Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail
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Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail | |
 Side of the building, with the county courthouse behind | |
   | |
| Location | 123 E. Washington St., Napoleon, Ohio |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 41°23′29″N 84°7′25″W / 41.39139°N 84.12361°W |
| Area | 1 acre (0.40 ha) |
| Built | 1882 |
| Architect | D.W. Gibbs |
| Architectural style | Second Empire, Gothic Revival |
| NRHP reference No. | 81000439[1] |
| Added to NRHP | June 24, 1981 |
The Henry County Sheriff's Residence and Jail is a government building in Napoleon, Ohio, United States. Built in 1882 to a design by architect D.W. Gibbs, the residence-and-jail is located adjacent to the Henry County Courthouse in the city's downtown.
On November 9, 1879, a fire destroyed the previous Henry County Courthouse. Within three months, the county had secured the approval of the Ohio General Assembly to issue bonds to pay for the construction of a new courthouse, sheriff's house, and jail.[2] The jail side of the resulting brick building, designed to be fireproof, was built to separate male prisoners from female prisoners and young inmates from elderly inmates. Its twelve iron cells are connected by sixty feet of concrete-floored corridors. A report prepared by a state humanitarian board in 1913 observed that the building was equipped with electricity and hot and cold running water; maintenance of the jail and provision of food for its inmates was the responsibility of the sheriff. Some prisoners in Henry County were housed separately: many smaller jails, ranging in capacity from one cell to four cells, were maintained by the villages of the county.[3]
