The Morris house is in the center of the frame. photograph from the collection of the New York Public Library.
Born on July 11, 1799, Gerard Walton Morris had a sterling American pedigree. His grandfather was Lewis Morris, a United States Senator a Founding Father, and the last Lord of Morrisania Manor. His grandmother was Mary Beekman Walton, who came from two distinguished Colonial families. Gerard's father, Richard Valentine Morris, was Commodore of the U.S. Navy and a member of the New York Assembly.
Gerard W. Morris married Martha Pyne on October 8, 1827. Within the subsequent decade, mansions began appearing along lower Fifth Avenue, sparked by the construction of the Henry and Laura Brevoort house on the northwest corner of Fifth Avenue and West 9th Street in 1834. Six years later, the Morris family were living in their new brownstone mansion at 25 Fifth Avenue, across from the Brevoorts.
The Drake Mills mansion next door at 23 Fifth Avenue sat upon two building plots, affording a capacious side garden. Although less sumptuous than the homes of the Brevoort and the Mills families, the Morris house held its own in fashion and luxury. Four stories tall above an English basement, its cast iron stoop railings sat atop stepped wing walls. Typical of the Greek Revival style, the entrance was flanked by stone pilasters that upheld a layered entablature. Also typical was the squat fourth floor that supplanted the dormered, peaked attic of the Federal style, which was quickly becoming passé.
When the couple moved into their new home, they had eight children. A ninth, Arthur Rutherford, would arrive in 1846. The family's country estate was in Morristown, New Jersey.
Gerard Walton Morris (original source unknown)
Tragically, two of the Morris children died in 1850--Anne Walton died on February 22 at the age of 20, and Richard Valentine died the following month, on the 24th, at the age of 11. The next year, on August 28, Isabella died at the age of 23.
Honora S. Morris was 21 years old in 1852. Her wedding to wealthy stockbroker Francis Julius Baretto was held in the Church of the Ascension on May 5 that year. The newlyweds lived in the Fifth Avenue house and at their summer estate, West Farms, in Westchester County.
Honora Morris Barretto (original source unknown)
The church was the scene of another, more somber Morris ceremony the following month. On June 9, the New York Evening Express reported that Mary Pyne Morris, "wife of Gerard W. Morris of this city, and daughter of the late John Pyne of South Carolina," had died at the age of 46. Her funeral was held in the Church of the Ascension on the 10th.
The population of the Fifth Avenue mansion quickly grew. Gerard Morris Barretto, Annie Barretto and Frances Baretto were born in 1853, 1854 and 1857 respectively. Sadly, little Annie would die two months before her second birthday on September 28, 1856.
(Unusual for the time, none of the many Morris family's funerals were held in the Fifth Avenue parlor, but at the Church of the Ascension.)
The parlors were the scene of a joyous occasion on December 19, 1854 when Mary Morris (known as Minnie) was married to Jonathan Edwards. (Gerard W. Morris would attend yet another funeral of one of his children three years later when Minnie died at the age of 22.)
In August 1865, Gerard Walton Morris was at West Farms, the summer home of the Barrettos, when he died on July 19 at the age of 67. His funeral was held in St. Ann's Church in Morrisania, once the familial estate of his ancestors.
Honora Barretto died at the age of 35 in 1866 and Francis Barretto and his children left 25 Fifth Avenue shortly after. Still living here were bachelor brothers Gerard Walton Morris Jr., who was a lawyer; Henry Walton Morris, and John Pyne Morris. Their only other surviving sibling was Reverend Arthur Rutherford Morris. John Pyne Morris had served in the Civil War, attaining the rank of captain. He would die in 1868.
from the collection of the New York Public Library
The Morris brothers leased their childhood home to Sophia Dye, the widow of George Dye, in 1871. She operated it as a high-class boarding house, taking in only a handful of boarders at a time. Among them that first year was merchant James S. Chappel, who would remain at least through 1874.
Sophia Dye continued to lease the mansion until 1881, when it was rented by attorney Henry C. Bowers and his wife, the former Estelle Durant. In September 1884, Estelle's parents, Charles C. and Margaret L. Durant, moved into the mansion with the couple. Now retired, Charles had been a banker and the president of the Rock Island Railway. The New York Times said he had "accumulated a large fortune" and was "now estimated to be worth far more than a million dollars."
The Durants, most likely, moved in with their daughter and son-in-law because Charles was exhibiting an "unsound mind," or what today we would recognize as the symptoms of dementia. Four months after moving in, in December 1884, Margaret L. Durant died in the residence.
In the spring of 1885, a court deemed Durant incompetent to handle his financial affairs. Two weeks later, on March 24, Estelle's brother, Howard M. Durant, visited. He told her that he would like to take their father on a drive. In fact, he essentially kidnapped him. Charles Durant never returned to 25 Fifth Avenue and he died the following month. A bitter court battle among the siblings erupted, each word followed closely by the newspapers.
Around 1895, General Daniel Edgar Sickles purchased and moved into the former Drake Mills house with his wife, Carmina. At the same time, he purchased 25 Fifth Avenue and rented it to Charles Runyon and his wife, the former Isabel Mercein Fitz Randolph.
from the collection of the New York Public Library
Born on March 4, 1837, Charles Runyon had a long career in the coal business. He had been secretary and treasurer of the Superior Mountain Coal Company and was instrumental in organizing the Hoboken Coal Company. He then founded and was president of the Communipaw Coal Company. He and Isabel were married in 1864 and they had a daughter and three sons, one of whom, Carmen Randolph, moved into the mansion with his wife, Helen O. Wiley.
Charles Runyon died in the house on October 13, 1903. Isabel remained in the house with her son and daughter-in-law at least through 1908.
By 1910, the mansion was once again operated as a high-end boarding house. The names of the select residents, like the O. Webers, here in 1911, appeared in Dau's New York Blue Book of high society.
By then, Daniel E. Sickles was experiencing money problems. On October 11, 1912, The New York Times said he had "become involved in further financial difficulties," and reported that he was was far behind in his mortgage payments on the two properties and "owed $11,000 for three years' taxes." Finally, on August 1, 1914, the newspaper reported that both properties had been sold at auction. The article disclosed that the corner property "brought $104,850," and 25 Fifth Avenue "went for $37,400." (The price paid for the former Morris mansion would translate to about $1.2 million in 2026.)
In October 1916, Oak Point Corporation purchased the two properties along with 1 East 9th Street and 27 Fifth Avenue. They were demolished for a 13-story apartment house completed in 1921, which survives.
photograph by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York.
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