"BILL" JONES HOUSE
(LORENZO D. JONES HOUSE)

468 W. 2nd St., Lexington, Fayette County, Kentucky
Built 1850's

J.M. Roche's father, Maurice Roche, did not build this house, but completed it—and thereby hangs a tale.

When Lexingtonians were leaving to join the army—Federal or Confederate—"Bill" Jones had a keg of bullets he was afraid the enemy would take, so Roche says. Two upstairs rooms of this house had not been completed when he was hastily preparing to leave for the war, so he poured his keg of bullets beneath the floor and into the upstairs wall.

Maurice Roche bought the house January 31, 1865, finished plastering the upstairs rooms and his family, after living there for some 30 years, sold it to the Misses Brown, who made many improvements. The latter, in having some interior repairs made, discovered some of the bullets. J.M. Roche learned from Mr. Jones the source of the bullets. That was several years ago.

Recently, the present owner, Dr. W.D. Funkhouser, was installing a furnace and discovered a lot of the bullets in the flooring. Being a scientist, psychologist, zoologist, archaeologist and anthropologist, he applied his keen analytical mind to solving the mystery of the "bullet cache" in his domicile, but failed. Mr. Roche later informed him of the facts.

Incidentally, the Federals had a forage lot back of this house during the war (now partially occupied by the Bruce Street City School) and it had been the site of John McMurtry's planing mill, which burned.

This entire section from 2nd to Short Street—4 1/2 acres and known as Lot "A"—was bought by Wm. Palmateer December 2, 1805 of Capt. Wm. Allen, who purchased it from James Masterson the month before.

Palmateer sold off the property in building lots.

This lot (48 feet) was sold to Robert Grooms (1818 Directory: "Robt. Grooms, Post and Rail Maker, Third St.") on January 5, 1825, and deeds for the next several years referred to the "framed house occupied by Robt. Grooms in 1825." James Hamilton bought it October 6, 1835, from Jane Grooms, the widow, and sold it to Lorenzo D. Jones, August 31, 1839. Jones conveyed it to Wm. R. Davis June 29, 1846, and Davis sold the brick house, which superseded Robert Grooms' frame building, to Maurice Roche nearly 20 years later.

Jane Grooms, the widow of Robert, was a daughter of James Lemon and inherited two brick houses from her father on Mill Street. Robert Grooms was listed among the victims of the 1838 cholera plague.

Lorenzo D. Jones had bought the Grooms' frame house in 1839 from James Hamilton.

Source: Old Houses of Lexington, C. Frank Dunn, typescript, n.d., copy located in the Kentucky Room, Lexington (Kentucky) Public Library.

Transcribed by pb, October 2006