Thomas Person

Born January 19, 1733 in the Colony of Virginia to William and Ann Person.[https://books.google.com/books?id=IU8UAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA16 Thomas Person], Stephen B Weeks, North Carolina Booklet, vol. IX, no. 1 (July 1909), 16-35 He married his cousin, Johanna Philpot; the two had no children, and his nephew William Person Little was adopted as his heir. General Thomas Person spent most of his life in service to Granville County, North Carolina.

In 1756, after several years working for Earl Granville as a surveyor, Thomas Person was recommended for the position of Justice of the Peace for Granville County.{{cite web|url=http://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.html/document/csr05-0216|title=List of Justices for Granville County|date=July 6, 1756|website=Colonial and State Records of North Carolina|accessdate=April 10, 2019}} By the year 1762, he had become the county's sheriff.{{cite web|url=http://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.html/document/csr06-0256|title=Minutes of the Lower House of the North Carolina General Assembly, November 03, 1762 – December 11, 1762|website=Colonial and State Records of North Carolina|accessdate=April 10, 2019}}

After his election to represent Granville County in the Province of North Carolina House of Burgesses in 1764, Thomas Person would find himself on the side of the disaffected colonials in the War of the Regulation. When the Battle of Alamance ended in defeat for the Regulators, Governor William Tryon issued a series of amnesty proclamations for combatants and rioters, from which Thomas Person was specifically excluded,[http://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.html/document/csr08-0237 Proclamation by William Tryon Concerning a Pardon for Rioters], June 11, 1771 even though he was not present at the battle. Person was held for three weeks in Hillsborough but was eventually released without trial, due either to lack of evidence or his personal friendship with Edmund Fanning.{{cite web|url=http://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.html/document/csr08-es01|title=Preface to Volume 8 of the Colonial Records of North Carolina], page xxvii|accessdate=April 10, 2019}}{{cite web|url=https://www.carolana.com/NC/Royal_Colony/House_of_Burgesses/royal_27th_house_of_burgesses.html|author=Lewis, J.D.|title=Royal Colony of North Carolina, 27th House of Burgesses|website=Carolana.com|accessdate=October 24, 2019}}

In spite of his issues with Governor Tryon, Representative Person continued to serve in the state General Assembly until the beginning of the American Revolution, when he was named to the extra-legal North Carolina Provincial Congress. This body would eventually "concur with the delegates of the other colonies in declaring independency."{{cite web|url=http://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.html/document/csr10-0250|title=Minutes of the Provincial Congress of North Carolina|page=512|website=Colonial and State Records of North Carolina|accessdate=April 10, 2019}}

On May 4, 1776, Person was commissioned a brigadier general in command of the Hillsborough District Brigade of the North Carolina militia. His service consisted mostly of raising troops and collecting supplies rather than fighting on the field, and he turned over command the following year to John Butler, who would lead the unit in the Battle of Guilford Court House. Person spent the rest of the war serving on the North Carolina Council of State.[http://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.html/document/csr10-0445 Ordinances of the Provincial Congress of North Carolina] December 20, 1776{{cite web|url=http://www.carolana.com/NC/Revolution/patriot_leaders_nc_thomas_person.html|website=The American Revolution in North Carolina|title=Thomas Person|author=Lewis, J.D.|accessdate=March 13, 2019}}

After the war ended, Thomas Person became a leader of North Carolina's Anti-Federalists. They opposed the ratification of the United States Constitution on the grounds "that the Senate would become a bastion of aristocratic privilege, that an imperial president would overawe a complacent Congress, and that an intrusive federal court system would engender costly and oppressive litigation".[http://www.northcarolinahistory.org/commentary/109/entry North Carolina History Project] The Antifederalists: North Carolina's Other Founders Though there was broad support for the anti-federalists in North Carolina (outside of the wealthy coastal regions),[http://ncpedia.org/anti-federalists Encyclopedia of North Carolina] Anti-Federalists the ratification by 11 of the other colonies and the formulation of the Bill of Rights made it clear that ratification was inevitable by the end of 1789. Nevertheless, at the Fayetteville Convention in 1789, Thomas Person would vote Nay.

File:Person's Ordinary.jpg at Personton, now known as Littleton]]

General Person was an early supporter of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He granted them a gift of one thousand silver dollars to complete their chapel, which later bore his name.[http://museum.unc.edu/exhibits/names/thomas-person-1733-1800-and-person-hall/ Thomas Person (1733–1800) and Person Hall] He sat on the inaugural Board of Trustees and is listed on the Memorial to Founding Trustees outside Person Hall which also bears his name.[http://docsouth.unc.edu/commland/monument/23/ Memorial to Founding Trustees]

When Caswell County was divided in 1791, the newly formed Person County was named in honor of General Thomas Person. He died on November 16, 1800, at the home of his sister, Patty Person Taylor.{{Cite web | author= Survey and Planning Unit Staff | title=Patty Person Taylor House| work = National Register of Historic Places - Nomination and Inventory | date =November 1974 | url = https://files.nc.gov/ncdcr/nr/FK0021.pdf | publisher = North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office | accessdate = 2014-11-01}} The Patty Person Taylor House was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.{{NRISref|version=2010a}}

By the time of his death in 1800, Thomas Person owned over 125 square miles of land in North Carolina and Tennessee.[https://books.google.com/books?id=VeSDB5tKDagC&pg=PA74 Thomas Person] Dictionary of North Carolina Biography: Vol. 5 He also owned at least 34 slaves that he kept at his estate, Goshen, in Granville County, North Carolina.{{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140810172010/http://www2.lib.unc.edu/mss/exhibits/slavery/documents/personsettlement.html |date=2014-08-10|title=Settlement of Thomas Person's Estate}} Person's Ordinary at Littleton, North Carolina, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

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Category:1733 births

Category:1800 deaths

Category:Members of the North Carolina House of Representatives

Category:People from Granville County, North Carolina

Category:Militia generals in the American Revolution

Category:North Carolina militiamen in the American Revolution

Category:Members of the North Carolina Provincial Congresses

Category:Members of the North Carolina House of Burgesses