Location: US 70 at Eno River bridge northwest of Hillsborough
County: Orange
Original Date Cast: 2006
By August 4, 1755, a Quaker by the name of Joseph Maddock was operating a grist mill on the Eno River just outside of Hillsborough. For years Maddock’s Mill had steady business as it was the closest mill to the Orange County seat of government. In 1766, it was the site of a large and well-publicized gathering of Regulators. Edmund Fanning deemed the meeting “an insurrection” when he believed the men were attempting to usurp power from the local court.
After the meeting, Maddock grew increasingly fearful of governmental retribution and decided to move to Georgia with a group of Quakers. In November 1767, he sold the mill to Governor William Tryon’s friend, Thomas Hart. He eventually accumulated more than 2000 acres. He became a sheriff of Orange County in 1763. He served in that office throughout the Regulator Rebellion and was a staunch opponent of the movement and played a prominent role. He served in Governor Tryon’s army at the Battle of Alamance in 1771.
Thomas Hart enlarged the grist mill into a complex that included a sawmill, oil mill, fulling mill, distillery, weaving house, tannery, nail factory, ropemaking factory, and a shoemaker shop. Hart also owned stables, an orchard, and raised hemp on his plantation. Additionally, he entered into a partnership with Nathaniel Rochester and James Brown and opened a store in Hillsborough. According to a 1779 tax list, he was the wealthiest man in Orange County.
In 1775, Hart was appointed Commissary to the 6th North Carolina Regiment. He resigned his commission in 1777 when he was elected to the state’s Senate. By 1780, Hart’s plantation was on the border between two areas; one dominated by Patriots and the other by Loyalists. Hart began to fear for his family’s safety. After the defeat of General Horatio Gates at the Battle of Camden, Hart moved his family to Hagerstown, Maryland. This was far from the threat of war. He sold his home, Hartford, to Reverend James Fraser.
A year after the sale, and following the Race to the Dan, Lord Charles Cornwallis led his army toward Hillsborough in mid-February 1781. A detachment of one Lieutenant, one Sergeant, twenty-four Privates, and two Loyalists was sent to Hart’s Mill. The facility was used by the troops for grinding corn meal. When the Patriots learned the British were at Hart’s Mill, Maj. Joseph Graham was dispatched with twenty dragoons and 20 mounted riflemen to attack them. Major Graham’s force was joined by five other volunteers. They marched overnight and attacked the mill on the morning of February 18th.
According to Major Graham, he ordered his men to open fire as soon as it was just light enough for the riflemen to see their sights. After a lengthy skirmish, the British Sergeant and eight Privates were killed, while the Lieutenant, sixteen Regulars, and two Loyalists were captured, nine of whom were wounded. Major Graham and his militia, with prisoners in tow, fled to General Andrew Pickens’s camp nearby, with a detachment of the British Legion in close pursuit. When Thomas Jefferson referred to the skirmish in a letter to George Washington, dated March 8, 1781, he remarked that, combined with the massacre of Dr. John Pyle’s Loyalist forces on February 23, the action at Hart’s Mill “had a very happy effect on the disaffected in that country.”
The history of the mill after 1781 is uncertain. According to Rev. Fraser, Major Graham and his troops damaged it beyond repair. However, Major Graham stated they were chased off by Tarleton’s troopers almost as soon as the battle ended. The mill stood west of Hillsborough, north of the Hwy 70 bridge over the Eno River. The exact location is unknown.
References:
Mary Claire Engstrom, “The Hartford Mill Complex during the Revolution,” Eno Journal (July 1978) available online at https://www.enoriver.org/journal/volume-4-number-2/.
William Alexander Graham, General Joseph Graham and His Papers on North Carolina Revolutionary History (1904).
Thomas Jefferson, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 1, at https://www.gutenberg.org/files/16781/16781-8.txt
Marjolene Kars, Breaking Loose Together: The Regulator Rebellion in Pre-Revolutionary North Carolina (2002).
Durward T. Stokes. “Thomas Hart in North Carolina.” The North Carolina Historical Review. Vol 41, No 3. (1964).
Thomas Jefferson to George Washington, March 8. -03-08, 1781. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/mtjbib000633/>.
Joseph Graham, General Joseph Graham and his Papers on North Carolina Revolutionary History. (1904).