Photo by Skye Marthaler
Nicholas Tate Perkins House/ Poplar Grove is a 2 story brick home in Federal style sitting at 3104 Del Rio Pike off Franklin Road.
Nicholas T. Perkins (1767-1843) married his cousin, Nancy Ann Perkins (1770-1839), in 1790 and they built their home in 1820. Perkins increased his estate to 702 acres. His son, Nicholas Tate Perkins, Jr. sold the property in 1847. Dr. Simeon Shy (1972-1878) and Amelia Mabry Shy (1800-1884) were the next owners. Dr. Shy was a successful farmer. His son, Col. William M. Shy served in the Twentieth Tennessee Regiment in the Civil War. During the Battle of Nashville, he was killed on Compton’s Hill south of Green Hills area and later that hill was renamed in his honor, Shy’s Hill, off Harding Place. The Shy family resided at Two Rivers until 1890. For several decades, the mansion was left vacant.
The Henry Horton family bought two-thirds of the property about 1890 and then twenty-two years later, in 1912, acquired the house and its surrounding land. In 1927, there was a terrible storm which destroyed many of the trees on the plantation. The Horton family renamed the farm Two Rivers for the West and the Big Harpeth Rivers flowing around the property. In 1971, Marion Green and the James L. Buford family owned and resided at Two Rivers.
In 1988, Dr. Bernard O. “Ben” Griffith owned Two Rivers with 3.4 acres. Dr. Griffith was a veterinarian who had a Nashville practice, then opened Hillsboro Animal Hospital with his brother Dr. Leland Griffith. In 1988, Dr. Griffith submitted Two Rivers for historic recognition.
In 2012, the home was transferred from the Estate of Bernard O. Griffith to the Bernard O. Griffith Family Trust. The home was originally called Poplar Grove by the Perkins family. NRHP 1988 See also Meeting of the Waters, River Grange, Montpier
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