The History of the Dividing Line betwixt Virginia and North Carolina Run in the Year of Our Lord 1728.

The Colonial Origins of Modern Territoriality: Property Surveying in the Thirteen Colonies

“…For example, as one historian notes, failures to survey the East-West Jersey line created a class of “property dispute that became a causal factor in the eighteenth-century unrest” in New Jersey (McConville 1999, 18). Similar connections can be seen in primary accounts, such as that of Virginia’s lead commissioner in its 1728 North Carolina boundary survey, writing that before the survey “People on the Frontiers enter’d for land, & took out Patents by guess, either from Virginia or North Carolina” (Berland 2013, 75). Surveying the colonial boundary would remove the uncertainty over which colony had the right to grant property in the boundary area.…”

“…In almost all of these cases, a surveyor with an official role, either as surveyor general or deputy surveyor, was included. The number of surveyors involved in each boundary survey varied, from one surveyor taking overall responsibility for the first East Jersey-West Jersey survey to the first North Carolina-Virginia survey, which included seven commissioners, four surveyors (one of whom was also a commissioner), one chaplain, one recruiter, and over 15 other workers, possibly including slaves (Berland 2013, 461–74). The relevant expertise of those involved in boundary surveys, then, was not limited to property surveying and also included various members of colonial society.…”