William Blount
Windsor, Bertie County, North Carolina
Marker Inscription
William Blount. Member of Continental Congress, signer of the Federal Constitution, governor S.W. Territory, Senator from Tennessee. Birthplace 1/5 mi. S.W.
Erected by North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources
The Story
Born in this corner of colonial North Carolina, William Blount rose to sit in the Continental Congress and to sign the United States Constitution in 1787. President Washington named him governor of the Territory South of the River Ohio, and Blount went on to become one of Tennessee's first U.S. senators as the young nation pushed west. His career bridges the Revolutionary founding and the opening of the trans-Appalachian frontier.
Why it matters
Blount embodies the founders who not only wrote the Constitution but then carried American government across the mountains, shaping the states that grew from the western territories.
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Related people
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