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FI 10: N54 1977 C.2
New Hanover County ...
... a brief history
By
Lawrence Lee
Display Lapy
NEW HANOVER COUNTY: A BRIEF HISTORY
N.C. DOCUMENTS CLEARINGHOUSE
OCT 25 1993
N.C. STATE LIBRARY RALEIGH
J
421
133
14
Hampstead
15
3
New Topsail Beach
Castle Hayne
Scotts Aillo
451
New Topsail Inlet
117
132
9
Rich Inlet
Maco
6
MINE
9
+
17
Mason Inlet
Wilmington
30
-
74
Kirlie Gardens
USS North Carolina 9 6
4
76
4
Wrightsville Beach
Bishop
Memorial
Town Creek
421
5
Masonboro Inlet
2
Cr. Part
20
87
5
6
I
C
K
Seabreeze
Orton Plantation Gardens
10
Brunswick Town
Carolina Beach
Wilmington Beach
9
Kure Beach
Smith
211
Ft. Fisher
5
1
Sunset Harbor
133
3
4
Corncake Inlet
Long Beach
Yaupon Beach
Caswell Beach
SMITH I.
CAPE FEAR LIGHTHOUSE
The boundaries and features of modern New Hanover County are clearly marked on the official North Carolina highway map.
Old Topsail Inlet
Phoenix
NEW HANOVER
87
LINE
76
Leland
1*
3
3
Battleship
7
132
Town
State
Intracoastal
- River -
17
133
Carolina Beach Inlet
Boiling Spring Lakes 3 2(87
Orton Pond
Feart
OL
Cape FY
Southport
Lockwood Folly Inlet
5
74
NEW HANOVER COUNTY: A BRIEF HISTORY
By
LAWRENCE LEE
RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA DIVISION OF ARCHIVES AND HISTORY DEPARTMENT OF CULTURAL RESOURCES SECOND PRINTING, REVISED, 1977
Copyright, 1971, by the North Carolina Department of Archives and History Copyright, 1977, by North Carolina Division of Archives and History
NORTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL COMMISSION
T. HARRY GATTON, Chairman
MISS GERTRUDE SPRAGUE CARRAWAY RAYMOND GAVINS FRONTIS W. JOHNSTON
J. C. KNOWLES HUGH T. LEFLER ROBERT M. LINEBERGER
for Borden
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2018 with funding from State Library of North Carolina
https://archive.org/details/newhanovercounty00leee_6
CONTENTS
Illustrations
ix
Foreword
xi xiii
Preface
I. Geography and Climate
II. The Colonial Period
3
Early History
3
The Cape Fear Indians
6
Pirates on the Cape Fear
6
Settlement of the Cape Fear Country
7
A Tale of Two Towns
10
The Courthouse in Wilmington
13
Economic Activities in Colonial Times
14
Early Transportation and Communication Religion 19
16
Education and Other Cultural Activities
21
Times of Violence 23
III. The Antebellum Period 31
The Beginning of a New Nation
31
Economic Activities of the Cape Fear People 33
Transportation 36
Church Life after the Revolution 41
44
Life in Antebellum Days 50
61
IV. The Tragedy of Civil War
V. The Modern Period 77
The Ordeal of Reconstruction 77
Local Government in Modern Times 80
The Growth of Modern Business
86
The Development of Modern Transportation
91
The People and Their Churches
97
The Development of the Modern School System
101
The Public Library 104
The Local Press 105
The Theater and Other Forms of Diversion 106
109
The Growth of Wilmington
110
The Story of Wrightsville Beach 113
Carolina Beach and Its Neighbors 117
Other Communities of the County 119
Present-Day New Hanover County 119
1
The Fight against Disease
Cultural Activities in Antebellum Days
ILLUSTRATIONS
Map of Present-Day New Hanover County
Frontispiece
The Landing of Vásquez de Ayllón
4
The Hanging of Stede Bonnet
8
Russellborough Ruins
10
Sauthier's 1769 Map of Wilmington
11
Turpentine Still
14
Map of Cape Fear River Plantations
15
Market Street Ferry
17
Saint James Church
20
Ecce Homo
20
Thomas Godfrey Memorial
23
A Protest Hanging of an Effigy
25
Cornelius Harnett House
29
Cornwallis Headquarters
29
Dock Hands Loading Cotton at Wilmington
35
Paddle-Wheel Steamer Loading at Dock
35 38
Portrait of P. K. Dickinson
39 43
Saint Mary's Pro-Cathedral
43
First Baptist Church
43 49
Rock Spring
53
Wilmington Fire Scene, 1886
54 59
Sprunt Map of Fort Fisher
64 67 69
Major General W. H. C. Whiting
69
General Braxton Bragg
70 70
Capture of Fort Fisher
74
Wilmington in an Earlier Day
84
Aerial View of Modern Wilmington
84
Liberty Ship: Zebulon B. Vance (John J. Meany)
89
Flowers Being Gathered at Castle Hayne
89
"The Rocks"
92
Modern Port of Wilmington
92 99
Tileston Normal School
102
Hemenway School
102
Isaac Bear School
102
New Hanover High School
102
City Hall-Thalian Hall
108
U.S.S. North Carolina
108
An Oystershell Road
111
Wilmington and Sea Coast Railroad
111
Lumina Pavilion
115
Captain Harper's Wilmington
115
Sites of Interest on New Hanover County Tour
121
Blockade Runner Museum
122
Azaleas and Swans at Airlie Plantation
122
Carolina Beach Yacht Basin
122
Christmas Tree at Wilmington
122
The Prometheus
Grace Methodist Church
Barnum and Bailey Circus Bandwagon
Dr. Armand John DeRosset
Rose O'Neil Greenhow
Colonel William Lamb
Thomas Bragg
Woodrow Wilson Plaque
ix
FOREWORD
New Hanover County: A Brief History is published as the third in a series of short histories of North Carolina counties. Publication was made possible through the generosity of the Smith Richardson Foundation, Inc., which made a grant to the State Department of Archives and History in 1968 whereby four brief county histories could be prepared and published. Appre- ciation is hereby expressed to the foundation for its generosity in supplying funds for a much-needed project.
The department is also grateful to Dr. Lawrence Lee, author of this study of one of the state's oldest counties. Dr. Lee, a member of the faculty at The Citadel in Charleston, South Caro- lina, is the well-known author of The Lower Cape Fear in Colonial Days and Indian Wars in North Carolina, 1663-1763; he is an acknowledged authority on the Cape Fear section of the Tar Heel State. New Hanover County is a history which will hold the attention of both students and adults who are interested in the rich heritage of this coastal county.
The illustrations have been taken from several sources. Fifteen were first published in Henry B. McKoy's book, Wilmington, N.C .: Do You Remember When? (Greenville, S.C .: Keys Pub- lishing Co., 1957), pp. 32, 34, 50, 66, 98, 124, 138, 144, 182, 185, 195, 206, 233; Mr. McKoy very kindly furnished his originals for reproduction in this publication. Nine are from William Lord DeRosset's Pictorial and Historical New Hanover County and Wilmington, North Carolina (Wilmington: Privately printed, 1938), [pp. 57, 70, 84, 85, 98, 99, 100]. Four are from Bill Sharpe's A New Geography of North Carolina (Raleigh: Ed- wards and Broughton, 1954), pp. 314, 316, 318, 322. Two are from the files of Richard Walser. Two were provided by the State Department of Conservation and Development. The fron- tispiece is a portion of the official North Carolina highway map. The State Department of Archives and History is grateful to Mr. McKoy, Mrs. Sharpe, and Mr. Walser for permission to use their material. All other illustrations are taken from the files of the State Department of Archives and History.
Mrs. Mary Reynolds Peacock was responsible for selecting the illustrations and seeing the pamphlet through the press. Mrs. Mary Frances Kelly did the typing preparatory to taking the manuscript to the printer. Mrs. Madlin Futrell and her staff
reproduced the pictures for use by the printer. Appreciation is expressed to each of these individuals without whose work the pamphlet could not have been published on schedule.
Memory F. Mitchell Historical Publications Editor
May 1, 1971
xii
PREFACE
To call this work a history of New Hanover County is to be somewhat misleading. It is not an all-inclusive study of the past, and it is not intended to be. Rather, it is a historical sketch in which the major events and developments of the past have been traced in summary fashion. This, it is hoped, will give to the reader some understanding of how the county has come to be what it is. A knowledge of the past is an indispensable guide to the future. In the beginning New Hanover extended over a far greater area than it does at present. From time to time through the years, parts of the original county have been detached to create other counties such as Bladen, Onslow, Bruns- wick, Duplin, and Pender. No worthwhile history of a geographi- cal area can be told without relating it to the surrounding region and to the world beyond. However, to the extent it is possible to do so, this chronicle has been restricted to the area within the present boundaries of New Hanover. Generally, events and de- velopments beyond these bounds, even though they occurred in what was then New Hanover, have been left to the histories of the neighboring counties.
New Hanover County has had a long and interesting history which, in this work, has been divided into several phases, or time periods. The colonial period extends from the beginning through the American Revolution by which the colonies won their independence from England and became a free nation. The ante- bellum period begins as this great struggle drew to a close and ends with the outbreak of another bloody conflict, the Civil War. Because of their importance, the Civil War years are treated as a separate period. The end of this conflict marks the beginning of the modern period which continues to the present. In the pages that follow, the account of each period is related before moving on to the next.
Information for this work has come from many sources. For the colonial period, I have relied almost entirely on my own volume, The Lower Cape Fear in Colonial Days. For later periods, I have used primary sources to some extent, but mostly from the works of others I have drawn segments of history which I have joined together in a continuous narrative. The volumes I have found most useful, in varying degrees, are listed following the text as "References for Additional Reading." This
list is not definitive, but it will lead the interested reader to a broader and deeper knowledge of the subject.
In addition to the works listed, I have also drawn from many magazine and newspaper articles, pamphlets, and other material, both published and unpublished. I am indebted to the author of each, and I regret they are too numerous to list individually.
I owe a particular debt to Miss Katherine Howell, librarian of the Wilmington Public Library. In some cases she has provided me with information. In other cases she has directed me to sources where it might be found. Either way, she has been most cooperative and helpful.
The people of New Hanover County and Wilmington are fortunate in the possession of their public library. Among its holdings there is an outstanding collection of regional historical material in its North Carolina Room. The high quality of the institution is due in large part to the standards of excellence set by Mrs. Emma Woodward MacMillan, who was librarian for many years. My own generation owes a lasting debt of grati- tude to "Miss Emma," not only for making adequate and proper reading material available, but also for her infinite patience in guiding readers of diverse ages and interests to the most reward- ing materials. Miss Howell currently directs the library accord- ing to her own high professional standards, and the present generation is in her debt in a like manner. As the dedicated librarian of the community, she must be counted among its most influential leaders.
Lastly, I want to extend my thanks to Mr. H. V. Reid, of the Greater Wilmington Chamber of Commerce, for providing me with information relating to present-day New Hanover County and Wilmington.
The Citadel January, 1971
Lawrence Lee
xiv
I. Geography and Climate
New Hanover County, located at the southeast corner of North Carolina and with an area of only 192 square miles, is one of the smallest counties in the state. This area has the general shape of a triangle with its tip at Federal Point, where the Cape Fear River and the Atlantic Ocean were once joined by New Inlet. The base is approximately 30 miles to the north- ward and extends for some 17 miles across to form the boundary with Pender County. On the east, the county is bounded by the ocean, but much of the coastline is made up of a chain of islands separated from the mainland by sounds and salt marshes which in places are a mile across. The western boundary is formed by the Cape Fear and its Northwest Branch. The county also includes a small area of Eagles' Island, across the Cape Fear from Wil- mington. The Northeast Branch forms part of the northern boundary and then flows southward through the county.
New Hanover is generally flat but has undulations and ridges that rise to a height of 65 feet or so. Of the approximately 120,- 000 acres of land in the county, almost one third is made up of swamps, sandhills, marshes, and sandy beaches which have little or no agricultural value. The swamps are found along the river and tributary streams; the sandhills are mostly in the southern and western sections; and the marshes and sandy beaches are along the coast. The rest of the county consists of sands and sandy loams of various types with subsoils of sand and, in some places, sandy clay. The quality of the soil depends largely on drainage conditions, the higher areas generally being the most productive.
New Hanover County is also favored with a moderate climate, long summers, and plentiful rainfall well distributed throughout the year. The combination of good soil and moderate climate makes the county ideally suited to farming, particularly for the truck farming that has been so important in recent years.
Of the various geographical features of the county, the most important is the Cape Fear River, which rises in two widely separated sources in the interior of North Carolina and flows as
the Northeast Branch and the Northwest Branch until the two branches merge into a single stream at Wilmington. From there it continues southward for some 30 miles to empty over "the Bar" into the Atlantic Ocean at Cape Fear. About 7 miles before it reaches its mouth, the river passes Federal Point, the southern tip of New Hanover County. Here, in 1761, a storm broke through to join the ocean with the river. This breach, called New Inlet, remained open to shipping until it was closed in 1881. Jutting outward from Cape Fear into the ocean, Frying Pan Shoals create a navigational hazard; but even so, the Cape Fear River has long been the principal water route by which North Carolina has been connected with the outside world.
2
II. The Colonial Period
Early History
Before the coming of the Europeans little is known of the area that is now New Hanover County except that it was a wilderness shared by wild beasts and native Indians. As part of the vast New World discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1492, the region was claimed by Spain. The first known Euro- pean visitor, however, was Ian Verrazano, an Italian in the service of the king of France. Verrazano was sent over in 1524 to investigate the newfound land and to report to his royal master. He came upon the American mainland at 34 degrees northern parallel in lower New Hanover County. Anchoring in deep water, he came ashore in a small boat to be greeted by numerous friendly Indians, who were also curious. The beach on which the Italian landed was studded with sand dunes ; beyond the dunes were fields and forests teeming with wild life. Verrazano wrote of what he saw, and his report is the earliest extant de- scription of the present United States. Such a pleasing account might have tempted the French king to occupy the area except that it was not the right time in history. Because the king was too involved with problems at home he left the settlement of New Hanover County to others.
Verrazano was followed by Spaniards. When, in 1513, Don Juan Ponce de Leon discovered the United States near where Jacksonville now stands, he called it Florida, a name which came to be applied to the entire east coast. Several years later, de Leon returned to establish a settlement in Florida, but he failed. In 1526 another Spaniard, Lucas Vásquez de Ayllón, came to Florida leading a large expedition from the Island of Santo Domingo (present-day Haiti and the Dominican Republic). He intended to found a settlement farther up the coast of Florida in a land the Indians called Chicora. These adventurers came first into the Cape Fear River region where, had they remained, the first white settlement in the United States would have been located; but they did not remain. Instead, they moved down the coast
3
and established their settlement, San Miguel de Gualdape, on Winyaw Bay, but this ill-starred venture was soon abandoned.
While entering the Cape Fear the Spaniards wrecked one of their vessels. The one they built to replace it was the first ship known to be built by Europeans in the United States. The Spaniards gave the names "Jordan" and "San Romano" to the river and cape now known as Cape Fear. The surrounding area came to be known as "the Land of Ayllón." In the years that followed, the exact location of the River Jordan became un- certain, but it lived on in Spanish literature as "one of the fairest rivers of the North." As such, the river would beckon to later adventurers; it was the English who next answered this call.
After Ayllón left the Cape Fear, almost a century and a half passed before the English arrived. The first to come were New Englanders who wanted to establish a Puritan colony in the more temperate climate of the southland. In the summer of 1662 they sent Captain William Hilton to examine the coast and find a suitable location. On this voyage Hilton gave to Cape San Romano the name "Cape Fear," which until then had been ap- plied to what is now called Cape Lookout. His choice of names was a mistake born of confusion, but it was a mistake that has been perpetuated. Ever since, the name Cape Fear has remained fixed to the present location. Hilton also called the adjacent River Jordan the "Charles River," but this name proved to be transi- tory.
Hilton remained on the river for about three weeks and
Lucas Vásquez de Ayllón and his company of Spaniards en- tered the Rio Jordon (assumed to be the Cape Fear River) in 1526. Sketch from Oviedo's His- toria General (Madrid, 1858) reproduced here appears in Richard Walser's Literary North Carolina (Raleigh, 1970), p. 2.
4
before leaving purchased the surrounding area from the Indians. He then returned to New England with a favorable report of his findings. The following winter a number of persons came down from Massachusetts to settle on the Charles, or Cape Fear, River. After a short stay they departed abruptly and left behind a message attached to a post at the point of the cape; the message warned its readers to avoid the area.
The reason for the settlers' leaving and for their bitterness is not known, but it might have been that news reached them that their king, Charles II, had made a gift of the region to others. In March, 1663, Charles of England gave to eight favored sub- jects a large grant of land including what is now North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and part of Florida; the grant extended from the Atlantic to the Pacific and was named Carolina in the king's honor. Since the Cape Fear area was within this grant, the New Englanders had no right to be there. They had become trespassers on the land of the Lords Proprietors of Carolina.
On May 29, 1664, another group of Englishmen from Barbados Island arrived and established a settlement on the west bank of the Cape Fear River. Known as Clarendon County, this settle- ment eventually had a reported population of 800 persons and extended for some 60 miles along the river which they called the Clarendon. The capital, Charlestown, was located several miles above the river mouth and was the first English town in Caro- lina. For various reasons, including disasters in England and war abroad, Clarendon County did not receive the outside help it needed. Within the settlement the inhabitants compounded their troubles by abusing the local Indians, who turned on them in violence. As a result, Clarendon County and Charlestown were abandoned in 1667 and soon were overgrown by the forest.
During the half century that followed, the Carolina grant evolved into two separate colonies, North Carolina and South Carolina. The former began in the Albemarle Sound section and by 1720 extended to the Neuse River. South Carolina began in 1670 when pioneers from England and Barbados established a settlement on the Ashley River. First called Albemarle Point and then Charles Town, or Charlestown, the small village was moved downstream in 1680 to the confluence of the Ashley and the Cooper rivers. In 1783 the village was renamed Charleston. By 1720 the colony had expanded along the coast northward as far as Winyaw Bay.
Between the two areas of settlement, from the Neuse to
5
Winyaw Bay lay some 200 miles of wilderness occupied only by native Indians. Lacking an official boundary between them, the two Carolina provinces, as a matter of convenience, came to accept as an unofficial line the Cape Fear River, the stream that ran its course through the heart of this wilderness.
The Cape Fear Indians
The Cape Fear area remained unoccupied by whites because, in part, the failures of the New Englanders and later Barbadians had left a stigma attached to it. Also, in part, it was because abuse by the whites had made the local Indians hostile toward all Europeans. The natives, known to history only as the Cape Fear Indians, were members of the Siouan language group as were the Waccamaws, the Winyaws, and various other tribes to the southward. Following a settled existence in which farming was combined with hunting and fishing, they lived in open towns or farm communities in which the homes of the various families were scattered out along the river and its tributaries. The towns had communal fields, but each family had its own plot of land, a cleared field on which stood the family home, a wigwam, or house, made of a pole frame covered with bark. Most of the tribal land was used in common for hunting.
Though hostile to whites, the Cape Fear Indians were neither numerous nor strong. In 1715 they numbered about 200 men, women, and children living in five towns. In that same year they joined other tribes in an uprising against the whites known as the Yemassee War. During the course of the struggle, which was fought mostly in South Carolina, the Cape Fears suffered a decisive defeat which greatly reduced their number. Weaker than ever, they became the victims of attacks by more powerful tribes. By 1725 they had abandoned their Cape Fear homeland. The remnants, in desperation, had fled into South Carolina, and within a few years even they had disappeared.
Pirates on the Cape Fear
Over the years, the Cape Fear River was reputed to be a haven where pirates gathered. However, it is unlikely that it ever served such a purpose because experienced pirates would have preferred harbors with more than one outlet to the sea, in- suring an alternate escape route in time of need. The Cape Fear
6
had only a single outlet at the time, and the danger of such a stream was the hard lesson learned by Stede Bonnet.
Stede Bonnet was a most unusual pirate. A retired army officer on the island of Barbados, he had become bored with idleness and so purchased a vessel and put to sea as a pirate. Bonnet had no experience as a seaman, but he soon joined with one who did, the notorious Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard. After sailing together for some time both of these infamous men took advantage of an offer by King George I to pardon all pirates who voluntarily surrendered and became law-abiding citizens. They received their pardon at Bath, in North Carolina, but both soon returned to piracy, this time each going his own way. Bonnet went northward and prowled off the Virginia coast where he seized several vessels with their cargoes. From there he went southward and slipped into the Cape Fear River. Be- cause the area was still unsettled it seemed an ideal place to hide while Bonnet and his men divided their stolen wealth and repaired their vessel. News of their presence in the Cape Fear reached Charlestown, however, and an expedition of two armed vessels was sent out against him. When the South Carolinians sailed into the river, Bonnet tried to slip out past them, but in a dramatic battle he was captured and taken to Charlestown where he was tried and hanged on December 10, 1718. Thus ended the career of Stede Bonnet and piracy on the Cape Fear. Bonnet's entrapment clearly revealed that the river was not suited for a pirate haven, and it is unlikely that any other made the same mistake as Bonnet. At least, there is no such evidence in the records.
Settlement of the Cape Fear Country
The permanent settlement of the Lower Cape Fear finally came in 1726 when settlers from South Carolina and upper North Carolina established themselves on the banks of the Cape Fear and the lesser streams. With the arrival of inhabitants, the lack of an official boundary between the two Carolinas led to un- certainty as to which had jurisdiction over the new settlement. North Carolina resolved this uncertainty when its General As- sembly on November 27, 1729, passed an act which created New Hanover County (or precinct, as the counties were known until 1739). This new county was "bounded to the Northward by the Haulover, and Little Inlet, and to the Southward by the South-
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