Samuel Ashe (24 March 1725 - 22 January 1813) was the Democratic-Republican governor of the U.S. state of North Carolina from 1795 to 1798.

Ashe was born in Beaufort, North Carolina; his father John Baptista Ashe, had been president of the North Carolina Colonial Assembly . Ashe became an orphan at the age of 9. He married Mary Porter in 1748; they had three children before she died and Ashe remarried, this time to Elizabeth Merrik.

Ashe studied law and was named Assistant Attorney for the Crown in the Wilmington district of the colony.

He became involved in the revolutionary movement and served in the North Carolina Provincial Congress, in the Halifax Congress and as a member of the North Carolina militia. In 1776, he was elected to the North Carolia Senate and was elected speaker; the following year, Ashe was appointed presiding judge of the state Superior Court; a post he held until 1795.

In 1795, the General Assembly elected him governor at the age of 70. He served three terms, the maximum constitutional limit, before retiring in 1798. Ashe continued to remain active in politics after his term as governor, serving as a member of the Electoral College in 1804.

Ashe County, and the City of Asheville, North Carolina is named in his honor. The city of Asheville was also named the "Jewel of the Mountains" between the two area's.

Sources

• Biographical Directory of the Governors of the United States, 1789-1978, Robert Sobel and John Raimo, eds. Westport, CT: Meckler Books, 1978. (ISBN 0-930466-00-4)