Locust Bottom

Locust Bottom is a farm of 199 nominated acres near Haymarket, in northwestern Prince William County. Its centerpiece is a two-story, four-bay Federal brick farmhouse on a raised basement, built by planter James Green in the early nineteenth century. A one-and-one-half-story kitchen wing, probably built around 1811, predates the main house, which land tax records suggest was completed about 1819 or 1820. A frame wing was added at the rear in the late nineteenth century. Inside, the house keeps carved and molded Federal mantels, a slender open-string staircase with decorative brackets, and grained woodwork by a skilled but unidentified local carpenter. Boxwood plantings surround the house, though they are overgrown. The farm also contains outbuildings such as a carriage house, horse barn, corncrib, dairy barn and tenant house, reflecting later dairy and horse farming. The house is regarded as one of the best-preserved Federal plantation houses in the northern part of the county.