1st Lt. (CSA) William Thomas Jones

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/10370746/william-thomas-jones

1st Lt., Company C, 35th N.C. Infantry Regt. One of the "Immortal 600".

From slave to industrialist, William T. Jones was Carthage, NC's best-kept secret:

"He was born the son of a slave and her white owner in 1833. By time time of his death in 1910, William T. Jones was one of the prominent business owners in Carthage. He rubbed elbows with the elite, white, upper class in Moore County during the 1880s, dined with them, threw elaborate holiday parties where most of the guests were white, and even attended church with them.

Both of his wives, Sophia Isabella McLean and Florence Dockery were white. Dockery was the daughter of a well-to-do Apex family.

Yet, until a decade ago, few in this small Moore County town acknowledged out loud that Jones was not a white man.

Then, Pat Motz-Frazier entered the scene in 2005. She purchased Jones home, built in 1880 for his wife, Florence, and today runs it as a bed and breakfast, aptly named “The Old Buggy Inn.”

“He built this huge elaborate house because he and his wife wanted to fill it with children,” Motz-Frazier says. “Unfortunately, they never had any.”

Motz-Frazier ran into many brick walls while trying to research the history of her historic Victorian home. Many of those she asked, declined to acknowledge that Jones, president of the Tyson & Jones Buggy Company, was anything but a white man, she says. Slowly and methodically, she finally put together the pieces of the puzzle of what was a remarkable story of Jones, one man who, in the 19th century, never let the color of his skin define him.

At the age of 27, Jones (and many other buggy company workers) joined the Confederate Army. By 1864, he had risen to the rank of first lieutenant. His unit was eventually captured in Virginia and sent to Fort Delaware, where they spent the better part of a year.

Ever the entrepreneur, Jones started picking up potato peelings and saving crusts from bread, to make homemade moonshine. He sold his fiery concoction to the prison guards and local townspeople. He was paid in Union currency for his product. According to Motz-Frazier, he came back to North Carolina with an estimated $3,000 in his pockets. Smart man.

“When the war was over, and they came back to Carthage, Sherman had marched through. There was devastation. People were starving. They couldn’t reopen the buggy company because all they had was Confederate money and it was worthless,” Motz-Frazier says. “They reopened the company with Mr. Jones moonshine money.”

The company was originally known as Tyson & Kelly, then Tyson, Kelly & Company.

Not to be deterred, Motz-Frazier continued her search for the secret to unlocking Jones’ story. When she started sharing her information, she was told that she “had it all wrong.”

“He was somewhat of a secret in town. Maybe it was because, after the Civil War, there was a very active vigilante force in this area. He had two white wives back when it was illegal for blacks and whites to marry, when blacks were persecuted and when whites who supported those blacks were persecuted.”

The people of Carthage looked the other way, Motz-Frazier says, to protect Jones — and themselves. Over time, any issues with Jones’ color eventually faded into history. It was simply not discussed.

“I finally found a record of his death that says that he was mulatto. Once that rock turned over, I got so excited! I ran all over town telling everyone. I was told that it was not true and that I was disturbing the history of Carthage and was told to stop spreading it around town.

“Charles Prevost and his sister told me that what I had been saying wasn’t true,” she adds. “So, I gave Mr. Prevost copies of everything I had found. Then he went to Raleigh and checked census records. He came back by himself about a month later and apologized and told me that I was right. Once he knew it, and I began telling it, people started coming out of the woodwork telling us that they knew.”

She discovered that in 1873, the company was renamed the Tyson & Jones Buggy Company. In 1876, it produced 400 buggies, and was incorporated in 1889. At its maximum production, Tyson & Jones constructed 3,000 carriages/buggies a year. The popularity of the automobile led to the closure of the company in 1925.

Motz-Frazier also discovered that the mysterious Mr. Jones was innovative — he invented the solution used for waterproofing. While his 1902 campaign was unsuccessful, Jones even ran for the N.C. House of Representatives, representing the Republican Party.

“I got the impression that he was a kind, gentle, intelligent, forward-thinking man,” Motz-Frazier says. “Inspite of being black, I think he overlooked it. This is a story of an unbelievably remarkable man who married a white woman when black-white marriage was illegal, and who was the president of what was then considered the Cadillac of buggy companies in the South.

“His can’t be the only story like this one, but it is a rare story. This is something that happened in the midst of war — and needs to be known.”

In recording his death on November 29, 1910, history records, “Col. W.T. Jones, president of the Tyson & Jones Buggy Company of Carthage, died this morning after a gradual decline for the three years.”

After his death, the local newspaper reported that Jones was “a citizen regarded in all respects as probably the peer of any, living or dead, in usefulness in accomplished purpose … and withal in the example and model which he has left the present and future generations.”

The race of this Confederate soldier, Methodist Sunday School teacher, town leader and prosperous industrialist was almost erased from Carthage history. His photograph never appeared in any Tyson & Jones catalog. In one history book dated 1981, his face is there in a photo, however, his name is not listed as the owner of the buggy company.

Jones is buried at Cross Hill Cemetery, just down the road from his former home. Today, the Carthage Buggy Festival proudly celebrates the achievements of this former slave."

Source: http://www.courier-tribune.com/…/wt-jones-carthage-s-best-k…