Historic Halifax

05/30/2026

Historic Halifax will be taking part in the 301 Endless Yard Sale once again this year. The Endless Yard Sale will be on Friday, June 19th and Saturday June 20th. It is sponsored by Halifax County Tourism, click on the link for more details including a map: https://www.visithalifax.com/301endlessyardsale

The Historic Site will hold its yard sale at the William R. Davie House on the corner of St. Davis Street and Norman Street both days. We are in need of donations! All the proceeds of the site’s yard sale will go directly into Historic Halifax’s living history and educational programs. Do you have used furniture, household goods, costume jewelry, books, toys, or collectables that you would like to donate? We’d love to have them. Call us at (252)583-7191 or bring them to the Visitors Center at 25 Saint David Street, Halifax.

05/29/2026

We wanted to share this beautiful coverage of our Halifax Resolves Days Event by NC Weekend and PBS North Carolina! It gives an exciting snapshot of the once-in-a-generation event that we held back in April! Thank you so much PBS North Carolina for the story of Halifax Resolves Days.

https://video.pbsnc.org/video/fresh-takes-7vcdlp/?fbclid=IwY2xjawSFjmJleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeTYmZR3KFwQU5EvlHlBOYqyFWHsFBAQq0fsKSP5wvJ53oDu6R0fsJq-WzplY_aem_kiNGNUUO9TGqwqHq2w8rfA

New ideas are reshaping familiar traditions across NC, from global flavors to reimagined spaces.

05/29/2026

Do you love history? Are you energetic and love talking to visitors from all over the world? Do you think old houses are the best houses? Do you secretly wish you could time travel to 1776 and witness the Halifax Resolves being adopted? Join us! Historic Halifax State Historic Site has an opening for a full-time Historic Interpreter I position. You can learn more about the position and apply here: https://wd108.myworkday.com/nc/d/inst/15$158872/9925$26600.htmld

05/28/2026

We are getting ready for the 301 Endless Yard Sale on June 19-20, 2026. People, businesses, churches, and other organizations will have merchandise for sale along US Highway 301 on those two days stretching from the Virginia border to the South Carolina Border. You can click on the Halifax County Tourism Board’s website here for more information, including a map! https://www.visithalifax.com/301endlessyardsale
Historic Halifax will hold its yard sale in the Tap Room once again, at 101 N. King ST. both days. We are in need of donations! All the proceeds of the site’s yard sale will go directly into Historic Halifax’s living history and educational programs. Do you have used furniture, household goods, costume jewelry, books, toys, or collectables that you would like to donate? We’d love to have them. Call us at (252)583-7191 or bring them to the Visitors Center at 25 Saint David Street, Halifax.

05/27/2026

: Halifax’s Town Commons was located just outside the eastern boundaries of the original 120 town lots. During the colonial period, it was common for a town to lay aside “common” land for livestock grazing and other community uses. Halifax’s commons also encompassed part of the runoff from Magazine Spring, a water source for the townspeople. The 1769 Sauthier Map shows two sheds and a square line drawing that could portray a fence.
In 1818, as the Roanoke Canal was nearing completion, Halifax’s leaders hoped expanded commerce would lead to growth. The North Carolina General Assembly passed “An Act for the Sale of Commons in the Town of Halifax” that named Andrew Joyner, Robert Johnston, Joseph John Daniel, Benjamin F. Hallsey, and Shirley Tisdale commissioners to break up the old commons into half acre lots and sell them at public auction.
Pictured here: A section of the Sauthier Map of 1769 showing the “Commons,” and a 1958 survey from the Halifax County Register of Deeds that shows the “Old Common Line.”

05/26/2026

Memorial Day is a time to remember those who went before us—those service men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice for our independence. While the holiday’s roots were in the Civil War, it was changed after World War I to honor all veterans. The poppy, also a symbol of World War I, was also used as a remembrance of the sacrifice of all veterans lost in war.
The poppy was first written about in 1915 by Canadian doctor Lt. Colonel John McCrae, after the second Battle of Ypres. He walked among the crosses that had been placed where soldiers of both sides had fallen, noticing that poppies were springing up across the battlefield. The poppies, a flower known for its resilience, were red. To McCrae, it seemed the very blood of the soldiers was becoming tangible, and beautiful. He wrote “In Flanders Field” to memorialize the deaths of his comrades and the site of the flowers popping up where they had fallen. The poem begins, “In Flanders fields the poppies blow, Between the crosses, row on row That mark our place;”
In November 1918 as the “Great War” was coming to an end, another poet, Moina Michael, wrote “We Shall Keep the Faith.” This poem solidified the poppy as a symbol for the honoring of fallen veterans. “We cherish too, the Poppy red That grows on fields where valor led, It seems to signal to the skies That blood of heroes never dies.”

05/24/2026

Royal Governor Josiah Martin wrote to the Earl of Dartmouth on June 23, 1775 to report about the rising tensions in North Carolina and his abandonment of the Governor’s Mansion in New Bern. These are just excerpts of his letter. You can read his entire letter here: https://ncssar.org/2025/06/30/june-30-1775-martin-to-earl-of-dartmouth/
(Grammar and spelling that of the original author)
“On Tuesday the 23d of May a day when a set of People, calling themselves a Committee met at New Bern a motley mob, without any previous notice of their purpose, appeared coming towards my House. I did not see them until they were near my door, and supposing they were the committee of whose meeting I had heard, I directed my Secretary, if they announced themselves by that name to signify my resolution not to see them, he came to me however with a message from this body, importing that they were the Inhabitants of the Town of New Bern who were come to wait upon me, and requested to be admitted to speak to me. . . Mr Abner Nash an Attorney, and the oracle of the Committee appointed in that Town, whom I have before had occasion to mention to your Lordship, as a principal promoter of sedition here, came forward out of the crowd, and presenting himself before me said he had been chosen by the Inhabitants of Newbern then present to signify their purpose in waiting upon me, that it was in consequence of a general alarm, the People of the place had taken that morning at my dismounting some pieces of old cannon which lay behind my house, and which had occasionally been made use of on rejoicing days; that this circumstance had caused alarm, because the Governor of Virginia had lately deprived the People of that Colony of their Ammunition, and that the Inhabitants therefore requested, and hoped I would order the Guns to be remounted, and restored to the same order they had been in until that morning.
Unprepared as I was My Lord, for such a visit, and filled with indignation at the absurdity and impertinence of the cause of it, assigned by Mr Nash, and satisfied also that it was a mere pretext for insulting me, I replied, that the visit of the inhabitants of Newberne, and the motives of it I thought very extraordinary. That the Guns which I had dismounted belonged to the King, and that I was duly answerable to His Majesty for any disposition I made of them, but being at the same time inclined to quiet the minds of the Inhabitants of Newbern, and to give them every reasonable satisfaction, I then declared to them that I had dismounted the Guns, and laid them on the ground because the carriages were entirely rotten and unserviceable and incapable of bearing the discharge of them on the King’s birthday that was at hand, and for the celebration of which I was making the usual preparation of those Guns. Mr Nash said he was persuaded, the Answer I had condescended to give would be very satisfactory to the Inhabitants of New Bern, and bowing retired with his mob. I must confess to your Lordship the reason I assigned for dismounting those guns, was really but one of my motives, and that I had another which I did not think fit to communicate upon that occasion. I had received for some weeks before repeated advices of a design concerting in the Committee of that Town, to seize those guns by force, and my principal object in throwing them off the carriages, at the time I did it (although it was really necessary and intended for the other avowed purpose) was to make the removal of them more difficult in case of such an attempt, and to procure thereby more time to defend them, or at least to parley about them. . . Accordingly I determined after revolving the matter a moment in my mind, to relieve myself from all embarrassments that the sufferings of my family might expose me to, by sending them instantly to New York, which would at the same time furnish me with a certain unsuspected opportunity of writing to prevent any hazard of the Arms and Ammunition if they were not already sent away; place Mrs Martin and my children in safety, and leave me at liberty to pursue such measures as occasion might call for. . . .
My removal from New Bern it appears My Lord, was prudential and well timed, for I received advices from thence yesterday that I should have been insulted at least on Friday last the day of the General Election of Assembly men, when a mob was stimulated by some of the Leaders in sedition, after being inflamed with liquour, to seize and carry off the cannon behind my house, which they likewise made some slight attempt to break into, after repeatedly demanding the Keys of it in vain of my servants, who in consequence of my orders (having notice of the intention of the rabble) had spiked the guns, to the great disappointment and discomfiture of the Assailants.

05/23/2026

Website Blog Article: The Revolution Gets a Refresh. Posted by Guide to NC - Guide to North Carolina

05/23/2026

On this day in North Carolina History: May 23, 1775, Abner Nash and the New Bern “Sons of Liberty” storm the Governor’s Mansion (AKA Tryon Palace). After the news of the Battles of Lexington and Concord reached North Carolina, tensions between Patriots and the Royal Government rose exponentially. Abner Nash led the New Bern Sons of Liberty in protesting Royal authorities starting in mid-May, 1775. Royal Authority in North Carolina was centered at the Governor’s Mansion in New Bern. In response to the elevated tensions, Governor Josiah Martin ordered all the cannons from their mounts around the palace and stored away. The Sons of Liberty demanded to know why he had removed the cannons. The governor’s explanation was that the mounts were rotten, but the actual reason, as they suspected, was his fear that the cannons might be used in an insurrection. As the protests escalated, Martin feared for the safety of his family and quickly sent them off to New York. On the evening of May 23rd, Nash led the patriots to remove the cannons. Governor Martin would end up fleeing New Bern in the wee hours of the morning. He became the first Royal Governor to abandon his colony during the Revolutionary War. Tomorrow, we will hear Josiah Martin’s side of the story.
Source: https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/nash-abner