Lewis Store

In 1749, when Fredericksburg was still frontier, John Lewis built a retail store at the corner of Caroline and Lewis streets. The building sits at the northwest corner — two-story front-gable three-bay brick store, twenty-six feet wide by thirty-seven feet deep. Flemish bond with random glazed headers. Corbelled-brick cornice. Rusticated ashlar sandstone quoins reinforce each corner; stone lintels with grooved keystones cap the openings. The roof is wood shake, the foundation laid in Flemish bond with a chamfered water table. A shed-roof frame addition — 2001 — abuts the west elevation.

The Lewises sold the store in 1776. It kept operating as a store until 1823, then became a residence. By 2000 it was falling down. Between 2000 and 2006 it was rehabilitated — the work followed the Secretary of the Interior's Standards. The original staircase was removed when the second story was added in 1808; the replacement — an open-string winder with paneled spandrel and rectangular balusters — remains. On the second story, a Plexiglass viewport exposes three-course American bond brick and the plaster ghost of the 1749 roofline.

Historic Fredericksburg Foundation operates it now. The building is listed on the National Register.