Historic Roswell District

Roswell’s official historic district is 122 acres, but the broader district, of 640 acres, covers much of downtown and the area down to the Chattahoochee River.

Historic sights include the city’s mid-19th-century town square and shops, historic homes and places of worship, old cemeteries and former mill buildings.

If you don’t mind (quite a lot of!) walking, it is feasible to see many of Roswell’s sights on foot. In general, however, your visit will be more convenient with a car. A free self-guided tour of the city’s main sights is available as a brochure. You can either pick up a copy from the Visitors Center or download it here. A more in-depth guide to Roswell’s historic cemeteries is available here.

Historic House Tours In Roswell

There are three antebellum historic house museums in Roswell, all owned and operated by the city. Guided tours of the houses are available, with free audio tours (available without admission) of the grounds.

Bulloch Hall (180 Bulloch Avenue) is the most historically-significant of Roswell’s three house museums. The 1839 Greek Revival mansion was the house out of which the parents of Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, were married. Tours discuss the house and its history, and you can also see the grounds, with reconstructed slave quarters, an orange grove, and a nature trail.

Barrington Hall (535 Barrington Drive) is a few hundred yards from Bulloch Hall. Built in 1842, it provides another excellent example of Greek Revival architecture. The house, set within seven acres of grounds, was built by Barrington King, son of the town’s founder Roswell King. It includes many furnishings original to the home or owned by the King family.

The Smith Plantation (935 Alpharetta Street) was built in 1845 by the Smith family’s slaves, prior to their move to Roswell from their former home on the Georgia coast. The two-story farmhouse (the farm once supplied cotton to the Roswell Mill) retains many of the family’s original possessions. The wooded grounds include several outbuildings and a slave cabin.

Each of the three Southern Trilogy historic homes has the same hours and admission prices. Hours are Tuesday-Saturday, 10am-4pm and Sunday, 1pm-4pm. House tours begin on the hour, with the last tour starting at 3pm.

Admission for each house is $5 for adults and $4 for children. If you plan on seeing all three houses, a discounted Southern Trilogy Pass can be purchased for $18 for adults or $15 for children (6-18), which allows admission to all three (you don’t need to visit them all on the same day). Passes can be bought at any of the homes, or at the Visitors Center.

Free self-guided audio tours of the houses’ grounds are also available (the admission fee for the houses applies to their docent-led tours). The audio tours last around 16-18 minutes per house. Access the free tour from your cell phone (your service provider’s usual fee for minutes will apply), or download the MP3 files in advance from the City of Roswell’s website.

Plan on spending an hour or so at each house, and longer if you want to enjoy the grounds and listen to the audio tour.

On any day other than Sunday, it is possible to see all three homes in a single day if you get started early. Barrington and Bulloch Halls are less than five minutes walk apart, with both very near to the Visitors Center. The Smith Plantation is a mile away.

Nature & Outdoors

Just a few hundred yards from Roswell’s Town Square and Visitors Center is Old Mill Park, site of the ruins of the former Roswell Mills and a man-made waterfall. A modern covered pedestrian bridge connects Old Mill Park to the adjacent Vickery Creek, part of the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area. Interpretive signs outline the history of the area.

Several other units of the 48-mile-long Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area are located in and around Roswell (see more information about the park’s units here). The Chattahoochee Nature Center is also nearby, offering trails, wildlife and nature interpretation in a family-friendly environment.

The Recreation Area is open daily, dawn to dusk. A $5 per vehicle fee applies. Visitor hours at the Nature Center are 10am-5pm Monday-Saturday and 12pm-5pm Sunday. Admission is $10 for adults, $7 for seniors and $6 for children ages 3-18.