Gay Mont

"Gaymont" or "Rose Hill"

Gaymont, HABS Photo
Location Off U.S. 17 near jct. with U.S. 301, Port Royal, Virginia
Coordinates 38°10′11″N 77°13′54″W / 38.16972°N 77.23167°W / 38.16972; -77.23167Coordinates: 38°10′11″N 77°13′54″W / 38.16972°N 77.23167°W / 38.16972; -77.23167
Area 318.5 acres (128.9 ha)
Built c. 1790 (1790)
NRHP Reference # 72001387[1]
VLR # 016-0032
Significant dates
Added to NRHP May 19, 1972
Designated VLR January 18, 1972[2]

Gaymont, or Gay Mont, is a historic home located at Port Royal, Caroline County, Virginia. Originally called "Rose Hill", the central section of the house was built about 1790 by John Hipkins as a two-story frame structure with a gable roof and two exterior end chimneys. His grandson and heir, John Hipkins Bernard, renamed the house in honor of his wife, Jane Gay Bolling Robertson, a descendant of Pocahontas. It was enlarged in 1819 with the addition of flanking one-story stuccoed brick wings and a one-story colonnade of stuccoed brick Tuscan columns. In 1834 a one-story octagonal music room was added and in 1839 an octagonal library and office at the ends of each wing. Except for a brief 18-month change in ownership in 1958-1959, the house remained in the Bernard-Robb family until 2007 at which time it transferred to the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities. A family cemetery with almost 40 graves is set just to the north of the house along the forest edge.

In June 1959, a fire of debated origin destroyed the frame center section and octagonal music room. Shortly after the fire, Frances Bernard Robb Upton Patton, the great-granddaughter of John Hipkins Bernard, repurchased the property that she and her cousins had previously sold. Together with her husband James S. Patton, she rebuilt the house and restored the garden along their original lines. This time, the center section was built as a stuccoed masonry structure and the music room foundation left as a patio. Also on the property is a contributing early brick outbuilding, probably the original kitchen.[3]

The Patton's donated the house, contents, and land to the Association for the Preservation of Virginia Antiquities in 1975 with life tenancy for the donors. In 2007, APVA took ownership and subsequently sold it to John and Billings Cay of Charleston, SC who began a multi-million dollar renovation of the house, including rebuilding the octagonal music room. They renamed the property "Rose Hill" as it was originally.

It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.[1]

References

  1. 1 2 National Park Service (2010-07-09). "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service.
  2. ↑ "Virginia Landmarks Register". Virginia Department of Historic Resources. Retrieved 5 June 2013.
  3. ↑ Virginia Historic Landmarks Commission Staff (January 1972). "National Register of Historic Places Inventory/Nomination: Gay Mont" (PDF). and Accompanying photo


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