Roughly bounded by Herrontown, River, Princeton-Kingston Rds., and lots W of Princeton Twp., Princeton, New Jersey. County/parish: Mercer.
Added to the National Register of Historic Places April 10, 1986. NRIS 86000707.
16 contributing buildings. 2 contributing structures.
The Kingston Mill Historic District is a 49-acre (20 ha) historic district in Kingston, New Jersey. It consists of the historic Kingston Mill on the Millstone River and surrounding colonial and republican structures, including several houses and an 18th-century stone bridge. It is notable for containing the home of Henry Greenland, the first European settlement in what is now Princeton, New Jersey. The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986 for its significance in engineering, exploration/settlement, industry, and transportation. The district includes 16 contributing buildings and 2 contributing structures. The district's territory is shared between Princeton, South Brunswick, and Franklin Township.
The area was first settled in 1683 when Henry Greenland established a tavern where a growing cart road met the Millstone River, building the first European settlement in the vicinity of what is now Princeton. Around the 1740s, Greenland's grandson Barefoot Brinson, sheriff of Middlesex and Somerset Counties, built housing for tenants and the area's first gristmill on the property as the area became more settled and less remote. After Brinson's death, Jacob Skillman built a second mill on the property, as well as a house and shop. After the mill was burned during the American Revolutionary War, it was rebuilt in 1797 by stagecoach owner John Gulick Jr, who expanded the property's buildings and improved the adjacent road into a turnpike. The mill was expanded by the Gulicks and later owners throughout the 19th century, and was rebuilt again by Nelson Thompson following a fire in 1888. The mill shut down in the 20th century, while the surrounding farm remained property of the Gulicks.
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