The Chatillon–DeMenil House, located at 3325 DeMenil Place in Benton Park, St. Louis, Missouri, was begun in 1848 for the pioneer Henry Chatillon, then enlarged to its present form by prominent St. Louis businessman Nicolas DeMenil from 1855 to 1863. The house serves as a house museum, and according to its nomination to the National Register of Historic Places, described "as being the finest example of Greek Revival architecture in the Midwest."Original homeThe property where the house was built was part of a five acre tract purchased by Odile Delor Lux, a granddaughter of Clement Delor de Treget, the founder of Carondelet, Missouri. The property originally was part of the St. Louis common fields. In 1848, Lux married Henry Chatillon, who had become somewhat famous as the leader of the expedition of Francis Parkman in The Oregon Trail. By 1849, a house stood on the property owned by Chatillons. The early house was a simple, two-story brick farmhouse with four rooms and a one-slope roof.Regardless of Chatillon's renown, parcels of the tract were sold in 1850, and the remainder of the property (including the farmhouse) was sold in 1855. The purchaser was Nicolas DeMenil, a French physician who in October 1836 married Emilie Sophie Chouteau, the descendent of both of the founders of St. Louis. DeMenil and his wife initially purchased the house in 1856 with another family. By the beginning of the Civil War they decided to reside in it year-round, and bought out the interest of the other family. The DeMenils hired Henry Pitcher, a carpenter and contractor, to remodel and expand it in the Greek Revival Style.
