Wickerham Inn - Peebles, OH
N 38° 58.217 W 083° 23.651
17S E 292584 N 4316205
The Wickerham Inn, the oldest brick building in Adams County, Ohio, and one of the earliest taverns to exist in the Northwest Territory, was used to hide runaway slaves when the Underground Railroad was in operation.
Waymark Code: WM5EKV
Location: Ohio, United States
Date Posted: 12/28/2008
Views: 8
A historical marker adjacent to the Wickerham Inn reads as follows:
The inn was built 1800-01 by Peter Wickerham, a Revolutionary War veteran.
It was used as an overnight stagecoach stop and tavern on Zane's Trace until ca.
1850. Runaway slaves were hidden here when the "Underground Railroad" was in
operation. Confederate soldiers, commanded by General John Hunt Morgan, slept in
the inn on the night of July 15, 1863, when "Morgan's Raiders" passed through
Adams County.
From the Ohio
History Central website:
The Wickerham Inn is the oldest brick building in Adams County, Ohio and
was one of the earliest taverns to exist in the Northwest Territory.
In 1797, Peter Wickerham moved to the Northwest Territory. Like many veterans
of the American Revolution, Wickerham hoped to improve his fortunes on the
frontier. He eventually settled in Adams County, in modern-day Peebles, Ohio. He
built a cabin along Zane's Trace, an important road during the late eighteenth
and early nineteenth centuries. In 1800, Wickerham decided to build a brick
tavern, which he completed in 1801. Known as Wickerham Inn, the tavern remained
in operation until the 1850s. In the years leading up to the American Civil War,
the tavern served as a stop on the Underground Railroad.
According to legend, the Wickerham Inn is haunted. Purportedly, a stagecoach
driver was murdered and beheaded in the tavern. Supposedly his body was not
found for approximately one hundred years. In 1922, the inn was remodeled, and
construction workers found a headless skeleton buried in the limestone floor.
The body was purportedly buried, but the inn remained haunted.