The mansion where Utah made peace with the army sent to crush it
A short walk from where you stand, a wood-and-brick house once hosted the meeting that ended a war without a shot.
Last reviewed 11 September 2026 · A three-minute read · 1857–2024
The short answer
Devereaux House in Salt Lake City was built in 1857 for William Staines and hosted the 1858 meeting between Brigham Young and territorial governor Alfred Cumming that ended the standoff between federal troops and Mormon settlers without battle. Later owned by millionaire William Jennings, it survived a 1979 fire and was restored in the early 1980s.
Fireworks at the Olympic Medals Plaza in downtown Salt Lake City during the 2002 Winter Olympics. — 2002 · Derek Baird from So California · CC BY-SA 2.0
1857 to 1865
A house settles a war between the army and Utah
The house was the first in the Salt Lake Valley built on a scale that could be called a mansion. William Staines had it designed by William Paul in 1857, brick walls under a mansard roof, a wide porch wrapping two sides. Within a year it mattered more than its size suggested. In 1858, Brigham Young met the newly appointed territorial governor, Alfred Cumming, inside these walls. Their meeting settled the Devereaux House (Salt Lake City). A standoff between federal troops and Mormon settlers had brought soldiers to the edge of the valley. No battle followed. The house did what a battlefield might have done instead.
Seven years later, Joseph Angell Young bought it. He was Brigham Young's oldest son. He paid $20,000 for a house that had already hosted the peace that let his father's settlement stand. He kept it only two years.
The next owner would turn a wartime meeting house into something the country could not ignore for a different reason.
1867 to 1886
A millionaire lived openly with two wives here
William Jennings paid $30,000 for the house in 1867, ten thousand more than Young had paid for it. He was believed to be the Salt Lake Valley's first millionaire, and he built like one. He expanded the mansion, landscaped the grounds, and named it Devereaux, after a family property in England. Here he lived openly with two wives, Jane and Priscilla. Jane had eleven children. Priscilla had fourteen.
The house kept receiving the country's attention anyway. Secretary of War William Seward and General Philip Sheridan visited in the 1860s. General William Tecumseh Sherman came in the 1870s. Their visits were read at the time as tacit tolerance of a marriage the federal government was, on paper, trying to stamp out. The mansion had once brokered peace with Washington. Now it sat at the center of the fight over polygamy. Washington kept walking through its door anyway.
Jennings died in 1886. The house passed through other hands after him: an alcohol treatment clinic, offices for a mining company. Its grand years were already behind it.
The State of Utah bought the property in the 1970s and approved money to restore it in 1978. A fire tore through it the following year and nearly ended the house for good. Restoration went ahead anyway in the early 1980s, and the mansion that had once sheltered a war's end was rebuilt to stand a little longer.
A fire in 1979 came close to finishing what a century of use had already started.
December 1866
A freed man was murdered near the house
Not everyone Salt Lake City protected made it out alive. Thomas Coleman had once been enslaved before he came to the valley a free man. In December 1866, someone beat him with a rock and cut his throat near this ground. His body was found on December 11. He was buried in the city cemetery. No trial is recorded for whoever killed him. The house that brokered peace with an army stood less than a quarter mile away while this went unanswered.
1982 to 1986
A Saudi-backed skyscraper plan collapsed on this block
A different kind of outside money tried to remake this exact block more than a century after Jennings died. In June 1982, Essam Khashoggi broke ground on the Triad Center. It was a $26-acre complex. It was meant to hold twin 40-story towers. These would have been the tallest buildings ever planned in Utah. A broadcast house went up first, finished in 1984. Steel was delivered for the main tower in 1985. Then the financing collapsed. The skyscraper was never built. Only the broadcast house, one office building, and a parking structure survive from the plan, standing now less than 50 meters from where you stand.
A few years later, a different kind of money would finish what Triad Center could not.
1990 to 1991
An owner built an arena to keep the Jazz
Larry H. Miller did not wait on outside financing. He paid for a 20,000-seat arena himself. He broke ground in May 1990. He wanted to keep the Delta Center's future tenant, the Utah Jazz, from leaving the city. It opened in October 1991, three blocks from the Devereaux grounds, at a cost of $93 million. The first hockey game there was a loss. The building outlasted that. It has hosted NBA basketball, Olympic figure skating in 2002, and now the Utah Mammoth, standing where a Saudi-backed skyline never got past its foundations.
The Devereaux House still stands in its unfenced yard, dwarfed now by everything that failed or succeeded around it.
Open this place in Strata
Every person, building and event in this story opens into its own dig in the app — and it will dig the ground you are standing on instead, wherever that is.
Sourced records, high and medium confidence. Era background is marked as such.
Prehistoric
between 200 West and 400 South
Construction crews digging near 200 West and 400 South in 1986 uncovered Fremont-era pit houses and Native American remains beneath the city's first pioneer cemetery.
Era background — not a record of this tile · This Is The Place Heritage Village
Early modern
95 meters south
The Devereaux House, built in 1857 for William Staines and later expanded by mayor William Jennings, became a social center that hosted Brigham Young and other prominent visitors.
Brigham Young, the LDS Church leader and Utah's territorial governor, died in Salt Lake City in 1877.
Era background — not a record of this tile · Wikipedia
Modern
364 meters southwest
The Gateway shopping and residential complex was built centered on the historic Union Pacific Depot, transforming the old rail district into open-air retail.
Era background — not a record of this tile · Wikipedia
near this spot
Thomas Coleman, a Black man formerly enslaved in Salt Lake City, was found beaten and with his throat cut about 200 meters from here on December 11, 1866.
Emma Abbott, an American operatic soprano, died in Salt Lake City in 1891 while on tour.
Era background — not a record of this tile · Wikipedia
214 meters southwest
Built in 1908-09 on the edge of downtown, the Union Pacific Depot served the city's railroad era before being repurposed in 2024 as the Asher Adams hotel.
Planned in the 1980s as a sprawling complex meant to include Utah's tallest towers, the Triad Center was built out to only two of its intended phases before the project was abandoned.
John B. Mortensen's 1990 bronze sculpture 'Lupine Meadow Roll' was installed at the Triad Center, close to where you stand.
Era background — not a record of this tile · Wikipedia
301 meters south
Opened in 1991, the arena now known as Delta Center became home to the Utah Jazz and later the Utah Mammoth hockey team.
Era background — not a record of this tile · Wikipedia
204 meters south
A bronze countdown clock shaped like an arrowhead, unveiled in 2001 at Arena station, counted down to the 2002 Winter Olympics and commemorated arrowheads found during the station's construction.
Era background — not a record of this tile · Wikipedia
Questions about this place
Answered in one sentence, then in full above
What happened at Devereaux House in Salt Lake City?
In 1858, Brigham Young met newly appointed territorial governor Alfred Cumming inside the house, a meeting that ended the standoff between federal troops and Mormon settlers without a battle.
Who built Devereaux House?
William Staines had it designed by William Paul in 1857, with brick walls under a mansard roof and a wide wraparound porch.
What was here before the Triad Center was planned?
The Devereaux House stood nearby before the Triad Center was proposed in the 1980s; the Triad Center itself was planned as a 26-acre complex with twin 40-story towers meant to be Utah's tallest buildings, but only a broadcast house, one office building, and a parking structure were completed.
Who lived at Devereaux House after William Staines?
Joseph Angell Young, Brigham Young's oldest son, bought it in 1865 for $20,000 and kept it two years. William Jennings then paid $30,000 for it in 1867, expanded it, and lived there openly with his two wives, Jane and Priscilla.
What happened to Devereaux House in the 20th century?
After passing through use as an alcohol treatment clinic and mining company offices, the State of Utah bought the property in the 1970s and approved restoration funds in 1978. A fire nearly destroyed the house in 1979, but it was restored in the early 1980s.
What happened near Devereaux House in December 1866?
Thomas Coleman, a formerly enslaved man living in Salt Lake City, was found beaten and with his throat cut near the house on December 11, 1866; no trial for his killer is recorded.
