Cortlandt Manor / Mohegan Lake / Shrub Oak / Jefferson Valley / Peekskill / Yorktown Heights, NY 10567

The Thomas Paine Cottage
The Thomas Paine Cottage in New Rochelle,
New York in the United States, was the home
from 1802 to 1806 of Thomas Paine, author of
Common Sense and Revolutionary War hero.
Paine was buried near the cottage from his
death in 1809 until his body was disinterred in
1819. It was one of a number of buildings located
on the 300 acre farm given to Paine by
the State of New York in 1784, in recognition
of his services in the cause of Independence.
It was here in August 1805 that he wrote his
last pamphlet, which was addressed to the
citizens of Philadelphia on “Constitutional Reform”.
The cottage has been owned by the “New
Rochelle and Huguenot Historical Association”
and has been operated as a historic
house museum since 1910. The cottage is
open to the public five days a week. There
are several weekend events scheduled at the
cottage throughout the year. In addition, the
cottage hosts many local school field trips. It
had 3,000 visitors in 2002.
The cottage is a two-story wood-frame saltbox
structure. It began as a simple building
16 feet wide and 31 feet deep. In 1804, an
additional 18 by 23 feet wing with a porch
was constructed. An exterior door and porch
pillars in the Greek Revival style were added in
about 1830. The main house has three rooms
set one behind the other; the kitchen in front,
a common room in the center and a bedroom
in the rear. The wing to the right contains
the parlor and there are four bedrooms
on the second floor. The entrance door and
the pillars of the porch on the wing are Greek
Revival and were added about 1830. The
current arrangement has rooms decorated
in the late 18th and early 19th century style
as well as exhibits pertaining to the history of
New Rochelle, the local Siwanoy Indians, and
the Huguenots.
The front door to the cottage enters directly
into its main room, which is maintained as the
“Huguenot Room”. The desk is said to have
belonged to Jacques Flandreau, an early Huguenot
settler of the town. Over the desk is a
steel engraving from the celebrated painting
at Versailles showing King Henry IV of France
(Henry of Navarre) entering Paris through the
unfinished Porte-Neuve on the morning of
March 22, 1594.
The rear room on the first floor is known as
the “Paine Room”. On Christmas Eve, 1805,
a gun was fired into this room in an attempt
on Paine’s life. He described the incident in
a letter:
“Whatever the gun was charged with passed
through about three or four inches below the
window making a hole large enough to (allow)
a finger to go through -the muzzle must
have been very near as the place is black
with powder, and the glass of the window is
shattered to pieces.”
There are several interesting items in this
room. There are two chairs used by Paine
when he boarded at Bayeau’s Tavern, almost
directly across North Avenue. Another item is
the stove set in the chimney. It was presented
by Benjamin Franklin to Thomas Paine, and
is one of the few real Franklin stoves in existence.
Still another item is a warming pan
which belonged to Mrs. Sarah Bache (1774-
1808), daughter of Benjamin Franklin and
wife of Richard Bache who was postmastergeneral
of the United States from 1776-1782.
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