Heartsease, 113 East Queen Street, Hillsborough, Orange County, NC

Significance: Firmly entrenched local tradition says that the State's third governor, Thomas Burke, lived in this house before the Revolution. This house was said to be his "town house" while Tyaquin, a plantation 1/2 mile northeast of Hillsborough (where Burke is buried), was his country residence. He is said to have been captured on the front steps of Heartsease on the foggy morning of Sept. 12, 1781, by David Fanning's band of Tories. Miss Mary W. ("Polly") Burke, daughter of Governor Burke, owned Heartsease from 1810 to 1837 when she sold it to the Heartt family who gave it its name. It was the home of Dennis Heartt, famous editor of the influential Hillsborough Recorder, for many years and still (in 1963) belongs to a relative of the Heartt family. One of North Carolina's most famous houses.
Survey number: HABS NC-159
Building/structure dates: ca. 1772 Initial Construction
Building/structure dates: after 1810 Subsequent Work
Building/structure dates: after 1837 Subsequent Work