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423-628-2441
Well over one hundred years ago, the settlers who founded Rugby enjoyed comfortable lodging at this charming, mansard-roof boarding house. And, guests can still stay there today, for Historic Rugby, the company which now runs the old town, has restored Newbury House and opened it to overnight guests.
Each of the five bedrooms is furnished with Victorian antiques, some of them from the original town itself. There is a parlor for guests, and relaxing on the front veranda is a favorite pastime. Tea and coffee are available, free of charge, at all times. There are no catering facilities at the house, however, so breakfast is served each morning at the historic wood-beamed Harrow Road Cafe. This is a full Cumberland Plateau home-cooked meal.
Historic Rugby is a touch of Victorian England in the Tennessee Cumberlands. More than one hundred years ago, its British founder described it as "a lovely corner of God's earth". Now, the National Trust calls it one of the "most authentically preserved historic villages in America". Listed in the National Register of Historic Places since 1972, Rugby stands in a rugged river gorge setting where more than twenty of its decorative, gabled buildings remain. Christ Church Episcopal (where the 1849 organ is still played for Sunday services), the Thomas Hughes Library, with its collection of seven thousand Victorian volumes, the Kingstone Lisle cottage and the Schoolhouse Visitor Center are all open daily for tours except in January.
The ghost at Newbury House is an Englishman named Mr. Oldfield, who in the 1880's was sent out from London to report on the progress of what was then a fledgling British colony. "He liked the place so well, he sent to England for his son and wife to join him. But he died of heart failure at Newbury the night before his son arrived", says Barbara Stagg, executive director of Historic Rugby, Inc., the preservation trust which now runs the old town.
The town is one of the most haunted in America and proud of it.
At Newbury House several guests have reported waking in the night to find the ghostly figure of a man bending over the bed - particularly in rooms 2 and 4. It might be Mr. Oldfield, looking for his beloved son. But there is another possible explanation, because when Rugby was built, it had a hostelry called the Tabard Inn, named for the inn in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. The manager of the Tabard Inn murdered his wife in room 13 by cutting her throat, then poisoned and shot himself. A few years later, the Tabard Inn was destroyed in a fire. But the colonists were able to save some of the contents of the inn, including must of the furniture from the fateful room 13. Some of the furniture found a new home in Newbury House, where it remains to this day. And who knows what spirits might have moved with it?
| RATES | ||
| Shared bath | $70 | |
| Suite | $96 | |
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