Loving Restoration
The story of Kenansvilles Liberty Hall, one of the Cape Fear regions most gracious and sensitively refurbished Greek Revival houses, is more than the history of one familys home. Beginning well before the graceful residence was built, the story of Liberty Hall tells the story of North Carolinas earliest and most tenacious Scottish settlers as well as the politics and events of the Colonial era, the Revolutionary period and the aftermath of the Civil War in eastern North Carolina.
Thomas Kenan came to what is now Duplin County in the 1730s with his wife Elizabeth Johnston Kenan, niece to Colonial Governor Gabriel Johnston. They established a plantation at Turkey Branch named The Lilacs. Over the years, the entrepreneurial Scotsman acquired considerable land holdings throughout the region. When Thomas son, James Kenan, a political activist, Revolutionary War general and one of the founding trustees of the University of North Carolina, became master of the estate he renamed the plantation Liberty Hall. The house was later destroyed by fire and James son Thomas Kenan, IIwhose own plantation Lochlin had also been destroyed by firemoved his family to Kenansville and is thought to have built the present-day Liberty Hall as the familys in-town home in the early 19th century. But years of drought and unfavorable economic conditions caused a decline in the familys fortunes. In 1833, Thomas, his wife Mary Rand Kenan, from Raleigh, and their four youngest children left North Carolina to seek opportunities in Selma, Alabama.
The couples oldest son, Owen Rand Kenan, chose to stay in Kenansville. He made changes to the structure of the house, including joining a kitchen wing to the main house by a breezeway and reorienting the homes entrance, which originally faced the Duplin County Courthouse. Today, the L-shaped house faces north to NC Highways 24 and 50. Owen also re-instituted the use of the name Liberty Hall for the residence.
Under the stewardship of Owen and his wife Sarah Graham Kenan, Liberty Hall flourished as the couple raised their four children: James Graham, William Rand, Annie Dillon, and yet another Thomas S. Kenan. The home and grounds reflect the couples interest in music, fine furniture and interior decoration, and portray a well-managed and largely self-sufficient household of the mid-19th century. Federal troops were in the region during the Civil War, but Liberty Hall was unmolested. Even more remarkable, all three of Owen and Sarah Kenans Confederate soldier sons survived the war and returned home to continue the tradition of service to their family, community and state.
At Owens death in 1887, Annie Dillon Kenan, the couples unmarried daughter, inherited the home and in turn left it to her niece, Mary Lily Kenan. Mary Lily had married Standard Oil magnate and Florida developer Henry Morrison Flagler in the parlor of Liberty Hall in 1901. The occasion brought the nations most fashionable social elite to Kenansville via a private train to Magnolia, North Carolina, and from there by horse-drawn carriages to Liberty Hall. Mary Lily Kenan Flagler left Liberty Hall to her colorful cousin, Colonel Owen Hill Kenan, an adventurous man who survived the sinking of the British ocean liner Lusitania by the Germans in 1917. He served as an officer in World War I and continued to visit Liberty Hall until his death in 1963. A year later, Frank Hawkins Kenan, Owens nephew and one of North Carolinas best-known businessmen purchased the home and deeded it to the Duplin County Board of Education and the Board of County Commissioners. The new owners immediately formed the Liberty Hall Restoration Commission.
Protecting the past
Thomas S. Kenan III, Franks son and namesake of the 18th-century Thomas Kenan, has been a member of the Restoration Commission since its inception. Kenan takes great pleasure in recounting the strides the Commission has made in re-creating a well-loved home and household complex of the ante-bellum period. He credits the impetus for the restoration to O. P. Johnson, who served as Superintendent of Schools for many years. Mr. Johnson kept telling my father and his brother James Kenan how important it was to restore Liberty Hall and make it an educational facility, not just a house museum, he says. I think that expanded vision of Liberty Halls potential inspired what we see today.
The restoration of the home took three years and was carried out by local craftsmen under the supervision of Robert Herring, owner of a regional construction company. Kenan cites Kenansville native F. W. McGowen for his on-going encouragement and assistance in the project and Wilmington architect William S. Boney for providing invaluable assistance in preserving the architectural integrity of the home and reconstructed complex.
When we got to furnishing the house and eventually the interiors of the restored outbuildings, we were fortunate to have a lot of documentary evidence to draw on, says Kenan. In addition to the family records, the Commission turned to New York interior designer John E. Winters, who had worked with several historic homes, to help re-create the interior of Liberty Hall. Working in concert with Winters was Zelina Brunswig and Mrs. Murray Douglas of the internationally recognized Brunswig and Fils fabric and wallpaper company, They re-created the wallpapers and fabrics used throughout the house based on documentary evidence and patterns popular at the time, says Kenan. Liberty Halls entrance hall features a beautiful wallpaper in shades of blue, green and red on a blue background. Named Parrot, the wallpaper design was based on an early 19th-century pattern and on bits and pieces of wallpaper found during work on the restoration, says Kenan. Some of the wallpaper patterns created for Liberty Hall are still available through the company catalogues.
Spacious and gorgeous
It is the dramatic entrance hall that sets the stage for the experience of Liberty Hall, one of the most appealing of North Carolinas many restored historic house museums. The tall ceilings establish a sense of spaciousness, and the gorgeous colors of the Parrot wallpaper are used throughout the rest of the house. Mrs. JoAnn Stroud, who has been a part of Liberty Halls restoration and educational outreach, gives an excellent history of the house, the family and the fascinating details about everyday life in the Kenan household. She and her associate Gloria McGowan retain their enthusiasm for Liberty Hall after sharing the property with scores of visitors and a steady progression of school children. Stroud begins her tour by reminding us that many of the familys furnishings were rescued when the first Liberty Hall burned and were incorporated into the furnishings at the Kenansville residence. The halls 18th-century English hunt board is an original family piece, as is the oil and pastel portrait of a gentleman by Francis Cotes that hangs on the halls transverse wall.
To the right of the center hall is the music room, furnished with the original piano and Annie Kenans sheet music. One of the homes most prized possessions is the rooms walnut secretary bookcase. It is thought to have been built on James Kenans plantation by a Charleston-trained craftsman. Across the hall from the music room is the parlor where Mary Lily married Henry Flagler. There an elegant Chippendale cabinet displays one of the 13 complete sets of china owned by the family. An original framed needlepoint stands by the fireplace.
The library, which served as Owen Kenans office, is a favorite with visitors to Liberty Hall. Much of the family memorabilia is displayed, including a 1760s land grant from George III and a draft in Thomas Kenans handwriting of the legislation that established Wake Forest College in 1834. (Wake Forest was the second major educational institution to be opened after the founding of the University of North Carolina in 1789.) There are James Kenans uniform epaulets and other kit from his Revolutionary War days, including a gourd canteen. Though there are no original Kenan portraits, a modern portrait of Thomas S. Kenan, Owen and Sarahs son, hangs above the library fireplace. Thomas Kenan attained the rank of Colonel in the War Between the States and later served as Attorney General of North Carolina. The library also displays original photographs of Christopher Dudley Hill and Emily Howard Hill, the parents of James Graham Kenans wife. The marriage of Ann Elizabeth Hill to James forged a link between the Kenans and yet another prominent North Carolina family.
Another favorite Liberty Hall room is the winter dining room, a cozy space that can be closed off and warmed by its fireplace. The room features warming shelves built into the fireplace wall. It is furnished with an 18th-century North Carolina Hepplewhite table set with the familys original 18th-century Darby china and silver flatware. The four Hepplewhite chairs at the table are the gift of George and Frances London.
Perhaps one of the most interesting areas in the house is the summer dining room. Adjoining the winter dining room, it can be entered from the transverse hall. It connects to the butlers pantry that Owen Kenan created when he brought the kitchen to the main house. Double doors open to a side entry porch, wide enough to allow the rooms hunt board to be carried into the yard to serve refreshments to guests on horseback. The table and chairs are scaled for children as the younger generation did not dine with their elders. And the rooms early North Carolina pine cupboard is simple yet lovely.
All of the beds in the house are original, notes JoAnn Stroud, as we climb the staircase. On the second level, four large bedrooms provide insight into the familys most intimate moments. In the gentlemens bedroom, an American walnut four-poster tester bed is carved with interlocking pineapples, acorns and palm trees, symbols of hospitality, strength and flexibility. The focus of the ladies bedroom is Mary Lilys wedding dress, which reveals how diminutive she was. Especially charming is the childrens bedroom with its miniature mantel and the original narrow childrens bed next to the original doll bed, the possession of the Kenans only daughter.
If the Kenan home is a testament to the familys refined tastes, the attached kitchen testifies to the efficiency of the household. The rooms large hearth is set with numerous cook pots; others stand on tripods to catch the fires heat, suggesting how much food could be prepared at one time. Large serving platters are braced on the mantelpiece and an original dough bowl and rolling pen are set out to begin the days baking. Below the kitchen, a large underground cellar is a place for drying and preserving herbs as well as storing and securing the households precious stock of wine.
Plantation grounds restored and re-created
Traces of foundations, old photographs and the extensive family records aided in the restoration of some of Liberty Halls 12 dependencies and in the re-creation of four of them. The overseers cottage, which also served as his office, is original, as are the chicken house and the summerhouse. Tom Kenan is particularly proud of the re-created servants cottage that was the home of Martha Cooper, the woman who grew up in the household of Thomas Kenan II where her mother was the family cook. Cooper, who also became a cook, and her brothers Lewis and James worked for Owen Kenans family and were given their freedom prior to the Civil War by Sarah Graham Kenan, whose New England heritage favored abolition. Maybe because they were free to make their own choices before the war, speculates Kenan, Martha and her brothers chose to remain with the family after the war. Their skills and dedication must have made a huge difference to Owens family during those difficult post-war years.
This year marks the 35th anniversary of the public opening of Liberty Hall. Since its inception, the Liberty Hall Restoration Commission, through grants from the Kenan Charitable Trust and other foundations associated with the Kenan family, has continued to expand the facilities of Liberty Hall to further its educational mission. Ten years ago, the group built the Frank H. Kenan Visitors Center. Located between the Liberty Hall complex and the Cowan Museum, another house museum with preserved outbuildings, the Visitors Center offers an introductory video and a gift shop. The Center also features a period model of the complex and the town of Kenansville as they were in the mid-19th century. Its gallery of original historical documents and artifacts is of a quality to delight the most serious historian.
This meticulously executed restoration is appealing historically and aesthetically. Liberty Hall recalls the decorative arts, music, literature and architecture of the period, and it details comprehensively the elements of a working ante-bellum household. It reminds us that a legacy of strong family values, a reverence for education and a dedication to public service is our birthright from many of North Carolinas early families. Thank you, Liberty Hall.