The Gilchrist House was a historic

farmhouse FarmHouse (FH) is a men's social fraternity founded at the University of Missouri on April 15, 1905. It became a national organization in 1921. Today FarmHouse has 34 active chapters in the United States and Canada.FarmHouse Fraternity New Memb ...

near Cordova in

Walker County, Alabama Walker County is a county located in the central portion of the U.S. state of Alabama."ACES Walker County Office" (links/history), Alabama Cooperative Extension System (ACES), 2007, webpageACES-Walker As of the 2020 census, the population wa ...

. Built when Alabama was still a part of the

Mississippi Territory The Territory of Mississippi was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that was created under an organic act passed by the United States Congress, Congress of the United States. It was approved and signed into law by Presiden ...

, it was considered by architectural scholars as one of the older surviving houses in Alabama and the oldest structure in the central and western area of the state. It was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

on March 24, 1972. It was destroyed by fire during the late 1990s, but the site remains listed on the National Register.

History

The Gilchrist House was built by Edmon (also spelled Edmond, Edmund) Gilchrist, who migrated to Alabama from

Edgefield, South Carolina Edgefield is a town in and the county seat of Edgefield County, South Carolina, Edgefield County, South Carolina, United States. The population was 4,750 at the 2010 United States census, 2010 census. Edgefield is part of the Augusta, Georgia met ...

. He first settled in Lowndes County, but relocated to Walker County and built the house in 1812 on land granted to him by the

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. The house was still owned by his descendants when it was listed on the National Register during the early 1970s.

Architecture

The house was a two-story wooden

timber frame Timber framing () and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy Beam (structure), timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and Woodworking joints, joined timbers with joints secure ...

structure, elevated on piers. The original portion was rectangular, with one upstairs room over one downstairs room. Bookend chimneys were present on each side of the two-story structure. A one-story side wing and a full-width porch were added in the late 1880s and early 1900s.

References

National Register of Historic Places in Walker County, Alabama Houses completed in 1812 Houses in Walker County, Alabama Demolished buildings and structures in Alabama {{WalkerCountyAL-NRHP-stub