As usual the source of the following information is the book ""Orange County - 1752-1952". Orange county originally included the present day Orange, Chatham, Caswell, Person and Alamance. There were also portions of Durham, Wake, Guilford, Rockingham, Randolph, and Lee. Wake was formed in 1770 from portions of Orange, Johnston and Cumberland to have a new county that would make it easier for the inhabitants to attend the courts, general musters and other public meetings. Guilford was formed in 1770 from Orange and Rowan "in order to separate the 'Insurgents' during the government trouble with the regulators." The original portion of Orange that went to Guilford included what in 1785 became the eastern portion of Rockingham. Chatham was formed from southern Orange in 1771 during the Regulator uprising to encourage its inhabitants in the public duties. The northern boundary was 16 miles south of Hillsboro. Chatham county included territory that in 1779 became the eastern part of Randolph. The residents in the northern part of Orange began trying for a new county as early as 1770 because they found attendance at the general muster and courts "very burdensome". Finally in 1777, Caswell county was formed with the dividing line between Caswell and Orange running 12 miles north of Hillsboro. Eastern Caswell was organized as Person in 1792. For more than a decade there were citizens trying to form a new county in the western portion of what was left of Orange. At the time the western portion was largely industrial and the eastern portion largely agricultural. Finally in 1849 Alamance county was formed from the western part of Orange. The dividing line ran 9 miles west of Hillsboro. Following the Civil War there was one more change in the size of Orange county. Durham had become a center of the tobacco industry. Hillsboro landowners apparently had very little interest in tobacco. Durham was formed from Orange and Wake in 1881. This left Orange a small county of only 398 square miles, its present size. Larry Noah - lrnoah@bigfoot.com Listowner - NCORANGE mailing list See my Ancestors at - http://www.trailerpark.com/tango/lrnoah Gedcoms & other data are at - http://members.tripod.com/~lrnoah Florence Co,SC GenWeb - http://www.rootsweb.com/~scfloren Orange Co, NC GenWeb - http://www.rootsweb.com/~ncorange ==== NCORANGE Mailing List ==== Larry Noah - lrnoah@bigfoot.com - Listowner - NCORANGE mailing list Orange Co, NC USGenWeb site is at http://www.rootsweb.com/~ncorange GENDEX at http://www.gendex.com/gendex/ has over 1400 databases on line