Background
Otway Burns was born around 1775 in Onslow County, North Carolina, near the present village of Swannsboro, was the son of Otway Burns whose father, Francis, came to North Carolina from Glasgow in 1734.
legislator privateer shipbuilder
Otway Burns was born around 1775 in Onslow County, North Carolina, near the present village of Swannsboro, was the son of Otway Burns whose father, Francis, came to North Carolina from Glasgow in 1734.
Otway Burns early went to sea and at the outbreak of the War of 1812 was in command of a merchantman plying between New Bern, North Carolina, and Portland, Maine. Learning of the declaration of war he sold his vessel in New York and for eight thousand dollars bought the Levere, a Baltimore clipper noted for her speed.
He took her to New Bern where books of subscription were opened to equip her as a privateer. She was renamed the Snap-Dragon and carried six guns and a crew of a hundred. For three years Burns was a terror to the enemy. He preyed on British commerce from Greenland to Brazil. The command of a privateer gave him every opportunity to display his reckless courage and skilful seamanship.
His daring exploits were many: he dashed into the midst of armed convoys to seize his prey; he pounced on British commerce under the guns of Halifax. He attacked British men-of-war; at St. Thomas he escaped from five of them; at other times capture semed so inevitable that the crew packed their baggage for the long journey to England and to Dartmoor. There are no estimates of the total damage he did to British shipping, but in a single cruise of about three months in 1813 he captured or destroyed commerce of over two and a half millions. The profits of these ventures were enormous; they would have been greater but for his miserable set of prize masters who allowed many of the most valuable prizes to be retaken. The British government offered a prize of $50, 000 for his capture, dead or alive.
In June 1814 through a skilful stratagem the Leopard captured the Snap-Dragon but Burns was not in command; rheumatism had kept him in port. After the war he returned to shipbuilding. In 1820 he built the Prometheus, the first steamer that plied the waters of Cape Fear, three years later the Warrior, and in 1831 the brig Henry.
Elected to the General Assembly in 1821 he represented Carteret County, in the Commons or in the Senate, until 1835. His vote in the Senate in January 1835 carried the measure calling the Constitutional Convention, and ended his political career.
He settled in the village of Portsmouth and there sank into his anecdotage.
He was fond of his brilliant naval uniform and cocked hat, he liked good whiskey, and he liked a good fight, whether on the water-front or in the legislature. The figure of this picturesque patriot early became wrapped in legends from which his biographers have not wholly disengaged themselves.
Otway Burns was married three times: first, to a Miss Grant; second, in 1814, to Jane Hall of Beaufort, North Carolina; and, third, in 1842, to Jane Smith of Smyrna, North Carolina.