A Main Street building taken down after being damaged by a fire has taken a piece of Wareham history with it.

The building was located on 298 Main Street and was most recently used for apartments and business.

But more than 200 years ago, it housed soldiers in the War of 1812, according to a Wareham Courier article published about the building in 1934.

"This is one of the original downtown buildings that was there before downtown was even thought of," said Lynda Ames, author of 2002 book "Images of America - Wareham."

"We don't have many buildings left on Main Street," said Ames. "It just seems like ever so many decades we lose another one, and lose another one."

The building was purchased in 2002 by Dominic Cammarano Jr. Cammarano also owns Gateway Gold & Pawn. The business was housed on the ground floor of the former building and now sits next door at 294 Main Street.

Last November an electrical fire spread through the third floor of the building causing $400,000 in damages and injuring a firefighter.

Cammarano said he would rebuild another house similar to the last one, except this time there would be three apartments instead of four, with more space for tenants.

Gateway Gold & Pawn will move back into the first floor of the new building, and Cammarano hopes to start working on the new building as early as next month.

Considering the recently renovated Main Street, he thinks the development will be timely.

"It'll be new and nicer…so I think a new building will fit into the aesthetics of the town," Cammarano said.

In contrast with the progress of the present, however, is a loss of the past.

The house was likely built in the 1790s, according to the Courier article. It was built for the Fearing family, a prominent Wareham lineage whose name also gives rise to the Fearing Tavern on Elm Street.

The house had a chimney with six flues to serve six separate fireplaces that kept the house warm in the winter months.

"That was big money to build something like that," said Ames.

The house was constructed using timber from the immediate surrounding.

Timber was abundant because at the time Main Street was just an Indian pathway leading off of the larger Wampanoag trail that now stretches from Route 28 in East Wareham to Fearing Hill Road in West Wareham, Ames said.

The house was turned into a modern four-apartment house in approximately 1934 by Josiah Eldredge, according to the Courier article. Ames said that growing up she remembers referring to the building as the Eldredge apartments.

By the time the house fell into Cammarano's hands, the house was hardly a picture of its former self. "When we bought it, it didn't really look historical," Cammarano said.

The loss, even though due to an unfortunate circumstance, still stings for lovers of history.

Ames hopes that future houses can be preserved, or at the very least, documented with photos for future generations.

"Because we can't save everything...the best we can do is save it in people's minds so that it's not forgotten," said Ames.

For Ames, the hope is that the past will be preserved amidst the changes of the present.

"Whatever we've got left, lets take care of it...and let people know what's behind it," she said. "I just want people to be aware, when you lose something…it's gone forever."