Historic Orton 
Orton Plantation was established in 1725 by 
Roger Moore, a gentleman of distinguished 
lineage from Goose Creek, South Carolina. His 
brother, Colonel Maurice Moore, had attained 
such fame in North and South Carolina as an 
Indian fighter and treaty maker that large grants 
were given him along the Cape Fear River by 
the Lords Proprietors, who, at that time, ruled 
both the Carolinas. 
Colonel Moore had spent the last nine years of 
his career just before reaching the Cape Fear, 
in Albemarle County, North Carolina, and 
brought with him a number of prominent friends, 
who together with a party from South Carolina, 
led by Roger Moore and Nathaniel Moore, 
divided the Cape Fear from its mouth to beyond 
Wilmington. Many fine plantations were then 
established, but Orton is one of the few that 
remains intact. The Moores established the 
town of Brunswick, now within the boundaries 
of Orton, where several of the prominent set- 
tlers took up their abode, and in a few years it 
became the chief business center of the State. 
All that remains of it today are the impressive 
- walls of St. Philip's Church and a number of 
interesting old graves. 
In 1749 Brunswick was captured by a Spanish 
expedition, but in three days the Cape Fear 
men drove them out and sank one of the three 
Spanish ships. An oil painting taken from this 
ship still hangs in the vestry of St. James Church, 
Wilmington. 
Still within the boundaries of Orton is the site 


