ics of family and fireside conversation with the "old
folks," and they always found attentive listeners in their posterity,
upon whose youthful minds impressions then made were as enduring as
time.

CAPTAIN ALEXANDER DAVIDSON.

Captain Alexander Davidson was one of the earliest settlers of the
western part of Rowan county (now Iredell.) He took an active part in
the Revolutionary struggle for independence. When Cornwallis was
moving from Charleston toward North Carolina, and General Gates was
ordered to meet him, Governor Caswell, of North Carolina, ordered a
draft of men to strengthen Gates' army. In response to this order the
people in that part of Iredell county bordering on the Catawba river
below the Island Ford, assembled at a central point, afterward known
as Brown's Muster Ground, when a company was formed under the draft
and Alexander Davidson was elected its captain. Soon afterward Captain
Davidson marched his company to Gates' rendezvous, when that officer
moved his army to the unfortunate and sanguinary field of Camden, S.C.

In that disastrous engagement Captain Davidson's company took an
active part, and the greater portion of them was cut to pieces.
Captain John Davidson, a grand son of Captain Alexander Davidson, now
(1876) resides near Statesville, in Iredell county. He well remembers
that the commission of his grand father, as captain of this company,
and a diary of his services during the war of the Revolution, were in
the possession of his father's family until 1851 when they were taken
to Washington City by the late Hon. J.P. Caldwell and were not
returned.

Captain John Davidson is one of the most prominent and public-spirited
citizens of Iredell county, and implicit reliance may be placed in his
statements.

CAPTAIN JAMES HOUSTON.

Captain James Houston was born in 1747, and was an early and devoted
friend of liberty. In the battle of Ramsour's Mill, near the present
town of Lincolnton, he took an active part, and by his undaunted
courage greatly contributed to the defeat of the Tories on that
occasion. During the engagement Captain Houston was severely wounded
in the thigh, from the effects of which he never fully recovered.
Seeing the man who inflicted the severe and painful wound he shot him
in the back and killed him as he ran. When it was ascertained that
Cornwallis had crossed the Catawba river at Cowan's Ford, and was
approaching with his army, the family of Captain Houston conveyed