Journal and Letters of Philip Vickers Fithian: A Plantation Tutor of the Old Dominion, 1773-1774.. Fithian Philip Vickers
at home, even when it was planned to send the youngsters abroad later. They also employed dancing and music masters to visit their households at regular intervals. A building near the mansion was generally set aside as a schoolroom. There the master's children and perhaps those of some neighboring planters were taught. The young men and women who came overseas to teach the children of Virginia were honored members of the households in which they lived. Great care was taken in selecting them. After a number of young Scotchmen had come to the colony as tutors during the eighteenth century, it was feared they would "teach the children the Scotch dialect which they can never wear off."[12] Throughout the period one finds frequent mention of the need of suitable instructors in the letters of the planters to their factors in the mother country. After the middle of the century, tutors were sometimes secured from Princeton and other American colleges.[13]
A goodly number of the youths sent to the English schools enrolled later at the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge, and others who had been educated by private tutors were also sent there. Certain families sent generation after generation of sons to these universities. At intervals from the time that Ralph Wormeley, the second of that name, had matriculated at Oriel College, Oxford, in 1665, until the outbreak of the Revolution, his kinsmen were found in English colleges. Not a few young Virginians attended the Inns of Court.
In his domestic establishment the planter sought to reproduce as nearly as he conveniently could the residence of the English gentry with its gardens, lawns, and parks. Plans of English homes and gardens, which intelligent workmen or even a layman might adapt, were accessible in the handbooks of architecture and gardening found in many of the planters' libraries. In some instances the striking similarity of detail leaves little doubt that the plans for a planter's residence derived directly from plates in these books. All the forms common to the English country architecture of the period were employed in the plantation residences. Sometimes English master builders and gardeners were imported to supervise the construction of the residences and the planting of the grounds.
The vogue for formality in English architecture and landscaping was mirrored in the arrangement of the Virginia estates. The mansions were generally placed according to carefully preconceived plans in a formal setting which nonetheless managed to achieve an air of ease and naturalness. Balance and symmetry were observed everywhere, with the buildings, gardens, and extensive lawns forming component parts of one composition. Walks of brick or oyster shell crossed the grounds in geometric pattern. If a bowling green or formal garden flanked one side of the mansion, an orangery or perhaps a park stocked with deer flanked the other.
English box and other ornamental plants were used with fine effect. Terraces, elaborate parterres, sunken panels, canals, and dramatic vistas gave variety to the scene. "Falling gardens" were popular at the residences situated on high eminences overlooking the great rivers and marshes.[14] Not infrequently, as at "Blandfield," a ha-ha provided a note of pleasant surprise for one walking on the lawns.[15] Graceful garden houses, dovecots, and other miniature structures, carefully placed, sometimes imparted a fanciful atmosphere to the whole. Every estate had its orchard, the fruit of which surpassed the choicest specimens of the homeland. Wildernesses or preserves of transplanted trees might be found at some distance from the residence, and sometimes serpentine drives and walks invited one to explore hidden retreats.
Situated amidst such attractive surroundings, the residences appeared to fine advantage. Their architectural arrangement contributed much to their impressiveness. At the same time it was admirably suited to the peculiar needs of plantation life. The mansion or "great house" was but the central unit, about which, at carefully spaced intervals, stood numerous smaller structures, all subsidiary to it. Spoken of indiscriminately as "offices," these dependent buildings all served some useful purpose or function in the domestic economy.
The mansion was usually a substantial two-story, rectangular building of brick, though sometimes it was built of stone or wood. The rather low-pitched roofs were generally shingled with cypress or slate. Since many of the activities of the household were carried on in offices under separate roofs, a central structure approximately seventy-five feet long and forty-two feet wide was usually regarded as commodious. The exteriors of these houses were often characterized by an elegant simplicity achieved through perfection of line and proportion. The severity of a facade might be relieved by a handsome wooden cornice, a pedimented hood over the doorway, a string-course and water table of molded brick, and window and door facings of rubbed brick. Sometimes pilasters of finely molded brick framed the doorways.
Not infrequently the principal offices, set in advance or in the rear of the mansion, served as foils to impart greater dignity to it. Sometimes, as at "Blandfield" and "Mount Airy," the major offices were connected with the central building by straight or curved lateral passages. The great house and its dependent structures were generally placed in such a relation as to form one or more rectangular courts.[16] The principal offices were often large and contained a number of rooms.
To one unfamiliar with plantation life, the number and diversity of the offices about the manor house occasioned astonishment. A Huguenot exile who visited "Rosegill," the home of Ralph Wormeley, as early as 1686, recorded that the master's residence comprised at least twenty structures. "When I reached his place," this Frenchman wrote, "I thought I was entering a rather large village, but later on was told that all of it belonged to him."[17]
Offices near the great house were utilized as counting-rooms, schoolrooms, and sleeping quarters for the sons of the family as well as for a variety of other purposes. The kitchen, wash-house, dairy, smoke-house, and other offices intimately connected with the processes of housekeeping were usually set farther away in order to keep the mansion cool in summer and free it of the noise and odors of cooking.[18]
Within the manor house the lower floors were usually devoted entirely to social purposes. Halls and chambers were generally finely panelled in native pine or walnut, and the symmetry of the paneling, the deeply recessed windows, and the excellent proportion of the doors and mantels imparted dignity and beauty to the rooms. Frequently the effect was heightened by fine carving, and occasionally the pink or orange tones of mantels of sienna marble lent a pleasing touch of color.
In many of the apartments there were fine cornices, modillions, and dentils. Delicately fluted pilasters often flanked windows and doors. Elaborately carved cornice and mantel friezes and frets represented the most skilled craftsmanship of the period. Sometimes, as at "Carter's Grove," the miniature carving of the friezes was of exquisite beauty. Motifs such as the egg and dart, the Wall of Troy, and the Tudor rose were employed with fine effect.
In the halls ornamentation was frequently given freer scope than elsewhere. The wide passageways which extended through the houses were customarily broken midway by arches of fine proportions. The usual focal point of interest in the hallways, however, was the stairs, the sweep of which was often majestic. Carved and hidden newel posts were common, and sometimes the pattern of the posts reappeared in elaborate friezes below the landing. Twist-carved balusters were placed on the steps, and running floral and foliated carving decorated the risers or step-ends of many of the stairs.
For these homes the Virginia aristocrats imported furniture, china, plate, and other furnishings from England and France. Their letters to factors in the homeland were filled with descriptions of the articles wanted, and frequently specified that items must be in the latest London fashion. Choice pieces of walnut and mahogany, expensive mirrors, and carpets and hangings of the best quality graced their drawing rooms. Harpsichords, spinets, and other fine instruments stood in many homes, and portraits of members of the family, some by the best artists of the day, hung on their walls. In the dining rooms, fine crystal and plate emblazoned with the family crest gleamed on polished sideboards and tables.
Though they sometimes maintained residences at Williamsburg for the court season, the Virginia great were rarely absentee landlords in the sense that planters in other colonies were. Rather, they were country gentlemen residing on their manor plantations, and, as we have seen, seriously interested
Robert Andrews, a Pennsylvania youth educated at "the College of Phileda," served as a tutor at "Rosewell," the Page home in Gloucester County, for several years, and two young men from Princeton taught the Carter children at "Nomini Hall." Cf. letter of John Page, Jr., to John Norton. "Rosewell," September 18, 1772, in Mason, Frances Norton,
A "falling garden" consisted of a series of very broad terraces, usually connected by ramps covered with turf, oyster shell or other surface material to prevent erosion. In some instances the successive levels were planted in elaborate patterns. In others the whole was covered with turf. The "falling garden" at "Sabine Hall" retains its eighteenth-century design intact.
A ha-ha is a boundary to a garden, pleasure-ground, or park of such a nature as not to interrupt the view from the mansion and may not be seen until closely approached. According to a French etymologist, the name is derived from
At "Mount Vernon" the mansion and its wings together composed three sides of an open square, the main house and its wings closing the side opposite the open end. At "Stratford Hall" four dependent structures formed a square court, inside of which the great house stands. Two offices are set twenty-eight feet in advance of the main house on the land front. On the water front two others are placed in a similar relation to it. At "Shirley" the great house and four principal dependent buildings form a long rectangular court, the mansion closing the side facing the river.
A historian who described the Virginia residences at the beginning of the eighteenth century stated that "All their Drudgeries of Cookery, Washing, Daries, &c. are perform'd in Offices detacht from the Dwelling-Houses, which by this means are kept more cool and Sweet." Cf. Beverley, Robert,