During Christmas I had many inquiries from visitors asking about the history of Columbus and if there was a guide for a walking tour of historic homes. The Columbus Convention and Visitors Bureau has put together a trifold walking tour guide to the oldest part of the Southside Historic District. Here’s an abbreviated summary, with the more detailed guide available at the Visit Columbus office.

The South Side Historic District in Columbus has about 250 homes on the National Register of Historic Places. In less than an hour walk, you can be carried through 200 years of architectural history. Begin the walk beside the Welcome Center at the 1875 Tennessee Williams home at the corner of Main and Third streets. This was the first home of playwright Tennessee Williams and is a National Literary Landmark. It was on this and the adjacent city blocks that the Town of Columbus planted roots.

The office of Visit Columbus on Third Street South sits about where the first house in Columbus, a log cabin, was built in 1817. By 1819 William Cocke resided in a large cross-hall log house where the Tennessee Williams house is now located.

From this founding location of Columbus, we walk south down Third Street. On the northwest corner of the intersection of Third Street and College Street is a ca. 1880 house in the Italianate style. On the southeast corner is the Ole Homestead and east of it is St Paul’s Episcopal Church which was completed in 1860.

The Ole Homestead, a vernacular raised cottage, was probably built in 1825. It resembles Madam John’s Legacy, a French Colonial raised cottage in New Orleans. It is  the oldest building known to have survived within the original town limits of Columbus.

A block south of College Street, at the corner of Third Street and Third Avenue, two historic houses face each other. On the northeast corner is the 1852 Greek Revival style Swoope home.

Facing the Swoope home is Twelve Gables. It is a Greek Revival that was built ca. 1837 and is the house in which in 1866 four ladies organized a Decoration Day ceremony which was an inspiration for Memorial Day.

A block south, Third Street meets Fourth Avenue and we leave the original town limits of Columbus. On the southeast corner is Corner Cottage, which may have been built as early as 1830. It is an excellent example of the transition from Federal Style to Greek Revival Style. The home on the southwest corner combines Italianate and Gothic elements and was constructed ca.1859.

Fourth Avenue was known as Bridge Street because in 1842, African-American engineer Horace King constructed Columbus’ first bridge over the Tombigbee at the street’s west end.

At Third and Fifth Avenue, three classic houses grace the corners. On the northeast corner is a ca. 1914 brick house in the Prairie style. This was a style created by architects of what is called Chicago’s Prairie School and was made famous by Frank Lloyd Wright. Across the street on the northwest corner is a ca. 1869 home in the style of an Italian villa. On the southwest corner is a turreted Queen Ann style house. This is the classic style popular in the late 1800s and very early 1900s.

A block east down Fifth Avenue at the corner of Fourth street are two houses worth noting. On the northwest corner is the ca. 1900 home of Capt. Sam Kaye, who commanded the 1st Flight in Eddie Rickenbacker’s famed Hat in the Ring Squadron during World War I. On the southwest corner is the ca. 1838 home of prominent mid-19th century Mississippi political figure William S. Barry. The house was originally one story with the second floor added later.

Returning to third street, turn left and a block down on the corner of Third and Sixth Avenue stands a Queen Ann house on the west corner and Greek Revival Whitehall on the east corner. Whitehall was built by James Walton Harris in 1843. Tennessee Williams’ mother often played cards there and Upton Sinclair attended parties there.

The house next to Whitehall was built by Harris as a wedding present for one of his daughters. Originally it was one story with the second floor added later. Turning right, go up to Second Street. We are greeted by White Arches on the southwest corner and The Colonnade on the northwest corner. White Arches is a unique mixture of Gothic Revival, Greek Revival and Towered Italianate styles. A block behind White Arches is Homewood. It is an 1836 Greek Revival home relocated from Main Street. Across the street in front of White Arches is the Colonnade, a Carolina side hall plan house with a Greek Revival looking facade. It was constructed about 1860.

Walking north up Second Street past the Colonnade is Lehmquen, a ca. 1838 Greek Revival raised cottage on the right side of the street. The house, though Greek Revival, has the flavor of a Louisiana Creole cottage. Crossing Sixth Avenue, two of the most impressive homes in Columbus face each other. On the right is the Pratt Thomas home and on the left is Riverview.

The Pratt Thomas home is a raised cottage in the Greek Revival style. It was completed in 1847 and is considered “the largest, most elegant, and most unusual of Columbus’ raised-cottage dwellings.” Riverview was completed by 1853 and is now a National Historic Landmark. The house was probably designed by James Lull as it is a larger, more ornate version of his personal residence, Camellia Place. Next to the house the original servants’ quarters and kitchen have survived.

The north end of the block on which Riverview sits was the site of the town’s first cemetery. It dated to about 1820 and was known as the Tombigbee Graveyard. The graves were moved after Friendship Cemetery was established in 1849. Half a block off Second Street on Fifth Avenue and across from the site of the graveyard site is Buttersworth, an 1820s dogtrot log house converted into a Greek Revival house in the 1840s.

On the northwestern corner of Second Street and Fourth Avenue is what appears to be a Queen Ann Victorian House but buried within it is a smaller 1840s house. Turning east — or right — onto Third Avenue we find in the middle of the block Errolton, a ca. 1848 home. Across the street is an 1840s cottage built around a log dog trot house. Walking back to Third Street we turn left or north and return to our starting point.

I will shortly do a series of columns delving more deeply into the architectural history of Columbus.

Rufus Ward is a local historian.

Rufus Ward is a Columbus native a local historian. E-mail your questions about local history to Rufus at [email protected].

READER FAVORITES

• 

  Slimantics: Redistricting by another name is no less offensive

  By Slim Smith • 1 day ago

• 

  Our View: We don’t want to hear, ‘there’s nothing to do’

  By Dispatch Editorial Board • 1 day ago

• 

  Our View: At 250, America’s improbable birth still inspires

  By Dispatch Editorial Board • 8 hours ago