According to the National Park Service, he was the "most prolific architect of the post-Civil War era" in the Charleston area.

[4] The 1870 Census shows Dorothy Devereux (John's mother), age 70, living with the young couple in Charleston.

In 1885, Devereux was appointed as Superintendent of Construction and Repairs of the U.S. Treasury Department, which handled public buildings.

[8] During the American Civil War, Devereux was commissioned as a captain in the Confederate Army in 1864; he was taken prisoner on 25 February 1865.

According to his death certificate, "Colonel" Devereux died from general arteriosclerosis with a contributing preexisting factor of "paralysis from Cerebral hemorrhage".

The National Park Service has recognized Devereux as Charleston's "most prolific architect of the post-Civil War era.

[8] Devereux designed the large, Gothic church for its black congregation; it was erected starting in spring 1891 and completed in 1892.

This "polychrome" effect reflected a motif for church architecture popularized at the time in The Stones of Venice by John Ruskin.

Its wrought iron spiral and finial built by Christopher Werner was destroyed, and not replaced due to cost.

A fire in 1965 caused the steeple to topple; it fell to the ground, impaling the spire eighteen feet deep, where it remains embedded to this day.

Devereux designed the Stella Maris Church and supervised its construction on Sullivan's Island in Charleston.

Devereux was hired after the Civil War by its next owner, Colonel Richard Lathers, a Southerner who fought for the Union Army.

According to the current owner, who operates the house as a bed and breakfast: "Charlestonians eventually told Lathers he was unwelcome so he took his Yankee blood money with him and left.

"[23][24] Lathers used his conference room to meet with such notables as New York Governor and Presidential Candidates John H. Seymour and William Cullen Bryant, seeking sectional reconciliation.

"[A]fter attempting for four years to restore good will between men of the North and the South, Lathers sold the house and returned to New York.

In 1852 it was purchased by Browning & Leman, dry goods merchants, and a new store was designed by Charleston architect Edward C. Jones.

It had a "Sun burner" gas-light chandelier illumination system, set in a faux "starlit sky" ceiling, and a proscenium arch "supported by gilded columns and moldings.

Performers included Oscar Wilde,[28] Sarah Bernhardt, Fanny Brice, Billie Burke, Eddie Foy, Lily Langtry, Lillian Russell, John Philip Sousa and his band, the Ziegfeld Follies[27] and others of similar international acclaim.

[D] In 1875, Susan Wood contracted for a three-story brick building designed and built by Devereux, replacing an earlier structure destroyed by fire that year.

It is a combination of Gothic Revival and Italianate stylings, an upright-and-wing structure with a prominent two-story porch across the wing.

Their company was William M. Bird & Co., "wholesale dealers in paints, oils, glass, naval stores and ship chandlery."

The house is faced with novelty siding typical of the period and the foundation is of Stoney Landing brick, made locally in the 1880s.

the building's interior was reconstructed inside the Brith Sholom Beth Israel Synagogue at 182 Rutledge Ave.[41][42] See History of the Jews in Charleston, South Carolina.

What is a now a parking lot includes the site of the Charleston Female Seminary, which was founded by Henrietta Aiken Kelley in 1870.

[4] All that remains today is the Gatehouse that was restored in 2005 under the direction of C. Jennings Smith of Sullivan's Island, SC This building was designed by Devereux in 1885.