Residence of the late E. B. C. Hambley

The Hambley-Wallace house was built for Egbert Barry Cornwall Hambley, an English mining engineer in 1902.  The two-and-a-half story yellow brick Jacobean styled structure was designed by Charles Christian Hook, a Charlotte architect, and built by A.R. Lazenby.  It is located on South Fulton Street.

Egbert Barry Cornwell Hambley was born in Cornwall, England in 1862.  He came to the Gold Hill mines of North Carolina in 1881 and stayed for three years.  After that, he traveled extensively in India, Africa, Mexico, Spain, and Norway to learn the latest mining techniques and the design of power facilities.  He returned to North Carolina where he took up permanent residence.  In 1887, he married Lottie Cleveland Coleman who was the great granddaughter of North Carolina Governor William Hawkins.  The couple had five children.  At first, they lived on a farm in Rockwell where Hambley raised Jersey cows.  Later, they moved to Fulton Street in Salisbury. 

He promoted business and industry in the area and organized the Salisbury Gas and Electric Light Company, served on the board of Salisbury Cotton Mills, Davis and Wiley Bank, and the Yadkin Railroad Company.  He became the vice-president and general manager of the Whitney Company, owned by George I. Whitney, a Pittsburgh financier.  Together they planned to build a hydroelectric power dam on the Yadkin River.  The project employed hundreds of people from as far away as Sicily (masons).  Granite from Rowan County was used in the construction of the dam.  The project was hampered by accidents and disease.  Hambley contracted typhoid and died suddenly at the age of forty-four.  One year later, Whitney abandoned the project, and it was not resumed for a decade.  Hambley is buried in Chestnut Hill Cemetery.

No series no. The Albertype Co., Brooklyn, N.Y. 

Source: 

Hood, Davyd Foard The Architecture of Rowan County North Carolina: A Catalogue and History of Surviving 18th, 19th, and 20th Structures  Salisbury: Historic Salisbury Foundation, 2000

Powell William S., editor Dictionary of North Carolina Biography Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, c1979-c1996

Theo Buerbaum

The materials in this collection are made available courtesy of Rowan Public Library for use in research and private study. Images and text may not be used without prior permission from Rowan Public Library, Edith M. Clark History Room.

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