Spring Hill - Home of Colonel Richard W. Thompson

Description:	Drawing of Spring Hill, the home of Colonel Richard W. Thompson by Juliet A. Peddle, Terre Haute artist and architect. Colonel Richard W. Thompsons Home, Spring Hill, destroyed by fire some years ago. Drawing by Juliet A. Peddle, Terre Haute artist and architect.SPRING HILL, for many years the home of Col. Richard Thompson, stood on a hill on the east side of Twenty-fifth street, continued south about two and one-half miles south of the city limits.This house is a hard one to identify with a particular owner because several families have lived here long enough to become identified with it. I am electing to associate it with Colonel Thompson as the one who occupied the house the longest of the later owners, and also because he seems to have lived here longer than in any other one house which he occupied.A newspaper clipping some years back gives this information about the early history of the house. The article says that it was built some time between 1822 and 1825 by Wm. C. Linton of Philadelphia who brought the plans with him from the east, (the deed records indicate that he bought the property in 1823). The brick were made on the place and the plastering, which was made of ground muscle shells, was so hard it was even in later years almost impossible to drive nails into. The rooms were quite large and the walls thick, so thick that the windowsills were sometimes used as tables.(text missing)---traded houses and Colonel Thompson owned the house until 1890. After Colonel Thompson disposed of it, the house passed through several hands and was rented part of the time. About nine or ten years ago a destructive fire destroyed the house so that today all that is left is the outline of the foundations. Harry Kern bought the property shortly after the fire and owns it today. Colonel Thompson was born in Virginia in 1809. He left home and came west in 1830. A year later he settled in Bedford where he engaged in many and diverse activities such as clerking in a store, founding a school, studying law and being elected to the legislature. He was later a state senator and was elected to congress in 1841. At the end of his term in 1843 he came to Terre Haute to live-in 1847 he was again elected to congress.He declined several offers of important positions in the government-among them minister to Austria. After Hayes election he was finally persuaded to accept an important post-secretary of the navy. He retired from this position in 1880. He served in a number of positions also in later years and published several books. In his reminiscences when he was 84, which was written up in the newspaper at the time of this birthday, he says he first lived at Fourth and---(text missing)
Origin:	01/01/2005
Contributor(s):	Peddle, Juliet, 1899-1979
Source:	http://indianamemory.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/rose/id/835
Collection:	Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology Logan Library
Rights:	http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/
Copyright:	Copyright Undetermined
Subjects:	Architectural drawings Architecture Houses Thompson, Richard W. (Richard Wigginton), 1809-1900 Architecture Domestic Life

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