_Tudor Place and Congress (31st) Street_
Like the brightest jewel in its crown of old houses, Tudor Place, now
the home of Armistead Peter, junior, sits high and aloof on the heights
of Georgetown. Its southern front, shown here, is the one most familiar
to everyone, and it is the view that I looked out on every day of my
life for more than a score of years from my father's house on Stoddert
(Q) Street.
As Mrs. Beverley Kennon, its owner during my youth, was my cousin and
had her motherless grandchildren living with her, some of my earliest
recollections are of running round and round the old circle of box in
front of the north entrance, playing "colors." I never, to this day,
smell box that I am not back at Tudor Place and see the cobwebs in the
old bushes bright with raindrops, as box, of course, is really fragrant
only after rain. Also there were lovely times in the fall when the
leaves were being raked up by old John, the colored gardener, who would
let us climb on top of the brilliant load in a wheelbarrow with a crate
on top of it. Such rides! Old John was a character (and one we loved
dearly), not much over five feet tall, with grizzled hair and goatee,
and always wearing an apron tied around his waist and a derby hat on his
head.
Tudor Place was purchased by Francis Lowndes, one of the prominent
tobacco merchants and shippers, in 1794, from Thomas Beall of George
who made a large addition to George Town in 1783, called by his name.
Mr. Lowndes started to build a mansion, but in 1805 he sold the property
to Thomas Peter and his wife, the former Martha Parke Custis.
[Illustration: THOMAS PETER]
When the Peters moved to their new home in George Town they used the
western wing, already built, with its addition on the east, as their
home, and the eastern wing was their carriage house and stable. This
fact has been proved by finding below the floors the signs of the old
stalls, and up in the rafters the corncobs of long ago. I have known
people who remembered the old yellow coach which often stood out in the
stable yard, and I've been told that if one dug deep enough its
cobblestones would still be found.
Mr. and Mrs. Peter decided to use the fortune left her by her
grandmother, Mrs. Washington, to build a stately mansion. They certainly
succeeded. They engaged as architect Dr. William Thornton, whose plans
for the Capitol had been accepted in the second competition, as the
first yielded none sufficiently good.
Dr. Thornton and his wife were intimate friends of the Peters, and a
beautiful miniature of him, done by her, is now in the possession of one
of the family. Mrs. Thornton was with Mrs. Peter when the British
soldiers set fire to the Capitol in 1814, and the two ladies sat at the
window of what is now the dining room of Tudor Place--the low part
between the main building and the western wing--and watched the
conflagration. You can imagine their grief as one saw the work of her
husband destroyed, and the other, the building which had been so much in
the mind and heart of her revered grandfather.
There is in existence a very lovely painting of Mrs. Peter at about the
time of her marriage; a sweet, young girl with light curls, and the
embodiment of daintiness. Suspended about her neck is, I think, the
miniature which General Washington had painted for her as a wedding
gift. When he asked her what she wanted she replied "a replica of
himself." He was much pleased that a young girl would want a portrait of
an old man! The photograph reproduced of Thomas Peter is from a portrait
done by him by his son-in-law, Captain William G. Williams.
While on a visit to Tudor Place occurred the death of Mrs. Peter's
mother, the former Eleanor Calvert. She was fifty-three years old, and
had borne twenty children.
[Illustration: MRS. THOMAS PETER (MARTHA PARKE CUSTIS)]
Mr. and Mrs. Peter had a family of eight children. Three of the
daughters had striking names: America, Columbia, and Britannia.
When General Lafayette paid his visit to Georgetown in 1824 it was, of
course, most natural that he should be entertained at Tudor Place, as
Mrs. Peter had known him in her childhood at Mount Vernon. At that time
America met her husband, Captain Williams, who was acting as an aide for
the Marquis. In later years, as chief of engineers on the staff of
General Zachary Taylor, Captain Williams was killed at the Battle of
Monterey. On that same visit Lafayette presented the youngest child,
Britannia, a little girl of nine, with a lovely little desk, now in the
National Museum in the loan collection of her grandson, Walter G. Peter.
On its under side it has an inscription in the handwriting of Martha
Custis Peter, telling her daughter its history.
Britannia Wellington Peter was born on January 27, 1815. She died the
day before her ninety-sixth birthday, and this editorial, from _The
Baltimore Sun_, gives a fine picture of the changes in the world in the
years covered by the span of her life:
A LONG AND INTERESTING LIFE
Mrs. Britannia Wellington Kennon, who died at Tudor Place, her
historic home in Georgetown, on the 26th instant, and who will be
buried today, was for many years a most interesting figure in the
social life of Washington. She was the last in her generation of the
descendants of Mrs. Martha Washington. John Parke Custis, Mrs.
Washington's son, left four children. One of his daughters, Martha,
married Thomas Peter, and Mrs. Kennon was their daughter. She
married Commodore Beverley Kennon, of the United States Navy, whose
father was General Richard Kennon, of Washington's staff, a charter
member of the Society of the Cincinnati, and a grandson of Sir
William Skipwith. Commodore Kennon was killed in 1844 by the
explosion on the U. S. S. _Princeton_, so Mrs. Kennon was a widow
for more than sixty-six years.
Tudor Place, Mrs. Kennon's home, was famous for the distinguished
guests that were entertained there, among them being General
Lafayette, who visited there in 1824. She was the center of an
intellectual and cultivated society, and was always in touch with
the progress of events in the world.
Mrs. Kennon was born three weeks after the Battle of New Orleans,
and several months before the Battle of Waterloo. Her life spanned
the period of the great advance in the appliances of civilization in
this and the last century. It was very important that the news of
the battle of Waterloo should reach London without delay, and yet
with every appliance and speed then known, it took three days for
the news to reach England. Indeed, when Mrs. Kennon was thirty-two
years of age, it required eight months to travel from New England to
Oregon. At the age of fifteen she could have been a passenger on the
first passenger railroad train that was ever run; until she was five
years old, there was no such thing as an iron plow in all the world,
and until she was grown up, the people were dependent on tinder
boxes and sun glasses to light their fires. She had reached the age
of twenty-three years when steam communication between Europe and
America was established, and when the first telegram ever sent
passed between Baltimore and Washington she was still a young woman.
If all the advances in civilization which took place during the
lifetime of this remarkable lady were catalogued, they would make a
singularly interesting list.
Mrs. Kennon was left a widow when less than thirty years of age, with
her one child, Martha Custis Kennon. To Mrs. Kennon and her daughter
Mrs. Thomas Peter bequeathed Tudor Place, having long survived her
husband, and her other children having received their inheritance.
Martha Custis Kennon married her cousin, Dr. Armistead Peter, the son of
Major George Peter, and so the original surname came back to the place,
which has never been out of the one family.
Until the death of Mrs. Kennon when they were, of course, divided, there
was at Tudor Place a very large and valuable collection of Washington
relics, fascinating things, among them Mrs. Washington's seed-pearl
wedding jewelry and dress, a set of china made for and presented to
General Washington by the French government, the bowl given him by the
Order of the Cincinnati, and numberless other interesting things. In a
corner of the central room, the saloon, as it is called, was the small
camp trunk always used by the General. The room on the east, off of
which opens the conservatory, is the drawing room; that to the west, the
parlor. The saloon opens out onto the temple, the round porch on the
south. The two large rooms at each side have lovely cornices, beautiful
marble mantels and handsome crystal chandeliers; long group windows to
the floor and very unusual doors of curly maple. At the debut tea of
Mrs. Kennon's granddaughter, I was helping to serve, when, seeing two
dear old ladies, one very short, the other very tall, both dressed in
simple black with big bonnets and long veils, looking about in the crowd
as if they were trying to see something particular, I went up and asked
them if I could bring them some refreshments. They said, "No, thank you,
we really don't want anything, we are just trying to see if there are
the same ornaments on the table as when Britannia was married." I found
out afterward that the ornaments were three beautiful alabaster groups
of classic figures. The two old ladies were Miss Mary and Miss Rosa
Nourse, of The Highlands.
Britannia Peter was a first cousin of Mary Custis, of Arlington, and was
one of the bridesmaids at the wedding there which united the daughter of
George Washington Parke Custis to the handsome United States army
officer, Robert Edward Lee. The friendship was an enduring one, and
General Lee visited Tudor Place when he paid his last visit to
Washington City in 1869.
Britannia Peter was bridesmaid for another first cousin, Helen Dunlop,
when she was married at Hayes to William Laird.
From the descendant of another one of those bridesmaids at that famous
wedding at Arlington who, as a young girl, paid long visits to Mary
Custis, I heard this delicious story: "There being no telephones, when
the girls at Arlington and at Tudor Place wanted to get together they
had a series of signals. Hanging a red flannel petticoat out of the
window meant 'come on over'. A white one had another meaning. This
method was not popular with the owners of the two mansions, but
persisted, nevertheless." To prove this, not long ago I went to
Arlington with the person who told me the story. The room there used by
the girls of those days does look toward Georgetown. There is a forest
of tall trees there now but trees can grow very tall in a hundred years.
When my father built his house at the foot of Mrs. Kennon's place, she
told him she was so glad to have him near by, but chided him for cutting
off her view of the river.
Until only a few years before her death, Mrs. Kennon sat perfectly erect
in her chair, never touching the back, and I can remember her as quite
an old lady, almost flying up the hill of Congress (31st) Street,
always, of course, in bonnet and long, crepe veil. She was a member of
Christ Church, and once many, many years ago when a parish meeting was
announced to decide some important question, the rector and gentlemen
were very much surprised on entering the vestry to find Mrs. Kennon
there waiting for the meeting. She said she wished to have a say in the
matter, and having no man to represent her, had come herself. So she was
the original suffragette! Mrs. Kennon was one of the early presidents
of the Louise Home, and was the first president of the National Society
of Colonial Dames of America in the District of Columbia.
Before the day of country clubs there used to be a very fine tennis
court at Tudor Place, on the flat part to the north of the house not far
from Congress (31st) Street, and it was much used. The Peter boys were
champions of the District several times. In the first administration of
President Cleveland, Mrs. Cleveland, a bride, used to drive her husband
in from Oak View or, as it was popularly called, Red Top, to his office
at the White House nearly every morning in a low, one-horse phaeton. No
secret-service entourage in those days! In the evenings she came again
in style in a Victoria, and frequently they would stop opposite Tudor
Place and watch the game in progress. There was a good deal of intimacy
between Tudor Place and "Red Top" in those days.
The only football I ever heard of being played at Tudor Place was by a
team of which my youngest brother was a member. They had nowhere to
play, so he walked up there one day, and being a very engaging young man
of about ten years, with big, blue eyes and a charming smile, he asked
the old lady for permission, which she gave. She used to sit by the long
window in the parlor and watch them with great interest and pleasure.
Some other boys thought they would like the same privilege and asked for
it, but she told me she always asked, "Are you a friend of my little
cousin?" Only his friends could play there.
Mrs. Kennon lived all her long and active life at Tudor Place, with the
exception of two brief periods. The first was the year and a half when
she was living at the Washington Navy Yard with her husband while he was
stationed there. And the second was when her daughter was at boarding
school in Philadelphia, just before the Civil War, and she leased the
place to Mr. Pendleton, a Representative in Congress from Virginia. Of
course, after the secession of that State, Mr. Pendleton left Washington
City--but very hurriedly. Mrs. Kennon heard that her home was to be
taken over by the United States government to be used as a hospital so
she hastened back and occupied it herself. She took as boarders several
Federal officers on the one condition that the affairs of the war should
not be discussed.
The last time I saw her was not many months before her death, sitting in
a chair in her bedroom and very, very feeble. When I told her good-bye,
she kept saying something to me over and over, which I couldn't
understand. Finally I leaned down very close, and heard, "Be a good
girl." I was then the mother of two children, but to her, just a little
girl and the daughter of my father and mother, of whom she was very
fond.
Opposite Tudor Place, where now is a twin apartment house, was until the
nineteen-twenties a simple old brick house somewhat like the old Mackall
house on Greene (29th) Street, only minus a portico. When I knew it it
was the home of the Philip Darneilles--and I remember hearing my mother
say, "But Mrs. Darneille was a Harry!" Which meant nothing to me until I
looked up the title to this place, and there I found that all this land
went right back to Harriot Beall, Mrs. Elisha O. Williams, one of the
three daughters of Brooke Beall, who was among those wealthy shipping
merchants who were responsible for Georgetown's early prosperity.
Mrs. Harriot Beall Williams left this property, all the way down to
Back (Q) Street, to her daughter Harriot Eliza Harry. Through her it
passed to Harriot Beall Chesley, and then to her daughter, Emily
McIlvain Darneille. The old house stood untenanted for several years
until bought for the erection of the apartments.
Mr. and Mrs. Darneille had three daughters, the eldest really a beauty
(the youngest inherited the old name of Harriot), and they had a great
deal of gaiety there in the nineties. I remember especially the New
Year's Day receptions they used to have, the many "hacks" overflowing
with young men, that used to climb the hill. It was the custom in those
days for the ladies of each household to receive on the afternoon of
that day. Only gentleman callers came, all dressed in their very best,
and left their cards for all the ladies of their acquaintance. If you
weren't receiving (attired in your best, sometimes to the extent of real
low-necked evening dresses, the dining room table loaded with salads,
old hams, biscuits, ices, candies, tea and coffee--and always a punch
bowl on the side) you hung a basket on your front door bell, and the
callers just deposited their cards and went on to the next place.
What fun the children had, watching the front doors and counting the
cards; and there was a real thrill when the caller happened to be an
Army or Navy officer, attired in full-dress uniform with gold braid and
feathers, having earlier in the day paid his respects at the White
House.
On part of the Darneille property stands an intriguing frame house. It
is quite an old house and stood originally several hundred feet to the
eastward in Mackall Square, the property owned by Christiana Beall
Mackall, who was the sister of Harriot Beall Williams. So you see one
sister sold it to the other and it took a trip across Washington (30th)
Street to reside on Congress (31st) Street. I wonder how they moved it
in those days, for it was a long, long time ago.
Mr. and Mrs. Charles Dodge lived there after they left Evermay.
In the 1880's this house, 1633 31st Street, was the home of a very
interesting and eminent person, John Wesley Powell, American geologist
and ethnologist. I now quote from the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_: "He was
born at Mount Morris, N. Y., March 24, 1834. His parents were of English
birth, but had moved to America in 1830, and he was educated at Illinois
and Oberlin colleges. He began his geological work with a series of
field trips including a trip throughout the length of the Mississippi in
a rowboat, the length of the Ohio, and of the Illinois. When the Civil
War broke out he entered the Union Army as a private, and at the battle
of Shiloh he lost his right arm but continued in active service,
reaching the rank of major of volunteers. In 1865 he was appointed
professor of geology and curator of the museum in the Illinois Wesleyan
university at Bloomington, and afterwards at the Normal university.
In 1867 he commenced a series of expeditions to the Rocky Mountains and
the canyons of the Green and Colorado rivers, during the course of which
(1869) he made a daring boat-journey of three months through the Grand
Canyon; he also made a special study of the Indians and their languages
for the Smithsonian Institution, in which he founded and directed a
bureau of ethnology. His able work led to the establishment under the U.
S. Government of the geographical and geological survey of the Rocky
Mountain region with which he was occupied from 1870 to 1879. This
survey was incorporated with the United States geological and
geographical survey in 1879, when Powell became director of the bureau
of ethnology. In 1881, Powell was appointed director also of the
geological survey, a post which he occupied until 1894. He died in
Haven, Me., on Sept. 23, 1902."
On two panes of glass in the front windows of this old house are names
etched by a diamond--on one is "Genevieve Powell," under it "Louis Hill"
and under that "1884." She probably was the daughter of Mr. Powell.
On the other pane of glass is etched "Moses and Mary." To the owners of
the house that means nothing, but to me it means "Moses Moore," who was
not a man but a woman (whose real name was "Frank"), and Mary Compton,
both of whom I knew and still know.
In the nineties it was for awhile the home of Mrs. Donna Otie Compton,
who was the daughter of Bishop James Hervey Otie, first Episcopal Bishop
of Tennessee. She was a picturesque figure, attired in her widow's cap
and long crepe veil. Mrs. Compton had four daughters who were great
belles.
Then for a good many years it stood there looking quite deserted, for
old Mr. Arnold, its owner, was almost a cripple and one rarely saw him
making his way up the street with great difficulty. Now General and Mrs.
Frank R. McCoy have bought it and made it a charming house with a lovely
garden.
Through the alley just north of here, described in the title as "a
private road," we can reach another house built on that same property of
the Harry's, but just who built it I do not know. It also was vacant
when I was a girl, for I remember going to a Fair there one night in the
spring when it had been loaned for some charity. In 1930 the house was
bought by Miss Harriet and Miss Mary Winslow, who have added a lovely
music room at the rear, but have kept the old-time appearance of the
house. A mammoth oak tree, the pride of the owners, stands near the
house.
The next house on Congress (31st) Street has another fine oak tree in
front of it, and used to have a companion even larger on the other side
of the walk. This property also came through Mrs. Harriot Beall Williams
to Mrs. Brooke Williams, senior, and her daughter, Mrs. Johns, who lived
there with her family.
A romantic story is told of how Captain William Brooke Johns, of the
United States Army, one day saw at a picnic the beautiful Miss Leonora
de la Roche, and fell in love with her immediately. But, since it was
not considered good form in those days to be presented to a lady at a
picnic, he watched her from a distance all day. The next afternoon he
went to call. It was a case of love at first sight for both, and the
wedding soon followed, with all the military splendor. As was told
before, when the Civil War came he left the Union Army. Captain Johns
had quite a talent for carving, and did a very good medallion of General
Grant, who continued always to be a true friend to him. He also invented
a tent which was used during the Civil War by the Northern Army.
This house was, for more than a generation, the home of Colonel and Mrs.
John Addison.
At that time it was a two-story house, with quite a different roof. It
was a big, merry household with four sons and four daughters. The
daughters were reigning belles in those days, and the old custom of
serenading was much in vogue. One lovely moonlight night four swains
with their guitars stationed themselves under the windows of the
handsome old house and sang plaintive love songs for an hour or more.
Finally a shutter was pushed open very gently, and the four hearts went
pitter-patter, anticipating the sight of a lovely young girl's face.
Instead, appeared an old, black one, capped by a snowy turban, and these
words floated down: "I'se sorrie, gen'le-men, but de young ladies is all
gone out--but I sure is pleased wid you-all's music!" The quartet was
composed of Summerfield McKenney, Frank Steele, and a young Noyes, of
the family now for many years identified with _The Evening Star_, and
another whose name I do not know.
It was while the Addisons were living here that Commodore Kennon was so
tragically killed on the _Princeton_.
One afternoon the youngest member of the Addison family, a little girl,
was swinging in the yard when a carriage came up the street and turned
in at the gate of Tudor Place, across the street. In it she saw her
older brother, John. Much mystified, she ran to her mother, telling her
how strange it seemed for "brother John" to be coming up the hill in a
carriage, and not coming home. It turned out that he had been sent to
notify Mrs. Thomas Peter of the sudden death of her son-in-law.
In later years Brooke Williams, junior, lived here and, still later,
George W. Cissel. The chapel of the Presbyterian Church on West (P)
Street is named for this family. The house is now the home of Mr.
Alfred Friendly, the well-known newspaper man.
Next door, where there is now a big apartment house, used to be a large,
double brick house, which was for many years the home of Abraham Herr,
who with the Cissels conducted an important flour-milling business in
Georgetown. His son, Austin Herr, was a fine figure of a man, and was, I
think, a promoter. I distinctly remember as a little girl his return
from a trip to China and the tales of all the treasures he had brought
back with him--not so common then as now.
At No. 1669, in the eighties lived one of the oddest characters--Mrs.
Dall. She had come from Massachusetts many years before to teach at Miss
English's Seminary. While there she received frequent visits from young
Mr. Dall who was an assistant at Christ Church while finishing his
course at the Episcopal Seminary near Alexandria. The gentleman stayed
so late sometimes--probably until eleven o'clock--that Miss English had
to ask him to mend his ways. The courtship resulted in a marriage, but
before long the bridegroom went off to India as a missionary to convert
the heathen. After some years the news came that, instead, he had been
converted to Hinduism. At last he was coming home. It was in the spring
and, of course, there had to be a spring cleaning, which took several
days. One night about twelve o'clock, when the peace of the old-time
world, minus the automobile and blaring radio, lay over old Georgetown,
the clop-clop of horses' hoofs was heard coming up Congress Street,
stopping in front of Mrs. Dall's. Then there was a great knocking on the
door--a window was raised and a voice called: "Who is that?" "It's
Henry." Came back from the wife: "Well, I'm in the midst of
house-cleaning. Go on down to the Willard and stay until I send for
you." A warm welcome, and one not approved of by the neighbors who had
heard the conversation through their windows.
Mrs. Dall was not very popular in Georgetown, it being overwhelmingly
Southern in its sympathies and she being an abolitionist. I can dimly
remember her padding down 31st Street, for so her progress might be
called from the form of footwear she wore, it had no form--the queerest,
high, shapeless boots. She wore a little close-fitting bonnet and a
long, loose, grayish cape. She was a most particular person in some
ways. A lady who lived there as a housekeeper said she was never allowed
to leave her thimble on the window sill for a few moments; and it was
well known that when a caller rang the front door bell the maid who
answered had orders to scan the costume closely. If there was "bugle
trimming" among its adornments the caller was shown into the parlor on
the right side, where the furniture was all stuffed and no harm could be
done, but if the clothes were devoid of the shiny, scratchy gear, she
might safely be allowed to enter and sit upon the polished mahogany of
the room on the left of the hall. She used to have a sort of salon for
long-haired scientists and exponents of all sorts of "isms."
Another story I've heard was about her going out to Normanstone to stay
for a rest. One morning after breakfast, having had a plentiful helping
of oatmeal with lots of cream, her hostess remarked to Mrs. Dall how
well she looked. "Yes," she said, she "felt well," and ended up with "a
little starvation is always good for one." Is it a wonder she wasn't
greatly beloved?
[Illustration: LLOYD BEALL]
A very handsome and imposing old gentleman, Mr. Joe Davis, who was a
bachelor, lived here in the nineties. I remember him always, in his
frock coat and high silk hat. This was where Mr. and Mrs. Fulton Lewis
lived for many years and where their son, Fulton Lewis, junior, the
noted radio commentator, grew up.
The house has been for several years the home of the Honorable and Mrs.
Francis E. Biddle. He was the Attorney-General under President Franklin
D. Roosevelt. Mrs. Biddle, whose pen name is Katharine Garrison Chapin,
is an eminent poet.
Adjoining Tudor Place on the north live the Bealls, descendants of Lloyd
Beall, who sold his patrimony in southern Maryland and converted the
proceeds to equipping and sustaining his company during the
Revolutionary War. He was adjutant on the staff of General Alexander
Hamilton and was wounded at Germantown. Later he was captured by the
British, but escaped by swimming the Santee River. The effect of this
performance is shown by the water-logging on his commission which he
carried in his pocket.
After being mustered out of the army he came to live in Georgetown, but
just where his home was I cannot discover. He served as mayor of the
town three times--in 1797, 1798 and 1799.
Upon the reorganization of the army he was reinstated, and died in
command of the arsenal at Harper's Ferry. The Bealls who live here are
also descended from Francis Dodge and from William Marbury.
In the seventies Frederick L. Moore came in to Georgetown from the
country and built his home next door, so as to be between his two
friends, John Beall and Joseph H. Bradley. The Bradleys no longer own
this house nor their ancestral estate which was Chevy Chase, where the
club of that name now is. Abraham Bradley came with the government from
Philadelphia, as Assistant Postmaster-General. He made his home in
Washington City and then bought Chevy Chase as his country estate. He
was living there in August, 1814, when the British came to Washington.
It is said that several members of the cabinet took refuge with him
there during those two or three dreadful days and brought with them
valuable records. His old house was mostly destroyed by fire several
years ago.
His grandson, Joseph Henry Bradley, built the house at number 1688 31st
Street. At the time of Lincoln's assassination he was living out in the
country near Georgetown. He bore a remarkable resemblance to John Wilkes
Booth and on April 15, 1865, the night after the tragic event in Ford's
Theater, he was driving home in his buggy along a lonely road when he
was held up by policemen and arrested. When he protested, he was told
that he was John Wilkes Booth and was taken to jail. He insisted he was
not, but to no avail. After a good while he got in touch with friends
who identified him and he was released and went home. His wife had
thought that her colored servants had been behaving strangely all day,
but though living not more than five miles from the scene of the great
tragedy, she herself had no knowledge of it.
In later years Mr. Bradley and his father, Joseph Habersham Bradley, who
practiced law together, served as counsel in the famous John Surratt
trial.
This house is now the home of Robert A. Taft, Senator from Ohio.