The Life & Times of Job Berry

A tour of the locations mentioned in the new book The Life & Times of Job Berry: Hillsborough, North Carolina, 1865-1890, by Elizabeth (Betty) Eidenier, et al.

The book is available locally at Purple Crow Books in Hillsborough, or online via Barnes & Noble and Amazon.

410 W. Margaret Ln. / Lisbon & Clarena Berry House / Berry-Gordon House

Its original site, looking west on West King St.; the Baptist Church is visible at left, 1973 (NCSHPO via Tom Campanella) This house started life on W. King Street on historic Lot 129. In 1983 it was moved to 410 W. Margaret Lane (part of historic Lot 229). On June 22, 1896 an undeveloped eighth-acre lot on King Street was purchased from Charles...

Dickerson's Chapel AME Church / Orange County Courthouse (third)

1961 (image from History of the Town of Hillsborough) (Below in italics is from the National Register listing; not verified for accuracy by this author.) Originally constructed in 1790 as the third Orange County Courthouse, this building has been moved and remodeled several times with the current exterior dating to 1947. The front-gabled frame...

St. Matthew's Episcopal

From the National Register nomination: Sited high on a hill overlooking St. Mary's Road, St. Matthews Episcopal Church is an outstanding example of the early Gothic Revival in North Carolina and is listed individually in the National Register of Historic Places. The three-bay-wide, front-gabled, Flemish-bond brick building has a slate roof and fine...

Nash Slave Dwelling / Yarborough House

Duncan Cameron moved to Hillsborough in 1799 to practice law, and after purchasing town lots 10 and 13 he had “a small one-story house, an office, and cabins for slaves' quarters" constructed, with at least one enslaved man living with him on his property in town. Cameron sold the combined property (now consisting of lots 10, 11, 13, 14, and 16) to...

Frederick Nash House / Nash And Kollock School

Late 1800s (from History of the Town of Hillsborough) In ~1801, Duncan Cameron purchased two lots on the south side of Margaret Lane from two of his great uncles, Abner and Francis Nash. There he built a story-and-a-half house for himself and an adjacent law office as well as a kitchen, corn crib, dairy, well-house, smokehouse, wagon house, barn...

Orange County Courthouse (1845)

The fourth courthouse in this approximate location, it was built in 1845 on Town Lot 1, with a clock purportedly dating from the 1760s.

216-220 W. King St. / Beverly House

Large house built by Haywood Beverly on a large plot of land; destroyed by fire in 1956, but the entryway remains as of 2016

Dimmock's Mill / Smith's Mill / Brown's Mill

The mill known to us as Dimmock's Mill began its life in October 1817, when John Taylor, Jr., purchased three acres of property from John Thompson and Thomas Crabtree "to build a saw and Grist Mill on the River Eno about one mile and a half mile above the Town of Hillsborough... ." Taylor also purchased adjoining property in February 1820 from...

219 N. Churton St. / James Cheek House

09.10.2016 (S. Kueber) (Below in italics from the National Register nomination; not verified for accuracy by this author) This impressive Italianate-style, triple-A-roofed I-house is well-sited on a hill overlooking North Churton Street. The center-hall-plan house is five bays wide and single-pile with weatherboards, two-over-two wood-sash windows...

Margaret Lane Cemetery

Henderson Faribault House

December 2015 (TMLS) It appears from a brief perusal of the online deed records that this property and those immediately adjacent were owned by Henderson Faribault, 1843-1902, who appears to be buried in the Margaret Lane cemetery. Per Rosetta Moore in "The Impact of Slavery On the Education of Blacks in Orange County, North Carolina: 1619-1970,"...

Chaseville

A "town" that was developed after the Civil War for freemen and former slaves, located just west of Hillsborough.

Adams House / Burwell School

One of several 'female schools' in 19th century Hillsborough, The Burwell School was enlarged in 1848 from a 1821 dwelling built by William Adams. Reverend Burwell was the pastor of the Presbyterian Church

Cedar Walk / Cedar Lane

Runs between King Street and Margaret Lane. The tree are said to have been planted by Mary Goddard Kollock Nash soon after she and her husband Frederick Nash moved to Hillsboro in 1807. It may have originally extended south to the Eno River. Circa 1908 (image via the OCHM) Circa 1910, view south (image via the OCHM) Circa 1915, view north (image...

Central High School (original)

Central High School was initially named the "Hillsborough High School for Negroes"; the 12-room main structure was built in July 1936, on property purchased from Louis Wilson and George Mayo. Mr. C. E. Hester was the first principal, and the school initially served first through eleventh grades (and a "secret" kindergarten class was also taught in...

Mt. Bright Baptist Church

Drawing of the 1906 structure (from History of the Churches of Hillsborough) Picture of the 1906 structure, circa 1960 (from History of the Churches of Hillsborough) From History of the Churches of Hillsborough (1962) in italics: THE HISTORY OF THE MT. BRIGHT BAPTIST CHURCH (written by Rev. Fred J. Boddie, Jr.) In the days when American...

201 N. Churton St. / Confederate Memorial Library / Orange County Historical Museum

View north west, 1930s (photo by the Albertype Company, via UNC) The NW corner of Churton and Tryon streets was the location of the 1836 " Session House" for the adjacent Presbyterian Church. In 1934, the Session House building was torn down and a new building was built on the site. It was built as a United States Federal Civil Works Administration...

First Baptist Church

From the National Register nomination: Designed by Virginia architect, William Percival, the Romanesque Revival-style First Baptist Church has a front-gabled sanctuary that faces South Wake Street with a symmetrical side-gabled educational wing at the rear (west) elevation of the sanctuary. The brick structure is three bays wide and four bays deep...

Mcpherson Park

The home of the Hillsboro All-Stars, an African-American semi-pro baseball team

Moorefields

Moorefields was built in 1785 as a summer home by Alfred Moore, a Revolutionary military leader, founder of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and prominent jurist who ultimately served as the second and last North Carolinian on the United States Supreme Court.

Woodside Farm (and School)

On January 21, 1868, Robert G. Fitzgerald moved to Hillsborough from Pennsylvania to work as an associate teacher at the Quaker Freedman's School in Hillsboro. In early March 1869, Fitzgerald received a letter from his family (then living in Pennsylvania) that they were moving to Hillsboro and would be there that month. They (his father Thomas...

The Grove / Burgwin House / Josiah Turner Jr. House

The house was built circa 1830.[1] It was nicknamed "The Grove."[2] Home to George W. B. and Maria Burgwin (also spelled Burgwyn) in the early/mid-1800s. There seems to have been an auction or forced sale (owing to debts?) of the property to Samuel J. Johnston in 1843.[3] With the Burgwins (and other families who owned this property prior to 1865)...

Gallows Hill

“Gallows Hill” was basically bounded by Nash Street on the north, King Street on the South, Occoneechee Street on the east, and Union Street on the north. It encompassed town lots 207 through 218 plus a section of the town commons. The gallows itself was located on the town commons, just south of present-day Union Street. Local resident/carpenter...

Nash Law Office

Despite the name, the law office was built by lawyer Duncan Cameron between 1801 and 1807. It was later used as part of the Nash and Kollock school, which was mainly located in the adjacent former home of Francis Nash, which was demolished in the 1940s.

Twin Chimneys

Twin Chimneys is reputedly a pre-Revolutionary house, however the exact date of construction is not known. The twin pairs of chimneys, for which the house is named, were constructed by Reverend John Knox Witherspoon between 1817 and 1832 and are laid in a Flemish bond.

Hillsborough Academy

From NCPedia, by Jean Anderson Hillsborough Academy was the name given various schools established by prominent citizens of the town of Hillsborough over a period of 80 years. A school chartered in 1779 as Science Hall seems to have evolved into Hillsborough Academy by the time it opened in 1785. Subscriptions were raised among a number of North...

Cresmont Cemetery / Cresmont Memorial Park

Cresmont sign

Cresmont Cemetery, aka Cresmont Memorial Park, aka Mars Hill Cemetery, is a historic African-American cemetery, and many well-known Hillsborough residents are buried here. A historic, disused road (variously known as the Mars Hill Road, the Road to Roxboro, the New Danville Road, etc.) marks its eastern boundary, its western boundary is Highway 86...

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