History of Carteret County...Pre-Revolutionary War: Hosues for Sale in Emerald Isle, NC

Carteret County, North Carolina was formed in 1722 out of Craven County, one of the more important regions of the Carolina colony.   It is named in honor of Sir John Carteret, who later became the Earl of Granville and one of the Lords Proprietors of North Carolina.

Native inhabitants of the area were the Iroquois-speaking Tuscarora Indians.  The Tuscarora Nation lived between the Neuse and Pamlico Rivers in eastern North Carolina.  As early as 1706, white settlers of Huguenot, German, Scotch-Irish, French, and English descent arrived in the region.  Most had migrated southward from northern American colonies rather than from Europe.  Also, in 1721 Quakers from Rhode Island came in family units and settled on the north side of the Newport River.

Beaufort, Carteret’s county seat, is the third oldest town in North Carolina.  Beaufort is located south of the center of Carteret County on the Beaufort Inlet, a channel which splits Bogue Banks from Shackleford Banks and leads south to the Atlantic Ocean. To the west is the tidal Newport River separating the town from Morehead City, another port city established in the 1850's on land known as Shepard's Point. To the east is the unincorporated neighborhood of Lenoxville, extending to the North River, another tidal river. Initially, Beaufort was known appropriately as Fishtown because the fishing industry was and remains an important part of the county’s history.  Beaufort was later named for Henry Somerset, Duke of Beaufort.

Almost from its beginning, Carteret County participated in global trade.  Plantations produced goods such as tobacco, grains, and salted meats and fish to export to England.  Lumber was also a major export due to the area’s vast forests.  The most significant commercial industry was naval stores–tar, pitch, rosin, and turpentine.

The largest plantations were in the central and western parts of Carteret County.  Large land owners included Robert Williams, William Borden, and the Stanton family.  Unlike other parts of North Carolina and Virginia, no large pillared houses were constructed in the county; the Williams’ plantation home, for example, was brick and plain.

Portsmouth to the northest and Beaufort to the south served as the county’s major ports and connections with England.  Ships landed in Portsmouth where the town functioned as a lightering port. Cargo from ocean-going vessels could be transferred to shallow-draft vessels capable of traversing Pamlico and Core Sounds. Portsmouth grew to a peak population of 685 in 1860. Though small, Portsmouth was one of the most important points-of-entry along the Atlantic coast in post-Revolutionary America., and workers transferred cargo to smaller boats for transport to the mainland.  However, as its depth decreased, Portsmouth harbor declined as a port of entry, and the town was subsequently abandoned. Beaufort remains significant to this day, and is home to the North Carolina Maritime Museum, the Duke University Marine Laboratory (Nicholas School of the Environment), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Center for Coastal Fisheries and Habitat Research. It is also the location of the Rachel Carson Coastal Reserve.

Formal education was not a priority for the early settlers of Carteret County.  Most children were preoccupied with working on the farms.  Wealthier families usually sent their children outside the colony for advanced training.  In the community of Hunting Quarters, however, the Scotch-Irish established the area’s first school; it became the first accredited high school in the county.  The first Anglican Church in Beaufort, St. John’s Parish, was organized approximately in 1724.  However, the increasing influx of Baptists, Quakers, and other denominations contributed to the decreasing number of Anglicans in Carteret County.

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