Virginia Department of Historic Resources Virginia Department of Historic Resources
For additional information, read the Nomination Form PDF
VLR Listing Date 09/17/2020
NRHP Listing Date 11/18/2020
NRHP Reference Number SG100005804
Located on the Hyco River in south-central Halifax County, Oak Cliff is significant for its diversity of architectural features that derive from Georgian, Federal, Greek Revival, and Gothic Revival styles. Built originally in the Georgian style around 1792 for General Joseph Jones, a Petersburg merchant, planter, and civic leader, the house and property may have served as Jones’s summer residence and base of operations for the management of his upcountry plantations. The English-bond construction of the house’s west chimney is unusually late and geographically far west in Virginia for such a chimney, a detail that may reflect the Petersburg roots of Jones or his brickmason. Oak Cliff’s transitional Federal-Greek Revival details relate to an 1830s remodeling during the ownership of William and Jane Carrington. A wing of the building with Greek Revival detail was added about 1850. On the grounds are a Carrington family cemetery with a decorative iron fence and professionally crafted marble tombstones as well as the circa 1880s stone abutments of an Atlantic & Danville Railway bridge and pedestrian-vehicular bridges over the Hyco River, which borders the property.
Many properties listed in the registers are private dwellings and are not open to the public, however many are visible from the public right-of-way. Please be respectful of owner privacy.
Abbreviations:
VLR: Virginia Landmarks Register
NPS: National Park Service
NRHP: National Register of Historic Places
NHL: National Historic Landmark
Updated: January 3, 2022
