Just 35 miles North of Asheville and named for the hot mineral springs found here, the Town of Hot Springs is surrounded by mountains & located at the junction of the French Broad River and the Appalachian Trail. The Inn is the 1868 home of Colonel James Rumbough, owner of ther 350 room Mountain Park Hotel. Our mission is to provide a space where people can come to rest, relax, and renew their bodies, minds and spirits. While the Inn is elegant, the atmosphere is relaxed and dress is casual.

The original owners of the house were Carrie and Colonel James Henry Rumbough. Carrie was the daughter of Joseph Powell, a Federal Circuit Judge from South Carolina. He was the only member of the South Carolina legislature to vote against the succession from the Union. Colonel Rumbough’s parents were Jacob Rumbough, from Woodstock, Virginia and Ann Danridge, who was a descendent of Martha Washington.

Jacob was a railroad contractor, who supervised the building of the railroad from Lynchburg, Virginia to Greenville, Tennessee, where he ultimately settled. James and Carrie Rumbough moved from Greenville, Tennessee, where James had run a stagecoach operation that ran from Greenville, Tennessee to Greenville, South Carolina by way of Warm Springs ( now Hot Springs). When James decided to join the Confederate Army, he wanted his family to have a safe place to live since he didn’t know if he would survive the war. So they moved to Warm Springs. In 1866 four tracts of land south of the French Broad River, including the entire town of Warm Springs, was sold to Carrie Rumbough by Joseph A. Mc Dowell of Buncombe County. In 1868, Rutland (now the Mountain Magnolia Inn) was built for Carrie and the children to live in. At this time, Colonel Rumbough was away at war, and Carrie was running the Patton Hotel, which was located by the hot springs. The hotel, which burned in 1884, accommodated about 300 people, and attracted many visitors to the springs and the area.