Fearing raids from the British Columbia Indians early Bellingham settlers
would crowd together into the stockade house on Peabody hill at night.
Company D of the Ninth Infantry was dispatched to offer security and
protection. They were led by Captain George E. Pickett, long time friend of
President Lincoln, a graduate of West Point in Virginia and veteran of the
Mexican War. Fort Bellingham, where the stockade was erected, was three
miles west of Whatcom Creek. Soon after his arrival Captain Pickett began
building his house on the bluff above Henry Roeder's lumber mill using
planks from the mill. Pickett's house has the distinction of being the
oldest building in Bellingham.
Pickett's house was a simple two-story building composed of undressed planks. The main section of the house measured only 15 feet wide and 25 feet deep. The first floor was composed of two rooms and the second floor, reached by ladder, had two bedrooms. A lean-to on the west side of the house contained the kitchen and dining room. A fireplace made of stick and mud heated the house. The first room in the house became Pickett's study, where he conducted much of his official business.
During his stay, Pickett married an Indian woman who gave birth to a son, James Tilton Pickett, in 1857. The mother died when James was still a child and he was sent to live with friends in Mason County. Since Captain Pickett's duties often took him away from Bellingham, his house was left vacant most of the time. Pickett left Bellingham in 1861, returning to Virginia to be a successful Confederate General in the Civil War.
Pickett’s house has changed ownership many times. Hattie Strothers, who lived there from 1889 until her death in 1939, deeded the house and property to the Washington State Historical Society in 1936. After her death the Pickett House became a historical monument and was later placed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Numerous changes have been made to the Pickett house yet much of it remains in the original state. Most of the improvements have made the house more livable, including the rear addition of a new kitchen. The lean-to has been converted into a caretaker's apartment, the front study is now a living room, and a narrow stairway has replaced the ladder to the second floor. Other modifications are the glassed-in front porch and shingled exterior. The Pickett House still serves as an excellent example of Bellingham's earliest style. To further preserve the structure, the Pickett house was designated as a museum in 1941, and in 1956, it became home to the Daughters of Pioneers. The Pickett house still serves both of these activities today.
