Whitethorn (Blacksburg, Virginia)

Last updated
Whitethorne
Whitethorn 1898.jpg
Whitethorne, 1898
USA Virginia location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Usa edcp location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Location200 Monticello Lane Blacksburg, Virginia
Coordinates 37°12′31″N80°27′4″W / 37.20861°N 80.45111°W / 37.20861; -80.45111
Area4 acres (1.6 ha)
Builtc. 1855 (1855)
Architectural styleGreek Revival, Italian Villa
MPS Montgomery County MPS
NRHP reference No. 89001879 [1]
VLR No.150-5021
Significant dates
Added to NRHPNovember 13, 1989
Designated VLRJune 20, 1989 [2]

Whitethorne is a historic plantation house located at Blacksburg, Montgomery County, Virginia. It was built about 1855, by James Francis Preston, who received the land from his father, Governor of Virginia, James Patton Preston. It is a large two-story, L-shaped, five-bay-by-three-bay, brick dwelling with a shallow hipped roof in the Italian Villa style. It has Greek Revival style exterior and interior decorative elements. It features a wide, elegant, one-story, five-bay front porch supported by square columns of the Tuscan order. Also on the property is a contributing two-story brick office building. [3]

Preston, a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point was a lawyer by trade. He was commissioned a captain in the 1st Regiment of Virginia Volunteers at the outset of the Mexican–American War in 1846. He served in Mexico from January 16, 1847, to July 31, 1848. Upon returning home from the war he resumed his law practice. [4]

When Virginia seceded from the Union Preston commissioned into the Virginia Militia, and was subsequently transferred to the Confederate Army, on April 24, 1861. He was promoted to colonel in the Confederate army and became the commanding officer of the 4th Virginia Infantry under brigade commander Stonewall Jackson. He commanded the 4th Virginia at First Manassas where he was wounded in battle. After several months of tending to his wound while in the army, including a brief two-week stint as a brigade commander, due to his failing health he was forced to resign his commission and returned home to Whitethorn. Preston did not live to see the end of the war. He died on January 20, 1862, at age 49. [4]

Whitethorne remained in the Preston family until 1889 when it was purchased by Beverly Stockton Heth, a Radford Banker and son of Chesterfield County coal mine magnate John Heth. [5] In the early 1970s the majority of the 1,500 acre estate was sold for the Hethwood development, a planned community that includes single family homes, townhomes, apartments and a shopping center. The home and 50 acres of the property are still owned by Heth family descendants after much of the remaining farmland was sold to Virginia Tech in 2001.

Whitethorne was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1989. [1]

Whitethorn in September 2012 Whitethorn (Blacksburg, Virginia) September 2012.jpg
Whitethorn in September 2012

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">A. P. Hill</span> Confederate Army general (1825–1865)

Ambrose Powell Hill Jr. was a Confederate general who was killed in the American Civil War. He is usually referred to as A. P. Hill to differentiate him from Confederate general Daniel Harvey Hill, who was unrelated.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Mahone</span> Confederate civil war general and politician (1826–1895)

William Mahone was a Confederate States Army General, civil engineer, railroad executive, prominent Virginia Readjuster and ardent supporter of former slaves.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Dorsey Pender</span> Confederate Army general

William Dorsey Pender was a general in the Confederacy in the American Civil War serving as a brigade and divisional commander. Promoted to brigadier on the battlefield at Seven Pines by Confederate President Jefferson Davis in person, he fought in the Seven Days Battles and at Second Manassas, Fredericksburg, and Chancellorsville, being wounded in each of these engagements. Lee rated him as one of the most promising of his commanders, promoting him to major general at twenty-nine. Pender was mortally wounded on the second day at Gettysburg.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Henry Heth</span> Confederate Army general (1825–1899)

Henry Heth was a career United States Army officer who became a Confederate general in the American Civil War.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">J. Johnston Pettigrew</span> American Confederate general

James Johnston Pettigrew was an American author, lawyer, and soldier. He served in the army of the Confederate States of America, fighting in the 1862 Peninsula Campaign and played a prominent role in the Battle of Gettysburg. Despite starting the Gettysburg Campaign commanding a brigade, Pettigrew took over command of his division after the division's original commander, Henry Heth, was wounded. In this role, Pettigrew was one of three division commanders in the disastrous assault known as Pickett's Charge on the final day of Gettysburg. He was wounded, in the right hand, during the Pickett-Pettigrew Charge on July 3, 1863, and was later mortally wounded during the Union Confederate rearguard action while the Confederates retreated to Virginia near Falling Waters, Virginia, on July 14, dying several days thereafter on July 17, 1863.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James L. Kemper</span> Confederate general and American politician (1823–1895)

James Lawson Kemper was a lawyer, a Confederate general in the American Civil War, and the 37th Governor of Virginia. He was the youngest brigade commander and only non-professional general officer in the division that led Pickett's Charge, during which he was severely wounded.

John Mercer Brockenbrough was a farmer and a Confederate colonel in the American Civil War.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richmond National Battlefield Park</span> Group of historical battlefields in Virginia, US

The Richmond National Battlefield Park commemorates 13 American Civil War sites around Richmond, Virginia, which served as the capital of the Confederate States of America for most of the war. The park connects certain features within the city with defensive fortifications and battle sites around it.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Bristoe Station</span> 1863 battle of the American Civil War

The Battle of Bristoe Station was fought on October 14, 1863, at Bristoe Station, Virginia, between Union forces under Maj. Gen. Gouverneur K. Warren and Confederate forces under Lt. Gen. A. P. Hill during the Bristoe Campaign of the American Civil War. The Union II Corps under Warren was able to surprise and repel the Confederate attack by Hill on the Union rearguard, resulting in a Union victory.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James J. Archer</span> Confederate States Army brigadier general (1817–1864)

James Jay Archer was a lawyer and an officer in the United States Army during the Mexican–American War. He later served as a brigadier general in the Confederate States Army (CSA) during the American Civil War.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Dearing</span> Confederate Army officer in the American Civil War

James Dearing was a Confederate States Army officer during the American Civil War who served in the artillery and cavalry. Dearing entered West Point in 1858 and resigned on April 22, 1861, when Virginia seceded from the Union. Dearing was mortally wounded at the Battle of High Bridge during the Appomattox Campaign of 1865, making him one of the last officers to die in the war. Despite serving as a commander of a cavalry brigade and using the grade of brigadier general after he was nominated to that grade by Confederate President Jefferson Davis, Dearing did not officially achieve the grade of brigadier general because the Confederate Senate did not approve his nomination. His actual permanent grade was colonel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Pegram</span> Confederate Army officer in the American Civil War

William Ransom Johnson Pegram, known as "Willie" or "Willy", was an artillery officer in Robert E. Lee's Confederate Army of Northern Virginia during the American Civil War. He was mortally wounded in the Battle of Five Forks. He was the younger brother of Confederate General John Pegram, who was also killed in action. His grandfather, John Pegram, was a major general during the War of 1812.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Defense of Cincinnati</span> Part of the American Civil War

The Defense of Cincinnati occurred during what is now referred to as the Confederate Heartland Offensive or Kentucky Campaign of the American Civil War, from September 1 through September 13, 1862. Confederate Brigadier General Henry Heth was sent north from Lexington, Kentucky, to threaten Cincinnati, Ohio, then the sixth-largest city in the United States. Heth was under orders from his superior, Major General Edmund Kirby Smith, not to attack the city, but to instead make a "demonstration". Once Heth arrived and reconnoitered the defenses, he realized an attack was pointless. After a few minor skirmishes, he took his men back to Lexington.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Third Corps, Army of Northern Virginia</span> Military unit

The Third Corps, Army of Northern Virginia was a unit of the Provisional Army of the Confederate States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James K. Marshall</span> Confederate Army officer in the American Civil War

James Keith Marshall was a Confederate Army officer during the American Civil War. Marshall commanded the wounded J. Johnston Pettigrew's brigade during Pickett's Charge at the Battle of Gettysburg and died during the assault.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elisha F. Paxton</span> American lawyer

Elisha Franklin Paxton was an American lawyer and soldier who served as a Confederate brigadier general during the American Civil War. He died while leading the “Stonewall Brigade“ during the Battle of Chancellorsville.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">4th Virginia Infantry Regiment</span> Infantry regiment in the Confederate States Army

The 4th Virginia Volunteer Infantry Regiment was an infantry regiment raised in southwestern Virginia for service in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. It fought in the Stonewall Brigade, mostly with the Army of Northern Virginia. Though it suffered heavy losses, two surviving officers resumed political careers after the conflict and won election to the U.S. House of Representatives, and several more served in the Virginia General Assembly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Burgh Westra</span> Historic house in Virginia, United States

Burgh Westra is a historic home located near Gloucester, Gloucester County, Virginia. Built between 1842 and 1851 on 2,400 acres, the estate's original design is a two and a half story brick dwelling in the Gothic Revival style. In addition to the main house, the property contains an original dairy, a rebuilt carriage house, guest cottage, gazebo built upon original sketches of Dr Taliaferro, north and south gardens modeled on the original house designs, and a kitchen vegetable garden. Additional dependency foundations of the kitchen, smoke, and ice houses on the property are currently under consideration for reconstruction. Still noticeable in the spring are native daffodils planted around the entrances to originally wooden servant houses on either side of the lane. Aspects of the original fruit and nut orchards are located next to the estate and near the remains of a barn burned by raiding union troops during the Civil War. The extended property contains the original farm managers house and working and fallow fields along the estate's nearly 2-mile long lane. Burgh Westra's floor plan is Design III in Cottage Residences (1842), by Andrew Jackson Downing. The name "Burgh Westra" comes from the Scottish phrase for "Village of the West", symbolizing the cottage's location on the North River, Virginia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Moor Green</span> Historic house in Virginia, United States

Moor Green is a historic home located near Brentsville, Prince William County, Virginia. It dates to the early-19th century, and is a two-story, five-bay, Federal style brick residence, with a one-room, two-story ell. It has a standing seam metal gable roof and a single-pile, central-passage plan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Lewisburg</span> Battle in the American Civil War

The Battle of Lewisburg occurred in Greenbrier County, Virginia, on May 23, 1862, during the American Civil War. A Union brigade commanded by Colonel George Crook soundly defeated a larger Confederate force commanded by Brigadier General Henry Heth. Panicked Confederate forces escaped by crossing and burning a bridge across the Greenbrier River.

References

  1. 1 2 "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places . National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
  2. "Virginia Landmarks Register". Virginia Department of Historic Resources. Retrieved 5 June 2013.
  3. Gibson Worsham (June 1988). "National Register of Historic Places Inventory/Nomination: Whitethorne" (PDF). Virginia Department of Historic Resources. and Accompanying photo
  4. 1 2 "James F. Preston: Possible Author of the Rebel Yell – Virginia Center for Civil War Studies". Civilwar.vt.edu. 2015-11-14. Retrieved 2022-05-03.
  5. "The trial of Professor Charles Vawter | News". collegiatetimes.com. 2022-04-24. Retrieved 2022-05-03.