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Revolution and early republic · 1775–1799
- 1770s
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Colonel John Gray dies and leaves Grayfields to his son-in-law Thomas Hart
Colonel John Gray, a former sheriff and assemblyman and one of the first vestrymen of St. Matthew's Parish, died in 1775 and willed his estate, including his large plantation Grayfields, to his son-in-law Thomas Hart, husband of his daughter Susannah. Stokes found that this inheritance gave Hart the capital for his many ventures.
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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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James Patterson keeps an inn on the road where Chapel Hill will be laid out
Before the university existed, James Patterson's inn stood near the sharp bend in the road west of the later campus, serving travellers on the two roads that met at New Hope Chapel. It was the only inn on the site when the first village lots were sold in 1793.
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John DeBow takes the Hawfields and Eno charge and preaches at New Hope
DeBow, a young minister, succeeded Pattillo at the Hawfields and Eno about 1775 and preached at New Hope as he could. Craig calls him probably the first preacher with anything like a regular appointment there.
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Nathaniel Rochester is named paymaster of the Hillsborough District minutemen
After the Provincial Congress at Hillsborough in 1775, Nathaniel Rochester, a young Hillsborough merchant, was made a major of militia, a justice of the peace and paymaster of the Battalion of Minute Men in the District of Hillsborough, under a bond of 5,000 pounds proclamation money. By his own later account he had also been named that year to the Orange County committee of safety.
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Orange County chooses a committee of safety
Orange had no committee of safety until the summer of 1775, and Samuel Johnston wrote on August 14 that one had been chosen. By 1776 John Hogan was its chairman and James Hogg its secretary; its records for 1775 and 1776 are lost.
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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 Allison family settles at Cedar Grove
The Allison family settles the Cedar Grove area in the late eighteenth century, and other families follow. Allisons still lived there when the survey was made.
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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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Orange County sends Thomas Burke, John Kinchen and Francis Nash to the second Provincial Congress
The second Provincial Congress met at New Bern a day ahead of the royal legislature, with Burke, Kinchen and Nash as Orange's delegates. In the legislature itself Orange sat Ralph McNair and Thomas Hart, and Thomas Nash sat for Hillsborough.
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Henry Pattillo chairs the Hillsborough congress's committee of the whole on a plan of union
The Provincial Congress resolved itself into a committee of the whole and unanimously chose the Rev. Henry Pattillo, a Bute County delegate, as chairman. The committee concluded that a plan of union for the colonies was not then advisable.
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Orange County sends Thomas Hart, Thomas Burke and three others to the Third Provincial Congress
Thomas Hart sat for Orange in the Third Provincial Congress at Hillsborough with Thomas Burke, John Kinchen, John Atkinson and John Williams. A 1961 article names Nathaniel Rochester as elected too, citing the Colonial Records; he may have sat for the town of Hillsborough.
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The Provincial Congress at Hillsborough votes 1,000 pounds for presents to the Indians
The congress sitting at Hillsborough directed everyone with information on Indian affairs to lay it before Willie Jones, one of the Continental Congress's agents for the Southern Department. Thomas Wade, Thomas Polk and John Walker reported on what they called the hostile intentions of Governor Martin and the Indians, the matter went to the congress, and it appropriated 1,000 pounds for Jones to buy presents for the Indians.
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The Provincial Congress names Caswell, Moore and Pattillo to win over former Regulators
The congress at Hillsborough agreed to protect former Regulators who broke the oath of allegiance forced on them after Alamance, and appointed Richard Caswell, Maurice Moore and Henry Pattillo to persuade them to join the American cause. William L. Saunders later remarked on the irony, since Pattillo had joined in denouncing the Regulators in 1768.
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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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Adam Boyd lays the Philadelphia synod's pastoral letters before the Provincial Congress
At the Provincial Congress meeting in Hillsborough, Boyd presented two hundred pastoral letters from the Synod of Philadelphia addressed to the inhabitants of the province, and they were handed out to the members. The congress voted to pay him for them.
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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 held among the Loyalist prisoners; on May 3, 1776 the Provincial Congress at Halifax paroled him to Perquimans County. St. Matthew's Parish had no Episcopal rector again until 1825.
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Orange County militia join Griffith Rutherford's campaign against the Cherokee
Orange was first asked for 500 men and could not raise them; the quota was cut to 300, which was met. Officers from the county included Major Hugh Tinnin and Captains William Williams and William Murray, with Jacob Albright as drummer.
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Orange County voters instruct their delegates to the Halifax Congress
Orange County gave its delegates to the Halifax Congress written instructions asking for a two-house legislature, freedom of religion, and a constitution ratified by the people, with freeholders voting for the upper house and householders for the lower. Douglass found that the only known copy was in Thomas Burke's hand and credits him with drafting it, and he notes that the 1776 constitution took up the instructions' statement that all power comes from the people.
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Richard Bennehan buys the land that began the Stagville plantation
Bennehan bought land northeast of Snow Hill on the west side of the Flat River, the start of what became the Stagville-Fairntosh plantation complex.
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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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The state constitution keeps Hillsborough's own seat in the House of Commons
The constitution of 1776 dropped the borough seats of Bath, Brunswick and Campbelton but kept those of Newbern, Wilmington, Halifax and Edenton, and, as Boyd reads it, to conciliate the west it also kept the borough franchises of Hillsborough and Salisbury. In the boroughs only freeholders or householders could vote and only freeholders sit.
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Major Nathaniel Rochester's Orange detachment takes retreating Loyalists prisoner
According to Rochester's own sketch of his life, he marched as paymaster with the Orange and Granville militia under Colonel James Thackston to Cross Creek, where Thackston sent him with two companies of infantry and one of cavalry after Donald MacDonald's Loyalists. After an all-night march of twenty miles to Devo's Ferry he met about 500 men retreating from Moores Creek Bridge and took them prisoner. Short of provisions, he let all but about 50, whom MacDonald had made officers, go home on oath not to bear arms again, and turned the officers over to Colonel Alexander Martin at Cross Creek.
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Michael Holt turns back from the Loyalist march and later takes the Whig oath
Holt took a commission from Governor Martin and started for the Loyalist gathering at Cross Creek, but turned for home with some of his men. After his arrest he was permitted to take the Whig oath of allegiance, as James Hunter later was.
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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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Orange County's Thomas Burke and John Kinchen sit on the committee whose report becomes the Halifax Resolves
On April 8 the congress named a select committee, Burke and Kinchen of Orange among its seven members, to weigh the British measures against America. Its report, adopted unanimously on April 12, empowered the colony's delegates at Philadelphia to join the other colonies in declaring independence.
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The Provincial Congress lets Colonel John Hogan resign command of the Orange County militia regiment
Sitting at Halifax, the congress granted Colonel John Hogan of the Orange County militia regiment leave to give up his command. Nine days later it split the county militia into two regiments under new colonels.
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John Butler and John Atkinson are named Orange County commissioners to gather and buy firearms for the troops
The congress appointed two commissioners in each county to take in arms seized from the Tories, buy serviceable guns and have broken ones repaired for the new regiments. John Butler and John Atkinson served for Orange, each county drawing an advance of 300 pounds.
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The Provincial Congress divides the Orange County militia into Northern and Southern regiments
The congress split the county militia into two equal regiments along an east-west line the county court had already run. John Butler became colonel of the Southern Regiment with Nathaniel Rochester as lieutenant colonel, and James Saunders colonel of the Northern Regiment with William Moore as lieutenant colonel.
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The Provincial Congress orders a public musket factory for Hillsborough District under Johnston, Burke and Ramsey
The congress told three commissioners in each district to set up a public works for muskets and bayonets, gather gunsmiths and pay no more than 5 pounds a gun. For Hillsborough District it named William Johnston, Thomas Burke and Ambrose Ramsey, with up to 1,000 pounds to spend.
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Orange County sends Rochester, Burke, Kinchen, Butler and Saunders to the Provincial Congress at Halifax
Orange County elected Nathaniel Rochester with John Kinchen, James Saunders, John Butler and Thomas Burke to represent it at the Provincial Congress at Halifax in 1776, the session that set up a provisional government, ordered six more Continental regiments raised and instructed the state's delegates in the Continental Congress to vote for independence.
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John Butler and William Tate are named to inventory the estates of Orange County Loyalists held or sent away
The congress named commissioners in six counties, Butler and Tate for Orange, to list the property of prisoners sent out of the province or out on parole or bail, guard it against waste, and see that their wives and children did not go without.
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The congress orders foot soldiers drafted from the Hillsborough and Salisbury brigades for duty at Cross Creek
To hold Cross Creek it ordered 100 light cavalry and 200 infantry there under Ebenezer Folsome, the footmen to be drafted in proportion from each regiment of the Salisbury and Hillsborough brigades unless enough volunteered. The same day it sent 400 pounds of powder to the Hillsborough District brigadier.
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The congress dissolves the district committees of safety and seats Person and Rand for Hillsborough District on a new Council of Safety
Setting up a Council of Safety to govern between sessions, the congress dissolved the Provincial Council and every district committee of safety, Hillsborough's among them, and chose Thomas Person and John Rand as the Hillsborough District members.
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The congress routes the money for Orange County militia claims through Nathaniel Rochester
On its last day the congress ordered the sum allowed for the Orange militia's claims paid to Rochester, who was to pay each officer named on the allowed pay roll once the officer handed over the roll or a copy.
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The Council of Safety refuses Rutherford troops from the Hillsborough brigade, citing disaffection
When General Griffith Rutherford asked for troops from the Hillsborough brigade for his expedition against the Cherokee, the Council of Safety refused because of the many disaffected persons in that district and neighborhood. Connor counts the refusal among the signs of Loyalist feeling in the summer of 1776.
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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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The new state constitution provides for public schools and a university
Section 41 of the constitution adopted at Halifax, modeled on Pennsylvania's, told the legislature to establish schools and to promote learning in one or more universities. Orange's delegates voted on it, and it became the legal basis for chartering UNC.
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Thomas Burke of Hillsborough is elected to the Continental Congress
The last Provincial Congress chose Burke with William Hooper and Joseph Hewes. Apart from April to August 1778 he served until April 12, 1781, sitting on 108 committees.
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A special Hillsborough District court fails to sit when John Penn does not appear
Governor Richard Caswell named John Kinchen and John Penn judges of a special court of oyer and terminer for the Hillsborough District. Penn did not come, Kinchen would not sit alone, and no court was held.
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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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James Watson becomes register of Orange County and a Hillsborough commissioner under the new state
When county government resumed under statehood in 1777, James Watson was the county's register and one of the first commissioners of the town of Hillsborough, with William Johnston, James Hogg, John Shields and William Courtney.
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Orange County elects Thomas Burke to the General Assembly
Back from the Continental Congress in October 1777, Thomas Burke was elected to the Assembly from Orange. There he was put on the committee to report on the Articles of Confederation, which recommended ratifying only seven of the thirteen articles, and the Assembly followed its report.
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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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The court law of 1777 makes Hillsborough one of six superior court towns
A court law of 1777 divided the state into six districts, each with a superior court to sit twice a year at its court town: Wilmington, Newbern, Edenton, Halifax, Hillsborough and Salisbury. Boyd notes the hardship this put on suitors and witnesses, who often travelled long distances, until an 1806 act ordered a session in every county.
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Thomas Hart sits for Orange in the state Senate
Thomas Hart served as a senator in the 1777 session of the General Assembly, sitting on many committees, and resigned his military commission to Governor Richard Caswell so that he could give all his time to state affairs. He had been commissary of the Sixth North Carolina Regiment with the rank of colonel.
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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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William Courtney is one of the first Hillsborough town commissioners under the state
When the new state government was organized, the commissioners for the town of Hillsborough were William Johnston, James Hogg, John Sheels (Shields), William Courtney and James Watson.
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William Courtney represents the town of Hillsborough in the House of Commons
Courtney held Hillsborough's borough seat in the House of Commons in the Assemblies of 1777 and 1778. At the August 1778 session held in Hillsborough he sat on joint committees on Indian affairs and on claims.
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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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The county court orders the road from Bennehan's to New Hope Chapel finished
The road ordered earlier from Richard Bennehan's to New Hope Chapel had been cleared only as far as John Patterson's, so the May 1777 court named an overseer to clear the rest.
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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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Richard Bennehan lists 31 enslaved people for taxes
On the 1778 tax list Richard Bennehan of Stagville, one of the largest landholders in Orange County with 4,065 acres, reported 31 enslaved people. Most Orange households of the period held no one in slavery.
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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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The Assembly sets Orange County's quota of clothing for the state's troops
A statewide act passed at New Bern fixed each county's share of supplies for soldiers in the field. Orange owed 73 hats, 306 yards of linen, 146 yards of wool, 146 pairs of shoes and 146 pairs of stockings.
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Orange magistrates tender the state oath across the county
The county court named two magistrates in each district to offer the oath to people suspected of disloyalty, and they returned lists of those who took and refused it to the May 1778 term. At that term James Hogg, William Johnston and Samuel Strudwick were cited again, and those who still declined were given sixty days to leave.
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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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Christopher Barbee buys his brother Francis's share of their father's land grant east of Chapel Hill
Christopher Barbee buys from his brother Francis the western half of the 585-acre grant their father William Barbee took up in 1753, which included the hilltop later called The Mountain. Barbee made his plantation there, and a stone foundation at Meadowmont is thought to be his house.
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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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John Hogan sits as Orange County's state senator
For the 1779 General Assembly, Colonel John Hogan was Orange County's senator, with Mark Patterson and William McCauley as its members in the House of Commons and Thomas Tulloch for the borough of Hillsborough.
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Orange County militia serve at Stono Ferry in South Carolina
Under General John Butler, militia from Orange took part in Benjamin Lincoln's attack on the British at Stono Ferry.
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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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Most Orange enslavers hold fewer than ten people
By 1780, 95 percent of the county's enslavers held fewer than ten people and 3 percent held twenty or more.
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Samuel Strudwick asks the Assembly to stop taxing him on the whole Haw Fields
Strudwick petitioned for relief from taxes on the entire Haw Fields tract, saying settlers had blocked his court-ordered survey and, since the Revolution, had taken state patents on nearly all of the 30,000 acres, even his own house and plantation.
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The Hawfields congregation leaves its first log meetinghouse for a new site farther west
As the congregation's center shifted west, Hawfields abandoned its log church on the old road west from Hillsborough and built anew on ground now in the back of the present cemetery. A granite marker given by the B. Frank Mebanes marks that second site.
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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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Thomas Hart leaves Hartford and moves his family to Maryland
With Loyalists raiding his property and Cornwallis expected after Camden, Thomas Hart took General Gates's advice and in the fall of 1780 moved his family from Hartford to Hagerstown, Maryland, according to his partner Nathaniel Rochester, who went with him. Before leaving Hart sold part of his land, and Hartford went to Jesse Benton, husband of his niece, for a payment and a note. There is no record that Hart came back.
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William Courtney serves as state senator for Orange County
In 1780 William Courtney was Orange County's senator in the General Assembly, while William McCauley and Mark Patterson represented the county and Thomas Tulloch the town in the House of Commons.
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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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James Thackston gathers Continental recruits and returned deserters at Hillsborough
With the Southern army broken at Camden in August 1780, the Board of War sent Lieutenant Colonel Thackston to collect fresh recruits and returning deserters at Hillsborough. By the middle of November he had gathered just sixteen men.
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Samuel Strudwick asks Thomas Burke for help as settlers threaten his Haw Fields plantation
Strudwick wrote Burke that a man named Bowles, who held a new patent for a small plantation in sight of his house, meant to take the peaches from his orchard to distill and said he could raise a posse to do it, and that another settler who had patented Strudwick's own house might drive the family into the woods. He asked Burke what he should do.
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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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Lee's Legion joins Pickens's militia camp after the Hart's Mill raid
Later the same day as the Hart's Mill raid, Henry Lee's Legion, returning from beyond the Dan River with Greene's army, reached General Andrew Pickens's militia at a farm up Stony Creek, where the camp at first took the horsemen for Tarleton's cavalry. The combined force then went after Tarleton west of the Haw, the movement that led to Pyle's defeat.
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Patriots and Loyalists clash at Hart’s Mill
At daybreak about 45 North Carolina cavalry under Captain Joseph Graham and mounted riflemen under Captain Richard Simmons, sent out by General Andrew Pickens, surprised the British guard of about 26 regulars and two Loyalists that was keeping Thomas Hart's mill on the Eno grinding for Cornwallis's army. Graham's accounts report the whole guard killed, wounded or captured with no Patriot dead, and the party reached Pickens's camp with its prisoners ahead of pursuing British cavalry.
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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, and issued a proclamation calling loyalists to join him. The ceremony of raising the King's Standard, ordered for one o'clock on February 21 with a salute of 21 guns, was put off that noon until the next day. 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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The British army posts a town guard and a mill guard at Hillsborough
On the day Cornwallis's army reached Hillsborough, orders from headquarters there set a town guard of a captain, three sergeants, four corporals, a drummer and fifty privates from the Guards brigade, with a corporal and six men detached to guard the mill. Each corps sent its quartermaster for half hides, and a quartermaster with all his Black workers was to bury the offal at the cattle pen at noon every day.
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The British army halts at Hillsborough to mend clothing, shoes and harness
Brigade orders at the camp near Hillsborough on February 21, 1781, said the army would halt for some days and told commanding officers to use the time to repair the men's clothing and finish their shoes. The Guards' collar makers and two smiths were sent to Lieutenant McLeod of the Royal Artillery and the tanners to Lieutenant Colonel Hamilton; on February 23 three carpenters and all the collar and harness makers were ordered to McLeod's tent, and the smiths and tanners at work were excused other duty.
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The British keep a guard at Kello's Mill during the Hillsborough occupation
The daily duty details issued at Hillsborough from February 21 to 24, 1781, assigned a subaltern, a sergeant, a corporal and twenty privates of Lieutenant Colonel Webster's brigade to Kello's Mill, alongside the town guard, the provost guard and the cattle guard.
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Cornwallis orders his outposts to stop soldiers straggling out for whiskey
General orders at Hillsborough said Cornwallis heard every day of soldiers taken by the enemy after straggling out of camp in search of whiskey. He told the officers commanding the outposts and pickets to let no soldier pass, asked commanding officers to keep their men in camp, and warned that a man taken would sit out the war in prison for a moment's gratification.
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A British court of enquiry at Hillsborough clears a Guards private of desertion
A brigade court of enquiry ordered on the march on February 19 and reconvened at the president's tent at Hillsborough on February 22 found that Edward Horman, a soldier of the 3rd Company, 2nd Battalion of the Guards, held on suspicion of desertion, was innocent, and brigade orders of February 23 released him from confinement.
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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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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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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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Cornwallis's troops plunder Jesse Benton's brandy and sugar
Jesse Benton wrote Thomas Hart in June 1781 that when Cornwallis's army held Hillsborough he had saved everything from the troops except 110 gallons of brandy, 60 pounds of brown sugar, and some jugs, bottles and other trifles that they plundered.
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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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Pickens's cavalry fights Tarleton's horse at Clapp's Mill
An American force ambushed Banastre Tarleton's cavalry at Clapp's Mill on Alamance Creek, in the part of Orange County that became Alamance County in 1849. Forty of Pickens's cavalry under Captains Joseph Graham and Richard Simmons took part. The American second line broke and the British lost about twenty-one men.
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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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Colonel Alexander Mebane rides to warn John Butler after Fanning's raid on Hillsborough
When David Fanning's Loyalists marched out of Hillsborough with Governor Thomas Burke and other prisoners, Alexander Mebane, a colonel in the local militia, rode to warn General John Butler, who then laid the ambush at Lindley's Mill.
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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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Governor Burke returns to Hillsborough and raises a company against the Loyalists
Hearing that Loyalists were plundering in southern Orange and that David Fanning was active again, Burke came to Hillsborough and formed a mixed infantry and cavalry company under a Captain Allen of New Hope to guard the area's Whigs.
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Alexander Martin takes the oath as acting governor while Burke is in enemy hands
Three weeks after Fanning carried Governor Burke out of Hillsborough, Alexander Martin, Speaker of the Senate, qualified before the Council of State at Colonel Williams's in Granville County and took up the administration. He told the council that the government must be supported and the most vigorous and decisive measures taken against so daring an enemy.
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Burke is admitted to parole as a prisoner of war on James Island
Held first as a prisoner of state after Fanning's men delivered him to Major Craig at Wilmington, Burke was admitted to parole on James Island outside Charleston. Loyalist refugees on the island, outlaws from the state he had governed, left him in what he called hourly danger of assassination.
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The Assembly levies a tax on the Hillsborough District to repair the courthouse, stocks and streets
An act taxed residents of the district and the town, with the money going to repair the courthouse and stocks and the town's streets.
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A brick courthouse replaces the first one at Hillsborough
The county's second courthouse, built of brick, went up in 1782. The book says fire destroyed it seven years later and a wooden courthouse followed in 1790.
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Alfred Moore prosecutes at Hillsborough and is made attorney general
Acting as prosecutor in several major cases at Hillsborough while the state attorney general was away, Alfred Moore of Wilmington did well enough to be appointed attorney general that same year. He held the office until 1790 and built Moorefields west of Hillsborough while serving.
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Drought leaves the Hartford mills without water and crops short around Hillsborough
Jesse Benton wrote Thomas Hart in December 1782 that it was a most fatal hard year, without water to run the mills or bring up the crops, and in March 1783 that crops were poor or lost and many families had to go fifty or sixty miles for bread while their debts mounted. He was letting many small debtors of Hart's wait because of the hard times.
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Hillsborough collects meat for Greene's army and holds prisoners of war
Alexander Mebane, commissioner of specific supplies for Orange, gathered more than 2,000 pounds of salt and fresh meat at Hillsborough for Greene's army in South Carolina. The town jail held British and Loyalist prisoners while exchanges were negotiated.
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The General Assembly names Hillsborough its meeting place until a seat of government is fixed
An act of the April 1782 session, held at Hillsborough, directed that future General Assemblies meet there until a proper place was fixed for the seat of government. With the war over, the April 1783 session, also at Hillsborough, repealed it. Boyd's History of North Carolina (1919) adds that the Assembly had chosen Hillsborough in 1781 and ordered the public building at New Bern sold, and that the next session rescinded the choice after Fanning's raid.
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William Hooper makes the Nash house in Hillsborough his home
The house Francis Nash built in 1772 became the home of William Hooper, signer of the Declaration of Independence, in 1782. William A. Graham lived there in the 1860s.
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Burke escapes from his parole on James Island
Having written General Leslie on December 30 asking for a parole within American lines, Burke slipped off James Island on the night of January 16. Two days later he offered Leslie to return within British lines if guaranteed the treatment of a Continental officer, and on January 19 he asked Greene that men of honor judge the act.
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Thomas Burke returns to Hillsborough and takes up the governorship again
After leaving his parole on James Island, Burke resumed his duties at Hillsborough. His breach of parole drew criticism from many constituents and a dispute between Greene and the British.
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Three of David Fanning's men are hanged at Hillsborough
Seven captured raiders were tried before Judge John Williams, with Alfred Moore prosecuting and William R. Davie defending in his first case. Three were hanged despite Fanning's threats, and Burke commuted the other four sentences to a year in the Continental army.
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Jesse Benton's son Thomas Hart Benton is born near Hillsborough
Thomas Hart Benton, later a U.S. senator from Missouri, was born on March 14, 1782, the son of Jesse and Ann Gooch Benton. His biographer William N. Chambers placed the birth in a house on the Benton land on the right bank of the Eno about three miles west of Hillsborough, and thought the family did not live at Hart's Mill until late 1782; the state highway marker gives Hart's Mill, and a local tradition names Moorefields.
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General Assembly at Hillsborough elects Alexander Martin governor and grants western land to Continental soldiers
The Assembly met at Hillsborough, heard Governor Thomas Burke's message about his capture, and elected Alexander Martin governor on April 22. Its laws granted land in a western military reservation to officers and soldiers of the Continental line and directed the sale of confiscated Loyalist estates.
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The General Assembly at Hillsborough votes its thanks to Thomas Burke
A day after choosing his successor, both houses resolved that the thanks of the General Assembly be given to Burke for his steady and constant attention to the duties of his office and his vigorous dispatch of the public business while he was governor. The resolution passes over his capture and parole in silence.
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A false alarm of a Fanning attack turns the legislators out into Hillsborough's streets
With the General Assembly in session and General John Butler guarding it with 200 county militia, members were roused from bed and paraded in the streets before the report proved false. Fanning had in fact married and fled to South Carolina.
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William Moore is named commissioner of confiscated Loyalist estates for the Hillsborough District
The April Assembly at Hillsborough appointed commissioners to deal with estates taken from Loyalists, electing William Moore for the Hillsborough District.
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Assembly at Hillsborough elects Abner Nash and Hugh Williamson delegates to Congress
On May 3, 1782, a joint ballot of the General Assembly at Hillsborough elected Abner Nash, Hugh Williamson, Benjamin Hawkins and William Blount as the state's delegates to Congress for the year. Nash had been returned to the House for Jones County, and Williamson sat for the town of Edenton.
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The Assembly names Thomas Davis state printer and tells him to set up his press at Hillsborough
On the last day of the session Davis was appointed public printer and directed to establish his press in Hillsborough as soon as he could, to print the state's laws and legislative journals there.
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A post route is opened between Hillsborough and Richmond
The route was part of a push, gaining ground in 1783, to make Hillsborough the permanent seat of state government.
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Hawfields residents petition the House of Commons against Justice John Steel
Orange County people objecting to the conduct of Steel, a justice of the peace in the Hawfields, sent a memorial to the Commons. It went to committee, and Steel resigned before any action was taken.
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Hillsborough's count at the end of the war: forty white polls and sixty-seven enslaved people
At the close of the Revolution the town listed forty white taxable men and sixty-seven enslaved people between the ages of twelve and fifty, which Nash reads as a population of about three hundred.
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Jesse Benton of Orange County writes to Thomas Hart about legal disputes
Jesse Benton of Orange County wrote to Thomas Hart about legal disputes and the pursuit of enslaved people. The letter survives in the Jesse Benton Papers at the State Archives.
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General Assembly at Hillsborough opens the western land office and passes an act of pardon
Meeting at Hillsborough, the Assembly re-elected Alexander Martin governor and chose Hugh Williamson, Benjamin Hawkins, Abner Nash and Richard Dobbs Spaight as delegates to Congress. Its laws opened a land office for western lands to redeem specie certificates and pay army arrears, and an Act of Pardon and Oblivion covered wartime offenses, with exceptions.
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John DeBow, minister to the Hawfields, Eno and New Hope people, dies
DeBow died at 38 and was buried at Hawfields church. Craig was told he was the first person buried in the present Hawfields churchyard.
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Continental officers organize the North Carolina Society of the Cincinnati at James Hogg's cabin
Former officers of the North Carolina Continental line gathered near Hillsborough in a cabin owned by the merchant James Hogg and founded the state's Society of the Cincinnati. They elected Jethro Sumner president, Thomas Clark vice president and Adam Boyd secretary. Sixty-six of the roughly six hundred commissioned officers the state sent to the war joined by contributing a month's pay.
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Thomas Burke dies at Tyaquin
Thomas Burke died at his farm near Hillsborough after serving as North Carolina’s governor.
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Cross Roads Presbyterian Church is organized from the Hawfields, Eno and Stony Creek congregations
During Jacob Lake's ministry a new congregation, Cross Roads, was gathered from members of Hawfields, Eno and Stony Creek. It later shared pastors with Hawfields for more than a century.
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Jesse Benton serves as secretary-treasurer of the Science Hall academy's trustees
Jesse Benton supported the academy called Science Hall that was trying to get started at Hillsborough, and in 1784 he was secretary-treasurer of its board of trustees. Some years later he gave the school the 50 pounds damages he won from Colonel William Sheppard for an assault. Chambers found that the school disappeared from the record about 1790.
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General Assembly at Hillsborough cedes the state's western lands to Congress
The spring 1784 Assembly at Hillsborough passed an act ceding to Congress the state's claim to lands west of the Appalachian Mountains and an act giving Congress power to levy import duties. The House of Commons chose Thomas Benbury as speaker and elected Hugh Williamson and Richard Dobbs Spaight as delegates to Congress.
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William Hooper divides enslaved people among his children
At Hillsborough, William Hooper gave his son Thomas Hogg Hooper a woman named Judah and her child Jack, in place of Tom, a man Robert Hogg had willed to Thomas and whom Hooper had sold to Samuel Campbell for 120 pounds. The same day, to put his children on an equal footing, he made over Pat and her son Alfred to his daughter Elizabeth and sold a girl named Molly to his son William, each transfer completed by handing a silver spoon to James Hogg as trustee.
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Orange County citizens petition to bar members of the Society of the Cincinnati from the Assembly
At the New Bern session county residents asked that members of the officers' society be kept out of the legislature. John Butler, Orange's representative and himself eligible to join, introduced a bill to that end, which was never acted on.
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A bill to make Hillsborough the state capital fails by four votes
Hillsborough's backers pressed the question from session to session, and in 1785 a bill to fix the capital there lost 41 to 37.
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Alfred Moore of Wilmington builds Moorefields near Hillsborough as a summer home
Moore, whom President John Adams later appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court, built Moorefields as his summer place. Local tradition held that Senator Thomas Hart Benton and Mrs. Henry Clay were born there, but both were born before the house was built, on Hart and Benton family land somewhat to the north.
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Hillsborough Academy opens in the old Anglican church
The school chartered as Science Hall opened as Hillsborough Academy in the old Anglican church, which an act of the 1784 Hillsborough session had ordered repaired for a school and a free meeting house. It never thrived and closed in 1790.
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Joseph Dunn Hughes keeps a school in the Eno Church community
Pender lists a school run by Joseph Dunn Hughes near Eno Presbyterian Church in 1785, the earliest of the Hughes family schools that later produced Cedar Grove Academy.
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The North Carolina Gazette begins publication at Hillsborough
The North Carolina Gazette of Hillsborough, apparently the county's first regular newspaper, appeared in 1785 by Lefler and Wager's account, early in 1786 by Boyd's. The only surviving copy with an imprint, dated February 16, 1786, was printed by Robert Ferguson for Thomas Davis.
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William Cabe and thirty neighbors on the Eno post a warning against hunters
William Cabe published a broadside, signed by his brother John and 28 neighbors, warning that people hunting with dogs and guns on their land had driven off their cattle and hogs and would be prosecuted.
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David Craig's 1785 stone is the oldest dated marker in New Hope's old graveyard
The earliest date Craig could find in the old graveyard beside the first church site reads 'D. C. - N. 2. - 1785', which he took for David Craig, a son of William Craige, who died November 2, 1785. Earlier graves there were marked with rough, unlettered stones.
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Sterling Harris builds the house on East Queen Street later called Heartsease
Sterling Harris built the one-and-a-half-story core of the house about 1786. Polly Burke bought it in 1810 and added a bay, and Dennis Heartt's family named it Heartsease after 1837.
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The William Whitted House is built facing East Queen Street
A two-story frame house with a massive stone chimney is built about 1786 for William Whitted at East Queen and North Churton streets. A five-bay Italianate wing facing Churton Street was added later, possibly designed by Jules Korner of Kernersville.
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The county court names a jury to lay off a road from McCauley's mill to Hillsborough
At the week-long August 1786 term, held by justices John Butler, William McCauley and William Ansley, the court named a jury to mark the best and most direct road from McCauley's mill to Hillsborough. The same term licensed three taverns and named tax collectors for all seven taxing districts.
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Thomas Lloyd signs his lands and enslaved people over to his sons-in-law
To keep his property from confiscation as a Loyalist, Thomas Lloyd conveyed his lands and the people he enslaved to his sons-in-law Daniel and John Hogan for nominal sums and leased them straight back. His property was never confiscated.
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The Assembly orders the state treasurer and comptroller to move their offices to Hillsborough
Meeting at Fayetteville, the Assembly directed both officers to take their offices and records to Hillsborough so they would be convenient to most of the state's people. The comptroller was slow to comply, and a year later the order was repeated.
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A one-story Federal house is built on West Queen Street, later the John Newman House
The hall-and-parlor house at 230 West Queen Street dates from about 1787; a deed of February 25, 1790 already describes the lot as improved. Its earliest recorded owner was Vincent Peter Williamson, and Governor Thomas Burke's widow Mary Burke Doherty owned it for a time before the Newman family bought it in the 1860s.
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Indian families from Virginia settle the Texas community in northern Orange County
Charles Whitmore, Jesse Whitmore and Jacob Jeffries appear on the Orange County return used for the 1790 federal census, which was compiled from a tax list of 1787. Families of the same names had moved southwest from Greensville County in Virginia, and by 1820 the settlement later called Texas, or Pleasant Grove, was intact, with the Corn and Jeffries families holding tracts of several hundred acres.
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Richard Bennehan buys land from Judith Stagg and opens the Stagville Store
After William Johnston's death in 1785 Bennehan opened his own store, on land he bought from Judith Stagg, which became the Stagville Store.
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The Assembly calls a convention on the Constitution to meet at Hillsborough
Meeting in joint session at Tarboro, the General Assembly resolved that delegates to a state convention on the federal Constitution be chosen on the last Friday and Saturday of March 1788, five for each county and one for each borough, with taxpaying freemen voting but only freeholders eligible to sit, and that the convention meet at Hillsborough on July 21, 1788.
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Samuel Strudwick's long Haw Fields lawsuits come to an end
Litigation between Strudwick and settlers on the Haw Fields tract, begun a few years after his 1766 meeting with them, ended in 1788 with Strudwick having lost about a third of the property.
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Tax lists show the property of Orange County's convention delegates
Pool's survey of tax lists, wills and grants found that Jonathan Lindley held a plantation of 2,657 acres and many town lots; William McCauley 822 acres on the New Hope and Haw waters, nine enslaved people, 31 houses and lots in Hillsborough, a tavern and a still; Alexander Mebane 1,181 acres in Orange and 6,400 in Davidson County, Tennessee, and seven enslaved people; William Mebane 500 acres in Orange, 7,200 in Tennessee and twelve enslaved people; William Shepard 584 acres and two Hillsborough lots; and Absalom Tatom, Hillsborough's member, 500 acres in Tennessee. All voted against ratification, and Pool concluded that property did not divide the parties.
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The county court rules Jesse Benton owes no tax on his unsurveyed western claims
Jesse Benton's 1788 list of taxable property showed claims to 23,931 acres west of the mountains, among them tracts on the Chickasaw Bluffs of the Mississippi and on the Obion River. Because none had been surveyed, the Orange County court, with his brother Samuel Benton Jr. as clerk, found that he need not pay tax on them that year.
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