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Lower Cape Fear Region Long Remained the Exclusive Domain of Its Native

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Lower Cape Fear Region Long Remained the Exclusive Domain of Its Native A HISTORY OF THE BRUNSWICK TOWN-FORT ANDERSON SITE IN BR UNSWICK CO UNTY, NORTH CAROLIN A By Wilson Angley - 1998 .. A History of the Brunswick Town-Fort Anderson Site in Brunswick County. North Carolina by Wilson Angley 1998 Research Branch Division of Archives and History • North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources • TO THE RESEARCHER This report was compiled from the published sources indicated and from original records held by the North Carolina state Archives. unauthorized reproduction of the entire report is expressly prohibited. Permission is hereby granted to publish brief extracts from this work. This authorization is not to be construed as a surrender of copyright, literary right, ou any other property right that is or may be vested in the state of North Carolina . • The lower coastline of present-day North Carolina appears to have been the first • portion of America's eastern seaboard to be seen and investigated by a European explorer. This initial contact occurred in 1524, when the Florentine voyager Giovanni da Verrazzano, on an expedition sponsored by Francis I of France, came within view of land several miles above the point of Cape Fear at approximately 34° of latitude. Anchoring his ship, the Dauohine, just offshore, Verrazzano dispatched a landing party that was greeted by a curious and friendly group of Native Americans. In a subsequent letter to Francis I, Verrazzano gave a glowing account of both the land and its inhabitants.! The first entry of Europeans into the Cape Fear River itself may possibly have occurred during the 1526 voyage of the Spanish explorer, Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon, although tbe evidence is now regarded as inconclusive. Having set sail from Hispaniola for an intended destination along the coast of present-day South Caro~ AyDon entered the mouth of a river, possibly the Cape Fear, which he referred to as the River Jordan. From his base on the lower portion of this stream, Ayllon dispatched parties of men to explore the interior of the region and the adjacent coastline. Soon, however, he relocated his expedition southward, where he founded the town of San Miguel de Gualdape, the first white settlement in what is now the United States of America.2 Unaffected by England's failed attempts to colonize Roanoke Island in the 1580s, and by the beginnings of white settlement along Albemarle Sound some seventy years later, the lower Cape Fear region long remained the exclusive domain of its Native American inhabitants, largely undisturbed by the incursions of whites. This began to change, however, in the ] 6605, when the area seemed to beckon to prospective settlers • from both New England and the West Indies. 2 In March of 1663 King Charles II of England granted the vast area of Carolina to a • group of eight loyal supporters known as the Lords Proprietors. During the following year. these owners of the province proposed the establishment of three separate areas of settlement to be called Albemarle, Craven, and Clarendon Counties. The last of these counties. Clarendon., was named in honor of the Earl of Clarendon., the most prominent of the Lords Proprietors, and was to be centered on the lower Cape Fear.} Even before the establishment of Clarendon., and indeed before the granting of the Carolina Charter, the lower Cape Fear had become an area ofpotentiaJ settlement. In August of 1662 the New Englander William Hilton set sail for the area aboard the ship Adventure. finally entering the mouth of the Cape Fear in early October. For more than three weeks he and his associates explored the region, taking the Adventure as far upstream as present-day Wtlmington. Representing a group of prospective Massachusetts Bay colonists, Hilton's primary purpose in coming to the Cape Fear was to gauge the feasibility of establishing a settlement aJong its banks. All indications are that he came away from these initial explorations with a favorable impression." Encouraged by Hilton's positive report, a group of hopeful New England colonists sailed down the Atlantic coastline and entered the mouth ofthe Cape Fear during the winter of 1662-1663. These prospective colonists soon departed from the region, however. having made little effort to establish a viable settlement. Behind them they left a quantity oflivestock and possibly other possessions as well. The reason for their early abandonment of the region is not entirely clear; but they are said to have left a public • notice intended to discourage other prospective settlers in the future.j 3 In October of 1663 Hilton returned aboard the Adventure to conduct a more • extensive reconnaissance of the lower Cape Fear. On this occasion he had sailed from Barbados rather thao New England, and primarily on behalf of prospective Barbadian colonists. For more than two months he and his men explored the region, and again they were favorably impressed by their discoveries there.6 Enticed by the contents of Hilton's more detailed account, a group of Barbadians soon set sail underthe leadership of John Vassal!. Arriving in May of 1664, they began a concerted effort to establish the pennanent colony and governmental entity envisioned by the Lords Proprietors. Vassall' s group was subsequently joined by other colonists from Barbados. New England, and elsewhere. Their combined activities soon gave birth to the projected Clarendon County and to the settlement called Charles Town, which was located on the west bank of the Cape Fear, just above the mouth of Town Creek. Although Charles Town was the commercial and political center of Clarendon, colonists took up lands and established homesites along a rather lengthy section of the lower Cape Fear, quite possibly including locations near the site where Brunswick Town would be established some six decades later.' As events unfolded, the Clarendon settlement was soon brought to an end by a combination of inadequate external support, internal dissension, and increasingly hostile relations with local Indians. Despite John Vassall's manful endeavors to hold the beleaguered colony together, even he was forced to acknowledge at length the hopelessness of the enterprise. By early autumn of 1667 the colony was completely • deserted. Following the failure of the Clarendon settlement, the lower Cape Fear region 4 returned to its Native American inhabitants. It would be theirs exclusively for nearly a half • century to come.' Little is known of the Cape Fear Indians, who preceded the Clarendon settlement and who reclaimed their lands when the settlement disbanded. These Indians are thought, however, to have represented the wide-ranging Siouan stock or language group. It has been estimated that the Cape Fear numbered about 1,000 persons in the early seventeenth century. and that quite a number of towns must have existed at that time in the lower Cape Fear region.9 The Cape Fear Indians lived in relative isolation from each other. in open towns or farm communities scattered along the banks of the Cape Fear River and its major tributaries. By 1715 they had only five towns remaining, their combined populations comprising merely seventy-six men and 130 women and children. 10 The Cape Fears' numbers were still further reduced during the Yamassee War of 1715-1716, when they joined with the Waccamaws, Cheraws, and other Siouan groups against white settlers in South Carolina. Many of the Cape Fear were kiUed and their remaining towns laid waste when Colonel Maurice Moore led his troops on a line of march which passed directly through the lower Cape Fear region. It was probably during this march that Moore familiarized himself with the area and began to lay plans for its future development. II The few Indians who survived Moore's campaign soon filtered westward and southward to join the Waccamaws and Winyaws. By 1730, if not long before, the Cape • Fear lndians had completely vanished from the area of their former habitation. 12 5 The settlement of Carolina under the Lords Proprietors built upon a small existing • base along the shoreline of Albemarle Sound in present-day North Carolina. and then took hold along the lower coastline of present-day South Carolina, where the city of Charles Town (now Charleston) was soon to develop. Between these two areas of permanent settlement was the failed Clarendon effort. From the Albemarle region and Charles Town area. settlement then spread to the south and north respectively in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, especially along the lower reaches of navigable streams. By the early J 720s, this expansion along the coastline had created several fledgling towns and had resulted in the wide-spread proliferation of farms, plantations, and commercial enterprises. The lower Cape Fear region remained a vast wilderness, however, unapproached by settlers from either the north or the south. 13 In large measure, the delayed settlement of the lower Cape Fear region resulted from the fact that it was long an area of disputed jurisdiction between the evolving colonies of North Carolina and South Carolina. The eventual separation of Carolina into two distinct colonies was foreshadowed in 1689 when the Lords Proprietors commissioned Philip LudweU governor over that portion of the province lying «north and east of Cape feare." In 1691 , however, the Lords Proprietors again united their colony under a single government in Charles Town, with a deputy governor presiding in the Albemarle region. Finally, in 1712, the northern and southern portions of the province were placed under governors of equal status and emerged as separate colonies. 14 Even after the separation of Carolina into distinct colonies, there remained for • many years uncertainty and controversy as to where the boundary between them lay. [n 6 general, South Carolina officials persisted in regarding the Cape Fear River as the • boundary line near the coast, therefore regarding the west bank of that stream as within their jurisdiction.
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