Andrew Lee Hatchell Comes to Beaufort, NC

When Andrew Lee Hatchell came to Beaufort in 1826 there were 1665 people, or about 230 families in Beaufort and the immediate area . As fate would have it, 23-year-old Andrew Lee Hatchell met Charity Fuller, who lived with her parents on the waterfront. The couple were married on November 16, 1826. Little did he know that this marriage would lead to inherited land and a home for him and his new wife. Even though Andrew met an early death in 1841, this marriage began the Hatchell/Hatsell lineage in Beaufort.

Charity Fuller, who would become mother, grandmother and caretaker of the family, was the daughter of Belcher Fuller and Zilphia Gutherie. Belcher Fuller's father Nathan Fuller (1750-1800) served in the Revolutionary War as an ensign in the Carteret County Militia. In Beaufort’s Old Burial Ground Mamré Wilson wrote, as a “navigator and ship owner, Fuller sailed from Beaufort to the West Indies, England and Barbados bringing supplies into Beaufort harbor prior to the Revolutionary War. By 1784, his landholdings had increased to 400 acres. He was elected to the North Carolina House the following year. He married Mary Pacquinett, whose family helped establish the Core Sound Quaker Meeting House.”

Belcher Fuller's Great Great Grandfather was William Borden. William Borden Jr. purchased property in 1768, the year the William Borden House was built on the Beaufort waterfront. His father, William Borden, Sr., was a shipbuilder from Portsmouth, Rhode Island, who arrived in North Carolina in 1732 aboard his schooner. He and his family settled in Mill Creek, where he built a shipyard and sawmill. He went on to accumulate much property and became a prominent citizen in Carteret County. William Sr. died in 1747, leaving his properties to his children. His son followed in his footsteps, becoming a leader in the Carteret shipbuilding industry, and was a delegate to the Fifth Provincial Congress that adopted the Bill of Rights in 1776.

In 1796, Belcher Fuller 1777-1828, married Zilphia Gutherie 1780-1846. Belcher Fuller was a North Carolina state Senator from Carteret County for several years in the early 1800’s. He was also a notary public, justice of the peace, and lieutenant colonel of militia in 1823.

Belcher and Zilphia had two daughters. Mary Polly Fuller 1800-1878 married Benjamin Leecraft in 1818. In his 1828 will, Belcher Fuller left them property on the northwest corner of Ann and Orange Streets—now the Arendell House. In 1843, their daughter, Zilphia Ann Leecraft married Michael Fisher Arendell, son of Bridges Arendell and Sarah Fisher.

When Belcher and Zilphia's other daughter, Charity Fuller 1807-1891, married Andrew Lee Hatchell in 1826, Fuller left them property on the west side of the first block of Orange Street. Andrew Lee and Charity built the 1827 Hatsell House on the southern portion of Lot 55 Old Town.