Dempsey Powell was an early resident of Wake County whose house once stood where the Meridian apartments are under construction. The house, part of it built in the mid-1700s, burned in 2006. It overlooked a large tract of land that was divided between his sons, Jesse and Caswell, after his death ca. 1793.
Jesse Powell inherited 318 acres from his father and accumulated much more before he died in 1842. When he decided to build a house on the then-main Raleigh to Oxford Road, the present owner says it was a long-range and meticulous plan because the heart pine used had been seasoned (cut and allowed to dry thoroughly before it was used), all the windows are of the same exact size, the floors have not warped in two centuries, and the rooms with their fireplaces remain intact.
It is a large Federal-style house with an unusual floor plan with a wide central hall that includes a set of enclosed stairs on the left, and elaborate woodwork. There are equal rooms on each side of the hall proceeding toward the back of the house; one on the right side has a semi-enclosed set of stairs to the rear of the second-floor hall. The two-story columned portico was added in the 1940s, replacing an earlier two-story porch. Two kitchens, bathrooms and a back porch were added about the same time when there were several family members living in the house. A number of outbuildings remain.
Among Powell’s use of state-of-the-art design was the new Rumford fireplace designed by Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, which reflected heat into the rooms by its shallow size and angled sides and also its throat carried away smoke without much loss of room heat. Each room had a fireplace.
Jesse Powell was a large-scale planter and an active Whig politician who undertook a number of improvements for the area that included the first bridge over the Neuse River, replacing a ferry, and improved the road the road from the river to Forestville. He founded a school, the Pleasant Grove Academy, which opened in 1826 across the road from his house and boarded the male students for $4 a month in his home. The second floor of the school building was used as the area’s first Masonic lodge.
After Jesse’s death in 1847 his widow, Mildred, and son, John D. Powell, sold 856 acres to John W. Harris, who promptly conveyed the tract back to John Powell. In 1850 John sold the tract to George C. Smith. The property probably passed from George Smith to his son, William B. Smith, and from William to William Madison Fuller, who purchased the house and some land in 1913.
Patricia Brothers, her brothers, one of them Mike Williams, and their family, her father, mother Gladys Fuller Williams, and grandmother moved into the house in 1956.
“At that time Aunt Martha, Aunt Iris, and Uncle Jack Fuller (all single) were living there. Aunt Martha and her brother, Uncle David Fuller, were the owners,” Mike recalls.
The family members had divided the house equally with each side having a kitchen at the back of the house and bedrooms on the second floor. When Patricia and her husband Curtis Brothers, became the owners there was a bed or a second bed in every room except the kitchens and living rooms. They have done several maintenance and renovation projects without disturbing the fabric of the house.
It remains a privately owned house where entrance is by invitation only and sightseers are not welcome.
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November 1, 2024
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