Record Atlas
5 eras · 1584–2026 · 2 places

The Outer Banks - Roanoke, Hatteras and Kill Devil Hills

Outer Banks, Kill Devil Hills. Which empire held this ground in which years — and, the part that matters, which archive that means.

Whose archive this ground was

YearsWho held itWhose archive that means
1584–1776 English Roanoke colonies, then colonial North Carolina FamilySearch

English attempts to colonise Roanoke began in 1584. Roanoke Island and the banks later lay within Currituck, Tyrrell and Hyde counties.
1776–1861 State of North Carolina - Currituck, Hyde and Carteret counties FamilySearch · National Archives Catalog (NARA)

The Thirteen Colonies declared independence on 4 July 1776. Currituck, Hyde and Carteret are among the counties that hold parts of the banks.
1861–1870 State of North Carolina - the Hatteras forts attacked in 1861 National Archives Catalog (NARA) · FamilySearch

On 27 August 1861 Commodore Silas Stringham and General Benjamin Butler decided to attack two Confederate forts at Cape Hatteras; the assault took about two days.
1870–1903 State of North Carolina - Dare County FamilySearch · National Archives Catalog (NARA)

Dare County was formed in 1870 from parts of Tyrrell, Currituck and Hyde counties and named for Virginia Dare, so county records before 1870 for the islands sit with those parent counties.
1903–2026 State of North Carolina - Dare County, Kill Devil Hills FamilySearch · National Archives Catalog (NARA)

The first controlled, powered flight took place at Kill Devil Hills on 17 December 1903.

The rings are approximate — deliberately. They exist to shade which filing system a place fell under, not to adjudicate a border. A place near a ring's edge should be checked against both neighbours.

See the whole span, 1584–2026, on the map →

The map takes a range, and a range that crosses one of the rows above is where records get lost: the family never moved, and the archive on the far side of the handover will tell you it holds nothing.

2 places on this ground

1742 FamilySearch collections reach this ground

Ranked with the regional ones first — a collection for a province is usually a better lead than a national index, though the national index is often where a name is actually written down. A free account opens the images.

…and 1682 more.

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