The origins of Brunswick House date back to the early 1830s, when the Stephen Jones family came to western Tennessee by covered wagon, traveling through the Cumberland Gap from Brunswick County in southern Virginia. Perhaps it was the rolling countryside − so reminiscent of southern Virginia − that led the family to settle here. Here, the family would put down roots, raise their children, and farm the land.
The earliest "homeplace" was built on a high point at the site of a natural
spring south of Memphis-Arlington Road and west of Seed Tick Road in Shelby
County. Through the property flowed Spott's Creek which over the years became
Scott's Creek. Two daughters and seven sons, including Russell Jones were born to the family; all
of the sons served in the Army of the Confederacy, with two riding with General Nathan B.
Forrest.
Returning from the emotional and economic destruction of the war, Russell wanted to have a place of his own on the family landholding. With timber felled from nearby woods, he commenced building a homestead that would become a shelter for himself and his offspring and the heart of a home for generations unborn. "Brunswick House" has been the home to every generation - now five - of the Jones' family since that time. Every generation has added to and enhanced the house. And yet its early character has been lovingly preserved in the original logs that frame the main hallway, in the orchard that Russell Jones cleared by hand to furnish logs for raising the house, in the old road or "trace" lined with twisted osage orange trees that served as impenetrable fences, and in the sheltering woods where wildlife can still find refuge.
Throughout 170 years of occupancy, every
generation of the family, through different interpretations of stewardship, has
attempted to avoid the destructive practices of exploitation and depletion of
the land resource. As current generations of the Jones family look ahead, we
want to plan the future in a way that honors the past. We cannot honor this past
by bulldozing the beautiful rolling countryside. Nor by disregarding the impact
of local development agendas on rivers and streams. Nor by destroying the last substantial wildlife
habitat in this part of Shelby County.
The future that we envision involves the creation of a holistic plan for the future of the Jones family holdings within the context of the City of Lakeland. The plan will build on the traditions of family stewardship of the land resource, while welcoming innovative planning approaches in which citizens, designers and others collaborate in developing a vision for the future.
- Rudolph Jones and family