The Hill-Jones Family: Lineage of Ownership.

The Octagon House today.

The 155-year-old "Octagon House" sits on property that was originally granted by King George III to Thomas Lee in 1713. This land was once an Indian camping ground - evidenced by shell beds and pottery found along the banks of the sound. In 1765, William Hill, from Lunenberg County, Virginia, purchased what had become known as the Cedar Point Plantation – hundreds and hundreds of acres on the White Oak River near Swansboro, then part of Carteret County.

In 1778, William's son Isaac Hill (ca.1750-1814) married Elizabeth Hatch (ca.1758-1819) daughter of Revolutionary War Lt. Col. Lemuel Hatch and Mary Fonville. Besides being a mariner, Captain Hill also operated a sawmill and salt works.

Family Cemetery on the grounds.

One of Isaac and Elizabeth's sons, John Hatch Hill, born in 1778, grew up on the plantation. On April 17, 1806, he married Hannah Fuller. Hannah died in April of 1823. John then married Hannah’s sister, Catherine Dudly, in August of the same year. Catherine died in October, making Hill a widower twice in the same year. In January of 1825, John married his third wife, Abigail Ward.

John Hatch Hill became a colonel while serving in the Carteret Militia. Col. Hill was a member of the  General Assembly (1814-1815) and served as sheriff, coroner and clerk of court of Carteret County. In 1837, Col. Hill purchased, at public auction, for only $500, the 1828 James Noe House on Orange Street in Beaufort. Col. Hill died the same year and was buried in the Old Burial Ground in Beaufort. His last will and testament lists children Catherine, Gaston, Edward and Cicero Ward Hill.

Col. Hill’s son Edward returned to Cedar Point in 1855 and built the octagonal house on the old family property.

Edward died sometime in the 1870's and left the house and property to his daughter, Mary E. Hill who was married to Robert H. Jones. The couple had seven children and unfortunately, Robert died December 25, 1884, six months before the birth of his eight child. The widow Mary married Mr. K. M. Bell who was the foreman of the plantation.

The house remained in the Jones family, and at the death of Mary, it was passed down to John Sherwood Jones... the only one of Robert and Mary Jone's eight children to outlive their mother.

John Sherwood Jones passed ownership of the property to his only son, John Robert Jones, who married Lois Anne Baily.

John and Lois Jones gifted the house and 60 acres of property to the Masons of North Carolina in 1999. The idea was that the property would be used for a children's camp, a Masonic Convention Center, and a retirement community.