Built on the Holston River in 1818, in the former Rossville (now Kingsport), named after the founder and plantation owner Frederick Ross, Rotherwood Mansion is one of the most famous haunted houses in the area.
Ross’s daughter, Rowena, seemed to be cursed from the start to suffer through many heartaches. On her wedding night, her fiance drown in the river when his boat capsized. Two years later, she married again, but this spouse died of yellow fever not too long after. Ten years later, she married again, this time conceiving a daughter. But after the little girl died at the age of three, she could take no more and committed suicide. Shortly thereafter a “Lady in White” began to walk the riverbank on the property.
The second ghost the mansion boasts is more malevolent. In 1847, Ross had fallen on hard times and sold his estate to the horrible slave holder, Joshua Phipps. His slaves assumably took out revenge, as he fell ill one July and was suffocated by a cloud of flies that came in through his bedchamber window. At his funeral, the carriage his casket was placed in wouldn't move, no matter how hard the men drove the horses. When it finally did move, there was a loud clap of thunder, and a large black hound jumped from a nearby bush. It is said this hell hound can be heard on nights of a storm. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
This house is now privately owned and occupied, please do not trespass.
