in a very bad humour with me, because I insist on waiting until the
large picture of General Washington is secured, and it requires to be
unscrewed from the wall. The process was found too tedious for these
perilous moments; I have ordered the frame to be broken and the canvas
taken out. It is done! and the precious portrait placed in the hands
of two gentlemen from New York for safe keeping. And now, dear sister,
I must leave the house, or the retreating army will make me a prisoner
in it by filling up the road I am directed to take. Where I shall again
write to you, or where I shall be to-morrow I cannot tell!
DOLLY.”
The British troops entered the Mansion and set fire to it. “I have
indeed to this hour,” wrote an eye-witness in 1855, “the vivid
impression upon my eye of columns of smoke and flame ascending all
through the night of August 24, 1814, from the Capitol, President’s
house and other public buildings, as if the whole were on fire, some
burning slowly others with bursts of flames, and sparks mounting high
in the dark heavens.”
This spectator was with President Madison, the Secretary of the Navy
and others across the river, watching the spectacle.
After the fire of 1814, the Madisons lived in rented houses in
Washington.
When the Mansion was partially restored and again made habitable, the
blackened exterior was painted white and the building received the name
White House in honour of Mrs. Washington’s early home in Virginia.
President and Mrs. Monroe held the first public reception in 1818, on
New Year’s Day.
The White House was refurnished in 1825, for the visit of General
Lafayette. Congress allowed John Quincy Adams $14,000 for this purpose.
Another allowance of $13,000 was made to Martin Van Buren for further
decorations and furnishings, and President Johnson was allowed $30,000
to repair the building after the Civil War.
The portico on the North Side was added in President Jackson’s time.
The most important changes, however, have taken place during President
Roosevelt’s administration. About half a million dollars have been
spent in making architectural improvements, both within and without.
A terrace has been added on the west side, leading to the executive
offices, and by the removal of the conservatory, the state dining-room
has been enlarged. This room has also been refurnished with panels,
tapestries and trophies of the chase.
The historical rooms are the great “East Room,” where the public
receptions are held and where the brilliant marriages of Nelly Grant
and Alice Roosevelt took place; the “State-Dining-room”; the “Red
Room,” the “Blue Room” and the “Green Room”; and although the furniture
and draperies of these rooms have been changed from time to time, the
colours have been rigidly adhered to.
The “Blue Room,” of which Jefferson was particularly fond, is the
President’s reception-room. It is oval in shape. At present the walls
are covered with blue silk and the window curtains are blue sprinkled
with golden stars.
Scattered through the various rooms are many portraits of the
Presidents and their wives.
The conservatory of the White House, which owes much to President
Grant, has always been noted, and supplies choice flowers and plants
for the state dinners and other important entertainments.
The White House is full of memories and associations of the public
and private life of the Presidents. Weddings, funerals, and births
have occurred here. Within its walls President Lincoln signed the
Proclamation of Emancipation. Here Garfield languished for weeks
after his assassination. The last notable event was the wedding
of Miss Alice Roosevelt, the President’s daughter, to Mr. Nicholas
Longworth,--the most brilliant entertainment that the White House has
ever seen.
THE WHITE HOUSE OF THE CONFEDERACY, RICHMOND
One of the Meccas of the Southern States is a house in Richmond
formerly known as “The White House of the Confederacy,” and now as “The
Confederate Museum.” It is a plain, substantial house with columns at
the back and is a typical residence of Richmond and of the Nineteenth
Century. The house was built in 1819 by Dr. Brockenbrough for his
residence and must have been more imposing with the original garden.
In 1862 Mr. Lewis Crenshaw, the owner, sold it to the city of Richmond
for the use of the Confederate Government; and the city, having
furnished it, offered it to Jefferson Davis, the President of the
Confederate States for his residential and official home. Mr. Davis
refused to accept the gift, and it was then rented from the Confederate
States for the “Executive Mansion.” President Davis and his family
lived here for three years until the evacuation of Richmond, when he
left with the government officials on the night of April 2, 1865.
The “Mississippi Room” was his study, and in it all the important
conferences of the President and his officers were held. It may be
interesting to quote here from Mrs. Davis’s _Memoirs of Jefferson
Davis_, regarding this historic house. She writes:
“In July we moved to the old Brockenbrough house, and began to feel
somewhat more at home when walking through the old-fashioned
terraced garden or the large airy rooms in the seclusion of family life.
[Illustration: WHITE HOUSE OF THE CONFEDERACY, RICHMOND, VA.]
“The mansion stands on the brow of a steep and very high hill that is
sharply defined against the plain at its foot through which runs the
Danville railway that leads to the heart of Virginia. The house is very
large, but the rooms are comparatively few, as some of them are over
forty feet square. The ceilings are high, the windows wide and the
well-staircases turn in easy curves towards the airy rooms above. The
Carrara marble mantels were the delight of our children....
“The tastes, and to some extent, the occupations and habits of the
master of the house, if he, as in this case, assisted the architect in
his design, are built in the brick and mortar, and like the maiden’s
blood in the great bell, they proclaim aloud sympathy or war with those
whom it shelters. One felt here the pleasant sense of being in the
home of a cultivated, liberal, fine gentleman, and that he had dwelt
there in peaceful interchange of kind offices with his neighbours.
The garden, planted in cherry, apple and pear-trees sloped in steep
terraces down the hill to join the plain below. To this garden or
pleasance came always in my mind’s eye a lovely woman, seen only by the
eye of faith, as she walked there in ‘maiden meditation.’
“Every old Virginia gentleman of good social position who came to
see us, looked pensively out on the grounds and said, with a tone of
regret, something like this: ‘This house was perfect when lovely Mary
Brockenbrough used to walk there, singing among the flowers’; and then
came a description of her light step, her dignified mien, her sweet
voice and the other graces which take hold of our hearts with a gentle
touch and hold them with a grip of steel. At first it seemed odd and
we regretted our visitor’s disappointment, but after a while Mary came
to us, too, and remained the titular goddess of the garden. Her name
became a household word. ‘Whether Mary would approve’ was a question
my husband playfully asked, when he liked the arrangement of the
drawing-rooms.”
When General Godfrey Witzel, in command of the Northern troops entered
the city on the morning of April 3, 1865, he made this house his
headquarters; and it was used as the headquarters of the United States
Government during the five years that Virginia was under military rule
and was called “District No. 1.” When Abraham Lincoln passed through
Richmond a few days after the evacuation, he was received in the
“Georgia room” of this old house.
After the war “The White House of the Confederacy” became the home of
the first public school established in Richmond and was used as such
for more than twenty years. Finally, to save it from destruction, for
the house was falling into decay, a mass-meeting was held in Richmond
to take measures for its preservation. A society was formed called the
“Confederate Memorial Literary Society” whose first act was to petition
the city to yield it to its charge for the purpose of establishing a
Museum of Confederate relics and a memorial to President Davis.
The Museum was formally opened in 1890. Quoting from the charter:
“The purposes for which it is formed are to establish in the city of
Richmond, in the State of Virginia, the capital of the late Confederate
States of America, a Confederate Memorial Literary Society or
Association, to collect and receive, by gift, purchase, or otherwise,
all books and other literary productions pertaining to the late war
between the States, and of those engaged therein; all works of art or
science, all battle-flags, relics, and other emblems of that struggle,
and to preserve and keep the same for the use of said Society and the
public.”
A room, bearing the distinctive name, shield, and colours of the State
it represents, is assigned to each State of the Confederacy, and is a
repository for memorials from that State. A Regent and Vice-Regent are
appointed to represent each State and to assume the care and expense
of their respective rooms--collecting by loan, donation, or otherwise,
contributions of what they think will make their rooms attractive.
The Solid South is represented by a general reception room, library
and gallery in which the portraits of the President of the Confederate
States and of his Cabinet as well as those of the distinguished civil
and military leaders are hung. On the left is the “Virginia Room” and
on the right the “Georgia Room” and beyond that the “Mississippi Room,”
in which the Confederate Cabinet sat. The relics of Jefferson Davis
are appropriately placed here. The Kentucky, Alabama, South and North
Carolina and Maryland Rooms are in the second story, and in the third,
the Alabama, Arkansas, Tennessee, Florida, Missouri, Louisiana and
Texas Rooms are situated.
The collection is exceedingly large and of great interest to the
student of the great struggle of 1861–1865.
THE OLD STATE HOUSE, BOSTON[23]
EDWARD G. PORTER
The Old State House stands upon the site of the original market-place,
opposite the first meeting-house in which, for a quarter of a century,
the town-meetings were held, according to the custom of the time.
In the year 1656 Captain Robert Keayne, one of the founders of the
Ancient and Honourable Artillery Company, left, in his voluminous and
eccentric will, “the sum of three hundred pounds, current money,” for
a Town House, which was to furnish room for the market, as well as for
the courts, a library, an exchange, an armoury, etc. An equal amount
was contributed by citizens, and a wooden structure was erected on
this spot which served the purposes of the town until it was destroyed
in the great fire of 1711. There are good descriptions extant of this
first building, but no pictures or plans. It was the scene of the
administration of Endicott, Bellingham, Leverett, Bradstreet, Andros,
Phips, Stoughton, Bellomont, and Joseph Dudley. By this time the Town
House had become such a necessity that its successor was immediately
provided for, one-half the expenses being borne by the Province, and
the other half by the Town and the Country in equal proportion.
The first Governor who presided in this building was Joseph Dudley, and
after him came Tailer, Shute, Dummer, Burnet, Belcher, and Shirley.
It was during the latter’s brilliant administration that the famous
expedition against Louisburg was planned and successfully carried out
in 1746 under General (afterwards Sir William Pepperell) and Commodore
Warren.
The following year the Town House (at that time commonly called the
Court House) was seriously injured by fire, which began in the second
story and destroyed much of the interior, and nearly all the records,
pictures and furniture. The building, however, was reconstructed very
much as before; and from that day to this, no essential changes have
taken place in its appearance.
An interesting description of it is found in a journal dated 1750:--
“They have also a Town House, built of brick, situated in King’s
Street. It’s a very Grand Brick Building, Arch’d all Round and Two
Storie Heigh, Sash’d above; its Lower Part is always open, design’d as
a Change, tho the Merchants in Fair Weather make their Change in the
Open Street, at the eastermost end. In the Upper Story are the Council
and Assembly Chambers. It has a neat Capulo, Sash’d all Round, which on
rejoycing days is Elluminated.”
The administrations of Pownall, Bernard, and Hutchinson bring us to
the stirring events immediately preceding the Revolutionary War. At
that time many eyes were turned to this building in hope or fear,
as the scene of the royal authority in the Council Chamber, and of
the popular demands for Liberty in the Hall of Representatives. The
obnoxious measures of the Crown, which followed so rapidly upon the
accession of George III. in 1760, were here officially promulgated by
the Governors, and vehemently denounced by the patriots.
[Illustration: OLD STATE HOUSE, BOSTON]
The collision which finally came in 1775, was foreshadowed in the
speeches of James Otis and Samuel Adams, in the protests of the
Legislature against the unjust imposition of taxes, in the arrival of
the British regiments, and in the massacre of March 5, 1770, which
occurred almost under the windows of the Council Chamber.
The quartering of troops in the Town House and the planting of
cannon at its doors gave great offence to the people, and served
only to increase the difficulty. Under General Gage, the last of the
Royal Governors, were developed those military movements which made
Lexington, Concord and Bunker Hill immortal, and which led to the
organization of an American army, by whose achievements the British
were compelled to evacuate Boston on the 17th of March, 1776.
In July of the same year, the Declaration of Independence was read
to the citizens of Boston from the famous east window of the Council
Chamber, where in the earlier time the Royal succession had been in
three instances proclaimed “with Beat of Drum and Blast of Trumpet,”
and where also had been announced in turn the appointment of eight
governors of Massachusetts under the Crown, and where at last, in 1783,
the Proclamation of Peace was read by the Sheriff of Suffolk, amid the
grateful shouts of the multitude and the salutes of thirteen cannon at
the forts.
In this building John Hancock was inaugurated the first Governor under
the Commonwealth; and here presided his successors, James Bowdoin,
Samuel Adams, and Increase Sumner. In 1789, General Washington, during
his last visit to Boston, reviewed the procession from a temporary
balcony erected at the west end of the Hall of Representatives.
Here the Legislature of Massachusetts met for the last time in 1798,
and then marched in a body to the more imposing structure which had
just been completed on Beacon Hill.
The old building has since then been given up to business purposes,
except during an interval of ten years, 1830–1839, when it was occupied
by the municipality as a City Hall.
In 1882, it was carefully restored and formally re-dedicated to the
public use as a memorial hall. The second floor, containing the
ancient Council Chamber and Representatives Hall, has been confided
to the custody of the Bostonian Society for a term of years. Valuable
portraits, engravings, documents, and other historical relics may here
be inspected daily by the public without charge. The tower, the quaint
roof, the lion and unicorn, the central stairway, and, in fact, all
the details of the building, present with almost absolute accuracy the
characteristic features of the old Town House of the fathers. And it is
confidently believed that the venerable structure will continue to grow
more and more in the affections of the people of Boston, because it was
here that “the child Independence was born.”
THE MORRIS-JUMEL HOUSE, NEW YORK
Commanding an extensive view, or “prospect,” as they would have said
in Colonial days, of the Harlem River and Long Island Sound, there
stands a dwelling of the Georgian period famous under two names,--the
“Morris House” and the “Jumel Mansion.” The house was built by Colonel
Roger Morris, an English officer who came to this country with General
Braddock and was wounded in the ill-fated expedition to Fort Du Quesne.
He also served under General Wolfe at Quebec and left the army in
1764 to settle in New York, where he became a member of the King’s
Council. He bought the property on Harlem Heights and erected the
house now standing as a present for his wife, Mary Philipse, daughter
of Frederick Philipse, whom he married in 1758. The Morrises made a
charming home here and entertained with lavish hospitality the most
distinguished guests until the beginning of the Revolution, when, being
Tories, they were forced to leave their house. Eventually, included
in the bill of attainder, they went to England, and their house and
property in Harlem Heights were confiscated and sold.
Immediately after the battle of Long Island, August 27, 1776, General
Washington retreated with his army to Harlem and selected the Morris
House for his headquarters. Here Aaron Burr, associated with the later
destinies of the house, served as secretary to Washington.
One day, after nearly three months’ residence, Washington started out
on a reconnoitering expedition and about fifteen minutes after he had
left, the British troops under Sir Thomas Stirling took possession of
this desirable place; and from that moment until the evacuation of
New York in 1783, the “Morris House” was the headquarters of General
Knyphausen and his Hessian soldiers.
In 1785, the house became a tavern and was used as such for several
years. It next looms into importance in 1810, when it was purchased by
Stephen Jumel, whose handsome and clever American wife and the society
that she gathered around her brought it once more into notoriety.
There have been several conflicting stories regarding Madame Jumel’s
parentage; but Mr. Josiah Collins Pumpelly in an article published in
the _New England Genealogical and Biographical Record_ (1903)
obtained the following statement from a relative: “Eliza (Bowen) Jumel
was born, April 2, 1777, in Providence, R. I., but not in a poor-house,
as was asserted by her enemies during the lawsuit. The statement made
in Appleton’s _Cyclopædia of National Biography_ that the lady’s
name was Capet, and that she was born at sea, is not sustained by
reliable history. Eliza Jumel was the daughter of Phœbe and John Bowen.
Her father was a sea-captain and owned his own vessels; her brother and
father were drowned together.”
[Illustration: THE MORRIS-JUMEL HOUSE, NEW YORK]
In 1804, she was married to Stephen Jumel, a rich coffee planter of
San Domingo, who, during an insurrection on the island and massacre of
the French, escaped to New York about 1790. He was much older than his
beautiful bride; for at the time of his marriage he was nearly fifty
and she twenty-seven. In 1810, they purchased the “Morris House” on
Harlem Heights where they lived in great style. Subsequently the Jumels
had a home in Paris, where they also entertained sumptuously until M.
Jumel’s large fortune melted away. In 1821, Madame Jumel returned to
her New York home. It seems that Madame Jumel immediately disposed
of her rich furniture and other treasures, for in 1821 the following
advertisement appears in the New York newspapers: “On Monday, the 16th
of April next, at the Mansion House of Mrs. Jumel, Harlem Heights, the
whole of her Furniture and Gallery of original Paintings, together
with Kitchen Furniture, Carriages, Horses, and other implements on the
premises. Any attempt to describe those superb and elegant articles
would hardly convey an idea of what they are; and as people will be at
liberty to go and see them one week previous to the sale, it is deemed
sufficient to say that such a collection has never been offered to the
public and connoisseurs in this country; being a careful selection made
in Paris by the best judges from the museum and palace of the late
Emperor.”
M. Jumel returned to New York in 1828 and recovered his lost fortune.
From that date till his death in 1832, the house again witnessed scenes
of gay society. Among the distinguished visitors at this period were
Joseph Bonaparte and Louis Napoleon.
Again to quote from Mr. Pumpelly:
“After the death of her husband Madame Jumel carried on her business
affairs by herself. She displayed in them excellent judgment and
ability. The varied experiences of her life had sharpened her
faculties, and the poor Rhode Island girl, with whom scandal had made
free, had developed into a woman of culture, tact and superior powers.
She furnished her mansion with somewhat of its former splendour. It
displayed abundant souvenirs of the First Empire and its renowned
master. There were eight chairs which had belonged to the First Consul,
a table, the marble top of which had been brought to her from Egypt, a
clock which the Emperor had used in the Tuilleries, a chandelier that
he had once given to Moreau, tapestries and paintings which had been
collected by Josephine; also a set of drawing-room furniture which had
once been owned by Charles X.; a bedstead upon which Napoleon had slept
for many months and his army chest. Visitors also told of a stand that
was said to have belonged to Voltaire, a black leather trunk which was
supposed to have been used by Napoleon on the march to Moscow, and an
elaborate embroidery of flowers surrounded by a golden chain, which had
been made by the Empress. On the furniture was emblazoned the symbolic
‘N’ of the Empire in commemoration of its great chief.”
In 1833, Madame Jumel was married in the drawing-room of this historic
house to Aaron Burr. After her death in 1865, the house became the
property of Mr. Nelson Chase, whose first wife was Madame Jumel’s
niece. It now belongs to the Daughters of the American Revolution.
FORT SUMTER
IZA DUFFUS HARDY
The next morning we sally forth early under a tropical sky of burning
blue and take our way to the market, a bright and busy scene, and cool
and pleasant even this hot day, the breeze blowing gently through
the long airy sheds, supported by open archways, the abundant array
of fruit and flowers and vegetables refreshing to the eye. The negro
element is in almost exclusive possession behind the stalls, the white
in front, but not exclusively. There is a negro majority in South
Carolina, in the market as well as elsewhere. Here are all shades of
black, yellow and brown; here a good-looking brown girl with immense
gold earrings, sits half hidden behind tempting great heaps of rosy
tomatoes, golden Florida oranges and crimson plantains; there an old
woman, black as a coal, coifed in a gorgeous striped bandana, presses
green peas upon our attention; here the tourist is buying bananas and
the housekeeper pricing pineapples.
We linger among the fruit-stalls and do not hurry ourselves past the
fishmonger’s department, where the cool shining fish lie on slabs
spread with green leaves. But we hasten through the butcher’s quarter;
it is too hot to look at raw beef. We observe strutting about here,
picking up pieces under the stalls and perching over the doorways, a
number of large birds, which we take at first for turkeys. They are,
however, buzzards, unfit to eat, but useful in picking up offal, and
therefore encouraged about this quarter of the market.
Returning to the main street of Charleston, we pass by the ruins of the
old church.
“Burnt during the war, of course?”
“No, madam, burnt by accident before the war.”
There its ruined and blackened walls stand still, the long grass
growing where aisle and altar were. We pass by the shops and soon
come to the private houses, pretty and picturesque detached villas
(residences “unattached,” are, of course the rule in these warm
climes). Many are surrounded by their own gardens; some nestle in the
shadow of tall trees; others are buried from basement to roof in the
luxuriant purple blossoms of the wisteria. At the end of this street we
come upon the Battery, the most beautiful spot in this beautiful city
by the sea.