City Directories and History: “From earliest Edgefield history Pine House (Piney Woods Plantation), has been an identification and a name around which tradition and sometimes legends cluster. The date of the first structure is unknown, but ruins existed until a few decades ago of a log tavern built on a tract of 1084 acres, originally granted to Van Swearingen over 200 years ago. A daughter of Van Swearingen, Frances, married Ezekiel McClendon and they inherited the Piney Woods Plantation in May, 1791. It was to this tavern that General George Washington came, changing horses and spending the night en route from Augusta to Columbia in 1791.
The tavern, which was located across the highway from the present Pine House, was a way station on the Stage Road from Columbia to Augusta. In 1849 the first home was built of sawn timber and therefore named “Pine House.” This house burned in 1858. Mr. Benjamin Warren Bettis rebuilt the “Pine House” in 1868. In 1933 Mr. Julius Marshall Vann bought the house and it is now occupied by his son J. M. Vann. On either side of the main house are two small guest houses which were built at the same time that the original house was built. These houses were not harmed by the fire that destroyed the “Pine House” in 1858.”
Information from: Names in South Carolina by C.H. Neuffer, Published by the S.C. Dept. of English, USC
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