Samuel Tenney House

The Samuel Tenney House is an historic building in Exeter, New Hampshire. This mansion was built circa 1800 as the primary residence of Samuel Tenney -- noted scholar, scientist, physician, Revolutionary War surgeon, patriot, judge and member of Congress—and his wife Tabitha Gilman Tenney, the noted early American author.

The master carpenter for the house was Ebenezer Clifford working with Bradbury Johnson. At the time, Clifford lived in the Gilman Garrison House, now owned by the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities. They also built the First Church, Exeter; the second Phillips Exeter Academy main building; and Atkinson Academy building.^[1]

Mrs. Tenney died in 1837, and the house was later occupied by the Honorable Tristram Shaw, who was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, representing New Hampshire from 1830 until his death in 1843.^[2] In January 1892, Dr. George W. Dearborn purchased the Samuel Tenney House from Frank H. Hervey.^[3]

Today the primary structure is located at 65 High Street, having been relocated there in 1893 from its location in the center of Exeter, next to and north of the First Church on Front Street, to accommodate construction of the Rockingham County Courthouse. On November 25, 1980, the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

References

Sources

• Samuel Tenney House at National Register of Historical Places NPS Focus
• Postcards from Exeter by Carol Walker Aten. Aracdia Publishing, 2003. Tenney House, Page 90.
• New Hampshire Architecture: an illustrated guide by Bryant Franklin Tolles, Carolyn K. Tolles. New Hampshire Historical Society. UPNE, 1979. Dr. Samuel Tenney House, Page 53.