Part 9 (1/2)

Expensive stone was imported for the house by Captain Roger Lyndon, master of the _Marigold_, whose account occurs in the ledger:

s. d.

1749 April By 630 Bricks at 20/ p^r m. 10

Dec^r By Gen'l Charges for hewn Stone from M^r Nicholson[98] 65 16 4

1750 June By Gen'l Charges for sundrys by the Marigold

By Do for freight of Stones to my House 5

It is interesting to note that bricks, probably carried from England as ballast, were brought by Captain Lyndon.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Figure 11.--FIREPLACE MANTELS ill.u.s.trated in William Salmon's _Palladio Londonensis_.

(_Courtesy of the Library of Congress._)]

Not all the hewn stone was fas.h.i.+oned in England. William Copein, a Prince William County mason, and Job Wigley were employed together in 1749 to the amount of 2 8s. In 1750 Copein was paid by Mercer for 64 days of work at 3s. 1d. per day, totaling 9 17s. 4d. Copein was another accomplished craftsman, the marks of whose skill still are to be seen in the carved stone doorways of Aquia Church in Stafford County and in the baptismal font at Pohick Church in Fairfax.

The design of the house will be considered in more detail later in the light of both archeological and doc.u.mentary evidence. It is already quite clear, however, that the new mansion was remarkably elaborate, reflecting the workmans.h.i.+p of some of Virginia's best craftsmen. The most significant clues to its inspiration are found in the t.i.tles of four books which Mercer purchased in 1747. These are listed in the inventory of his books in Ledger G as follows:

”Hoppne's Architecture.” This was probably _The Gentlemans and Builders Repository on Architecture Displayed. Designs Regulated and Drawn by E. Hoppus, and engraved by B. Cole. Containing useful and requisite problems in geometry ... etc_, (1738). Edward Hoppus was ”Surveyor to the Corporation of the London a.s.surance.” He also edited Salmon's _Palladio Londonensis_. We find no writer on architecture named Hoppne and a.s.sume this was a mistake.

”Salmon's Palladio Londonensis.” _Palladio Londonensis: or the London Art of Building_, by William Salmon, which appeared in at least two editions, in 1734 and in 1738, had a profound influence on the formal architecture of the colonies during the mid-century.

”Palladio's Architecture.” The Italian Andrea Palladio was the underlying source of English architectural thought from Christopher Wren down to Robert Adam. Under the patronage of Lord Burlington, this book was brought out in London in an English translation by Giacomo Leoni under the t.i.tle _The Architecture of A. Palladio; in Four Books_. It had appeared in three editions prior to this inventory, in 1715, 1721, and 1742, according to Fiske Kimball (_Domestic Architecture of the American Colonies and of the Early Republic_; New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1924, p. 58). Mercer probably owned one of these.

”Langley's City & Country Builder.” _City and Country Builder's and Workman's Treasury of Design_ by Battey Langley, 1740, 1745. This was another copybook much used by builders and provincial architects.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Figure 12.--DOORWAYS ILl.u.s.tRATED IN WILLIAM SALMON'S _Palladio Londonensis_ (the London Art of Building), one of the books used by William Bromley, the chief joiner who worked on Mercer's mansion. (_Courtesy of the Library of Congress._)]

All four of these books were listed in succession in the ledger and bracketed together. Next to the bracket are the initials ”WB,” to indicate that the books had been lent to someone who bore those initials. In this case it is virtually certain that the initials are those of William Bromley, to whom the books would have been of utmost importance in designing the woodwork of the house.

Door hardware was purchased from William Jordan in June 1749, according to an item for ”Locks & Hinges” that amounted to the large sum of 13 8s. 8d.

FOOTNOTES:

[93] Probably the same Thomas Anderson whose appointment as tobacco inspector at Page's warehouse, Hanover County, was unsuccessfully protested on the basis that the job required ”a person skilled in writing and expert in accounts”

(_Calendar of Virginia State Papers_, op. cit. (footnote 18), vol. 1, pp. 233-234). A letter to Thomas Anderson of Hanover County was listed as uncalled for at the Williamsburg Post Office in August, 1752 (_Virginia Gazette_; all references to the _Gazettes_ result from use of LESTER J. CAPPON and STELLA F. DUFF, _Virginia Gazette Index 1736-1780_ [Williamsburg, 1950], and microfilm published by The Inst.i.tute of Early American History and Culture [Williamsburg, 1950]).

[94] See THOMAS TILESTON WATERMAN, _The Mansions of Virginia, 1706-1776_ (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1946), pp. 183-184, and MARCUS WHIFFEN, _The Public Buildings of Williamsburg_ (Williamsburg, Virginia: Colonial Williamsburg, Inc., 1958), pp. 84, 133, 218.

[95] WHIFFEN, ibid., pp. 134-137, 217; _JHB, 1742-1747; 1748-1749_ op. cit. (footnote 6), p. 312; _JHB, 1752-1755; 1756-1758_ (Richmond, 1909), p. 28.

[96] Purdie & Dixon's _Virginia Gazette_, September 26, 1766.

Mercer spelled the name _Brownley_ in Ledger G, but in the _Gazette_ article it is printed consistently as _Bromley_. As published in the _George Mercer Papers_ it is spelled, and perhaps miscopied, _Bramley_. We have chosen _Bromley_ as the most likely spelling, in the absence of other references to him.

[97] _George Mercer Papers_, op. cit. (footnote 51), p. 204.

[98] Captain Timothy Nicholson was a London merchant and s.h.i.+pmaster engaged in the Virginia trade with whom Mercer arranged several transactions.