Parson Thorne Mansion

Parson Thorne Mansion stands on part of the 1,750-acre Saw Mill Range tract, a Duke of York land patent granted to Henry Bowman in 1680. The first known resident of this portion was Joseph Booth, who bought 510 acres from the Bowman family in 1730. After John Cullen purchased 263 acres in 1746, he built the center brick section of the present structure. Reverend Syndenham Thorne, an Episcopal clergyman instrumental in Milford’s development, bought the property in the 1780s and is buried on the grounds. John M. Clayton, United States Senator and Secretary of State under President Zachary Taylor, spent part of his boyhood here, and members of the Clayton family are also buried nearby. The house was later home to philanthropist Col. Benjamin Potter and Dr. William Burton, Governor of Delaware during the early years of the Civil War. Col. Henry Fiddeman, founder of the First National Bank of Milford, acquired the mansion in 1858 and altered its Colonial Georgian architecture to Gothic Victorian. The Draper family bought the property in 1916, and in 1961 the building and grounds, then known as Silver Hill, were conveyed to the Milford Historical Society by J. Richard Draper. The mansion was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.

Milford, Delaware · United States