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Coleen Perilloux Landry | all galleries >> Galleries >> Porches and Galleries > Toby's Corner at First and Prytania
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August 2006 Coleen Perilloux Landry

Toby's Corner at First and Prytania

2340 Prytania Street

This is believed to be the oldest house in the Garden District. Built in 1838 for Thomas Toby, a businessman from Philadephia, it is the type of architecture that reflects the style of the West Indies plantation homes that were built in New Orleans at the time.
Mr. Toby came to New Orleans in the early 1800's and made his fortune as a wheelwright.
After Mr. Toby's death Thomas Dugan purchased the house as a wedding present to his daughter, Louise, in 1858 who married into the Westfeldt family. Their descendants still live in the home.
The spacious grounds are completely surrounded by lush foliage, trees and shrubs thus giving only a glimpse to the street.
Raised on piers these were the type houses built to escape the overflow of the Mississippi River during high water seasons.


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John Harrison 21-Aug-2017 14:45
Thomas Toby was the son-in-law of Jean Augustin, a French seminarian who escaped the French revolution, and met his future wife and father in law sailing to Saint-Domingue, where he learned coffee farming, until the Saint-Domingue revolution, where he and his wife and child escaped to Cuba. All French were forced leave Cuba during the war between France and Spain, and the family immigrated to New Orleans around 1812, where he was a Latin professor and the family owned and operated a haberdashery. They had several children, including Mary Ann Elvira Clemence Augustin, who was married to Thomas Toby, the Texas consul to New Orleans, and a financier of the Texas Revolution. I had the opportunity to visit the Toby corner there during 2005 shortly before Hurricane Katrina and am interested in whether the Garden District homes made it through. My Toby ancestor was Eliza Mellon Toby Bogert, sister of Alabama, Simeon, and Edward Toby.
Guest 21-Apr-2009 14:53
I have a photo from 1996 taken of myself in front of this house with an apperation in the window on the bottom floor of the home. It was a rainy day. We did not use a flash and the picture was taken almost across the street. Any ghosts connected to this home?
Ronda Williamson 24-Feb-2009 20:36
My mother, Martha Richard Williamson, asked me to find some info on the Toby family, her grandmother was Martha "Mattie" Toby, a granddaughter of Thomas Toby. Mr Toby also had some influence in the development of the Republic of Texas. My great grandmother did not live in this house but did live in the Garden District on Prytania St. She married Eduard DeRussy, grandson of Louis (Lewis) G DeRussy.
JW20-Aug-2006 21:16
Fascinating. Seems across the Western world, affluence was exhibited by the size of their columns!
Guest 16-Aug-2006 15:55
Great picture and you know that I like the history. Well done.
s_barbour16-Aug-2006 14:35
I love the porch on this home. Thanks for the history behind this beautiful home Coleen, it is really nice to learn of the origin of these old places.
laine8216-Aug-2006 05:59
Early " Queenslanders " were built here for the same reasons in the same way. Nice that it escaped Katrina !!
Toney Smith16-Aug-2006 03:47
Nice image of real Louisiana Coleen. Many of residents surely wish their homes would have been built this way in New Orleans. These earlier settlers knew what they were doing.
Karen Leaf16-Aug-2006 03:39
NICE! place
Gayle P. Clement16-Aug-2006 03:11
A beautiful home.