The Williams Mansion

The Williams Mansion is a colossal Italianate villa that dominates the corner of South Battery and Legare Street with its towering brick facade and expansive arched windows. Built in eighteen seventy-six by George Williams, a wealthy banker and blockade runner, the house was a deliberate display of defiance and status following the Civil War. Williams famously constructed the home with a single massive ballroom on the second floor, designed specifically to host elaborate parties that mocked the post-war economic struggles of his neighbors.