1886- 111th Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence Celebration

The following are two articles announcing the 111th May 20th celebration of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence and another article explaining the history behind the celebration.

The Daily Charlotte Observer: Local Ripples 5/20/1886 p.3 and 5/20/1886

LOCAL RIPPLES.   —All the married folks are invited to attend the 20th of May ball tonight.  Young men can procure tickets from Mr. J. A. Solomons.  Dancing will begin promptly at 9:30 o’clock.   —Mr. W. S. Taylor and Mr. Julius Ahrens, two Charlotte boys who lately went to Lancaster to engage in business came home yesterday to spend the 20th.  This is a day when every Charlotte man wants to be at home.

Thursday, May 20, 1886

 The 20th May. 

Today is the 111th anniversary of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence.One hundred and eleven years ago the people then living in Mecklenburg county, so far as they could by mere words, sundered their relations as subjects of the crown of Great Britain.Some long years of war followed, and they made good on a hundred battlefields the declaration which pledged:“Their lives,Their fortunes andTheir most sacred honor,”Maintaining in the field of arms the resolutions passed at the meeting as a mere simple assertion.Looked at through the broad, effulgent, advancing civilization of today our Declaration was a superb piece of folly.We can hardly suppose a parallel case unless we imagine that some remote township in North Carolina should secede from the United States by the formal passage of an ordinance of secession.It would be laughed at today.But it was different a hundred and eleven years ago.There was then no such State as the State of North Carolina.There was a Province of North Carolina, presided over and ruled over by a British satrap,Who, with his minions, lived in the favor and by the appointment of the British Crown.There were no railroads,There were no telegraphs,There were no fast mails.Communities were segregated,And consequently much more independent that they are now.Organizations to fight against the Indians independently of the general government of the country, were common a few decades prior to the revolution.Indeed, possibly for a century, the Yadkin river was the dividing line between the territory inhabited by the whites and the Indians.Remember that Charlotte was fifty miles west of this line.That while it had a scatt-red population, Mecklenburg was not laid out as a county until 1765.For many years it had been a part of Anson county, and the county courthouse was in Wadesboro.Before that it had been an unknown territory, inhabited by Indians and wild animals.In the meantime Scotch-Irish and other people took possession of the lands within this territory.They took possession in the name of the crown of England.At length the government that was set up was so far imperfect thatThese founders of a new governmentWere no longer satisfied.There was taxation without representation,There were inordinate exactions of fees, as in the case of Fanning,There was no security for the future.American blood asserted itself andAmerican Liberty was born.Born in Mecklenburg,On the 20th day of May, 1775.Today is the anniversary.Celebrate it in your hearts if in no other way.

Year of Celebration: 1886