Part 3

A few years ago there was a murder in the neighborhood. There had been some trouble between the murdered woman and the Dockery-Dana people because of trespassing goats. The two recluses were accused of the murder. They were taken into court, held in prison, stood trial, and finally were declared “not guilty”. Dana proved that at the time of the murder he was playing the piano and was not near the scene of the crime.

During the period of their incarceration, vandals ransacked “Goat Castle” and carried away many valuable relics. A guard was finally placed over the place to prevent souvenir hunters from taking the remainder of the valuable pieces. Public sympathy was aroused, and for a short time Dana and Miss Dockery were lionized. They seemed to take a new lease on life. They improved in personal appearance. They often came to town, but conditions in “Goat Castle” changed little.

Goats roam the place in undisturbed joy. Chickens roost on the foot of the great mahogany bed while Dick plays his old piano for curious tourists who pay twenty-five cents to see the old aristocrat, and Miss Dockery tells stories of the former wealth and prestige of her friend, who desired to withdraw from the world.

Glenwood is falling. Neglect and age are causing decay. The stables and outhouses are piles of mortar and decayed timbers, though the grounds are still beautiful with majestic moss-draped oaks and flowering magnolias.

_Gloucester_

A mile drive from the city limits of Natchez, along a roadway where moss-draped boughs overlap into a verdant shelter, brings one in view of a stately red brick mansion. It is Gloucester. Still half concealed by giant oaks and tropical growth, it seems a great ruby in a gray-gold setting.

Gloucester is surrounded by 250 acres of farm land and virgin timber. It was built about 1800, and is of solid brick construction. Huge Corinthian columns support spacious galleries across the broad front. The windows are iron barred and shuttered.

This mansion is of historic interest. It was the home of Governor Winthrop Sargent, who was the first Governor of Mississippi Territory.

Front twin doorways are an unusual feature. Inside these doors are the heavy wooden bars, the original fastenings against unfriendly Indian tribes and traveling bandits, who were not infrequent during the early days of life at Gloucester.

The twin doors open into a wide hallway which contains a graceful curving stairway leading to hall and bedrooms above.

Gloucester has a splendid library of rare first editions and valuable old books. The drawing room contains Colonial furniture and paintings by masters.

Upon the death of Governor Sargent, Gloucester became the property of his wife, who, in turn, willed it to her son, George Washington Sargent.

During the occupation of Natchez by Federal troops, the young Sargent was called to the doorway of Gloucester, and shot by two soldiers to whom he had given greeting. Stains of the life-blood of this George Washington Sargent are still visible on the doorway of Gloucester. The murdered boy was buried beside his father in the family burial ground across the road from the home.

In the Negro quarters there are weird tales of ghosts wandering over the premises. “Two tall ghosts, in uniform, carrying guns, come on dark rainy nights when the owls hoot in the oaks above the graves.”

Records show that in 1877 Gloucester was sold to James Surget, who was one of Natchez’ earliest and most affluent citizens. This home was continuously owned by the Surget family for sixty years, until the recent death of Mrs. Katherine Boyd Surget, when the property was bequeathed to its present owner, Lenox Stanton.

Mr. and Mrs. Stanton hold dear every Gloucester tradition and take pride in maintaining the home and grounds in their original state of perfection.

_Hawthorne_

On the famous Natchez Trace Highway, within calling distance of the Lower Woodville road, through a narrow gateway flanked by giant oaks, is a quaint little cottage, “Hawthorne”.

It is the old Southern Planter type home, a story-and-a-half.

A beautiful double front door with panels of early period thin glass and an exquisitely wrought fanlight above give an atmosphere of friendliness to the entrance.

Architects interested in the unusual find charm in the hand-hewn stairway which rises from the broad back hall to the rooms above.

“Hawthorne” more than a century ago belonged to a family named Overaker who sold the place with its sixty acres of wooded land to the Dunbar family, under whose regime this quaint old home sheltered and entertained the elite of the South as early as 1837. It is believed that Hawthorne was built by the Tichenor family about 1825.

For many years this old place was vacant. Lumber mills and grist mills crowded too near, but the property was recently bought by the family of William McGehee, who are reclaiming “Hawthorne”. Every line of the period architecture is being followed, and “Hawthorne”, its meadows and gardens, will soon be restored as in stage coach days to greet today its motor car visitors. The history of Hawthorne is a sad story with a hopeful ending.

_Hope Farm_

A few years ago when “Hope Farm” fell into the hands of Mr. and Mrs. Balfour Miller it was truly “getting a break” for rehabilitation. Today when one steps into this old Spanish house, built about 1775, there breathes from every crevice and corner the true atmosphere of the Old South.

The original portion of Hope Farm, its English wing, is believed to have been built by Marcus Haller. The front, the straight, low, Spanish portion, was built by the Spanish Governor, de Grand Pre, about the year 1790.

The low sweeping roof extending over a broad portico across the entire front of the house is upheld by seven hand-hewn cypress columns. Broad steps lead from the driveway to the terraced yard. This yard is a veritable bouquet of old-fashioned small flowers, bordered by boxwood and flanked by syringa, japonica, and other old-fashioned evergreen shrubs. A radiant variety of orchid-like irises dot the entire approach to the old brick steps of the terrace.

For ninety years Hope Farm belonged to the Montgomery family; of the last generation of ten children (seven girls and three boys) two of the sisters lived in spinsterhood at Hope Farm until within the last few years when the property was acquired by the Millers.

Restoration of exterior and interior has been done with exceeding care to hold every line of the original house. There were no nails in the day when Hope Farm was built and its timbers are held together by wooden pegs.

The front door leads directly into a huge living room, which opens through an archway into a large dining room. These two rooms extend across the entire front.

The welcoming gate of Hope Farm opens at the intersection of Homochitto street on the drive to Duncan Park.

_Homewood_

It required five years to build this palatial mansion of brick, cement, and iron grill, and until recently “Homewood”, exterior and interior, was in a perfect state of preservation—just as it was the day of its completion, more than 75 years ago. Homewood was destroyed by fire, January 2, 1940.

By reason of its solid masonry (built to withstand the storms), its architectural lines, and the grace and magnificence of its iron trimmings, architects of note from all over the country came to inspect and to study “Homewood”.

One million home-burned brick were used in the main structure. Copper pipes laid in cement supplied the huge cisterns throughout the years with cold drinking water. This construction represented the work of hundreds of slaves. All locks, hinges, and door knobs were of silver. The fluted Ionic columns and grill work were imported from Spain.

Approaching Homewood by the magnificent forest driveway, it was a wonderfully imposing structure with a front of thirty-foot columns, an upper balcony of cast iron grill, and massive double panel entrance doors flanked on either side by expensive ruby glass which was imported from Belgium.

There were six rooms on the ground floor, connected by huge sliding mahogany doors, making it possible to open the entire floor into one immense room, 80 feet long. Leading to six rooms and cross halls above was a fan spread stairway. The top floor was a peculiarly constructed octagonal hall surrounded by eight large closets or storage rooms with cedar linings.

The mantels in Homewood attracted much attention because of their delicate beauty and apparent value. In the drawing room the mantel was of white marble, while in the dining room stood one of pink marble with deep rose tracings.

Homewood had no historic interest but it was an outstanding example of the advanced architectural ideas of the builders of Southern ante-bellum homes. It was built for a gift from David Hunt to his daughter, Catherine, and her husband, William L. Balfour.

The most recent owners, Mr. and Mrs. Kingsly Swan, spared no expense in maintaining this magnificent home and its spacious grounds in model perfection.

Homewood was the scene of the famous double wedding so effectively described in Stark Young’s _So Red the Rose_.

_Inglewood_

A Southern planter’s typical home, “Inglewood” stands today as the perfection of a beautiful dream recalled from crumbling ruins of years long gone. More than a century ago this quaint old story-and-a-half house was built by Gustavus Calhoun, who practiced medicine in Natchez Territory in 1829—back in the days when calls were made on horseback and the doctor carried along his miniature drug store in his “saddle bags”. Dr. Calhoun was a friend and contemporary of Dr. Stephen Duncan of “Auburn”.

In 1858 “Inglewood” became the home of Edward M. Blackburn through his marriage into the Calhoun family. It has been for many years known as “the old Blackburn place.” Here the last member of the Natchez Blackburn family lived until the old house was about to tumble down. Then the place was purchased by Dr. Wallace Smith, a young physician who came with his bride to reclaim and rebuild Inglewood along the exact lines of its original architectural design.

The old gardens of Inglewood were once as famous for beauty as those of “Arlington” and “Melrose” but the gardens too passed with the old families. Doctor and Mrs. Smith are replanting, and are replacing walks and borders of old-fashioned boxwood, everything to conform as nearly as possible to original design.

Inglewood, like all Natchez homes, is off the highway, secluded by forests, and only by careful observation can one glimpse the gleaming white outlines of this beautiful old plantation home.

The approach to the house is marked at the public highway by a wrought iron replica of the old-fashioned doctor’s horse and buggy. Inglewood is today, as it was originally, the property of a practicing physician’s family.

_Jefferson College_

Founded in 1802, Jefferson Military College is the oldest college for boys in the State of Mississippi, and one of the oldest in the United States.

It was here that the South’s beloved Jefferson Davis, who became President of the Confederacy, attended school when he was ten years old.

After the battle of New Orleans Gen. Andrew Jackson rested his victorious army on the campus of this college, which is located six miles from the city of Natchez.

Mississippi was a territory when the college came into existence. On the spot where the constitution of the State of Mississippi was adopted is a marker commemorating the birth of Mississippi as a State. The marker was erected May 14, 1935, the 119th anniversary of the State.

Near the front gate of the college there are two giant gnarled liveoaks, known as the Aaron Burr oaks because they stood in front of the old courthouse where Aaron Burr was tried for treason against the United States. The old courthouse was demolished ages ago but the oaks stand sentinel with wide spreading boughs marking the spot famous in history and in story.

_King’s Tavern_

In the days when Indians roamed the territory of Natchez, block houses were built by the white settlers who came that way. These were sturdy, well-fortified houses built to protect occupants against Indian outbreaks. Such is King’s Tavern—an inconspicuous, faded, old wooden structure on a high brick foundation.

Although unostentatious, King’s Tavern is important. According to the records it is the oldest building in this part of the South. Parts of St. Augustine, Florida, are somewhat older. Its very atmosphere breathes of days and people long dead; of Indians, of Spanish and English and French noblemen; of weary travelers over foot paths or by river boats, wandering into the old Tavern, resting, and then departing, disappearing from the face of the earth.

The house is more than 170 years old. Records show that “the first United States mail brought over the Natchez Trace was delivered to King’s Tavern by an Indian runner and was distributed from this point.”

The timbers are held together by wooden pegs and beams. The heavier timbers are of the type used in the construction of large ships of that period. Ceilings in the rooms are low. Doors and windows are heavy with narrow frames. The sills and sleepers of the building show the rope holes, again indicating that timbers came from old sailing vessels.

The earliest official record of transfer of this property shows 1789 as the year it was granted to Richard King, a member of the King family of Long Island, New York, and by him it was given the name “King’s Tavern”. Formerly it had been known as the Bledsoe House.

For a period of about 115 years the property has been owned and occupied by the descendants of Mrs. Elizabeth Postlethwaite.

An interesting relic of bygone years is a portrait in oils of the late Samuel Postlethwaite III, who was Mayor of Natchez in 1825 when the great Lafayette visited the little village. This portrait is signed by the artist, Benjamin West.

Mrs. A. C. Register and Mrs. Jean Register Modsett, descendants of the Postlethwaite family, are the present owners and occupants of King’s Tavern.

_Legend:_

At night, when all’s dark and quiet at King’s Tavern, ghosts of Indian warriors, in full dress of their native tribe, wander through the old Tap Room, loll and lean against the old bar, peer out through small crevices, and then disappear through the heavy doors which lead onto the street.

_Lansdown_

Lansdown has been the home of the Marshall family for more than eighty-five years. Like many other magnificent plantation homes around Natchez, Lansdown was a wedding gift to Mr. and Mrs. George Marshall, whose descendants of the same name own and occupy today this comfortable Georgian type house.

Lansdown is an unpretentious but quite substantial structure with a broad front portico enclosed by artistic grill bannisters fashioned in Greek pattern. Broad, spreading steps lead down to a brick walk, and on each side stand the old carriage blocks of yesteryear.

Portraits by famous artists of earlier generations of Marshalls, including a portrait of Levin R. Marshall by Sully, look down on gorgeous rosewood and mahogany furnishings of their own selection placed in Lansdown.

The china and silver in this home are the pride of the present generation of Marshalls. Much of the original china is in use today. Many pieces of the original Robert E. Lee furnishings of “Stratford Hall” are now in Lansdown. Within the past few months the younger generation at Lansdown discovered several pieces of silver bearing the unmistakable mark of Robert E. Lee.

Lansdown came to the Marshalls through Mrs. Charlotte Hunt Marshall. Natchez had a great benefactor in David Hunt, the father of Charlotte Hunt Marshall. It was he who made possible the Chamberlain-Hunt Military Academy at Port Gibson, Mississippi, one of the first schools for boys in the Southland. It is still an excellent school for young men.

Today Lansdown is owned and occupied by George Marshall III and Mrs. Agnes Marshall Ward, lineal descendants of the original owner, who named the place “Lansdown” by virtue of his friendship for the celebrated Marquis of Lansdown, England.

_Linden_

The origin of Linden seems lost to history although it is known to have existed as early as 1790. It came to ancestors of the present owners a hundred years ago, and has been owned and occupied by the A. M. Feltus family for several generations.

Nature seems to exert herself to give to Linden a perfect setting. Surrounding the magnificently constructed house, with its 98 feet of gallery, are dozens of oak trees, draped in long gray moss which sweeps the very eaves of the dwelling. Standing in the artistic entrance of Linden one sees the outside world through growing draperies of swaying gray lace.

The architecture of Linden is as unusual as it is simple. The center portion is two stories, flanked on each side by single-storied rooms. A gallery runs the entire width of the building. To the rear of the single-storied rooms is a long two-storied wing. Each wing is a complete apartment.

The furnishings are rare and exquisite, producing a feeling of restfulness and satisfaction. “Linden” has three paintings by Audubon, and an interesting portrait of the song-bird, Jenny Lind.

The driveway through the grounds of Linden leads past the front entrance entirely around the house and passes its beautifully kept gardens. A circle driveway which leads out through the bricked entrance affords a final glimpse of the stately white house in the distance, not unlike “Mount Vernon”. The view across the hill brings “Monmouth”, a neighboring mansion, to the eye as another delightful prospect.

_Greenleaves_

“Greenleaves”, built prior to 1812, is a town house—a great rambling cottage type of architecture in the very heart of Natchez. It is as sturdy as the old gnarled oaks which seem to hold it in their protecting boughs. It represents comfort, luxury, and beauty without ostentation or pretense.

The halls and rooms are palatial in size and appointments. The house as originally constructed shows that it was built to endure. It was remodeled in the early 40’s by the grandfather of the present owners.

A wealth of the original furnishings in solid mahogany and rosewood and many rare museum pieces have remained in Greenleaves throughout generations, and are today as beautiful as the day they came from foreign shores.

The present owners, Mr. and Mrs. Melchoir Beltzhoover, the third generation of the Koontz family to occupy Greenleaves, grace this ante-bellum home with pardonable pride of possession.

The family of the original owners of Greenleaves was wiped out during a yellow fever epidemic, the entire family filling one grave. Eventually Greenleaves was bought by George Washington Koontz of Pennsylvania, who became a leading influence, financially and socially, in Natchez. Children of the present occupants of Greenleaves are the fourth generation of the Koontz family to enjoy this luxurious home.

Mr. Beltzhoover’s ownership of this property is shared with his sister, Mrs. Guy Robinson, who is a resident of New York state.

_Legend:_

Under the giant liveoaks at the rear of Greenleaves the Natchez tribe of Indians held their annual pow-wows and decided all momentous questions.

_Longwood_

Longwood stands in a moss-tangled forest. It is a monument to a dream that was interrupted by the tragedy of the War Between the States in 1861-’65. It was to have been a gorgeous structure of Moorish design, planned by Sloan of Philadelphia, who in those days had no equal as artist-architect.

Longwood was being built for Dr. Haller Nutt. Landscape gardeners came from abroad, and even today rare imported shrubs and trees form a part of the dense growth around the unfinished gardens.

When the house reached its present point of construction, with more than a hundred thousand dollars already invested, there came the cry of war and the call to arms. Workmen laid down their tools and took their guns and never returned to the task of completing Longwood.

The deep concrete foundation, the outside framework, and some of the trimmings of the house were well under way. Today there are huge sections of carved moulding, old paint buckets and brushes, tool boxes, and carpenter’s implements scattered about the upper floors—just as they were left almost 75 years ago.

The house, begun in the late 50’s, is of brick, burned by slaves on the place, with columns and grill work of hand-carved, time-enduring cypress. The ground floor contained a nursery and an adjoining apartment for a white housekeeper and governess, a card room, a billiard room, wine cellar, and heating plant. This floor is the only part of the building that reached anything like completion. The upper floors were boarded up. All orders for materials, marble stairway, mosaic floors, and elaborate furnishings were canceled. Many of these orders had been placed in Italy and France. Some costly pieces were en route on the high seas. A few items were returned and others are now in national museums.

Dr. Nutt died in 1864, survived by his wife and a large family of children. One of the descendants of these children now occupies the finished lower floor or basement of Longwood. There is on this floor a huge rotunda and eight large rooms, surrounded by a moat. Many relics of past generations adorn these quarters, including antiques from different branches of the family.

There are several pieces of richly carved rosewood furniture, an exquisite old grand piano, and oil portraits of Dr. Nutt and his beautiful blonde wife by famous old-world artists.

James and Merritt Ward of Natchez and Mrs. Julia Ward Blanchard of New York City are the present owners of Longwood.

Planned as a palatial home for a family of eleven children and eight hundred slaves, today Longwood (often referred to as “Nutt’s Folly”) is occupied by Merritt Ward and one servant.

_Magnolia Vale_

A few hundred feet below the city of Natchez, along the river edge, is an extension of land on which the first Natchez was situated. This old town was known as “Natchez Under the Hill”. The commercial center of the old Natchez has passed into decay. The buildings that sheltered the river men, the gambling “joints” that housed the riff-raff of those steamboat days, have long since tumbled into the river. Driving down a long and steep shelf of land, at the north end of what was old Natchez, one comes to the gate of a castle-like home in the heart of a garden which is always beautiful with blossoms. It is “Magnolia Vale”.

This house was built about 110 years ago by Andrew Brown and is owned today by Andrew B. Learned, a direct descendant.

Andrew Brown was a native of Scotland, and a great lover of flowers. After building a home of the early American type, with wide galleries, handsome Doric columns, spacious halls and large rooms, he found self-expression in creating a garden which has been famous for generations, from St. Louis to New Orleans, as “Brown’s Gardens”.