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Churches and lodges

St. Mary’s Chapel

St. Mary's Chapel is the small brick Gothic Revival Episcopal chapel on St. Mary's Road northeast of Hillsborough, built in 1858 and 1859 for an Anglican congregation established about 1759 on land given by Thomas Holden. Bishop Thomas Atkinson consecrated it on November 25, 1859, and regular services ended in the early 1930s.

Map tiles © OpenStreetMap contributors. Site locations from the N.C. State Historic Preservation Office survey, Open Orange, Orange County GIS, OpenStreetMap and a few other published sources named on each site’s page; town and community pins show approximate locations.

People in its history

People named in events about this site, ordered by number of mentions. Each example links to an entry with a source citation.

Sites linked through the same people

Indexed works

Books, articles, records, and images about St. Mary’s Chapel. Each has been reviewed for relevance; materials held at OCPL appear first.

Held at OCPL

Archaeological Assessment of St. Mary's Chapel Cemetery, Hillsborough Vicinity, Orange County, North Carolina

Joy, Deborah · 1995

Deborah Joy's archaeological assessment of St. Mary's Chapel Cemetery, a field report from 1995 on a burial ground in the Hillsborough vicinity of Orange County. It belongs with the cemetery and archaeological studies of the county and would interest anyone tracing burials at St. Mary's or the condition of the site.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

✓ Held at OCPL · NC 929.509 JOY

Elsewhere

Families of Saint Mary's Episcopal Chapel, Orange County, North Carolina: A Special Service Project by the Young Women of Chapel Hill First, Chapel Hill Second, and Durham First Wards of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Franklin, Ben · 2009

Compiled in 2009 by Ben Franklin from the records of Saint Mary's Episcopal Chapel in Orange County, this genealogy came out of a service project by the young women of three Latter-day Saint wards in Chapel Hill and Durham. Topics include church registers, cemeteries, registers of births and wills for the county, so the volume gathers burial and family data on Episcopal families there.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

Durham

A celebration of 250 years of Anglican and Episcopal witness in Orange County : September 19 to 21, 2003

2003

A booklet from a three-day celebration, September 19 to 21, 2003, marking 250 years of Anglican and Episcopal presence in Orange County, North Carolina. A note summarizes its contents as the history of four congregations: St. Matthew's Church and St. Mary's Chapel in Hillsborough, and the Chapel of the Cross and the Church of the Holy Family in Chapel Hill. Sixteen unnumbered pages.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

UNC

Information related to St. Mary's Chapel

Browning, Hugh Conway, 1896-1983 · 1996 · Polly Cabe Roberts?

Hugh Conway Browning's notes on the history of St. Mary's Chapel, the Episcopal chapel near Hillsborough, gathered into 31 unnumbered leaves with plans and issued in Orange County in 1996, after Browning's death in 1983, apparently by Polly Cabe Roberts, who added a biographical sketch of him. Topics include Episcopal church history in Orange County.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

UNC

An archaeological assessment of St. Mary's Chapel Cemetary, Hillsborough vicinity, Orange County, North Carolina

Joy, Deborah · 1995 · Committee on St. Mary's Chapel

Deborah Joy's archaeological assessment of St. Mary's Chapel Cemetery outside Hillsborough, prepared for the Committee on St. Mary's Chapel in April 1995. The report documents what survives at the burial ground. One volume in various pagings with illustrations, of use to anyone researching graves and families locally.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

UNC

Surveys and maps of the area

Not about St. Mary’s Chapel alone: the architectural surveys that cover its town or the county, and maps drawn while it stood. Several of the surveys can be read free online at NC Digital Collections.

History and Architecture of Orange County, North Carolina

Mattson, Richard L. · 1996 · Unpublished manuscript

Richard L. Mattson's manuscript survey of the history and architecture of Orange County, completed in September 1996. Its 78 pages cover the county's historic buildings and structures and end with a bibliography.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

NC Cardinal NC Digital Collections DPLA

NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

Orange County multiple property documentation form: "Historic resources of Orange County."

1993

National Register multiple property documentation form on the historic resources of Orange County, completed in 1993. Kelly Lally and M. Ruth Little led the first phase of the survey, and Jody Carter and Todd Peck the second. It runs 123 pages with a bibliography.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

NC Cardinal NC Digital Collections DPLA

NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

[Architectural field surveys for Orange County : collected for the Historic and architectural resources of the Tar-Neuse River basin report]

1974 · Survey and Planning Branch, Historic Preservation Section, Division of Archives and History

Historic building survey forms for Orange County gathered in 1974 by the state's Historic Preservation Section for a report on the Tar-Neuse River basin. About 400 pages of forms covering buildings in Chapel Hill, Hillsborough and the countryside; a form can carry a description, historical notes, location, a photograph and a floor plan.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

NC Cardinal

Architectural survey and National Register evaluation of St. Mary's road (S.R. 1002), Orange County, North Carolina

Henry, Geoffrey B. · 1999

Geoffrey B. Henry of GAI Consultants surveyed the historic buildings along St. Mary's Road (S.R. 1002) near Hillsborough in August 1999 and evaluated them for the National Register, for the Orange County Department of Planning. A 53-page report with maps.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

NC Cardinal NC Digital Collections DPLA

NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

[Map of Orange County].

1849

Large manuscript map of Orange County on linen, tracing ownership and chains of title for notable tracts with the dates each passed to new owners. Hachures show relief, and it marks principal towns, roads, railroads, mines, creeks, rivers and lakes. The date is uncertain; both 1849 and 1913 have been given for it.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

UNC DigitalNC DPLA

Map of Orange County, N.C.

Tate, George W. · 1891 · George W. Tate

Facsimile, dated 1940, of George W. Tate's 1891 map of Orange County. It shows towns, roads, railroads such as the North Carolina Rail Road and the Chapel Hill line, residences, schools, churches, mills and mines, with portraits and pictures of buildings in the margins.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

UNC DPLA Library of Congress Library of Congress Digital Collections
Show 3 more surveys and maps

A map of Orange County, N.C.

Noble, M. C. S. (Marcus Cicero Stephens), 1855-1942 · 1915

Marcus Cicero Stephens Noble drew this 1915 map to show how Orange County's original territory was divided, tracing the formation of Caswell, Person, Alamance, Durham, Chatham, Randolph, Guilford and Rockingham counties out of it. Topics include county boundaries and the history of political divisions in the Piedmont. Surviving as a photocopy on a sheet 31 by 23 centimeters.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

UNC

Soil map, North Carolina, Orange County sheet

United States · 1918 · United States Government Printing Office

Color soil map of Orange County issued in 1918 by the U.S. Government Printing Office at one inch to the mile, 68 by 46 cm. Besides soil types it marks roads and railroads, the Southern Railway among them, churches, schools, mills, stores, cotton gins, iron mines, cemeteries and the county home, and it names the townships of Bingham, Cedar Grove, Chapel Hill, Cheeks, Eno, Hillsborough and Little River.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

Duke DPLA

Map of Orange County, N.C. : 1939

Stanaland, E. A. · 1939 · E.A. Stanaland

Hand colored map of Orange County drawn by E. A. Stanaland and published at Parrott, Georgia, in 1939. It shows towns and townships, roads and railroads, and marks the schools and churches standing in the county. One sheet, 58 by 36 centimeters.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

UNC

Found a book OCPL doesn’t own? You can often borrow it through interlibrary loan at OCPL.

Start at OCPL

Books in OCPL’s Rebecca B. Wall Local History Collection at the Main Library in Hillsborough whose titles, catalog subjects or descriptions are about this site. The Friends’ recommended starting points are labelled.

Where to look next on the shelf

These books don’t necessarily mention St. Mary’s Chapel, but they cover where it stands, its kind of building and the land, family and burial records behind it, and they are where a search for a place like this usually goes next. All are at OCPL, most in the Wall Collection.

Histories of the town and county

  • Foundational · NC 975.656 ORA Orange County--1752-1952 1953

    Hugh Talmage Lefler and Paul W. Wager's history of Orange County across its first two centuries, 1752 to 1952, prepared for the county's bicentennial. It covers government and politics, biography and the county's families, and doubles as a genealogical reference. Published in Chapel Hill by the Orange Printshop in 1953, 389 pages with illustrations and an index; this copy is a later reprint.

Buildings and surveys

  • Foundational · NC 720.975 BIS A Guide to the Historic Architecture of Piedmont North Carolina Bishir, Catherine W. · 2003

    Catherine W. Bishir and Michael T. Southern's field guide to the historic buildings of the North Carolina Piedmont, arranged county by county from Wake and Franklin in the east to Mecklenburg and Gaston in the west. The Orange County section takes in Hillsborough, Chapel Hill and Carrboro along with the rural county, with entries on individual buildings and maps for finding them. Published 2003, 596 pages with illustrations and maps.

  • Foundational · NC 917.56 ORANGE An Inventory Of Sites Of Cultural, Historic, Recreational, Biological, And Geological Significance In The Unincorporated Portions Of Orange County Orange County (N.C.) · 1986

    County planning department survey of significant sites in the unincorporated parts of Orange County, published in 1988, 95 pages with maps. The survey covers cemeteries, church buildings and archaeological sites on the cultural side, and plants, animals, endangered species, wildlife refuges, geology and recreation areas on the natural side. Useful for local historians, genealogists tracing burial grounds and land planners alike.

  • Foundational · NC 363.69 HIS Historic Preservation Element: Orange County Comprehensive Plan ; Orange County, North Carolina Orange County (N.C.) · 1996

    The historic preservation element of Orange County's comprehensive plan, prepared for the county Historic Preservation Commission and Planning Department by the Jaeger Company of Gainesville, Georgia, and adopted on 1 April 1996. Partly financed by National Park Service funds through the state Division of Archives and History, it sets county policy on historic buildings and sites and their conservation. 59 pages plus 50 unnumbered, with illustrations and maps, some folded and in color.

Land, family and burial records

  • Start here · NC 333.16 CHILTON The Land Grant Atlas of Old Orange County Chilton, Mark · 2012

    Mark Chilton's oversized atlas plotting eighteenth-century land grants across the original Orange County, which stretched well beyond today's boundaries into what became Alamance and Durham counties. Published in Carrboro by Hand Made Books beginning in 2012, the set was planned in four volumes: Henry McCulloh's great tract number 11 and the land north of it; the Saxapahaw old fields (volume 2); Chapel Hill, Hillsborough and the Johnston Tract; and Durham, Rougemont and McCulloh's tract number 12. Maps and color illustrations, 41 cm.

  • Start here · NC 306.097 KEN Kinship and Neighborhood in A Southern Community: Orange County, North Carolina, 1849-1881 Kenzer, Robert C. · 1987

    Robert C. Kenzer's study of kinship and neighborhood in Orange County between 1849 and 1881, the decades before and after the Civil War, tracing family ties and neighborhood networks through the county's records. Published by the University of Tennessee Press in 1987, 251 pages with illustrations, maps, portraits and a bibliography. Topics include kinship, neighborhoods and social conditions in the county in the nineteenth century.

  • Rebecca Wall Collection · NC 929.509 STO Tombstone Inscriptions: Recorded From Private or Abandoned Cemeteries in Alamance and Orange Counties, North Carolina Stokes, Durward T. · 1979

    Durward T. Stokes's transcriptions of tombstone inscriptions from private and abandoned cemeteries in Alamance and Orange counties, dated at Graham, N.C., August 25, 1979. A photocopied typescript of 60 leaves with 10 preliminary pages, it preserves names and dates from family and neglected burial grounds and is a genealogical source for both counties.

In the chronology

  1. St. Mary's congregation is established Anglicans established St. Mary's Chapel about 1759 on land given by Thomas Holden, about seven miles northeast of Hillsborough, to serve northern Orange County. The congregation joined the Episcopal convention in 1819 and built the present brick chapel, consecrated in 1859; regular services ended in the early 1930s. NC Department of Natural and Cultural Resources: St. Mary's Chapel (G-90)
  2. St. Mary's Chapel is admitted to the Episcopal convention The St. Mary's congregation in eastern Orange County was received into the Episcopal convention of North Carolina, two years after the diocese was formed. Lefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952 (1953), p. 293
  3. Bishop Ravenscroft makes his first visitation to Orange County Newly elected and consecrated, the bishop came to Orange the year before St. Matthew's was reorganized under William Mercer Green. A notice in the Hillsborough Recorder dated June 8, 1823 announced that he and another clergyman (the name is garbled in the scan) would attend at St. Mary's Chapel on the fourth Sunday of the month, June 22, to hold confirmation and the Lord's Supper. People: William Mercer Green A Celebration of 250 Years of Anglican and Episcopal Witness in Orange County (2003), scan p. 10 · Also: Hillsborough Recorder, June 11, 1823, p. 3
  4. Commissioners take bids for a stone wall around the St. Mary's graveyard The Hillsborough Recorder reported that commissioners were letting the contract for a stone wall around the burying ground at St. Mary's. The dry-laid fieldstone wall still encloses the one-acre lot where the first log chapel stood. Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 49
  5. St. Mary's Chapel is built The Episcopal congregation of St. Mary's, about six miles northeast of Hillsborough, replaced its eighteenth-century church with a small brick Gothic Revival chapel on land bought beside the original tract. Bishop Thomas Atkinson consecrated it on November 25, 1859, and the congregation reported that the neat brick church had cost $2,000. NC State Historic Preservation Office: National Register nomination, St. Mary's Chapel
  6. John H. Webb buys 9 9/16 acres from Ellen Bain for the St. Mary's congregation Acting for the congregation, Webb bought the tract next to the old one-acre chapel lot from Ellen Bain, a great-granddaughter of Thomas Holden. The new brick chapel was raised on this land about 350 feet northwest of the first log chapel. Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 15
  7. Bishop Atkinson consecrates St. Mary's Chapel The St. Mary's Chapel building in eastern Orange County was consecrated by Bishop Atkinson with the Rev. Dr. Curtis taking part. People: Moses Ashley Curtis Lefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952 (1953), p. 293
  8. St. Mary's Chapel is reported as no longer entitled to representation as a parish Long served once a month from Hillsborough and weakened as its old families' children drifted away, St. Mary's Chapel was reported to the 1868 diocesan convention as no longer qualifying for parish representation. Joseph W. Murphy, A Sermon-Sketch of the History of St. Matthew's Parish, Hillsboro, N.C. (1900), scan p. 31
  9. The Rev. Joseph W. Murphy takes charge of the St. Mary's congregation Murphy began serving St. Mary's together with St. Matthew's in Hillsborough and opened the chapel's second parish register, which records much of the little church's later history. People: Joseph W. Murphy Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 19
  10. St. Mary's Chapel is reorganized as a mission Twenty years after losing its standing as a parish, St. Mary's Chapel was reorganized in 1888 as a mission served from Hillsborough. Murphy wished it had long since been joined with Salem Chapel and Flat River under a minister of its own. People: Joseph W. Murphy Joseph W. Murphy, A Sermon-Sketch of the History of St. Matthew's Parish, Hillsboro, N.C. (1900), scan p. 31
  11. The St. Mary's Chapel land is deeded to the trustees of the Episcopal Diocese Two days after an Easter meeting elected Philip Walker warden and made the minister trustee with power to transfer the property, the Rev. Joseph W. Murphy deeded the chapel's 9 9/16 acres to the diocesan trustees. The old one-acre burial ground was left out of the deed. People: Joseph W. Murphy Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 21
  12. Black pupils of the St. Mary's district are given the old 1904 schoolhouse When the white school moved to the chapel grounds, the 1904 frame building northeast of the chapel was turned over to the district's Black children. It was later closed and its pupils sent to the Hillsborough school. Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 61
Show all 23 dated events
  1. The Episcopal Diocese deeds two acres by St. Mary's Chapel to the county school board The diocese gave the Orange County Board of Education two acres of the chapel tract, west of the chapel and north of St. Mary's Road, on condition that the land be used only for a public school and return to the diocese if the school closed. Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 59
  2. St. Mary's Chapel stops holding regular services during the Depression Its members were moved to the rolls of St. Matthew's in Hillsborough. A Celebration of 250 Years of Anglican and Episcopal Witness in Orange County (2003), scan p. 11
  3. Ernest L. Lockhart buys and tears down the closed St. Mary's school for Black pupils The county board of education sold the former school property northeast of St. Mary's Chapel to Lockhart, who razed the 1904 frame building and took the lumber to his farm on St. Mary's Road. Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 61
  4. The local Grange begins annual Homecoming services at St. Mary's Chapel St. Mary's Grange announced a homecoming at the chapel for August 19, 1951, to renew the custom, and by July 1953 the Grange had cared for the chapel and held homecomings there for three years. The yearly services kept the otherwise unused chapel in use. A Celebration of 250 Years of Anglican and Episcopal Witness in Orange County (2003), scan p. 12 · Also: The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), August 16, 1951, p. 1; The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), July 23, 1953, p. 1
  5. Annie Cameron receives the Hillsboro Exchange Club's first Book of Golden Deeds award At the annual homecoming at St. Mary's Chapel, A. H. Graham presented Miss Annie Cameron with the Hillsboro Exchange Club's Book of Golden Deeds award for her years of service to the community. She was the first to receive the award, begun that year, and the book was to be shown in the Hillsboro Public Library. People: Alexander H. "Sandy" Graham, Annie Sutton Cameron The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), August 18, 1955, p. 1
  6. A committee forms to restore St. Mary's Chapel The Committee for the Restoration of St. Mary's Chapel took charge of the building and grounds, apart from worship, starting with about $300 left in an old chapel fund and about $1,250 saved from Homecoming collections. Its drive had raised about $3,400 by the end of 1969. People: Hugh Conway Browning Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 41
  7. St. Mary's Chapel gets a new roof and a new cross The restoration committee's first project reroofed the chapel and set a new cross on top in place of one removed because it was in danger of falling. Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 41
  8. St. Mary's Chapel near Hillsborough joins the Study List The National Register Advisory Committee placed St. Mary's Chapel, the 1859 brick Episcopal chapel northeast of Hillsborough, on North Carolina's Study List, its list of properties likely to qualify for the National Register. It was one of 84 properties across the state approved that day. NC State Historic Preservation Office: National Register Advisory Committee agendas, minutes and approved lists, p. 47
  9. St. Mary's Chapel is listed in the National Register St. Mary's Chapel, the brick Gothic Revival Episcopal chapel on St. Mary's Road northeast of Hillsborough, built in 1859 for a congregation dating to the late 1750s, was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on July 12, 1978. National Park Service NPGallery: St. Mary's Chapel (NRIS 78001968)
  10. Conway Browning's bequest starts a perpetual care fund for St. Mary's Chapel cemetery Hugh Conway Browning, who had spent two decades researching Orange County families and churches, left $1,000 in his will as principal for the upkeep of the cemetery. Hugh Conway Browning, Information Related to St. Mary's Chapel (1996), scan p. 7
  11. Orange County Episcopalians celebrate 250 years of Anglican witness The weekend moved among St. Matthew's, St. Mary's Chapel, the Chapel of the Cross and Holy Family, with talks on the colonial church, the university and race. A Celebration of 250 Years of Anglican and Episcopal Witness in Orange County (2003), scan p. 3

Open these in the chronology →

Research sources

Sources cited in this site’s history, National Register documents, and places to get research help. Research guide: Investigate a school or community institution.

Background

National Register files

Historic sites, markers, and maps

Records of the time 10

Show all 10

Collections and databases 5

Local help 6

Nearby

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Two mice reading back to back against a leaf, with the hand-lettered words Friends of the Orange County Public Library
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