Kenwood home ... Connection to Civil War, Mark Twain

It was to have been the dream home of the charismatic bootheel Congressman Samuel Caruthers for whom Caruthersville was named. In fact, the home was well under pen and construction of Edwin Branch Deane when Caruthers' life was abruptly ended in 1860 at the age of 40. Caruthers had always admired Ashland, the Kentucky home of Henry Clay, and asked Deane to duplicate it.

Uncompleted, it attracted the interest of Jacob Burrough, lawyer and husband of Deane's niece, Mary E. Deane. After purchasing, they finished the eight spacious rooms of the main house made of thousands of handmade bricks by slaves on property. The upstairs hallway featured large windows through which one could observe the majestic trees and many sloping meadows of sheep. A beautifully crafted barn, stables and brick ice house at the spring were part of the outbuildings.

In his early years, 1854-55, Jacob went to St. Louis to become a journeyman chair maker. While there, he roomed with Samuel Clemens who was a journeyman printer. Clemens admired Burrough for his "wide reading and keen literary judgments." (Mark Twain Encyclopedia, 1993) It also states, Twain used Burrough as a model for Mr. Barrow in "The American Claimant," 1892. More than likely, Clemens visited Burrough's home on his steamboat visits to Cape Girardeau over the years.

During the Battle of Cape Girardeau, the Confederates under Col. Carter were dug into the hill at Kenwood during a barrage of shells and cannonballs from Fort C. During the 1970s, five cannonballs were unearthed in the vicinity.

Jacob and Mary were the parents of Emma, George and Frank. Very involved in the process of Cape Girardeau being chosen as the site for the Third District Normal School, Jacob was chosen president of the first Board of Regents and served on the building committee of the first school.

Following Jacob's death in 1883 and his wife 1884, the estate passed on to son Frank and wife Annie Kenrick. A graduate of the Normal School and University of Michigan Law School in 1885, Frank came to Cape Girardeau to become the Normal School's attorney. He served as Cape Girardeau County prosecuting attorney and Common Pleas judge from 1897-1901. He was taken ill during a trial in Farmington, Missouri, and died a few days later of pneumonia at the age of 38.

None of Frank's and Annie's three children married; therefore they continued to live in the gracious home following Annie's death in 1937. Son Kendrick graduated from Yale and Harvard Law School, after which he returned to Cape to practice law. The eccentric sisters, Jean and Mary, were the focus of many endearing stories as Cape's "old maid" sisters. They loved giving tea parties, socials and soirees, while all along shunning modern conveniences, especially electricity until 1919, and automobiles.

The Burrough family home era ended as a Kentucky relative sold Kenwood to a housing development. Unfortunately, the stately manor sits obscured in the center of the Cape LaCroix Apartments and serves today as the complex's community center.