{{short description|Historic house in Alabama, United States}} {{Use American English|date=September 2025}} {{Use mdy dates|date=March 2025}} {{Infobox NRHP | name = Georgia Cottage | nrhp_type = | image = Georgia Cottage.jpg | caption = HABS photo of Georgia Cottage in 1963 | location = 2564 Springhill Avenue<br />Mobile, Alabama | coordinates = {{coord|30|41|47|N|88|6|0|W|display=inline,title}} | locmapin = USA Alabama Mobile#Alabama#USA | built = 1840 | architecture = Greek Revival | added = September 14, 1972 | area = {{convert|6|acre}} | refnum = 72000170<ref name="nris">{{NRISref|version=2010a}}</ref> }}
'''Georgia Cottage''', also known as the '''Augusta Evans Wilson House''', is a historic residence in Mobile, Alabama, United States. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 14, 1972, based on its association with Augusta Jane Evans.<ref name="nris"/> She was one of the most popular American novelists of the nineteenth century and the first female author in the United States to earn over $100,000 for her work, but has been largely forgotten in recent times.<ref name="eoa evans">{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/face/Article.jsp?id=h-1072|title=Augusta Jane Evans Wilson|access-date=2009-08-18|encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Alabama|publisher=Alabama Humanities Foundation and Auburn University}}</ref><ref name="eog evans">{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-453|title=Augusta Jane Evans (Wilson) (1835-1909)|access-date=2009-08-18|encyclopedia=New Encyclopedia of Georgia|publisher=Georgia Humanities Council and the University of Georgia Press|archive-date=2008-06-21|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080621024537/http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-453|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref name="aca">{{cite web|url=http://www.americanartists.org/art/article_augusta_jane_evans.htm|title=Augusta Jane Evans|access-date=2009-08-18|last=Sledge|first=John|year=2003|publisher=The American Center for Artists|archive-date=2009-06-04|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090604144626/http://www.americanartists.org/art/article_augusta_jane_evans.htm|url-status=dead}}</ref>
==History== Colonel John Murrell of Georgia had the Greek Revival style house built in 1840 for his daughter, Mrs. William A. Hardaway. It was then sold in 1855 to Alfred Batre, nephew of Adolphe Batre, Mobile Mayor (1830), who purchased it for his new bride Hortense Addison, daughter of Lloyd Dulany Addison of the Oxon Hill Manor Addison's.<ref>{{Cite web | url=http://nscda.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/AL_Our_Founding_Mothers.pdf | title=Our Founding Mothers | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190224062632/http://nscda.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/AL_Our_Founding_Mothers.pdf | archive-date=February 24, 2019 }}</ref> Augusta Jane Evans purchased the house from Batre in 1857 for her father, Matthew R. Evans, with the proceeds from her first book, ''Inez: A Tale of the Alamo''. Matthew Evans had relocated his family to Mobile from San Antonio, Texas, in 1849.<ref name="habs">{{cite web|url=http://memory.loc.gov/pnp/habshaer/al/al0400/al0461/data/al0461.pdf|title=Hardaway-Wilson House (Georgia Cottage)|access-date=2009-08-18|work=Historic American Buildings Survey|publisher=National Park Service}}</ref> The Batres would move into 110 S Franklin Street, then 400 Church Street.
Augusta Evans went on to write two of her most famous novels at Georgia Cottage, ''Macaria'' and ''St. Elmo''. She married Lorenzo Madison Wilson in the parlor of the house in 1868. Following her marriage she moved into her husband's Greek Revival mansion, Ashland, namesake of the modern Ashland Place neighborhood. Georgia Cottage remained in the Evans family until 1879, when it was sold to Andrew Damrell. Damrell's heirs sold it in 1926 to J.N. Brownlee, and it was subsequently purchased by Dr. Edward Simmons Sledge in 1935.<ref name="eoa evans"/><ref name="habs"/>
Dr. Sledge's son, Eugene Bondurant Sledge, grew up at Georgia Cottage. He served in the United States Marines during World War II and became a noted university professor and author. His memoir ''With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawa'' was, in part, the basis for Ken Burn's PBS documentary, ''The War'', and the HBO miniseries, ''The Pacific''.<ref name="eoa sledge">{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/face/Article.jsp?id=h-1796|title=Eugene B. Sledge|access-date=2009-08-18|encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Alabama}}</ref>
==Architecture and grounds== Although now deep within the Mobile city limits, Georgia Cottage was a country house when originally built. Slave labor was utilized in its construction.<ref name="habs"/>
The one-story wood-frame structure, on a brick foundation, is a stylistic blending of Gulf Coast cottage and Greek Revival forms. It has matching side wings to each side of the main block and a hipped roof.<ref name="habs"/>
The house is situated at the end of a long avenue of live oaks, planted prior to 1840. The avenue is listed with Alabama's Famous and Historic Trees Program.<ref name="trees">{{cite web|url=http://www.forestry.state.al.us/PDFs/famous_and_historic_trees.pdf/ |title=Alabama's Famous & Historic Trees Program - 2003 |access-date=2009-03-13 |work=Alabama Forestry Commission |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081120154053/http://www.forestry.state.al.us/PDFs/famous_and_historic_trees.pdf |archive-date=November 20, 2008 }}</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}}
{{NRHP in Mobile, Alabama}} {{National Register of Historic Places}}
Category:National Register of Historic Places in Mobile, Alabama Category:Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Alabama Category:Greek Revival houses in Alabama Category:Houses in Mobile, Alabama Category:Houses completed in 1840 Category:Gulf Coast cottage architecture in Alabama