Little England is a historic

plantation house A plantation house is the main house of a plantation, often a substantial farmhouse, which often serves as a symbol for the plantation as a whole. Plantation houses in the Southern United States and in other areas are known as quite grand and e ...

located near

Gloucester Gloucester ( ) is a cathedral city and the county town of Gloucestershire in the South West of England. Gloucester lies on the River Severn, between the Cotswolds to the east and the Forest of Dean to the west, east of Monmouth and east ...

Gloucester County, Virginia Gloucester County () is a county in the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 38,711. Its county seat is Gloucester Courthouse. The county was founded in 1651 in the Virginia Colony and is named for Henry Stuart, ...

. The

plantation A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...

dates to a 1651 land grant to the Perrin family by Governor William Berkeley. Capt. John Perrin built the house on a point of land overlooking the York River directly across from Yorktown in 1716 with plans reputed to have been drawn by

Christopher Wren Sir Christopher Wren PRS FRS (; – ) was one of the most highly acclaimed English architects in history, as well as an anatomist, astronomer, geometer, and mathematician-physicist. He was accorded responsibility for rebuilding 52 churches ...

. The house was used as a lookout for ships during the

Battle of Yorktown The Siege of Yorktown, also known as the Battle of Yorktown, the surrender at Yorktown, or the German battle (from the presence of Germans in all three armies), beginning on September 28, 1781, and ending on October 19, 1781, at Yorktown, Virgi ...

. It is a -story, five bay, gable roofed brick dwelling in the

Georgian Georgian may refer to: Common meanings * Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country) ** Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group ** Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians **Georgian scripts, three scrip ...

style. A -story frame wing was added in 1954. It has a single pile plan and two interior end chimneys. The brickwork is

Flemish Bond Brickwork is masonry produced by a bricklayer, using bricks and Mortar (masonry), mortar. Typically, rows of bricks called ''Course (architecture), courses'' are laid on top of one another to build up a structure such as a brick wall. Bricks ...

with few glazed headers. Little England is one of Virginia's least altered and best preserved colonial plantation homes. The interior features some of the finest colonial paneling in Virginia. The house was restored in 1939. an
''Accompanying photo''
/ref> 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 1970.

References

External links

Little England, State Route 672 vicinity, Bena, Gloucester County, VA
1 photo at

Historic American Buildings Survey Heritage Documentation Programs (HDP) is a division of the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) responsible for administering the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), Historic American Engineering Record (HAER), and Historic American Landscapes ...

Historic American Buildings Survey in Virginia Plantation houses in Virginia Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Virginia Georgian architecture in Virginia Houses completed in 1775 Houses in Gloucester County, Virginia National Register of Historic Places in Gloucester County, Virginia 1651 establishments in Virginia {{GloucesterCountyVA-NRHP-stub

See also

References

External links