Piedmont Historic Homes

Updated December 5, 2025

These historic homes are on farms or other properties with substantial acreage.

Guilford County
Forsyth County
Alamance, Orange, Caswell and Rockingham Counties
Stokes, Surry, Wilkes, Yadkin, Davie and Neighboring Counties
Davidson, Randolph, Montgomery and Neighboring Counties

Recent Sales

Guilford

Guilford County

5530 Linch Road, Whisett, Guilford County
Listing withdrawn January 12, 2025
Relisted July 15, 2025

• $2.5 million (originally $2.975 million)
• 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 3,538 square feet, 89.65 acres
• Price/square foot: $707
• Built in 1900
• Listed February 13, 2024
• Last sale: $350,000, February 2005
• Neighborhood: Although it has a Whitsett mailing address, it’s well to the southeast, about midway between Forest Oaks and Piedmont Dragway, “the DoorSlammer Capitol of the World.”
• Note: Previously listed without a sale at far lower prices in 2012 ($1.4 million) and 2013 ($1 million).
  • Oddly for such an expensive property with a large, well cared-for house, there are no interior pictures of the house.
  • The property was sold in 1958 by the estate of Emma Phipps Lynch (1879-1955). Emma and her husband, George Haywood Lynch (1879-1952) bought dozens of properties and hundreds of acres of land in eastern Guilford County beginning in 1922. Only Emma’s name was on the vast majority of deeds. It’s unknown whether they lived on the property (digital records show their address as Route 1, Whitsett) and when they bought it.
  • Emma was a school teacher. George was a farmer. They were members of the Asheboro Street Friends Meeting.

Forsyth

Forsyth County

3030memorial

3030 Memorial Industrial School Road, Germanton, Forsyth County

• $1.5 million (originally $1.85 million)
• 3 bedrooms, 3 1/2 bathrooms, 3,432 square feet, 22.79 acres (two lots)
• Price/square foot: $437
• Built in 1920 (see note)
• Listed October 1, 2025
• Last sale: Two transactions, 1963 and 1964, prices not recorded on deeds
• Neighborhood: Located about 3 1/2 miles south of Germanton and about 11 miles north of Winston-Salem. The property has a Germanton mailing address.
• Note: The listing says the original 1920 log cabin was built from “hand-hewn logs sourced on site.”
  • The property is adjacent to the county’s Horizons Park.
  • The buyer in the 1960s was attorney Fred G. Crumpler Jr. (d. 2020, age 89). Crumpler is best known as the lawyer for murder defendant Henry Alford in 1970. In a precedent-setting case, Alford did not plead guilty but admitted that the state had sufficient evidence to convict him and agreed to be treated as guilty. Ultimately upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, the “Alford plea” is now accepted in all 50 states.
  • As noted in his obituary, Crumpler also defended Madge “Mama Rabbit” Roberts, the central figure in a major Winston-Salem prostitution operation. In 1976 Roberts pleaded guilty to tax evasion, paid a $36,000 fine and spent a year in prison. The plea prevented not only a trial but also any public disclosure of Roberts’s list of locally prominent customers.
  • Fred’s wife, Marsha Crumpler, is now selling the property.

Alamance

Alamance, Orange, Caswell and Rockingham Counties

3542bason

3542 Bason Road, Mebane, Alamance County
The Griffis-Patton House
Listing withdrawn August 23, 2024; relisted October 3, 2024
Listing withdrawn October 29, 2024
Relisted April 16, 2025

• $2.2 million (originally $2.3 million)
• 4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 4,847 square feet, 9.49 acres (per county)
• Price/square foot: $454
• Built circa 1840
• Listed August 1, 2024
• Last sale: $709,000, August 2009
• Neighborhood: On Graham-Mebane Lake/Quaker Creek Reservoir, about 4 miles northwest of Mebane and 3 miles northeast of Haw River.
• Previous listing: “The entrance to the main property offers an electric gate which leads to a large parking area flanked on the left by the side entrance porch. The back covered patio off the primary bedroom leads to the L-shaped pool. The pool has a pergola and large area for lounging.
  • “The formal established garden has roses, hydrangeas, flowing trees, spices, ornamental grasses, ivy, a large peony garden and a Wisteria-covered pergola. The garden is fully fenced with gates and additionally offers a raised vegetable garden, the original cook’s kitchen—which currently acts as an office/workout room, the historic well-house and gazebo.
  • “Outside of this area is a second 5 ft barbed wire lined fence along with a garden house, a wood shed, a tree house (with electricity and internet) and a 5 stall barn and tack room.”

National Register nomination: “The Griffis-Patton House, built 1839-1840 on the west side of the Hillsborough and Haw River Road northeast of the village of Haw River, is a handsome two-story, five-bay brick plantation house of commanding presence. …

“In addition to its local historical significance the house possesses local (county) architectural significance as one of the county’s few antebellum brick plantation seats and the most intact member of that group. The wide five-bay front elevation of the house and the two-story rear ell raise the house to a status above the more usual three-bay brick house of the North Carolina Piedmont. Its exterior trim and interior finish, particularly the door and window surrounds, their paneled reveals, and mantels executed in a transitional Federal/Greek Revival manner are the work of a fine vernacular craftsman, possibly William P. Griffis himself.”

The house was built on land owned by William Griffis through purchases beginning in 1795 and eventually totaling more than 1,000 acres. It was first occupied by one of William’s three sons, William P. Griffis, a carpenter, and Mary Robbins Griffis. They lived there until 1859, when they and other members of the family moved to Texas.

Another son, Dr. Thomas E. Griffis (1820-1903), a physician, took ownership of the house, although he, too, moved to Texas with William and their mother and never lived in the house. It became a rental for more than 50 years, eventually owned by Thomas’s descendants. Various records show it to have been at various times a store, a stagecoach stop and a tenant house.

The house and its then 138 acres were sold in 1912 and then again in 1916, this time to Lonnie Lee Patton Sr. (1880-1920) and Mary Bason Patton (1880-1958). Lonnie was a prominent farmer. Although he died just four years later at age 39, the family occupied the house for 62 years.

“Both Lonnie Patton and Mary Bason were descendants of long established and well respected families in the Quaker Creek area. Their marriage brought together a heritage of successful farming and community prestige. The Patton occupancy returned the house to its antebellum status as the property and home of a prominent Alamance County family.”

One of the Pattons’ daughters, Ida Hazeline Patton Tickle (1917-2014) became owner of the house and 37 acres in 1936. She lived there until she sold it in 1982. Hazeltine lived to be 97; she had a sister who lived to age 104 and two brothers who died in early childhood.

Hazeltine sold the house to W. Eric Hinshaw and Patricia A.K. Hinshaw. Eric was CEO of Kingsdown in Mebane for 31 years. After he retired, he and the company exchanged a string of lawsuits (here’s an interesting one) in which the company accused him of various forms of self-dealing and evading the oversight of the company’s board, of which he was chairman, which he denied. The tears and recriminations eventually ended with an out-of-court, confidential settlement.^* Patricia sold the house in 2006, and everything seems to have been pretty quiet since then.

* I actually couldn’t find anything on the internet about how it all ended, so I asked ChatGPT about it. The bot said it had been resolved out of court, which apparently means it was either settled out of court or the bot doesn’t know the answer and just made that up to amuse itself.

11741 N.C. Highway 150, Caswell County
The Ansel Ware House
Sale pending February 18, 2025
No longer under contract February 18, 2025

• $799,000 (originally $850,000)
• 5 bedrooms, 3 full bathrooms and 2 half-bathrooms, 4,274 square feet, 6.84 acres
• Price/square foot: $187
• Built in 1858 (per listing; see note)
• Listed February 17, 2025
• Last sale: $283,500, July 2020
• Neighborhood: Stony Creek Township, near the Ashland community. The property has a Reidsville mailing address.
• Note: County records date the house only to 1907 (it’s common for county records to fail to reflect the actual age of historic structures). The architecture of the house suggests an earlier date, but, oddly, it’s not documented in records of the State Historic Preservation Office or in An Inventory of Historic Architecture, Caswell County, North Carolina. A trove of historical documents are reported to have been auctioned off in 2020 to a buyer from New York.
  • Listing: “This is an historic property that has buildings on it that were present on the property during the Revolutionary War.”
  • There’s plenty of lore surrounding the house. The property’s log cabin is said to have sheltered Continental soldiers after the Battle of Guilford Courthouse. Interior woodwork — much of it unpainted — is attributed to master craftsman Thomas Day of Milton. Jesse James is said to have lived in the house for a time (and, yes, there actually does appear to be evidence that James visited North Carolina). There’s a lot more digging to be done on this one.
  • The original owner appears to have been Ansel Ware (1802-1872). The property remained in the Ware-Matlock-Griffin family until 2019. Ansel was a farmer and, as of 1860, owner of 14 slaves. His will left the 230-acre property to his son, Joseph Talbot Ware (1850-1927). Deeds refer to the property as the J.T. Ware home place. He was a farmer and “one of the best known and most highly respected citizens in his county,” the Greensboro Daily News reported in his obituary. Joseph passed the property to his children.
  • In 1945, Joseph’s son Dr. Sterling Ansel Ware (1875-1962), a physician in Atlanta, and daughter Lucy Alice Ware Waynick (1880-1976) of Greensboro sold it to their sister Annie Miller Ware Matlock (1885-1972).
  • Annie sold the house in 1969 to her daughter Una Matlock Griffin (1914-2003) and son-in-law John Earl Griffin Sr. (1915-1992). They lived in Greensboro from 1942 to the early 1970s. Una was a nurse. John held a variety of sales jobs and operated Griffin Finance Company and similar firms in High Point. He was very active in the Odd Fellows, serving as Noble Grand Master of the Greensboro lodge and Grand Master of North Carolina. He also served as chairman of the Odd Fellows’ World Eye Bank and Visual Research Foundation. John and Una lived in Greensboro’s College Hill neighborhood and were members of the College Place United Methodist Church.
  • Una was still living in the house at her death in 2003. The property, then totaling 200 acres, passed to their son, John Earl Jr. (d. 2019, age 75). He was a professor of architecture and mechanical engineering and also was a farmer. He was an accomplished woodworker and furniture maker. He apparently didn’t marry or have children. His estate sold the property in 2019.

Stokes

Stokes, Surry, Wilkes, Yadkin, Davie and Neighboring Counties

3450sparta

3450 Sparta Road (N.C. Highway 18), Mulberry, Wilkes County

• $749,900 (originally $800,000)
• 2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, 2,190 square feet, 39 acres
• Price/square foot: $342
• Built in 1935 (per county, appears older)
• Listed January 27, 2025
• Last sale: $377,500, July 2002
• Neighborhood: In the Mulberry community, 7 miles north of North Wilkesboro
• Original listing (January 2025): “Pristine 40-acre organic family farm in North Wilkesboro, NC. 90 years in family, no pesticides or chemicals used, beautiful fertile clay soil fallow since 1980s.” Why would they remove that from the listing?
  • The property includes “a sturdy, antique barn.”
  • Although county records date the house to 1935, the style looks much older.
  • The property is being sold by the heirs of Velma A. Brown Rohla (1932-2022). It was previously owned by her parents, William Ira Brown (1893-1945) and Nettie Leona Kilby Brown (1900-2000), and grandparents, James Presley Brown (1866-1935) and Sarah Jane Brown Brown (1867-1927).

1104 Old 60, Millers Creek, Wilkes County

• $675,000 (originally $785,000)
• 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, 1,500 square feet, 33.66 acres (per county)
• Price/square foot: $450
• Built in 1880 (per county)
• Listed May 29, 2024
• Last sale: $167,000, January 2021
• Neighborhood: The property has a Wilkesboro mailing address but is about 9 miles northwest of Wilkesboro in the Millers Creek community. Millers Creek is the birthplace of the late NASCAR champion Benny Parsons.
• Note: The listing says that the cabin was built in 1800 and that the property is 34.14 acres. A 2021 deed also shows 34.14 acres, but a 2020 deed says 33.66, matching county tax and GIS records.
  • In addition to the cabin detailed above, the property also includes a one-story cabin with one bedroom and one bathroom.
  • The current owner is an LLC in Huntersville.
  • Part of a 70-acre tract owned for decades by Andrew Blaine “Dick” Johnston (1886-1957). The Charlotte Observer called him “one of North Carolina’s most prominent furniture manufacturers” in its obituary for him. He was co-founder of American Furniture Company and Drew Furniture Company. His widow, Ruby Pearson Johnston (1905-2003), owned the property until her death, 46 years after he died.

652 Johnson Ridge Road, Elkin, Surry County
Sale pending January 4, 2024
No longer under contract January 28, 2025

• $450,000 (originally $495,000)
• 4 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, 1,456 square feet, 19.83 acres
• Price/square foot: $309
• Built in 1925
• Listed November 28, 2021
• Last sale: Four tracts bought in separate transactions between 1925 and 1948, prices not recorded on all deeds
• Note: The property includes a barn and another outbuilding.
  • The property has two separate listings, one labeled “Single Family” and one, “Lots/Land.” Neither listing has any photos of the interior of the house.

Davidson

Davidson, Randolph, Montgomery and Neighboring Counties

No current listings