By Warren L. Bingham
It’s 2026 which means it’s time to celebrate America’s semiquincentennial. Since semiquincentennial sounds like a dreaded medical procedure, the celebration’s formal organizers just call it America 250. For this special anniversary, we should do more than the customary overindulgence in hot dogs, ice cream and fireworks on the Fourth of July. We should remember.
Sometime before the last Roman candle brightens the sky, you should consider paying tribute to three important Founding Fathers whom you’ve likely never heard of: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes and John Penn, the trio from North Carolina who signed the Declaration of Independence, which is, after all, the reason for all this merrymaking and bottle-rocketing. The Fourth is about the Declaration.
The three North Carolinians were among a total of 56 signers of the Declaration. Great Britain considered all of them to be traitors, for which they risked their lives. The last line of the Declaration summarizes the gravity of the signers’ commitment: We mutually pledge to each other our lives, fortunes, and our sacred honor. Had the American rebellion failed, the signers would have likely been executed in the public square. Or as Benjamin Franklin, the oldest signer of the Declaration at the age of 70, observed, “We must all hang together or assuredly we shall hang separately.”
In July 1776, the Continental Congress, composed of delegates from the 13 British colonies lining the Atlantic Coast from New Hampshire to Georgia, had been in session in Philadelphia for over a year. Hooper, Hewes and Penn, selected by their peers in North Carolina’s Provincial Congress, represented North Carolina. The primary topic was governance and whether the Colonies should seek independence from Great Britain.
The Colonies had recently ousted royal governors, and now Colonial assemblies were trying to figure out how to best govern themselves — but the people were still subjects of King George III, and a good number of Americans liked it that way. Many felt it was beneficial to remain with Great Britain, and numerous English, Scots and Scots-Irish settlers had known only loyalty to the king. Some historians describe the Revolutionary War as America’s first civil war.
News of deadly skirmishes in New England perpetrated by British troops against local militia, combined with King George III’s uncompromising efforts to tax and regulate the Colonists, increasingly drove Americans to question their loyalty to the Mother Country. The women of eastern Carolina were notably engaged in their own protest of the crown and the British Parliament. Fifty-one women, led by Penelope Barker of Edenton, lent their names in the fight against tyranny when they staged the Edenton Tea Party in 1774. Parliament had passed several taxes on imported British goods, and the ladies of Edenton called for a boycott of British imports.
As debates about independence crept along in Philadelphia, delegates would come and go, tending to matters at home. Among the dozens of delegates from the 13 Colonies, rarely was everyone present at the same time. Travel was hard — the trip by horse from North Carolina to Philadelphia took two to three weeks.
In North Carolina, momentum for self-governance was growing. In May 1775, Mecklenburg County leaders met in Charlotte and publicly resolved their desire for independence. Then, in April 1776, the North Carolina Provincial Congress put forth the Halifax Resolves in which North Carolina became the first Colony to call for independence from Great Britain. From that action in Halifax comes a significant claim: North Carolina — First in Freedom.
In January 1776, Thomas Paine, a theretofore little-known writer and thinker, released his pamphlet, Common Sense, which strongly advocated for American independence from Great Britain. Written for the masses, Paine called monarchies absurd and implored Americans to unite, proclaim independence, and create a democratic government. Paine’s words resonated. Common Sense was a bestseller. As the season turned from spring to summer, throughout the Colonies, the call for independence was as hot as the weather. The delegates in Philadelphia got the message.
On July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress set forth the Declaration of Independence, which spelled out grievances with Great Britain and specifically with King George III. The collective body declared the “united” States of America to be free and independent states, absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown.
The Declaration was the seed of the future, but the lower case “u” in united, as printed in the Declaration, meant that each state was sovereign. For the time being, the states within their new independence would move forward in a loose alliance. That alliance took on the British military, and after eight years of battles and skirmishes from New Hampshire to Georgia and all the land in between, independence was secured in 1783.
Despite their noble role in representing North Carolina in Philadelphia, Hooper, Hewes and Penn are relatively unknown today. They all died in their late 40s, and though they made continued contributions to the fledgling state of North Carolina after July 4, 1776, they never became widely heralded. Though each man is recognized by historical markers and tributes at their graves, there are no places in North Carolina named in their honor.
There are, however, places around our state for some of the big founding names. The town of Washington is on the Pamlico River, and the town of Jefferson is in the Blue Ridge. Franklin County is named for Ben, as is Franklin Street in Chapel Hill. Fayetteville is named for Lafayette, the young French officer who served under Washington. Thanks to a modern Broadway play, practically everyone now knows Alexander Hamilton. Hip-hop has proven to be a Revolutionary educator.
Even though he wasn’t from North Carolina, Gen. Nathanael Greene has several namesakes here, enough to make other Revolutionary leaders green with envy: Greensboro, Greenville and Greene County are all named in honor of the general. Additionally, a Greensboro brewer produces Natty Greene beer. Cheers!
Beyond its signers of the Declaration, North Carolina produced its share of founding heroes. Some of them are honored with county namesakes: Nash, Harnett, Moore, Jones, Lenoir and Sampson were all North Carolinians and founding leaders, but there are no counties named for Hooper, Hewes or Penn.
None of our signatories were originally from North Carolina, but that was not unusual in their day. In the 1770s, it’s thought that over half the residents of North Carolina had come from somewhere else. It was a time of significant population growth and resettlement, and newcomers were plentiful in the state. People came from other states and abroad seeking land and opportunity, bringing new talents and skills, and new ways of thinking.
In 1776, William Hooper was a Wilmington lawyer, but he had previously lived in Campbelltown (present-day Fayetteville) and at one time served in Royal Gov. William Tryon’s legal department. Hooper had been a Royalist, a reminder that everyone in the Colonies was a subject of the king. His wife was the former Anne Clark, daughter of a New Hanover sheriff.
Born to a prominent Boston family in 1742, Hooper’s father was the second rector of Trinity Church. His son graduated from Boston Latin for his prep education, then earned both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree at Harvard University. Trinity Church, Boston Latin and Harvard are all still up and running. In addition to his formal training, Hooper studied law in Boston in the early 1760s under Boston lawyer James Otis, who was known for his strong advocacy of Colonial rights.
At the time of the Declaration, Joseph Hewes was a well-established Edenton merchant who had served in Colonial assemblies for 20 years. Hewes was in import-export trading and was a shipbuilder. Born on his family’s large farm in Kingston, New Jersey, in 1730, Hewes completed his formal studies at Kingston Friends School and was apparently bound for college at Princeton but — in today’s vernacular — turned pro instead. Strong-willed and ambitious, Hewes was drawn to commerce and in lieu of college, sought practical training as an apprentice to a Philadelphia merchant.
After five years of dock work and learning the trading business from the cargo hold up, Hewes struck out on his own, at first in Philadelphia. But by 1755, he was making a life and career for himself in Edenton. Hewes was engaged to marry the well-connected Isabella Johnston of Edenton, sister of Samuel Johnston, a future North Carolina governor. The Johnstons’ uncle was former Royal Gov. Gabriel Johnston. Sadly, Isabella Johnston died after a short illness before her marriage to Hewes could take place, and Hewes never married.
By 1776, John Penn was a known advocate for independence. A Virginia native who grew up on a small farm near the Rappahannock River in Caroline County, Penn was born in 1741 to a hard-working farm family. Though he received little formal education in his late teens, after the death of his father, he could afford to take time to study the law. John Adams famously said, “All Virginia geese are swans.” Yet, despite his Virginia birth and rearing, Penn was more goose than swan — but an ambitious, hard-working, smart goose.
Unlike Hooper and Hewes, he was not of the Eastern North Carolina elite. He lived in Granville County, in the northern Piedmont, where he farmed and maintained a successful law practice. His wife, the former Susannah Lyme, was a native of Granville County, and their marriage is what brought Penn there. He was more typical of back country settlers who lived simpler lives and distrusted both the Crown and the Eastern North Carolina elite.
Though Penn was ready sooner than most to move on from Great Britain, Hooper and Hewes were not early rabble-rousers for independence. In fact, in 1775, Hewes was among the leaders in the Continental Congress that offered the Olive Branch Petition to King George, an offer for a reset in relations between the Americans and British through peaceful means. The offer was rebuffed by George III.
Frustrated by repeated British affronts, heavy taxes and regulations, enforced at times by corrupt officials, the North Carolina signers grew to accept that independence was the inescapable course. Hooper, Hewes and Penn were amiable colleagues, but not close friends. Their bond was a shared belief in the principles of self-governance, democracy and individual freedom — the spirit of ’76.
The North Carolina trio had challenges during the ensuing war. Hooper’s home, Finian, was situated on 100-plus acres on Masonboro Sound south of Wilmington. The British bombed and burned Finian, and Hooper and his entire family were forced to flee to Hillsborough, where they lived out their lives.
Leaving his family, farm and law practice for long periods, Penn attended more days of the Continental Congress than any other North Carolinian. Over the years, he was a member of 15 or more Congressional committees. Back home, Penn was involved in equipping and supplying both the North Carolina militia and soldiers of the Continental Army.
During the war, Hewes was in Philadelphia more than in Edenton, often using his knowledge and skill in trade and shipbuilding to help the American cause. He was in effect the first secretary of the Navy. As the war raged, his health worsened and he grew increasingly weak, probably from malaria. He died in his Philadelphia rooming house in 1779 and was laid to rest nearby in Christ Church Burial Ground, just a few hundred yards from where he signed the Declaration of Independence.
If not the authors, the three Carolinians — Hooper, Hewes and Penn — were witnesses and signatories to what historian Walter Isaacson has characterized as The Greatest Sentence Ever Written. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and pursuit of Happiness.”
That’s not nothing. EB
Warren L. Bingham is a speaker, writer and author of George Washington’s 1791 Southern Tour.