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4 dated events match your filters.
Searched the full chronology of 6,764 dated events and 63 storylines, not only the highlights. Showing 1–4.Back to highlights
- Antebellum and Civil War · 1800–1865
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Harriet, enslaved by the Smith family in Hillsborough, gives birth to Cornelia after Sidney Smith rapes her
Harriet, bought by James Strudwick Smith in 1834 as a maid for his daughter Mary Ruffin Smith, was raped by his son Sidney and gave birth to Cornelia in 1844, while the family's home was in Hillsborough. Cornelia's granddaughter Pauli Murray told the story in Proud Shoes.
People: James Strudwick Smith · Mary Ruffin Smith · Pauli Murray · Cornelia Smith Fitzgerald
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James Strudwick Smith sells Harriet, Julius and Cornelia to Mary Ruffin Smith
Shielding his property from creditors, James Strudwick Smith passed most of the family's holdings to his daughter Mary Ruffin Smith, including Harriet and her children Julius and Cornelia, whom he sold to her in 1845. Cornelia had been born in 1844 after Sidney Smith raped Harriet.
- Reconstruction and the New South · 1866–1899
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Robert G. Fitzgerald marries Cornelia Smith of Chapel Hill
Fitzgerald married Cornelia Smith, a niece of Mary Ruffin Smith, the Chapel Hill benefactor of the university. Their granddaughter Pauli Murray later told the family's story in Proud Shoes.
People: Pauli Murray · Mary Ruffin Smith · Cornelia Smith Fitzgerald
- Recent decades · 1976–2026
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Pauli Murray celebrates her first Eucharist at the Chapel of the Cross
Murray, newly ordained an Episcopal priest, celebrated her first Eucharist at the Chapel of the Cross in Chapel Hill at the invitation of the rector Peter James Lee, who cited her family's connection to the parish. Her grandmother Cornelia Smith Fitzgerald had been baptized in the same chapel on December 20, 1854.
People: Cornelia Smith Fitzgerald
Subject: Chapel of the Cross
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A dated event is a fact, filed on the page of the subject it belongs to: a person, a place, a theme, or a named event or history. Pages are subjects, with their own works and sources; the Place, community, or institution filter also gathers the institutions that recur in the entries without a page of their own. The page opens on the highlights; a search or any filter looks through every dated event and storyline, and each filter’s counts say how many entries choosing it would show alongside the others. A storyline is a longer history that gathers related dated events, and each storyline’s page lists its own. Counts give dated events and storylines separately. Dates come from the sources named on the cards and from the index’s event pages; where sources disagree, the card follows the county records. Entries marked approximate or needing research say so on the card; the rest were checked against the source named on it. The correction link under the entries opens the contact form; name the entry and its date and the Friends will check the source. Suggest an event →
Compiled and maintained by the Friends of the Orange County Public Library from county records, the sources named on each card, and the index’s event pages. Last updated October 3, 2026.
