Circa 1835 Plantation Home on 50.76 Acres in South Carolina

This wonderful home is an intact example of an antebellum plantation house. It was built around 1835 by a Texan, Richard Hallums, who supervised the quality of construction and assured that not a single inferior piece of lumber was used. In 1856 Mr. Hallums sold the home and its 1,000 acre plantation to John Montgomery Lemmon for $10,000.

Lemmon was a moderately wealthy planter with nineteen slaves. In February 1865, while Lemmon was in the Confederate army in Virginia, elements of General Sherman's Federal army advanced toward Winnsboro from Columbia, SC and looted the plantation of food, livestock, and valuables but did not put it to the torch. The Oaks was owned by the Lemmon family or their descendants until the 1980s. It was listed in the National Register of Historical Places in 1984.

The Oaks, reportedly named for an oak grove which originally surrounded the house, is a large, two-story, weather boarded frame residence with a gable-end roof. The front has a central, two-tiered portico with a pediment featuring a fanlight and boxed cornice. The porticos are supported by four wooden columns and have wooden balustrades. The portion of the front sheltered by the portico is sheathed in flush board. The rear elevation has a one-story, shed-roofed porch supported by four wooden columns, trimmed out by plain balustrades on the left portion but with an enclosed room on the right. Side elevations feature double-end chimneys and pedimented gable ends with boxed cornices. The striking interior of the home is punctuated by fireplaces, heart of pine floors and wainscoting in every room on the first two stories. On the first floor is a formal living room, dining room, office, den/study and a kitchen with solid wood cherry cabinets. On the second level are two large bedrooms, two bathrooms and an office/library. The third floor has two more rooms and three covered porches.

The formal gardens, restored to much of their original magnificence, are positively breathtaking. The front garden is marked by the original granite fence posts and the restored wooden picket fence. The focal point of the garden is now a pavilion designed and created by the current owners while in front of the pavilion is a terrace, featuring an arbor and fountain, all overlooking the pond.