The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1903-10-29
ADDRESS OF WELCOME.
Speech of Col. James T. forehead, on
Behalf of the County of GuiIford and
the City of Greensboro, in Response
to the Address of Welcome by Gov.
Aycock at the Greensboro Reunion.

the City of Greensboro, in Response
to the Address of Welcome by Gov.
Aycock at the Greensboro Reunion.
Responding to the speech of wei
come from the Governor, Col. James
T. Morehead, on behalf of the county
of Guilford and city of Greensboro,
said:
cat the invitation of all the people
of our common mother, extended by
their representatives in the General
Assembly, you have left your homes,
here to meet again under her sunny
skies, and you have just listened to the
hearty welcome expressed through
our Chief Executive. | have the
honor to welcome you specially in
behalf of the people of historic Gull
ford and her capital city, and to as
sure you that we yield to none in
genuine heartfelt pleasure in greet
ing Carolina's scattered abroad
Il hope l may be pardoned for re-
peating what has been said by Others
that it was happy suggestion that
this location was the most apprO-
pirate selection for this first reunion.
AS this city, then a village, was the
gateway through which thousands
of emigrants, who, in the last two
decades of the first half of the last
century, sorrowfully passed, emf
grating to the then new States and
territories, their caravans of white
covered wagons freighted with their
household goods lining its unim-
proved streets; so now it is the gate
city through which the great major
ity of those whom from time to time
return pass to visit the scenes of
their early childhood and youth to
almost every section of the State.
Within forty miles, and little North
east of the centre of the State. al
most equi-distant from the Blue
Ridge Mountains, from whose valleys
and recesses poured the patriot band
to destroy Ferguson at Kings
Mountain, and the birthplace OF the
first child born of English parents in
America washed by the Atlantic,
from her Southern border where An
drew Jackson first saw the light
amidst the muttering OF a storm
which was soon to break the power
of Britain in America, and her North
ern borders, the birthplace OF Nathan
iel Macon, the great commoner, friend
and adviser of Jefferson; in the heart
of that part of the State largely
settled by the Scotch-Irish race, one
dogma OF whose religion was resist
ance to tyrants is the will OF God,
and who educated, elevated and
dominated every people among
whom their lot was cast, the central
county of that section which first
met in armed resistance legalized op-
pression-at Alamance-the scene OF
the labors of Caldwell, one among
the greatest of those who led the
people to maintain their rights, and
of the labors of Caruthers, his sue
cessor, who first preserved in written
form the traditions of those stirring
times, the result of whose labor and
learning is one of the important
bases of the histories OF the Common
wealth. Where you now sit-then in
original forest-could be heard the
guns fired at old Guilford Court
House-the beginning of the end at
Yorktown.
''These facts, | repeat, made the
selection of Greensboro for the first
reunion peculiarly appropriate.
"History teaches us that wherever
on the globe one of the Gallic race
has settled, whatever his environ
ment, his heart is ever turning to
vine-clad France, and the ambition
and hope of his life is some day to
return again to look upon the scenes
of his youth and bask in her
glorious sunlight-and equally true
it is, as is now the common saying,
'once a North Carolinian, always q
North Carolinian.'
"When the Cherokees were invited
| by the Federal government to leave
| their mountain Businesses and move
beyond the Father OF Waters to q
more fertile and better game-stocked
hunting-ground prepared for them,
one band in our mountains declined
the offer and remain until this day.
1t is told of their chief, Junaluski
when he realized that the days of his
pilgrimage were numbered, and he
felt that the Great Spirit was beckon
ing him, he caused his tribesmen to
lay him in his cabin door, that the
last object upon which his eyes
might rest should be the grand ole
mountain in whose shadow his child
hood was passed, over the slopes O
which he had chased the bear anC
the deer, and, in the sparkling water
which flowed at it's foot, he had fish
ed for his favorite trout in his youth
and manhood.
"Though of a different race from
US, he vas a typical North Caro-
linian, in his love for the land OF hi:
nativity.
"Let me give you an illustration
which came under my personal OBJ
servation. Some time in the 4O's
among the emigrants from NORTH
Carolina, were some of our brethreI
of Scotch descent, who finally landed
in Missouri. Thirty years afterwart
young man from Guilford, seeking
to better his fortune after Appomat
tox,' made his home in Missouri
married a daughter of our Scotch
man, born to him in that State. Il
the course of time the young uan re
turned with his wife and one son, /;
child of six or eight years. Icon
graduated him on his return and ex
pressed a hope that he had come t.
stay Not exactly he replied, IN.
wife's parents from her infancy hav
i. spoken SO often and lovingly ofGod
country, and especially of the oil
|, home in Guilford, she longed to visi
and see for herself the glories {
which she had heard At famil
council it was decreed that the bo
|, could never grow up to be the righ
, sort of man unless he drank out {
the old spring at the old homestead
Accordingly he had brought the bo
to Guilford, carried him to the oil