Early Life
Williams was born in Hanover County, Virginia and orphaned before he was twelve. He moved into the home of his brother, John, in Granville County, North Carolina. John, being a lawyer, gave him a basic education before James set out on his own. He settled on the Little River in South Carolina.
By 1773, Williams had started a farm and built a mill in the Ninety-Six District on the western frontier (in what is modern Laurens County, South Carolina), and was an officer in the local militia. Tensions rose before the revolution, as many of his neighbors took Loyalist positions. Williams, however, supported the American cause. He joined the local Committee of Safety, and was elected to the state's Provincial Congress in 1775 and again in 1776.
Read more about this topic: James Williams (Revolutionary War)
Famous quotes related to early life:
“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)