Skipwith Hall, also known as Skipwith Place, Oakwood Farm, Skipwith Harlan Hill, and Oakwood Hall, is a former plantation and

plantation house A plantation house is the main house of a plantation, often a substantial farmhouse, which often serves as a symbol for the plantation as a whole. Plantation houses in the Southern United States and in other areas are known as quite grand and ...

located in

Maury County, Tennessee Maury County ( ) is a county located in the U.S. state of Tennessee, in the Middle Tennessee region. As of the 2020 census, the population was 100,974. Its county seat is Columbia. Maury County is part of the Nashville-Davidson– Murfreesb ...

. It was initially built by Edward Brinley Littlefield and Cornelia Lott Skipwith (née Greene) as their residence. It has been listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

since November 23, 1978, for architectural significance.

History

Littlefield and Skipwith family

The 25,000 acre land was granted by

George Washington George Washington (, 1799) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. As commander of the Continental Army, Washington led Patriot (American Revoluti ...

to war general

Nathanael Greene Major general (United States), Major General Nathanael Greene (August 7, 1742 – June 19, 1786) was an American military officer and planter who served in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, Revolutionary War. He emerge ...

in 1807. Greene let his brother-in-law, Captain William Littlefield, settle the land. Skipwith Hall was once a 950-acre farm. When Littlefield's son,

Newport, Rhode Island Newport is a seaside city on Aquidneck Island in Rhode Island, United States. It is located in Narragansett Bay, approximately southeast of Providence, Rhode Island, Providence, south of Fall River, Massachusetts, south of Boston, and nort ...

-native, Edward Brinley Littlefield, married Greene's daughter, Cornelia Lott Greene, recently widow of Peyton Skipwith (c.1779–1808, third child of Sir Peyton Skipwith, 7th Baronet), the new couple decided to build a mansion for their plantation. The mansion was built with timber in 1815–1816. It was home to the first

piano A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...

in Maury County and had the first "coffin room”, where they displayed each of the personal family coffins. Edward lost the property, when he won Lucius J. Polk's seat in the

Tennessee Senate The Tennessee Senate is the upper house of the U.S. state of Tennessee , Tennessee's state legislature, which is known formally as the Tennessee General Assembly. The Tennessee Senate has the power to pass resolutions concerning essentially any ...

, Littlefield moved to Nashville and left the mansion to his stepsons, George Greene Skipwith (1803–1852) and Peyton Horatio Skipwith (1805–1898). They formally inherited the site in 1836. By 1849, George Greene Skipwith passed the property on to the Planters Bank through a deed of trust.

Harlan family

Shortly after, the bank sold it to Benjamin Harlan. Harlan renamed it Oakwood Farm and turned it into a

stock farm Stock Farm or Stockfarm is a northern suburb of Roseau, Dominica. It contains the national prison of Dominica Stock Farm Prison, the Dominica State College Dominica State College (DSC) is a national college in Stockfarm, Dominica. It is an am ...

, importing stock from Spain and selling it in the south. Harlan hired architect Nathan Vaught to redesign the mansion. Vaught added "six white pillars and a grand veranda." According to local historian Reid Smith, Harlan added his "own special trademark of hospitality" with "A little Negro slave boy ho stationed in the shade of a mighty oak along the pike, stood ever ready with a drink of spring water for each and every passerby." The property was later inherited by Harlan's descendants, who were still the owners of the mansion in the 1970s.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Skipwith Hall Houses in Columbia, Tennessee Houses completed in 1816 Plantation houses in Tennessee Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Tennessee National Register of Historic Places in Maury County, Tennessee

History

Littlefield and Skipwith family

Harlan family

See also

References

External links