Le
Refuge Inn's home is the Samuel Pell House, a historic 1876 landmark
which is a beautifully restored 19th century sea captain’s
house, and now a romantic six-room Victorian Inn overlooking the 300-year
old harbor on City Island. The elegant country French inn with fireside
dining, old world charm, French cuisine and a relaxed atmosphere, offers
an ideal setting for weddings, private parties, romantic dinners and
weekend getaways. If you like
the French countryside, Le Refuge Inn is your perfect escape. Just minutes
from
Built around 1876 for oysterman Samuel Pell, this house is a significant reminder of the enormous wealth that the oyster trade brought to the maritime community of City Island in the nineteenth century.
Samuel Pell was a descendent of the Pell family that once owned this area of the Bronx. He and his children, who occupied this house until about 1900, were prominent members of the City Island community. In 1907, the house was sold to James Feeley, a partner in a wholesale lace curtain importing firm. In the late 1920s, the house passed to his son, Edgar J. Feeley, a prominent attorney and part owner-officer of the New York Giants baseball team, who occupied the house until his death in 1972. The Samuel Pell House is currently being used as an inn and restaurant. A five-bay wide, three-story frame building, the Pell House has the boxy form characteristic of Second Empire buildings. It is sheathed in its original clapboards and retains its original two-over-two fenestration. Its overhanging cornice with bracketed eaves is capped by an elaborately detailed mansard roof that retains its original patterned polychrome slate shingles, pedimented dormers, and decorative metal flashing.
"Oyster trader's pad made a pearl of city", Daily News
The Samuel Pell House on City Island, Once Part of Pelham
Landmarks Preservation Commission Designation
Le Refuge Inn, City Island, New York, all rights reserved