Mordington
a.k.a. Douglass House
S of Frederica on Canterbury Rd., Frederica, DESituated in Milford Hundred, Mordington represents the lifestyle of a very prosperous eighteenth-century mill owner in Delaware.
In 1785 James Douglass bought fourteen and a half acres of land and cripple (wetlands) on Brown's Branch of Murderkill Creek from William Frazier. This adjoined property at the mill pond dam, which Douglass had bought earlier. It is believed that a frame dwelling was already on the property when Douglass bought it. A family descendant, the late Clayton Douglass Buck, believed that the brick house was built by James Douglass' son Walter. The name "Mordington" is said to be taken from the Scottish title of an ancestor who was created Baron Mordington of Clyde by King Charles I.
The Douglass family built mills at the mill pond dam; by 1822 Walter Douglass had increased his holdings there to more than five hundred acres. It is noted in family documents that the mill seat was used for smelting bog iron. Walter Douglass and his brother William were also involved in several other ironworks in Sussex County particularly the Deep Creek Furnace at the head of the Nanticoke. It is probable that they used the Mordington mill seat to power a bloomery forge, as well as for grinding grain. Certain sources indicate the presence of two water wheels and three pairs of stones in the gristmill. The remains of the stones are found around the house.
Walter Douglass' widow Harriet Middleton Douglass sold her dower rights in Mordington to Charles Kimmey in 1828. The property passed through several other owners before being deeded in 1848 to Joseph O. McColley who gave his name to the mill pond. At this point, the Mordington Mills included a gristmill, a sawmill and a bark mill. Only traces of these remain today.
There is not only history but folklore involved with the house. One of these legends concerns a slave girl who haunts the house, having jumped to her death from an upper floor after being unjustly punished. Another legend concerns a man who came home drunk one night and led his horse up the stairs.
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.