On the 2nd of October, 1768, Captain James Jack, as stated in his own family register, moved to his own place, on the head of the Catawba river, then receiving a considerable emigration.  He had five children:  1.  Cynthia, born on the 20th of September, 1767. 2.  Patrick, born on the 27th of September, 1769. 3.  William Houston, bom on the 6th of June, 1771. 4.  Archibald, born on the 20th of April, 1773 (died young); and 5.  James, born on the 20th of September, 1775.

On the 4th of August, 1772, Captain Jack left his mountain home and moved to the residence of his father, Patrick Jack, in Mecklenburg county.  On the 16th of February, 1773, he and his father moved from the country, where they had been temporarily sojourning, into “Charlotte town,” prospered in business, and soon became useful and influential citizens.

On the 26th of Sept., 1780, Lord Cornwallis, elated with his victory at Camden, entered Charlotte, with the confident expectation of soon restoring North Carolina to the British Crown.  Patrick Jack was then an old and infirm man, having given up the chief control of his public house to his son, Captain James Jack; but neither age nor infirmity could enlist the sympathies of the British soldiery.  The patriotic character of the house had become extensively known through Tory information, and its destruction was consequently a “foregone conclusion.”  The British soldiers removed its aged owner from the feather bed upon which he was lying, emptied its contents into the street, aid then set the house on fire!  The reason assigned for this incendiary act was, “all of old Jack’s sons were in the rebel army,” and he himself had been an active promoter of American independence.

The loss to Patrick Jack of his dwelling-house and much furniture, accumulated through many years of patient toil and industry, was a severe one.  The excitement of the burning scene, consequent exposure, and great nervous shock to a system already debilitated with disease, a few months afterward brought to the grave this veteran patriot.  His aged partner survived him a few years.  Both were worthy and consistent members of the Presbyterian Church, and their mortal remains now repose in the old graveyard in Charlotte.

By the last will and testament of Patrick Jack, made on the 19th of May, 1780, he devised the whole of his personal estate and the “undivided benefit of his house and lots to his beloved wife during her life-time.”  After her death they were directed to be sold, and the proceeds divided among his five married daughters, viz.:  Charity Dysart, Jane Barnett, Mary Alexander, Margaret Wilson and Lillie Nicholson.  James Jack and Joseph Nicholson were appointed executors.  It is related of Dr. Thomas Henderson, a former venerable citizen of Charlotte, that, on his death-bed, he requested to be buried by the side of Patrick Jack, “one of the best men he had ever known.”