Along the Jefferson Davis Trail – Miller’s Crossing @Newport, S.C.
City Directories and History: This lovely old home was demolished in 2016 for a new bank building. Enjoy the image gallery showing the home just before it was razed. Images were taken in the fall of 2015. The historic house was demolished to make room for a new Founders Bank in 2016.
The house was the home of Cathcart family for generations. Author and historian Wm. B. White, Jr. states: ARCHIBALD INGRAM BARRON, M.D. (Learned his medical knowledge from studying under Dr.J. H. Cathcart.)
“Dr. A. I. Barron, beloved Yorkville physician, planter, churchman, and signatory of the Ordinance of Secession, was born near the site of Tirzah Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church on July 4, 1807. He died at Yorkville on August 20,1887. He was the son of William and Frances (Stewart) Barron. His paternal grandfather was Archibald Barron, who settled in the general area of Tirzah Church in the 1760’s, having immigrated to this country from Northern Ireland. A large number of Barrons were residents of the neighborhood of Carrickfergus, County Antrim, Ireland; and it is believed that the Barrons of York County, South Carolina, may trace their European roots to that place.
Archibald Barron was a farmer and all his sons grew up following that same occupation. A.I. Barron’s father, William Barron, was the first to add merchandising to his accustomed way of life. By dint of hard work and an uncommonly generous inheritance of common sense, William prospered in his new work and accumulated a handsome property. Archibald Ingram Barron was sent to Ebenezer Academy for his formal education. While there he was a diligent student of Latin and of English grammar. Many of his classmates grew up to become outstanding lawyers, judges, physicians, and ministers. Archibald Barron was a talented writer and an acclaimed public speaker.
He soon decided that medicine would be his chosen field. He began the study of that subject under the tutelage of Dr. J. H. Cathcart, who practiced and lived about two miles west of Ebenezerville. Following this period of learning, he went to Lexington, Kentucky, and enrolled at Transylvania University, from which institution he was graduated in 1829. Doctor Barron returned to York District to enter upon his own practice. He first engaged himself in medicine in the Bethel neighborhood, where he remained about a year. Then he moved to the Santuc section, located not far from the Neely’s Creek A. R. P. Church.
In February, 1830, he was married to Mary A. Pressley, daughter of William Pressley. Mr. Pressley had been dead for a number of years; and when his estate was settled up, at the insistence of his wife, Archibald Barron bought “the Hicklin place,” the name given to William Pressley’s farm. It was here that A. I. Barron made his home until removed, for reasons of health, to Yorkville in 1854. He joined the practice of Dr. J. Rufus Bratton. He sold out his lands near Ebenezerville and purchased a large farm near Yorkville, which he operated for many years. He, with Col. W. C. Beatty and Col. William Wright, helped to organize the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in Yorkville, in the 1850’s. He was an elder in that congregation. Eight or ten years before his death, his health became poor and he gradually relinquished his practice, devoting his time to deeds of love and mercy, reading the classics and the Bible, and attending to the myriad details of everyday living. It would be accurate to describe Archibald Ingram Barron as a Christian gentleman of the highest type. He was honest to a fault and his word was his sacred bond.
Doctor Barron’s stately old home on the north side of East Liberty Street in Yorkville has now been razed. The present home of Mrs. Frances Martin Barron is located on a portion of the old Barron lot.” Information from: The Genesis of York, by Wm. B. White, Jr., Yorkville Historical Society, 2015 – Jostens Publishing Company
GRIST VISITS OLD YORK COUNTY HOMES: (Editor A. M. Grist of the Yorkville Enquirer wrote a column he titled “Just A-Rolling Along the Way in My Green Chevrolet.” This one appeared October 27, 1933.)
Not very far below the Martin home, just off highway No. 5, and on the Chester and Lincoln road (I think that’s the name) stands an old two-story house. You have seen it many times. It was in the late eighties that I first came to know that house, but I didn’t know much about it. Tom told me that the house was built many years ago by some of the Barrons and that the late Dr. A. I. Barron once lived there and had his office in a little building that stood close by in the yard. The house is built partly of logs and weather- boarded over. That means that it was built many years before the Civil war. It was later occupied by a Dr. Martin as long as he lived and then by his family afterwards. In the the eighties his widow married a man named Brunner, and that’s another story that doesn’t need to be told here. (Part of an article) – (Information courtesy of and from: YCGHS – The Quarterly Magazine)
R&R NOTE: It would have been this route, in front of, the old Carthcart Home that CSA President, Jefferson Davis would have traveled from Ebenezer to York. There is no record of his stopping here or other locations on the Old York Road but this is a link on the Jefferson Davis Trail through S.C.
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