The home was built by Samuel Richards, a wealthy and influential ironmaster from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as a summer country estate for his family.

An iron forge at Atsion was established in 1766 by Charles Read, a businessman in the Province of New Jersey prior to the American Revolutionary War.

By December 1824 the mansion was complete enough for Richards to host, what contemporary sources called, "a grand housewarming."

The property was passed down through differing owners, with Joseph Wharton purchasing the lands at Atsion in 1892, as a part of his 96,000 acre holdings in the New Jersey Pine Barrens, and converted the mansion into a storage facility for cranberry and peanut harvesting.

[5] The exterior of the mansion features a patterned stucco scoring over an ironstone core, intended to replicate marble blocks.

Four chimneys rise from the home, the smoke escape for nine fireplaces locate inside of the home.The interior of the mansion is divided into 20 rooms on four levels.