Wildercliff

Wildercliff is a privately owned estate on Morton Road, in Rhinebeck in Dutchess County, New York.

Wildercliff is a large house with Federal style details situated on a bluff overlooking the Hudson River.

Built in 1799, it was the home of the Reverend Freeborn Garrettson (1752-1827), an early circuit riding Methodist minister, and his wife, Catherine Livingston (1752–1849).

Garrettson met Catherine Livingston in 1792 while visiting her brother-in-law, Dr. Thomas Tillotson at his estate, "Linwood".

[4] The name "Wildercliff" is an Anglicized version of the Dutch "Wilder Klippe" and refers to a petroglyph, first reported in 1877, depicting an Indian with a tomahawk in one hand and a peace pipe in the other carved on a rock at the shoreline of the property.

President of Union College Eliphalet Nott, author Susan Warner, and Edward Eggleston visited.

The water was both pure and cool, and workers on the railroad would climb the long hill up from the river to draw from the well.

Wildercliff is one of twenty-one contiguous estates along the east bank of the Hudson River between Stratsburg and Tivoli, New York.

[13] 11 photos, 5 measured drawings, and 8 data pages at Historic American Buildings Survey.