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Half A Chimney Half A Door

We hope that the two persons who first owned the Cahoon House in Osterville got along well together. They would have been an unhappy pair had they not, for they were bound together by the house which they owned. Each had title to half. The dividing line ran east and west through the middle of the central chimney and the middle of the front door.

The Cahoon House, one of the oldest in Osterville, was built about 1725. This is the date shown by the feather-edged paneling and the gunstock corner posts as well as by the color of the wood itself. The old kitchen looks like it was ready for a 1725 housewife to step into and feel that she had never been away.

When the house was bought by a previous owner he found a chestful of mementoes. Among them was the old deed that showed the divided ownership of the house. There was also a bullet. The bullet was wrapped in a piece of varnished paper bearing the inscription, “This bullet was in Comrade Sergt. Wm. H. Benett’s hip 6 months and 4 days. Extracted March 5, 1865, by Surgeon F. A. Ropes, Readville General Hospital, Mass.” Bennett was with P. H. Sheridan in Shenandoah and fought in the Louisiana Lowlands.

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