Background
He was born on July 9, 1758 near Charlotte, North Carolina, United States, the son of Thomas Polk and Susan (Spratt).
He was born on July 9, 1758 near Charlotte, North Carolina, United States, the son of Thomas Polk and Susan (Spratt).
He was a student at Queen's College, Charlotte.
William was appointed second lieutenant in a South Carolina regiment composed of troops from both of the Carolinas, and saw service against the Loyalists in South Carolina, attracting notice as a daring and resourceful young officer. He was desperately wounded at the battle of Reedy River and confined to bed for nine months. Thereafter it was his proud boast that his was the first American blood spilt south of Lexington.
On November 27, 1776, the provincial congress elected him major of the 9th Regiment of the North Carolina Line, which he commanded when it went to Charleston and when it joined Washington's army in New Jersey in March 1777. He participated in the battles of Brandywine and Germantown, and was severely wounded in the latter. He spent the winter at Valley Forge and when the nine North Carolina regiments were consolidated into four, the officers fell out by lot and he was retired.
He returned to North Carolina on recruiting service and presently joined General Caswell's staff and was with him at Camden. He then joined the staff of General Davidson, with whom he served until Davidson was killed at Cowan's Ford. He was a volunteer officer at Guilford Court House, after which he served with General Pickens for a short time until Governor Rutledge commissioned him lieutenant-colonel commandant of the 4th South Carolina Cavalry. Transferred later to the command of the 3rd Regiment, he fought with it in the engagements at Friday's Ferry, Orangeburg, Fort Motte, Eutaw Springs, Watboo Creek, and Quinby.
He was appointed a surveyor general of the state land office with headquarters in Davidson County, which he represented in the North Carolina House of Commons in 1785 and 1786. The following year he returned to Mecklenburg, which he represented in the House in 1787 and again in 1790. In 1791 he became supervisor of internal revenue for North Carolina, serving until 1808.
He moved to Raleigh in 1799, where he was increasingly prominent in political, business, and social affairs. He was president of the state bank from 1811 to 1819, president of the Neuse River Navigation Company, an active and devoted trustee of the University of North Carolina from 1790 to 1834 and president of the board from 1802 to 1805, and grand master of Masons for North Carolina and Tennessee from 1799 to 1802. He was several times a candidate for governor before the General Assembly, but, a Federalist, he had no chance of election.
Opposed to the War of 1812, he refused to consider the command of a regiment, and when President Madison appointed him a brigadier-general, he declined in spite of much embarrassment. Later, he refused to consider an informal tender of a major-general's commission. In 1824 and 1828 he was an enthusiastic supporter of Jackson, his close friend, and managed his campaign in North Carolina. In the latter state he owned more than one hundred thousand acres of land.
William Polk died in Raleigh.
He was twice married: on October 15, 1789, to Grizelda, daughter of Judge Thomas and Martha (Jones) Gilchrist of Suffolk, Virhinia, who died in 1799; on January 1, 1801, to Sarah, daughter of Philemon Hawkins, Jr.
By his first marriage he had two children, one of whom, William J. , was the father of Lucius Eugene Polk; by the second he had twelve children, one of whom was Leonidas.