Music has always played an important role in political movements. This is especially true when few people read and write. Most ideas were shared orally. The Regulators also used songs to communicate their complaints about colonial leaders. Political songs were sung at meetings or in taverns. They reminded people of their anger and inspired them to action.

Rednap Howell was a schoolmaster from New Jersey. He became a leader of the Regulator movement and likely wrote these songs. No original copy of the songs survives. They may not have been written down at all. The two verses here were reprinted in the Raleigh Register in 1825. A former Regulator recited these verses as he remembered them. Unfortunately, we don't have a way to know tunes. But Howell's words would have likely been set to the tunes of folk songs that settlers already knew.

"When Fanning first to Orange came" was one of the best-known poems. It told of Edmund Fanning's corruption. The lyrics are below. 

The best-known of the poems, "When Fanning first to Orange came," told of Edmund Fanning's corruption​. The lyrics are below. 

When Fanning first to Orange came
He looked both pale and wan,
An old patched coat upon his back,
An old mare he rode on.
Both man and mare wa'n't worth five pounds,
As I've been often told,
But by his civil robberies
He's laced his coat with gold.1

A second song tells the story of John Frohock. He was the lieutenant-colonel of Rowan County's militia group. Frohock was also a member of the colonial assembly. The Regulators charged him with illegally demanding money by making threats. But the jury was packed with militia officers, and Frohock was not convicted.

Says Frohawk to Fanning, to tell the plain truth,
When I came to this country I was but a youth;
My father sent for me; I wa'n't worth a cross;
And then my first study was to steal for a horse.
I quickly got credit, and then ran away,
And hav'n't paid for him to this very day.

Says Fanning to Frohawk, 'tis folly to lie,
I rode an old mare that was blind of one eye;
Five shillings in money I had in my purse,
My coat it was patched, but not much the worse;
But now we've got rich, and it's very well known,
That we'll do very well, if they'll let us alone. 2

1. These lyrics were reprinted in John Spencer Bassett, The Regulators of North Carolina (1765-1771). Annual report of the American Historical Association, 1894, p. 157

2. Reprinted in Revolutionary History of North Carolina, in Three Lectures (Raleigh: William E. Cooke, 1853), p. 17.