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b
<br /> father' s former partner, on January 2, 1865a20 The couple had three children, Sallie
<br /> Elizabeth, Loretta J., and Harry when Loretta died in 1869 . Five years later, on
<br /> December 30, 1874, Addison married fifteen-year-old Elizabeth Edney Breeze, called
<br /> "Bettie . " This union took place just after he completed the farmhouse that was * to be
<br /> home to his family for the next 37 years . 21
<br /> Vic Garrard, who with his father, Jerome, and brother, Julian, operated the
<br /> Holden-Roberts farm as a tenant, recalls that his grandfather, Wade Cates, as a
<br /> seventeen- year- old, helped to bring preconstructed panels to the farm via horse-drawn
<br /> wagon and to assemble the handsome I-House with Greek Revival details for Addison
<br /> Holden. 22 Using his grandfather' s age as a guide, Garrard dates the construction of the
<br /> house to 1873-74. 23 It is of interest that Isaac Holden loaned his nephew $242 .48 at this
<br /> time, receiving a mortgage secured by the land on October 14, 1874. 24 Garrard also
<br /> reports that the stone for the chimneys was taken from a soapstone quarry northwest
<br /> of the f arm . 25
<br /> After the .house was completed, Addison Holden lived quietly among his
<br /> neighbors, undoubtedly wishing _ to avoid any unpleasantness associated , with the
<br /> unpopularity of his half-brother, W. W . Holden, then Governor. This man had doubled
<br /> North Carolina' s debt by the corrupt issuance of railroad bonds; raised taxes
<br /> exorbitantly to pay interest on these obligations; given hefty per-diem allowances to
<br /> state legislators, most of whom were viewed as carpetbaggers and scalawags,
<br /> encouraged newly-freed blacks to vote and run for election to political offices; ordered
<br /> Colonel George W. Kirk and the state militia into Caswell and Alamance Counties to
<br /> suppress opposition and Klu Klux Klan activities with force; and jailed influential
<br /> newspaper editor Josiah Turner of Raleigh who spoke out against him in print. 26
<br /> Holden was later impeached in office, and family members are reported to have been
<br /> threatened occasionally by angry neighbors . 27
<br /> Addison Holden made a payment of $158 in August of 1880 that settled the debt
<br /> to his uncle. That year population and an agricultural censuses, taken in June, give the
<br /> only official records of his family and farming activities . The population - census lists
<br /> Addison as a farmer, aged 42, and Bettie, aged 26, as a housekeeper . Other members of
<br /> the household noted were the children from Addison's marriage to Loretta Lyon: Sallie
<br /> Elizabeth, aged 16; Loretta J., 13; Harry S ., 12; and Addison's sister, Maggie G ., 52 . Two
<br /> additional children, Ralph and Koma, are reported to have been born to Addison and
<br /> Bettie Holden several years later. 28
<br /> Diversified agriculture was the basic economic pursuit in North Carolina after
<br /> the Civil War, but prices of agricultural staples such as cotton, corn, and wheat collapsed
<br /> t
<br /> 20 Browning, letter, p . 6.
<br /> 21 Browning, letter, p. 6.
<br /> 22 Garrard, interview.
<br /> 23 Garrard, interview.
<br /> 24 Orange County Deed Book 42, p. 550.
<br /> 25 Garrard, interview.
<br /> 26 Newsome and Lefler, P. 468-9.
<br /> 27 Jones, interview, and Browning, letter, p. 8.
<br /> 28 Jones, interview.
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