Pelletier House and Wantland Spring

Perched on a bluff above the New River in downtown Jacksonville, this small one-story Greek Revival building was probably put up in the 1850s as an office and bachelor quarters for merchant Rufus Pelletier. It has a hipped roof that covers a front porch, a central brick chimney with two original mantels, and nine-over-six windows. Below the bluff flows Wantland Spring, which helped determine the 1753 location of the county courthouse and later served a turpentine distillery operated by William Pelletier and partners until it burned in 1851. Rufus Pelletier later served as postmaster and magistrate and added wings for his family, which burned in the late 1950s. The Onslow County Historical Society bought the property in 1957 and restored the house in the 1970s. It was recognized as the oldest building in Jacksonville and as a rare surviving local example of Greek Revival design, with the spring adding historic and landscape value.