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Survey of Historic Sites and Buildings

	GRAND ASSEMBLY OF THE ALBEMARLE (LOST SITE) North Carolina
Location: Monument in Pasquotank County, on N.C. 170, about 1 mile north of Nixonton.

At least 100 settlers were already living in the region just north of Albemarle Sound in 1663, when Charles II granted Carolina to a group of proprietors. In 1664, they appointed William Drummond as Governor, and early the next year they promulgated the "Concessions and Agreement," which provided for a unicameral legislature having broad powers and composed of the Governor, his council, and 12 deputies. The first such legislature met early that year on Halls Creek, about 7 miles south west of present Elizabeth City. According to tradition, it assembled beneath a large oak tree because no building was large enough to accommodate it. Among the business transacted was a petition asking that land be granted to settlers on the same terms as in Virginia—resulting in the Great Deed of Grant in 1668. The exact site of the first meeting of the Grand Assembly of the Albemarle is not known, but the stone monument adjacent to Halls Creek Church is probably not far away.