Elizabeth Weeks & Phoebe Munden
(Pasquotank County)
Featured Characters – Divided Allegiances
Union
General Edward Wild's Men as they Marched to Norfolk
Courtesy of the North Carolina State
Archives
Born in 1823 as Phoebe Jennings, she became the wife of
William J. Munden, a successful Pasquotank
County farmer. The 1860 Census lists Munden’s net assets at
$4,260, including one twenty-two year old female slave. In 1863, William joined John T. Elliot’s
company of Confederate partisan rangers as a first lieutenant. During Union General Edward Wild’s Raid, the guerrillas captured a
colored soldier, Samuel Jordan.
Following the Union introduction of black troops, the Confederacy vowed
to treat any colored soldiers as escaped slaves and return them to
bondage. Worried about that possibility
with Private Jordan, General Wild decided to retaliate against the Confederate
captors. Wild seized Phoebe Munden and
Elizabeth Weeks, wife of another partisan, as hostages until Elliot guaranteed
the safe return of Samuel Jordan. After
receiving no reply from the Confederate captain, Wild took the women back to
Union-occupied Norfolk. An investigative committee of the Confederate
Congress later claimed that Munden and Weeks spent three days behind bars, with
their hands and feet tied. In January
1864, Elliot avenged Daniel Bright’s execution by hanging Samuel Jordan in Elizabeth City. Following, Union commander
Benjamin Butler ordered the women’s release.
After the removal of all Confederate guerrillas by North Carolina Governor
Zebulon Vance, Munden’s band of rangers became Company A, 68th North
Carolina Infantry. The Mundens returned
to Pasquotank County after the war.