Dean Richmond

It began when Dean Richmond and his wife Mary Elizabeth chose Batavia, New York, as their home in the mid-1800s. The mansion that many remember as the Richmond Mansion was not built by Dean Richmond but rather by William Davis, a land speculator in the 1830s. He made the central part of the mansion.

Over the years, the land changed hands five times before the actual estate was built. It was still in stages as it changed hands three more times before Dean and Mary Elizabeth Richmond took title to the property on April 24, 1854. The Richmonds bought the mansion for $9,000.

With Dean's money and Mary's exquisite taste in furnishings, the mansion eventually was considered one of the most imposing structures in the state. So they began their restoration by changing the Federal-style design into a much larger home with a wide front veranda supported by four stately columns two stories high. At the top of the roof, a graceful balcony extended around the house. Beautiful gardens surrounded their home with a variety of rare, often imported plants and flowers.   The interior was magnificent, with a wide hall through its center, spacious rooms on both sides, large side wings extending out from the middle of the house, and a long addition in the rear.

When supplies were needed, horse-drawn wagons drove right into the mansion's basement. It was designed to ease the unloading of coal for the three furnaces and food for the kitchen.

A large greenhouse stood amidst the formal gardens. A lacy, wrought iron fence marked the front of the mansion grounds that also featured sunken Italian gardens. That fence today borders the parking for the Richmond Memorial Library and St. Joseph's Church.

Majestic splendor reigned throughout the mansion; one room had a one-of-a-kind crystal chandelier. Carved rosewood and highly polished mahogany were the prevailing woods. One bedroom had a toilet set bearing the Tiffany mark. The rooms were decorated with plastered moldings and ceiling center medallions from which many chandeliers were suspended. The main bedroom had an adjoining bathroom complete with solid silver fittings. 

Mr. and Mrs. Richmond were wonderful hosts, and many brilliant galas were held at their mansion, including an annual holiday ball conducted in their drawing room and ballroom. The drawing-room contained a yellow velvet carpet flowered with roses, yellow damasked walls adorned with solid gold, framed artwork, and yellow satin damask furniture: French plate glass mirrors and one large ornate mirror between the windows reaching from floor to ceiling.

Mrs. Richmond presided over the mansion with dignity and grace and was loved by the town and visiting dignitaries. She possessed the education her husband lacked.

Mrs. Richmond was active in the community, serving as president of the Holland Purchase Historical Society; she was noted for her charity and business sense. 

Dean Richmond may not have had a formal education and might have appeared calculating and hard-hearted, yet he was admired by members of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers. In addition, he gave generously to the building of the School for the Blind and St. James Church.

Richmond's death came suddenly on August 27, 1866. He was in New York City at the home of Samuel Tilden after returning from the State Democratic Convention at Saratoga. The liberty pole flag was lowered to half-staff to mourn his death in Batavia. The train depot was draped in mourning, and the locomotives on the New York Central Railroad were draped in black and accompanied by the tolling of muffled bells. The locomotives drew the funeral train named Dean Richmond and George J. Whitney. Dean Richmond died at the age of 62. He was Batavia, New York's railroad magnate, director of the Utica and Buffalo Railroad Company, first vice president of the New York Central Railroad, and from 1864 to 1866, president of the New York Central.

After Dean died, Mary Richmond’s keen business sense multiplied the value of her husband’s estate.

The Richmond mansion passed from Mr. and Mrs. Richmond to their daughter Adelaide, who left it to her niece, also named Adelaide, with the provision that upon the younger Adelaide’s death, it was to go to her brother, Watts Richmond. Dean Richmond’s grandson.

Watts then sold it to strangers.

The Children’s Home occupied the mansion from 1928 to 1966, when the Batavia Board of Education purchased it for $75 000 and tore it down to build a more extensive library.

Today, the Richmond Memorial Library’s Reading Room has suspended from the ceiling the chandelier that hung in the Richmond dining room. Also, portraits of members of the Dean Richmond family can be seen on display in the library.

File Photo: Richmond Mausoleum photo by Howard Owens.

Top four photos, courtesy the Holland Land Office Museum.

For generations, the Richmond name dominated civic life in Batavia.

Dean Richmond was one of the most successful businessmen of his generation -- from the time he inherited his father's salt works company when he was 15 until his death in 1866. Mary Richmond continued and grew her husband's business empire and served on numerous local boards and committees. Their daughter carried on the tradition of local involvement and leadership.

But by the mid-part of the 20th Century, the Richmond family had dispersed to other parts of the country, but still, the Richmond name looms large in Batavia.

There is, of course, the Richmond Memorial Library, and the Richmond Mausoleum in the Batavia Cemetery.

But sadly, the once grand Richmond Mansion -- actually built in 1839 by Col. William Davis -- was torn down by a short-sighted City Schools board in 1970. All that's left is a wrought iron fence surrounding a parking lot owned by St. Joseph's.

Now, at least, there is a historical marker on the site to commemorate the location of the mansion.

The unveiling ceremony was attended by two generations of Richmonds, Harold Richmond, above, with his sons Kyle and Alex with his wife Cheryl.

Harold Richmond said it's quite an honor to see his great-great-grandfather remembered and honored in Batavia.

"It's great that the family gets recognized," said Richmond, a resident of New Jersey. "The Richmonds aren't really any different from anybody else today. We don't have anybody of note in the family that I know of, but the fact that the city has maintained the history and recognized the contributions of Dean Richmond and his wife and his daughter is just amazing."

As for the destruction of the Richmond Mansion -- which local preservationists tend to think of a huge loss to the community -- Richmond was forgiving.

"Maintaining that mansion in the 1970s, with that orphanage going away, that's a huge financial burden on a community," Richmond said. "It doesn't shock or surprise me that they had to make that choice. It was probably a good financial choice at that time. It's sad that it couldn't have been sustained as a museum or Masonic lodge or something like that, but it's understandable."

Harold Richmond pointing to the crypt of his great-grandfather with his son Alex inside the Richmond Mausoleum.

The Richmonds, Harold, Kyle, Cheryl and Alex, with Sharon Burkel inside the Richmond Mausoleum.

Checking in at number 10 on the Holland Land Office Museum's ongoing list of 25 Things that Made Genesee County Famous is Dean Richmond.

The name Richmond still plays a prominent role in Batavia. There is the library, of course, but there is also the impressive looking family tomb in the Batavia Cemetary on Harvester Avenue.

Too bad his grand old mansion was torn down by the school board (the school board!?) after the board purchased the building in 1966 and the failed in an attempt to annex the Richmond Library. Where the Greek Revival structure once stood (311 East Main St.) is ... a parking lot. (I think they call that progress.)

But back to dear old Dean.

Mr. Richmond, according to HOLM, was born in 1804 in Barnard, Vermont. He was the son of an entrepreneur, but was forced to make his own way in life at age 14, when his father died.  He turned his father's money-losing business into a profitable one, and eventually used his growing wealth to invest in the emerging railroad business.

Dean Richmond is best known in railroad circles as the first person in America to advocate the use of steel rails for the construction of railroads. An order was placed in England for the steel rails for a test run, but the tests were completed after Richmond died. The tests were successful and the steel industry grew out of the demand for the product by the railroad.

While Richmond was president of the New York Central, he demanded that all trains stop in Batavia. In 1866, the year of Richmond’s death, more than 3.7 million travelers rode on the train line. Not all of those people stopped in Batavia, but a fair share did, and because of Richmond, Batavia became a terminal and a gateway to the west.

Among the passengers who road through Batavia, according to Patrick Weissend, was Abraham Lincoln -- both on his way to assume the presidency in Washington, D.C., and his casket was carried through Genesee County when his body was returned to Springfield, Ill. In both cases, the name of the engine that transported Mr. Lincoln was the Dean Richmond.

The Buffalo History Works site quotes this passage about the train's pass through Batavia from the Buffalo Morning Express:

The funeral train was met at Batavia yesterday morning by the Committee from this city which included Honorable Millard Fillmore. The Committee left here at 6:00 o'clock Wednesday evening by a special car provided for their accommodation, passing the night at Batavia. At 5:00 o'clock yesterday morning, the funeral train arrived at that point, where it was received, as at every halting point along the line of its long, sad journey, by an immense concourse of people. The assemblage had begun with the very dawn, when the firing of the minute guns awoke the village from its slumbers and hastened the steps of pilgrims from the surrounding country flocking in. Before the train appeared, it had grown to the proportions of a city throng.

The multitude stood with their heads bowed, silent, sorrowful and reverent, paying that sincere homage to the dead which had everywhere been so memorable and remarkable. The pause of the train was but for ten minutes, during which the committee from Buffalo took their places in the car reserved for them. From thence to this city no halt on the journey was made but at every station and almost continuously the train passed between long lines of people, who had come to catch but a floating glimpse of what bore the remains of their beloved President; and everywhere they bowed, with uncovered heads, in afflicting bestowment of their little passing tribute of solemn reverence.

Here's something additional I just found: The wreckage of the Dean Richmond, a freighter on the Lake Erie that went down in a storm in 1893. Here's a 1872 article from the New York Times about a fire aboard the very same steamer. Actually, maybe those are not the same boats. This article says there were for Great Lakes steamers named the Dean Richmond -- all met similar fates.  The link contains a picture of the fourth one.