Thomas Townsend House   -   circa 1735-50

The Thomas Townsend House is a two story, gambrel-roofed house with a single interior chimney.  It appears on the Stiles 1758 map of Newport and was owned, prior to the Revolution, by William Gardner.  Thomas Townsend, an innkeeper, and part of the Townsend family of cabinetmakers, bought the property in 1795.

The Townsend House is quite typical of small, 18th century, three and four bay houses.  This three bay plan house has three heated rooms around the central chimney on each floor.  Detailing in the Townsend House is, for the most part, simple and straightforward.  However, some details are distinctly Federal in style, such as the fanlight doorway and certain trim details on the two main rooms on the first floor – all of which seems to date from the 1795 period of Townsend’s ownership.

The Townsend family controlled quite a bit of property in the area of the Point during the 18th century, building and occupying houses and workshops in relative proximity to one another.  While Thomas was not a cabinetmaker by trade as the majority of Townsends were, he would have had an interest in residing around this family enclave.

Thomas (1742-1827) was the youngest son of cabinetmaker Job Townsend.  Newport records indicate Thomas built a house on land on Third Street given to him by his father.  This house was completed c. 1767 when Thomas would have been about twenty-five years old.  He was probably, at that time, a joiner involved with one of the family shops in the area.  There are very few documented furniture pieces attributed to Thomas, but two exist that are definitely of his hand.           

In the late 1780s, when he was in his mid-forties, Thomas changed careers and became a successful innkeeper, operating the Townsend House on the northeast corner of Thames and Pelham Streets.  In 1795, while working as an innkeeper, records indicate he bought the house at 53 Bridge Street. Thomas Townsend died in 1827 at the age of eighty-five.

The Thomas Townsend House is on its original site.  The house was purchased by NRF in1968 and restored in 1974-75.