Biography
Like his brother Charles, Joseph McDowell was born in Virginia and moved with the family to Quaker Meadows in today’s Morganton. He served in the Burke County Militia Regiment commanded by Charles, in time leading the “light horse”—cavalrymen without the training and equipment of those in the regular armies. Joseph was thus in the 1776 Cherokee Campaign, the 1779 Battle of Stono Ferry against the British in South Carolina, and 1780 Battle of Ramsour’s Mill (without Charles) and Battle of Cane Creek against the corps of Maj. Patrick Ferguson. Because Charles was elsewhere, Joseph likely commanded their regiment at the Battle of King’s Mountain (S.C.) as a major.[1] But he was one of the judges at the trial leading to the hanging of prisoners afterward.
McDowell was wounded at the Battle of Cowpens (S.C.) early the next year. Yet he likely fought in the subsequent resistance to the 1781 British campaign in North Carolina, though not at Guilford Court House, and helped suppress Loyalist forces afterward.[2] He definitely led one 1782 campaign against the Cherokees, and was the regimental leader in a second commanded by his brother, now as a colonel.
After the war McDowell was promoted to general, practiced law, and served in both the state General Assembly and its convention to approve the U.S. Constitution—which he voted against, because the Bill of Rights had not been ratified. He was noted for his insistence back home that former Loyalists be treated well. Later he was elected to the U.S. Congress. The state named him to the commissions that ran the border between North Carolina and Tennessee and laid out the new capital city of Raleigh (where McDowell Street is thus named for him.)[3] After he returned to Quaker Meadows, a brain hemorrhage took him at age 45. McDowell County is named for him as well.
More Information
- Ervin, Eunice, Under the Forest Floor (The Historic Burke Foundation, 1997)
- Inscoe, John, ‘McDowell, Joseph’, NCpedia, 1991 <https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/mcdowell-joseph> [accessed 30 April 2020]
- ‘Joseph McDowell, Not to Be Confused with Joseph McDowell’, NC DNCR <https://www.ncdcr.gov/blog/2016/05/18/joseph-mcdowell-not-to-be-confused-with-joseph-mcdowell> [accessed 30 April 2020]
- Lewis, J. D., ‘The Patriot Leaders in North Carolina – Joseph McDowell’, 2013 <https://www.carolana.com/NC/Revolution/patriot_leaders_nc_joseph_mcdowell.html> [accessed 30 April 2020]
- Sherman, Wm. Thomas, Calendar and Record of the Revolutionary War in the South: 1780-1781, Tenth Edition (Seattle, WA: Gun Jones Publishing, 2007) <https://www.americanrevolution.org/calendar_south_10_ed_update_2017.pdf>
- White, Emmet, Revolutionary War Soldiers of Western North Carolina: Burke County, Volume I (Southern Historical Press, Inc., 1984)
[1] A “Joseph” was in command, but there is some debate about which, because a cousin who fought with the brothers had the same name. Sources refer to that man as “Joseph McDowell of Pleasant Gardens” to differentiate him from this Joseph McDowell “of Quaker Meadows.” The early sources related to King’s Mountain do not specify. But this Joseph is the most likely, not only as Charles’ brother, but also because he was a state-appointed “field officer” instead of a “company officer” initially voted in by the men, as was Joseph of Pleasant Gardens (per White 1982).
[2] Ervin 1997; Sherman 2007.
[3] White; see also: Williams, Sam’l. C., ‘The North Carolina-Tennessee Boundary Line Survey (1799)’, Tennessee Historical Magazine, 6.2 (1920), pp. 46–57 <https://www.jstor.org/stable/42637443>. Some sources incorrectly state he worked on the Kentucky-Tennessee line.