The White House Hotel

by David Shanahan

The White House Hotel was built by Nathaniel Fenton in the mid-1830's. Fenton was also responsible for the fine building on the north-west corner of Clothier and Rideau streets, and was an important individual in the business life of Kemptville for many years. A map of 1861-62 indicates that the Hotel was then called Rideau House.

Nathaniel Fenton had a secret part of his life as a respectable hotel-keeper in Kemptville. He also a member of the underground Hunters Lodges, a republican group dedicated to rebellion in Canada and followers of William Lyon MacKenzie King. The Hunters Lodges continued to make occasional raids into Canada from the United States even after the failure of MacKenzie’s 1837 Rebellion.

An informer led to the dispersal of the Kemptville Lodge, although Fenton returned in a short time to carry on his life in the community. He was, it seems, the big winner in the entire affair . Now that the Hunters Lodge was defunct and the members could not identify themselves without facing the consequences, it seems their Treasurer, Nathaniel himself, decided to spend the funds raised by the Lodge on a big new stone house for himself. It still stands at the corner of Clothier and Rideau, and Fenton continued to live there until his death in 1849. Ironically, the house built by the funds of a republican secret society of rebels later became the home of a Conservative Member of Parliament, Dr. Charles Ferguson, and the boyhood home of a future Ontario Premier, G. Howard Ferguson.

Thomas Adams bought the hotel in 1865 and maintained it until 1881. To attract business to his establishment, Thomas ran a free shuttle service between his hotel and the railway station at Bedell for visitors and travelling salesmen. Thomas Warren, whose name appears on the sign in the photograph, owned it from 1881 until 1928. One of the first buildings in cont'd on page 15

History