283 Victoria Rd
Asheville, NC, USA

National Register of Historic Places - Smith-McDowell House

Statement of Significance:

The Smith-McDowell House is a large, impressive dwelling with Flemish bond brickwork and a two-tier porch engaged beneath an extension of the main roof. Said to have been built in the 1840s and thus to be the oldest house surviving in Asheville, the house was constructed for James M. Smith who provided it to his son John P. Smith. The elder Smith was among the wealthiest and most influential men in the antebellum days of Asheville, engaging in a wide variety of enterprises. The ambitious house reflects the confident spirit of the early and mid-nineteenth century entrepreneurs who stimulated the economic development of far western North Carolina.

The Smith-McDowell House was built during the 1840s for James McConnell Smith on land lying at the confluence of the Swannanoa and French Broad rivers in present-day Asheville. Local tradition has it that the house is Asheville's oldest surviving structure, and no older ones have been recorded.

James M. Smith was born at the future site of Asheville on June 14, 1787. He was the second child of Colonel Daniel Smith, a native of New Jersey and a Revolutionary soldier, and Mary Davidson Smith, daughter of Major William Davidson of Swannanoa. An inscription on Smith's gravestone declares that he was the "FIRST CHILD OF WHITE PARENTAGE BORN WEST OF THE ALLEGHANY IN THE PRESENT STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA...." was married in 1814 to Mary (Polly) Patton, daughter of Colonel John Patton of Swannanoa, and became the father of at least nine children.

Smith soon began acquiring large tracts of land in Buncombe County. In 1826 he purchased from his brother Daniel Smith, Jr., a 123-acre tract "on Swannano river" adjoining the lands of his father-in-law. In 1832 he acquired from Moses Smith (probably another brother) a 485-acre tract lying "on both sides of French Broad River at the mouth of Swannano” These two tracts were to serve Smith as farmland for the remainder of his life and it was here that he built the brick house which stands today at 283 Victoria Road in the city of Asheville.

No evidence could be found to suggest that Smith ever lived in the brick house. He appears to have resided in the heart of the town of Asheville. It is likely that he had the dwelling built for his son John Patton Smith, as he devised "the Col. Daniel Smith farm & the new brick house near the road. . ." to the younger Smith in his will.

James M. Smith was by any measure one of Asheville's wealthiest and most successful men. In the early 1830s he owned and operated a ferry across the French Broad River and later built and operated the first bridge (a wooden one) across that watercourse. He was the proprietor of the Buck Hotel, Asheville's third such facility, and is believed to have built it, probably during the 1840s. The wooden structure became an Asheville landmark and survived under various names and proprietors until 1907. Smith also engaged in several mercantile enterprises, often in partnership with various sons-in-law. The most notable of these was the firm of Smith & McDowell, which maintained a store directly across Asheville's main street (now Patton Avenue) from the Buck Hotel. Smith's partner in this firm was W. W. McDowell, husband of Smith's daughter Sarah Lucinda and later owner of the Smith-McDowell House.

The 1850 census lists James M. Smith as a merchant and hotel keeper and credits him with the ownership of real estate valued at $30,000. The 1850 slave schedule indicates that Smith was the owner (either directly or through an agent) of sixty-six slaves, making him Buncombe County's leading slaveholder. The agricultural schedule places a cash value of $35,000 on his farmland and the industry schedule reveals that he also operated a tannery which processed "1600 upper and sole leather hides per year worth $2,000." An inventory of Smith's estate indicates that at the time of his death he was the owner of tangible personal property worth at least $53,234.43, with cash on hand alone amounting to $9,844.99.

Smith's will provide possibly the clearest overall picture of his great wealth. He devised to his children or their heirs (his wife had died in 1853) parcels of real estate in Asheville (including his hotel, storehouse, barn, and stables) and in Buncombe County (including his tanyard and toll bridge); a large number of slaves; furniture; livestock; farm implements; and a gold mine in Georgia which he apparently owned outright. Despite his wealth and his connection by marriage to the prominent Patton family, Smith apparently took little interest in politics. He was elected in 1849 to Asheville's newly-created board of commissioners (and was subsequently named chairman of that body). This was the only elective office he ever held.

James M. Smith died May 18, 1856, at the age of sixty-eight. As noted earlier, he willed to his son John Patton Smith the brick house at the confluence of the Swannanoa and French Broad rivers. John P. Smith died intestate and without issue (he was apparently not married) the following year. In June, 1858, the property was put up for public auction by virtue of a decree issued by the Buncombe County Court of Equity. High bidder for the property was John P. Smith's brother-in-law (and former business partner of James M. Smith) William Wallis McDowell, who paid $9,610 for a 315-acre tract "lying on the east side of French Broad River and North side of Swannanoa River including the cane break farm." This is the first and only reference to the former Smith farm tract by that name.

W. W. McDowell, grandson of Revolutionary hero Major Joseph McDowell, was born in 1823 at Pleasant Gardens in present-day McDowell County. He moved to Asheville in 1845 and the following year married Sarah Lucinda Smith, fifth daughter of James M. Smith. In addition to forming the mercantile enterprise in partnership with his father-in-law, McDowell served as a cashier in the Asheville branch of the Bank of Cape Fear.

McDowell was one of four men incorporated by the General Assembly in February, 1861, as the "Buncombe Riflemen," one of North Carolina's first volunteer infantry units. (The unit had actually been organized in December, 1859, in response to the John Brown raid on Harper's Ferry.) McDowell formally enlisted at the age of thirty- eight and was appointed captain of the volunteers, who after Fort Sumter became Company E of the First North Carolina Volunteers, or the "Bethel Regiment" (so named for its participation in that engagement). In the early summer of 1862, the First Regiment was made a part of the new Sixtieth Regiment, which had been organized by W. W. McDowell's brother Dr. Joseph A. McDowell. W. W. McDowell was named captain, and later major, of this regiment.

Poor health compelled McDowell to return to Asheville before the end of the Civil War. He and his wife continued to reside in the brick house until April, 1881, when they sold it to Alexander Garrett for $11,000. (W. W. McDowell died in Asheville June 22, 1893, and his widow died there in 1905.) Alexander Garrett apparently rented the house to Robert U. Garrett for a time and in January, 1891, sold it outright to him. At this time the house was said to be "in the Town of Victoria." (This small village was merged into the city of Asheville in 1905.) In the twentieth century the house had a number of owners, including C. Brewster Chapman (1913-1920) and Herman A. Gudger (1920-1949). During this period remodeling was done and the sun porch and side entrance added, most likely during Chapman's ownership. In 1951, the place was sold to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Raleigh for $15,000; it was used as the site of a Catholic high school for a number of years. The house was recently sold by the diocese to the Asheville-Buncombe Technical Institute, which has leased it to the Western North Carolina Historical Association. The group seeks to renovate the house and use it for headquarters for the Western North Carolina Heritage Center.