Caswell County NC Speakers of Senate and House

Speakers of the Senate and of the House of Commons of North Carolina, from 1777 to 1856-1857, Inclusive

An intelligent and well-informed friend, who takes an interest in statistics and in historical facts, especially such as are connected with our own State, has kindly furnished us for publication with the following list of the Speakers of the two Houses of the General Assembly, from 1777 to the present times. 

The Speakers of the two Houses, it will be observed, have been chosen for the space of eighty years from twenty-eight Counties, to wit: . . . Caswell . . . .

The longest continuous service of any of the Speakers, was that of Mr. Yancey, of Caswell, who was Speaker of the Senate from 1817 to 1827, inclusive, eleven years.

Chowan . . . can boast of having given Speakers to the two Houses for twenty years our of the eighty years; Caswell County stands next in rank in this respect, having had Speakers for seventeen years. 

Caswell had the Speakers of both Houses in 1819 and 1820 -- Mr. Yancey, of the Senate, and Mr. Saunders, (now Judge,) of the Commons. . . . 

Of the sixty-one persons who have occupied the Speaker's chair of the two Houses since 1777, the following we believe, only survive, to wit [only Caswell County listed]: Bedford Brown; Romulus M. Saunders . . . .

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Speakers of the Senate

1817: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell 

1818: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1819: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1820: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1821: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1822: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1823: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1824: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1825: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1826: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1827: Bartlett Yancey, Caswell

1829: Bedford Brown, Caswell

1848-1849: Calvin Graves, Caswell

Speakers of the House of Commons

1819: Romulus M. Saunders, Caswell

1820: Romulus M. Saunders, Caswell

1842-1843: Calvin Graves, Caswell

1854-1855: Samuel P. Hill, Caswell

Source: Semi-Weekly Standard (Raleigh, North Carolina), 25 Mar 1857, Wednesday, Page 3.

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Bartlett Yancey, Jr. (1785-1828)

Bedford Brown (1795-1870)

Calvin Graves (1804-1877) [served as speaker in both houses]

Romulus Mitchell Saunders (1791-1867)

Samuel P. Hill (c.1824-1874) [first president of the Bank of Yanceyville]