"even the wildest of the men": The Regulator Movement Comes to Bethabara

Casey and Kait talk about Bethabara during the Regulator Movement, a period of intense political conflict in pre-revolutionary North Carolina. Though the Moravians attempted to keep the peace, Bethabara became a major center of activity for the movement. The “Regulators” organized to regulate corruption in government, which seemed to be steadily increasing in mid-1760s North Carolina. This grassroots reform movement began with debates over land, taxes, and representation, and evolved into a rebellion with the Regulators meeting the Governor in open battle in 1771. The Regulator movement gained a widespread following in the western backcountry, and so the Moravians in Wachovia got caught up in the conflict despite their best efforts to stay out of it. In this episode we’ll cover the visits of Regulators to Bethabara, the Moravians' opinion of the Regulators, the Moravians’ relationship with Governor William Tryon, the collapse of the movement after the Battle of Alamance, and the encampment of Tryon’s militia forces at Bethabara. Bibliography & Further Reading: Bassett, John Spencer. The Regulators of North Carolina (1765–1771). Washington: Government Printing Office, 1895. Fries, Adelaide L., ed. Records of the Moravians in North Carolina. Volumes 1 & 2. Kars, Marjoleine. Breaking Loose Together: The Regulator Rebellion in Pre-revolutionary North  Carolina. University of North Carolina Press, 2002. Stewart, Bruce E. Redemption from Tyranny: Herman Husband’s American Revolution Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2020. Troxler, Carole Watterson. Farming Dissenters: The Regulator Movement in Piedmont North         Carolina. Raleigh: North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources, 2011. Music (freemusicarchive.org): Allegretto (green pastures) by Dee Yan-Key (Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) Grand Piano Theme - Echo - Loopable by Lobo Loco (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) On my Way to Work by Lobo Loco (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)