This past July, when my daughter and I took our two-day trip to Western Kentucky, we made a stop in Lyon County to visit Rose Hill. As always, I didn’t know what to expect, and as always, I was pleasantly surprised. While Rose Hill is the oldest standing structure in Old Eddyville, a visit to Rose Hill isn’t about the home. Instead, it’s a history tour of the county. It truly was an amazing experience, and I learned more than I ever dreamed possible. So, this write-up will be different than most. This won’t be a history of one family. This will be a little bit of history about a lot of topics. We will, however, start with Robert Livingston Cobb, builder of Rose Hill. Stay with me, I really think you’ll enjoy this one!
Robert Livingston Cobb (1805-1873)
Robert Livingston Cobb, the builder of c. 1834 Rose Hill, was born on October 6, 1805, in Eddyville, KY. He was the son of Gideon Dyer Cobb and Modena Chittenden Clark Cobb.
In 1832, Robert, a local merchant, purchased a piece of land on Water Street in Eddyville. It was on this piece of land that Robert built a two-story brick Federal-style home.
Now, according to the 1981 National Register of Historic Places Nomination Form for Old Eddyville Historic District, Robert’s father is said to have built the home c. 1800. His father, Gideon Dyer Cobb, was with Matthew Lyon’s first party of settlers that came from Vermont and settled in the area of Eddyville in 1799. (David Walker laid out the area of Eddyville the year before, in 1798.)
“In 1800, Cobb obtained a license to operate a tavern and was appointed one of the five trustees of Eddyville. The following year, he acquired additional town lots to be used for warehouses, and in 1802 he began operating a ferry across the Cumberland River at his house.”
National Register of Historic Places Nomination Form
So, whether it was Robert or Gideon who built the home, I can not say for sure. But no matter, Robert was living in the home when he married Cornelia Barbour Mims on May 13, 1835. The couple didn’t stay in the house for long, though. Robert sold the home and land in 1844.
The home then went through the hands of Thomas Washington Catlett and Frederick Henry Skinner. In 1952, the home became the property of Kentucky and was used as housing for the employees of the Kentucky State Penitentiary, which had been built next door to Rose Hill between 1884 and 1889. The home later arrived in the hands of the Lyon County Historical Society when the state no longer needed the space, and that is who still owns it today.
So, what happened to Robert? He went on to acquire a few town lots and built a fairly large home for his wife, his children, and himself. While he was a merchant, he also became Justice of the Peace for Caldwell County in 1832 and was appointed treasurer for the county in 1837. He must have done very well in all of these positions because on the 1850 Census record, his real estate was valued at $10,600, and he documented owning 14 enslaved people on the census. Robert later moved his family to Paducah, where he died in 1873. To read more about Robert and his life in Eddyville, click here.
Eddyville and Lyon County, KY
As stated above, Eddyville was settled in 1798, on the banks of what was then the Cumberland River. The town was named for the eddies in the river. Now, if you’re from Eddyville, you probably know what an eddy is, but if you’re like me, you have no idea. So, of course, I “googled it.” Eddies are “areas of circular, swirling water in a river that flow in the opposite direction from the main current, typically forming behind an obstruction like a rock or a bend in the bank.” Thank you, Google!
Eddyville became the county seat of Livingston County in 1799, when the county was formed. It then became the county seat of Caldwell County in 1804 when that county was formed, and finally it became the county seat of Lyon County when it was created in 1854. Eddyville remains the seat of Lyon County today and is the only Kentucky town to have served as the county seat of three counties.
Lyon County, KY, was Kentucky’s 102nd county to be created and was named for Colonel Chittenden Lyon. Lyon was born in Vermont in 1787 and came to Kentucky with his father, Matthew Lyon, whom I mentioned above. Chittenden was a merchant like his father and also ran a farm. He moved into politics, serving in the Kentucky state house of representatives from 1822 to 1824, the Kentucky state senate from 1827 to 1835, and was “elected as a Jacksonian candidate to the Twentieth and to the three succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1827-March 3, 1835).” (Source: U.S.House of Representatives) Chittenden died on November 23, 1842, and was buried in River View Cemetery in Eddyville, KY.
Eddyville State Penitentiary
Photo on left: Courtesy of KHT / Photo on right: Public Domain via Wikipedia
Why was Eddyville chosen as the location for the Kentucky State Penitentiary? That’s exactly what I searched to find out! Well, it seems that Eddyville residents actually wanted the “Castle on the Cumberland” (as the penitentiary is also known) to be built in their town. Baffled? I know I am. I mean, why would you want Kentucky’s only maximum security and supermax prison, which houses Kentucky’s most dangerous criminals, in your backyard? Here’s what I learned!
Kentucky’s first penitentiary was built in 1798, in Frankfort, KY, and opened in 1800. It was the first state penitentiary west of the Alleghenies. Well, by the 1880s, the prison was overflowing with prisoners. A “branch” prison was needed to help manage the number of both men and women housed in Frankfort. Kentucky’s governor, Luke P. Blackburn, created a three-man commission that was charged with deciding upon a location for this new branch prison. The three men were Judge Richard H. Stanton, Hylan Benton Lyon (from Eddyville), and William Morgan Beckner.
H.B. Lyon was the moving force behind Eddyville being chosen, but the people of Eddyville were surprisingly also on board. They were excited about the idea of the prison. The railroads were negatively impacting Eddyville’s river economy at that time, and the residents of the town saw the prison as a new opportunity for jobs. The community pledged land and money for the construction of the prison.
While I’m sure the commission wanted the residents of the chosen location to be on board, they also needed it to be a location that met other, likely more important, requirements: an area with great resources for building materials, and a less populated area so inmates could be as far removed from society as possible.
Eddyville looked to be the perfect location to meet all the prison’s needs. Eddyville’s population in 1880 was all of 390 people. The railroad and the Cumberland River were nearby for transportation purposes. The proposed site for the prison was high on a hill, approximately 116 feet above the river’s low water mark. Lastly, the region was plentiful with natural resources needed for building: coal, iron, clay for bricks, and limestone.
Needless to say, Eddyville was ultimately chosen, and construction began on the prison in 1884. It was officially opened in 1889, housing 859 inmates, and run by 348 staff members. The building itself covered 10.5 acres, with the entire facility covering 87 acres.
“The first 114 convicts imprisoned at Eddyville quarried the limestone necessary for construction and transported it 300 yards to the construction site using a specially built, narrow gauge railway. Thirty Italian stonemasons dressed the stones of the prison buildings
SAH Archipedia
and the wall encompassing its immediate ten acres.”
“…the penitentiary at Eddyville is a heavily castellated, medieval revival style prison. It was designed by the McDonald Brothers of Louisville, who were adept at the architectural eclecticism of the post-Civil War era…”
The Eddyville State Penitentiary is now the oldest continuously used prison in the state and houses Kentucky’s male death row inmates and the execution facility. (Frankfort’s original prison was demolished after being significantly damaged by the 1937 Flood.)
And Then There was Water
Take an extra moment and look at the photo above. Notice all the farmland on the other side of the river, across from the prison? Notice all the farmland on the left side of the photograph, to the left of the prison? All of that land was the original area of Eddyville. In 1966, with the completion of Barkley Dam, all of that land went underwater. That’s right. The majority of Old Eddyville is now at the bottom of Lake Barkley. Today’s Eddyville is approximately three miles north of its original location. You see, in 1957, construction of the Barkley Dam was started. The town’s people knew that flooding was imminent, so they began their move to the new location in 1959.
Why build a dam? Simple answer – to control flooding, which seems odd that you have to flood a town to control flooding, but that’s what happened.
“The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) began constructing a series of dams on the Tennessee River to provide flood control, cheap hydroelectric power and recreational opportunities for the people of the Tennessee Valley from Paducah to Knoxville.
Kentucky Lake Area History
The last dam to be built on the Tennessee River, and the largest, was Kentucky Dam. Construction began in 1938 with the completion done in 1944. During the process, entire towns, families, homesteads, farms and infrastructure had to be relocated for the permanent flooding of the Tennessee River.
Birmingham, Kentucky was one of those towns directly impacted. Located right on the banks of the Tennessee River in Marshall County, the town of a few hundred, for some reason, did not relocate and was simply abandoned. Now the old roads and foundations of the town are under several feet of water in the middle of Kentucky Lake.
The US Army Corp of Engineers decided the Cumberland River would need to be dammed near the site of Kentucky Dam on the Tennessee River. Due to extensive flooding of the Cumberland and also to help with navigation on the river, the Corps built a dam
– Barkley Dam – and finished it in 1964.
Similar to Kentucky Dam and the lake it created, the situation for Eddyville and Kuttawa was the same as Birmingham. The towns had to relocate for be faced with extinction. Thankfully, those two towns moved a bit up to higher ground.
Today Lake Barkley provides hydroelectric power to thousands of homes and businesses. Lake Barkley features great boating recreation and fishing opportunities for residents and tourists up and down the lake.”
Approximately 57,900 acres of land were permanently flooded by the creation of Lake Barkley. Luckily, Rose Hill was not affected by the flooding, and today, it sits on the edge of the water.
Want to read more about the creation of the dams and lakes? Check out this Kentucky Living article found here.
Map on left: Google Map shows the location of Rose Hill and Eddyville today. / Photo on right: A look out the second-floor window of Rose Hill shows just how close the water of Lake Barkley is to the home. Courtesy of KHT
Our Visit to Rose Hill
Needless to say, I knew absolutely none of this history when my daughter and I arrived at Rose Hill on that sunny July day this past summer. When we pulled up to the home, my daughter and I were both floored that it sat right next to the state prison. I think we were both a little unnerved by it, but we proceeded to exit the car anyway. 🤣
Our uneasiness was quickly forgotten as we were greeted in the parking lot by Sally, our tour guide for the day. Yes, she knew we were coming for a visit, and she was ready for us! With a very warm welcome, Sally led us into a smaller home across the parking lot from Rose Hill. The Lyon County Historical Society also owns that home and uses it for additional displays and office space. We were thrown right into Lyon County history with a room designed to look like a classroom. In that space, we learned about the various high schools throughout the county and heard stories of consolidation, as often happens in our smaller communities when their economic lifelines fail to exist, such as river or coal mining industries. The schoolroom included a display of high school pennants, jackets, and yearbooks of a bygone time.
From there, Sally took us into Rose Hill. As I stated in the beginning, I expected a tour of a historic home, but as soon as we stepped in the back door, I knew we were in for something quite different. The rooms were not set up as living spaces, as I expected, but instead were filled with antique farm tools and equipment. I was still taken back in time, but in a completely different way. Sally began telling us about the tools displayed, their usages, and the history behind them. We continued from room to room, each one telling a story of the county’s history. We learned about LBR – the Land Between the Rivers – before the creation of Kentucky Lake, Lake Barkley, and the Land Between the Lakes Recreational Area. We learned of the homesteads, churches, and cemeteries that were on the lands that had to be moved, or they were to be forever underwater. We learned of the families that were displaced and the towns of Eddyville and Kuttawa that were moved to higher ground. In another room, we learned about iron furnaces with an almost room-sized display, telling of another industry lost to time. In another room filled with old photographs, we learned of mineral spring resorts that had once been a part of the community.
Sally was amazing. She was like a walking encyclopedia of Lyon County. When we finished exploring every floor and room within Rose Hill, Sally asked if we had time for one more tour. Of course, I am never going to say no! She took us next door to another, much smaller building, also owned by the historical society. In this space, we found a history I never expected. Display cases were filled with Kentucky State Penitentiary artifacts. We saw ordinary, everyday items that had been whittled into weapons by inmates of yesteryear. We saw log books that listed the names of those who had been incarcerated in the early years of the prison. Other books held recordings of infirmary visits and illnesses that were treated. While interesting, the display felt dark and sad. It was then that I had the nerve to ask Sally about the prison. I wondered if she ever felt unsafe being just a few feet from barbed wire, tall fences, and the most dangerous men in Kentucky. Her answer was simply, “No.” She said that in all the years she had been visiting Rose Hill and the historical society, she had never once been worried or concerned, and they had never had a problem with “the boys next door.”
We wrapped up our time with Sally at the front of the home, where she told us a little more about the area and some additional historical tidbits. She told us about the Corvette Club that had come through the area many years before. They lined up all their corvettes in front of the penitentiary and took a photo like it was a tourist destination. The road in front of the prison has since been gated and closed off to the public. I mean, really, do we want the state prison to be on the Kentucky Must-See Bucket List? Gorgeous on the outside, dark on the inside. I think not.
Historic Markers along the Cumberland River/Lake Barkley area in front of Rose Hill tell additional history of the area. / Photos Courtesy of KHT
We wrapped up our time with Sally, discussing the historic markers along the front of the home, and then bid her a farewell. We had taken up plenty of Sally’s time, and we still had a stop or two more on our Western Kentucky tour.
Reflection
Rose Hill is an absolutely fascinating stop. Where else can you go to see a display of so much history in one place? More specifically, where can you go to see a display on the Kentucky State Penitentiary? Okay, so maybe that’s not going to be everyone’s cup of tea. Just a visit to Rose Hill is worth your time. I learned so much about that area of Kentucky. Things I knew absolutely nothing about. It was actually this visit that led me to add a section on the mineral spring resorts of Kentucky in my most recent book. Without this visit, I probably wouldn’t have thought anything about it. Seriously, there is so much to be learned from this historical museum. I highly recommend a visit. I also highly recommend that you ask for Sally to be your guide. You won’t be disappointed!
What a WONDERFUL article!!
So we’ll written and such a tribute to our beloved county! We are so honored that you came and that you were touched by our history. Thank you so much!!
Thank you so very much. I am so happy you enjoyed it! Thank you again for a wonderful visit! 💚
Did you see the pump organ that was in the penitentiary museum? That was my great grandparents. My great grandfather was a guard there and also the chaplain. My great grandmother played the organ at services. My grandmother was born in Kuttawa and my dad in Eddieville.
I really enjoyed this post.
I think I remember seeing it, but I did see many items that day. Either way, that is very cool! Your great-grandfather must have had a very kind heart. I don’t know that I could have been in that role. 💚