Andersons of Colonial N. Carolina

A couple of quotes I find interesting…

Report by George Burrington concerning general conditions in North Carolina

Burrington, George, 1680-1759

January 01, 1733

Colonial and State Records of North Carolina  Volume 03, Pages 429-437

…Plantations continue to sell very cheap, those with Houses, Barns, Orchards, Gardens, Pasture, and Tillage grounds fenced: yield about thirty or forty pistoles; Notwithstanding the work done upon them, oft’ times has cost four times as much. The reason why they yield no more is, that several People chuse to remove into fresh Places, for the Benefit of their Cattle, and Hogs, which is a great convenience to new Comers, who may always buy convenient settlements; for less mony then the buildings, and other improvements could be made.

A few years past a Planter removed from Virginia into this Government, he bought eleven inhabited Plantations, adjoyning each other in the old settlements; on the said Plantations lived almost one hundred white People when I was here formerly, now all removed into new settlements, this Purchaser has no white Person in his family except a wife, and not more then ten Negroes, yet keeps all the Plantations in his own management; by this and many other instances I am able to give, it appears how easy a man that has a little mony may purchase much Land in North Carolina.

…Land is not wanting for men in Carolina, but men for land.

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http://www.ah.dcr.state.nc.us/SECTIONS/hp/Colonial/Bookshelf/murray/preface.htm

Letters of James Murray, Loyalist

JAMES MURRAY TO WILLIAM ELLISON,  BRUNSWICK, 14th Febry, 1735/6.

“…If he can find land, he may have 10 times that quantity; if not, he will get none that is worth while, nor no body else, for people that are aquaint with ye country only know where ye vacant land is, so they get a warrant survey & patents & then screw as much as they can from a stranger for it, who in his turn serves others the same way.”

James Murray (1713-1781) emigrated to the Cape Fear region of North Carolina as a young Scot in 1736. For the next 29 years Murray was a moderately successful merchant, planter, and government official in the colony.

Murray was appointed to several minor offices almost as soon as he arrived in North Carolina. By 1739 he was a member of the provincial council, of which he became president in 1754, and at various times served as secretary and associate justice of the General Court. His conflict with Governor Arthur Dobbs and disappointed hopes of himself becoming chief justice moved him to quit the colony in 1765. Murray joined relatives in Boston and remained there until 1776, spending the few remaining years of his life as a loyalist refugee in Nova Scotia.