Books by Carroll C. Jones
Thomson's Pulp Mill: Building the Champion Fibre Company at Canton, N.C.-- 1905 to 1908
Peter G. Thomson came to the western North Carolina mountains more than a hundred years ago in search of a proper site to build his mammoth pulp mill. This book tells the story of the building of the Champion Fibre Company at Canton, North Carolina between 1905 and 1908. Also included are many old construction photographs that illustrate the immense effort that took place on the bank of the Pigeon River.
“Carroll C. Jones has recovered from astonishing obscurity a crucial series of events in Canton's past. Through his exceptional talents and relentless pursuit of the actual story behind Thomson's pulp mill, Carroll has turned this past into a history." (author and architectural historian, Camille Wells)
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Thomson's Pulp Mill with a prestigious 2019 History Book award.
August's Treasure
The third book in the East Fork Trilogy is August's Treasure, with a setting that alternates between the late nineteenth-century and the modern day. The story begins to unravel in 1883 when young August Hargrove is forced to flee from the Carolina highlands to save his neck. Unbelievable fortune and misfortune follow him westward all the way to California and continue to bless and curse him after he returns home to western North Carolina.
August's adventures aboard a steaming Mississippi riverboat and speeding transcontinental train, mining for gold in California, and logging the wild wilderness of the East Fork River Valley leave a baffling legacy for later Hargroves to comprehend. Great-Grandson Clint Hargrove, a man with troubles of his own, stumbles upon an old treasure map and uses it to try and sort out this Hargrove legacy.
"Carroll C. Jones is known for his extensive knowledge of Appalachian history and his exhaustive research. His readers will find that reputation well earned with his latest offering, August's Treasure." (Rita Quillen, author of Hiding Ezra)
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded August's Treasure with a prestigious 2017 History Book award.
The third book in the East Fork Trilogy is August's Treasure, with a setting that alternates between the late nineteenth-century and the modern day. The story begins to unravel in 1883 when young August Hargrove is forced to flee from the Carolina highlands to save his neck. Unbelievable fortune and misfortune follow him westward all the way to California and continue to bless and curse him after he returns home to western North Carolina.
August's adventures aboard a steaming Mississippi riverboat and speeding transcontinental train, mining for gold in California, and logging the wild wilderness of the East Fork River Valley leave a baffling legacy for later Hargroves to comprehend. Great-Grandson Clint Hargrove, a man with troubles of his own, stumbles upon an old treasure map and uses it to try and sort out this Hargrove legacy.
"Carroll C. Jones is known for his extensive knowledge of Appalachian history and his exhaustive research. His readers will find that reputation well earned with his latest offering, August's Treasure." (Rita Quillen, author of Hiding Ezra)
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded August's Treasure with a prestigious 2017 History Book award.
Rebel Rousers
This second book in the East Fork Trilogy is a sequel to Master of the East Fork and is set during the American Civil War. It is a coming-of-age tale of a youthful Rebel soldier who hails from the western North Carolina highlands. At once the strapping lad has to bear-up under his romantic longings for the miller’s daughter, the hateful acts of an antagonist named Bugg, numerous personal tragedies, and the terrible trials of war. Will he and his best buddy Hack Hartgrove survive the war? What about the girl? Best you pick-up a copy and find out.
“Carroll Jones blends unique story-telling and crafty writing with historical facts and regional lifestyles to create a superb, thought-provoking novel, Rebel Rousers. (The book) reminds us how the lines between joy and sorrow, good and evil, and justice and vengeance can blur. As a good historical novel should, Rebel Rousers transports us back in time and teaches us about our past without sacrificing a compelling story." (from the book's Foreword by Kathy Nanney Ross)
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Rebel Rousers with the prestigious President's Award as well as a History Book Award for 2016.
This second book in the East Fork Trilogy is a sequel to Master of the East Fork and is set during the American Civil War. It is a coming-of-age tale of a youthful Rebel soldier who hails from the western North Carolina highlands. At once the strapping lad has to bear-up under his romantic longings for the miller’s daughter, the hateful acts of an antagonist named Bugg, numerous personal tragedies, and the terrible trials of war. Will he and his best buddy Hack Hartgrove survive the war? What about the girl? Best you pick-up a copy and find out.
“Carroll Jones blends unique story-telling and crafty writing with historical facts and regional lifestyles to create a superb, thought-provoking novel, Rebel Rousers. (The book) reminds us how the lines between joy and sorrow, good and evil, and justice and vengeance can blur. As a good historical novel should, Rebel Rousers transports us back in time and teaches us about our past without sacrificing a compelling story." (from the book's Foreword by Kathy Nanney Ross)
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Rebel Rousers with the prestigious President's Award as well as a History Book Award for 2016.
Master of the East Fork
Then the loom fell forever silent at the Crab Orchard. And the bucolic quietness of the countryside returned, broken only by a blood-drenched baby’s hysterical cries and the lonesome bray of a jackass. (excerpted from the book)
Master of the East Fork, the first book of the East Fork Trilogy, tells the ante-bellum story of a young man relegated to the family’s plantation in the wild mountains of western North Carolina and left to fend for himself. Living in a lonely log cabin and with little or no farming experience, Basil Edmunston is at once expected to manage the business affairs of his father’s huge 5,000 acre farm. It was his "familial duty" was the way the patriarch had put it to Basil, and he could not rightly refuse. The interactions with tenant farmers, doings of his small band of slaves, and simultaneous feelings for two neighbor girls fill the pages with historical details and facts, action, period dialog, hilarity, drama, and romance.
In the beginning, Basil is unsure he is up to the challenge. But he is resolved to endure the rural wilderness assignment, at least long enough for his father to find a more apt and tested overseer. However, over time the many tests and experiences that quickly come his way and the enchanting allure of two beautiful mountain belles, Julia and Altha, allow him to grow as a man and as a proxy for his father.
Julia initially captures Basil’s fancy when they bump into each other at her father’s general store. She is a young, blonde-haired beauty from the most affluent family in the region; and her perky beguiling personality is simply too much for any young man to resist. However, while struggling with the strange emotions that Julia has evoked within him, Basil encounters yet another young woman who also captures his attention.
Altha is a striking brunette and the daughter of one of Basil's tenants. He first takes notice or her as she works at a spinning wheel in her bare feet. Although the girl is obviously with child and supposedly without a husband, her natural beauty and mature manner immediately fascinate him.
The slaves are yet another source of extreme vexation for the young master as they test his capabilities to oversee their work and their lives. The “Africans” try Basil’s patience to the breaking point and he is even forced to mete out a harsh punishment in one instance, much to his distaste. A secondary story unfolds when Basil refuses to allow one of the slaves – Lark – to marry a neighbor’s slave girl named Delia. But Lark and Delia, who are wildly crazy for one another, suddenly take their fate out of their masters' hands and exciting and unusual adventures unfold.
Readers will be kept in suspense until the ultimate chapters to learn how Basil eventually sorts out his romantic dilemma and deals with the story's vile, no-good antagonist--a man named Sam Beck.
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Master of the East Fork with a prestigious Clark Cox Historical Fiction Award for 2015.
Then the loom fell forever silent at the Crab Orchard. And the bucolic quietness of the countryside returned, broken only by a blood-drenched baby’s hysterical cries and the lonesome bray of a jackass. (excerpted from the book)
Master of the East Fork, the first book of the East Fork Trilogy, tells the ante-bellum story of a young man relegated to the family’s plantation in the wild mountains of western North Carolina and left to fend for himself. Living in a lonely log cabin and with little or no farming experience, Basil Edmunston is at once expected to manage the business affairs of his father’s huge 5,000 acre farm. It was his "familial duty" was the way the patriarch had put it to Basil, and he could not rightly refuse. The interactions with tenant farmers, doings of his small band of slaves, and simultaneous feelings for two neighbor girls fill the pages with historical details and facts, action, period dialog, hilarity, drama, and romance.
In the beginning, Basil is unsure he is up to the challenge. But he is resolved to endure the rural wilderness assignment, at least long enough for his father to find a more apt and tested overseer. However, over time the many tests and experiences that quickly come his way and the enchanting allure of two beautiful mountain belles, Julia and Altha, allow him to grow as a man and as a proxy for his father.
Julia initially captures Basil’s fancy when they bump into each other at her father’s general store. She is a young, blonde-haired beauty from the most affluent family in the region; and her perky beguiling personality is simply too much for any young man to resist. However, while struggling with the strange emotions that Julia has evoked within him, Basil encounters yet another young woman who also captures his attention.
Altha is a striking brunette and the daughter of one of Basil's tenants. He first takes notice or her as she works at a spinning wheel in her bare feet. Although the girl is obviously with child and supposedly without a husband, her natural beauty and mature manner immediately fascinate him.
The slaves are yet another source of extreme vexation for the young master as they test his capabilities to oversee their work and their lives. The “Africans” try Basil’s patience to the breaking point and he is even forced to mete out a harsh punishment in one instance, much to his distaste. A secondary story unfolds when Basil refuses to allow one of the slaves – Lark – to marry a neighbor’s slave girl named Delia. But Lark and Delia, who are wildly crazy for one another, suddenly take their fate out of their masters' hands and exciting and unusual adventures unfold.
Readers will be kept in suspense until the ultimate chapters to learn how Basil eventually sorts out his romantic dilemma and deals with the story's vile, no-good antagonist--a man named Sam Beck.
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Master of the East Fork with a prestigious Clark Cox Historical Fiction Award for 2015.
Captain Lenoir's Diary : Tom Lenoir and His Civil War Company from Western North Carolina
I have sailed down to the beach -- once with Col. Clingman & we enjoyed a fine sea bath & I picked up shells and was delighted with a view of the Atlantic & the white breakers etc. We saw two ships at a distance.
This has been a dreary dark day, & I have been working hard at Muster Rolls -- Troublesome Institutions!
(excerpts from Captain Thomas Isaac Lenoir's personal wartime diary)
I have sailed down to the beach -- once with Col. Clingman & we enjoyed a fine sea bath & I picked up shells and was delighted with a view of the Atlantic & the white breakers etc. We saw two ships at a distance.
This has been a dreary dark day, & I have been working hard at Muster Rolls -- Troublesome Institutions!
(excerpts from Captain Thomas Isaac Lenoir's personal wartime diary)
After the fall of Fort Sumter in April 1861, Thomas Isaac Lenoir, a landholder, slaveowner, and farmer from the region known as the East Fork of the Pigeon River, and Col. Joseph Cathey, a respected farmer, merchant, and politician in the Forks of Pigeon community, assembled a band of zealous volunteers who had poured out of the North Carolina hills to fight the Yankees.
Lenoir, at the age of forty-three, was unanimously elected to lead the fledgling military unit his mountaineers styled the "Haywood Highlanders." As captain, he recorded in his personal diary the various activities and movements of his company as well as many other events and impressions as the mountaineers defended the Carolina coastal regions.
In this annotated transcription of a previously unpublished document, award-winning historian Carroll C. Jones brings to light the captain's daily life in the field. Lenoir's capability as an officer, his concern for his men, and the difficult decisions he faced are delineated in regular entries full of keen observations. Jones expands his coverage by including an account of the Highlanders for the duration of the war and enriches the edition with more than 140 illustrations and selected letters from the Lenoir Family Papers, many never before published.
To the list of the most revealing editions of wartime documents, Captain Lenoir's diary adds an extraordinarily valuable resource--the portrait of an officer who served the Confederacy honorably and an account of his company, the Haywood Highlanders, as they marched and fought through almost four years of the horrible American Civil War.
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Captain Lenoir's Diary with a prestigious Robert Bruce Cooke Family History Book Award and a Willie Parker Peace History Book Award for 2011.
After the fall of Fort Sumter in April 1861, Thomas Isaac Lenoir, a landholder, slaveowner, and farmer from the region known as the East Fork of the Pigeon River, and Col. Joseph Cathey, a respected farmer, merchant, and politician in the Forks of Pigeon community, assembled a band of zealous volunteers who had poured out of the North Carolina hills to fight the Yankees.
Lenoir, at the age of forty-three, was unanimously elected to lead the fledgling military unit his mountaineers styled the "Haywood Highlanders." As captain, he recorded in his personal diary the various activities and movements of his company as well as many other events and impressions as the mountaineers defended the Carolina coastal regions.
In this annotated transcription of a previously unpublished document, award-winning historian Carroll C. Jones brings to light the captain's daily life in the field. Lenoir's capability as an officer, his concern for his men, and the difficult decisions he faced are delineated in regular entries full of keen observations. Jones expands his coverage by including an account of the Highlanders for the duration of the war and enriches the edition with more than 140 illustrations and selected letters from the Lenoir Family Papers, many never before published.
To the list of the most revealing editions of wartime documents, Captain Lenoir's diary adds an extraordinarily valuable resource--the portrait of an officer who served the Confederacy honorably and an account of his company, the Haywood Highlanders, as they marched and fought through almost four years of the horrible American Civil War.
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Captain Lenoir's Diary with a prestigious Robert Bruce Cooke Family History Book Award and a Willie Parker Peace History Book Award for 2011.
The 25th North Carolina Troops in the Civil War:
History and Roster of a Mountain-Bred Regiment
______________________________________________________________________
"A well-written, beautifully illustrated history of one of the lesser-known
North Carolina units" -- Civil War News
"Compelling insight" -- NC Historical Review
"Well-researched, marked by solid writing...a commendable history ...
recommended" -- Blue & Gray Magazine
"This volume should be deemed the consummate source of information regarding the 25th N.C. Regiment." -- Willie Parker Peace History Book Award
"In my personal opinion, Jones is now the world's leading expert on the 25th North Carolina Infantry Regiment...
extremely well-written and researched. As regimental histories go...this is as good as it gets."
Terrell Garren, author of The Secret of War and Mountain Myth.
History and Roster of a Mountain-Bred Regiment
______________________________________________________________________
"A well-written, beautifully illustrated history of one of the lesser-known
North Carolina units" -- Civil War News
"Compelling insight" -- NC Historical Review
"Well-researched, marked by solid writing...a commendable history ...
recommended" -- Blue & Gray Magazine
"This volume should be deemed the consummate source of information regarding the 25th N.C. Regiment." -- Willie Parker Peace History Book Award
"In my personal opinion, Jones is now the world's leading expert on the 25th North Carolina Infantry Regiment...
extremely well-written and researched. As regimental histories go...this is as good as it gets."
Terrell Garren, author of The Secret of War and Mountain Myth.
This historical non-fiction account covers the 25th Regiment North Carolina Infantry Troops during the Civil War. Farmers and farmers' sons left their mountain homesteads to enlist with the regiment at Asheville in July and August of 1861 and to defend their homeland from a Yankee invasion. The book chronicles the unit's defensive activities in the Carolina coastal regions and battlefield actions at Seven Days, Antietam Run, Fredericksburg, Plymouth, Richmond, and Petersburg. In addition, casualty and desertion statistics are included along with a complete regimental roster and 118 photos, illustrations, and maps.
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded The 25th North Carolina Troops in the Civil War with a prestigious Willie Parker Peace History Book Award in 2009.
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded The 25th North Carolina Troops in the Civil War with a prestigious Willie Parker Peace History Book Award in 2009.
Rooted Deep in the Pigeon Valley
...an informative and entertaining collection of stories that provide insight into the lives of the hardy pioneers who settled in the rich and beautiful area of North Carolina called Pigeon Valley. Vivid imagery echoes memories etched in the author's mind of times he spent in the 1950's and 60's in this verdant valley and surrounding area. The pages of this book make a good read for both those familiar with this area as well as those who are not.
(from the foreword by Edith Hutchins Burnette)
...an informative and entertaining collection of stories that provide insight into the lives of the hardy pioneers who settled in the rich and beautiful area of North Carolina called Pigeon Valley. Vivid imagery echoes memories etched in the author's mind of times he spent in the 1950's and 60's in this verdant valley and surrounding area. The pages of this book make a good read for both those familiar with this area as well as those who are not.
(from the foreword by Edith Hutchins Burnette)
Nestled in the ancient mountains of western North Carolina, near Asheville, lies a fertile and historic valley carved by the brawling headwaters of the Pigeon River. Home to Cherokee Indians, pioneer settlers, Civil War volunteers, and to farmers, adventurers, and industrialists, the Pigeon Valley has claimed a firm place in the hearts of its residents as well as in American history. Carroll C. Jones captures the spirit of this unique mountain community and chronicles the lives, accomplishments, and folkways of its people--preserving its portrait in word and image for generations to come.
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Rooted Deep in the Pigeon Valley with a prestigious Willie Parker Peace History Book Award for 2010.
The North Carolina Society of Historians awarded Rooted Deep in the Pigeon Valley with a prestigious Willie Parker Peace History Book Award for 2010.