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fl. 1775–89

Samuel Andrews, a Loyalist leader during the Revolution, left his home in New Bern for Governor Josiah Martin's protection after the latter fled to the Cape Fear estuary in 1775. Commissioned a lieutenant by the governor, he fought at Moore's Creek Bridge and was taken prisoner to Halifax. He was released in October 1776 after taking the state oath of allegiance before the committee of safety. In 1781, Andrews raised a militia company in Bladen County and joined Cornwallis's forces. Part of the time he served under David Fanning, specializing in rescuing Loyalist prisoners and conducting them to the British areas. In 1782 he was in Charles Town as a major in Hector McNeill's regiment of the North Carolina militia.

At the evacuation of Charles Town, he went to East Florida, taking his wife, four children, and four enslaved people with him. There they lived on Doctor's Lagoon. Meanwhile, in North Carolina, Andrews was specifically excluded from the 1783 Act of Pardon and Oblivion. He reluctantly decided to go to Nova Scotia. In 1784 he told the Spanish authorities that he had not decided whether to remain in East Florida or to go with the British. He was in Shelburne, Nova Scotia, in 1785, and in 1788 he received 250 acres on the nearby Tusket River. He was living in the Shelburne area in 1789.

References:

Walter Clark, ed., State Records of North Carolina, vol. 16 (1907).

East Florida Papers, Bundle 323 A (Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.), for the 1784 census.

Marion Gilroy, Loyalists and Land Settlement in Nova Scotia (1937).

Public Archives of Nova Scotia, vol. 213 (Halifax, N.S.).

Public Record Office, A.O., 13:138, for the Joseph Mercer claim, and T., 50:5.

Lorenzo Sabine, Biographical Sketches of Loyalists in the American Revolution (1864.

reprint ed., 1966).

William L. Saunders, ed., Colonial Records of North Carolina, vol. 10 (1890).

Additional Resources:

Papers of James Iredell: Volume 2, North Carolina Digital Collections: https://digital.ncdcr.gov/Documents/Detail/papers-of-james-iredell-vol.-2/2149027/a>

The Adventures of David Fanning in the American Revolutionary War, by David Fanning, Alfred William Savary (accessed January 23, 2013).

Fanning, David. The narrative of Colonel David Fanning, (a Tory in the Revolutionary War with Great Britain;) giving an account of his adventures in North Carolina, from 1775 to 1783, as written by himself. Richmond, Va., Printed for private distribution only, in the first year of the independnence [!] of the Confederate States of America. 1861. https://archive.org/details/narrativeofcolon02fann (accessed January 23, 2013).

Proclamation by Alexander Martin concerning loyalists, Martin, Alexander, 1740-1807, July 28, 1783, Volume 16, Pages 850-851, Documenting the American South: https://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.html/document/csr16-0601

Minutes of the North Carolina Council of Safety, North Carolina. Council of Safety, September 27, 1776 - October 25, 1776, Volume 10, Pages 873-881,Documenting the American South https://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.html/document/csr10-0413 (accessed January 23, 2013).

Citation

Troxler, Carole W. "Andrews, Samuel." NCpedia. Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, University of North Carolina Press. Accessed on December 12th, 2024. http://ncpedia-02.dcs.mcnc.org/biography/andrews-samuel.