James Innes, Commander of the Colonies

Four miles west, on the Cape Fear River, lies the grave of James Innes, one of colonial North Carolina's most consequential soldiers. Born around seventeen hundred, likely in Scotland, Innes raised a company of men for the disastrous seventeen forty Cartagena expedition during the War of Jenkins' Ear. He sailed one hundred men to assault a Spanish fortress on the coast of South America.

Only twenty-five came home, most of the rest lost to disease. He survived, and fourteen years later found himself at the center of an even larger crisis. When the French and Indian War erupted in seventeen fifty-four, Innes was appointed Commander-in-Chief of all colonial forces in the Ohio River Valley, a posting that placed him above a young Virginia officer named George Washington.

He led the colonial effort through seventeen fifty-six before ill health forced his resignation. He died in seventeen fifty-nine and was buried on his Cape Fear estate, a soldier who shaped the early shape of North America.