Early years at Blewett Falls (Part 1)

Our story began at a place on Pee Dee River that was and now called Blewett Falls. Native Americans used this fall of the river to trap and catch food. The falls were later named by William Blewett (Bluit) Sr. William was born in England in 1719 and died and was buried in Richmond Co N.C

For many years before the white man came to the New World there were no dams to block the flow of the Pee Dee from the mountains to the coast. At the natural falls of the river native Americans would build V-shaped fish traps with rock off the river bottom. They would also use these shallow rapids to ford the river on foot.

When the white man came over to the New World, trappers, traders, and hunters would venture up the Pee Dee in their canoes. They would camp along side the banks of the river but when they reached the falls they had to portage around to get to deeper water.

It was around 1740 that river traffic, up and down the Pee Dee, began in earnest. Pole boats were used like barges and either just crossed the river or traveled upstream as far as Ol Sneadsboro. It would be another fifty years before steamboats would travel from the coast to Cheraw.

It was about this time that a local man by the name of Silas Hailey ran a river boat down from Rockingham area to Cheraw S.C. and all in between. So happened his father William Hailey (A Quaker) built and ran a Hailey’s Ferry on the Pee Dee just below what is now Cordova N.C.

Before we go chasing too many rabbits in a hole, let’s get back to William Blewett and Blewett Falls.

William Blewett came to New England around 1730. Some said that he later guided a group of Quakers down to the Carolinas around the Pee Dee River. While he was there, he scoped out the land. During this time in history all these areas around Richmond, Anson, Scotland and Montgomery counties were part of Bladen Co. and belonged to the king of England or his proprietors.

William went back to Wilmington Delaware after his trip to Carolina and married Sarah Gardon. This marriage produced four children but by the time old William died in Richmond Co. in 1810 he had been married three times and had even more children.

William always loved the land along Pee Dee River he had seen in N.C. and so in 1746 he applied for a King’s grant for 200 ac. He secured the land in 1748. The land started at the mouth of Cartledge Creek and went north and east along the river. William later secured a total of five land grants all boarding along the Pee Dee. He then named the falls after himself and then built his house overlooking the falls in 1760. He also built a ferry and opened a fishery just south of the falls. This was on the road from Fayetteville (Cross Creek) to the mountains

When William Sr. wrote his will on June 15th, 1790, he left the ferry and fishery to his six sons and a bunch of land between the river and Buck Walls store on state Hwy.# 1005 to his daughters.

In the early eighteen hundreds Pee Navigation co. and several other companies tried to navigate the falls but failed.

Mean while a lot of the Blewett family either died or moved on to Mississippi. Some of the land around Blewett Falls was sold to Steven Wall. After Wall died, the land was sold to T.T. Covington of Laurinburg who later sold it to his brother-in-law John C. Ellerbe.

After the Civil War, reconstruction bore down hard all over our southern states. It took several long years, but business started to pick up. In Rockingham alone there were nine cotton mills in operation all powered by water or steam. On the horizon though was a new type of energy called electrical power. This new type of power would take a lot of men with vision, determination and of course money to become a reality.

One such man was Hugh McRae; McRae was born of Scottish ancestry just fifty-one days after General Lee surrendered at Appomattox. His family lived in Wilmington, N.C. area but when things got bad after the war they moved up round the Chatham and Moore Co. line in the Piedmont or Sandhills section of our state.

As Hugh moved into manhood, he became a promoter and even an enthusiast of this new energy called electricity. In the late 1800’s he even conceived the idea of harnessing this great power potential on the Pee Dee River.

About this same time (1899) Colonel John Polk was also planning to harness the upper Pee Dee about where the Yakin River ends at a place called the Narrows.

Both men knew to produce this new energy a dam large enough to hold the sometimes-flooded waters of the mighty river had to be constructed along with a powerhouse to generate the power.

McRae carefully gauged the Pee Dee River around Blewett Falls and concluded that this would be the best site for his new dam. The river dropped some sixteen feet, and the flow was 7716 cubic feet per second. Compared to High Rock, Wilkesboro and other sections of the river this was the greatest flow.

Mr. McRae and his team worked tirelessly from the years 1900 to 1905 to promote the large project. In 1903 with investors in place, he purchased the land around Blewett Falls where the new dam would be built. By Feb. 20th, 1905, Mr. McRae started the Great Pee Dee Electric and Power Co. but in less than a year the named changed to Rockingham Power Co.

In part #2 we will continue with our story about the building of Blewett Falls Dam and the men who built it.