Dunleith Historic Inn

Built about 1855, Dunleith is Mississippi's only surviving example of a plantation house with a fully encircling colonnade of Greek Revival columns. The colonnade consists of 26 Tuscan columns built of brick and stucco. Porches with wrought iron railings wrap the entire building on the first and second floor. First-floor windows roll up to become doorways, similar to those at Monticello. The 12-room main house sits on 40 acres. Outbuildings include a carriage house, a dairy barn, a poultry house, and a three-story brick courtyard building that historically housed the kitchen, laundry and slave quarters. The previous building, called Routhland, had been built by Job Routh in the 1790s and passed to his daughter Mary Routh. When lightning struck and burned it down in 1855, Mary's husband, General Charles G. Dahlgren, rebuilt. It was sold in 1858 for $30,000 to Alfred Vidal Davis, who renamed it Dunleith. Among its occupants was John Roy Lynch, born enslaved at Tacony Plantation in Louisiana. Lynch became the first African-American Speaker of the House in the Mississippi State Legislature and one of the first African-American U.S. Congressmen. He studied law, authored articles and books, and served in appointed political and military positions. After his death in Chicago in 1939 at age 92, Lynch was buried with military honors in Arlington National Cemetery. Dunleith was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1974. It has operated as a historic inn since 1976. The historic inn has 22 guest rooms divided among the main house, courtyard and dairy barn buildings. The Castle Restaurant & Pub occupies the former carriage house, constructed circa 1790.