Edward Hyde was a colonial governor of North Carolina.
Background
Hyde was born circa 1650 to a prominent family in England. His name suggests kinship with Edward Hyde, first earl of Clarendon and one of the original Lords Proprietors of Carolina, and, through him, with Queen Anne. What this connection was is uncertain, but in the colony it was believed to be very close, and Hyde encouraged the belief to advance his political fortunes.
Career
In 1709 he was designated by the Lords Proprietors as deputy governor of North Carolina, and Gov. Edward Tynte of Carolina, resident at Charlestown, was instructed to commission him. Upon arriving in Virginia in August 1710, Hyde learned that Tynte had died, leaving him without a commission and with no evidence of his appointment except some private letters in his possession. He found the colony torn by dissensions between an Anglican faction led by William Glover and a Quaker faction led by Thomas Cary, both of whom claimed the presidency of the Council. Cary had triumphed and Glover had fled to Virginia. The Glover faction, therefore, welcomed Hyde and proposed to settle the dispute by electing him president of the Council. Under the pressure of public sentiment inspired by the "aweful respect" for Hyde's supposed relationship to the Queen, Cary finally joined in the petition to Hyde to accept and he was elected, thus becoming acting governor until the further pleasure of the proprietors could be ascertained.
His first Assembly, controlled by the Gloverites, passed such severe punitive measures against the Cary faction that the latter rose in rebellion and were suppressed only when Virginia, at Hyde's urgent request, dispatched marines from the guardships to his aid. Cary, "impeathed [sic] of high crimes and misdemeanours" by the Assembly, fled to Virginia, but was arrested and sent to England for trial. His case was finally dismissed because Hyde failed to furnish any evidence against him.
On July 31, 1712, Hyde issued a proclamation pardoning all the rebels except Cary and four others. On December 7, 1710, the Lords Proprietors resolved that "a Governour be made for North Carolina Independent of the Governour of South Carolina" and selected Hyde for the place; on July 30, 1711, the Privy Council approved the choice. Hyde's commission was issued January 24, 1711/12 and on May 9 he qualified before his Council at Edenton. During his brief administration, he justified the Lords Proprietors' estimate of him as "a Person of integrity and Capacity. "
He was a stanch Anglican and in him the missionaries of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel found a strong supporter. Baron de Graffenried acknowledged the value of Hyde's aid in the settlement of his colony of Palatines on the Neuse River. His judicious course in the long-standing Carolina-Virginia boundary dispute won the confidence of both parties, but his "precarious footing" in North Carolina prevented a settlement during his administration. Encouraged by the divisions in the colony, the Tuscarora Indians along the Neuse declared war on the whites, and on the morning of September 22, 1711, practically wiped out De Graffenried's colony. In this crisis Hyde acted with great energy, but before the Indians could be subdued he contracted a fever from which he died.
In the colony he enjoyed a reputation as "a great and good character. " He was survived by his wife, Catherine, who left North Carolina shortly after his death, presumably to return to England.
Achievements
Connections
In 1692, he married Catherine Rigby, whose family was prominent in Cheshire.