Laurance Corley House

Front: This log house was built ca. 1771 by Laurance Corley (1742-1815), whose plantation of over 1700 acres occupied much of present-day Lexington. Corley later served in Capt. Gabriel Friday's militia company during the Revolution. The house stood on two previous locations near Twelve Mile Creek, approximately 1 mile east, and was moved here on part of the original tract in 1974, then restored by the Lexington Co. Museum. Reverse: Laurance Corley was the father of sixteen children, founding a prominent and well-known Lexington County family. His first wife Christena died in 1806, and he later married a widow, Barbara Derrick Drafts (1770-1858), later known as "Granny Corley." In 1820, five years after Corley's death, Mrs. Corley deeded two acres to the state for the establishment of a new county seat, which became the town of Lexington.