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Updated: May 13, 2025
The first mention made of Captain Hecklefield is found in Vol. I of the Colonial Records, where the following notice is inscribed: "At a General Court held at ye house of Captain John Hecklefield in Little River, Oct. 27, 1702. Being present the Hon. Samuel Swann, Esq., the Hon. William Glover, Esq., Jno. Hawkins, Esq."
Down the Pamlico, Chowan, Perquimans and Pasquotank the white-sailed vessels bore their passengers into Albemarle Sound and a short distance up Little River; then disembarking at the Hecklefield Landing, where the hospitable host of the occasion was doubtless waiting to receive the travelers, they made their way with many a friendly interchange of gossip and jest to the great house, standing back from the river beneath the arching branches of the sheltering sycamores.
And how did Madam Hecklefield manage to provide for the numerous guests who so often met around her fireside? The housewife to-day would rebel at such frequent invasions of the privacy of her home; and the high price of living would indeed prohibit such wholesale entertainment of the public; but in those good old days living was easy.
His descendants moved to New Hanover, and a namesake of his in later years won for himself undying fame at the Battle of Moore's Creek Bridge. At the homes of Captain John Hecklefield and Captain Richard Saunderson, the General Assembly and the Governor's Council often convened.
The Hecklefield home was located on Durant's Neck on the plantation adjoining the tract of land purchased by George Durant from Kilcokonen, the great chief of the Yeopims.
Samuel Pricklove had preceded him into Wikacome, and later came George Catchmaid, Captain John Hecklefield and Richard Sanderson, while later still the Blounts, the Whedbees, the Newbys, Harveys and Skinners, names still prominent in Albemarle, came into the neighborhood and settled throughout Perquimans County.
After the meeting of the Assembly of 1708, various other public gatherings took place at the Hecklefield home, until November 22, 1717. On this occasion the colony was formally notified of the death of Queen Anne, and George I was proclaimed the "Liege Lord of Carolina."
But by 1670 the homes of the planters were being built of sufficient size to accommodate these public meetings; and from that time until Edenton was founded and became the seat of government, we find these private homes being used for public gatherings. Of Captain John Hecklefield himself, though his name appears very frequently in the Colonial Records from 1702 until 1717, but little is known.
One of the most interesting and important of all the public gatherings convened at the Hecklefield home was the meeting of the Assembly on October 11, 1708, to decide which of the two claimants of the office of President of the Council, or Deputy Governor of North Carolina, should have just right to that office.
The neighboring planters doubtless came to the rescue, and helped to provide bed and board for the gentry whom Captain Hecklefield could not accommodate; and the lesser fry found the humbler settlers on the "Neck" no less hospitable in opening their doors to them, though very probably good coin of the realm often settled the debt between guest and host.
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