CHURCHES OF THE COLONIAL PERIOD
It is a far cry from the first place of worship contrived at Jamestown,
in 1607, to the stately fanes erected in the eighteenth century in all
the Colonies. Through each successive stage of development, however,
runs a thread of continuity corresponding to the material circumstances
of the colonists. Everywhere in the Colonies, the church building was an
exceedingly important structure and no one building or set of buildings,
in each community, more faithfully reflected the social and political as
well as the religious conditions of the colonists. Setting aside the
civic and defensive uses to which church edifices were often put,
especially in the earliest period, and confining ourselves to the purely
ecclesiastical side of their existence, we shall find them an invaluable
index to the varied aspects of the life of the times.
For the sake of contrast, both historical and architectural, it will not
be amiss to quote Captain John Smith’s account of the first Virginia
place of worship so that we may fully realise the strides of progress
made from the feeble Jamestown beginning in 1607. He says: “This was our
church till we built a homely thing like a barne, set upon cratchets,
covered with rafts, sedge and earth; so was the walls. The best of our
houses [were] of like curiosity; but the most part far much worse
workmanship, that neither could well defend [from] wind nor raine. Yet
we had daily Common Prayer, morning and evening; every Sunday two
sermons; and every three months the Holy Communion, till our minister
died; but our prayers daily with an Homily on Sundaies we continued two
or three years after till our preachers came.” The words “till our
preachers came” mean, of course, the successors of the Rev. Mr. Hunt who
had accompanied the expedition.
In tracing the history of the older parishes and congregations, it is
the rule rather than the exception to find two or three successive
houses of worship erected, as the means and growing numbers of the
people made it possible or expedient, to replace former structures of
meaner fabric which seem to have been regarded from the outset as merely
temporary gathering places, meant to serve only until worthy edifices
could be undertaken. Some of the earliest churches were merely block
houses or forts, occasionally surrounded by stockades, proclaiming the
ready physical as well as spiritual militancy of the worshippers within
their walls, but these were abandoned so soon as the increasing
prosperity and a greater sense of security from attacks by hostile
savages warranted a more peaceful and comfortable type of building for
religious purposes.
Of course, in the several parts of the Colonies, the character of the
buildings erected for religious uses indicated the prevailing local
ecclesiastical organisation. In the South, especially in Virginia and
Maryland, where the Church of England was the recognised dominant body
and Church and State were closely allied, we find the churches
conforming to English ecclesiastical traditions. In the Middle Colonies,
where religious liberty was freely permitted, we find a greater variety
including the structures peculiarly adapted to the worship of the Church
of England, Quaker meeting houses and the buildings designed to
accommodate the different German sects. In theocratic New England, while
Church of England edifices were to be met with now and again, the simple
meeting house type, agreeable to the congregational form of worship,
everywhere prevailed.
And now let us glance for a moment at the manner of people who
frequented these churches Sunday after Sunday. We shall find among them
the extremes of both worldly pomp and ostentation, on the one hand, and
humble simplicity, on the other, as they went to the weekly discharge of
their religious duties. Our Colonial forebears, however democratic some
of them may have been in religious principle or however much some of
them may have decried set ceremonial forms, were, almost without
exception, great respecters of persons and in no way did they more fully
display this common failing--it is just as prevalent in kindred forms at
the present day--than in their methods of seating the congregations
according to the accepted worth or dignity of the individual members.
In the South, the lords of the manors or the squires, just as in
England, had their great square pews in the chancel or, perhaps, a whole
transept would be reserved to their exclusive use for their family,
dependants or tenants as was the case, for example, in Christ Church,
Lancaster County, Virginia, where Robert (“King”) Carter, at whose
charge the edifice was built, made such a reservation. The “King’s” own
high panelled family pew, just before the pulpit, had a brass rail
around the top from which hung damask curtains on all sides except that
opposite the pulpit. This screened the occupants, when standing up, from
the gaze of the rudely inquisitive.
Upon the removal of the seat of the Virginia government from Jamestown
to Williamsburg, in 1699, Bruton Parish Church became the “court church”
of the Colony and “official distinction was recognised and emphasized”
in the order of seating. The historian of the parish, writing of the
present building, which was completed in 1715, says: “To His Excellency
the Governour and His Council of State was assigned a pew elevated from
the floor, overhung with a red velvet canopy, around which his name was
emblasoned in letters of gold, the name being changed as Spotswood,
Drysdale, Gooch, Dinwiddie, Fauquier, Lord Botetourt and Lord Dunmore
succeeded to office. In the square pews of the transepts sat the members
of the House of Burgesses, the pews in the choir being assigned to the
Surveyor General and the Parish Rector, while in the overhanging
galleries in the transept and along the side walls of the church sat the
Speaker of the House of Burgesses and other persons of wealth and
distinction, to whom the privilege of erecting these private galleries
was accorded from time to time.”
In city churches, because of the greater number of important folk,
questions of precedence in seating were more perplexing than in the
country. At Annapolis in St. Anne’s, in Christ Church at Philadelphia
and also in the “court churches” in New York and Boston the Royal
Governours’ pews were marked by appropriate symbols of the majesty of
state, the royal arms carved in walnut that once hung above the
Lieutenant Governour’s seat being still preserved at Christ Church in
Philadelphia. The lesser dignitaries sat in due order becoming their
station.
In New England it seems to have been the general custom in the earlier
period for the men to sit on one side of the church and the women on the
other. Afterwards, families sat together. In order to avoid bickering
and contention about the order of precedence it was not an unusual thing
to appoint a committee to “dignify the meeting.” The members of these
committees were changed from time to time “in order to obviate any of
the effects of partiality through kinship, friendship, personal esteem
or debt.” A second committee was appointed to seat the members of the
first committee according to their proper rank. In her charming book,
“The Sabbath in Puritan New England,” Alice Morse Earle says:--
“Sometimes a row of square pews was built on three sides of the
ground floor, and each pew occupied by separate families, while the
pulpit was on the fourth side. If any man wished such a private pew
for himself and family, he obtained permission from the church and
town, and built it at his own expense. Immediately in front of the
pulpit was either a long seat or a square enclosed pew for
[Illustration: OLD SOUTH CHURCH, BOSTON. 1730.]
[Illustration: KING’S CHAPEL, BOSTON.]
[Illustration: CHRIST CHURCH, PHILADELPHIA. 1727.]
[Illustration: ST. PETER’S CHURCH, PHILADELPHIA. 1761.]
the deacons, who sat facing the congregation. This was usually a
foot or two above the level of the other pews, and was reached by
two or three steep, narrow steps. On a still higher plane was a pew
for the ruling elders, when ruling elders there were. The
magistrates also had a pew for their special use. What we now deem
the best seats, those in the middle of the church, were in olden
times, the free seats.”
“In front, on either side of the pulpit (or very rarely in the
foremost row in the gallery), was a seat of highest dignity, known
as the ‘fore seat,’ in which only the persons of greatest
importance in the community sat.”
Not only in New England, but in the other Colonies as well, seats and
pews in the galleries seem to have been preferred as the most desirable
by persons of quality and consideration in the community next to the
specially exalted seats belowstairs.
In many places, particularly in the Middle and Southern Colonies, the
churches were regarded as the most dignified places of sepulture for
persons of consequence, and their gravestones, with the armorial
bearings and inscriptions almost effaced by the treading feet of
generations of worshippers, are to be seen in the aisles and chancel
pavements. The chancel was esteemed the most honourable place of burial
and as an instance of this may be mentioned the grave of General Forbes,
the hero of Fort Duquesne, in the chancel of Christ Church,
Philadelphia. John Penn, one of the Proprietaries, is buried at the
foot of the chancel steps. It is interesting in this connexion to note,
by way of exception, that Judge Moore of Moore Hall, the stout old
Pennsylvania Loyalist, and the person of greatest consequence in the
parish of St. David, Radnor, directed that he and his wife, the Lady
Williamina Wemyss, should be buried at the threshold of the church.
Emblazoned hatchments were frequently used at the time of funerals and
some of them are still preserved in our old churches. As in England,
during much of the eighteenth century, it was the fashion in the
Colonies to bury persons of note at night by the light of torches.
In not a few of the early churches there was an utter lack of uniformity
in the style of the seats or pews employed and permission was often
granted to influential persons to buy space within the churches and
erect pews of their own, suited to their personal fancy. The space not
occupied by these privately owned pews was sometimes filled with movable
benches, stools, or chairs, and it was not an unusual thing for the
humbler members of the congregation to bring their seats with them and
put them wherever they could find room. We find ample evidence of this
condition of things in places as widely apart as the simple country
parish of St. David’s, Radnor, in the Welsh Barony, and King’s Chapel
in Boston. In early days the members of St. David’s congregation fetched
thither nondescript seats as they listed and it was not until well into
the eighteenth century that rough benches were furnished and “rented for
the support of the Church.” Not till the middle of the eighteenth
century do the parish records show the existence of pews and the custom
seems to have then prevailed of “selling a piece of ground within the
Church on which the purchaser had the privilege of building such a pew
as he desired.” With this system, or rather lack of system, in seating,
it appears that squabbles occasionally arose as we may judge from the
following minute in the old register:--
“October ye 26th, 1747. Whereas a Difference hath arisen between
Francis Wayne and his Brother Isaac Wayne [the father of General
Anthony Wayne] about their Right in the pugh Late Anthony Wayne and
John Hunter, and it appearing to the Vestry that ye sd. Francis and
Isaac have purchased the Ground of a Pugh and the sd. Isaac having
Built upon a part of the Ground the Vestry Do agree that the sd.
Francis have the ground for half a pugh joining of the west side to
Richard Hughes and Wm. Owen’s Pugh.”
So late as 1763 the “Vestry granted to Robert Jones the privilege to
build a Pew on a piece of ground in St. David’s Church, adjoining
Wayne’s and Hunter’s pew, he paying for the ground £4 10_s._” In King’s
chapel in Boston the vestry “stipulated that each member should pay the
cost of building his own pew; this was accordingly done, but without any
uniformity, so that the interior of the old church must have presented
an amusing diversity of work.... The walls were decorated with banners,
escutcheons, and coats of arms of the King of England, of the nobility
and gentry of the congregation, and of the Governour of the province,
and the interior was considered so magnificent and so luxurious as to be
a blot upon the religion of Massachusetts.”
As might be expected, when so much was made of assigning each member of
the congregation a seat befitting his dignity, the question of suitable
clothing loomed large in the minds of our forebears and from one end of
the Colonies to the other they gave way to the temptation to appear
before their neighbours in their best frills and furbelows so that the
church service on Sunday was often a clothes show as well. To such an
extent was this passion for display carried that it led to a custom in
some country parishes of New England to which Alice Morse Earle refers.
She says:--
“One very pleasing diversion of the attention of the congregation
from the parson was caused by an innocent custom that prevailed in
many a country community. Just fancy the flurry on a June sabbath
in Killingly, in 1785, when Joseph Gay, clad in velvet coat, lace
frilled shirt, and white broadcloth knee breeches, with his fair
bride of a few days, gorgeous in a peach coloured silk gown and a
bonnet trimmed ‘with sixteen yards of white ribbon,’ rose in the
middle of the sermon, in their front seat in the gallery and stood
for several minutes, slowly turning around in order to show from
every point of view their bridal finery to the eagerly gazing
congregation of friends and neighbours. Such was the really
delightful and thoughtful custom, in those fashion-plateless days,
among persons of wealth in that and other churches; it was, in
fact, part of the wedding celebration. Even in midwinter, in the
icy church, the blushing bride would throw aside her broadcloth
cape or camblet roquelo and stand up clad in a sprigged India
muslin gown with only a thin lace tucker over her neck, warm with
pride in her pretty gown, her white bonnet with ostrich feathers
and embroidered veil, and in her new husband.”
If the same custom did not prevail in other parts of the country,
doubtless the members of the congregation had ample opportunity, and
made the best of it too, to scrutinise the apparel of their fellow
worshippers. It is to be feared, however, that their brave attire
sometimes suffered damage from insufficiently dusted seats for we read
that the sexton of Christ Church, Philadelphia, probably the wealthiest
and most splendid church in the Colonies, having applied in 1761 for an
increase of salary, it was agreed to give him “£20 a year on a condition
that he was ‘to wash the church twice a year and sand it at Easter and
September; and also to sweep the church _once every two weeks_.’”
The music was of an exceedingly indifferent character from an artistic
point of view and was not always edifying and whole hearted on the part
of the congregation. In New England, musical instruments were only
introduced after a storm of bitter opposition and general repugnance to
the “boxes of whistles,” as organs were contemptuously called. Even in
the Middle and Southern Colonies, where a prejudice against instruments
did not exist, the music must often have been of a distressing nature.
Referring once more to Christ Church we read that “the singer then
called the Clerk, was Joseph Fry--a small man with a great voice, who,
standing in the organ gallery, was wont to make the whole church resound
with his strong, deep and grave tones.” When there was a ripple of
improvement in the general musical situation, after the Revolution, “the
efforts of church musicians to raise the standard were apparently not
looked upon with favour. Joseph Fry, or his successors, did not ‘make a
cheerful noise before the Lord’ to the taste of the congregation, for in
1785 the vestry passed a resolution ‘that the clerks be desired to sing
such tunes only as are plain and familiar to the congregation; the
singing of other tunes, and frequent changing of tunes, being to the
certain knowledge of this vestry, generally disagreeable and
inconvenient.’”
Although early New England settlers were at first summoned to meeting
“by drum, horn and shell,” bells were soon introduced and in the Middle
and Southern Colonies great store was set by them and more than one fine
peal was brought hither from England. The bells of Christ Church,
Philadelphia, were particularly famous and were always being pealed so
that the German traveller, Dr. Schoepf, said that you would think you
were in a papal or imperial city--there was always something to be rung.
“From the time that ‘the ring of bells’--the first in the Colonies--was
first hung, their metal throats were busy proclaiming all sorts of
things from the anniversaries of King Charles’s Restoration, Guy
Fawkes’s Day, and the King’s Birthday, down to semi-weekly markets or
the arrival in the Delaware of the ‘Myrtilla,’ Captain Budden’s ship, in
which the peal had been brought out from London.”
In a previous chapter reference has been made to the splendid equipage
in which wealthy people of the Northern and Middle Colonies came to
church. A word must be added, to complete the picture, of the way in
which Southern congregations arrived. While a few of the very wealthy
drove to church in their state coaches, the great majority came on
horseback for the distances were too great to traverse afoot. Horses
were tethered in groups to the trees about the churches and it was the
recognised custom that the congregation should gather in the church yard
before and after service and they gladly embraced the opportunity thus
afforded for social intercourse. In country districts of the South the
same condition prevails to-day, and saddle horses and buggies may be
found in groups under all the trees near the church building or in the
sheds, where such are provided.
And now we pass to a consideration of the architectural features of the
church buildings in the several Colonies. We shall begin with those in
Virginia as they were the earliest. Only two of the seventeenth century
structures in the Old Dominion remain but they are sufficiently
distinctive to give us a very definite idea of the architectural ideals
that actuated the Virginia colonists. These are St. Luke’s at
Smithfield, built in 1632, and St. Peter’s, New Kent County, built at
the very beginning of the eighteenth century, but so closely following
the type of the first mentioned building that it may be reckoned as a
seventeenth century structure. Besides these two, there is the tower of
the old church at Jamestown to which has been added, in the way of
restoration, a body designed upon the lines of St. Luke’s, Smithfield.
St. Luke’s is a staunchly built rectangular brick structure with a steep
pitched roof and a heavy, square tower, of three stages, at the western
end. The coping of the eastern gable is curiously stepped in a way that
suggests Dutch or Flemish influence. The general appearance is that of a
rural English village church that might have been transplanted to its
new environment. There is little in its contour, proportions or detail
that savours of Renaissance inspiration, then dominant in England, but
rather does it smack of the old English Gothic feeling that
characterised many of the sixteenth century structures, when the Gothic
spirit was really decadent but still strong enough to retain certain
well defined traditional features. The side walls are strengthened and
divided into bays by buttresses and the pointed arch is retained above
the twin lancet windows. The mullions of these windows and of the east
window, with its unusual combination of round arch and pointed arch
sections, are substantially constructed of bricks. The one particular in
which Renaissance influence is visible is the use of quoins instead of
buttresses to stiffen the tower corners. The round arched door is almost
Norman in character. Within, the walls are plastered above the wainscot
and the ceiling is a single barrel vault.
St. Peter’s, New Kent County, presents the same general contour so that
a family resemblance is unmistakable but it is less felicitous in all
its details. The tower is pierced by such large arched openings in front
and at the sides that it appears to stand on legs and to have no
particular connexion with the ground. There are no buttresses to support
the walls, the windows are rectangular with flat-arched lintels and are
filled with sashes. While venerable and interesting, St. Peter’s can
scarcely be regarded as in any way architecturally so satisfying as St.
Luke’s is. How much of this lack of charm is due to so-called
“restoration” and “improvements,” it would be hard to say, for want of
sufficiently specific data.
One of the earliest structures to show a distinctly Renaissance feeling,
a suggestive precursor of the Georgian buildings that soon followed, was
Bruton Parish Church at Williamsburg, completed in 1715. Here for the
first time may be seen the cruciform plan, often met with in other
Virginia churches, sometimes of Latin, sometimes of Greek outline. It is
curious that this feature, which belongs peculiarly to edifices of
Gothic provenance, should make its first appearance in a structure of
Renaissance inspiration. The pitch of the roof is steep and this fact,
along with the cruciform plan, gives the contour a partly Gothic
character. All else is of Renaissance affinities.
[Illustration: GLORIA DEI (OLD SWEDES), PHILADELPHIA. 1700.]
[Illustration: ST. LUKE’S CHURCH, SMITHFIELD, VA. 1632.]
[Illustration: OLD SHIP CHURCH, HINGHAM, MASS.]
[Illustration: SLEEPY HOLLOW CHURCH, IRVINGTON, N. Y.]
There are no buttresses, the tall windows with round or compass heads
contain sashes with broad muntins and the sturdy, square tower, of three
stages, at the western end, is surmounted by an octagonal wooden spire
which, although severely simple and devoid of architectural ornament,
suggests in structural treatment the methods of Wren and his
contemporaries. Circular windows pierce the end walls of the transept
and chancel and these were originally filled with panes of plain glass
set in broad muntins. The brick is laid in Flemish bond and the cornice
is exceedingly simple and far less prominent than in later buildings of
purely Georgian character.
For examples of the typically Georgian churches of the South we may
instance Christ Church, Lancaster County, Virginia, “Old Pohick Church,”
Fairfax County, Virginia, with the building of which Washington was
intimately concerned and of which he was a vestryman, and Christ Church,
Alexandria, where Washington was also a vestryman and frequent
attendant. The last named building was designed by James Wren, a
descendant, it is said, of the great Sir Christopher. Other churches
just as typical might have been selected but these three will fully
answer the purpose.
Christ Church, Lancaster County, was built in 1732 at the charge of
Robert (“King”) Carter as before stated. The ground plan is in the form
of a Greek cross, all the arms being of equal length. The shingle roof
is hipped and of steep pitch, the cornice is bold and vigorously
proportioned, the walls are of brick laid in Flemish bond with black
headers. The windows are round-or compass-headed and the brick surrounds
project slightly from the face of the wall, meeting at the top in a
white keystone. The muntins of the sashes are heavy and the panes small.
The door is set between heavy pilasters and surmounted by a straight
pediment. Above the pediment, and just below the cornice, is a small
elliptical window. Within, the aisles are paved with stone, the pews are
high and straight backed, the pulpit is an imposing structure and the
plastered ceiling is vaulted. All the details, both inside and out, are
characteristic of the Georgian mode.
“Old Pohick Church,” the parish church of Mount Vernon, was built in
1769 and shows evidence of later Georgian feeling in several of its
details. The cornice, notably, has become more refined in the proportion
and contour of its mouldings and the muntins are of less buxom
dimensions. The building is taller than Christ Church, Lancaster County,
and the walls are pierced by two tiers of windows, those in the lower
tier being rectangular while those in the upper tier are round headed.
Both upper and lower windows have surrounds of one-coloured brick, not
projecting as at Christ Church but set flush with the surface of the
wall. The building is practically square in plan, the corners being
stiffened by white stone quoins, and the roof is hipped. Inside, the
aisles are paved with stone, the communion table, surrounded by a
railing, stands at one end of the church and the wall back of it is
panelled and embellished with a broken pediment resting on four Ionic
pilasters, in the panels between which are painted the Lord’s Prayer,
the Creed and the Ten Commandments. Against one of the side walls is
built a high, wine-glass pulpit with a great sounding board above it
and, just below it, the clerk’s desk. At the angle of the walls and
ceiling is an unusually heavy and elaborate wooden cornice. All the
minutiæ of the interior woodwork show the increasing refinement of
proportion and detail characteristic of this part of the Georgian
period.
Christ Church, Alexandria, built slightly later than Pohick Church, is
substantially the same in plan, the main points of difference being the
Palladian window at one end of the building and the tower and portico at
the other, the latter embellishment being a later addition. Inside, the
chief point of difference consists in the placing of the pulpit
immediately in front of the central member of the Palladian window, the
panelled spaces on each side of the window being devoted to the Creed,
the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments, according to a common
custom. Christ Church, Alexandria, further differs from Pohick Church in
having galleries around three sides, supported on slender Tuscan
columns. The coved cornice at the angle of walls and ceiling, while
exceedingly graceful, is not so beautiful as the wooden cornice in
Pohick Church.
From considerations of date and geography, our attention is next claimed
by the group of small churches in the Middle Colonies which may be
represented by the Gloria Dei (Old Swedes), Philadelphia, St. David’s,
Radnor, and Trinity, Oxford. The present structure of the Gloria Dei was
built in 1700 to replace the old block house, built in 1665, which had
afforded a place of worship for the congregation since 1677. Seen from
the exterior, the church is cruciform in plan with an apsidal east end.
At the west end is a small, sharp pointed belfry surmounting a
projection in front of the church which is carried up to the peak of the
roof somewhat in the manner of a tower, the lower part forming a
vestibule. The roof is exceedingly steep in pitch and, by the same
token, thereby exhibits the Swedish origin of its plan. The apsidal east
end also indicates its Swedish origin for both the steep pitched roof
and the apse were thoroughly characteristic of the Scandinavian
ecclesiastical edifices. The brick is laid in Flemish bond, the headers,
which seem to have been the arch bricks in the kiln, being covered with
a vitreous blue black glaze. At several places an interesting diaper
pattern is worked in the walls by the ingenious use of these glazed
headers. The great square windows are filled with heavy muntined sashes
and small panes of glass. It was found at an early date that the side
walls were being pushed over by the thrust of the roof and to brace them
the transepts, which do not appear in the interior plan, were built
about 1703, giving the building its cruciform appearance. The south
transept is a vestibule or porch while the north transept is used as a
sacristy. The ceiling is vaulted. North and south galleries date from an
early period but were built somewhat later than the rest of the
structure. The details of panelling and woodwork are of distinctly
pre-Georgian affinities.
St. David’s, Radnor, was built in 1714 and seems to have been the result
of the efforts of local artisans without much attempt at architectural
direction or planning. It is extremely simple in every way. In plan it
is rectangular with a later addition at one side to accommodate the
vestry room. The organ gallery is at one end and is reached by an
outside enclosed stone stairway. The roof is of steep pitch and the
cornices are severely plain. The round headed windows are now filled
with small panes set in broad muntins but, if we may believe tradition,
they were originally filled with diamond paned leaded casements. Perhaps
the most interesting architectural feature of St. David’s is the texture
of the stone work in its rubble walls which are built of random sized
native field stone and pointed with white mortar. This masonry is
thoroughly representative of the traditional manner of building stone
walls which the Welsh artisans seem to have brought with them from their
Cambrian home and which has left such a strong impress upon the stone
work of so many of the old houses in Pennsylvania. It is one of the
clearest instances of the survival in America of methods of
craftsmanship brought from specific localities in the old world.
Trinity Church, Oxford, was built in 1711 and is mentioned here chiefly
because it exhibits a more ambitious plan in its original design, having
transepts in the interior which greatly add to its seating capacity and
carry out the cruciform idea both within and without. Its details of
design, masonry and woodwork display an affinity with the earliest phase
of Georgian work.
Christ Church, Philadelphia, to which we now come, stands for all that
is best in church architecture of the Colonial period in America. The
present building was erected in 1727 from plans prepared by Dr. John
Kearsley who seems to have drawn his inspiration largely from St.
Martin’s-in-the-Fields, London. From whatever source his inspiration
came, Christ Church is a peculiarly beautiful and graceful structure,
well meriting all the praise that has been bestowed upon it and
incidentally affording a striking instance of what might be achieved by
the amateur architects of the eighteenth century who believed that a
knowledge of architecture was an essential part of every gentleman’s
education and who were willing to put aside their own professional
vocations for a time in order to plan and superintend the erection of
some public structure as a kind of public duty.
In every respect the building is thoroughly representative of the best
Georgian traditions. In outline the plan is rectangular with nave and
aisles. The round headed windows of the lower stage are separated from
each other by pilasters whose capitals support the projecting
cornice-like string course. Superimposed above this member are the bases
of other pilasters separating the windows of the upper tier and while
their capitals come immediately below the wooden frieze of the cornice,
the roof is surrounded by a heavily carved balustrade whose posts are
capped by well proportioned urns. At the eastern end of the church, a
great Palladian window lights the chancel. The tower, at the western
end, is a massive structure of brick and is surmounted by a wooden spire
of singularly graceful proportions and beautiful detail, inspired by
some of the masterly creations of Sir Christopher Wren. For all the
proportions are massive, the structure presents a light and graceful
appearance, attributable in large measure to the manner in which the
side walls are pierced with many windows and the wall spaces broken by
graceful architectural adornments such as the pilasters and string
courses. In this general lightening effect the triglyphs of the cornice
frieze and the spindles of the surmounting balustrade must not be
forgotten.
Within, the woodwork is thoroughly typical of the best Georgian
traditions with its fluted pillars, its carefully carved triglyphs and
guttæ and the nicety of the panelling. The aisles are now paved with
tile but fortunately the ancient tombstones fill most of the aisle space
so that the modern tiling is not obstrusive. The ancient pews have been
replaced by modern seats but historic locations are carefully noted by
small brass tablets.
St. Peter’s Church, Philadelphia, built in 1761, is peculiarly
interesting because it has never undergone profanation at the hands of
improvers or restorers. The old pews remain in their original condition
as does also the paving of small, square blocks of stone in the north
and south aisles. The exterior of St. Peter’s is less ornate than the
exterior of Christ Church but it preserves the same interesting feature
of having doors approximately at the four corners, the tower in both
cases either serving or having served at one time or another as a vestry
room. St. Peter’s exhibits at its eastern end a large Palladian window
of more expansive dimensions than that of Christ Church which, however,
was fully in accordance with the tendency of the times as Palladian
windows seem to have expanded their dimensions as the Georgian period
progressed. The pediments over the four doors are peculiarly interesting
at St. Peter’s and the cornice shows considerable refinement.
The galleries within are supported on Tuscan pillars and the other
woodwork, while of excellent proportions, is exceedingly simple and
dignified. It is of interest to note that the pulpit is accessible only
by climbing up through the tower; the clerks’ seats are immediately
beneath it. The organ gallery is built above the chancel which is at the
east end of the church while the pulpit and the clerks’ desk are at the
west end so that frequent processions of the clergy during the course
of the service are sometimes necessary.
In the same class with Christ Church and St. Peter’s must be mentioned
St. Michael’s Church, Charleston, S.C., and St. Paul’s Chapel, New York
City. St. Michael’s was built in 1742 from plans, it is believed,
furnished by James Gibbs, the famous English architect, while St. Paul’s
is of native American design. Both churches show the strong influence of
Wren feeling which persisted in the ecclesiastical architecture of the
Georgian era.
While speaking of ecclesiastical architecture of the Middle Colonies we
must not omit to mention the Quaker meeting houses which were ordinarily
of brick or stone and sometimes covered with a coating of roughcast.
They are rectangular in form with pitch roofs and usually display two
rows of square windows. The cornices are simple and severe and all the
woodwork is extremely plain. As a rule there are four doors, two on each
of the longer sides. The woodwork within is not infrequently devoid of
paint and has acquired a wonderfully rich colour from age. In many of
the meeting houses there are galleries although the gallery is by no
means a universal feature. The smaller and older meeting houses are
generally of one storey in height but those of later date are frequently
of two storeys and in that case ordinarily have galleries. All the
details of woodwork are so exceedingly simple that one can scarcely say
they show a marked affinity with Georgian models although they belong,
for the most part, to the Georgian period.
Nor must we forget the meeting houses erected to accommodate the various
German sects. These buildings generally displayed architectural
affinities of Teutonic character. As an example of this we might mention
the old Trappe Meeting House on the Perkiomen, or some of the Moravian
churches and Reformed churches in the interior of Pennsylvania.
It will be unnecessary to make any further mention of the Georgian
churches of New York as they are, in the main, similar to those that
have been mentioned in an earlier part of this chapter. Some note,
however, should be made of the little Dutch churches one occasionally
finds such as that at Tarrytown-on-the-Hudson. Here we see the same
persistence of Dutch ecclesiastical traditions as was noted in
Pennsylvania in the case of German traditions exemplified in the
structures like the Trappe Meeting House. The general form of the
building and the method of its execution might readily be paralleled in
Holland.
We now come to the New England Meeting House as the next type demanding
examination and for this we can find no more fitting example than the
Old Ship Meeting-house at Hingham, Massachusetts. This building was
erected in 1680 and it is said to have been framed by ship’s carpenters.
It is a spacious square building of extreme severity of line. The roof
is hipped, or would be a perfectly hipped roof were it not truncated at
the top and finished with a balustrade and a belfry with a small pointed
spire. The exterior is so devoid of all architectural amenity that one
can scarcely speak of the structure as having any architecture at all.
The walls are clapboarded and the cornice is of the simplest contour.
The interior is plain and, owing to modernisation, has been made
unattractive and prosaic. For our purpose this building is valuable as
marking the four-square type of meeting house so often met with.
Where the older meetings have not fallen victims of modern improvement,
their interiors, though severe and rigid, possess a degree of charm with
their ancient high backed pews, tall pulpits, and seats for the elders
of the meeting immediately below them. Their excessive plainness is, of
course, proverbial, but although there was a dearth of architectural
amenity in their construction, it must be admitted that many of them
possessed the charm of unobtrusive simplicity.
The Old South Meeting-house, erected in 1730, is a fair representative
of similar structures where more attention was paid to and more
allowance made for architectural endeavour. The wonted plan of having
the pulpit on one of the long sides was adhered to and the gallery
stretched around on the other sides. The double rows of windows are
round arched and form the chief point of interest both on the exterior
and in the interior. The brick is laid in Flemish bond and there is a
slightly projecting base course several feet from the ground. Cornices
are plain and the expansive roof is rather flat in pitch. The tower,
while graceful enough in proportion, is severely plain. Nevertheless it
must be confessed that the attenuated proportions of the spire with the
little arcade around its base have a certain charm of their own which it
is extremely difficult to analyse.
Of wholly different type is King’s Chapel. Here we find ample evidence
of attention to architectural opportunity and enrichment. While the
rectangular plan is adhered to, the interior is divided into nave and
aisles by the columns which fulfil the double function of supporting the
roof and upholding the galleries. The windows in the lower row,
underneath the gallery, are of smaller dimensions than those in the
upper row which throw their light down over the galleries into the
middle of the nave. The windows of the lower row have flat arched tops
while those above are round arched. The masonry is of carefully dressed
stone and, while there are no buttresses, the front of the building is
adorned by pilasters at the corners and by a pillared arcade forming a
porch around the square tower. The roof is hipped. Inside the building,
far more play is given to architectural elaboration than outside. Here
we find the pairs of columns supporting the roof and galleries are
fluted from top to bottom and surmounted by elaborately carved
Corinthian capitals upon which are imposed sections of frieze and
cornice from which again spring the arches of the roof vaulting. While
the effect is agreeable enough, it cannot be denied that the arrangement
and general method of execution are illogical and capricious.
The old North and Trinity Churches, Newport, also exhibit a somewhat
similar and illogical arrangement of the ceiling and its method of
support. Trinity, Newport, and the old North are mentioned in addition
to King’s Chapel because they all represent the New England type of
ecclesiastical edifice erected during the Georgian period which affords
an antithesis to the auditorium type represented by the Old South which
may be regarded as a logical development of the type exemplified by the
Old Ship Meeting-house at Hingham.
It would be an unpardonable oversight to bring this chapter to a close
without mentioning buildings like the Park Street Church in Boston with
its graceful spire and other buildings of similar type, erected about
the same period, whose inspiration we owe partly to former
ecclesiastical traditions and partly to the new spirit of the Classic
Revival. In Boston, and elsewhere throughout New England, may be found
many such churches which illuminate the era in which that master of
architectural refinement, Samuel McIntire, wrought so successfully.
The foregoing pages, cursory as the review of ecclesiastical
architecture has necessarily been, will show the diversity of styles
that prevailed in the Colonies from North to South and incidentally the
reader will be enabled to compare the modes of architectural expression
with the ideals and habits of the people inhabiting the several sections
of the country.