Thomas Hart

Life and Orange County connections

Dated events connected with this person, earliest first. See these 13 dated events in the chronology →

1. 1764 or 1765 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. People: Thomas Hart, Francis NashSearch the index · Lefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952 (1953), p. 23
2. November 1767 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. People: Thomas HartNC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources: Hart's Mill (G-122)
3. 1768 Thomas Hart begins a term as Orange County sheriff and is made militia captain and commissary Thomas Hart began his second term as sheriff of Orange County in 1768. The same year he was made a captain in the Orange County militia and commissary for the troops of Orange and Granville counties.Search the index · NCpedia: Hart, Thomas
4. April 23, 1768 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. People: Edmund Fanning, William Tryon, Thomas Lloyd (died 1792), Thomas Hart, Francis NashLefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952 (1953), p. 31
5. September 19-21, 1768 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. People: William Tryon, Edmund Fanning, Thomas Lloyd (died 1792), Thomas HartInternet Archive: Bassett, The Regulators of North Carolina (1765-1771) (1896), p. 177
6. September 24–25, 1770 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. People: Herman Husband, Edmund Fanning, Richard Henderson, Alexander Martin, Thomas HartColonial and State Records of North Carolina, vol. 8, pp. 241-244: Letter from Richard Henderson to William Tryon, September 29, 1770
7. September 30, 1770 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. People: Francis Nash, Thomas Hart, William JohnstonDocumenting the American South, Colonial and State Records: Letter from James Watson, Francis Nash, et al. to William Tryon, September 30, 1770
8. April 1771 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. People: William TryonSearch the index · Documenting the American South: Colonial and State Records of North Carolina, Letter from William Tryon to Thomas Hart (Apr 13, 1771)
9. August 25, 1774 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.Search the index · Nash, Hillsboro, Colonial and Revolutionary (1903), p. 38
10. April 3, 1775 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. People: Francis Nash, Thomas Hart, Ralph McNairSearch the index · Lefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952 (1953), p. 42
11. 1778–1780 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. People: Thomas Hart, James BrownSearch the index · NCpedia (Dictionary of North Carolina Biography): Rochester, Nathaniel
12. February 12, 1779 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. People: Alexander Martin, Nathaniel Rochester, Thomas Hart, James Hogg, Thomas Burke, William Hooper, William JohnstonDocumenting the American South: Acts of the North Carolina General Assembly, 1779 (Colonial and State Records, vol. 24)
13. 1783 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. People: Thomas HartSearch the index · State Archives of North Carolina catalog: Jesse Benton Papers (PC.322)