More information at the Virginia Department of Historic Resources here
Home Site – Nelson County, Virginia
Edgewood, located at 3008 Warminster Road near Warminster, Virginia, was established as a plantation circa 1790 on a lot originally associated with the neighboring Liberty Hall tract. The property is on the southeast side of Route 626, 1.4 miles northeast of intersection with Route 743. Buried in the cemetery are: Joseph Carrington Cabell (1778-1856), R. Parke F. Carter (d. 1839); Mrs. Lelia Tucker (d. 1837), St. George Tucker (1752-1828). Mary Walker Cabell, Margaret Cabell Self, Sydney Baldwin Self, George Selden Somerville (1896- 1973), Mary Cabell Somerville (1911-1998).
Architecture
Joseph C. Cabell added single-story wings to each end of the original three-part home. A kitchen was built east of the house and linked by a low covered passage. Most likely the two rooms east of the center passage were the public area and the dining room was probably located nearest the kitchen. The wing to the west was the family’s private quarters.
Beautifully detailed porches were at both the north and south entrances. At the time of his death in 1856, the house consisted of 12 rooms, two of which were libraries as Joseph’s library was among the largest in Virginia, consisting of around 1500 volumes. The oldest part of the house was the double H which opened to small verandas at the front and back and was linked to the side wings by one-story passages. There was a Jeffersonian staircase.
To the rear of the house, Joseph added a stable, carriage house and slave housing. “Cabell paved the floors of the cellars, smokehouse and dairy with bricks, plastered and whitewashed cellars and outbuildings, rebuilt hearths, repaired flooring and installed new stairs.”
Although the house burned in January, 1955, there remains in the yard, the St. George Tucker cottage, where Mrs. Mary Carter Tucker and her husband lived. Mrs. Tucker was the mother of Joseph Cabell’s wife, Mary Carter. Both Mrs. Tucker and her husband are buried in the graveyard.
Box locks are on the six-panel doors. There is beaded picture molding, chair railing and crown molding. A rear addition was added about 1830-1840. The transitional style home (late Georgian to early Federal style) has six-over-nine windows.
In addition to the St. George Tucker Cottage, some of the cottage dependencies also have survived. There is a smokehouse, dairy, dovecote, round brick ice house and frame slave quarters. The original frame slave quarters burned in the 1940’s. A new structure was built on the original foundation.
The antebellum smokehouse is a small square building with closely set studs and a pyramidal roof supported by a king post truss and vertical vents. Adjacent to the smokehouse is the dairy which is frame with a pyramidal roof and distinctive “S” shaped vents. There are remnants of faceted finials. Along the row is the dovecote which is a square frame building with pyramidal roof and faceted finials.
“The three pyramidal-roof dependencies date to or at near the time of the main house (1790). All three buildings incorporate king-posts in their roof framing. King-post trusses, however, are something entirely different and do not occur in the smokehouse or either of the other two.” The log corn crib (or corn house) also has diamond notching and is a triple crib log structure.
Timeline of Edgewood Ownership
- 1791- 1803: Robert Rives (1764-1845) and wife Margaret Cabell (1770-1815), daughter of Col. William Cabell and Margaret Jordan of Union Hill. They lived at Edgewood from 1791-1803 at which time they moved to Oak Ridge.
- 1807-1856: Joseph Carrington Cabell (1778-1856), son of Nicholas Cabell and Hannah Carrington of Liberty Hall.
- 1856- 1862: Mary Carter Cabell, Joseph’s wife, lived at Edgewood till her death in 1862.
- 1862- 1904: Philip B. Cabell (1836-1904), son of Nathaniel Francis Cabell of Liberty Hall.
- 1904-1925: Julia Bolling Cabell ( wife of Philip B. Cabell) lived there until her death in 1925.
- In 1925 the house was owned by Philip’s son, Joseph Hartwell Cabell (1863-1955).
- 1965 – Mary Cabell Somerville (1911-1998), daughter of Joseph Hartwell Cabell inherited the home.
- 1980: Robert Self (great grandson of Joseph Hartwell Cabell) inherited the house. They continue to reside at Edgewood, continuing a Cabell-family ownership of over 215 years.
Additional Photos – Edgewood
Photos courtesy Bob Self
Additional Photos – Tucker Cottage and Outbuildings
Photos courtesy Bob Self
