In this modest weatherboard house, constructed ca. 1820, Mary Virginia “Jennie” Wade was born on May 21, 1843. Wade, the second of six children of James and Mary Filby Wade, spent her childhood here, attending local schools and helping with her father’s tailor shop. In 1854, the family moved to a new house on Breckenridge Street.

During the Battle, “Jennie” and her mother were visiting the home of sister Georgia Wade McClellan (now 548 Baltimore Street). There, on the morning of July 3, 1863, while working in the kitchen, Jennie was killed by an unknown Confederate sharpshooter, becoming Gettysburg’s only civilian fatality of the fighting.

In the early 1920’s, John White Johnston, a Rochester, New York businessman who had become fascinated with the Wade story, purchased this house and the Breckenridge Street house. On May 21, 1922 he dedicated a bronze plaque here in a ceremony attended by Georgia Wade McClellan.

We visited this location in 2018 when the building housed the Reid’s Orchard and Winery. While we were there, we asked the employee if they ever had any paranormal experiences and she was more then happy to explain all of the experiences she had. She told us that there was a room upstairs that had strange noises coming from it. She also experience cold sports on occasions and the feeling that she was being watched. She also told us that she experienced seeing a woman looking out of the window on the second floor when she looked back at the building after closing up at night.