Historic Buildings of Connecticut

Exploring the Nutmeg State One Building at a Time

Greek Revival

Capt. James Monroe Buddington House (1854)

The 1854 Greek Revival home (with later Victorian additions) of Captain James Monroe Buddington, is on Monument Street in the Groton Bank neighborhood of Groton. Capt. Buddington was a whaling captain, famous for his recovery of the HMS Resolute. The Resolute was a British ship that, in 1852, was part of a four ship expedition sent to the Arctic to investigate the fate of the lost John Franklin Expedition, which had been searching for the Northwest Passage to Asia. The Resolute became lodged in ice in the Canadian Arctic and in 1854, after a year-and-a-half of being trapped, the ship was abandoned by her crew. Capt. Buddington, on the whaling ship George Henry, found the deserted Resolute, which had become freed from the ice and was drifting, having traveled nearly 1200 miles! He sailed the lost ship back to New London, arriving on Christmas Day, 1855. The US government restored the ship, which was returned to Britain and presented to Queen Victoria amid much fanfare. The Resolute would continue in service until 1879. When she was decommissioned, Queen Victoria had several desks made from her timbers and one was presented to President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1880. The famed Resolute Desk has been used by many presidents since then, frequently as the President’s desk in the Oval Office.

First Church of Christ in Saybrook (1840)

Saybrook Colony was established in 1635 at the mouth of the Connecticut River. It was Connecticut‘s third oldest settlement and first military fortification. A fort was constructed at Saybrook Point and in 1646 the Congregational Church was founded in the Great Hall of Fort Saybrook. The congregation’s first two meeting houses were built at Saybrook Point, the first in 1647 and the second in 1681. The third meeting house was built in 1726, further north in Old Saybrook on the Church Green. It’s steeple was only added in 1793 and a bell in 1794. This church was taken down in 1840 and the fourth church building was constructed across the street. Greek Revival in its style, the First Church of Christ in Saybrook was one of the first prefab churches in the country. The church was extensively renovated in 1977.

The Acors Barns House (1837)

Acors Barns was a New London whaling agent. He was also president of the National Bank of Commerce of New London. His 1837 Greek Revival house is on Federal Street.

The Jared Shailer House (1838)

Jared Shailer built a Greek Revival-style house on Bridge Road, in the Tylerville section of Haddam, in 1838, the year after he married his cousin, Florilla Shailer. Several other Shailer cousins lived nearby. The side hall house has a side wing addition–a common method of adding more space to a front-gabled Greek Revival home.

Samuel Lay House (1754)

Built in 1754 by Samuel Lay, the son of Robert Lay, Jr., the house at 17 North Main Street in Essex was altered the nineteenth century to conform to the popularity of the Greek Revival style. In 1924, the house was purchased and again altered by E.E. Dickinson, Jr.

Mortimer Mather House (1870)

A few doors down from the home of Dr. Ezra Mather, on Main Street in Essex, is a house he had built for his son, Mortimer Mather. The 1870 house (or more likely earlier) is a late example of the Greek Revival style.

The Loren Humiston House (1854)

The Loren Humiston House, on Main Street in Cheshire, is a Greek Revival style home, with an elaborate doorway, built in 1854 for a prosperous farmer. Today, the house is used as offices by an insurance company.