Tryon County is a former
county
A county () is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesL. Brookes (ed.) '' Chambers Dictionary''. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2005. in some nations. The term is derived from the Old French denoti ...
which was located in the
U.S. state
In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its so ...
of
North Carolina
North Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, South Carolina to the south, Georgia (U.S. stat ...
. It was formed in 1768 from the part of
Mecklenburg County west of the
Catawba River, although the legislative act that created it did not become effective until April 10, 1769. Due to inaccurate and delayed surveying, Tryon County encompassed a large area of northwestern
South Carolina
South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...
.
["Tryon County, North Carolina History"]
by Alfred Nixon; 1910 It was named for
William Tryon
Lieutenant-General William Tryon (8 June 172927 January 1788) was a British Army officer and colonial administrator who served as governor of North Carolina from 1764 to 1771 and the governor of New York from 1771 to 1777. He also served durin ...
,
governor
A governor is an politician, administrative leader and head of a polity or Region#Political regions, political region, in some cases, such as governor-general, governors-general, as the head of a state's official representative. Depending on the ...
of the
North Carolina Colony from 1765 to 1771.
The county seat, finally designated in 1774, was located eight miles southwest of the present-day community of
Lincolnton, in
Lincoln County.
History
The act establishing the county named commissioners to select a place "whereon to erect court house, prison and stocks."
[North Carolina GenWeb.com]
/ref> The initial court records beginning with the April 1769 sessions were recorded by Ezekiel Polk, clerk, and the grandfather of James K. Polk
James Knox Polk (; November 2, 1795 – June 15, 1849) was the 11th president of the United States, serving from 1845 to 1849. A protégé of Andrew Jackson and a member of the Democratic Party, he was an advocate of Jacksonian democracy and ...
, 11th president of the United States.
In 1771 Governor Tryon called out five militiamen of Tryon County to help put down the Regulator Movement
The Regulator Movement in North Carolina, also known as the Regulator Insurrection, War of Regulation, and War of the Regulation, was an uprising in Provincial North Carolina from 1766 to 1771 in which citizens took up arms against colonial offi ...
, a protest against corrupt county officials and excessive taxes, centered in counties to the northeast of Tryon. Although the colony was officially at peace with the Indians from 1763 to 1776, the Tryon County frontier was the target of occasional raids, usually by Cherokee
The Cherokee (; , or ) people are one of the Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, they were concentrated in their homelands, in towns along river valleys of what is now southwestern ...
, but sometimes by Shawnee
The Shawnee ( ) are a Native American people of the Northeastern Woodlands. Their language, Shawnee, is an Algonquian language.
Their precontact homeland was likely centered in southern Ohio. In the 17th century, they dispersed through Ohi ...
and other faraway tribes. Settlers constructed several stockade forts to protect themselves and their neighbors: Fort McGaughey was near Brittain Church; Fort McFadden was on Mountain Creek near Rutherfordton; and Potts' Fort in Montfords Cove.
It was not until 1774 that any county buildings were planned or even constructed, using appointed residents' houses for county activities in the interim. The commissioners (appointed by an Act of Assembly to select the place whereon to erect and build the court-house, prison and stocks of Tryon County, on 26 July 1774) reported their selection of the place: "..called '' 'the crossroads' '', on Christian Mauney's land, between the heads of Long Creek, Muddy Creek, and Beaver Dam Creek in the county aforesaid as most central and convenient for the purpose aforesaid." The county court then adjourned to immediately re-meet at Mauney's. The site of the old Tryon courthouse is eight miles southwest of Lincolnton, Lincoln County, North Carolina colony. The October Sessions of 1774, were also held at the house of Mauney, and a room in his dwelling was designated as county jail.
When the British-allied Cherokee attacked several settlements in the county early in the American War for Independence (1776), most Tories joined with their Whig neighbors in fighting off the raiders. General Griffith Rutherford then led a punitive expedition
A punitive expedition is a military journey undertaken to punish a political entity or any group of people outside the borders of the punishing state or union. It is usually undertaken in response to perceived disobedient or morally wrong beha ...
to devastate the Overhill Cherokee
The Overhill Cherokee were a group of the Cherokee people located in their historic settlements in what is now the U.S. state of Tennessee in the Southeastern United States, on the western side of the Appalachian Mountains. This name was used b ...
towns across the Blue Ridge Mountains
The Blue Ridge Mountains are a Physiographic regions of the United States, physiographic province of the larger Appalachian Highlands range. The mountain range is located in the Eastern United States and extends 550 miles southwest from southern ...
, .
Following the Battle of Lexington
The Battles of Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775 were the first major military actions of the American Revolutionary War between the Kingdom of Great Britain and Patriot (American Revolution), Patriot militias from America's Thirteen Co ...
in Massachusetts
Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...
, 49 county residents gathered at the courthouse and issued the Tryon Resolves, a declaration of resistance to coercive actions by the British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, Crown colony, colonies, protectorates, League of Nations mandate, mandates, and other Dependent territory, territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It bega ...
against its North American colonies. Although not a statement of independence, the Tryon Resolves were among the earliest of many local colonial declarations which called for the redress of perceived wrongs inflicted on the colonies from the British Parliament
The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, and may also legislate for the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of ...
and The Crown
The Crown is a political concept used in Commonwealth realms. Depending on the context used, it generally refers to the entirety of the State (polity), state (or in federal realms, the relevant level of government in that state), the executive ...
. The document was signed on August 14, 1775, predating the United States Declaration of Independence
The Declaration of Independence, formally The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen States of America in the original printing, is the founding document of the United States. On July 4, 1776, it was adopted unanimously by the Second Continen ...
by almost 11 months.
Earlier in the decade, Tryon residents had formed a Committee of Safety to provide security for the settlers in the area. Now, the committee had to prepare for a potential war. As tensions between the North American colonies and the British government further increased, the committeemen, all signers of "The Resolves," gathered the following month (on September 14, 1775). At that time they formed the Tryon County, North Carolina militia in preparation for British retaliation against American resistance.
In 1779, Tryon County was divided into Lincoln and Rutherford Counties in North Carolina, and ceased to exist.
Geography
In December 1768, Governor Tryon described the area in a letter as:
"''...forty-five miles in breadth due north and south and eighty miles due east and west—it having been found to be that distance from the Catawba River to the western frontier line which was run last year between the Cherokee hunting grounds and this Province''."
The original area of Tryon County encompassed the following modern day areas:["The Formation of the North Carolina Counties, 1663–1943"; by David Leroy Corbitt; Raleigh, Division of Archives and History, North Carolina (Department of Cultural Resources); 1950.]
The entire areas of:
* Cleveland County, North Carolina
Cleveland County is a County (United States), county located in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains and the western Piedmont, on the southern border of the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, t ...
, including Kings Mountain
* Gaston County, North Carolina
* Lincoln County, including Ramsour's Mill
* Rutherford County, North Carolina
Rutherford County is a County (United States), county in the southwestern area of the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 64,444. Its county seat is Rutherfordton, North Carolina, R ...
* Cherokee County, South Carolina
Cherokee County is a county in the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 56,216. The county seat is Gaffney. The county was formed in 1897 from parts of York, Union, and Spartanburg counties. It was named ...
* Chester County, South Carolina
Chester County is a County (United States), county located in the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, its population was 32,294. Its county seat is Chester, South Carolina, Chester.Chester County is i ...
* Laurens County, South Carolina
Laurens County is a county located in the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 census, its population was 67,539. Its county seat is Laurens. Laurens County is included in the Greenville-Anderson-Greer, SC Metropolitan Statistical Ar ...
* Spartanburg County, South Carolina
Spartanburg County is a county located on the northwestern border of the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 327,997, making it the fifth-most populous county in South Carolina. Its county seat is Spartan ...
* Union County, South Carolina
Union County is a County (United States), county located in the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 27,244. Its county seat is Union, South Carolina, Union. The county was created i ...
* York County, South Carolina
York County is a county on the north central border in the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 282,090, making it the seventh-most populous county in the state. Its county seat is the city of York, and its ...
...and parts of:
* Burke County, North Carolina
Burke County is a county in the U.S. state of North Carolina. It is part of the state's western mountain region, containing sections of the Blue Ridge Mountains including the Linville Gorge and South Mountains. As of the 2020 census, its po ...
* McDowell County, North Carolina
McDowell County is a county located in the U.S. state of North Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 44,578. Its county seat is Marion.
McDowell County comprises the Marion, NC Micropolitan Statistical Area, which is also incl ...
* Greenville County, South Carolina
Greenville County ( ; locally ) is located in the U.S. state of South Carolina. As of the 2020 census, the population was 525,534, making it the most populous county in the state. Its county seat is Greenville. The county is also home to ...
* Newberry County, South Carolina
Newberry County is a county located in the U.S. state
In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separ ...
* The Catawba Indian Reservation
Notable people
* William Graham, militia and political leader during the War for Independence.
* Frederick Hambright, "Resolves" signer and militia leader wounded during the War for Independence.
* Joseph Hardin, "Resolves" signer, militia leader during the War for Independence, and later a legislative representative for the State of Franklin
The State of Franklin (also the Free Republic of Franklin, Lost State of Franklin, or the State of Frankland) was an unrecognized proposed U.S. state, state located in present-day East Tennessee, in the United States. Franklin was created in ...
and the Southwest Territory
The Territory South of the River Ohio, more commonly known as the Southwest Territory or the old Southwest Territory, was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from May 26, 1790, until June 1, 1796, when it was ...
.
See also
* List of former United States counties
This is a list of former United States counties, a list of United States counties (administrative subunits of a U.S. state) that no longer exist.
They were established by a state, provincial, colonial, or territorial government. Most of these ...
* List of North Carolina counties
The U.S. state of North Carolina is divided into 100 counties. North Carolina ranks 28th in size by area, but has the seventh-highest number of counties in the country.
Following the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, King Charles II rewa ...
References
External links
Tryon County, North Carolina
at carolana.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tryon County, North Carolina
1768 establishments in North Carolina
1779 disestablishments in North Carolina
Former counties of North Carolina