Carteret County News-Times | Cheryl Burke
TUTTLE’S GROVE — The past and present met in a special way Sept. 19 when N.C. State University students spent the day cleaning up a Quaker cemetery, dating from the 1700s, nestled near a creek and wooded area behind Tuttle’s Grove Methodist Church on Highway 101.
The plot of land in front of the cemetery was given to the Quakers by Nicolas Briant in the 1700s as the site for a Quaker meeting house, according to Tuttle’s Grove church member and historian June Merrill.
Records show that the Core Sound Meeting House was built in 1736, and the Friends, another term used for Quakers, held their first meeting in the new structure Jan. 3, 1737. Tuttle’s Grove Methodist Church is located about 50 yards east of the original Quaker meeting house and contains some of the building’s lumber and beams.
“It is documented that on Sept. 23, 1737, Henry Stanton, a prominent leader in establishing the Quaker community in Carteret County, deeded two adjoining acres of pastureland to meet the need for a community cemetery,” Merrill said. “Benjamin Small was assigned to pale or fence in the graveyard.”
Merrill added that some of the fencing, including an old gate, remains on the site, where she estimates there are about 55 Quaker members buried. The graveyard is still used to this day and contains early county residents from the 1700s, 1800s and up to the present.
The cemetery had become overgrown with trees, underbrush and other debris.
The group of 10 students, who attend classes at the N.C. State University program in Havelock, agreed to donate time for their wellness day, which was Sept. 19, after members of Tuttle’s Grove contacted the program’s student director. The wellness day is set aside by the university for students to take a break for their mental well-being.
N.C. State sophomore Jared McCleery said he wanted to spend his time helping others.
“I wanted to come out and do something to help,” he said. “I think it’s really cool, and I’ve learned a lot.”
Junior Mack Harrison of Morehead City agreed.
“This is nice,” he said. “I’m a fan of history and preserving and restoring it.”
Merrill said the congregation appreciated the much-needed help.
“I think it is magnanimous of them to do this, and we are very thankful for their help,” she said.
The church hopes to refurbish the old cemetery so the public can enjoy it. Several old gravestones and bricks used to mark graves still lie broken or fallen over. In addition, old ballast stones from ships, used by Quakers to mark some graves, remain on the grounds. Merrill said other markers were “modest wooden headstones from cedar trees.”
Of the early Quaker leaders, one of the most legible headstones remaining today marks the grave of Joseph Borden, who died Jan. 6, 1825, at the age of 56.
“His marker is the only one in the ancient burying ground upon which the inscription can be raised (copied),” Merrill said.
The area’s Quaker population began to diminish in the early- to mid-1800s when division regarding the issue of slavery caused many in the church to leave the county and move to free states.
According to historical records and accounts by the late county historian F.C. Salisbury of Morehead City, a large group of Quakers, primarily from Rhode Island, came to what is now Carteret County as early as 1721 to establish homes and enjoy the freedom to worship. While historical records don’t say how Quakers traveled to the county, it is believed a great number of them came by boat, because two of the principal leaders of the group, William Borden and Stanton, were boatbuilders in Newport, Rhode Island. Little is known about Nicolas Briant who gave the land.
Borden settled in the Harlowe township, purchasing a large tract of land bordering the Newport River, where he established a sawmill and shipyard in the area known today as Mill Creek. Stanton took up his grant of 1,900 acres eastward from Core Creek. Merrill said many of the Quakers settled in communities along the Newport River, including Beaufort, Core Creek and Harlowe.
“They extended into adjoining counties, tending to follow rivers like the Trent and Pamlico,” Merrill said.
In the mid-1800s, Methodists were becoming increasingly active in the county, and the property was eventually transferred to The Methodist Episcopal Church South in Beaufort (Ann Street Methodist Church), according to Merrill. Half a century later, on Jan. 12, 1948, Ann Street Methodist Church deeded the property to the trustees of Tuttle’s Grove Methodist Church.
Merrill said when Tuttle’s Grove members voted in 2022 to split from the United Methodist Church, the building and property became an incorporated, independent Methodist Church with a board of directors. The property and building became theirs.
With that move came a renewed interest in fixing up the Quaker cemetery, making it attractive and accessible to those who want to see it. The church hopes to establish a level rock pathway, refurbish the grave markers and clear additional brush. They also hope to get it marked as a historical site. Church members are raising funds for the project.
As for what became of the county’s original Quaker population, Merrill said, “Quakers lingered in the area for more than 100 years after 1733. The coming of Methodists into Carteret County and the issue of slavery led to the decline in Quaker congregations. Pressure was brought to bear on the Friends for owning and hiring slaves to work their farmland. Also, younger ones among them associated with the Methodists and began ‘marrying out of unity.’ A sharp decline in their numbers seemed inevitable.”
A historical marker was placed in 1959 on Highway 101 in front of Tuttle’s Grove United Methodist Church to mark the original meeting house’s location.
“It was located slightly to the right of the present-day church and faced Beaufort,” Merrill said. “The building standing on the site today has in its framing all the lumber and beams its builders could reuse from the meeting house, which had stood in a state of disrepair for several decades. These early Methodists were being frugal and at the same time keeping the history of the Quaker church alive in the new structure.”
Construction of Tuttle’s Grove was started in 1902. The Rev. Daniel Herndon Tuttle, whose tent meeting on the site in 1898 started the church, returned to dedicate the new church.
Merrill said the cost of refurbishing the Quaker cemetery will be funded through donations from church members, friends and others interested in helping. Those interested can make checks payable to Tuttle’s Grove Methodist Church and mail them to the church treasurer, Lou Umstead, 2963 US Highway 70 E, Beaufort, NC 25816. Designate “Quaker Cemetery” on the memo line.