Benton - To Die for Images

Built in 1840 for the justice of the peace, William Wiggins, this is a rare brick hall and parlor home, especially for the area where timber was more plentiful. Wiggins purchased the land for $205 in April 1840. Benton, Tennessee, is the county seat of Polk County and was founded the same year the home was built.

Dr. J. D. Nuchols purchased the home in 1905. Until the 1920s, the home had a double porch with columns. The porch lines can still be seen between the first and second-floor windows. Nuchols used an attached commercial space as his medical office. It’s the oldest extant commercial building in the county.

The home is now a commercial space called “The Drug Store.”

It was put on the National Register of Historic Places in 1993.

Overlooking the Ocoee River in Benton, Tennessee are the graves of Nanyehi (known more by her colonized name of Nancy Ward), her son Five Killer, and her brother Longfellow. Nanyehi was known as a Beloved Woman of the Cherokee because of her bravery in a battle and for how she kept her tribe safe during the American Revolutionary War.

By the age of 17, Nanyehi was married to Tsu-la and had two children. She fought alongside her husband against the Creek Nation. When he died during the war, she took his gun and helped in the battle.

In the late 1750s, she married a man named Bryan Ward from South Carolina. Ward was married to another woman in South Carolina. Ward and Nanyehi had one daughter. Ward eventually moved back to South Carolina to be with his other wife and children.

Nanyehi stayed in the area and ran an inn until her death.

To Die for Images

Tag Archives: Benton

William Wiggins House-Benton, Tennessee

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The Gravesite of Nanyehi-Benton, Tennessee

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Mostly Southern Back Roads and Cemeteries

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Mostly Southern Back Roads and Cemeteries