Sherwood Forest is the only private residence in the United States to have been owned by two unrelated U.S. presidents. William Henry Harrison inherited the plantation, then named Walnut Grove, in 1790 and held it for three years. He sold the 3,000 acres (12 km2) property in 1793 having never lived in the house. Harrison's vice president and successor John Tyler purchased the plantation, which by then had been reduced to 1,600 acres (6.5 km2), in 1842 and lived there after leaving the White House.[5]
John Tyler renamed the plantation Sherwood Forest in 1842. He said it signified that he had been "outlawed" by the Whig party. He was attracted to the plantation because it was near his birthplace at Greenway Plantation. He retired there when he left the White House in 1845 and spent the rest of his life there with his second wife Julia Gardiner Tyler and some of his children. He had eight with his first wife and seven with his second wife.
Pearl, the youngest, was born in 1860, when Tyler was 70 years old; she died in 1947.
As regional hostilities in the United States escalated to become the American Civil War in 1861, Tyler backed Virginia's secession, although he died in January 1862. Later that spring, the house was occupied by Union soldiers during McClellan's Peninsula Campaign of 1862 and again during Grant's Overland Campaign in 1864. During the latter, the Battle of Wilson's Wharf was fought nearby. When an Ohio regiment vacated the house in 1864, they attempted to raze it with fire as a punishment for Tyler's support of the Confederacy. The fire was quickly extinguished by a loyal slave and did little damage to the house.[4]
Owners of the house who started restoring it in the mid-1970s started removing some home-made storm windows and then discovered from old records that Tyler had built them himself, so they kept them. One of the house's claims to fame is its length; 301 feet (91 m). It is noted for its long, skinny ballroom, a "hyphen" Tyler had added to the house to accommodate the style of dancing popular then - what is today called "line dancing" but was then the "Virginia reel."[4]
The house has been in the Tyler family since it was purchased in 1842. The house currently is owned by Harrison Ruffin Tyler, President Tyler's grandson and the son of Lyon Gardiner Tyler;[6] he and his wife, Frances Payne Bouknight Tyler, restored the home and grounds based on information gathered from over 47,000 letters describing the decor, furnishings, and landscape.[citation needed] It is open to the public for tours by appointment.[7] The grounds are open daily for self-guided tours from 9am-5pm excepting Thanksgiving and Christmas days.
Cemetery
The grave of Tyler’s horse, The General, including a humorous epitaph by Tyler.
A pet cemetery is located on the property, where Tyler family pets were and still are buried, most notably, John Tyler's horse, The General.
Staff at the site also maintain a small grove where Tyler planned to be buried. In January 1862, while in Richmond to serve in the Confederate House of Representatives, Tyler became seriously ill. He died while arranging plans to return to Sherwood Forest, and his request to be buried at his home was ignored. He was instead buried Richmond’s Hollywood Cemetery.
^ ab"Tyler, John, House". National Historic Landmark summary listing. National Park Service. Archived from the original on December 29, 2008. Retrieved June 27, 2008.
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