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North Carolina's Governors
Edward Bishop Dudley (1789-1855) was the first governor of North Carolina elected by the vote of the people. Born in Onslow County, he served as colonel of the local militia that, during the War of 1812, was sent to protect Wilmington against a threatened invasion. Shortly after the war he moved to Wilmington and rose to political prominence. Elected to fill a vacant seat in Congress in 1829, Dudley found his views incompatible with those of President Andrew Jackson and his followers. Dismayed by the tactics of the president and the compromising nature of the Congress, Dudley refused to run for a second term. Dudley's return home coincided with a groundswell in the movement to awaken North Carolina from its economic and political slumber. He assumed a role in the formation of the Whig party that challenged the Democratic leadership by supporting constitutional reform, stronger banks, railroad construction and other internal improvements, and education. In 1836 he hosted in his Wilmington home the committee that organized the Wilmington and Raleigh Railroad. The most notable change enacted by the 1835 constitutional convention allowed the governor to be elected by popular vote, and the direct beneficiary was Dudley. With the revival of the two-party system, Dudley became the choice of the Whigs in 1836 and defeated Richard Dobbs Spaight Jr., the Democratic candidate. Two years later, Dudley increased his margin of victory, defeating John Branch. The most significant changes during his term were internal improvements, with the completion of the Wilmington and Raleigh and the Raleigh and Gaston railroads, and educational advances with the beginnings of the public school system and the opening of three colleges: Davidson, Greensboro Female, and Union Institute (later Trinity College, then Duke University). Dudley retired to his home on the Cape Fear River where he died in 1855. He was buried in Oakdale Cemetery in Wilmington.
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