St. Andrew’s By-the-Sea
1915, 1930s
4212 Virginia Dare Trail
Religious
https://saintandrewsobx.com/ ; Susan Byrum Rountree, Nags Headers, 2001
The Episcopal congregation was established before the Civil War and worshipped in a simple building located among the dunes; called All Saints, it was built in 1849 and consecrated in 1850. That structure is reported to have been destroyed during the war. A replacement (a simple gable-fronted, weatherboarded structure with Gothic Revival doors and windows) was built in 1915 and consecrated in 1916; S. J. Twine is credited with its construction. The building was named St. Andrew’s By-the-Sea. (See photograph in Susan Byrum Rountree, Nags Headers, 2001.) The Rev. Robert Brent Drane, rector at St. Paul’s in Edenton, was in charge of the congregation until his death in 1939. When the present “beach road” (Virginia Dare Trail) was built, the little church was moved in 1937 to its present location; Twine is credited with the move as well. It was evidently about that time that it gained its wood-shingled wall surfaces, an entrance projection, and a belfry. The Rev. Frederick B. Drane, then of Monroe, N. C., and later of Edenton, succeeded his father, Robert, and according to church history “was responsible for much of the carved furnishings in the sanctuary. The little chapel is now part of a larger church complex. See https://saintandrewsobx.com/ ; Susan Byrum Rountree, Nags Headers, 2001.