4 Landmarks That Tell Perquimans County's Story

The first time you drive across the US 17 Business bridge into the town of Hertford, you feel it before you see it. The truss span swings open for a boat, and traffic on both banks waits with you. That is the thing about Perquimans County: its story is not roped off in a museum, it is in four places you can stand on.

1. The Swing Bridge Over the Perquimans

The S-shaped swing bridge carrying US 17 Business over the Perquimans River is the county’s signature landmark, and the one most often published wrong. NCDOT built the original in 1929, and by 2015 its sufficiency rating was 3 out of a possible 100¹. The old span came out in July 2021. The bridge there today is a 2022 replacement, built under a Section 106 agreement to echo the original: a truss swing span, Oregon rails, pedestrian lights matching the town’s streetlights, and the original bridge plaque reused².

And it still works like a drawbridge. Federal regulation 33 CFR 117.835 requires it to open on signal from 8 a.m. to midnight April through September, and 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. October through March³. If you live here, that horn becomes part of your week.

2. The Perquimans County Courthouse

At 128 N Church Street, the white Federal-era courthouse has held court since 1825, which makes it the state’s oldest courthouse in continuous use⁴. Inside the vault is the 1662 deed signed by George Durant, often cited as the first recorded land transaction in North Carolina, in which a settler paid a Native American for land⁵. The courthouse went on the National Register in 1979⁶.

3. The Newbold-White House

Out Newbold-White Road, outside the town of Hertford, sits the county’s best-known building. Dendrochronology, dating by analysis of the rafter timbers, pinned its construction to 1730⁷. The Quaker couple Abraham and Judith Sanders built the house, and the Perquimans County Restoration Association, which owns and operates it, describes it as the oldest brick house in North Carolina⁸. It is not a state historic site; it is a nonprofit-run house, open Saturdays from May through October⁹.

4. The Church of the Holy Trinity

At 207 S Church Street, the Gothic Revival Episcopal church has served the town since 1848, when the congregation organized, and its frame sanctuary was completed around 1850¹⁰. The National Register nomination calls it the earliest frame example in North Carolina of the Early English parish church style championed by the Ecclesiological movement¹¹. It was listed on the National Register in 1998⁶.

The Bottom Line

None of these four will tell you what a Perquimans County lot costs, and that is the point. The history here is not a slogan on a sign; it is the courthouse that still holds court, the bridge that still opens, and the house that has stood since 1730. When you buy in this county, you are buying into a place that has been making the same trades for three hundred years: slower mornings, a longer drive for big errands, and neighbors who can tell you the bridge schedule from memory. Come walk all four stops before you make an offer, and if you want the tour, call me at (252) 202-4945. I will show you the county the way a buyer should see it.