William Churton

William Churton (died December 1767) was an early North Carolina surveyor.

He moved to Great Britain's North American colonies in about 1749 as a surveyor and cartographer for the Granville District which included all of North Carolina north of the 35 degree, 34 minute parallel, a strip 60 miles (97 km) wide. This line had only been surveyed as far west as the Haw River at that time. The northern boundary, the Virginia line, had been run as far west as the Blue Ridge in present-day Stokes County by 1729. At that date, the entire area was still a part of Bertie County and extended west to the Pacific Ocean, the claims of the Spanish and French notwithstanding.

In 1749, William Churton, and Crown lawyer Daniel Weldon, representing the interests of Lord Granville, along with Peter Jefferson and Joshua Fry, representing the interests of the Colony of Virginia, surveyed an additional 90 miles (140 km) westward of the Blue Ridge to Steep Rock Creek.

Daniel Weldon’s seat was near the present town of Weldon. Peter Jefferson was the father of Thomas Jefferson and Joshua Fry was formerly a professor of mathematics and natural philosophy at the College of William & Mary.

Jefferson and Fry had earlier (1746) completed a similar survey of the extensive holdings of Lord Fairfax in western Virginia. More to the point, they had, in 1749, formed a venture called the Loyal Land Company, which included Lewises and Meriwethers and other Albemarle County residents. The Loyal Land Company was chartered “... for the discovery and sale of western lands” and was granted “eight hundred thousand acres [3,200 km²] in one or more surveys beginning on the Bounds between this Colony & North Carolina & running to the Westward & the North...” Jefferson and Fry needed to establish the southern boundary of Virginia so as to delineate the limits of their grant.

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