VLR Listing Date 06/18/2003
NRHP Listing Date 10/23/2003
NPS property number 03001090
Conjurer’s Field (Conjurer’s Neck Archaeological District) is situated on a peninsula where Swift Creek meets the Appomattox River. It contains a prehistoric village site already listed in the state and national registers, as well as a portion of a major 18th-century plantation house built by the Kennon family. The site was named by early English explorers who allegedly encountered a Virginia Indian religious leader there. Richard Kennon settled on the land in the 1680s. One of his descendants constructed the Flemish-bond manor house between 1725 and 1750. It burned in 1879, and about half of the standing walls were used to create the present three-bay, two-story dwelling. Originally it was a five-bay house, similar to the Ludwell-Paradise House in Williamsburg. Archaeological investigation in 2002 provided information on the in-filled cellar remains of the house and remains of associated outbuildings. A prehistoric component at the site consists of an accumulation of Middle and Late Woodland lithics and ceramics likely related to the Conjurer’s Field prehistoric site previously identified.
Abbreviations:
VLR: Virginia Landmarks Register
NPS: National Park Service
NRHP: National Register of Historic Places
NHL: National Historic Landmark
Updated March 30, 2020
