Torian Givens Cottage c. 1897

The structure was built by Sallie Torian Givens for her daughter, Louise Slye Givens, when she married Baxter Clegg in 1897. They moved to Allegheny, Pennsylvania, and then to Montreal, Canada for work purposes. In 1910, Louise moved back to Lafayette and in 1916, she was persuaded by Southwestern Louisiana Industrial Institute President, Dr. Edward L. Stephens, to become the first full-time librarian. She worked there until her retirement in 1939.

1. • It is a building that is part of a group of related properties in an area which attains significance by being part of or related to a square, park or other distinctive area which exemplifies an historical period, cultural connection, or architectural motif unique to the development of the Parish of Lafayette;

The building is a contributing structure in Sterling Grove National Historic District. This District and structure further exemplify the details surrounding the history of the District, specifically the families who lived on this block of North Sterling Street throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.

The property was once part of and is located next door to the Planation Home of Charles Mouton, the son of the founder of Vermilionville, LA. Sarah Lyle “Sallie” Torian Givens (1840-1928) moved to North Sterling Street in 1893 after the death of her husband, Judge John Slye Givens (1835–1887). Sallie Torian Givens was the daughter of Dr. Thomas Torian of Halifax County Virginia and Agnes Glenn Bethel, daughter of a wealthy planter in North Carolina.

When she was 10 years old, Sallie and her family left Virginia for Saint Mary Parish Louisiana, near Pattersonville (now Patterson), to live with her mother’s brother, Pinckney Bethel. Pinckney, also a wealthy planter, owned several sugar plantations and sugar mills between Franklin and Patterson along the Bayou Teche. In 1852, a few years following their move, Sallie’s mother died in childbirth, and her father died two years later. Sallie and her siblings became wards of her uncles, Pinckney Bethel and William Bethel who was a man of considerable means, in Memphis. They lived the usual life of the families of wealthy southern planters, spending the “opera season” in New Orleans and visiting the resort hotel at the beach on what is now Last Island or Isles Dernières.

When Major General Nathanial P. Banks led Union forces up the Bayou Teche, Pinckney Bethel moved his entire household including slaves who had not revolted, to safety in Goliad, Texas. It was there that Sallie met her husband, a young Confederate officer, Major John Slye Givens.

Major Givens, who was born in Kentucky, had originally moved to Texas with his father to practice law in Corpus Christi, Victoria, and Indianola, Texas. In 1871, after an eight-year courtship that began in 1863, John and Sallie were married at Lucknow Plantation near Patterson, Louisiana. They made their home first in Indianola, TX, and later in Corpus Christi, Texas. After 16 years of marriage and with three children, ages 11 to 15, Judge John S. Givens died of a heart attack. At the time, it was natural for Sallie and her children to move back to Louisiana to be close to family. Therefore, Sallie moved to Lafayette, to be with her brothers, William Bethel and Walter Scott Torian.

In 1893, Sallie purchased property at 324 and 318 North Sterling Street from Martha Greig Mudd, wife of Dr. Francis Sterling Mudd for $925.00. The purchase consisted of three arpents of land next to the plantation home of Dr. J. B. Mudd, which was the original Charles Mouton Plantation home. The conveyance for the sale of the land states, “Vendor declares that Sterling Avenue is hereby dedicated, as a street, to the use of this property.”

Sallie continued to live in the Givens Townhouse at 324 North Sterling Street until her death in 1928. Louise moved into the Townhouse and lived there until her death in 1954. In 1946, Louise sold the Givens Cottage at 318 North Sterling Street to her nephew, Dr. Thomas Hopkins Givens, for $4500 payable in $40 monthly installments. The Cottage remained in the Givens family until May 23, 1983, when it was sold to, the Chappuis family, next-door neighbors who at the time were living in the John Nickerson House at 310 North Sterling Street. The Chappuis are descendants of John Nickerson and Elisabeth Ransom Nickerson from Simcoe, Ontario, Canada, who built the John Nickerson House.