Horry-Guignard House is a historic home located at

Columbia, South Carolina Columbia is the capital of the U.S. state of South Carolina. With a population of 136,632 at the 2020 census, it is the second-largest city in South Carolina. The city serves as the county seat of Richland County, and a portion of the city ...

. It was built before 1813, and is a two-story, late Federal style, modified I-house type frame dwelling. The front facade features a one-story, full-width balustraded porch supported by square columns. During the winter of 1813–1814, the main hall was widened from six feet to eleven feet. To do this, the house was sawed in half and the two ends were pulled apart to rest on two new foundations. It was probably built by

Peter Horry Peter Horry (1743 – 28 February 1815) was a planter of Huguenot descent and a South Carolina militia leader. On June 12, 1775, the Provincial Congress of South Carolina elected twenty captains to serve in the 1st and 2nd South Carolina Regimen ...

(1747-1815), a Revolutionary War Colonel and Brigadier General of the South Carolina Militia. Later, the house was acquired by John Gabriel Guignard (1751-1822), the Surveyor General of South Carolina from 1798 to 1802. Guignard is responsible for the early design of the city and laid out the first streets of Columbia. According to urban legend, the house was spared during the civil war by General Sherman's troops thanks to the cooking of a slave named Dilcie. While the owners of the house at that time had fled before the Union troops stormed the city, Dilcie remained in the home. She sought General Sherman at his headquarters and invited him to dinner, promising the best cooking in Columbia. Apparently Sherman was impressed because he ordered the home be spared as a gesture of gratitude. It was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 1971. In 2016, the fire department responded to the house after heavy smoke and fire was observed coming from the building. Firefighters were able to extinguish the fire and save the house from destruction. Horry-Guignard House Front

The house and an outbuilding, which is believed to have been an office built sometime between 1822 and 1876, is currently being restored as part of the University of South Carolina School of Law complex.

References

Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in South Carolina Federal architecture in South Carolina Houses completed in 1813 Houses in Columbia, South Carolina National Register of Historic Places in Columbia, South Carolina University of South Carolina {{ColumbiaSC-struct-stub