1902 Greek Revival Inn of North Augusta's Founding Family
804 Carolina Avenue, North Augusta, SC 29841
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$$
Bed-and-breakfast room rates; check innkeeper website for current pricing and seasonal availability.
Access
Limited Access
Two-story historic home with wraparound porch and stairs
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1902 · Greek Revival Architecture · James U. Jackson / North Augusta Founder · President Taft 1908 Christmas Visit · National Register of Historic Places 1975 · Rosemary Pine Paneling
James U. Jackson, president of the North Augusta Land Company, founded the city of North Augusta in the late 1890s as a planned residential community across the Savannah River from Augusta, Georgia. Rosemary Hall, completed in 1902, was Jackson's principal residence and a centerpiece of the new town's social life.
The house is a striking example of Southern Greek Revival design. The two-story wraparound porch carries twelve fluted Corinthian columns. The principal entry features Italian colored glass, and the interior is paneled in rosemary pine, a rare regional timber that Jackson hand-selected for the project and after which he named the house. Floor-length windows on the first floor open to the porch.
The Jackson family hosted regular social gatherings for prominent politicians and industrialists during the early twentieth century. President William Howard Taft spent Christmas Day 1908 at the house during his inaugural tour. After James Jackson's death in 1925, his wife Edith and three of their five children continued to live at Rosemary Hall. The last family member to occupy the house, Edith Barrington Jackson Alexander, died in 1982.
Rosemary Hall was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975. The property has operated as a bed and breakfast under several owners since the 1980s; current operation is as the Rosemary Inn Bed & Breakfast, which uses both Rosemary Hall and the adjacent Lookaway Hall (a separate 1895 Jackson family home next door) for guest stays and events.
Sources
Among well-known Southern historic-house inns, Rosemary Hall's paranormal reputation is restrained. The lore that does circulate centers on James U. Jackson himself. Guests and staff have described the brief impression of a man in early-twentieth-century formal dress on the main staircase or in the entry hall, occasional unexplained door closings on the second floor, and the faint scent of pipe tobacco in the front parlor in rooms long since converted to non-smoking use.
The inn appears on regional ghost-tour itineraries serving the Augusta area but does not actively program paranormal investigation content. The interpretive focus remains the social history of the founding family of North Augusta and the architectural detail of the rosemary-pine paneling, the colored-glass entry, and the Corinthian porch.
Notable Entities
Stay in one of the historic guest rooms of Rosemary Hall, the 1902 Jackson family home with its rosemary-pine paneling, Italian colored-glass entry, and two-story wraparound porch with twelve fluted Corinthian columns. President William Howard Taft spent Christmas Day 1908 at the house during his inaugural tour.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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