A Portrait of Old George Town Part 8

[Whose residence was at 3348 M Street.]

'Wednesday, 30th.

'The parties to whom I addressed myself yesterday evening, having taken the matter into consideration, saw the propriety of my observations; and that whilst they were contending for the shadow they might loose the substance; and therefore mutually agreed and entered into articles to surrender for public purposes, one half of the land they severally possessed within the bounds which were designated as necessary for the City to stand with some other stipulations, which were inserted in the instrument which they respectively subscribed.

'This business being thus happily finished and some directions given to the Commissioners, the Surveyor and Engineer with respect to the mode of laying out the district--Surveying the grounds for the City and forming them into lots--I left Georgetown, dined in Alexandria and reached Mount Vernon in the evening.'"

The "others," with whom he dined, were evidently the proprietors of the land, sixteen, who next day signed before witnesses the agreement drawn up that day. It is too long to quote in its entirety, but in effect these were the conditions: "that in consideration of the good benefits they were to derive from having the Federal City laid off upon their lands the President may retain any number of squares he may think proper for public improvements or uses at the rate of 25 ($66.66 in Penn.

currency) per acre. For the streets they should receive no compensation.

Each proprietor was to retain full possession of his land till it should be sold into lots." The men who signed, in order of signing, were: Robert Peter, David Burnes, James M. Lingan, Uriah Forrest, Benjamin Stoddert, Notley Young, Daniel Carroll, of Duddington; Overton Carr, Thomas Beall, of George; Charles Beatty, Anthony Holmead, William Young, Edward Peirce, Abraham Young, James Peirce, and William Prout. At a later date the following men joined in the agreement and are often counted among the original property holders: Robert Morris, Samuel Blodget, William Bailey, Samuel Davidson, William Deakins, Jr., James Greenleaf, Thomas Johnson, Robert Lingan, Dominick Lynch, John Nicholson, John H. Stone, Comfort Sands, Benjamin Oden, John P. Van Ness, George Walker, and the legal guardians of Elizabeth Wheeler.

It was in this little town that the President issued his proclamation concerning the permanent seat of government of the United States. It reads thus:

Done at George Town, aforesaid, the 30th day of March in the year of our Lord, 1791 and in the Independence of the United States the fifteenth.

By the President, GEORGE WASHINGTON.

THOMAS JEFFERSON.

Having satisfactorily accomplished this business, General Washington proceeded to Mount Vernon, whence he wrote on April 3, 1791, to the Commissioners to proceed at once with the Attorney-General in regard to deeds so that the sale of lots and public buildings might commence as soon as possible. He quotes a letter from Mr. Jefferson:

... that on the 27th of March a bill had been introduced in the House of Representatives for granting a sum of money for building a Federal Hall, a house for the President, etc.

At a meeting of the Commissioners on September 9, 1791, in reply to a letter from Major L'Enfant a letter was written saying:

... that the t.i.tle of the map he was making was to be, "A Map of the City of Washington in the Territory of Columbia," and that the streets were to be named alphabetically one way and numerically the other, etc.

(Signed by) THOMAS JOHNSON, DAVID STUART, DANIEL CARROLL.

L'Enfant aimed to make an original plan for the Federal City, adapted to the topography, but he endeavored to secure ideas from plans of great cities of Europe that might be found possible of adaptation so he wrote to Jefferson who sent his notable reply and plans of a number of cities that he had secured evidently while our minister to France.

"June 30th Washington noted, 'The business which brot. me to Georgetown being finished and the Comrs. instructed with respect to the mode of carrying the plan into effect, I set off this morning a littel after 4 o'clock, in the prosecution of my journey towards Philadelphia....'"

"Thereupon the building site for the city took on intense activity."

Pierre Charles L'Enfant was the son of Pierre L'Enfant, an artist who painted battle scenes and also designed tapestries for the Gobelin Works. L'Enfant himself was an artist and it was his artistic temperament which caused him trouble. At the age of 22 he had come to America to volunteer his services in the war against England. He became an officer of engineers, and also helped Gen. von Steuben drill the Army at Valley Forge, and worked on fortifications. After the war he was a practicing architect in New York City for several years but when he heard of the Federal City to be created he longed to be the author of its plan and as I have said wrote to Washington asking for the job.

But it was his desire for perfection which eventually was his undoing.

There was delay in submitting the Plan to President Washington, and also he refused to take orders from any one except Washington, whereas he was told to take them from the three Commissioners of the District of Columbia: Thomas Johnson, David Stuart, and Daniel Carroll. Dr. David Stuart had become the second husband of Mrs. John Parke Custis, daughter-in-law of Mrs. Washington. Things went from bad to worse when the nephew of Daniel Carroll the Commissioner, Daniel Carroll of Duddington, started to build a house which ab.u.t.ted into a street laid out on the Plan and Major L'Enfant had it demolished. Also there was delay in getting the Map engraved.

Major L'Enfant lived at Suter's Tavern during the months he was working in George Town. But where he actually did his work of drawing his famous Map, where Andrew Ellicott had his office as surveyor, and where the three Commissioners met for their business has never been settled.

The tradition is that their office was The Little Old Stone House, now 3049 M Street, and known for many years as "General Washington's Headquarters." As General Washington never had need for military headquarters here, for there was no fighting nearby, this tradition has persisted that this was the office of the Commissioners.

On December 13th President Washington sent a letter to L'Enfant advising him that he must work under orders from the Commissioners.

"Then before leaving for Philadelphia to superintend the engraving of his "Plan" personally, L'Enfant wrote to the Commissioners asking for supplies for the winter work, as follows:

'Georgetown Dec. 25, 1791.

'Gentlemen: Mr. Roberdeau, on whose activity and zeal I rely in the execution of what is necessary to accomplish this winter, will communicate to you a statement of the business I committed to this care and I have to request you will make provision for the supply of 25 hands in the quarries and 50 in the city which in all will be 75 men kept in employment besides their respective overseers.

'There is an immediate necessity for a number of wheel-barrows and above 100 will be wanted early in the spring. Therefore I beg you will devise the mode of obtaining that number before the 15th of March next--These wheel-barrows ought to be made light and should be only roughly finished, though substantial, ...'

Next we find that L'Enfant addressed a long and comprehensive Report to President Washington 'for renewing the work at the Federal City' in the approaching season and giving an estimate of expenditures for one year in the amount of $1,200,000."

"We have here to do with the idealism of L'Enfant that contemplated quite a completely built city before it was occupied and operated as a 'Seat of Government.' Unfortunately, L'Enfant did not realize the poverty of the Treasury; and the state of mind of national legislators, particularly of the North, who preferred to stay in Philadelphia to moving 'to the Indian Place' on the banks of the Potomac."

"It is generally thought that the trouble concerning the Daniel Carroll of Duddington House was the reason for L'Enfant's resignation from the Washington work in March, 1792, and the reason for the letter from Secretary of State Jefferson terminating his services that month. But a close a.n.a.lysis of L'Enfant's experiences reveals that this was simply a 'serious incident' in a chain of troubles to follow. This brings to light the names of L'Enfant's a.s.sistants Roberdeau and Baraof. There were also Benjamin Banneker; and Alexander Ralston."

"L'Enfant remained silent so far as arguments with President Washington and the Plan was concerned, until 1800 after 'his General' had died. In the meantime the L'Enfant Plan was engraved, the question of compensation to L'Enfant came up and he was reimbursed in part." But the question of payment to Major L'Enfant was never settled.

After leaving Georgetown he worked on a Plan for the city of Patterson, New Jersey, built a magnificent house for Robert Morris in Philadelphia which was never finished, and also Oeller's Hotel where the Philadelphia a.s.semblies were held.

From 1800 to 1810 he spent most of his time and efforts trying to secure payment for his services in laying out the Plan of the Capital City of Washington. On July 7, 1812 Secretary of War Eustis appointed him Professor of Engineering in the Military Academy at West Point but he declined saying that he had not "the rigidity of manner, the tongue nor the patience, nor indeed any inclination peculiar to instructors."

In 1814 he was consulted in regard to the fortification of Fort Washington opposite Mount Vernon and did some work there.

After the war was over he continued to live there at Warburton Manor with Thomas A. Digges until 1824 when he went to live with a nephew William Dudley Digges at Green Hill nearby, where he died, June 14, 1825, and was buried on the estate.

In 1909 the U. S. Government at last honored him by burying him in the National Cemetery at Arlington, in front of the house, overlooking the city of his dream.

At twelve o'clock October 12, 1792, the corner-stone of the President's House was laid, but there is no record of any ceremony. There is, however, a long account in the newspapers of the laying of the corner-stone of the Capitol, which was personally performed by George Washington in his capacity as a Mason, on September 18, 1792, "amid a brilliant crowd of spectators of both s.e.xes." Right at the head of the procession, immediately following "the Surveying Department of the City of Washington," is noted "The Mayor and Corporation of George Town."

John Threlkeld was Mayor that year, and certainly that "brilliant crowd" must have been largely composed of Georgetonians for the dwellers in the City of Washington at that time were few and far between. Witness General Washington's letter on the 17th of May, 1795, to Alexander White, one of the Commissioners: "I shall intimate that a residence in the City if a house is to be had, will be more promotive of its welfare than your abode in George Town." He was nursing along his namesake in every possible way. On February 8, 1798, he notes in his diary: "Visited Public Buildings in the morning." The day before, the 7th, he speaks of going to a meeting of the Potomac Company, dining with Colonel Fitzgerald, and lodging with Thomas Peter at Number 2618 K Street. This was only natural, as Mrs. Peter was, of course, his step-granddaughter.

On that same trip he met the Commissioners again, this time at Union Tavern, and dined there. On August 5th his diary says: "Went to George Town to a general meeting of the Potomac Company. Dined at the Union Tavern and lodged at Mr. Law's." Thomas Law, an Englishman, had married Eliza Custis, Mrs. Washington's eldest grandchild, and had a home on Capitol Hill.

On August 11th he again spent the night at Thomas Peter's home, and that was the last night he ever spent in the city named in his honor. He was never to live to see the government established in the city over which he had worked so hard, and in which he had such absolute implicit faith.

"A century hence," he wrote, "if this country keeps united, it will produce a city, though not so large as London, yet of a magnitude inferior to few other in Europe."

Chapter VI

_Below Bridge Street_

Nearly all of the business, and most of the social life, up until 1800 took place below Bridge (M) Street. The island in the river below George Town, which was called, variously, a.n.a.lostan, Mason's Island, My Lord's Island, and Barbadoes, was almost a part of George Town in those days.

It belonged to the great plantation of George Mason, of Gunston, the brilliant statesman and author of the Bill of Rights.

His son, General Mason, had there an estate where he entertained in fine style. Louis Philippe of France, while a visitor in George Town, was feted there and said he had never seen a more elegant entertainment.

Twenty-three kinds of fish were caught in the river in those days, besides terrapin and snapping turtles, so perhaps they helped to embellish the occasion.

The island was rich in forest trees, foliage, flowering and aromatic shrubs, orchards of cherry, apple, and peach trees. Cotton was grown there which was the color of nankeen; it was spun, woven, and used in its natural color, without being dyed. Also, there was grown a variety of maize of deep purple color, used as a dye.

John Mason had also a town house which we shall mention later. He, like most of the men in this community, was engaged in the business of shipping tobacco. The majority of his trade seems to have been with France, from letters of his father to him, in which the great George offered to help out his son in his shipments by letting him have some of the hogsheads he had on hand.

John Mason had been a general in the Revolution, and was at the head of the militia here, and also owned a ferry operating to the Virginia sh.o.r.e from the foot of High Street (Wisconsin Avenue). The ferry was worked by a great iron chain.