to white settlers and were eventually forced to sell off almost all of their ancestral lands. Some Catawba headed north to Illiquos lands, others intermarried with the Cherokee to the west. A small reservation survived in South Carolina. In 1959, the US government declared the tribe extinct and voided all land claims. They regained tribal recognition in South Carolina in 1973, and 20 years later they were recognized once again by the federal government. In the 2010 census, 3,370 people identified as having Catawba ancestry.
It’s hard to say which war is being marked by the signage in Concord. The Catawba were allied with the British in the French and Indian War. They later turned against the British in the Revolutionary War and they fought alongside Confederate troops in the Civil War. They also participated in a number of conflicts between settlers and other native people in the area.
The marker “GOV TYRON CROSSED RIVER MAY 25, 1771” refers to the British governor taking 1000 troops through the area in his successful attempt to quell a tax rebellion by 2000 “Regulators” in western North Carolina. It is seen by some historians as part of the arc of the movement toward American Independence.
The final part of the marker “Others - INDIANS 300 years - STAGECOACH -1800.” looks to me like notes from a history class by someone with ADHD.
The Catawba people along the Catawba River had occupied the Piedmont region of Virginia, South Carolina and North Carolina for over 6000 years. Their first contact with Europeans was when Hernando Desoto first came looking for gold in the 1500’s. They had little contact with the Jamestown settlers until the mid 17th century when Europeans pushed inland.How did they react to frontier expansion? Sources are contradictory. Some say they were peaceful traders, while other sources tell of their fierce reputation in defense of their homeland. It does seem that they tried to adapt and accommodate the newcomers, but like all eastern Native Americans, they were decimated by disease. Repeated waves of smallpox swept through the Catawba and their allies. In 1759, smallpox killed approximately half the population. Warfare and disease continued to reduce their numbers. They leased their farmlands to white settlers and were eventually forced to sell off almost all of their ancestral lands. Some Catawba headed north to Illiquos lands, others intermarried with the Cherokee to the west. A small reservation survived in South Carolina. In 1959, the US government declared the tribe extinct and voided all land claims. They regained tribal recognition in South Carolina in 1973, and 20 years later they were recognized once again by the federal government. In the 2010 census, 3,370 people identified as having Catawba ancestry.
It’s hard to say which war is being marked by the signage in Concord. The Catawba were allied with the British in the French and Indian War. They later turned against the British in the Revolutionary War and they fought alongside Confederate troops in the Civil War. They also participated in a number of conflicts between settlers and other native people in the area.
The marker “GOV TYRON CROSSED RIVER MAY 25, 1771” refers to the British governor taking 1000 troops through the area in his successful attempt to quell a tax rebellion by 2000 “Regulators” in western North Carolina. It is seen by some historians as part of the arc of the movement toward American Independence.
The final part of the marker “Others - INDIANS 300 years - STAGECOACH -1800.” looks to me like notes from a history class by someone with ADHD.