{{Infobox newspaper | name = Carolina Watchman | logo = | logo_size = | logo_alt = | image = Carolina Watchman first issue.jpg | image_size = | image_alt = | caption = First issue of the ''Carolina Watchman'' | motto = | type = Weekly newspaper | format = | owner = <!-- or |owners= --> | founder = Hamilton C. Jones | publisher = | editor = | staff_writers = | founded = {{start date|1832|07|28}} | political_position = Various, including Whig, independent, Democratic, and Populist | ceased_publication = {{end date|1937|01|29}} | publishing_city = Salisbury, North Carolina, United States | circulation = 1,000 (1898)<ref name="Ayer"/><br/>2,327 (1913)<ref name="Daniels"/> | sister_newspapers = | ISSN = | eISSN = | oclc = | RNI = | free = }}
The '''''Carolina Watchman''''' was an American weekly newspaper published in Salisbury, North Carolina, from 1832 to 1937. It variously supported the Whig, Democratic, and Populist parties, as well as the Confederacy during the Civil War. For a few years, it was mostly politically independent and known as the '''''Watchman & Old North State'''''.
==History==
===Early years=== The first issue of the ''Carolina Watchman'' was published July 28, 1832.<ref name="LOC 1832-67">{{cite web|url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85042201/|title=About Carolina watchman. [volume] (Salisbury, N.C.) 1832-1867|publisher=Library of Congress|accessdate=October 24, 2019}}</ref> The founding editor, Hamilton Chamberlain Jones (1798–1868),<ref name="NCPedia Jones">{{cite web|url=https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/jones-hamilton|title=Jones, Hamilton Chamberlain|last=Walser|first=Richard|date=1988|work=Dictionary of North Carolina Biography|publisher=NCPedia|accessdate=October 24, 2019}}</ref> started it as a weekly newspaper competing with Salisbury's other newspaper, the ''Western Carolinian'', which had turned from supporting President Andrew Jackson to supporting John C. Calhoun.<ref name="Baldasty">{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/commercializatio00bald|url-access=registration|title=The Commercialization of News in the Nineteenth Century|last=Baldasty|first=Gerald J.|year=1992|publisher=University of Wisconsin Press|pages=[https://archive.org/details/commercializatio00bald/page/17 17], 26|via=Internet Archive}}</ref> The ''Watchman'' has been described as being founded in opposition to nullification,<ref name="Cook">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=g0FMAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA147|title=United States Newspaper Directory: Containing Correct Lists of All the Newspapers and Periodicals Published in the United States, Territories and British Provinces|publisher=Cook, Coburn & Company|year=1876|page=147|via=Google Books}}</ref> though it has been described as anti-Jackson as well.<ref name="NCPedia Jones"/><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FP87AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA215|title=North Carolina University Magazine|publisher=Dialectic and Philanthropic Societies, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill|year=1892|page=215|via=Google Books}}</ref> Early editions frequently contained humor and had a couple sketches by Jones.<ref name="NCPedia Jones"/> In the 1830s, it printed several advertisements seeking escaped slaves.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.ncpedia.org/anchor/advertising-slaves|title=Advertising for Slaves|work=Dictionary of North Carolina Biography|publisher=NCPedia|accessdate=October 24, 2019}}</ref>
In the 1830s and the next decade, the ''Watchman'' supported the Whig Party (while that party existed).<ref name="Cook"/><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aPKS9wcA63sC&pg=PA224|via=Google Books|title=Southern Frontier Humor: An Anthology|page=224|last1=Inge|first1=Thomas|last2=Piacentino|first2=Ed|publisher=University of Missouri Press|year=2010|isbn=9780826272201}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9OdjBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA85|page=85|via=Google Books|last=Orser|first=Joseph Andrew|title=The Lives of Chang and Eng: Siam's Twins in Nineteenth-Century America|publisher=University of North Carolina Press|year=2014|isbn=9781469618319}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ztF8DAAAQBAJ&pg=PA114|page=114|via=Google Books|title=Willie Mangum and the North Carolina Whigs in the Age of Jackson|last=Huggins|first=Benjamin L.|year=2016|publisher=McFarland & Company|isbn=9780786498765}}</ref> After that, the newspaper was described as "liberally conservative".<ref name="Cook"/>
===1850–1890=== John Joseph (J. J.) Bruner (1817–1890) left an apprenticeship at the ''Western Carolinian'' to join the ''Watchman'' in its early years, and he became part-owner at age 22 and full owner at 33, in 1850.<ref name="Brown">{{cite web|url=https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/bruner-john-joseph|title=Bruner, John Joseph|last=Brown|first=Louis A.|date=1979|work=Dictionary of North Carolina Biography|publisher=NCPedia|accessdate=October 24, 2019}}</ref> Though he often sold the paper to start other ventures, he often would buy it back too.<ref name="Powell"/> Bruner developed a reputation as a forceful voice for the common man, and he used his newspaper to advance his interests, such as supporting the Confederacy in the Civil War (he did not print anything negative about Salisbury nor the Confederacy).<ref name="Brown"/> A national newspaper directory from 1876 states that the ''Watchman'' "resisted the disunionists" before the war, was "thoroughly confederate during the war", and was "thoroughly union now, and democratic".<ref name="Cook"/> Publication was suspended for six months in 1865–66.<ref name="LOC 1832-67"/>
In 1866, Lewis Hanes (1826–1882) launched a competing newspaper, the ''Old North State''.<ref name="Powell"/> Two years later, the two papers merged as the ''Watchman & Old North State''.<ref name="Powell"/><ref>{{cite web|url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn87070107/|title=About Watchman & Old North State. (Salisbury, N.C.) 1868-1868|publisher=Library of Congress|accessdate=October 24, 2019}}</ref> Upon the merger, Hanes became editor and Bruner remained publisher.<ref name="Powell">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gejhoRgwLXwC&pg=PA25|title=Dictionary of North Carolina Biography: Vol. 3, H-K|last=Brawley|first=James S.|editor-last=Powell|editor-first=William S.|year=2000|publisher=University of North Carolina Press|page=25|isbn=9780807867136|via=Google Books}}</ref> Hanes claimed that the paper was politically independent, which was true during his editorship except when it backed the unsuccessful conservative effort to stop the adoption of a new state constitution in 1868.<ref name="Powell"/>
Bruner bought the newspaper back when Hanes left Salisbury, rebranding it as the ''Carolina Watchman'' in 1871.<ref name="Powell"/> With Bruner as editor, the ''Watchman''{{'s}} circulation apparently reached about 50 counties in North Carolina, and it was said that he fended off competition from more than 50 other papers.<ref name="Brown"/> An 1889 newspaper catalogue lists the ''Watchman'' as a Democratic paper.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rLYsAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA581|title=Branson's North Carolina Business Directory|volume=7|year=1889|last=Branson|first=Levi|via=Google Books|page=581}}</ref> In Bruner's later years, while he was one of North Carolina's oldest editors running one of its oldest newspapers, other editors in the state called him "Father Bruner".<ref name="Brown"/>
===20th century=== An 1898 catalogue lists the ''Carolina Watchman'' as a Populist paper, with editor H. J. Gasque and a circulation of 1,000.<ref name="Ayer">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=U4IfkqH4KP0C&pg=PA611|title=N. W. Ayer & Son's American Newspaper Annual, Part 1|publisher=N.W. Ayer and Son|year=1898|page=611|via=Google Books}}</ref> A catalogue fifteen years later says it was a Democratic paper, with a circulation of 2,327.<ref name="Daniels">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9bRZ3B4GMCEC&pg=PA194|page=194|via=Google Books|title=Report|volume=27|publisher=North Carolina Department of Labor and Printing|last=Daniels|first=Josephus|year=1913}}</ref> On January 29, 1937, the weekly ''Watchman'' announced that it would be succeeded by the ''Rowan County Herald'' beginning February.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84026488/|title=About Carolina watchman. [volume] (Salisbury, N.C.) 1871-1937|publisher=Library of Congress|accessdate=October 24, 2019}}</ref> The latest known issue of the ''Herald'' was published June 18, 1937.<ref>{{cite book|title=Rowan County herald and the Carolina watchman.|publisher=WorldCat|oclc=37427131}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Nh6WDdauKLwC&q=%22rowan+county+herald%22|title=Biennial Report|via=Google Books|page=172|year=1966|publisher=North Carolina State Dept. of Archives and History}}</ref>
==See also== * List of defunct newspapers of North Carolina
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== * [http://www.digitalnc.org/newspapers/carolina-watchman-salisbury-n-c/ Partial archives of the ''Carolina Watchman''] at DigitalNC
Category:Defunct newspapers published in North Carolina Category:Salisbury, North Carolina Category:Newspapers established in 1832 Category:Newspapers disestablished in 1937