Mecklenburg County Courthouse

In the record (11)

1. 1766

   Mecklenburg County's first courthouse -- a log building raised on ten-foot brick pillars in the English tradition, leaving an open ground floor used as a market for selling animals and produce -- was built at the intersection of Trade and Tryon streets; sources differ on the exact construction year, citing either 1766 or 1768, and it served as the county courthouse for about 42 years until replaced by a brick courthouse in 1810.

   Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.

   Independence Square (Trade & Tryon)William Tryon

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

2. 1768

   The town of Charlotte was formally incorporated in 1768 following advocacy by Thomas Polk, one of Charlotte's founders and a state legislator (and great-uncle of future U.S. President James K. Polk); the county courthouse stood at the center of the Trade-and-Tryon street grid, drawing farmers who combined legal business at court with trading, cementing Charlotte's role as the county's main trading town.

   Queen City Drug StoreThomas PolkWilliam Tryon

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

3. 1768

   Thomas Polk was instrumental in having Charlotte designated the Mecklenburg County seat under the 1768 town charter; the county courthouse at Trade and Tryon was built directly across from his homestead.

   Independence Square (Trade & Tryon)Thomas PolkWilliam Tryon

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

4. 1772

   When William Moultrie passed through while surveying the North Carolina-South Carolina boundary in 1772, Charlotte Town consisted of only five or six houses, described as 'very ordinary built of logs,' illustrating the small scale of the courthouse village even after incorporation.

   William Moultrie

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

5. 1775 · 1775-05-20

   Traditionalist heritage accounts hold that delegates from Mecklenburg County's militia companies met at the county courthouse in Charlotte on May 19-20, 1775, and, upon hearing news of the Battles of Lexington and Concord, adopted a declaration proclaiming themselves 'a free and independent people' who dissolved all political ties with Great Britain and the Crown, more than a year before the national Declaration of Independence.

   Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

6. 1775 · 1775-05-31

   Separately from the disputed Declaration, the Mecklenburg Resolves were a set of about 20 resolutions adopted on May 31, 1775, at a meeting organized by Colonel Thomas Polk at the Mecklenburg County courthouse in Charlotte, with Dr. Ephraim Brevard serving as secretary; the Resolves declared 'that all Laws and Commissions confirmed by, or derived from, the Authority of the King or Parliament, are annulled and vacated' and asserted that the Continental Congress and locally elected committees held governing authority in the colonies.

   Thomas PolkEphraim Brevard

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

7. 1780 · 1780-09-26

   On September 26, 1780, at the Battle of Charlotte, Colonel William R. Davie's roughly 150 mounted infantry and dragoons, reinforced by Captain Joseph Graham's volunteers, made a defensive stand around Charlotte's wooden courthouse against Lord Cornwallis's much larger British force, repelling several cavalry charges before withdrawing in an orderly retreat; Patriot losses were about five killed, while the British reportedly suffered around thirty casualties among privates plus wounded officers.

   Lord CornwallisPeter ForceWilliam R. DavieJoseph Graham

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

8. 1791

   Before any dedicated church building existed for Charlotte's own Presbyterian congregation (First Presbyterian Church of Charlotte was not formally organized until 1832), traveling ministers preached in a grove near a blacksmith shop on what is now First Presbyterian's grounds as early as the 1750s, and many town-dwelling Presbyterians in the courthouse-village era instead worshipped at Sugar (Sugaw) Creek Presbyterian Church, located three to four miles north of town.

   First Presbyterian ChurchMecklenburg PresbyteryFirst United Presbyterian ChurchFirst Baptist Church WestFirst Presbyterian Church

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

9. 1809

   A 1809 travel diary by William D. Martin ('A Journey from South Carolina to Connecticut') describes Charlotte at the close of the courthouse-village era as consisting of two streets crossing in a square, with a 'tolerably elegant Brick Court House with a cupola' at the center -- the county's third courthouse on that site, replacing the earlier 1766 log courthouse.

   Douglas Martin

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

10. 1845

    A new two-story Mecklenburg County courthouse was erected in 1845 on the northeast corner of Trade and Church Streets in Charlotte, the county's third courthouse building, replacing an earlier brick courthouse that had been overhauled around 1829.

    Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.

    Mecklenburg PresbyteryFirst United Presbyterian ChurchFirst Baptist Church West

    Source · checked 2026-08-14

11. 1970

    The land cleared from Brooklyn's demolition was used to build the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Government Center, the Mecklenburg County Courthouse, Marshall Park, and, decades later, the NASCAR Hall of Fame — government and civic buildings replaced the residential and commercial Black neighborhood that had stood there.

    NASCAR Hall of FameMarshall ParkCharlotte-Mecklenburg Government CenterMarshall ParkNASCAR Hall of Fame

    Source · checked 2026-08-13