Calling on the Presidents: Tales Their Houses Tell. Clark Beim-Esche
(Bob smilingly noted that Livingston had sent his own statue to Madison to add to his collection, subsequent to visiting here for the first time.) Appropriately enough, though, it was the spirit of Madison's best friend, Thomas Jefferson, that most clearly permeated the room. In addition to his marble bust, two oil painting portraits of the third President hung on opposite walls, and a Campeche chair, Jefferson's favorite, sat in one of the corners of the parlor.
Bob then led us into the formal dining area, another beautifully decorated interior, complete with a grass-green scalloped design wallpaper that perfectly matched the sample of the original wall covering that had been discovered during the renovation. Gathered around the extended table were life-sized cardboard images of some of the most famous persons who had dined here, including Jefferson, of course, and Andrew Jackson.
Next was the room which had originally been James and Dolley Madison's bedroom. It now contained objects which had been part of Madison's library, including a large fossil of prehistoric marine life. Also of interest here was yet another portrait bust, but unlike the statues in the parlor, this piece, Bob informed us, was the only sculpture original to the house. As I inquired about just who this image was, Bob replied with a laugh, “I know the name, but you've got me here. You'll have to do a bit of research yourself to find out his significance to Mr. Madison. The man was George William Erving. That's all I know."
Now, nothing gives a writer more joy than such a challenge, and in the days following our visit, I did learn more about this interesting man. George William Erving had been a diplomat during the Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe administrations, serving as U.S. Consul in London from 1801 to 1804, Charge d'Affaires of the United States in Madrid from 1804 to 1809, Special Negotiator to Copenhagen in 1811, and U.S. Minister to Spain from 1814 to 1819. But it was not until I dug deeper that I discovered why Madison might have wanted to have the sculpted bust of this personage prominently displayed in his home. In a long out-of-print volume entitled Diplomatic Services by J.L.M. Curry, I found the following passage:
Mr. Madison then told me that he never had a more capable and faithful minister in his service during his sixteen years' term as Secretary of State and as President of the United States, than George William Erving. (6)
Any student of Madison's presidential years quickly discovers that he had been faced with daunting challenges, both from foreign quarters and from within regions of his own nation, sometimes even from within his own political party. It was telling to me that Madison had come to value so highly both the abilities and faithfulness of this now largely forgotten diplomat. Erving's marble image must have assured the now aging ex-President that his years as Chief Executive, as arduous as they had been, had not lacked loyal and capable workers within his administration. There must have been comfort in that remembrance.
Our last stop on the first floor of the house was James Madison's final study and sitting room. Its walls were colored a deep aqua, and it was here that Bob recounted the story of Paul Jennings, Madison's slave who had served him to the very end. It was Jennings who had helped Dolley remove the famous Stuart painting of George Washington on the night in 1814 when British troops had captured the capital and burned its public buildings, including the White House. It was Jennings who had continued to care for Madison at Montpelier during his difficult post-presidential years. And it was Jennings who had been present to overhear Madison's last words. When a visible alteration had passed over the old man's countenance, he had been asked if everything was all right. His response, his last response, was simply, “Nothing more than a change of mind." A moment later he had slumped over, dead.
After a moment of stillness, Bob then led our group upstairs, and here the renovation of the home was very much an ongoing process. There were no bookcases in Madison's second floor library, though the ink stain on the floor remained quite visible. Overall, this tour had been such a marked improvement over my earlier visits to Montpelier, that, after Bob had finished his presentation and had encouraged us to go off and wander the grounds, I couldn't resist cautiously questioning him about the sunken walkway. He was immediately interested, and he told me that he had never heard about it.
“But I know the person you should ask about this," he added. “Carole White is in charge of all the docents. If anyone can answer your question definitively, she's the one. Come on, I'll find her for you and introduce you."
Before I had a chance to respond, Bob was rapidly heading downstairs, and I sprang after him. At the foot of the stairway, he told me to wait, and he exited out a door. In only a minute or two, the same door opened, and a pleasant woman greeted me.
“I hear you have a question that Bob couldn't answer," she began. “Maybe I can help."
I recounted to Ms. White the story of the sunken walkway and its disappearance. She listened carefully, then quietly shook her head.
“Oh dear," she sighed, “I do so wish that those early docents had simply been willing to admit it when they didn't know an answer. I do know exactly what you saw, but it's nothing like what you were told. When the deconstruction and restoration of Montpelier got underway, a careful examination of the foundation of the home revealed serious cracks and water damage that threatened to weaken the overall structure of the mansion. It was decided that, first off, the foundation needed waterproof sealant applied to the entire exterior of the foundation. The restoration team dug that sunken walkway around the circumference of the house so that the foundation could be correctly sealed. Once the moisture problem had been solved, the ground was graded up to the foundation just as it had been during Mr. Madison's time. The Montpelier Foundation accepts the facts of Virginia's plantation life, and we would never have tried to conceal an original architectural feature of this home. I hope this helps you," she gently concluded.
It certainly had. How wrong, how eagerly wrong I had been—both to assume that Madison had wanted to hide his slaves from view and, next, to believe that such a careful and painstaking restoration of a site could be complicit with a cover-up of a historical truth. I thanked Ms. White and went to find Carol who had already exited the house. After I told her the information that Ms. White had just given me, I realized that I would have some important phone calls to make when I returned home, particularly to colleagues to whom I had told the infamous story of Montpelier's vanishing sunken walkway.
And I had also learned an important lesson about anecdotal information conveyed by docents. Check the facts before repeating a tale.
In some ways, like Mr. Madison, I had experienced a profound “change of mind" regarding what I had believed to be true. But also like Madison, my error had been “nothing more" than that, only a misunderstanding. The truth had never been affected by what I had been willing to believe. And now that I had experienced a “change of mind," I understood the reality of the situation. I wondered if Mr. Madison, too, as he had experienced “nothing more than a change of mind," had reached a similar revelatory understanding, only, in his case, of the much grander matter of the nature of life itself.
James Monroe: "...getting things done."
Every once in a while, my natural inclination to be chatty has stood me in good stead. This was certainly the case in March of 2012 when I first called Ash Lawn-Highland for advice about Carol's and my upcoming visit there. My chief concern had been whether or not we could fit in a meaningful tour of both Thomas Jefferson's Poplar Forest and James Monroe's Ash Lawn-Highland estates in a single day. My computer research had suggested to me that it would be possible, but I wanted the plan to be confirmed by someone “on the ground," as it were.
The telephone at Ash Lawn-Highland was answered by a woman with a pleasant voice who was happy to tell me that, because of Ash Lawn-Highland's late closing hour (6 pm at the season when we had scheduled our trip), this double site plan would be completely workable. She even reconfirmed the routing to Charlottesville from Poplar Forest that I had found online. I was most relieved by her assurances and thanked her for taking the time to give me this help. But before I hung up, I felt impelled to mention my book project to her.
“The