Joseph McDowell Jr. was an American soldier and congressman.
Background
Joseph McDowell Jr. was born at Winchester, Virginia. He was the son of Joseph McDowell and Margaret O'Neal or O'Neil and the brother of Charles McDowell. His father settled at Quaker Meadows (near Morganton), Burke County, N. C. , where Joseph's youth was spent.
Career
After the outbreak of the Revolution he was attached to Charles McDowell's militia regiment and accompanied his brother on the Rutherford expedition against the Cherokees (1776). He took part in the numerous battles in North Carolina against the Loyalists including Ramsour's Mill (June 20, 1780), the Pacolet River skirmish, and Musgrove's Mill. When the "backwater men" assembled in September 1780 to oppose the Loyalist invasion of Maj. Patrick Ferguson of the 71st Highlanders, McDowell was major in his brother's regiment. During the absence of Charles McDowell on a mission to General Gates, Joseph commanded the McDowell regiment in the battle of King's Mountain, October 7, 1780. At the battle of Cowpens (January 17, 1781) he commanded a detachment of 190 mounted riflemen from Burke County. In the same year he was active in attacking the Cherokees and later commanded the McDowell regiment during his brother's expedition against the Cherokees (1782). He was a member of the North Carolina House of Commons (1785 - 88), of the North Carolina Senate (1791 - 95), and of the North Carolina conventions of 1788 and 1789 that met to consider ratification of the Federal Constitution.
Achievements
Politics
McDowell opposed ratification because the Constitution lacked a bill of rights. A leader of the Democratic-Republicans in western North Carolina, he was elected to the Fifth Congress (1797 - 99), where he joined other Democratic-Republicans in opposing the Alien and Sedition acts. He is usually said to have been a member of the Third Congress (1793 - 95), but the Biographical Directory of the American Congress (1928) credits the term to his cousin Joseph, known as "Pleasant Gardens Joe. "
Personality
The descendants of the latter insist that it was he who commanded the McDowell militia at King's Mountain, but the claim is disproved by the testimony of other officers.
Connections
"Quaker Meadows Joe" married Margaret Moffett of Virginia, by whom he had six daughters and two sons, one of whom was Joseph Jefferson McDowell, member of Congress from Ohio.