HERITAGE AND HISTORY
The history of Pender County before 1875 is interwoven with that of New Hanover County.
Pender County was established by an act to establish a new County by the name of Pender. This Act was ratified by the General Assembly of North Carolina on the "16th day of February 1875." The County was named after Major General William Dorsey Pender.
The county site was to be at any point on the Wilmington and Weldon Railroad. The Act also called for an election to be held the 3rd Thursday in April 1875 to elect a Clerk of the Superior Court, a Sheriff, a Treasurer, a Register of Deeds, a Surveyor, five commissioners and a Coroner. A Township Board was to be elected at the same time in each of the Townships. All of those elected were to "hold office until the 1st Thursday in August 1875 or until their successors shall have been elected."
New Hanover County was to have two members elected to the House of Representatives and Pender County one member. New Hanover and Pender Counties were to elect one State Senator.
The first provisional meeting of the Commissioners was to be held at Rocky Point the 5th Thursday in April 1875.
The Act also called for the holding of Superior Court on the second Monday in July and the third Monday in December 1875 in a town "which shall be called Cowan."
The townships of Pender County as depicted on an 1869 map of the northern partition of New Hanover County were Franklin, Kantuck, Lincoln, Columbia, Union, Holden, and Holly.
The official vote to establish a County Seat was held on April 15. South Washington was selected by a vote of 1,129 to 952 for all other locations.
A new Board of County Commissioners was elected in November 1876 consisting of Miles Armstrong, Augustus Gemberg, Robert M. Croom, Elijah Tate and C.M.D. Humphrey.
Burgaw was chosen as the County Seat of Pender County in the Spring of 1879. The last meeting of the Commissioners was held in South Washington on September 3, 1877. Burgaw was incorporated in 1879.
(The above facts and figures were obtained the Pender County Centennial 1875 - 1975, a publicly available publication)