lead rather than in gold.

CHAPTER XII. Watauga--Haven of Liberty

The Regulators despaired of seeing better times and therefore
quitted the Province. It is said 1,500 departed since the Battle
of Alamance and to my knowledge a great many more are only
waiting to dispose of their plantations in order to follow
them.--Reverend Morgan Edwards, 1772.

The five years (1766-1771) which saw the rise, development, and
ultimate defeat of the popular movement known as the Regulation,
constitute a period not only of extraordinary significance in
North Carolina but also of fruitful consequences in the larger
movements of westward expansion. With the resolute intention of
having their rulers "give account of their stewardship," to
employ their own words, the Sandy Creek Association of Baptists
(organized in 1758), in a series of papers known as Regulators'
Advertisements (1766-8) proceeded to mature, through popular
gatherings, a rough form of initiative and referendum. At length,
discouraged in its efforts, and particularly in the attempt to
bring county officials to book for charging illegal fees, this
association ceased actively to function. It was the precursor of
a movement of much more drastic character and formidable
proportions, chiefly directed against Colonel Edmund Fanning and
his associates. This movement doubtless took its name, "the
Regulation," from the bands of men already described who were
organized first in North Carolina and later in South Carolina, to
put down highwaymen and to correct many abuses in the back
country, such as the tyrannies of Scovil and his henchmen.
Failing to secure redress of their grievances through legal
channels, the Regulators finally made such a powerful
demonstration in support of their refusal to pay taxes that
Governor William Tryon of North Carolina, in 1768, called out the
provincial militia, and by marching with great show of force
through the disaffected regions, succeeded temporarily in
overawing the people and thus inducing them to pay their
assessments.

The suits which had been brought by the Regulators against Edmund
Fanning, register, and Francis Nash, clerk, of Orange County,
resulted in both being "found guilty of taking too high fees."
Fanning immediately resigned his commission as register; while
Nash, who in conjunction with Fanning had fairly offered in 1766
to refund to any one aggrieved any fee charged by him which the
Superior Court might hold excessi