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Orange County Indexed

Chronology

Key events from Orange County history: 100 highlights to start, then the full chronology of 6,171 dated events and 63 storylines, each connected to the index. A storyline gathers many dated events into one history, such as the Regulator crisis.

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Searched the full chronology of 6,171 dated events and 63 storylines, not only the highlights. Showing 1–10.Back to highlights

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10 dated events
1770Colonial and Regulator years
  1. Colonial and Regulator years · 1680–1774
  2. Hillsborough officials and merchants pledge to defend one another after the riot

    Protest or organizing · Hillsborough

    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.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: Francis Nash · Edmund Fanning · Alexander Martin · Jesse Benton · William Johnston · Adlai Osborne

  3. James Hunter presents a Regulator petition to Judge Henderson on the first day of the Hillsborough court

    Protest or organizing · Hillsborough

    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.

    Part of Hillsborough court riot, September 1770

    People: Richard Henderson

  4. Regulators disrupt the Hillsborough Superior Court

    Protest or organizing · Hillsborough

    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.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: Herman Husband · Edmund Fanning · Richard Henderson · Alexander Martin · Thomas Hart

  5. Regulators pull down and plunder Edmund Fanning's house in Hillsborough

    Violence or armed conflict · 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.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: Edmund Fanning · Richard Henderson · Ralph McNair

  6. Hillsborough's leading men write to Governor Tryon for protection after the riot

    Protest or organizing · Hillsborough

    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.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: Francis Nash · Thomas Hart · William Johnston

  7. Tryon's Council orders a proclamation against the Hillsborough rioters and defers the Assembly

    Law, policy or court · New Bern (Council Chamber)

    Meeting at New Bern on the Hillsborough dispatches, the Council heard the Attorney General's opinion that pulling down Fanning's house and the assaults amounted to a riot, and ordered a proclamation requiring every justice of the peace to pursue the persons who assembled at Hillsborough on September 24 and 25. It advised putting off the Assembly to November 30.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: William Tryon · Edmund Fanning

  8. The Assembly expels Orange County's member Herman Husband and the Council orders his arrest

    Law, policy or court · New Bern

    The House of Assembly resolved that Husband, a principal promoter of the late riots in Orange County and publisher of a seditious letter printed over James Hunter's name, be expelled. The same day the Council unanimously advised his arrest and the Chief Justice issued a warrant; he lay in the New Bern jail until a grand jury found no bill on February 8, 1771.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: Herman Husband · James Hunter · William Tryon · Martin Howard

  9. The Assembly passes the Johnston Riot Act against the Regulators

    Law, policy or court · New Bern

    Named for its author Samuel Johnston, the law let riot cases be tried in any county, outlawed anyone who resisted or evaded arrest, and allowed the governor to use troops against the Regulators. The Crown later condemned parts of it.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: Samuel Johnston

  10. A special court at New Bern presents and indicts Husband, Hunter, Butler and Howell for the Hillsborough riot

    Law, policy or court · New Bern

    Sitting under Chief Justice Martin Howard with Maurice Moore and Richard Henderson, the special court of oyer and terminer at New Bern received a grand jury presentment against the Regulators who in September last 'broke up that Court' at Hillsborough, and returned indictments for riot against Herman Husband, James Hunter, William Butler and Rednap Howell among others.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: Richard Henderson · Herman Husband · James Hunter · William Butler (Regulator) · Maurice Moore · Martin Howard

  11. At Governor Martin's urging, Edmund Fanning drops his riot damage suits

    Law, policy or court · Hillsborough

    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.

    Part of The Regulator crisis, 1766–1771 · 90 events

    People: Edmund Fanning · Josiah Martin

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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 2, 2026.

Two mice reading back to back against a leaf, with the hand-lettered words Friends of the Orange County Public Library
Illustration by Caldecott Medalist Matthew Cordell, gifted to the Friends 2026