Young House (Nicholasville, Kentucky)

The Young House is an historic estate in Jessamine County, Kentucky, United States, in the city of Wilmore off of Kentucky Route 29 on Lexington Road. The reference to Nicholasville, Kentucky in the title of this page is incorrect. Popular legend has it that the house was the birthplace of Bennett H. Young, an American Civil War soldier, lawyer, and architect.[2]

Young House
Front of the house
Nearest cityWilmore, Kentucky
Coordinates37°52′58″N 84°38′31″W
Area150 acres (61 ha)
Architectural styleItalianate
MPSJessamine County MRA
NRHP reference No.84001787[1]
Added to NRHPJuly 13, 1984

However, the reference given here does not substantiate this last claim. Apparently, the National Register information submitted in 1984 by Glenn Dorroh, a previous owner, correctly identifies this as the house of Dr. Brown Young (1823-1893), a fact confirmed by Jessamine county maps from 1861 and 1877 which identify the house as belonging to "Dr. B. Young." But Dorroh's file goes on to claim: "Brown Young's father John was a Revolutionary War soldier and his son was the historian Col. Bennett H. Young." Both of these claims are false.

Bennett H. Young himself would say so as he wrote A History of Jessamine County KY (1898),[3] which he dedicated to his father. Bennett Young identifies his father as Robert Young, whom he describes as a native of Fayette County, KY, who set up shop as a hatter (hat maker) in Nicholasville, KY (Jessamine County) from 1825 to 1848. In 1848 Robert sold the store and bought a farm. The Jessamine County Atlas of 1877 shows that the farm of R. Young was located on Kentucky Route 29 just west of what is now the Nicholasville by-pass. The home no longer stands and is the site of a subdivision, but its location is included on C. N. Bunch's map of Jessamine County Historical Homes (2003). Since Bennett would have been 6 years old by the time his father bought the farm, he clearly was not born there either; he probably was born in the town of Nicholasville in the home adjacent to his father's hat shop.

The house pictured here (not actually on Route 29 but off it on the Lexington Road to Wilmore, KY, far further to the southwest) is indeed the former house of Dr. Brown Young. He was the son of Dr. Archibald and Martha Young, who lived in the home adjacent to the north. Archibald was apparently either the brother or the cousin of Robert Young (there was more than one), and both of them were among the several sons of John Young, who had been a revolutionary War soldier.[4]

Brown Young married Emline Drake, whose family owned the property adjacent to the south of the B. Young house. Brown and Emline had a daughter, Adelia (b. 1846), who married a Leonard Willis. According to the Lamont Family DNA study, the Youngs may also have had a son named Samuel (b. 1849), but there is no mention of this son in the biographical sketch of Dr. Brown Young in Kentucky: A History of the State (Battle, et al., 1887), so he may have died in infancy or childhood.

The 150 acres is now a working Angus farm named Sycamore Hill in reference to the Sycamore trees that line the driveway. The property is owned by the Ashbrook family although they do not occupy the main house. It is rented as a single family home.

The property was placed on the United States National Register of Historic Places on July 13, 1984.[1]

Architecture

The Young House was supposedly built between 1814 and 1820, and is decorated in the Italianate style. The two-story, nine-room house has 18 -inch-thick brick exterior walls and is now a total of approximately 3600 square feet in size. It has wide-plank, ash wood flooring.[2]

But if this date is correct, then it could not have been built by Brown Young himself, as he was born in 1823. The National Register only claims this home was built in the mid-19th century.

References
  1. "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. March 13, 2009.
  2. Coleman, J. Winston (1968). Historic Kentucky (Second ed.). Lexington, Kentucky: Henry Clay Press. p. 128.
  3. Young, Bennett H. (1898). A History of Jessamine County, Kentucky, from its earliest settlement to 1898. Louisville, Kentucky: Courier Job Printing Co. pp. 270.
  4. Battle, J. H., Perrin, W.H., Kniffin, G.C. (1887). Kentucky: A History of the state, embracing a concise account of the origin and development of the Virginia colony; its expansion westward, and the settlement of the frontier beyond the Alleghenies; the erection of Kentucky as an independent state, and its subsequent development. Louisville, Kentucky: F. A. Battey. p. 1122.
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