McNEILL, Archibald, a Representative from North Carolina; born in Moore County, N.C.; member of the State house of commons in 1808 and 1809; served in the State senate 1811-1813, 1820, and 1821; elected as a Federalist to the Seventeenth Congress (March 4, 1821-March 3, 1823); reelected as a Jacksonian to the Nineteenth Congress (March 4, 1825-March 3, 1827); moved to Texas in 1836; in 1849 raised and was chosen captain of about one hundred men who started for California, where gold had been discovered; struck by a sandstorm while crossing a desert (in what is now part of Arizona), he and most of the men were killed; his remains were never recovered.
(Source: Biographical Directory of the United States 1774-present.)