History

The first documented mention of the area was in a written description from 1670 by Dr. John Lederer of the Native American trading paths in what would one day become Orange County.  He described the Oenocks or Eno settlement near modern-day Hillsborough and made mention of the area that would one day become Alamance County.  He wrote, “Fourteen miles West Southwest of the Oenocks dwell the Shackory Indians upon a rich Soyl, and yet abounding in antimony, of which they shewed me considerable quantities. Finding them agree with the Oenocks in Customs and Manners, I made no stay here, but passing thorow their town…”

Another documented European visit to the area was in a book by British Explorer John Lawson, who spent the first decade of the 1700’s exploring the Carolinas, observing plant and animal life, and learning about the local Native American Tribes.  In early 1701, he was exploring the area and detailed a cold, windy night spent near the stony banks of “the famous Hau-River, called by some the ‘Reatkin’.”  He mentions a local tribe called the “Sissipahau who dwell on this stream”.  He described the land as “extraordinarily rich” with “plenty of good timber”.  He said that the land could hold “some thousands of families”.

His closing comments about the area say it best:

“…no Man that will be content within the Bounds of Reason, can have any grounds to dislike it.  And they that are otherwise, are the best Neighbours, when farthest of.”

A New Voyage to Carolina by John Lawson.

The early history of the area was dominated by the Sissipahaw, who lived in the southern part of the county, along the banks of the Haw River. As the years went on, Europeans entered the region, largely following Native American trading paths that would one day become the basis of the railroad and interstate highway routes.

The colonial period for the Alamance County area was marked, mostly, by farming and trade.  Family farms appeared as the rural population of North Carolina moved west, and much of the area was devoted to agriculture.  In the 1740’s, Europeans started to heavily settle the area as various settlers from the north started to move south, taking the “lower road” of the Piedmont rather than the “high road” of the Appalachian Mountains.

In general, the settlement of the Alamance County area was by religious affiliation.  Quakers tended to settle around the Cane Creek area, near what is now called Snow Camp.  The German Reformed and Lutheran settlers settled near Great Alamance and Stinking Quarter Creek, near the present day Village of Alamance and unincorporated community of Bellmont.  Finally, the Presbyterian settlers established themselves in Hawfields, near modern-day Mebane.  As closely as these groups were, in the early days, there was little interaction between the three communities.

In the 1750’s, war broke out between France and Great Britain, and North Carolina sent its milita.  After the war, Great Britain found itself in great debt, and the colonists who served in the milita saw their efforts unrewarded.  To make matters worse, taxes were raised to pay for the war.  In North Carolina, those taxes were collected by Sheriffs who often collected taxes unfairly by adding charges and destroying evidence of payment.

In the 1760’s, poor farmers in North Carolina organized into a group called “The Regulators” and conducted minor raids and skirmishes in the frontier.  In 1771, the colonial militia was called out against them, and on May 14, 1771, Governor Tryon and his militia camped out on the banks of Great Alamance Creek, named so for a local Native American word describing the blue-colored mud found in the creek.  Leaving a token guard of 75 troops at the camp, his main force of 2,000 troops marched 10 miles until they reached the site where the Regulators had gathered.  6,000 men – mostly farmers who came unarmed, gathered in hopes of creating enough fear by their superior numbers to force the governor to retreat.Battle of Alamance Soldiers

Governor Tryon did not retreat, and on May 16, the Battle of Alamance was fought.  There is some confusion as to how the battle began.  A common story is that Governor Tryon felt insulted by a representative of the regulators – Robert Thompson – who came to Tryon’s camp, listed the Regulators’ demands, and then turned his back on the Governor, who promptly grabbed a musket and shot Thompson in the back.  When Tryon realized what he did, he ordered a white flag flown, but the flag was shot out of the flagbearer’s hands.

The Regulators were disorganized and mostly unarmed.  The militia was organized, trained, and well-armed.  Both sides fought fiercely.  Tryon himself – who tried again to fly a flag of truce – was nearly shot by a musket ball that hit his hat.  When it was all over, nine members of the milita were killed and sixty-one were wounded.  Between ten and fifteen members of the Regulators were killed and between 100 and 150 were wounded.  Tryon took 15 prisoners, six of whom were hanged at the Hillsborough Courthouse and one, James Few – brother of American Founding Father William Few, who was hanged the day after the battle at Tryon’s camp.

Within 5 years of the Battle of Alamance, the American Revolution had begun.  While the earlier battle was merely an action taken against corrupt sheriffs and the governor, the American Revolution was a full rebellion against the British Crown.

Much of the early war focused in the Northern States, but by 1778, the war had turned south, and the battles came close to home.  Alamance County, then the western half of Orange County, sent troops to the war, with some of the participants at the Battle of Alamance fighting in the war – some for the colonists, some for the British.  Much of the action took place in South Carolina, however, by 1780, North Carolina had seen several major battles as British General Cornwallis pursued the General Nathaniel Greene’s American Army north.

In February 1781, Cornwallis put out a call for Loyalist troops.  Colonel John Pyle, a former Regulator, responded to the call and gathered up 300-400 troops and requested an escort.  Cornwallis sent General Banastre Tarleton to escort them.  At the same time, American Brigadier General Andrew Pickens and Colonel Henry “Lightfoot” Lee were scouting the area with orders to harass the British.  They discovered Pyle’s army and had planned to attack General Tarleton, who was only a few miles away.

In the waning hours of February 24, 2 of Pyle’s men encountered Colonel Lee’s troops, who wore similar uniforms to Tarleton’s dragoons.  Taking advantage of the opportunity, they allowed the 2 men to walk them into the middle of the camp.  After exchanging pleasantries, the sounds of battle commenced as militia in the back realized that the camp was filled with British loyalists.  10 minutes later, the battle was over and 93 British loyalists were dead.  The Americans lost a horse.

On March 4, 1781, a second battle occurred, this time between a group of militia called the Botetourt Riflemen and Tarleton’s troops.  Lee’s troops had crossed Alamance Creek and set up near Stinking Quarter Creek.  Tarleton learned that Lee’s troops were in the area and led a force of around 700 mounted troops to engage them.  Lee’s scouts discovered them and Lee ordered the riflemen to lay in wait behind a rail fence with Lee’s militiamen hiding in the thick of the woods.  Tarleton’s troops rode into the ambush and within moments, between 21 and 25 British troops were killed.  Tarleton quickly regrouped and began returning fire.  Between 8 and 12 Americans were killed before Lee ordered his militia to retreat.

Less than two weeks later, Cornwallis and Tarleton would suffer a pyrrhic victory at Guilford Courthouse in neighboring Guilford County.

Later, Alamance County was the site of the Battle of Lindley’s mill, occurring on September 13.  The bloodiest battle in Alamance County history was an attempt by Colonial militia, under the command of General John Butler, to free the captured Governor Thomas Burke.  The British Loyalists, under the command of Colonel David Fanning, defeated the militia and escaped with the Governor.  In a battle that had only 900 participants, nearly one-third were killed in the battle that ended the Revolutionary War in North Carolina.  One month later, the Revolutionary War as a whole would be over, and a new country would be on the map.

The new nation was born, and the western half of Orange County was beginning to grow the enterprises that would drive its industry for the next 200 years.  But the area was not to remain Orange County.  For over a decade, the citizens of the more industrial western half of Orange County petitioned the state to form a new county, and in 1849, the county was formed, with the dividing line located 9 miles west of Hillsborough.  The battle near Great Alamance Creek provided the source for the name of the new county: Alamance.

The area was rich with agriculture, with hundreds of farming families working the land to produce crops and other goods for themselves and for sale to others.  Many of these families owned slaves, as was common in the Southern US at the time.  This would become a major issue for the county and the state a few decades later.

A second industry was transportation.  Many people who came to the area followed the old Native American trading paths that lead between major towns such as Hillsborough and Greensboro.  With time came industry and the development of the railroad and the need to transport goods and people en masse and the need to maintain the trains, cars, and equipment.  In 1851, the first shovel of dirt for the Atlantic and North Carolina railroad was dug in Greensboro, and in 1859, the maintenance roundhouse for that railroad opened at Company Shops, located a few miles northwest of the new county’s seat in Graham.

However, the largest industry that drove the new county’s people and economy was situated along the banks of its many waterways, especially the Haw River.  Throughout the county, textile and other mills sprang up, providing a source of employment for the people and a place for farmers to sell or process their crops.  One of the most famous developments of this new industry came in the 1850’s with the production of Alamance Plaids, a popular fabric in the 2nd half of the 19th century.

Mills and textiles continued to provide jobs and fuel for the Alamance economy through good times and bad.  The Haw River Watershed itself was home to over 65 mills in Alamance County alone, and this number does not include mills that were not built on creeks.  These mills provided the lifeblood of the Alamance County economy for well over a century.

The growth in the economy of the Southern States was due in part to the contributions made by people who had no rights and no freedom.  Slavery was an active part of Southern American life, and Alamance County was typical of most counties in the South.  In 1860, out of  883 farms in the area, 520 of them held slaves, most of them holding between 1 and 5 slaves.  Roughly 33% of the county’s population were slaves.

The issue of slavery drove national politics as politicians and voters in the North sought to control, restrict, and end slavery in the South.  The South viewed this as an attack on their primary economy – agriculture – and the states began to split off from the North in 1861, following the election of President Abraham Lincoln.  Efforts had been made to avert the war, including efforts by former North Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice Thomas Ruffin from Alamance County, but those efforts were in vain.  President James Buchanan felt that if Ruffin had persisted, the war could have been averted.

But war was coming.  In March 1861, North Carolina held a secession vote.  The citizens of Alamance County overwhelmingly voted against secession by a vote of 1,114 to 254.  The state, as a whole, also rejected secession from the Union.  However, on April 12, 1861, the Battle of Fort Sumter in South Carolina opened the American Civil War, and after a month and a half of fierce debate, North Carolina chose to join the Confederate States.

Alamance County gave over 230 of its sons’ lives to the war, but it gave up any of its sons reluctantly.  The county was a hotbed of resistance to the Confederacy and contributed some of its largest resistance in the form of the Heroes of America, or “Red Strings”, a group dedicated to resistance of the Confederacy who hid draft dodgers, among other activities.

As the war came to a close, however, North Carolina did begin to see an increase in activity.  The largest battle was at Bentonville, NC, south of Raleigh.  After this battle, General William T. Sherman of the Union Army stationed his troops in Raleigh and General Joseph E. Johnston of the Confederate Army stationed his troops in Greensboro.  The two generals met at the Bennett Farm near Durham, NC and worked on terms of surrender for Johnston’s Confederate Army.  Confederate President Jefferson Davis was traveling by rail near Greensboro and issued orders to Johnston (which were ignored).  Johnston, upon surrendering, stopped at Company Shops to dismiss some of his soldiers.

After the war, reconstruction took its toll on the area.  Although mills could provide jobs, the economy of the Southern US was heavily in recession.  Lawlessness and bitterness took root and secret organizations began to appear.  In Alamance County, these groups appeared as the former organizers of the Red Strings were in control in the area, and in 1870, events became deadly as racial and political tensions came to a head.

On February 26, 1870, Wyatt Outlaw, a former slave – the son of one of the leaders in the Red Strings, Union veteran, political leader, councilman, and constable, was lynched by members of the Ku Klux Klan.  On May 21, 1870, state Senator John W. Stephens was murdered by Klansmen in Caswell County to the north.  In July 1870, Governor William Holden declared Alamance and Caswell Counties to be in insurrection, and sent Colonel Geroge Kirk to manage the state militia in the area.  Governor Holden suspended habeas corpus and arrested over 100 people.  When the State Supreme Court ordered the men charged in court, Holden refused.

By September 1870, Holden had declared that the insurrection was over, but the political damage by his decision to ignore court orders was done.  The opposition party had been elected to the Legislature in August of 1870, and in December 1870, Holden was became the second governor in United States history to be impeached, and after a 3-month long trial, on March 22, 1871, William W. Holden became the first governor in United States history to be removed from office.

Following the events of the Kirk-Holden “War”, Alamance County’s history turns, again, to the mills that dominated its economic landscape prior to the Civil War.  New mills meant new jobs, even in the turbulent economic periods of the Long Depression of 1873-1897.

Several mills opened between the end of the Civil War and the end of the Century.  Many of these mills still made use of the water for power and other uses.  However, the advent of electrical power and the introduction of advances in transportation technology, including the continued advance of the nation’s railroads all worked together to help the Alamance County economy move strongly through the end of the nineteenth century.  The first steam-powered mill opened in the county in 1882.  Many of these mills are now closed, but many have been turned into new opportunities for business, tourism, and homes.

The mills also used advances in textile technology to make money and provide jobs.  The Alamance Plaids that had been developed in the late 1850’s were now being made in great amounts and remained very popular until World War II.  The demand for these low-cost high-demand textiles meant that the mills needed more employees.  The companies that ran these mills – mostly local businessmen – built housing developments around their mills so that their employees would have a place to live, work, and build their families.

Along with the growth in the mills came new towns and cities.  The North Carolina Railroad had been purchased by the Richmond and Danville Railroad and the repair facilities had been moved from Company Shops to Manchester, Virginia.  The residents of the area, however, had new work in the form of the growing mill industries, and decided to rename their city from Company Shops to Burlington.  Gibsonville was incorporated in 1871 around another depot that had been built on the North Carolina Railroad.

The railroad was not the only source of growth.  The mill towns – some of them unincorporated – of Altamahaw, Ossipee, Glencoe, Haw River, Alamance, Bellmont, Swepsonville, and Saxapahaw all grew around the mills that provided jobs for so many. The Town of Mebanesville was established in 1881 around both the mill in the area and the railroad that went through it.

In 1889, the North Carolina Legislature issued a charter for the founding of a new college to be called “Elon College”.  Today, Elon University is one of the most prestigious universities in the United States, and has received Presidents, Prime Ministers, and Nobel Prize winners as its guests.

This pattern of life and growth continued through the Great Depression.  While the economy of the area was hit as hard as many other areas in the country, Alamance County seemed to suffer less.  The mills had jobs and the farms still produced agriculture, and the area provided both to many who needed them.

The middle years of the 20th Century also brought the changes that rocked the nation.  Many of Alamance County’s finest answered the nation’s call to arms for the Second World War and Korean War, and many of them gave their lives.  Back at home, people did their part in service to the nation, building and donating supplies and contributing everything from support to work to ideas to keep our nation well-armed against her enemies.

In 1950, Dr. Charles Drew, a pioneer in the field of preserving blood plasma who was an African-American, was mortally wounded in a car accident near Burlington.  While every effort was made to save his life, those efforts were unsuccessful.  While this gave rise to legends regarding his care, these legends were untrue, and today, a community health center stands near the former hospital that treated him.

While the county was relatively free of much of the conflict that engulfed the nation as the Civil Rights movement moved on, nearby Greensboro, NC was the site of one of the most famous moments in Civil Rights history: the Greensboro Sit-Ins.  The result of those efforts was more freedom and opportunity for people whose freedom had been long supressed by law and deed.

Beginning in the 1970s, the economic view of Alamance County began to change.  Textile mills began to close, and many of the companies that had been so strong 50 years prior were now disappearing.  However, new jobs came into the area, and the few remaining textile manufacturers strengthened their place in the community.

Today, these new technologies have opened new doors to jobs, leisure, and education in the new millennium.  Hi-tech manufacturing and a fast-paced, exciting business environment meet in a county with a low tax rate and a ready-trained workforce to meet the challenges that tomorrow will bring.

Alamance County’s Historic Courthouse is a local landmark, a member of the National Register of Historic Places, and an important link to our shared past, present, and future.  The 2011 renovation gives us an opportunity to explore the history of Alamance County through the eyes of its court buildings and to learn more about this fascinating structure, its history, recent renovation, and future.

• The Original Courthouse
• Building the Historic Courthouse
• Through the Years
• 2009-2011 Renovation

Alamance County first met at the site of Providence Meeting House, near what is today Providence Christian Church in Graham, NC, near the railroad tracks.  The original building was torn down some years later, but the markers of the original building can be found in the cemetery next to the church.

At the first county court meeting on June 4, 1849, the commissioners (Chair Michael W. Holt, George Garrison, Jr., Absalom Harvey, William Harvey, and Abraham Tarpley discussed the construction of the county courthouse.  On July 17, 1849, the contract was awarded with instructions to spend $8,000 to construct a courthouse.

Since the exact center of the county was too marshy to allow a courthouse to be built, a 75-acre site was selected and purchased short distance north of the center.  The land was subdivided into lots, which were sold to local investors to help fund the building of the courthouse.

The original courthouse was constructed for $6,400, or around $163,000 in 2009 money.  It was a small, cube-shaped 2-story building that met the needs of the small population of Alamance County at that time.  It featured a roof made of either tin or zinc, although there are some indications that it may have been copper at some point during its lifetime. It also featured a cupola with a large 400-lb bell at the very top.  That bell, believed lost for many years, was recovered in the 1990’s and is now the featured attraction at Sesquicentennial Park in the Courthouse Square in Graham.

The original courthouse opened in 1852 and served as the focal point for elements of local, state, and federal government and historic events.  It also served as a town center in the new, growing county seat.  All roads in Graham, whether they were dirt, plank, or macadam, led to the original courthouse.

In the 1880’s, having survived 30 years of progressively heavier use, a Civil War, occupation by troops, and a host of other local events, the courthouse was beginning to show its age and space limitations.  $7,500, or around $177,000 in 2009 money was spent to add 2 wings to the east and west ends of the courthouse and to stucco the entire building.  The increase in size made each story of the building about the size of a modern, small fast food restaurant.

The next major addition to the courthouse grounds was a memorial statue to Confederate soldiers added and dedicated on May 21, 1914.  The name of the soldier at the top of the statue is “Conrad” (pronounced koon-rahd).  This would be the last major addition to the courthouse grounds before space limitations forced the county commissioners to approve the demolition of the original courthouse and the construction of a new, larger facility.

The original courthouse was demolished in 1923.

Over the years, there have been persistent rumors of a fire which destroyed the original courthouse.  However, no documentation or news reports from the time indicate that the courthouse burned down.  The reason for its demolition was much simpler: it was a very small building and Alamance County was a growing community, and was demolished in 1923.

The historic courthouse’s cornerstone was laid on November 17, 1923.  William Arnold  amd James Lexie Moore, brothers of Sheriff Hallie Moore, dug the foundation for the Historic Courthouse in 1924 using mules and dragpans.

Just over a year later, on November 23, 1924, the courthouse was dedicated by Judge W. A. Devin.  At the time, the 4-story courthouse was considered to be one of the best examples of modern architecture in the state of North Carolina, and the $253,925.82 cost – or $3.16 million in 2009 dollars – reflected that.

The Historic Courthouse is an example of Neoclassical Revival Style architecture, a popular style for government buildings in the United States during the early 1900’s.  Other examples can be seen in buildings like the White House and the Lincoln Memorial.  It can also be viewed in the Old Guilford Courthouse and in other courthouses designed by architect and Greensboro resident Harry Barton, who designed our own Courthouse.

The courthouse features some unique elements:

• While the original courthouse had its first floor at street level, the Historic Courthouse features a raised first story sitting above a basement area used for small claims court and records storage.
• The top of the courthouse features a flat roof concealed by a parapet wall and balustrades.
• The porticoes on the north and south sides of the courthouse each feature six fluted Doric columns, each topped with acanthus and palmette flourishes.  They also feature the words Alamance County Courthouse at the top of each portico.
• On the east and west sides of the courthouse, the colums are replaced with 4 matching pilasters.
• Each entrance features stairs built into the granite foundation, columnar iron lamps, and doorways with entablatures resting on scroll consoles and decorated with a crest of anthemion and palmette antefixes.
• Throughout the external structure, you will see numerous decorative friezes and other flourishes.
• The terracotta stonework features multiple, subtle colors throughout the structure.  This is best seen in the columns on the north and south sides

The courthouse has served as a seat of justice and government, a landmark, a social event location, and a community center for Alamance County since it was first opened in 1924.  From the day to day activities of the court system to the weekly after-church gatherings of residents in the 30’s and 40’s to historical celebrations of major events to the occasional wedding or fashion show, the courthouse has seen its share of use throughout the years.

In order to accommodate its use as a community center of so much activity, several upgrades and repairs have been made over the years.  In the 1980’s, an elevator was installed to assist disabled residents in their use of the building, and in the 1990’s, major repairs were done to the aging roof of the building to prevent further damage from external leaks.  The massive structural damage caused by those leaks, however, was not repaired until the 2010-2011 renovations.

After 40 years of use, much like its predecessor, space began to become an issue for the courthouse.  However, instead of changing the structure of the Historic Courthouse, this time additional buildings were constructed to ease the crowding issues and to provide county government with its own buildings.

In 1966, the Courthouse Annex was built at the site of the original jail, one block west of the courthouse at 126 West Elm Street.  8 years later, construction began on a neighbor to the Courthouse Annex: the County Office Building, located at 124 West Elm Street.  In 2009 and 2010, the Courthouse Annex underwent renovations and was renamed the Alamance Civil Courts Building.

In 1993, further issues with the nearly 70-year-old Historic Courthouse, including noise and dangerous conditions, caused the county to construct a new courthouse a bit further west down Elm Street.  The Criminal Courts Building, commonly referred to as the “New Courthouse”, began construction in 1992 and opened in 1993.

From 2009-2011, the Historic Courthouse underwent its largest renovation ever.  Throughout the years, massive damage had been done to the structure of the building due to its leaking roof, burst pipes, and normal wear and tear.

Most of the damage you’ll see in the pictures linked to the right is done by water.  While the leaking roof was repaired in the 1990’s, the damage done by the water over the years was not repaired, and so the deterioration of the building continued.

Other issues besides the deteriorating structure included asbestos found throughout the building.  Asbestos was a common building material in the 1920s, but in the 1970’s, it was found to be dangerous, and so, during the renovation, it was removed.