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Colonial and State Records of North Carolina
Journal of William Edmundson [Extracts]
Edmundson, William, 1627-1712
1676
Volume 01, Pages 226-227

EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL OF WILLIAM EDMUNDSON'S
SECOND VISIT TO CAROLINA.
[Reprinted from “The Friends Library,” Vol. II, Pages 123 and 124.]

“I was moved of the Lord to go to Carolina, and it was perillous travelling, for the Indians were not yet subdued, but did mischief and murdered several. They haunted much in the wilderness between Virginia and Carolina, so that scarce any durst travel that way unarmed. Friends endeavored to dissuade me from going, telling of several who were murdered. I considered, that if I should fall by the hands of those murderers, many thereby would take occasion to speak against truth and Friends; so I delayed some time, thinking the Lord might remove it from me, but it remained still with me.

“The next day I made ready for my journey, but none ventured to go with me, save one ancient man, a Friend. We took our journey through the wilderness, and in two days came well to Carolina, first to James Hall's house, who went from Ireland to Virginia with his family. His wife died there, and he had married the widow Phillips at Carolina, and lived there; but he had not heard that I was in those parts of the world. When I came into the house, I saw only a woman servant; I asked for her master. She said he was sick. I asked for her mistress, she said she was gone abroad. I bid her show me the room where her master lay; so I went into the room, where he was laid on the bed, sick of an ague with his face to the wall. I called him by his name, and said no more; he turned himself, and looked earnestly at me a pretty time,

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and was amazed; at last he asked if that was William? I said yes. He said he was affrighted, for he thought it had been my spirit; so he presently got up, and the ague left him, and did not return. He travelled with me the next day, and kept me company whilst I stayed in that part.

“On the first-day following, the appointed a meeting on the other side of Albemarle river, where the men and women had been convinced when I was there formerly; but when we came the man told us his wife was just dying, and it would not be convenient at that time to have the meeting there. So we ordered the meeting to be about a mile from thence, at one Tems's house, a justice of the peace, who with his wife, was convinced, and received the truth when I was in that country before. There we had a full precious meeting, but after we had gone from the house where the dying woman lay, she came to her senses, and her husband told her of the meeting, and of me; she said she remembered me well, and the words I spoke when I was there several years before, were as fresh in her memory, as if she heard me speak them just then; and said it had been happy for her that day, if she had lived accordingly. She died before our meeting was done, so that I could not speak with her. I had several precious meetings in that colony, and several turned to the Lord. People were tender and loving, and there was no room for the priests, for Friends were finely settled, and I left things well among them. When I was clear of that service, we returned to Virginia, safe under the Lord's protection; praises to his name for evermore!”

NOTE.—No date is given except that the whole tour in the Barbadoes, America, &c., is said to have been from 1675 to 1677; but a reference to Bacon's Rebellion seems to fix the date of this second visit to Albemarle in the year 1676.—ED.