Hardings Belle Meade

LE stands for Limited Edition Print

William Giles Harding completed building his famous Belle Meade Mansion in 1853. It was named for the beautiful meadows of the vast estate owned and developed by the Harding family. The architecture is Greek Revival.

The plantation, which is located at the northern end of the old Natchez Trace, is best remembered as a very successful horse farm which produced many of the great thoroughbreds of the last half of the 19th century. The most famous was Iroquois, winner of the English Derby in 1881.

The mansion, known as the "Queen of the Cumberland Hills", was the scene for much entertaining of Harding family and friends...and did sustain some damage during the Battle of Nashville in the Civil War.

This 1989 lithograph shows that the Belle Meade mansion is maintained as a beautiful remembrance of a bygone era. The Association for the Preservation of Tennessee Antiquities oversees the mansion and maintains the structure...with a major renovation completed in 1988.