A Lark Through Clarke

Need an excuse to lark in the countryside?

Posted on Wednesday, November 25, 2009 by Kathy Fisher in History, Long Branch
Tags: Millwood, Old Chapel, Willard Scott

Historic Long Branch is a great bet.  The house is rich in history, with ties to the American Revolution.  The Historic Long Branch House and Farm web site features a video introduction and overview: History of Long Branch Narrated by Willard Scott.

My great aunt, Sallie Page Nelson, and her husband, Hugh Nelson, Jr., were great-grandchildren of Gov. Thomas Nelson, Jr., a Virginia Signer of the Declaration of Independence.  How convenient that she didn’t have to change her maiden name!  She lived at Long Branch for 36 years after the death of her husband in 1915.  She loved to entertain and have visitors and relatives stay at Long Branch.  During the Depression, her younger sister, Charlotte Nelson Holt, Caroline Nelson Britten, and Laura Lewis Bunch were just a few to enjoy her hospitality.  Story has it that Laura was

. . . known as the cousin who came to visit for two weeks and stayed twenty-seven years.  Her children were Laura Crease Bunch and Tilghman Howard Bunch, Jr.  The women at Long Branch became avid bridge players.[1]

Interestingly, several of these women are buried at Old Chapel in Millwood.  My mother, Mary Winston Nelson Fisher, spent summers at Long Branch in her teens and early twenties, riding a horse called “Fancy.”  She had wonderful stories and fond memories of her time there.