Eden Hill
W end of Water St., Dover, DEEden Hill is noted, not primarily for its innate architectural value, but for its connection with a prominent Delaware family. In 1680 a large tract called "Brothers Portion" was warranted to John and Richard Walker.
In 1694 two hundred acres of "Brothers Portion" were purchased to create the town of Dover, under a warrant
issued by Penn. When the town plot was completed in 1718, seventy-five acres to the west were not laid out. Sixty-nine of these acres were purchased by John Mifflin, and, after passing through several owners they came into the possession of Nicholas Ridgely in 1748.
Nicholas Ridgely was a descendant of Henry Ridgely, who emigrated from Devonshire in 1659. By 1749 Nicholas Ridgely had erected a house on his farm west of Dover; he also purchased a house within the town itself. Among his public interests, Nicholas Ridgely served as Treasurer of Kent County and as one of the provincial justices of the Supreme Court of the Three Lower Counties. At the age of seventeen, the orphaned Caesar Rodney, one of Delaware's most illustrious patriots, chose Nicholas Ridgely as his guardian. At the death of Nicholas Ridgely in 1755, his third wife, Mary Middleton Vining, continued to live at the plantation house. She had named the house Eden Hill and also planted two avenues of trees.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1973.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.