Rippon Lodge | |
Rippon Lodge | |
Nearest city | Woodbridge, Virginia |
---|---|
Coordinates | 38°36′51.3576″N77°16′38.4234″W / 38.614266000°N 77.277339833°W |
Area | 40 acres (16 ha) |
NRHP reference No. | 71000988 [1] |
VLR No. | 076-0023 |
Significant dates | |
Added to NRHP | July 2, 1971 |
Designated VLR | January 5, 1971 [2] |
Rippon Lodge is one of the oldest houses remaining in Prince William County, Virginia, and listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1971. [3] Built around 1747 by Richard Blackburn (1705-1757 [4] ) as the main residence and headquarters of his plantation, it lies on high ground overlooking Neabsco Creek at the south end of what is now the unincorporated town of Woodbridge at 15520 Blackburn Road. The house takes its name from Richard Blackburn's birthplace, the small city of Ripon in North Yorkshire, England.
The plantation house is located along a remnant of the original Kings Highway (now known as the "Washington–Rochambeau Revolutionary Route" ). This vital roadway connected the 13 original colonies, stretching from Newport, Rhode Island to Charleston, South Carolina. It played a vital role in the American Revolutionary War, in part because colonial troops marched on this section before defeating the British at Yorktown.
Originally a tobacco plantation, at its greatest extent under Richard Blackburn (ca. 1706-1757) who had emigrated with his brother from Ripon in Yorkshire, England in 1720, it managed land holdings which stretched from Neabsco Creek westward to near what is now I-95 and amounted to about 21,000 acres (85 km2). [5] The property featured its own port on Neabsco Creek and is close to the town of Dumfries, once the county seat until the Quantico River silted up early in the 19th century. In 1796, Benjamin Henry Latrobe painted the plantation house. [6]
Richard Blackburn farmed and built this and other houses using enslaved labor. At his death, the house passed to his son, Col.Thomas Blackburn who represented Prince William County several times in the House of Burgesses, then in most of the Virginia Revolutionary Conventions, before becoming an aide-de-camp to General George Washington, until wounded at the Battle of Germantown. His son Richard Scott Blackburn would also represent Prince William County, in the Virginia House of Delegates. Thomas Blackburn corresponded with Thomas Jefferson and also did business with Bushrod Washington who inherited his uncle's Mount Vernon plantation as well as married one of Thomas Blackburn's daughters. Rippon Lodge remained in Blackburn family hands until around 1820, when it was sold to the Atkinson family, who also farmed using enslaved labor until after the American Civil War, and whose members lived there for about another century.
In 1923 the property was sold again. The buyers were former Ohio Attorney General Wade H. Ellis and his wife Dessie, who had moved to Washington, D.C. after Wade Ellis accepted a position as assistant to the U.S. Attorney General. The Ellises both renovated and preserved the property. Sometime after buying Rippon Lodge, Ellis discovered Richard Blackburn was his ancestor, but it remains unclear at what point during his tenure this became known and how much it influenced the preservation efforts. After Wade Ellis died, Mrs. Ellis sold the house to another Blackburn family member, Admiral Richard Blackburn Black, an Arctic explorer and compatriot of Admiral Byrd. Admiral Black's daughter inherited the house in 1989 and sold it to Prince William County in 2000. The house and grounds are now maintained by the Prince William County Department of Parks and Recreation, and by a local friends organization.
Prince William County has restored the house and maintains the surrounding 42 acres (170,000 m2) of property. Rippon Lodge is open to the public from May through October on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays from 11am to 4pm.
Woodbridge is a census-designated place (CDP) in Prince William County, Virginia, United States, located 20 miles (32 km) south of Washington, D.C. Bounded by the Occoquan and Potomac rivers, Woodbridge had 44,668 residents at the 2020 census.
William Grayson was a planter, lawyer and statesman from Virginia. After leading a Virginia regiment in the Continental Army, Grayson served in the Virginia House of Delegates before becoming one of the first two U.S. Senators from Virginia, as well as a leader of the Anti-Federalist faction. Grayson became the first member of the United States Congress to die while holding office.
Elsing Green Plantation, a National Historic Landmark and wildlife refuge, rests upon nearly 3,000 acres (1,200 ha) along the Pamunkey River in King William County, Virginia, a rural county on the western end of the state's middle peninsula, approximately 33 miles (53 km) northeast of the Richmond. The 18th-century plantation, now owned by the Lafferty family, has been in continuous operation for more than 300 years. In addition to the plantation house, dependency buildings and cultivated land, Elsing Green includes 2,454 acres (993 ha) of surrounding farmland, forest and marsh land. Elsing Green has been on the Virginia Landmarks Register and the National Register of Historic Places since 1969, and received formal National Historic Landmark status in 1971.
Lower Brandon Plantation is located on the south shore of the James River in present-day Prince George County, Virginia.
Leesylvania State Park is located in the southeastern part of Prince William County, Virginia. The land was donated in 1978 by businessman Daniel K. Ludwig, and the park was dedicated in 1985 and opened full-time in 1992.
Col. Henry Lee II (1730–1787) of was an American planter, soldier, and politician, from Westmoreland and later of Prince William County. Although he served in local military offices as well as state legislative offices before and after the conflict, he may today be best known for Leesylvania plantation in Prince William County, or as the father of several important revolutionary figures, especially, Henry "Light-Horse Harry" Lee III, and grandfather of Robert E. Lee.
Beverley, also known as Bullskin, is a farm near Charles Town, West Virginia that has been a working agricultural unit since 1750. The narrow lane that leads from U.S. Route 340 to the Beverley complex was, in the 18th and 19th centuries a toll road. The main house was built about 1800 by Beverley Whiting on the site of a c. 1760 stone house. The house is Georgian influenced Federal style, with a later Greek Revival portico. A number of outbuildings dating to the original 1760 house accompany the main house.
William Fairfax (1691–1757) was a political appointee of the British Crown in several colonies as well as a planter and politician in the Colony of Virginia. Fairfax served as Collector of Customs in Barbados, Chief Justice and governor of the Bahamas; and Customs agent in Marblehead, Massachusetts, before being reassigned to the Colony of Virginia.
Belvoir was the plantation and estate of colonial Virginia's prominent William Fairfax family. Operated with the forced labor of enslaved people, it was located on the west bank of the Potomac River on the present site of Fort Belvoir in Fairfax County, Virginia.
Wade Hampton Ellis was a Republican politician in the U.S. state of Ohio who served as Ohio Attorney General (1904–1908), then Special Assistant to the Attorney General of the United States (1909–1911) and special counsel to the U.S. Department of Justice where he gained fame as a trust buster before resuming a private practice. The United States Supreme Court also appointed Ellis as special master in the case of Massachusetts v. New York. While splitting his time between Washington, D.C., and Cincinnati, Ohio, Ellis acquired and restored Rippon Lodge, which proved to be built by his ancestors and which a descendant placed on the National Register for Historic Places
Leesylvania, formerly known as Neabsco, is a census-designated place in Prince William County in the U.S. state of Virginia.
George Steptoe Washington was a Virginia planter and militia officer who died at the age of 37 of tuberculosis.
Leesylvania was a plantation and historic home in Prince William County, Virginia, now part of Leesylvania State Park. During the 18th century, it was the home of Henry Lee II, his family and numerous slaves, and known for its productive land and especially the quality of its tobacco. Lee's sons Henry "Light-Horse Harry" Lee, Richard Bland Lee and Charles Lee, held prominent positions in Virginia during the American Revolutionary War and early federal government.
Linton Neck also known as Burbage's Neck is a peninsula in eastern Prince William County, Virginia bounded by the Occoquan River, Occoquan Bay, and Neabsco Creek. It is named after the prominent Linton family of the colonial era. Historically farmlands, today the plantation is home to a number of communities including: Featherstone, Woodbridge, Marumsco, and Neabsco. Near the fall line of the Occoquan River at the very North of Linton Neck is the incorporated town of Occoquan, Virginia. At the very south of Linton Neck is the historic site of Rippon Lodge.
Bushrod Corbin Washington was a Virginia planter and politician, nephew of Supreme Court Justice Bushrod Washington, and grandfather of Confederate soldier and author Bushrod C. Washington (1839–1919) also discussed below.
Ludwell Lee was an American lawyer and planter who served in both houses of the Virginia General Assembly representing Prince William and Fairfax Counties and rose to become the Speaker of the Virginia Senate. Beginning in 1799, following the death of his first wife, Lee built Belmont Manor, a planation house in Loudoun County, Virginia, which today is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Henry Washington was an American planter and legislator who served one term as a delegate from Prince William County in the Virginia House of Delegates before moving to Shelbyville, Kentucky and later what became Limestone County, Alabama.
Thomas Blackburn was a Virginia officer, planter and politician who represented Prince William County, Virginia in the last sessions of the House of Burgesses and in most of the Virginia Revolutionary Conventions alongside future general and Virginia Governor Lighthorse Harry Lee. He may today be best known as a correspondent with Presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, as the father of two women who married owners of Mount Vernon plantation, or for his plantation, Rippon Lodge, the remnants of which were placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971 and are now operated as a park in Prince William County.
Richard Scott Blackburn was a Virginia planter and politician who became an officer in the U.S. Army.