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Updated: May 16, 2025
At Hecklefield's home on Little River, the plantation adjoining Durant's, the Assembly of 1708 met to investigate the Cary-Glover question and to decide which of those two claimants to the gubernatorial chair had rightful authority to occupy that exalted seat.
Though no one now living remembers the ancient building, yet the residents of Durant's Neck to-day, many of whom are the descendants of the early settlers in that region, confidently point out the site of Captain Hecklefield's house, and with one accord agree to its location, "about three hundred yards to the north of the main Durant's Neck road, at the foot of the late Calvin Humphries' Lane."
Some years later, at a meeting of the Council in April, 1714, Charles Eden, lately appointed by the Proprietors to succeed Hyde, who had died of yellow fever during the trouble with the Tuscaroras, took the oath of office at Captain Hecklefield's home, and became Governor of North Carolina.
Disputes over the matter grew so numerous and violent that finally the two factions agreed to leave the decision of the matter to a new Assembly which was elected at this juncture. And this was the Assembly that convened at Captain Hecklefield's in 1708.
But that the building must have been, for those days, large and commodious, is evident from the fact that so often beneath its roof the leading men of the colony gathered to transact affairs of public interest. On no less than twenty occasions did executive, judicial and legislative officers assemble at Captain Hecklefield's to perform their various duties.
From that day until 1717, we find many instances of these public gatherings at Captain Hecklefield's home. The most prominent men in the Albemarle Colony were often there assembled.
Possibly a coach and four may have borne Governor Eden and Governor Hyde the long journey from Chowan and Bath to Hecklefield's door.
At the first Council held at Captain Hecklefield's, July 4, 1712, we find among the dignitaries assembled on that occasion, Edward Hyde, first Governor of North Carolina, as separate and distinct from South Carolina, and first cousin of Queen Anne. This lordly gentleman commanded "most awful respect," and doubtless received it from planter and farmer.
Captain John Hecklefield's house on Little River now disappears from history; but though no longer the scene of the public activities of Albemarle, it doubtless kept up for many years its reputation as the center of all that was best in the social life of the colony.
Governor Hyde and Chief Justice Gale have doubtless often hailed with relief the glistening white branches and broad green leaves of the old tree, whose outlines had grown familiar through many a journey to Hecklefield's home on business of state. No description of the house is now extant.
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