Thomas Polk

In the record (11)

1. 1753

   Thomas Polk (b. c.1732/1732 in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania) moved with two brothers to Anson County, North Carolina in 1753.

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

2. 1755

   In 1755, surveyor Thomas Polk built his home at the spot where two Indian trading paths crossed -- a site that decades later became "the Square," the intersection of Charlotte's Trade and Tryon Streets. That same year he married Susannah Spratt, of the Spratt settler family.

   Independence Square (Trade & Tryon)William TryonSusannah Spratt

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

3. 1763 · 1763-04-19

   The first session of the Mecklenburg County Court of Common Pleas and Quarter Sessions convened on April 19, 1763, when sixteen Justices of the Peace -- including Thomas Polk -- took their oaths of office.

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

4. 1765

   Thomas Polk rose to local prominence during the 1765 "Sugar Creek War," organizing settler resistance against colonial land surveyors over land grants and tax disputes in the backcountry.

   Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.

   Sugaw Creek Presbyterian Church

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

5. 1767 · 1767-01-15

   On January 15, 1767, Abraham Alexander, Thomas Polk, and John Frohock purchased 360 acres from George Augustus Selwyn for ninety pounds as the site for the town of Charlotte; commissioners then laid out one hundred acres in half-acre lots on a grid of streets, with the east-west trading path becoming Trade Street and the Great Wagon Road becoming Tryon Street (named for royal governor William Tryon).

   Trading Path (NC highway marker L-36)George AlexanderAbraham AlexanderSamuel C. AlexanderAugustus BechtlerKing GeorgeWilliam TryonJohn FrohockGeorge Augustus Selwyn

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

6. 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 StoreMecklenburg County CourthouseWilliam Tryon

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

7. 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)Mecklenburg County CourthouseWilliam Tryon

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

8. 1771

   Queen's College opened operating out of a building erected by Thomas Polk at the southeast corner of South Tryon and Third Streets in Charlotte, with advertisements for the college appearing in newspapers beginning July 1771; the college operated through 1771-1772 without final royal approval of its charter, with Edmund Fanning (Yale 1757, Harvard 1764) nominally selected as president, though he likely never served due to his role suppressing the Regulator Movement.

   Queen's CollegeElizabeth CollegeWilliam TryonEdmund Fanning

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

9. 1775 · 1775-05-20

   The traditional narrative names approximately 27 signers of the Mecklenburg Declaration, with Colonel Thomas Polk (commander of the Mecklenburg militia) presiding over the meeting and Dr. Ephraim Brevard credited as the principal author/secretary; the group was, with perhaps one or two exceptions, entirely Presbyterian.

   Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.

   Ephraim Brevard

   Source · checked 2026-08-13

10. 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.

    Mecklenburg County CourthouseEphraim Brevard

    Source · checked 2026-08-13

11. 1780

    The famous attribution of the phrase 'hornet's nest [of rebellion]' to Lord Cornwallis describing Charlotte/Mecklenburg has NO surviving contemporary 18th-century documentary source -- no letter, diary, or dispatch written by Cornwallis or his officers during or shortly after the 1780 occupation contains the quote. According to multiple secondary historical accounts, the earliest known appearances of the story in writing come from local Mecklenburg figures John McKnitt Alexander and William Polk, writing in the early 19th century (i.e., 30+ years after the events), meaning the quote as popularly repeated is oral tradition/local legend rather than a documented historical fact.

    Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.

    George AlexanderAbraham AlexanderSamuel C. AlexanderJohn McKnitt AlexanderLord CornwallisWilliam Polk

    Source · checked 2026-08-13