Cornelias Harnett, an American revolutionary statesman, born in England, April 20, 1723, died at Wilmington, N. C, April 20, 1781. He came in early life to America, and prior to the disputes with Great Britain was a man of wealth and distinction, residing on a large estate near Wilmington, N. C. He was one of the earliest to denounce the stamp act and kindred measures. In 1770 - '71 he was representative of the borough of Wilmington in the provincial assembly, and chairman of the most important committees of that body. In 1772 he was appointed by the assembly, with Robert Howe and Maurice Moore, to prepare a remonstrance against the appointment, by the royal governor Martin, of commissioners to fix the southern boundary of the province. Josiah Quincy, who visited him in the following year, called him "the Samuel Adams of North Carolina;" and, as the revolution approached, he was its master spirit throughout the Cape Fear region. He was elected to the provincial congress in 1775, and to the congress at Halifax, on the Roanoke, in 1776, and drew up the instructions to the North Carolina delegates in the continental congress. When in 1776 Sir Henry Clinton appeared with a British fleet off Cape Fear, Harnett and Howe were excepted, as arch-rebels, from the terms of a general pardon.

On the arrival of the Declaration of Independence at Halifax, July 26, 1776, Harnett read it to a great concourse of citizens and soldiers, who took him on their shoulders and bore him in triumph through the town. In the autumn he was on the committee for drafting a state constitution and bill of rights, and afterward as member of the continental congress he signed the articles of confederation. When in 1780-'81 the British held possession of the country around Cape Fear, Harnett was made a prisoner, and died while a captive.