snippets ~ chatham history BLOG

This photo of Charlie Crump and his granddaughter is one of only two photos of formerly enslaved people from Chatham County who were interviewed in the 1930s for the Federal Writers Project. Charlie was born at Evan’s Ferry in Lee or Chatham Co. He was enslaved by Davis Abernathy and wife "Mis’ Vick." His parents were Ridge and Marthy Crump. His brothers were Stokes and Tucker, and sisters were Lula and Liddy Ann.

You can access his narrative, as well as the ten others who were enslaved in Chatham County, from a link on our website:

ChathamCountySlaveNarratives.pdf

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #Slavery #BlackHistory

Shiloh School

Shiloh was a school for Black children that operated in the late 1920s into the 1930s—perhaps even earlier. It was located on the west side of Alex Cockman Road, between US 64 and Elmer Keck Road.

Barbara Pugh obtained some information about the Shiloh school in 2014 from Louise Womble, age 90. Ms. Womble recalled that the James Jackson family, which lived between her family and Highway 64, had a number of children who were similar in age to the Womble children. The Jackson children attended Shiloh.

The property for the school was likely sold to the Chatham Board of Education by a member of the Alston family, which owned much of the land in this area. After Shiloh ceased to be a school it was sold at public auction in 1948 to George Rogers, whose heirs still own the one-acre parcel in 2026. Ms. Womble reported that after it was no longer a school that it was, for a time, the residence of a family named Hopkins.

If anyone can share more about the Shiloh school, please do!

These photos by Duane Hall were taken in 2014 and are part of the CCHA collection.

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #BlackHistory #ShilohSchool #Schools

A paper on the Chatham County Historical Association website focuses on the forty-seven households headed by free people of color who are listed in the 1850 Chatham County census -- the first census to provide the names of all family members in each household. The author researched each of those households to provide as much information as possible about those persons for anyone looking for information about their FPOC ancestors.

Learn more here:

EarlyFreePeopleofColorinChatham.pdf

The surnames of the free people of color who are highlighted in the paper include: Allen, Alston, Archy/Archey, Anderson, Bass, Bowden, Brewer, Brown, Burnett, Byrd, Chandler, Chavis/Chavey/Chavers, Evans, Glovers, Goins/Goens, Goodwin, Grymes, Harris, Hatwood, Hill, Jeffreys/Jeffries, Linn, Lewis, Michel, Powel/Powell, Read/Reed/Reid, Roe/Rowe, White.

The photos shown here are of George and Asenanth Jane Allen Burnett and Cyrus and Eliza White Bowden. The photos were provided by their g-g-grandson, Calvin Dark

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #FreePeopleofColor #BlackHistory #AfricanAmericanHistory #NativeAmericanHistory #1850Census #FPOC

This photo of the Bonlee Baptist Church congregation was provided by Kim Beal, who also provided the following information about the church.

Bonlee Baptist was organized in 1912, and the church was constructed in 1914 at a cost of $1200 by a firm out of Sanford. So based on that, naturally, the picture is 1914 or after. It may be around that actual time, and that may very well be what this picture was all about, posing with the new church.

The Sunday school addition to the right is not showing in this picture. If there is a record of when it was added on, we could get even closer on the time of this photo.

Those windows were still being opened during warm weather in the early to mid-1970s.

My Great Grandfather James Atlas White was a carpenter, and he helped build it. My great aunt Blanche Phillips (his daughter) told me that he would come home each evening and tell about the construction that took place daily. She said he told her he could see Mt. Vernon Springs from atop the steeple. He passed away in 1920, along with four other men from the community from drinking bad water.

I grew up in this church. There were a lot of good people from the early families of Bonlee still attending here at that time. Ina Dunlap Andrews was one of those people. She often spoke of the early days of Bonlee. Her father Isaac Dunlap and his brother John Dunlap were the founders of the town. They built the town, the Bonlee and Western Railroad, the feed mill, and John donated land and loaned $10k dollars to build the first school which was chartered in 1914. I remember a small wooden sign that was out front of the drive at the entrance when I was a student there that read “Bonlee School founded 1914.”

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #BonleeNC #churches

Construction of Carbonton dam, 1921.

The dam stood 17’ high and 270’ long, and spanned the Deep River. The current facility at Carbonton was built in 1921 as the first electrical power plant in the Sandhills. Earlier structures date back to the Evans Lock and Dam in the mid-19th century when attempts were made to move coal on barges down the river, hence the origin of the name Carbonton. The original power plant was a cornerstone of the Sandhills Power Company and ultimately became CP&L, now Progress Energy.

See more photos of the dam construction here:

Construction of Carbonton Dam 1921

The dam was removed in 2005. The removal project was the largest in North Carolina at the time. You can read more about the dam removal here:

https://web.archive.org/.../case_studies/carbonton-dam/

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #ChathamHistory #ChathamNC #CarbontonNC #Carbontondam #DeepRiver #ElectricPower

How did Chatham County's Chicken Bridge get its name? You old-timers will know, and several Chatham families are connected to the event that named the bridge.

If you haven't heard the story, see Barbara Pugh's article on the Chatham County Historical Association website to find out. Everyone is likely to learn something here about the history of the bridge.

https://chathamhistory.org/resources/Documents/PDFs/ResearchArticles/TheDayChickenBridgeGotItsName.pdf

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #ChathamHistory #ChathamNC #ChickenBridge #chickens #bridges #1950s

Photo: Fearrington House before porch and columns were added. 

Fearrington Village has been a prominent fixture of Chatham County since the 1970s, and many people know that the property was previously the farm of the Fearrington family. That farm was called Eureka Farm, and it was owned by Bill Sharpe’s great grandparents. Bill has recorded some history of the family and the farm in four short articles. The articles document what farming was like in Chatham County in the 1930s to 1960s, providing details that would likely be lost if Bill had not taken the time to add to his own memories by interviewing his cousin Jesse Fearrington, his father, and others, and to record them. Bill also includes photographs that add so much to the stories. We are grateful that he has shared these stories with us so that we can make them available to everyone and preserve them for future generations.

You can link to the articles individually from this page.

Additional photos of Eureka Farm have been donated to CCHA by Jess Fearrington. You can see a photo gallery of those photos on our website:

https://chathamhistory.org/Fearrington-Family-Eureka-Farm

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #Fearrington #EurekaFarm #farming #1930s #1940s #1950s #1960s

Luttrell’s Barracks ~ A Chatham County Revolutionary War Landmark

Don’t miss this fascinating new paper on our website! While researching the Revolutionary War record of his 6th great grandfather, Thomas Mattocks came across a reference to a Revolutionary War barracks in Chatham County. His curiosity led him to look for more information and to eventually document the precise location of the landmark, as well as numerous other references to it in the pension records of veterans of the North Carolina State Militia. His research sheds light on little-known local events occurring during what would become known as the Tory War in Central North Carolina. From 1780 until his death in 1781 in the Battle of Lindley's Mill, Luttrell commanded a regiment of mounted rangers from Chatham and neighboring counties to help suppress the Loyalists who began organizing under a charismatic former Patriot named David Fanning.

The paper lists more than 50 Chatham men who served in the State Militia who applied for pensions. Maybe you'll find an ancestor among them!

Here’s the link:

https://chathamhistory.org/resources/Documents/PDFs/ResearchArticles/Luttrells%20Barracks%20Rev%20War%20Landmark.pdf

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #RevolutionaryWar #Luttrell #1780s

View at Mt. Vernon Springs, NC circa 1908.

"View at Mt. Vernon Springs, N.C." in Durwood Barbour Collection of North Carolina Postcards (P077), North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives, Wilson Library, UNC-Chapel Hill

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #MtVernonSprings #postcard #1900s

Gulf Depot 1966

Photo from the North Carolina Railroad Station Photograph Collection, North Carolina Collection Photographic Archives, The Wilson Library University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

#ChathamNCHistory #ChathamCountyNC #ChathamHistory #ChathamNC #railroads #railwaystations #GulfNC #depot #1960s