The Almshouse (Shockoe Hill II Elderly Apartments)

This Italianate brick building was constructed from 1860 to 1861 as a home for the city's poor residents and replaced an early nineteenth-century building. The building became the Confederacy's first major hospital during the Civil War. The building was later converted into a nursing home which operated until the 1970s. The City of Richmond sold the property to a developer who converted the old almshouse into apartments for low-income elderly residents in the 1980s. The building is now known as Shockoe Hill II Elderly Apartments. The building became a Virginia Landmarks Register and National Register of Historic Places listing in 1981. Three more historic buildings are on the grounds: an 1899-1905 garage; the West Building, built in 1908 as a new hospital and home for poor Blacks; and an Infectious Diseases/Administration Building from the 1920s.

The Almshouse was an Italianate brick building constructed from 1860 to 1861 as a home for the city's poor residents, to replace an early nineteenth-century building in the same location. The front (south) facade has changed little since then, with three three-story pavilions with narrow arched windows, connected by two-story hyphens, all on a raised basement; the three pedimented porches on the pavilions were added after the Civil War; multiple paired chimneys were removed a century later. The building became the Confederacy's first major hospital during the Civil War, "General Hospital Number One." For part of the war, the building also served as a temporary location for the Virginia Military Institute after its campus was destroyed by Union troops.

The City of Richmond established a second almshouse for African Americans - the "colored department" - which began operating on April 1st, 1868. The "Colored Almshouse" building was on a separate tract of land nearby, to the east of the Shockoe Hill Burying Grounds; this location is now part of the Interstate 64 roadway. The "white department" (the surviving 1860 Almshouse described in this entry) was to the north of the same cemetery (see the attached 1873 map). The annual report on the Almshouses, from March 1869, reported that although the population within the Almshouses had doubled, the expenses had been increased by less than one-half. Over 350 adults and children were admitted to the white department during 1868; from April 1868 to March 1869, nearly 200 adults and children became residents of the colored department. Including about $3,000 for new construction and building insurance for both almshouses, the city spent over $27,000 on both during the calendar year 1868; the other expenses were for food, fuel, clothing, and salaries of the officers and employees.

The city's Committee for the Relief of the Poor solicited bids in May 1870 for supplies needed for one quarter of a year at both almshouses (see the attached newspaper clip). Nearly 60,000 pounds of corn meal and over 22,000 pounds of bacon and fresh beef were part of the foodstuffs on the list; other items included corn brooms, matches, and washing soda. The male ward was to the left of the main entrance of the (White) Almshouse, and the female ward was to the right, by 1905. A twelve-foot-tall brick wall edged the rear yards on three sides; another similar wall divided the males' yard from the females' yard. A new wing for tuberculosis patients was built onto the rear of the east wing in 1926 and served that purpose until 1955. The aging building was becoming increasingly expensive to repair and maintain, and the city decided in 1976 to close what had become the "Richmond Nursing Home."

The National Register nomination for the Almshouse was completed in 1981. Very little of the original interior remained visible by that time other than several simple mantels with Greek Revival style trim on the top floor of the east pavilion. The nomination was modified later to expand the period of significance from 1860-1899 to 1860-1929 and to include three more buildings within the nominated grounds of the Almshouse complex: a garage dating to 1899-1905; the West Building, built in 1908 as a hospital for poor Blacks to replace an earlier building on other lands to the southeast; and an Administration Building (originally the Infectious Diseases unit) constructed in 1926 and expanded in 1928. The 1929 date came from an addition that was built that year onto the West Building. Another standing building within the nominated boundaries, a Boiler House built in 1946, was not considered historic. The Almshouse was renovated in the mid-1980s into apartments for low-income elderly residents. The building is now known as Shockoe Hill II Elderly Apartments, with sixty-four rental units for those aged 62 and up.

Anonymous. "Almshouse Report." Daily Dispatch (Richmond) March 17th, 1869. 1-1.

Apartments.com. Shockoe Hill Senior Apartments, Apartments.com. January 1st, 2024. Accessed January 29th, 2024. https://www.apartments.com/shockoe-hill-senior-apartments-62-plus-richmond-va/3rkqefe/.

EHT Traceries. Updated NRHP nomination of The Almshouse, Richmond, Virginia. National Register of Historic Places. Washington, DC. National Park Service, 2020.

Mulford, John E. "Sealed Proposals will be received until 12 o'clock...." Daily Dispatch (Richmond) May 24th, 1870. Classifieds sec, 2-2.

Virginia Department of Historic Resources. 127-0353, The Almshouse, Historic Registers. January 1st, 2023. Accessed December 31st, 2023. https://www.dhr.virginia.gov/historic-registers/127-0353/.

Virginia Landmarks Commission staff. McGehee Jr, Carden C. NRHP nomination of The Almshouse, Richmond, Virginia. National Register of Historic Places. Washington, DC. National Park Service, 1981.