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Colonial and Regulator years · 1670–1774
- 1670s
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John Lederer visits the Eno people near present Hillsborough
The German physician described an Eno town on the Eno River laid out around a playing field, with large grain harvests and a government guided by its elders. About fourteen miles away he also met the Shakori, placed by the book on the Haw River near the Haw Fields.
- 1680s
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The Occaneechi settle on the Eno near Hillsborough
After leaving the Roanoke River valley in 1676, the Occaneechi built a town on the Eno River near present-day Hillsborough and lived there from about 1680 to 1710. It was a small stockaded village of ten or twelve houses and probably fewer than 75 people, and it was the town John Lawson visited in 1701. Archaeologists dug the whole village between 1983 and 1986 at a place they named the Fredricks site, and they call this period of Occaneechi life on the Eno the Fredricks phase.
- 1700s
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Enoe Will agrees at Occaneechi Town to guide John Lawson to the English settlements
Within two hours of John Lawson's arrival at Occaneechi Town on the Eno, Enoe Will came into the king's cabin and agreed to guide Lawson's party to the English, leaving his pay to their discretion. The next morning they set out for Adshusheer, his town about 14 miles east, which Lawson described as Shoccories mixed with Eno and Adshusheer people with Will as their chief man.
- 1710s
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Occaneechi Town on the Eno is largely abandoned
By 1713, when the Occaneechi signed a peace treaty with Virginia at Williamsburg, their town on the Eno near present-day Hillsborough was almost empty. They moved north to Fort Christanna in Virginia, and some Saponi families later resettled in North Carolina.
- 1740s
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William Hooper, signer of the Declaration and a Hillsborough resident, was born
William Hooper was born in Boston; he later lived in Hillsborough.
- 1750s
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Creation of Orange County and Hillsborough
The General Assembly created Orange County in 1752 from parts of Granville, Johnston and Bladen counties. William Churton laid out its county seat in 1754 where trading paths crossed the Eno. The town was called Orange, then Corbin Town, then Childsburgh from 1759, and took the name Hillsborough in 1766.
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St. Matthew’s Parish is established
The act of the spring 1752 General Assembly session that created Orange County also made it the Anglican Parish of St. Matthew, with its own vestry. The parish's first church stood in Hillsborough by about 1768, but today's St. Matthew's Episcopal Church descends from a congregation reorganized in 1824.
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Daniel Weldon settles as the county town's first lawyer
Daniel Weldon was the first lawyer to live in the new town. He came about 1754, stayed some six years and then drops out of the public records.
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Hillsborough is laid out
William Churton laid out a town and common on a 400-acre tract on the north side of the Eno that was granted to him in 1754, where the trading path crossed the river. Known as Corbinton by 1755, it was incorporated as Childsburg by an act of the 1759–60 session and renamed Hillsborough in 1766.
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The Assembly moves the county seat to the Eno crossing of the Western path
Judging the Piney Ford site too far west, the Assembly directed that the courthouse, prison and stocks stand where the Western path crossed the Eno, on land where James Watson lived. The site, just east of the present courthouse, was the start of Hillsborough.
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The Orange County court moves to the new town on the Eno
Nash dates the county court's first sitting at the new county town to 1754, the year Churton laid off the town.
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The burying ground beside the town church lot is laid out
The cemetery next to the site of the present Presbyterian church, later called the Old Town Cemetery, was laid out in 1754, the year the town itself was laid off.
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The county court names trustees for Corbin Town
James Watson, Josiah Dixon and Lawrence Thompson became commissioners and trustees of the county seat, then called Corbin Town after Francis Corbin, Earl Granville's land agent.
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The house later called William Reed's Ordinary is built on East King Street
The two-story main block of the house at 157 East King Street, on the lot first owned by town official and tavern keeper William Reed, was probably built around 1754, and early owners kept a tavern in its basement rooms. A one-story west wing was added around 1830.
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Town treasurer John Patterson is told to hold back ten shillings a lot for public use
The county court directed Patterson to keep ten shillings sterling from the price of each Corbin Town lot for public purposes.
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A law orders a road from Orange courthouse to the Cape Fear
The act was not carried out at once, and in the meantime farmers cut their own rough roads across the county.
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Alexander Mebane, Josiah Dixon and William Churton lay out Hillsborough's first prison
Lot No. 1 in the town was set aside for the market house, courthouse, prison, pillory and stocks.
-
James Watson succeeds Richard Caswell as clerk of the Orange County court
Watson, one of the town's first residents, was the second clerk of the county court from 1755 to 1763. He was named register of the county in 1772 and was reappointed under the state government shortly before his death.
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The first Orange County courthouse is built at Hillsborough
A frame courthouse went up at the new county seat in 1755. Until then the court had met in private homes.
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Herman Husband buys two town lots from William Churton
Years before he became a Regulator leader, Herman Husband bought two lots in Corbinton from William Churton and built a house on them. He lived in the town only a few months.
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Hillsborough's first courthouse is ready for use
Until it opened, the county court met at the home of James Watson. It was the first of the four courthouses Hillsborough has had.
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Joseph Maddock builds Hillsborough's first prison
Maddock had the log prison pinned to the ground to make it more secure.
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The sheriff is ordered to provide stocks, a pillory and a whipping post
The order for these instruments of public punishment at the county seat came the same year the first prison was built.
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Thomas Lloyd's grant on Mark Creek is entered
Lloyd, one of Orange County's first members in the General Assembly, led the Welsh settlers who made homes between Hillsborough and present Chatham County.
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St. Mary's congregation is established
Anglicans established St. Mary's Chapel about 1759 on land given by Thomas Holden, about seven miles northeast of Hillsborough, to serve northern Orange County. The congregation joined the Episcopal convention in 1819 and built the present brick chapel, consecrated in 1859; regular services ended in the early 1930s.
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The town on the Eno is incorporated as Childsburg
The town William Churton had laid out in 1754 as Corbin Town or Corbinton was incorporated by act of assembly in 1759 as Childsburg, named for Thomas Child, the colony's attorney general. It was renamed Hillsborough in 1766.
- 1760s
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Abner Nash settles briefly in Hillsborough and builds the town's first mill on the Eno
The Virginia lawyer Abner Nash moved to Hillsborough, then called Childsburgh, in 1762 or early 1763 with his younger brother Francis. He bought town lots, dammed the Eno River and built the town's first mill before moving to Halifax by 1764.
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Francis Nash becomes clerk of the Orange County court
Having settled at Childsburgh (Hillsborough), where he kept a store and a law practice, Francis Nash became clerk of the Orange County court in 1763. A superior court clerkship at Hillsborough was possible only after the 1767-68 act made the town a district court seat, with its first term in March 1768.
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Edmund Fanning qualifies as register of Orange County
Fanning, a lawyer who came to the county town in 1762, qualified as register in March 1763. He went on to buy several town lots and build a large house on the later site of the Masonic Lodge.
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A second jail with a stockade goes up at Hillsborough
A ten-foot stockade was built around the jail and stocks for twenty-four pounds, with Thomas Hart and Francis Nash overseeing the work.
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The county town becomes a courthouse village of stores, ordinaries and public buildings
William Few recalled that in 1764 the town was the metropolis of the county, where the courts were held and all public business done, a village of thirty or forty inhabitants with two or three small stores and two or three ordinary taverns, and that Scottish merchants then opened stores of European goods and a church, courthouse and jail were built. Claude Joseph Sauthier's 1768 plan of the town marks Canby's Ordinary, Nunn's Ordinary, McNair's Store, the market house, the first courthouse and the second jail.
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William Few moves his family to a farm a mile from town and keeps a tavern
Few bought 200 acres near the town, later called the Kirkland place, and moved his family there from their mill farm lower down the Eno. He kept a tavern at the house while the family still ran the mill.
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Childsburgh is renamed Hillsborough
Childsburgh was renamed Hillsborough in honor of Wills Hill, Earl of Hillsborough.
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Town lot owners are required to build, and taxable men to work the streets
Building requirements enacted in 1766 gave the purchaser of a town lot two years to put up a brick, stone or frame house at least twenty feet long, sixteen feet wide and nine feet pitch in the clear, with a brick or stone chimney. A separate ordinance made all taxable males liable for street service under a penalty of two shillings eight pence for each day neglected.
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Orange County's first Regulator paper invokes the Stamp Act resistance
An Orange County notice of August 1766, later called Regulators' Advertisement No. 1, praised the Sons of Liberty for resisting the Stamp Act and asked each neighborhood to send men to a meeting at Maddock's Mill to question local officers.
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The Regulator crisis
Orange County farmers organized in 1766 against high fees, taxes and dishonest county officers, calling a meeting at Maddock's Mill that October. Protest turned violent at the Hillsborough court in September 1770 and ended with the Regulators' defeat at Alamance on May 16, 1771 and the hanging of six at Hillsborough on June 19.
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Edmund Fanning tells the November court he has answered the farmers' complaints
Speaking for the county officers, Fanning rejected the protest and reported that he had written its organizers a reply he expected to end the matter.
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The Assembly fixes the Orange County court at Hillsborough for good
Twelve years after the county court first sat at the town, the colonial Assembly made that location permanent in November 1766, the same month the town took the name Hillsborough.
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Hillsborough is made the seat of a superior court district
An act dividing the province into six districts and establishing a superior court of justice in each set the court for the District of Hillsborough at Hillsborough, for the counties of Orange and Granville, on the twenty second day of March and September, each term to run ten days. Nash records that no superior court sat at Hillsboro until March 1768, the town having belonged first to the Halifax and then to the Salisbury district.
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Sandy Creek men challenge the register's deed fees in the Orange County court
Using a copy of the province's revised laws bought jointly by two men, one of them a county justice, two Sandy Creek men copied the lawful fees for registering deeds and objected in court to what they were charged. Threatened with arrest for contempt, they gave up, and the justice who half owned the book was soon put out of his commission.
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William Few takes over management of a second family farm near Hillsborough
In 1767 William Few Sr. bought another farm about seven miles from Hillsborough, and his son William, then nineteen, took over its management.
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Governor Tryon reports that Hillsborough has hardly twenty families
Writing to the colonial secretary about the town's new name, Tryon put its resident households at scarcely twenty but predicted it would soon be the leading inland town of the province.
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George Micklejohn is sent to St. Matthew's Parish in Hillsborough
Governor William Tryon sent the Rev. George Micklejohn, a Society for the Propagation of the Gospel missionary first assigned to Rowan County, to St. Matthew's Parish in Orange County.
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Thomas Hart buys Joseph Maddock's mill on the Eno
Joseph Maddock, a Quaker who had run the grist mill on the Eno west of Hillsborough since 1755, sold it to Thomas Hart, a friend of Governor William Tryon, who built it up with a sawmill, oil mill, fulling mill, distillery, tannery and other works. This is the mill, known as Hart's Mill, that a British guard held in February 1781.
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A house is built for Catherine Lockhart at Churton and Tryon streets
A one-and-a-half-story frame house is built for Catherine Lockhart on the northeast corner of Churton and Tryon streets. In the early 1800s shoemaker William H. Brown lived in it and kept his shop there; its front half survives next door at 103 East Tryon Street.
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Clerk Francis Nash is cleared of charging illegal fees
In the first Regulator complaints against Orange County officials in 1768, the clerk Francis Nash was accused of taking illegal fees. He was exonerated.
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George Micklejohn carries messages between the Regulators and the authorities
During the 1768 unrest the Hillsborough rector acted several times as a courier between the Regulators and the authorities, seeking a peaceful settlement. The Regulators called him "our Rector."
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Nathaniel Rochester goes to work for a Hillsborough merchant
At sixteen Rochester took employment with James Monroe, a Scottish merchant in Hillsborough, the seat of Orange County. Within two years he was made clerk of the vestry of St. Matthew's Parish.
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William Johnston and James Thackston go into business as Hillsborough merchants
Johnston, a Scottish merchant of means related to the Johnston governors, came to Hillsborough and formed a partnership with James Thackston. Their store stood at the southwest corner of King and Churton streets.
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William Johnston offers Richard Bennehan a partnership in the Little River Store
William Johnston offered Richard Bennehan a one-third partnership in the Little River Store on his Snowhill plantation near Hillsborough. Bennehan moved to North Carolina in late 1768 or early 1769 to manage it.
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Settlers west of the Haw River call Orange County's representatives and vestry to a settlement at the courthouse
Inhabitants on the west side of the Haw River addressed Orange County's Assembly men and vestrymen, asking them to fix a day before the next court to meet at the courthouse and settle accounts of taxes and officers' fees, and declaring they would pay no more taxes until they had a full settlement.
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The superior court sits at Hillsborough for the first time
Nash writes that no superior court was held at Hillsborough before the March 1768 term. Until then Orange lay first in the Halifax and later in the Salisbury district.
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Regulators rescue a seized horse at Hillsborough
After the sheriff seized a Regulator's horse for an unpaid levy, about 100 Regulators rode into Hillsborough, took the horse back and fired shots into the roof of Edmund Fanning's house. Officials sought the arrest of William Butler, Peter Craven and Ninian Bell Hamilton as ringleaders.
-
Edmund Fanning writes Governor Tryon that Orange is in revolt
Two weeks after Regulators rescued a seized horse at Hillsborough, Fanning reported people across the county binding themselves by oath to refuse taxes, and said he and other officers expected an attack.
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The governor's secretary posts Tryon's proclamation at Hillsborough
On the day the Regulators met to choose their delegates, Governor Tryon's secretary Edwards reached Hillsborough and put up the governor's proclamation against the disturbances. Fanning set out for Sandy Creek with an armed party the next day.
-
Orange militia is called out against the Regulators, and only 120 armed men appear
With Edmund Fanning away at the Halifax court, Lieutenant Colonel Gray reported the Hillsborough horse rescue and was ordered to raise seven militia companies. Only 120 men came with arms, and the officers judged that no more than 150 men in the county could be relied on, so they agreed to a truce and named three men to meet the Regulator leaders on April 20.
-
Regulators confront officials at Hillsborough
Edmund Fanning and 27 armed men arrested Herman Husband and William Butler at Sandy Creek on May 2, 1768. The next day hundreds of Regulators and neighbors marched on Hillsborough; officials released the prisoners, and the governor's secretary read a proclamation promising to hear their grievances, after which the crowd dispersed.
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Ralph McNair presses Herman Husband to adopt a petition written by the officers
After the May confrontation at Hillsborough, the county officers sent Husband, through Ralph McNair, a petition of their own drafting in which the Regulators would call their conduct illegal and withdraw their charges. McNair warned that Fanning would report the case to Tryon as treason if it was refused, and the Regulators instead named their own committee to lay their papers before the governor.
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Governor Tryon arrives at Hillsborough and stays into August
Tryon came to Hillsborough in early July 1768 and stayed until mid-August, hoping the county would submit, while the Regulators went on refusing their taxes. He left for Salisbury on August 17.
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James Hunter and John Low deliver a Regulator letter to Governor Tryon at Hillsborough
Hunter and John Low waited on Governor Tryon at Hillsborough with a letter from the Regulators. Tryon told them he would answer it on August 17, after consulting his Council.
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Eight Regulator leaders meet Governor Tryon at Hillsborough and are refused a committee to examine the county's taxes
A week after their letter was delivered, eight principal Regulators met Tryon in Hillsborough and asked that their grievances be settled by a committee reviewing the county's tax accounts. Tryon refused, telling them the law was the only channel for redress, and the next day sent a letter to the inhabitants south of the Haw.
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Sheriff John Lea brings the Regulators Tryon's demand for a 1,000 pound bond
On the day set for settling accounts, the former sheriff stayed away and the new sheriff, John Lea, brought a severe letter from Tryon, endorsed by three councillors at Hillsborough. It demanded that twelve leading Regulators meet him at Salisbury by August 25 and give a 1,000 pound bond that no one would try to rescue Butler and Husband at the September court; Tryon left for Salisbury the same day.
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Hillsborough's town commissioners sign the earliest town deed on record
James Watson, William Nunn, Edmund Fanning and Francis Nash, acting as commissioners for the town, sign the earliest of the Hillsborough town deeds kept by the Orange County register of deeds.
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Presbyterian ministers, among them Henry Pattillo of Orange, write against the Regulation
While Tryon toured Rowan and Mecklenburg to raise troops, Presbyterian ministers Hugh McAden, James Creswell, Henry Pattillo and David Caldwell sent him a letter of loyalty condemning the Regulators, and the pastors also wrote to the colony's Presbyterians telling them to keep out of the movement. The letter was read to the Rowan militia and helped raise volunteers for the march on Hillsborough.
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Tryon musters about 400 militia at Hillsborough and swears them to allegiance
When the town was thought to be in danger, Tryon called out the militia but could gather only about 400 men, to whom he gave an oath of allegiance to the King and the provincial government before sending them home.
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Tryon's army gathers at Hillsborough to guard the superior court
Tryon reached Hillsborough on September 19 with 195 Rowan and 310 Mecklenburg volunteers, and two days later 699 Orange and 120 Granville militia joined them. With gentlemen volunteers, artillery and officers the force came to 1,461 men, a quarter of the Assembly among its officers.
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Chief Justice Martin Howard and two associate justices hold the Hillsborough superior court term
Martin Howard, Maurice Moore and Richard Henderson sat at the Hillsborough District Superior Court term in which Edmund Fanning was found guilty and Regulators including William Butler were tried.
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Eight hundred Regulators gather within a mile of Hillsborough, face Tryon's militia and disperse
With the superior court sitting under guard of more than a thousand militia, upwards of eight hundred Regulators appeared within a mile of Hillsborough on September 22. A council of war set terms: surrender nine leaders, lay down arms and promise to pay taxes. The Regulators asked for the night to answer and by the next morning had dispersed, about thirty coming in to give up their arms.
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George Micklejohn preaches to Tryon's militia at Hillsborough
Before Governor Tryon and the troops raised against the Regulators, Micklejohn preached on the important duty of subjection to the civil powers. Tryon had the sermon printed and distributed, and it cost Micklejohn favour with opponents of royal authority.
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A Hillsborough jury finds Edmund Fanning guilty on an indictment
In the same superior court term that tried the Regulator leaders, the King's indictment against Edmund Fanning went to a jury on September 27, which found him guilty. The day before, Herman Husband had surrendered William Butler to the court, and both men entered 500 pound bonds to abide its sentence.
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The last of Tryon's militia leave Hillsborough
The troops stayed in town through the court term, began to be discharged on September 28, and the last detachment marched away on October 2. The expedition cost the province 4,844 pounds.
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Grand jury indictments for rout against James Hunter are quashed at the Hillsborough superior court
The grand jury returned three indictments for rout naming James Hunter with William Butler, Ninian Hamilton and other Regulators. The court quashed all three for an irregular return and ordered the attorney general to prepare new bills.
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Dennis Bradley is acquitted at Hillsborough of burning the Granville jail
At the September 1768 superior court at Hillsborough, which also tried the Regulator cases, Dennis Bradley was tried for burning the Granville County jail and acquitted.
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Edmund Fanning resigns as register of Orange County after his conviction
Found guilty at the September court on five counts of taking excess fees for registering deeds, and fined a penny on each, Fanning at once gave up the office of register.
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Henry Pattillo preaches to Tryon's troops at Hillsborough
While the militia were quartered in Hillsborough, the Presbyterian minister Henry Pattillo preached to them and was publicly thanked. The German minister Suther was ordered to preach to the German troops as well.
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Samuel Devinney and John Philip Hartzo are convicted over the horse rescue
Each was fined 25 pounds and given three months in jail, but Tryon soon freed the prisoners and put off collecting their fines for three months.
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William Butler is convicted of riot at the Hillsborough superior court
With Governor Tryon's militia in Hillsborough for the September 1768 term, the superior court tried the Regulator cases. Herman Husband was acquitted; William Butler was found guilty on two counts and sentenced to a fine of 50 pounds and six months in prison, but Tryon released him and suspended the fines.
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Tryon pardons the 1768 protesters except thirteen named leaders
His proclamation left out men including James Hunter, Herman Husband, Ninian Bell Hamilton and William Payne.
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Episcopalians build Hillsborough's first church
Members of the Church of England put up the town's first church at the corner of Churton and Tryon streets, under George Micklejohn, the parish minister Governor Tryon had appointed. It later held the 1788 convention and its lot passed to the Presbyterians.
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Orange County inhabitants petition for a public inspection at Hillsborough
Francis Nash and twenty five other inhabitants petitioned Governor Tryon and the legislature for a public inspection station at Hillsborough. They argued that having to haul tobacco and hemp at least a hundred miles overland to be inspected discouraged farmers from growing crops their soil suited.
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The March 1769 superior court at Hillsborough hears the Regulators' cases against the officers
With no troops in town, many Regulators came to the March 1769 court to prosecute the officers, with little success. Herman Husband was tried and acquitted, James Hunter's case was continued, and Fanning was tried again on the old fee charge and formally convicted.
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Governor Tryon buys county land and two Hillsborough lots
Tryon bought a large tract in the county and two lots in the town, and put up a house on the lots. His private secretary, Isaac Edwards, also bought and built in Hillsborough.
- 1770s
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Hillsborough officials and merchants pledge to defend one another after the riot
Just after the September 1770 riot, Francis Nash, Edmund Fanning, Alexander Martin, Thomas Henderson, Jesse Benton, William Johnston, Adlai Osborne and others formed an association for mutual aid and protection. Many members lived too far apart to help one another in a sudden emergency.
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Orange County reelects Herman Husband and John Pryor to the Assembly
In the new election called after Tryon dissolved the Assembly in November 1769, Orange again returned the Regulator candidates Husband and Pryor. Fanning, who had lost, came back through the new borough of Hillsborough.
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William Few conveys his home place near Hillsborough to John Butler
In debt and weighing a move to Georgia, Few deeded the Kirkland place east of town to his friend John Butler, sheriff that year. Butler in turn sold the tract to the Scottish merchant Ralph MacNair on July 23, 1771.
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Tryon makes Hillsborough a borough and market town
Hillsborough became a borough, with its own member in the Assembly, and a chartered market town. Edmund Fanning sat for the new borough when the Assembly met at New Bern that December.
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James Hunter presents a Regulator petition to Judge Henderson on the first day of the Hillsborough court
On Saturday, the first day of the September 1770 Hillsborough superior court, James Hunter presented Judge Richard Henderson with a petition signed by many Regulators. Henderson put off his answer until Monday, the day the Regulators crowded the courtroom and broke up the court.
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Ralph McNair's house is attacked on the night of the Hillsborough court riot
On the night after the Regulators broke up the superior court, parties of them patrolled Hillsborough's streets, and McNair's house was attacked and its windows broken along with those of several other houses. McNair gave a sworn account on October 9, 1770.
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Regulators disrupt the Hillsborough Superior Court
About 150 Regulators crowded the Hillsborough Superior Court, beat the lawyer John Williams, Edmund Fanning and others, and forced Judge Richard Henderson to adjourn; he fled that night. The next day the crowd tore down Fanning's house and wrote mocking judgments on the court docket.
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Regulators pull down and plunder Edmund Fanning's house in Hillsborough
The morning after the court broke up and Judge Henderson slipped out of town, the Regulators went to Fanning's house, smashed the furniture, emptied the cellar, carried his papers into the street and left the house almost demolished. Witnesses also heard them drink damnation to King George and success to the Pretender.
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Hillsborough's leading men write to Governor Tryon for protection after the riot
James Watson, Francis Nash, Thomas Hart, Robert Lytle, William Johnston, James Thackston and James Monro wrote from Hillsborough describing the Regulators' insolence at the superior court, said they stood hourly in danger of their lives and estates, and asked Tryon to adopt whatever measures he judged proper.
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A district jail is built at Hillsborough
It replaced the second county jail, which had burned.
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Governor Tryon's army buys supplies at Ralph McNair's Hillsborough store
On his expedition against the Regulators, Governor William Tryon bought supplies at McNair's Hillsborough store, including Delft bowls and gilt tin cups.
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Regulator leader Thomas Person is held in irons at Hillsborough
After the Battle of Alamance, Governor Tryon had Thomas Person seized and held in irons in Hillsborough for three weeks, during which he was marched to the gallows and back. He was released without trial.
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Guilford County is formed from Orange and Rowan
Governor Tryon assented to the act creating Guilford County from parts of Rowan and Orange, a bill Edmund Fanning had brought in. Tryon told the Earl of Hillsborough the new county was meant to divide the Regulator districts.
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A mounted troop of Regulators rides through Hillsborough firing pistols
A troop of mounted Regulators, turned back from its march on New Bern, came down on Hillsborough, drove residents indoors, took liquor at the tavern and galloped through the streets firing pistols before riding off. Nash says they did no great damage.
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Regulator threats keep the Hillsborough superior court from sitting
At the March 1771 term the Hillsborough District superior court recorded that the Regulators led by Herman Husband, James Hunter, Rednap Howell, William Butler and Samuel Devinney, who had broken up the September court, were still threatening judges, lawyers and officers, so none attended. The court was continued to September 1771.
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Four Orange County militia companies march with Tryon against the Regulators
When Tryon's eastern column gathered on the march from New Bern, Orange and Dobbs each supplied four companies, the largest contingents in a force of 917 rank and file and 151 officers. Two Orange companies were later left to guard Hillsborough when the army moved on to Alamance.
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Thomas Hart contracts to supply provisions for Tryon's campaign against the Regulators
Hart accepted Governor Tryon's offer to victual the militia raised to suppress the Regulators, on the terms on which he had supplied the troops at Hillsborough in 1768. His department covered nearly a thousand men from eleven counties including Orange.
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Tryon's army camps on the south bank of the Eno opposite Hillsborough
Marching west from New Bern, Tryon's army entered Orange by an old road past Patterson's and camped across the Eno from the town on May 9. A hospital and a supply depot were set up at Hillsborough, and on May 11 the army marched through town and west along the later Graham road.
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Tryon offers 100 pounds and a thousand acres for Husband, Hunter, Howell and Butler, dead or alive
Marching back toward Hillsborough, Tryon proclaimed from Bethabara that Herman Husband, James Hunter, Rednap Howell and William Butler stood outlawed and liable to be shot by anyone, and offered one hundred pounds and one thousand acres of land to whoever brought any of them into his or General Waddell's camp.
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Tryon's army returns to Hillsborough with its Regulator prisoners
The army came back on June 14 and the next day marched through town with drums beating and oak sprigs in their hats before camping a mile east. The special court of oyer and terminer, opened May 30 and adjourned to await the prisoners, then resumed and tried fourteen men for treason.
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Regulators are tried and executed at Hillsborough
After the Battle of Alamance, Regulator prisoners were tried at Hillsborough and twelve were condemned for treason. Six were pardoned; on June 19 Governor Tryon's army marched the others to a gallows east of town and hanged them, among them Benjamin Merrill, Robert Messer, Robert Matear and James Pugh. James Few had been hanged at camp on May 17.
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Tryon takes leave of his army at Hillsborough and hands the command to Colonel Ashe
Having received at Hillsborough camp the King's command to go at once to govern New York, Tryon thanked the officers and men for their conduct through the campaign, gave the army to Colonel John Ashe to march to Colonel Bryan's and disband by counties, and ordered the artillery escorted to New Bern and the horses taken in battle sold for the public. He reached New Bern on June 24 and sailed on the 30th.
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The Hillsborough superior court holds its first term since the 1770 riot
For the first time in a year and a half the district court sat at Hillsborough, with Judges Maurice Moore and Richard Henderson presiding and about 300 cases on its dockets. Thomas Clark qualified as clerk, and a suit by James Few against Francis Nash was entered as abated by the plaintiff's hanging.
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At Governor Martin's urging, Edmund Fanning drops his riot damage suits
After the matter was raised with Governor Martin in March 1772, he urged Fanning, by then surveyor general of New York, to drop his suits over the destruction of his Hillsborough property, and Fanning had them discontinued, leaving his 1,500 pound claim to the Assembly. The House refused to pay it in March 1773.
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Francis Nash builds his house on West Tryon Street
Francis Nash built the house now called the Nash-Hooper House on West Tryon Street in Hillsborough in 1772, on land bought from Isaac Edwards. After his death in 1777 it passed through other hands to William Hooper in 1782.
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Thomas Burke is admitted as an attorney and settles at Hillsborough
Burke, born in Ireland and trained as a physician, had practiced law in Virginia before coming to Hillsborough. He was admitted as an attorney in March 1772 and later lived two miles northeast of town.
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Governor Josiah Martin spends the summer at Hillsborough
Governor Martin dated his dispatches to London from Hillsborough through the summer of 1772, and in August the Rev. Charles E. Taylor wrote that the governor had gone up to Hillsborough to spend the summer.
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Governor Martin and his council at Hillsborough forbid the export of wheat, rye and flour
Told of a long drought and failing corn crops in the western parts of the province, the council sitting at Hillsborough advised an embargo, and Martin proclaimed a three-month ban on shipping wheat, rye or flour out of the province.
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Governor Martin summons the judges to Hillsborough over the cases of the outlawed Regulators
After Regulator leaders offered to surrender, Martin called the judges to Hillsborough and asked in writing whether their outlawry could be completed and whether they could still be tried. Writing from Hillsborough on August 30, he told London the troubles had been provoked by extortion from attorneys, clerks and other officers.
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English traveler J. F. D. Smyth finds German-speaking districts west of Hillsborough
Traveling in western Orange, Smyth had trouble in some places finding anyone who understood English, a sign of how many Germans had settled there.
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Rochester becomes a partner in a Hillsborough store
Rochester joined James Monroe and John Hamilton as a partner in a Hillsborough store in 1773. The business prospered but was liquidated in 1775 as the Revolution approached.
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Thomas Hart is Orange County's only member at the first Provincial Convention
When North Carolina's first Provincial Convention met on August 25, 1774 and chose delegates to the first Continental Congress, Thomas Hart alone sat for Orange County and the borough of Hillsborough sent no one.
Revolution and early republic · 1775–1799
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James Hogg moves to Hillsborough and opens his company's office there
The merchant James Hogg, who had brought emigrants from Scotland to North Carolina in 1774, moved from Cross Creek to Hillsborough about 1775 to open his company's office, and lived at Old House on his land east of town.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough orders its journal printed by James Davis
The congress meeting at Hillsborough directed that its proceedings be delivered to James Davis, the province's printer and a delegate for the town of New Bern, who was desired to print them and send a copy to each member. It also named a committee to state and settle his account for services done as printer to the province.
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The Provincial Congress names Orange County's minutemen and militia officers
Orange was to raise three companies of minutemen, and James Thackston was named colonel of minutemen for the Hillsborough district. For the county militia the Congress named John Hogan colonel, John Butler lieutenant colonel, William Moore first major and Nathaniel Rochester second major.
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William Johnston produces gunpowder, lead and flints at Snow Hill
During the Revolution Hillsborough merchant William Johnston apparently produced gunpowder, lead and rifle flints at his Snow Hill plantation northeast of the town.
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Third Provincial Congress meets at Hillsborough
Delegates to the Third Provincial Congress gathered at Hillsborough on August 20, 1775 but lacked a quorum. The Congress organized the next day, its members signed the test of allegiance on August 23, and it sat until September 10.
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George Micklejohn opens the Provincial Congress with prayers
At the request of the congress, delivered by Francis Nash, Micklejohn attended and opened the Provincial Congress by reading prayers in the church at Hillsborough.
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The Provincial Congress at Hillsborough adopts a test for its members to sign
On August 21, 1775 the congress sitting at Hillsborough named Allen Jones to a committee of seven to prepare a Test to be signed by its members. The committee reported on August 23 and the Test was read, approved, ordered entered on the journal and signed. Subscribers professed allegiance to the King while denying that Parliament could tax them.
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Congress at Hillsborough appoints a committee to address the inhabitants of the province
The same day the congress named Maurice Moore, William Hooper, Robert Howe, Richard Caswell and Joseph Hewes to prepare an address to the inhabitants of North Carolina, stating the controversy with Great Britain in plain language and calling on them to unite in defence of American liberty. Doctor Burke was added to the committee on August 24.
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Henry Pattillo is asked to read morning prayers to the Provincial Congress
The congress at Hillsborough asked the Rev. Henry Pattillo, a delegate from Bute County, to read prayers to it every morning, and Charles Edward Taylor every evening.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough names a Committee of Secrecy to procure arms
On August 23, 1775 the congress sitting at Hillsborough resolved that its president, Mr. Harnett, Mr. Caswell, Mr. Hewes, Mr. Nash, Mr. Willie Jones and Mr. Young be a Committee of Secrecy for procuring arms and ammunition. The committee was to report what sums of money would be needed for the purpose.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough names a committee to confer with inhabitants who had scruples about the American cause
The congress sitting at Hillsborough appointed thirteen of its members, among them Memucan Hunt of Granville County, to confer with inhabitants of the province who held religious or political scruples. They were directed to use argument and persuasion to bring those inhabitants into support of the American cause.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough orders Governor Martin's proclamation burnt by the hangman
The congress read a proclamation Martin had issued on August 8 from HMS Cruizer in the Cape Fear, addressed to the "Provincial Convention of Hillsborough", and resolved unanimously that it was a seditious libel to be burnt by the common hangman.
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Hillsborough has seventy or eighty houses when the Congress meets
At the time of the 1775 Congress the town held about seventy or eighty houses and three or four hundred people, and residents found lodging for nearly two hundred delegates and visitors.
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The Provincial Congress forms the Hillsborough District and its committee of safety
The Congress grouped Orange, Granville, Chatham and Wake counties into a Hillsborough District with a thirteen-member committee of safety; John Atkinson, John Butler and William Johnston sat for Orange. Thomas Person and John Kinchen represented the district on the Provincial Council.
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Congress at Hillsborough names Francis Nash lieutenant colonel of the 1st North Carolina Regiment
On September 1, 1775 the Provincial Congress meeting at Hillsborough appointed the officers of the first of its two new regiments: James Moore, colonel, and Francis Nash, lieutenant colonel. On the congress's opening day Nash had been asked to bring the Rev. George Micklejohn to open it with prayers in the church at Hillsborough.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough appoints Benjamin Williams a lieutenant in the second regiment
Williams sat for Johnston County in the Third Provincial Congress at Hillsborough. On September 1 the Congress named him one of the lieutenants of the second regiment, and on September 9 it made him a member of the committee of safety for the New Bern district.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough names Alexander Martin lieutenant colonel of the Second North Carolina Regiment
Alexander Martin attended the Third Provincial Congress at Hillsborough as a delegate from Guilford County. On September 1, 1775, the Congress named the officers of its two new regiments of Continental troops, with Robert Howe as colonel and Martin as lieutenant colonel of the Second Regiment.
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Congress at Hillsborough appoints Hooper, Hewes and Caswell to the Continental Congress
Meeting at Hillsborough on September 2, 1775, the congress thanked William Hooper, Joseph Hewes and Richard Caswell for their service as the province's delegates at the last Continental Congress and appointed the three delegates for a further year, each to be paid five hundred pounds proclamation money.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough names Samuel Johnston treasurer for the Northern District
Meeting at Hillsborough, the Congress appointed Samuel Johnston treasurer for the Northern District and Richard Caswell treasurer for the Southern District, giving them the powers the colony's treasurers had held under a 1773 act of Assembly.
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The Provincial Congress at Hillsborough appoints John Penn to the Continental Congress
Richard Caswell told the congress at Hillsborough that his new duties as treasurer for the Southern District and as a signer of the public bills of credit left him unable to serve in the Continental Congress. The congress resolved the same day that John Penn take his place beside William Hooper and Joseph Hewes, with the same powers and allowance.
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The Provincial Congress at Hillsborough adopts William Hooper's resolution of loyalty to George III
Two days before it dissolved, the Congress unanimously passed a resolution from Hooper professing its members' support for the king's succession, even as it raised troops and money for defense.
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John Butler is commissioned lieutenant colonel of the Orange County militia
The Third Provincial Congress named John Butler to the committee of safety for the Hillsborough District and on September 9, 1775 made him lieutenant colonel of the Orange County militia under Colonel John Hogan. Minutemen officers were named by district, not county. Butler went on to lead the county's militia in the Moore's Creek Bridge campaign and became its colonel in April 1776.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough elects a Provincial Council to govern between sessions
On September 9, 1775, the Congress at Hillsborough elected a thirteen-member Provincial Council to direct the army and militia during its recess: Samuel Johnston for the province at large and two members for each of the six districts, among them Abner Nash and James Coor for New Bern and Thomas Person and John Kinchen for Hillsborough.
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Provincial Congress at Hillsborough makes Thomas Benbury a Chowan militia major and a district committee of safety member
Thomas Benbury sat for Chowan County in the Third Provincial Congress at Hillsborough. On September 9, 1775, the Congress named him first major of the Chowan County militia under Colonel Thomas Bonner and a member of the committee of safety for the Edenton District.
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Loyalist rector George Micklejohn is taken into custody
With the outbreak of the Revolution Micklejohn remained loyal to the Crown and was taken into custody. St. Matthew's Parish had no Episcopal rector again until 1825.
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Rochester is named to a commission to set up a gun factory near Hillsborough
The commission was to establish a gun factory near Hillsborough, and Rochester led a wagon train to Philadelphia to obtain iron for it. Illness later that year ended his military service.
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Orange County militia under James Thackston hold Cross Creek during the Loyalist rising
Militia bound east against Donald MacDonald's Loyalists gathered at Hillsborough, and Thackston's Orange contingent occupied Cross Creek (now Fayetteville), denying the Loyalists a refuge. The rising ended at Moore's Creek Bridge on February 27, 1776, a battle the Orange men did not fight in.
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William Hooper signs the Declaration of Independence
William Hooper signed the Declaration in Philadelphia. He later became a Hillsborough resident.
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Crowds force the Orange County polls to close four times in the election for the fifth Provincial Congress
The whole county, then taking in later Caswell, Alamance, Person and Durham, voted only at the Hillsborough courthouse, and the crush of voters forced four halts; by sunset about a quarter had voted. The winners, James Saunders, William Moore, John McCabe, John Atkinson and John Paine, faced a petition to keep them from their seats.
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George Micklejohn swears allegiance to the state and is released from parole
Taken prisoner after Moore's Creek, the Hillsborough rector was paroled on May 3, 1776 to Perquimans County, then ordered moved there in July when he was found still in Orange. On November 24 he took the oath of allegiance before the Halifax Congress and was discharged, and he later lived at Thomas Person's Goshen in Granville.
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Orange County votes again after the Halifax Congress voids its October return
The Congress first upheld the sitting Orange members on November 21, then on November 28 ordered a new election run by named commissioners over as many as three days. Held December 10, it returned Thomas Burke, Nathaniel Rochester, Alexander Mebane, John Butler and John McCabe, who took their seats just before the state constitution was adopted.
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Hillsborough gets its first regular Presbyterian services
After years of occasional preaching in the courthouse by David Caldwell, John DeBow and others, the Rev. Alexander McMillan began regular services there in 1777, shared with Little River and New Hope. Presbytery deposed him in September 1778, and the town had no organized Presbyterian church for many years.
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James Hogg sits on the Hillsborough board of commissioners
James Hogg, a member of the Hillsborough Committee of Safety during the Revolution, sat on the town's board of commissioners in 1777.
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Rochester serves as clerk of the Orange County court
Rochester resigned his seat in the first General Assembly of the state to become clerk of court. He was also commissioned to supervise the building of a new courthouse and to help establish an academy in the Hillsborough area, and he gave up the clerkship in 1778 because its fees did not cover the expenses of the office.
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William Courtney buys the East King Street lots from Ralph McNair
William Courtney bought from Ralph McNair the lots at 141 East King Street where the house later called William Courtney's Yellow House stands.
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The Orange County court sits for the first time under the new state
The May 1777 court recorded 22 justices commissioned by Governor Richard Caswell, and eleven took the state oath and their seats. It named Alexander Mebane Jr., son of the first sheriff, as the first sheriff under statehood and county treasurer, and appointed 33 road overseers.
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The county court jails Charles Richardson for refusing the oath of allegiance
Called before the court as a suspicious person, Richardson would not swear allegiance to the state. The court sent him to jail until he took the oath and paid the fees.
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The county court orders the Hillsborough District jail to hold Continental deserters
At its May 1777 term the court told the jailer of Hillsborough District to take in any Continental Army soldiers arrested as deserters by a justice of the peace anywhere in the district.
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Caswell County is created from northern Orange
An act of the General Assembly's spring 1777 session divided Orange County, forming Caswell from its northern part, from a point twelve miles due north of Hillsborough to the Virginia line. The legislature cited the hardship northern residents faced in attending to public duties, and the new county took effect June 1, 1777.
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Merchants who traded with Britain are ordered to swear allegiance or leave
Under a state act, the August court cited fourteen merchants and agents, among them James Hogg, and only Nathaniel Rochester and John Hogan took the oath. The court ordered everyone who failed to appear or to swear, Quakers excepted, to leave for Europe or the West Indies within sixty days.
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The county court binds James Empey not to recruit soldiers for another state
The August 1777 court made Empey give security for his good behavior and for not evading the state law by recruiting men in North Carolina for another state. Robert Baker and William Armstrong were his sureties at fifty pounds each.
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Brigadier General Francis Nash of Hillsborough is killed at Germantown
Nash, promoted to brigadier general, died leading North Carolina troops at the Battle of Germantown in Pennsylvania. Word reached Orange County that October.
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John Hogan's paper mill opens near Hillsborough
A notice in the North Carolina Gazette announced a newly built paper mill near Hillsborough ready to work and asked households to save linen rags for it. John Hogan owned the mill, a mile and a half northeast of town; drought hampered it in 1778, and the Assembly gave him more time to earn the state's premium for paper.
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Absalom Tatom becomes assistant quartermaster and keeper of the arsenal at Hillsborough
During the Revolution, Continental officer Absalom Tatom takes charge of the state's arsenal at Hillsborough as assistant quartermaster.
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Drought shuts down the state gun factory near Hillsborough
The factory's shop sat beside a creek on Thomas Burke's land about two miles northeast of town, and a dry summer left the creek too low to drive its wheel. The dry spell slowed the paper mill as well, and the Assembly gave John Hogan more time to earn the paper bounty.
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Methodists divide their North Carolina circuit and form the New Hope Circuit, taking in part of Orange
When the original North Carolina circuit was split in three in 1778, the new New Hope Circuit covered parts of Orange, Chatham, Cumberland and Wake counties. Hillsborough was served by its riders, beginning with James O'Kelly and Philip Adams in 1779.
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Rochester opens a Hillsborough store with Thomas Hart and James Brown
The partnership was successful and Rochester began putting his earnings into real estate. The business was liquidated in 1780 when British occupation of Hillsborough became a probability, and Hart moved his family to Maryland.
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The superior court sits at Hillsborough for the first time in five years
Judges Samuel Ashe and James Iredell opened the March 1778 term in the old courthouse, with Waightstill Avery prosecuting and John Henderson of Granville as grand jury foreman. The district court had not sat since September 1772, when the quarrel between Governor Martin and the Assembly over the court law shut the courts.
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The Assembly orders a new courthouse built at Hillsborough
Nathaniel Rochester and William Courtney oversaw the work. Planned in brick but built of wood because of wartime shortages, it was one room about 40 by 25 feet near the present courthouse site and served until fire destroyed it in late 1789 or 1790.
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General Assembly holds its August 1778 session at Hillsborough
The second session of the 1778 General Assembly met at Hillsborough, elected Whitmell Hill and Thomas Burke as additional delegates to the Continental Congress, and authorized 850,000 pounds in bills of credit to pay the state's war debts. The House adjourned to meet next at Halifax in January 1779.
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The Assembly at Hillsborough clears Thomas Burke in his quarrel with Congress
Congress had referred Burke's conduct to North Carolina after he walked out to break a quorum and sent back a rough answer when summoned. A joint committee chaired by William Hooper reported on August 14 that he was answerable only to the state, and the Assembly, which had re-elected him to Congress two days earlier, adopted the report.
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John Hogan is appointed trustee for Orange County
The county court named John Hogan trustee, the office later called county treasurer, under a bond of 1,500 pounds. The book dates the treasurer's office in Orange from 1778 to its abolition in 1948.
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The Presbytery removes Alexander McMillan, who had led Presbyterian worship in Hillsborough
McMillan had held regular services in the courthouse jointly with the Little River and New Hope congregations until the Presbytery deposed him for misconduct. For some years afterward Hillsborough had no regular Presbyterian services.
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Hillsborough becomes a depot for the army's supplies
As the war moved south the town became a collection and storage point for army supplies, and the governor split his time between Halifax and Hillsborough.
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Hillsborough gathers supplies and light horse for the South Carolina campaign
As the state sent troops to aid South Carolina in 1779, supplies for the militia were collected at Hillsborough and a regiment of light horse under General Allen Jones assembled there. Hillsborough district militia under John Butler fought at Stono Ferry on June 20.
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William Cain acquires the Pleasant Grove plantation on the Trading Path
William Cain acquired the Orange County property later called Pleasant Grove, beside the old Indian Trading Path, and held it until his death in 1834.
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General Assembly charters an academy near Hillsborough named Science Hall
Meeting at Halifax, the General Assembly passed an act to establish an academy in the neighborhood of Hillsborough, naming William Hooper, Thomas Burke, Nathaniel Rochester, James Hogg and others as trustees. The act named the school Science Hall and gave its trustees the same powers as those of Liberty Hall in Mecklenburg County.
- 1780s
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Colonel John Gunby of Maryland commands the Hillsborough garrison
With more than a thousand troops in and around the town, among them Buford's horse and the Maryland Continentals, Colonel Gunby of the First Maryland Regiment served as commandant through the last months of 1780 and into January 1781. His 400 to 500 Marylanders were barefoot until shoes came from Maryland.
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The oldest frame section of the Hill Farm house is built on St. Mary's Road
The earliest part of the Hill Farm house, a frame section on a stone foundation with a double-shouldered chimney nearly eight feet wide, may go back to the 1780s, making it one of the few eighteenth-century buildings along the road.
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Thomas Burke takes up his neighbors' complaints against army plundering
Home from Congress in 1780, Burke found troops around Hillsborough grazing horses on growing corn, pulling down haystacks and taking cattle, wagons and smokehouse stores. He warned local officials, wrote to the president of Congress and to General Gates, and Nash credits him with largely stopping the abuse in Orange.
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Baron de Kalb halts at Hillsborough with 2,000 Continental troops
De Kalb's force, marching to relieve Charleston after it had already fallen, stopped at Hillsborough and used up the area's provisions before moving south.
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Horatio Gates, on his way to the Southern Army, presses the governor for supplies from Hillsborough
Writing from Hillsborough, Gates told Governor Abner Nash that the army's commissary and quartermaster departments were in a deplorable state, asked the state to set up magazines of provisions and forage and to supply 700 tents for its militia, and urged Nash to come to Hillsborough himself.
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Barnaby Cabe takes a wagonload of flour to General Gates's army
Thomas Burke of Hillsborough wrote to Horatio Gates that his neighbor Cabe was bringing a load of flour to the southern army and would hand it over only on Gates's order, having been put off by the commissaries. The former Tryon wagoner had come over to the patriot side.
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Francis Asbury preaches to about 200 people at a Hillsborough tavern
On a tour of the state the Methodist leader Francis Asbury rode into Hillsborough and preached in the tavern of a Mr. Cortney (Courtney) to a crowd of about 200, whom he found orderly.
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Gates regroups the defeated southern army at Hillsborough after Camden
After the American defeat at Camden, South Carolina, on August 16, 1780, Gates gathered the remnants of his army at Hillsborough. On September 3 he reported from the town that the Maryland division and the artillery were there being refitted and that nearly 500 regulars were marching from Petersburg to join them.
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General Assembly meets at Hillsborough and creates a Board of War
Meeting at Hillsborough under Governor Abner Nash, the Assembly levied a provision tax in kind to supply the army and navy, passed acts on treason trials and confiscated property, and created a five-member Board of War. The Board of War held its first meeting in Hillsborough on September 14, 1780.
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General Assembly at Hillsborough relieves Richard Caswell of command of the state militia
After commanding the North Carolina militia in the defeat at Camden, Caswell reported to the General Assembly sitting at Hillsborough. On September 12 the Assembly took his illness into account and relieved him temporarily of command of the state militia, leaving him the separate command of the North Carolina Partisan Rangers.
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Board of War, led by Alexander Martin, directs the war effort from Hillsborough
The Board of War created by the General Assembly first met at Hillsborough on September 14, 1780, with Alexander Martin, John Penn and Oroondates Davis present. Through the fall it issued orders for arms, provisions and militia from the town and ran a shoe factory there for the army, then rose in late November to sit at Halifax from December 1.
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South Carolina's Governor John Rutledge takes refuge in Hillsborough
After Camden the town filled with fugitives, and Rutledge, Tadeusz Kosciuszko and Daniel Morgan were among those there. It was so crowded that Attorney General Iredell and Judge Williams, arriving for the October superior court, found beds only at Burke's house two miles out, and Rutledge moved into town to share a bed with John Penn of the Board of War.
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The Board of War makes the courthouse a storehouse and the church a hospital
With supply wagons crowding every road into Hillsborough, the board designated the courthouse a storehouse and ordered the church repaired for use as a hospital.
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From Hillsborough, Gates thanks the victors of Kings Mountain
On receiving the news of Major Ferguson's defeat at Kings Mountain, Gates wrote from Hillsborough thanking the commanding officers and ordering the prisoners sent under guard to Fincastle Court House, Virginia. The same day he told Governor Thomas Jefferson he would move the whole army to the Yadkin once supplies arrived.
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Gates marches the southern army out of Hillsborough toward Salisbury
The Board of War concluded that Hillsborough and Orange County could not feed the army through the winter and persuaded Gates to move toward Salisbury, where provisions were thought to be more plentiful.
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Nathanael Greene reaches Hillsborough in search of his new command
Named by Washington to succeed Gates, Greene arrived to find the army already gone and hurried after it.
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Civil authorities hold four Maryland soldiers for robbing a house south of Hillsborough
Four free Black soldiers of the First Maryland Regiment, Leonard Turner, Valentine Murrin, Thomas Thompson and John Adams, were charged with robbing Joseph Hastings's house and abusing him and his wife. Major McIntosh took them from the civil officers by force, but Colonel Gunby returned them to the sheriff when the magistrates appealed, and they were bound over for trial but never tried.
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Thomas Freeland is killed when Hillsborough is taken
In a story John Strayhorn told John A. Freeland, Whig militia were gathering at the public spring when Hillsborough was taken and the governor captured, and Thomas Freeland was shot through the head by a Tory. He was buried on the hill south of the Eno near Kirkland's old tan yard, where Strayhorn had been posted.
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Cornwallis calls loyal subjects to the Royal Standard at Hillsborough
From his headquarters at Hillsborough, Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis issued a proclamation inviting loyal subjects to come without delay, with their arms and ten days' provisions, to the Royal Standard erected in the town and help restore royal government in North Carolina.
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Cornwallis occupies Hillsborough
After driving Nathanael Greene's army across the Dan River, Lord Cornwallis reached Hillsborough on February 20, 1781, raised the royal standard and issued a proclamation calling loyalists to join him. Short of food and forage, and told that Greene had recrossed the Dan, he left on February 26, crossing the Haw toward Alamance Creek.
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Cornwallis marches his army out of Hillsborough
With his commissary reporting that town and county could no longer feed the army, Cornwallis left before his proclamation's deadline and camped on Alamance Creek between the Deep and Haw rivers.
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Pyle's defeat near the Haw River
Henry Lee's Legion and Andrew Pickens's militia attacked a few hundred Loyalist recruits under Dr. John Pyle who were riding to join Cornwallis at Hillsborough. Mistaking Lee's men for Tarleton's cavalry, the Loyalists were cut down, with more than 90 killed, on Michael Holt's land, then in Orange County and now in southern Alamance.
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British soldiers pave the crossing of King and Churton streets
To keep his men busy and away from plunder, Cornwallis had stone laid near his artillery park for 150 yards in each direction from the intersection of King and Churton streets.
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Greene sends Pickens's militia to shadow the British army at Hillsborough
Nathanael Greene ordered Brigadier General Andrew Pickens to pass around the British force at Hillsborough, fall in its rear and report its movements. Pickens's men struck at British parties when they could, and he sent Captain Joseph Graham to scout the ground around the town.
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The Assembly elects Thomas Burke of Hillsborough governor
Meeting at Wake Court House, the General Assembly chose Burke. He ran the government from Halifax for his first two months.
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David Fanning raids Hillsborough and captures Governor Burke
Fanning’s Loyalists captured Governor Thomas Burke during a surprise raid on Hillsborough.
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Loyalists rob James Hogg at his Hillsborough house during Fanning's raid
During David Fanning's raid on Hillsborough on September 12, 1781, Loyalists ransacked James Hogg's house on Cameron Street and took his watch, buckles and keys until an officer posted a guard. Poplar Hill, sometimes named as the scene, was not built until about 1793.
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Butler's militia ambushes Fanning's Loyalists at Lindley's Mill
The day after David Fanning's raid carried Governor Thomas Burke out of Hillsborough, John Butler rode with about four hundred militia to the ford where the Wilmington road crossed Cane Creek at Lindley's Mill and laid an ambush with Colonel Robert Mebane. The opening volley killed Colonel Hector McNeil, but Fanning organized a flanking attack that drove the militia from the field, and the prisoners went on to Wilmington.
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