The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 21, July 1917 - April, 1918 Page: 424

The Southwestern Historical Quarterly

BOOK REVIEWS
Chronicles of Cape Fear River, 166-0-1916. By James Sprunt,
with preface by S. A. Ashe. Second Edition. (Raleigh,
N. C., Edwards & Broughton Printing Company, 1916, Pp.
xi, 732. $4.00. For sale by Miss Rosa Pendleton Chiles,
Washington, D. C.
Mr. James Sprunt, a prominent citizen of Wilmington, N. C.,
has been identified for many years with every effort to collect and
preserve the material relating to the history of his own section of
his state and to promote historical research in that fruitful field.
All students of Southern history know the James Sprunt Histori-
cal Publications issued by the University of North Carolina and
their predecessors, the James Sprunt Historical Monographs.
This volume is in a large part the result of Mr. Sprunt's own
researches which have extended over many years of a busy life.
The first edition was published in 1914. This second one con-
tains about one hundred pages of new material and six maps,
with a rearrangement of the whole book. It makes an imposing
volume.
Beginning with accounts of the origin of the name of Cape
Fear, of the Indians of that vicintty, and the first European ex-
plorers, the chapters deal successively with the developments of
the colonial period-the establishment of towns and forts, early
commerce, colonial society and local worthies-with the develop-
ment of the spirit of revolution, and the Revolution itself; then
on through the nineteenth century--the rise of steamboat navi-
gation, the stirring of Wilmington's ambition to become an im-
portant port, and the pushing of internal improvements, especi-
ally railroads, to that end-with glimpses of great personages who
move in and out of the picture and gossipy anecdotes of some of
lesser note. About one-third of the book is given to the four
years of the Civil War, notable years in the history of Wilming-
ton, when that place was by far the most important port in the
Confederacy and for much of the time the only one. The stories
of the blockade-running, in which Mr. Sprunt himself had a
part, are the most fascinating in the volume, while the author's

424