Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 24.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

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[35] This beneficent system remained vigorous to the end. The public school was maintained in North Carolina throughout the war, except in those sections where the Federals had control, and Sherman's army on its entrance into Raleigh found Dr. Wiley at his desk receiving reports and tabulating statements on the condition of the schools.

The position of Dr. Wiley among Southern educators, generally, was not less distinguished. He was regarded by all as an honored and trusted leader.¹ Another alumnus, Colonel William Bingham, class of 1856, remained at the head of his private school for boys during the whole of the war period. The school was continued at Oaks, in Orange county, and ten miles from a railroad, until the winter of 1864-65, when it was removed to Mebane, N. C. It was then put under a military organization, it officers were commissioned by the State, and the cadets were exempted from duty until eighteen years of age. The difficulties were great, one of the most serious being the lack of the necessary books. This want was met by the preparation of Bingham's series of English and Latin text-books, which have been republished since the war and are now used in every State of the Union.²

Perhaps the most curious of the educational enterprises of our alumni was the law school for Confederate prisoners, established on Johnson's Island in 1863 and 1864, by Joseph J. Davis (1847-50), who was then a prisoner of war.