Walter and Nellie Stokes had a great view. Their Breeezemont mansion overlooked the hillside south from Hillsboro Rd. South to what is now the vast I-440 Parkway interchange. The home likely was built on the spot of the current Enclave at Hillsboro Village.
Breezemont was built on the Stokes Family Farm about 1898 by Walter Stokes (1862-1942) and Nellie Treanor Stokes (1862-1948). It was a 2 story brick with Corinthian columns. The original home (origin date unknown) burned down in 1987.The estate stretched from Stokes to Cedar Lane, Belmont Blvd to Hillsboro Pike. Walter and Nellie married in 1888. Nellie’s parents were Thomas Ormsby and Mary Eliza A. Treanor of Tulip Grove. He was a railroad lawyer/ executive in the early 1900s and was general counsel of the Tennessee Central Railway for 30 years. While a student at Vanderbilt University, Walter helped settle a will that resulted in the building of Furman Hall on the Vanderbilt campus. He served as chairman of the Hermitage Association board of trustees. Nellie had grown up at Tulip Grove. The Stokes helped to construct a public school for the Nashville public school system: Completed about 1935, it was named the Walter Stokes School and also housed the Nellie T. Stokes library. It was closed by the 1990s and by 2014 was sold to Lipscomb University.
About 1942, Nellie published a book about Rachel Jackson. Breezemont was razed by the late 1940s - likely after Nellie’s death. In 1967, developers had purchased a portion of the property near the Hillsboro Pike/ Lombardy Rd. intersection and built the Versailles Townhomes Association condominiums. The family name is remembered through Stokes Lane near the former property.
Their daughter, Ellen Stokes More Wemyss, was married in 1925 to E. (Elijah) Livingfield More (?-1934). Livingfield moved to River Falls, Alabama and had made his fortune with the Horse Shoe Lumber Company. They returned to the Franklin area and lived on River Grange farm. She then married William Hatch Wemyss. When she married Wemyss, the couple lived at Wemyss’ Fairvue property in Gallatin. After Wemyss’ death, “Miss Ellen” had Three Terraces built on the Stokes Farm estate near Breezement. See also: Tulip Grove, Fairvue, Three Terraces
Sources:
Nashville Pikes: Vol Two 150 Years along Hillsboro Pike, Ridley Wills II, p. 97
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