"Hailing from Wagram in Scotland County, McNeill spent a blissful childhood among spacious fields and broad forests. He attended a small school near his boyhood home until his family moved to Riverton, when McNeill was twelve. After a short time at another school, in his early twenties McNeill attended Wake Forest College.
After studying law his junior year, McNeill graduated as valedictorian of his class in 1897, and received a master’s degree in English two years later. At twenty-six, he moved to Lumberton, where he established himself as an attorney, although he preferred journalism and poetry to the drudgery of law. It was in Lumberton that he began submitting material, including poems, to a weekly newspaper. His election in 1903 to the state senate provided him an opportunity to pursue his political ambitions, where he supported the popular temperance movement by introducing legislation that forbid the production or sale of alcoholic beverages in Scotland County. After leaving Lumberton in 1904, McNeill moved to Laurinburg again to establish a private practice.
While a senator, McNeill penned poems, a number of which were published in Century Magazine and the Charlotte Observer. He became a staff member of the Observer in 1904. Already an established poet, he became a roving journalist, covering interest stories from all over the state. In October of 1905, McNeill won first place in the competition for the inaugural Patterson Cup, the first literary contest to be held in North Carolina. The achievement gave McNeill greater exposure, and with the unofficial title of “North Carolina’s Poet Laureate,” he was hired for numerous speaking and literary engagements. Two years later, McNeill became gravely ill and returned to the family house in Riverton. On October 17, 1907, he died and was buried in Spring Hill cemetery, near Wagram. His boyhood home has been preserved and is open to the public at Temperance Hall in Wagram. Two collections of McNeill’s poems were published, Songs Merry and Sad in 1906 followed by Lyrics from Cottonland, published posthumously.
References:
William S. Powell, ed., Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, IV, 181-3 (1991)—sketch by Richard Walser
Heritage of Scotland County (2003)
Richard Walser, McNeill's Poem about a Suicide: An Essay in Literary History, The Windhover (Spring 1966)
Richard Walser, Literary North Carolina (1970)
North Carolina Writers Network website, John Charles McNeill, 1874-1907: (
visit link) (search John Charles McNeill)
John Charles McNeill, Songs Merry and Sad (1906).
--Source (
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Sunburnt Boys
A poem by John Charles McNeill
Down on the Lumbee river
Where the eddies ripple cool
Your boat, I know, glides stealthily
About some shady pool.
The summer's heats have lulled asleep
The fish-hawk's chattering noise,
And all the swamp lies hushed about
You sunburnt boys.
You see the minnow's waves that rock
The cradled lily leaves.
From a far field some farmer's song,
Singing among his sheaves,
Comes mellow to you where you sit,
Each man with boatman's poise,
There, in the shimmering water lights,
You sunburnt boys.
I know your haunts: each gnarly bole
That guards the waterside,
Each tuft of flags and rushes where
The river reptiles hide,
Each dimpling nook wherein the bass
His eager life employs
Until he dies--the captive of
You sunburnt boys.
You will not--will you?--soon forget
When I was one of you,
Nor love me less that time has borne
My craft to currents new;
Nor shall I ever cease to share
Your hardships and your joys,
Robust, rough-spoken, gentle-hearted
Sunburnt boys!
- John Charles McNeill
Text of marker:
John Charles
Youngest son of
Capt Duncan &
Euphemia McNeill
July 26, 1874.
Oct. 17, 1907
He giveth his beloved sleep