About Poplar Grove Mill and House
Industrial Facilities, Mills, Interesting Places
Poplar Grove Mill and House is a historic tide mill and home located near Williams, Mathews County, Virginia. The tide mill is a two-story frame structure built after the American Civil War with a gable roof built on a narrow mole which separates a small lagoon or mill pond from the bay. It replaced an earlier mill destroyed during the war at which, it is believed, that corn was ground for General George Washington's troops when they camped nearby. The earliest portion of the miller's house is dated to about 1770, and is a small 1 1/2 story gambrel roof cottage which has been incorporated into the present five section house as an end wing. The central portion of the house is a late 18th-century temple-form building fronted by a later Ionic order portico. Captain Sally Louisa Tompkins, the famous woman Confederate officer, was born at Poplar Grove in 1833.
