Calvin Pritchard was born on February 25, 1831, in Aulander, North Carolina, to Allen and Sarah Pritchard. His father was a farmer who owned $1,500 of real estate and $11,350 of personal property by 1860. He grew up and attended school in Bertie County, North Carolina.
He sided with the Confederacy during the Civil War, and he received a commission as a 3rd lieutenant in Company G of the 32nd North Carolina Infantry in the spring of 1862. He was promoted to 1st lieutenant in September 1862. Union forces captured him at Gettysburg on July 3, 1863, and he remained imprisoned until March 1865.
He settled in Franklinton, North Carolina, after the war, and he earned a living as a farmer. By 1870, he owned $300 of personal property. He married Maria Ward around 1874, and they had at least five children: Bessie, born around 1876; Kate, born around 1878; Fanny, born around 1879; Calvin, born around 1880; and Charles, born around 1883. They lived in Franklinton until the early 1900s, when they moved to Portsmouth, Virginia. He died of apoplexy in Holly Springs, North Carolina, on November 8, 1921.