The Settlement of the Cape Fear

BY R. D. W. CONNOR,

Secretary of the North Carolina Historical Commission

After the failure of Sir John Yeamans's colony in 1667 the Cape Fear region fell into disrepute and more than half a century passed before another attempt was made to plant a settlement there. Four causes contributing largely to this delay were: the character of the coast at the mouth of the river; the pirates who sought refuge there in large numbers; the hostility of the Cape Fear Indians; and the closing of the Carolina land offices by the lords proprietors.

The character of the coast could not, of course, be changed, but those who were interested in the development of the Cape Fear region used pen and tongue to improve the reputation which its very name had forever fastened upon it. "It is by most traders in London believed that the coast of this country is very dangerous," wrote Governor Burrington, who was interested in the Cape Fear settlement, "but in reality [it is] not so." The fact remains, however, that this sentence stands as a better testimonial to the governor's zeal than to his love of truth. A different spirit inspired a later son of the Cape Fear* who, with something of an honest pride in the sturdy ruggedness and picturesque bleakness of the famous point, wrote thus eloquently of it: "Looking then to the cape for the idea and reason of its name, we find that it is the southernmost point of Smith's Island, a naked, bleak elbow of sand, jutting far out into the ocean. Immediately in its front are the Frying Pan Shoals pushing out still farther twenty miles to sea. Together they stand for warning and for woe; and together they catch the long majestic roll of the Atlantic as it sweeps through a thousand miles of grandeur and power from the Arctic towards the Gulf. It is the playground of billows and tempests, the kingdom of silence and awe, disturbed by no sound save the sea-gull's shriek and the breakers' roar. Its whole aspect is suggestive not of repose and beauty, but of desolation and terror. Imagination cannot adorn it.

*George Davis.

Romance cannot hallow it. Local pride cannot soften it. There it stands today, bleak and threatening and pitiless, as it stood three hundred years ago, when Greenville and White came near unto death upon its sands. And there it will stand bleak and threatening and pitiless until the earth and sea give up their dead. And as its nature, so its name, is now, always has been, and always will be the Cape of Fear."

But the very danger that repelled traders and adventurers engaged in legitimate enterprises made the Cape Fear a favorite resort for those whose enterprises were plunder and rapine. Behind the sand bars that stretch across the mouth of the river hundreds of pirates rested secure from interference while they leisurely repaired damages and kept a sharp lookout for prey. The period from 1650 to half a century after the departure of Yeamans's colony, John Fiske has aptly called "the golden age of pirates." As late as 1717 it was estimated that as many as 1,500 pirates made their headquarters at New Providence and at Cape Fear. But the next year New Providence was captured and the freebooters driven away. "One of its immediate results, however," as Fiske says, "was to turn the whole remnant of the scoundrels over to the North Carolina coast, where they took their last stand." The names of Blackbeard and Bonnet became household words along the North Carolina coast. The former made his headquarters at Bath, the latter at Cape Fear, and their wild deeds in those waters have furnished materials for stories and traditions that linger yet by village firesides. Finally through the exertions of Governor Spotswood, of Virginia, a force under Captain Maynard attacked Blackbeard in his lair, killed him, and captured and executed his infamous crew; and through the exertions of Governor Johnston, of South Carolina, Captain William Rhett sailed to the Cape Fear, captured Bonnet and carried him to Charleston, where the pirate paid for his crimes "at the tail of ae tow." These were decisive blows to piracy along the North Carolina coast and after a few more years the black flags of the buccaneers disappeared from our seas.

The Indians of the Cape Fear "were reckoned the most barbarous of any in the colony." During the Indian wars of 1711-13 they joined the Tuscaroras in a stand against European civilization and the province was compelled to appeal to South Carolina

for aid. Though this was generously furnished it required three years of the combined exertions of both provinces to crush the Tuscaroras and drive them out of North Carolina. Two years later the Yemassee Indians of South Carolina allied all the tribes from the Cape Fear to Florida in hostilities against the whites, and North Carolina then paid her debt to the southern province. Governor Eden sent Colonel Maurice Moore with the North Carolina militia to the Cape Fear, where he struck the blow that finally upset the power of the Indians in that region.

But the struggles of the Carolina settlers with the forces of nature, the freebooters of the sea, and the savages of the wilderness, to recover this splendid region for civilization, were to avail nothing if they were to yield obedience to the orders of the lords proprietors. In their wisdom the proprietors saw fit to resolve "That no more land shall be sold in our province of North Carolina, but such sales of land only as are made here at our board shall be good." But there were men in the province who could not understand the justice of the system by which a few wealthy landowners beyond the sea could prevent their clearing and settling this region in the name of civilization. The more adventurous of them determined to disregard the orders of the proprietors, and about the year 1723 the ring of their axes began to break the long silence of the Cape Fear. They laid out their claims, cleared their fields, and built their cabins in fine disregard of the formalities of law. When Governor Burrington saw that they meant to take up lands without either acquiring titles or paying rents, he decided that the interests of his masters would be served by his giving the one and receiving the other. In his judgment "the jingling of the guinea" would heal the hurt their pride might feel at his disobedience of their orders. At his suggestion, therefore, the assembly petitioned the governor and council that the land offices in Carolina might be reopened, and the governor and council finding officially what they already knew individually, that "sundry persons are already seated on the vacant lands for which purchase money has not been paid nor any rents," granted the assembly's prayer. Good titles thus assured, settlers were not wanting and the wigwams of the red men rapidly gave place to the cabins of the white men.

The two men more instrumental than any others in planting

the Cape Fear settlement were Governor George Burrington and Colonel Maurice Moore. Burrington's claims to this credit were repeatedly asserted by himself and were allowed by contemporaries who bore him no love. The fact that he himself owned five thousand acres of land there only partially explains his interest. He was an ambitious governor, full of pent-up energy, and to whatever task he put his hands, whether leading a riot against Governor Everard, or laying out roads through the wilderness, or clearing the forests for settlers, he went at it with enthusiasm, though not always with good judgment. The grand jury of the province in an address to the king in 1731 bore testimony to the "very great expense and personal trouble" with which he "laid the foundation" of the settlement at Cape Fear. The assembly also in an address to the king declared that Burrington's "indefatigable industry and the hardships he underwent in carrying on the settlement of the Cape Fear deserve our thankful remembrance." Such testimony to his sacred majesty was doubtless very flattering and duly appreciated by his excellency, but Burrington evidently expected something more substantial, for he complained more than once that the only reward he ever received for his losses and hardships "was the thanks of a house of burgesses."

The man who planted the first permanent settlement on the Cape Fear was Colonel Maurice Moore. The Moores were descended from distinguished Irish ancestry, numbering among their forefathers, it is claimed, the ancient kings of Leix.* It is supposed that the great grandfather of Maurice Moore was Roger Moore, who organized the Irish Rebellion of 1641, to whose "generous nature" Hume, in his History of England, pays tribute. Maurice Moore came to North Carolina as a captain in the regiment which his brother James Moore led from South Carolina in 1713 to aid in the subjugation of the Tuscarora Indians. At the close of the war he settled in Chowan county, and in 1715, bearing a colonel's commission from Governor Eden, led the North Carolina militia sent to the aid of his native province in the Yemassee War. While he was on this campaign his attention was attracted by the fertility of the lower Cape Fear region and he determined to lead a settlement there. This

*George Davis: Address at University of North Carolina, 1855.

plan he carried into execution sometime prior to the year 1725. Among those who followed him were his two brothers, Roger and Nathaniel, with their families; the family of a deceased brother; a sister, Mrs. Clifford, formerly the wife of Job Howe, and her two sons, Job and Joseph Howe; and his son-in-law, John Porter, with his mother, Mrs. Sarah Porter, the daughter of Major Alexander Lillington. Of them Mr. Davis says: "They were no needy adventurers, driven by necessity—no unlettered boors, ill at ease in the haunts of civilization, and seeking their proper sphere amidst the barbarism of the savages. They were gentlemen of birth and education, bred in the refinements of polished society, and bringing with them ample fortunes, gentle manners, and cultivated minds. Most of them united by the ties of blood, and all by those of friendship, they came as one household, sufficient unto themselves, and reared their family altars in love and peace." After these leaders had cleared the way they were joined by numerous other families from the Albemarle settlement, from South Carolina, from Barbadoes and other islands of the West Indies, from New England, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, and from Europe.

The leaders were the three brothers, Maurice, Roger, and Nathaniel Moore. In a letter to the board of trade in 1732 Governor Burrington refers to them as follows: "About twenty families are settled at Cape Fear from South Carolina, among them three brothers of a noted family whose name is Moore. They are all of the set known there as the Goose Creek faction. These people were always troublesome in that government, and will, without doubt, be so in this. Already I have been told they will expend a great sum of money to get me turned out." Burrington's reference to their conduct in South Carolina is evidently to the fact that James Moore, a fourth and older brother, led the revolt of the people of South Carolina against the rule of the lords proprietors and after their success was elected governor. A century and a quarter later Mr. Davis paid the following tribute to Maurice and Roger Moore: "These brothers," said he, "were not cast in the common mould of men. They were 'of the breed of noble bloods.' Of kingly descent, and proud of their name which brave deeds had made illustrious, they dwelt upon their magnificent estates of Rocky Point and Orton, with much