Built by a member of a well-known Tidewater Virginia family, this manor house combines rugged, coursed-rubble limestone walls with delicate Federal details. The main block has a five-bay facade with large first-floor windows containing twelve-over-twelve sash. Second-floor windows contain twelve-overeight sash. The elegant cornice has a fretwork architrave more typical of interior than exterior trim. A two-tiered porch, covered by an extension of the gable roof, fronts a recessed side wing. A huge rear wing that extends the width of the main block was added early in the nineteenth century. Rural Hill presides over a pristine setting, on a knoll overlooking verdant fields with the wooded slopes of North Mountain as a backdrop.