It would be hard to exaggerate the importance of John Lawson when it comes to the early settling of North Carolina. He was a brilliant naturalist, explorer, philosopher, artist, building, who was involved in both New Bern, where the British governor had his palace, Tryon’s Palace, and he lived also in Bath. He died a gruesome death at the hands of Tuscarora Indians who were ticked off about the stealing and exploitation of their land by English-speaking settlers. Here is a plaque honoring Lawson….
And here is a plaque honoring the Bonner House which we will now visit…..
The house while a hundred or so years younger than the Palmer House, is more primitive. 
One of the more interesting stories you regularly run into in these old houses is how guests, or residents have carved their names in the wood on the house, or in the glass windows…..as in these two examples, the former of which is from the Bonner House, the latter from Hopsewee Planatation….
Full disclosure, one is not allowed to take pictures inside these old homes, hence the focus on the exterior. They sometimes have period furniture, but there is not really any original furniture of the residents still in these houses in Bath. But… you can admire the arboreteum with the grapevine outside the Bonner House….
But lest you think life in Bath was dozy and boring….. what if I told you this is where the real pirate, Edward Teach aka Blackbeard, lived and plied his trade (here and on Ocracoke Island), the subject of our next post.
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