Davis Cottage to the south of Longford House on Duke of Kent Street is its close contemporary. In 1713 widow Jehoadan Davis was granted an odd-shaped triangular lot on the condition that she build upon it within four years and the following year she was granted a garden lot across the street in the northwest corner of Somers Garden. The gableroofed core of the present house thus dates to at least 1717, for Davis retained the lot.

The oldest part of the house lies to the south. Its western end is slanted, reflecting the triangular shape of the original lot, and is buttressed by a large internal chimney. Its entrance on the east end is reached via a set of side steps fronting on Duke of Kent Street.

Jehoadan Davis remarried in the 1730s to merchant William Martindale, and the couple had two children before Martindale died in 1757. Their son, also William, moved to Barbados but their widowed daughter, Mary Atkins, occupied the house until her death in 1779. It thereupon passed to another widow, Mary Riding, and then to Ann Gwynn who married American mariner Benjamin Pindar in 1797.

The Pindars tried repeatedly to sell the house but could find no buyers, surprising for a residence that boasted six rooms and a closet, a storeroom and floored kitchen in the cellar below, a walled garden and a good well.

In November 1828 the body of Benjamin Pindar was found floating at Blue Hole. He was returning from attending court at Hamilton when two of his friends reported seeing him fatigued, pausing often on his way home. An inquest ruled the death accidental, speculating that perhaps he had stumbled and fallen into the sea. The widowed Ann occupied the house until her death in 1850, whereupon Charles Pickthorne, a convict establishment warden officer originally from Devonport, England, purchased it. The Pickthorne family occupied this house for more than half a century. Charles and his wife Betsey died in 1876 and 1871 respectively. After the last of their four daughters died in 1908, the property was sold to Dr Richard Higinbothom and then Solomon Brown, a shoemaker. The cottage has not been substantially changed since the early 19th century. A rustic detached shed to the south of the house was Brown’s cobbler’s shop.