THURSDAY'S TREASURES - Lee & Jackson Busts, Horst House - Mobile, AL

In a previous post, I told the story of the house built in Mobile, Alabama, by my great-great-great-grandfather Martin Horst (1830-1878). Read it here. The home still stands in Mobile, built in 1867, making the home 146 years old. In the previous post I describe the arrangement of the rooms in the home. But for this story only one area needs to be highlighted.

Bust of Robert E. Lee in Horst House
Mobile, Alabama

On the first floor of the house there is "a central hall, flanked by two rooms on the right, and a double parlor on the left. In the archway between the two parlors, Martin Horst had placed a bust in bas-relief of Robert E. Lee on one side, and Stonewall Jackson on the other."

In 1993, my father commissioned a reproduction of these two busts to be displayed in the new home my parents were building in Birmingham, Alabama. As my father always loved history - and was the keeper of the family history for both his family and my mother's family - he wanted to honor Martin Horst, my mother's great-great-grandfather.

He had two sets of plaques made. When the artist was creating the molds, he found that the plaques had originally been painted. The artist painted both sets, but my parents had the paint removed from one pair. The pair in Mobile are now painted white [see above picture].


Reproductions of the busts of Robert E. Lee (L) and Stonewall Jackson
Found in Horst House, Mobile, AL

He never did display either pair of busts but they, of course, are very special reminders of Martin Horst, his wife Apollonia Weinschenk (1829-1908), and the glorious life he made for his family after emigrating from Germany in 1846.