Built in the Federal style around 1800, this grand home took on its present appearance with the addition of the colonnade around 1841. Duncan G. Campbell, its first notable resident, was involved in the treaty that removed the Cherokee Indians from Georgia and also for introducing in the Georgia Legislature the first bill for providing for higher education for women. His son, John Archibald Campbell, was born here in 1811. The younger Campbell served as an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court from 1853 until 1861, when he resigned to become Assistant Secretary of War of the Confederate States of America. After the war he practiced law in New Orleans.
This is typical of what many of Washington’s early Federal style houses once looked like before they were modified into grander styles. Begun as a two-room dogtrot by James Alexander, James Shepard enlarged it soon after he purchased it. In her iconic 1865 book, War Time Journal of a Georgia Girl , Eliza Frances Andrews refers to it as “Mrs. Cooper’s House”. The same passage cites the indignation that “Fanny Andrews” expressed due to the commandeering of Mrs. Cooper’s house as a convalescent home for a Yankee soldier.
This Federal I-House, built by Reuben Rogers, is among the oldest in Madison and is open for tours via the Morgan County Historical Society. This is a style sometimes referred to as Plantation Plain or Piedmont Plain. It’s a decidedly Federal form. The ornate porch posts and fine trim are later additions in the evolution of the house.
Madison Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
This house was built by Thomas Jefferson Smith, presumably in the late 1820s, and was moved from Hillsboro to this location near the courthouse square after his marriage to Nancy Pierce Broddus in 1830. Mr. Smith also operated a large plantation outside town but kept this as a townhouse so his sons could attend the local academy. Smith also built the first three stores in Monticello. He sold the house to Milton S. Benton circa 1890. The Victorian ornamentation was added around the time the house was sold. Mrs. M. S. Benton held the organizational meeting of the Monticello Garden Club [thought to be the second oldest in the nation] here in May 1896.
The house was moved circa 2020.
Monticello Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Perhaps the oldest house in Monticello, this Federal Style hall and parlor house was built for Jeremiah Pearson, a pioneer settler, merchant and landowner. Built c.1816 for Jeremiah Pearson, (1777-1855), early settler, merchant, and large land owner.
The house is largely original, except for the architecturally and aesthetically intrusive sun room.
Monticello Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Surrounded by a stacked granite wall on expansive grounds, this is one of the most imposing properties in Lexington. Photographs of the gardens were included in the landmark Garden History of Georgia (1933). Though the one-story portico seen here is now the entrance, it was once the rear of the house. Otherwise, the house is in relatively original form. Amazingly, another of Upson’s Georgia homes survives largely intact in Athens, now used as bank offices.
Connecticut native Stephen Upson (1785-24 August 1824), who was called the “wisest man in Georgia” during his lifetime, came to Lexington via Virginia to study law under William Harris Crawford. He married Hannah Cummins after establishing a practice in Lexington and was a member of the Georgia legislature from 1820 until his death. He also served as the head of the Georgia bar. Shortly after his death, the legislature created and named Upson County in his memory.
Paul D. Hicks writes: Ben Dooley is correct that it was his son, Stephen (Cummins) Upson, who owned the “Upson” House in Athens. SCU was born in Lexington just months before the death of SU. His mother remarried and he lived many years in New York State. In 1885, he returned to GA and bought the Athens house, which had been built in 1847 for Dr. Marcus Franklin. Francis Upson, the older son of SU, returned to Lexington after graduating from Yale Law School in 1835, was a judge for many years, and died there in 1894. It is possible he lived in the SU house.
Lexington Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
Robert West Alston built this grand home around 1817. It was originally a simply vernacular form, facing Short Street, but was remodeled shortly before the Civil War by Captain Richard Bolling Baxter, with the present porch added to face Maiden Lane. J. H. Burnet bought the house around 1830. Charles Whitehead and the Robert Wiley family have been some of the home’s other owners. It’s commonly known as the Alston-Wiley House.
Sparta Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
According to Nancy Stephens, who once owned this house, it was built circa 1815 by Thomas Whaley in the Federal style. It was purchased in 1853 by Dr. Edmund Monroe Pendleton (1816-27 January 1884), who expanded it. Pendleton was a graduate of the South Carolina Medical College and a local physician. He was also an entrepreneur and developed the Pendleton Formula, which made use of animal matter as fertilizer. After leaving Sparta, Dr Graves served as chair of the Agriculture Department at the University of Georgia (1872-1877).
Entrepreneur and banker Richard Augustus Graves (11 July 1848-27 December 1901) bought the house in 1880 and modified it to its present Victorian appearance. A native of Burke County, he came to Sparta from Augusta and ran a successful retail store before becoming a banker in 1887. He served as chairman of the county commission and vice president of the Georgia Bankers’ Association.
The house is presently unoccupied.
Sparta Historic District, National Register of Historic Places
