The History of The Murray House

This large plantation home was built facing the old cart path between Kenansville and Warsaw in 1853 by Dr. Needham Whitfield Herring. Dr. Herring was a medical doctor with a degree from UNC Chapel Hill and a Presbyterian minister. Dr. Herring’s handwritten journal still exists, and describes the day-by-day account of building this high-style Greek Revival plantation home that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

In the early 1900s the Murray family purchased the property and plantation house. A new road was built between Warsaw and Kenansville and the house was moved to face the new road. It took 30 days for one plug mule to move it approximately 300 yards and the Murray family continued to live in the home while it was being moved. Mrs. Effie Murray’s brick flower house, circa 1930, still exists along with an old carriage house and smoke house.

The first floor features an elegant curved staircase, fine moldings and a magnificent center medallion damaged by the Union soldiers during the Civil War. The upper balcony features an unusual sheaves of wheat and ionic colonettes pattern.This combination has not been known to appear before or since.

Lynn and Joe Davis purchased and restored the home in 1990. The bed and breakfast inn opened in June of 1994.