Allen, Joseph Nathaniel, 1834-1917

Educator, attorney, and Confederate officer Joseph Nathaniel Allen (also known as Nat Allen) was born in Warren County, N.C., in 1834 and died in 1917.

Joseph Nataniel Allen (also known as Nat Allen) was born in 1834 to Edmond and Sallie Park Watson Allen in Warren County, N.C. Allen was educated at the Warrenton Male Academy and, in the 1850s, he read law with Judge Richmond M. Pearson. Although admitted to the North Carolina bar in 1859, it appears that Allen's primary vocation was education and his career culminated with his election to the post of Warren County superintendent of public instruction, in which position he served, 1899-1909.

During the Civil War, Allen served the Confederacy in three different capacities: in November 1861, he served briefly as a captain with the 34th Regiment of the 9th Brigade of the North Carolina Militia; he then served as private secretary to General Robert W. Ransom; and then he was dispatched to Wilmington, N.C., to serve on the staff of the Commissary Department.

Allen was married twice. In 1859, he married Mary Elizabeth Powell; they had two sons, Eugene and Ivey. In 1868, two years after his first wife's death, Allen married Mattie Harper, who was also an educator. They had three surviving daughters: Ida, Edna, and Sallie. Allen died in 1917.