Chapter Three (1777-1792): "give beauty & granduer to the pile"

Table of Contents 

Chapter Three (1777-1792): "give beauty & granduer to the pile"

26. A 1757 map of Maryland before the Plan

"Eclat" became a choice word in the correspondence of the "Founders" shortly after the alliance with France in 1776. The young Marquis de Lafayette who led the French expeditionary army personified eclat. For General Washington that French word meant more than style and brilliance. It also meant the thunder-striking solution to a problem. Founding a national capital was not as problematic as beating the British, and congress gave the president until 1800 to have the city ready. However, before the Revolution the General had led troops in the American theatre of the Seven Years War between Britain and France. He had never overseen planning and building a city or experienced the palaces and forums where heroes of old had made their mark. Having never been to Europe or Mexico City, which had a population around 100,000 in 1790, he was hard pressed to even imagine what a capital city to rival all others should look like. 

To solve the problem, he called on another Frenchman who in a way was more impressive because he wasn't a marquis. L'Enfant had briefly signed his name "de L'Enfant," but his father, Pierre Nicholas Lenfant, was a government painter specializing in battle scenes and a teacher at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris. The son studied at the school and was trained to be a painter. Nonetheless, in 1777, Pierre Charles L'Enfant let himself be recruited as a military engineer and was accepted as such in America even by his French colleagues, who then began to teach him how to be one. After the war after all his colleagues  returned to France, Peter Charles L'Enfant was arguably America's premiere engineer.(2)

Two hundred years later, his lack of academic credentials would trouble historians, but it had not troubled influential contemporaries. In 1792, when L'Enfant's knowledge of "water-works" was challenged, Alexander Hamilton, who had known him for over a decade, retorted: "He is by Trade what is called in France a civil Engineer that is an Artist acquainted with Mechanics generally; particularly in reference to Architecture Aqueducts Canals &c &c including necessarily a knowlege of Hydraulicks. This is the mans profession, & from my knowlege of him I rely that he will undertake nothing which he is not able to execute solidly and well."(3)

Of course, President Washington was looking for more than an engineer, and in that regard, he had witnessed L'Enfant's talents. In July 1782, Major L'Enfant made a temporary ballroom to celebrate the birth of the Dauphin, which was the title given to the heir to the French throne. Beside the French minister's rented house on Philadelphia's Chestnut Street, L'Enfant built a 40 by 60 foot frame building open all around with "painted pillars" supporting a ceiling decorated “with several pieces of neat paintings emblematical of the design of the entertainment.” The garden beside the building “was cut into beautiful walks, and divided with cedar and pine branches into artificial groves.” 

In 1783, he designed the diploma and medal for Society of the Cincinnati, the fraternal order of American and French officers who served in the war just ending. The General sent him to France in the fall of 1783 to notify French officers and have the diploma printed and the silver medals made. As a rule, French officers were not allowed to wear foreign medals. Louis XVI bowed to L'Enfant. He left France in March with diplomas and medals for American members to purchase. A flaw found in the medal raised suspicions but friends in the Society defended L'Enfant's honor.(4)

He settled in New York City where members of the Cincinnati became leaders in the city's government and institutions. As well as private work as an architect, he altered Trinity Church so it could better coexist with a monument to Richard Montgomery, the first fallen hero of the war. On July 23, 1788, the New York City celebrated the ratification of the Constitution with a procession honoring trades and professions that would benefit from the new federal government. The Federal Ship Hamilton stole the show as it maneuvered through narrow streets and "sailed" over hilly greens. The procession of 5,000 people extended a mile and a half and ended where three temporary pavilions were joined. Supported by ten colonnades, they covered ground enough, 880 feet by 600 feet, to accommodate 6,000 people, and were built in less than 5 days. An official account described the middle building as "majestically rising above the whole terminated with a dome, on top of which was a figure of Fame trumpeting a New Era...." The account concluded "the taste and genius of Major L'Enfant (so often displayed on other occasions) and to whom the city is indebted for the design and execution, appeared in the present occasion to have derived additional brilliancy from the dignity of the object on which it was employed...."(5)

Then in 1788, he turned a nondescript building into Federal Hall to accommodate the new Federal government. He completed the job in time and to general satisfaction. The painter and playwright William Dunlap, who was then 23 years old, captured the living moment on April 30, 1789, when thanks to L'Enfant, Washington's greatness was framed by architecture. He took the oath of office on a balcony that led into the senate chamber and over looked the street. Dunlap thought the balcony was “made sacred” by the inauguration. Later, the president's secretary informed L'Enfant that Martha Washington wanted L'Enfant to give her a tour of Federal Hall.(6)

30. Federal Hall

In 1789, congress began debating legislation to fulfill its Constitutional obligation to create a capital for the federal government. The debate over where to put the capital made no difference to L'Enfant. In September 1789, he wrote to the president asking for the chance to draw a plan for the new capital “on such a Scale as to leave room for that aggrandisement & embellishment which the increase of the wealth of the Nation will permit it to pursue at any period however remote....” He also asked for a career.

The Confederation congress had created the office of Surveyor of the United States. L'Enfant asked to be appointed Engineer of the United States. He pointed out that he was the only member of the army's old engineering corps still in the United States. He offered to design and build fortifications to protect the coast, and added “that the sciences of Military and civil architecture are so connected as to render an Engineer Equally serviceable in time of peace as in war by the employment of his abilities in the internal improvemen⟨ts⟩ of the Country.” All to say, he could design the public buildings in the new capital. The president did not reply to letters begging for a job.(7)

In July, after a year of plotting and acrimonious debate, congress passed the Residence Act of 1790 that empowered the president to put the federal district somewhere along an 110 miles stretch of the Potomac River. The plan of a city inside the district as well as the designs of the Capitol and other public buildings were entirely up to the president.(8) The State of Maryland put up $72,000 in seed money. Virginia promised to pitch in with $120,000. As long as he didn't ask congress to appropriate money, the president had complete control. He had to appoint three commissioners to procure the land but did not need the Senate's advice and consent. On January 22, 1791, he announced the site of the federal district and appointed the three commissioners. Thomas Johnson was the most prominent. He had been the former Revolutionary War governor of Maryland and co-founder, along with Washington, of the Potomac Company which aimed to develop the river as the principal  commercial route to the West. Congressman Daniel Carroll of Rock Creek, another Marylander, and Dr. David Stuart, a politically savvy Virginia doctor filled out the board. The latter was married to Eleanor Calvert Custis, Martha Washington's widowed daughter-in-law. The president decided on the site of the federal district before he appointed the commissioners. In February, the president sent Andrew Ellicott to survey and mark the boundaries of the new district. He decided on the site of the federal city before the commissioners had their first meeting. In March 1791, he sent L'Enfant to Georgetown to make a plan for the federal capital to be built just across Rock Creek and stretching to the Eastern Branch, now known as the Anacostia River, to the east. Since the Confederation congress had set March 4, 1789, as the date when the first federal congress would convene, it adjourned on March 3, 1791. The second congress would convene in December. That allowed the president to leave Philadelphia in late March and check on L'Enfant's progress.

Inclement weather prevented the president from touring the site with L'Enfant, but he negotiated and signed the founding document of the city with a dozen gentlemen eager to sell their land for the new capital city at $66 an acre provided that once the city was divided into building lots, they would retain half. Surveyors would soon begin to mark 1200 squares most with more than 20 lots. The original proprietors thought that would assure their making a fortune as the city grew. By selling their moiety, the commissioners expected to raise millions to build the public buildings and the city's infrastructure. After his meeting with the proprietors, the General set off on a presidential tour of the Southern states. Upon returning he hoped to affirm L'Enfant's choices for the sites of the Capitol and President's house. Meanwhile, the three commissioners were still trying to organize their first meeting, which didn't bother the president. His secretary of state, Thomas Jefferson, with congressman James Madison's help, had shepherded the Residence Act through congress, and was eager to advise L'Enfant and the commissioners. In the British government, secretaries of state had handled both foreign and domestic matters. It was assumed that in regards to domestic matters, an American secretary of state would little to do by way of telling sixteen states what to do which would allow him to focus on the future residence of the federal government.(9)

In April, Secretary of State Jefferson wrote to L'Enfant: "I am happy that the President has left the planning of the town in such good hands." He immediately sent L'Enfant the plans of several European cities, fruits of his four years in Paris where he replaced Franklin as America's ambassador. He encouraged L'Enfant to draw a plan with "very liberal reservations" for the public and gave his ideas for the public buildings: “Whenever it is proposed to prepare plans for the Capitol, I should prefer the adoption of some one of the models of antiquity which have had the approbation of thousands of years; and for the President’s house I should prefer the celebrated fronts of Modern buildings which have already received the approbation of all good judges. Such are the Galerie du Louvre, the Gardes meubles, and two fronts of the Hotel de Salm. But of this it is yet time enough to consider.”(10) On April 23, Daniel Carroll, one of the three commissioner, cheered L'Enfant on. In a letter to James Madison, he predicted that before the president returned in late June “it is probable some plans of the City and the public buildings may be then exhibited."(11)

When the president return to the city in July, he was so pleased with L'Enfant's ideas that he mentioned that in a letter to the former aide who had arranged for L'Enfant to give Martha a tour of the federal building in New York. He had sent that aide to represent America at the court of the King of Portugal in Lisbon. Of course, news of the future American capital had international importance, and who wouldn't be pleased to know that “the business of laying out the city, the grounds for public buildings, walks & c is progressing under the inspection of Major L’Enfant with pleasing prospects." 

L'Enfant responded to such personal attention with a work of eclat, "The Plan of the City of Washington." On August 19, 1791, the Major gushed to the president that "the heigest of my embition Gratified in having met with your approbation in the project of the Plan which I have now the Honor of presenting to you altered agreeable to your direction." He added that: “the spots assigned for the Federal House & for the President palace in exibiting the most sumpteous aspect and claiming already the suffrage of a crowd of daily visitor both natives & foreigners will serve to give a grand Idea of the whole,...”(1) 

The Plan struck the attention of many, including on the island of Tortola. Mrs. Brodeau kept Thornton's mind on opportunities in his adopted country, especially the development of the new nation's capital. Evidently, she didn't know anything about her son-in-law's African plans. She noted the disdain most in Philadelphia had for the project, but she also passed on the opinion that as long as George Washington lived, the capital would move to the Potomac River. Thornton exhibited more faith in the project. In a November 3, 1791, letter to her, he opined that since lots had been sold in the new federal district in October, the government would move there. He continued: “I must own if I purchase it will be in the 10 mile square, and I....” and that portion of the letter discussing that possible future is missing. It was written before Thornton saw the plan. On December 21, Mrs. Brodeau wrote to Thornton about "a most elegant plan laid down for the Federal City...." and promised to send a drawing of it as soon as possible. When Thornton returned to Philadelphia, he sent a copy of the plan to a fellow student at Edinburgh and to his step-brother. He alerted the latter that "this place is improving very fast and property rises prodigiously here." On the other hand, he also angled for but failed to get loans to buy more slave plantations in the Virgin Islands. Perhaps, his sometimes antic take on slaves didn't help.  In April 1793, when trying to get a mortgage on his share of the property, assuming his step-father would divide the property, he told his agent: "You will observe in choosing the Negroes that I prefer good field Negroes to house Negroes, and good clowns to gentlemen and ladies."(12)

32. The Plan

Unfortunately for L'Enfant, General Washington wanted a chain of command to implement the plan. The three commissioners had only been working on getting title to the land taken for the city-to-be not covered by the March agreement with the proprietors. Just after L'Enfant came to Philadelphia in August  1791 with his plan for the city, the president sent Jefferson and Madison to Georgetown to confer with the commissioners. They decided to have design contests for the public buildings. L'Enfant was stunned. The president vetoed the design contests, but told the commissioners to oversee L'Enfant's work. After having conferred about the future of their city with the president alone, L'Enfant bristled at getting an order from the commissioners. The summer of eclat was over. (13)

To make a long story short, that bristling became just one in a series of actions and in-actions on L'Enfant's part that the commissioners and president thought were perverse. L'Enfant refused to show a copy of his city plan during an October auction of lots. L'Enfant refused to hire brick makers and dig clay for bricks. L'Enfant tore down the house being built by Commissioner Carroll's nephew because it was in a future street. The president insisted that he work under the commissioners, and at the same time told the commissioners that he thought L'Enfant was irreplaceable. After all, neither the commissioners nor the president had any idea how to build a capital city. 

Jefferson did have ideas, and his sympathy was crucial to L'Enfant's survival. The president asked him to in effect arbitrate the dispute between L'Enfant and Carroll's nephew. Jefferson was also a lawyer and thought L'Enfant went too far too fast. Meanwhile, he discovered a good French draftsman in Philadelphia who also had trained to be an architect. He was trying to help L'Enfant get the Plan engraved. In December 1791, as L'Enfant fell from favor, Jefferson gave Stephen Hallet some ideas for a Capitol and he drew a design forever known as the "fancy" design. 

While L'Enfant's Plan was not engraved until July and not distributed until the fall, L'Enfant asked Hallet to reduce the plan so that it could be engraved and printed. Thus he not only had Jefferson's ideas to guide but also the outlines of a Capitol that L'Enfant drew on his plan. After only two years in the country and without  a command of English, it is doubtful that Hallet grasped the American system of divided government. But his fancy plan pictured it. Architectural historian Pamela Scott put it this way: "Hallet's precomposition design shown to Jefferson in 1791, established the basic form the Capitol was eventually to take: a central dome, flanked by wings containing legislative chambers, symbolically separate yet part of a single architectural unit." 

However, there is no evidence that at that time Jefferson shared Hallet's fancy plan or even alluded to its existence when with or writing to the president or the commissioners. Jefferson balanced a passion for architecture with an aversion to criticism. History would credit him for the design of the State Capitol in Richmond, but he was in Paris, the legislature asked for a design which was freely modified before being built. He had been part of the process, but in 1792 he found himself effectively in control of the design process for the Capitol. Foisting a design that he personally commissioned might invite criticism and endanger his political ambitions. In January 1792, his job was to manage L'Enfant who returned to Philadelphia again where, he told the commissioners, he could have access to books when he worked on his designs for the public buildings. But first he drew up a comprehensive work plan estimating the number of stone workers, carpenters and laborers that would be needed. He also estimated the amount of "rough stone" needed, as well as lime, and the cost of lumber. He didn't estimate the number of bricks but noted the need for 23 brick makers. Obviously, he had outlines of buildings in his mind, if not on paper. He estimated the total cost, $4 million dollars, and proposed a plan for a loan of that amount. But he never showed the president, Jefferson or the commissioners his designs for the Capitol and President's house. Rumor had it that L'Enfant showed "different views" to the artist Col. John Trumbull.

The Colonel had stood on Capitol Hill with the Major in 1791. He would also hand Thornton's second design to the president in 1793. He concluded that there was enough known about L'Enfant's design ideas to give them some agency in the design process. In a 1795 letter to L'Enfant, he rued the differences between L'Enfant and the commissioners, and wished "that the noble plans you formed then might not be entirely defaced by want of professional knowledge in those to whom the buildings might be entrusted." In an 1818 letter to Charles Bulfinch, the architect who took over the project from Benjamin Latrobe, Trumbull observed “that the great circular room and dome, made a part of the earliest idea of the Capitol, projected by Major L'Enfant, drawn by Dr. Thornton, and adopted by General Washington.” Trumbull had graphic evidence of L'Enfant's "projection" of the Capitol. He cited the outline of the building on the engraving of the L'Enfant Plan as proof, no matter that it was about an inch wide.(18)

27. A hint of L'Enfant's plan for the Capitol?

 

One of L'Enfant's assistants, who had supervised workers tentatively digging a foundation on Capitol Hill, would return to the city in June 1793, and report back to L'Enfant that "the Bow of the [Capitol] is carried 75 feet lower down the hill than you intended." That suggests that L'Enfant had a design, at least in his mind, with a circular room forming the West front just as Thornton would draw.(15)

In a February 22 letter to L'Enfant, Jefferson cited "the advance of the season" for requiring "that the plans for the buildings... should be in readiness," and asked if L'Enfant was "disposed to continue...." He added that "your continuance would be desireable" to the president, but added "that the law requires it should be in subordination to the Commissioners." On the 26th, L'Enfant replied with a 4,000 word letter that professed his devotion to the federal city but he refused to work under the commissioners. Jefferson replied that  "your services must be at an end." In a March 8 letter to Commissioner Stuart, the president dressed down L'Enfant in the harshest terms. Looking forward to the design contests for the public buildings, he fretted about what damage L'Enfant might still do to the city. He told the commissioner not to expect any "aid" from L'Enfant, "rather I apprehend opposition and a reprobation of every one designed by any other, however perfect."(16) As it turned out, L'Enfant did not reprobate any designs. However, that he expressed such a fear of L'Enfant's criticism suggests that he could conceive of a perfect design beyond criticism. There could be a design with undeniable eclat, but he must see a plan. Jefferson had one, but kept it in reserve.

There is no better way to get plans than by advertising a design contest with a $500 first prize and $200 for the runner up. The president expected Jefferson to make the arrangements which meant that instead of the problematic L'Enfant, he faced the problematic Commissioner Johnson. Jefferson was governor of Virginia during the Revolution and counted by many as a coward. Governor Johnson, who was over a foot shorter than the lanky Virginian, was a counted a hero. He had never been to Europe, but he knew an English builder who was bricking up Baltimore. Johnson built buildings at his Frederick iron mines with bricks, and he wanted the Capitol made with bricks. Needless to say, he wrote a prospectus for the design contests that did not give a grand idea of the whole.

 

 

It suggested that the President's house could be built piecemeal: "A central Part... capable of admitting additional Parts, in future, if they shall be wanting." As for the Capitol, the Senate should be 1200 square feet. A Conference Room and Room for the Representatives "sufficient to accommodate 300 Persons each." Twelve committee rooms each had to have 600 square feet. Both of the buildings were also "to be of Brick." Finally, along with "Ground-Plats," elevations and sections, an entry should include "an estimate of the cubic feet of Brick-Work composing the whole Mass of the Walls."  There was no mention of "models of antiquity which have had the approbation of thousands of years"

Thornton cued the first design that he drew in Tortola to the relative size of the rooms that the prospectus dictated. His rectangular Senate room was twice the size of a committee room. His rectangular room for the "Representants," as he labeled it in a French fashion, would be twice the size of the Senate. Between them sat the rectangular Conference Room, which thanks to two slightly bowed windows was a little bit larger than the room for the Representants. Sixty feet separated the Senate from the House. Their smaller room afforded senators the convenience of having two committee rooms next door. Other committee rooms would be distributed in two smaller two story buildings flanking the main building.

 

 

Thornton knew of the American taste for the Classical orders. But he kept his columns well within the bounds of a typical Georgian government house. Nothing was full bore Neo-classical save that the pediment could barely contain an eagle trying to fly away from the six anemic Ionic columns below. The sloping roof that also unites all the rooms is topped with a chaste colonnade and cupola. The latter was an indulgence. The prospectus for the Capitol didn't call for one; the prospectus for the library forbade it in order to economize.

 

Most of the entries were as dull as Thornton's, but he had one advantage. He didn't read about the contest until it was too late to submit a design before the July 15 deadline. Three submissions made an impact, likely because the designers had been exposed to the ideas of L'Enfant or Jefferson or both. Despite Hallet's help, the French printer L'Enfant hired promised only delays. Then Samuel Blodget, Jr., burst upon the scene. He was a Yankee just back from a stint of successful stock trading in London where he bet heavily on the India trade. He bought federal city lots as well as land not yet divided. In March, he also promised to package a $500,000 loan for the commissioners, and knew that with his Boston connections he could get the Plan engraved and printed in no time at all. By July, there was no loan and only a proof sheet of the Plan that he could give to Jefferson but Blodget had an almost completed entry for the Capitol design contest. Needless to say, he knew L'Enfant's Plan and his expression of the Capitol. In Philadelphia, he discussed architecture with Jefferson. From Boston, he sent him a preliminary plan of the Capitol to be viewed "at 3 yards distance in a good light before you determine on the effect it may produce." He convinced everyone he talked to that the Capitol must have a dome to dominate the two wings of the building.

Blodget entertained the right person with his idea for a dome. While in Paris, Jefferson was especially struck by a modern variation on an ancient theme that democratized the dome. The Halle au Ble or the Wheat Exchange was a warehouse for evaluating and marketing the wheat harvest. It had a high wooden dome mounted on a wall of arches surrounding an oval floor. Where the French had shocks of wheat, Jefferson saw the American congress. Blodget looked askance at the wooden dome that Jefferson wanted, and hinted that a "rustic base" would be economical enough to allow stone columns and dome. In August, Jefferson passed what Blodget sent him on to the president who passed it on to the commissioners. His plan has been lost. The commissioners also didn't think it completed enough to be an entry. But the necessity of dome caught on.

Another entrant who likely had some inkling of L'Enfant's ideas was Judge George Turner, an English gentleman who rose to the rank of major fighting for the revolution. He served in South Carolina where L'Enfant had made his mark, and like L'Enfant was captured by the British. As secretary of the Society of the Cincinnati, Turner had defended L'Enfant and helped sell his medals to state chapters of the society. Unfortunately, Turner asked for the immediate return of his design and it is no longer extant. Having worked for General Washington during the war and in Society of the Cincinnati, he naturally asked for an office in the new government preferably near the seat of government to better support "a small family." In 1789, the president appointed him as one of three judges to be sent to the Northwest Territory. It took some prodding by the president's secretary to get him to go west and after getting as far down the Ohio River as far as Vincennes, he returned to Philadelphia by December 1791. He likely entered the design contest on the chance that it would at least win him a job near the future seat of government. He likely wanted his design returned for same reason. He would remain the only source of his ideas.

At the last moment, Hallet entered a design and it was unlike anything he drew before or after. He seemed to purposely go contrary to the L'Enfant/Jefferson model. Instead, his design seemed to entomb the houses of congress, but he redeemed himself as an unparalleled draftsman by surrounding the complex with 40 columns.

Hallet's July 1792 floor plan

The commissioners forwarded the designs to the president as they came in, and they expressed some enthusiasm for Turner's design: "There is something in it agreeable and striking to us." As for Hallet, they told the president that they were "inviting him down to attempt Improvements." They evidently were made aware that Jefferson had a more interesting Hallet design.

In a July 23 letter to the commissioners, the president clearly favored Turner's design. In retrospect, what is most interesting about the letter is that it roughly describes the design Thornton would submit in January: 

Your favor of the 19th, accompanying Judge Turner’s plan for a Capitol, I have duly received; and have no hesitation in declaring that I am more agreeably struck with the appearance of it than with any that has been presented to you.... There is the same defect, however, in this plan as there is in all the plans which have been presented to you—namely—the want of an Executive apartment: wch ought, if possible, to be obtained. The Dome, which is suggested as an addition to the center of the edifice, would, in my opinion, give beauty & granduer to the pile; and might be useful for the reception of a Clock—Bell, &ca. The Pilastrade too, in my Judgement, ought (if the plan is adopted) to be carried around the simicircular projections at the ends; but whether it is necessary to have the elevation of the upper Storey 41 feet is questionable; unless it be to preserve exactness in the proportion of the several parts of the building; in that case, the smaller Rooms in that Storey would be elevated sufficiently if cut in two, & would be the better for it in the interior provided they can be lighted. This would add to the number of Committee Rooms of which there appears to be a dificiency....

Could such a plan as Judge Turner’s be surrounded with Columns, and a colonade like that which was presented to you by Monsr Hallet (the Roof of Hallet’s I must confess does not hit my taste)—without departing from the principles of Architecture—and would not be too expensive for our means, it would, in my judgement, be a noble & desireable Structure. But, I would have it understood in this instance, and always, when I am hazarding a sentiment on these buildings, that I profess to have no knowledge in  Architecture, and think we should (to avoid criticisms) be governed by the established Rules which are laid down by the professors of this Art.(27)

An Executive apartment, a dome, semi-circular projections and a more extensive use of pilasters all wound up in the design Thornton entered in the contest. He would also compress the wings of the building to better dignify its center. The semi-circular projections on its North and South Fronts found no place in the building as constructed which relieved historians from explaining why Turner offered them and the president noticed them. Turner likely was aware that before moving into Robert Morris's mansion at 6th and Market Streets in Philadelphia, the president directed that a semicircular projection be constructed on a side room with a "Bow-Window."(27A)

In response to the president's letter, the commissioners invited Turner to join Hallet in Georgetown where they could discuss their designs with the president. They all conferred on August 26 & 27 and also looked at some of the other plans including what Blodget offered. He was then in Boston, and, by the way, the secretary of state was at Monticello. To the president and commissioners none of the designs "appeared so completed in the whole as to fix a decided opinion...." They faulted the advertisement for not describing all the rooms necessary, i.e, the Executive apartment was missing.

The upshot of the meeting seemed to be to rely on Hallet, the trained architect, to draw another design. A September 21 letter Hallet wrote to Jefferson gives the impression that the commissioners left it completely up to him to make an acceptable design. In his letter, written in French, he didn't mention Turner's plan and described the commissioners' orders as merely increasing the proportions of his design without changing its "form." That required increasing the size of his columns which would be too expensive. So, the commissioners asked him to make a design similar to what he made for Jefferson in 1791: "J’ai recu ordre de travailler a un nouveau projet dans le Sistême de celui que J’ai eu l’honneur de vous faire voir a Philadelphie l’année derniere." Hallet had new a design by October which roughly approximates what was finally finished by Bulfinch in 1829.

Hallet October 1792

 

 

Capitol in 1846

Hallet added that he expected his "new plan Will be accepted or rejected after being exposed to the judgment of the Public, which will undoubtedly be numerous here on October 8th because of the Land Sale which will take place at that time." All that said, Hallet wrote the letter because he had just seen the president who was on his way back to Philadelphia. He presumably saw what Hallet was working on and his reaction was to ask Hallet what qualified him to be an architect. He begged Jefferson to relay his bona fides to the president.

One gets the impression that due to his poor command of English, Hallet didn't fully grasp what was happening. But at least he and his design didn't disappear from consideration. The next official mention of Turner was a November letter from Secretary of State Jefferson informing him that the president expected him to go to Ohio as soon as possible. There was no mention of his Capitol design. Evidently the administration was too embarrassed to ask Turner to improve his design while he was expected elsewhere on official duties. He was not the only AWOL appointee in the West which added to the embarrassment. Meanwhile, even with an open path to victory, Hallet's designs still did not gel into something acceptable. If he showed his design at the October sale, no one seems to have mentioned it. Likely he didn't because the president still did not like what he saw and the commissioners asked Hallet to draw yet another.

Judging from what the president had written about Turner's design, Hallet simply didn't understand the president's wanting to exalt the center of the building with both an "Executive apartment" and a dome. Likely thanks to Jefferson's fascination with the Halle au Ble, Hallet had the two wings with a domed roof and with facades which in some respects were more noble than the facade of the center portion. That meant that the dome over the center portion didn't steal the show. It didn't add sufficient "beauty and grandeur to the pile." With the House and Conference Room in the wing, that left the Senate in the center of the building which may have put too much focus on that body for president's taste. It continually vexed him and, after all, that is where Caesar died.

On September 4, 1792, the commissioners received a letter from Tortola dated July 12, 1792 and signed “Fellow Citizen.” That worthy reported that as soon as he had heard about the design competition, he had “been constantly engaged since endeavoring to accomplish what you propose.” He claimed he was keeping “strictly to the rules of architecture.” He didn't send the design because he meant to “depart hence in a few days for America.” The spur to action came at the right time. In a May letter to Granville Sharp, Thornton stopped asking for support for his African scheme, and offered to be "a member" of the Sierra Leone project, "if I could know the terms and be able to obtain the suffrage of its members." He likely expected no response and got none. Thornton landed in Philadelphia three weeks after the October sale of lots and moved into a house on Chestnut Street not far from his mother-in-law's house. She prepared everything and he was able to look to his affairs immediately. On November 9, he wrote to the commissioners, using his real name, and explained that a serious illness had detained him in Tortola. However, he had learned from Turner that a decision had not been made. Commissioner Carroll, who Thornton had met in Philadelphia in 1787, wrote back on November 15 welcoming his design and looking forward to seeing it on December 1 when the commissioners had their monthly meeting. Then at the December meeting, since Hallet would not finish his revised design until January, the commissioners made that the deadline. Thornton now had time enough to make a design to compete with Hallet's.  

However, Commissioner Stuart had already alerted the president that Hallet would be the winner: "From the judgement I could form of it, in it’s unfinished state, I entertain very sanguine hopes that it will meet with approbation." Even if it didn't, Stuart still saw a role for Hallet teamed up with Blodget. In a letter to Stuart, the president called Blodget "a projecting genius." The commissioners and president began thinking of Blodget as just the man to be the Superintendent of the City. The president averred that L'Enfant was the only man he ever knew who he thought could do the job, but Blodget won the president's full support by promising to finance the development of Pennsylvania Avenue. Stuart seemed delighted with the president's endorsement of Blodget, and reminded him that with Hallet around Blodget need not be an architect: "Tho’ he [Blodget] may not be so thorough an Architect as some others, he has certainly turned his attention much to that subject, and may I think be justly allowed to have a very pretty taste for it. And more perhaps is not so very necessary, if Mr Hallet is employed in the same line for the execution of the Capitol, in which Hoben is for the President’s house; which I should suppose very proper—I believe he fully deserves the high opinion Mr Jefferson entertains of him." James Hoban had emigrated from Ireland around 1786, won plaudits for designing and building houses in Charleston, South Carolina. With letters of introduction, he won the president's blessing, worked with the commissioners, won the design contest for the President's house and the commissioners hired him to supervise its construction.

At the same time, Turner met with Thornton. He had been one of the three attesting witnesses to Thornton's steam-cannon demonstration. He never had the money to invest in the steamboat company, which prompted other directors to ignore him, but Thornton didn't. When Thornton offered the first fruits of sojourn in Tortola, Turner was delighted. It wasn't his Capitol design, instead he handed Turner what would be called  Cadmus, or a Treatise on the Elements of Written Languages. Here was how he explained it in a letter to Lettsom: "I prove clearly that there are thirty letters in the English language, twenty-one of which are vowels and the remaining nine are aspirates. There is no language that I cannot write perfectly (with regard to sound I mean), nor indeed is there a dialect that I cannot reduce to writing, provided I can pronounce it. Upon this plan I can shew clearly that there is not a sentence in all the books ever published in English of ten words properly spelt!" When he had the 110 page book printed, he added an introduction inviting the new Republic to be the marvel of the world by having a rational orthography. He had the facing pages of the introduction written in the new alphabet. Years later, after Cadmus got a bad review in a British magazine, Turner reminded him that while sitting around a table, he and Mrs. Thornton had told him not to make his introduction too revolutionary.  

In November 1792, Thornton's first goal was to win the annual prize given by the American Philosophical Society for the best dissertation. He did and Turner, who was a member  of the Society until expelled in 1800 for embezzlement of Society funds, became the book's greatest exponent. After he settled in Ohio in the late summer of 1793, he claimed that Cadmus allowed him to understand Indian languages. Indeed, after a judicial reign of terror made his resignation an honorable way to avoid impeachment, in 1797, he came back East as an expert in Indian culture.

Perhaps, the evident elasticity of Thornton's talents convinced Turner to invest his time into bettering Thornton's Capitol design. His Tortola design exhibited skill in depicting pilasters, columns, pediments and urns. Thornton only lacked good information. On the back of Thornton's Tortola design, Turner sketched a semblance of the Hallet design that was inspired by Jefferson which illustrated the American ideal of divided government. Its nodes of power had to be more than 60 feet from each other. As architect and historian Don Hawkins, who discovered the sketch, put it: "The similarities and differences between the sketch and Hallet's designs are of the sort that might have been the result of being drawn by someone who had seen all his drawings and was attempting to give a sense from memory of how things stood in the Capitol design process." 

 

 In Thornton's papers at the Library of Congress there is an aborted first take on a new floor plan that showed his stubborn adherence to his Tortola design. It kept its East Front, and added semicircular projections to the other fronts of the building.  

 

The design Thornton submitted which won the $500 prize was soon lost. By 1797, he had reconstituted it but clearly what he drew then was not what he drew in 1793. Using what documentary evidence that there is, Hawkins offered a floor plan that captures what Thornton submitted in January 1793. Its distinguishing feature was a very large Rotunda topped by a dome. Thornton's Tortola design didn't have any oval rooms. It's not known if Turner's design had oval rooms, but he could have pointed out to Thornton that the Capitol on L'Enfant's map seemed to have one. Thanks to Jefferson's regard for the Halle au Ble, Hallet's October design had one. The design the president chose for the President's house also had one on each floor. But no one drew an oval room like Thornton's. It had no purpose other than being a glorious space topped by a dome for an American Pantheon where he would put the long talked about equestrian statue of General Washington. He had the Executive apartment overlooking the Rotunda and, to its west, a semi-circular Conference Room which gave the impression that those gathered below would be taking orders, not giving them to the president 

Thornton certainly added "grandeur to the pile" and didn't forget the Executive. As for the legislative chambers, Thornton's semi-circular projections on the wings were just big enough to light up the largely rectangular House and Senate chambers. Turner may have noted that the president had wondered if, except for the dome, the building had to be over 41 feet high. As an experienced landscape painter, Thornton could easily proportion a design to better focus attention on the center by streamlining the wings. While his floor plan was busier than Hallet's, his East Elevation showed how it could all be contained in a seemingly efficient and economical pilestraded exterior. The colonnaded exterior balcony on arches was reminiscent of the one where the General was sworn in as president.

 
In 1818, John Trumbull recalled in a letter to Charles Bulfinch that when drawing his design Thornton was "assisted by a Russian officer of engineers, and the Vitruvius Britannicus." Ulrich Rivardi had spent time with Thornton in Tortola and in Philadelphia but what Thornton drew had no semblance to the fortifications that Major Rivardi would soon design for the American army. Trumbull remembered the wrong major, but thanks to the Vitruvius Britannicus, Thornton had multiple models of basements faced with rusticated stone which was the most picturesque way to focus attention on the Grand Story above. Marcus Vitruvius Pollio was a first century BC Roman who wrote a book on architecture. Then in 1715, the Scottish architect Colen Campbell published Vitruvius Britannicus about British architecture. Its 200 plates are mostly elevations of country houses. The book allowed Thornton to copy the facades popular in Britain. In 1795, Thornton would refer to it in a letter to the president defending the necessity of a "rustic" basement story.                 

Hallet's January design had a Conference Room a la Halle au Ble, and shaped a House Chamber with semi-circular front and back. However, Hallet did little to flatter the executive branch, tucking it in the middle of the building with the Senate. His dome was small and more Baroque than Classical. Indeed, architectural historian Pamela Scott characterized his January 1793 design as shaped like a Greek cross: "The resultant Greek-cross form, which answered all functional and symbolic purposes, was unusual in it fusion of antique and baroque elements." The president and secretary of state were underwhelmed.

The commissioners had instructed Thornton to give his plan to the secretary of state who would then give it to the president.  Thornton came up with a better go-between. John Trumbull had been collecting subscriptions to finance his masterpieces. Thornton was one of many who subscribed, and he was one of few Americans who, thanks to his few months in London showing off his paintings, understood the world of art. He and Trumbull became friends. Col. Trumbull had been an aide-de-camp to Washington during the war which ever after gave him easy access to the president. Alone with Trumbull, the president could concentrate on Thornton's design, not his bona fides, and he was well pleased:

I have had under consideration Mr Hallet’s plans for the Capitol, which undoubtedly have a great deal of merit. Doctor Thornton has also given me a view of his. These last come forward under some very advantageous circumstances. The Grandeur, Simplicity and Beauty of the exterior—the propriety with which the apartments are distributed—and the œconomy in the mass of the whole structure, will, I doubt not, give it a preference, in your eyes, as it has done in mine, and those of several others whom I have consulted, and who are deemed men of skill and taste in Architecture. I have therefore thought it better to give the Doctor time to finish his plan, and for this purpose to delay ’till your next meeting a final decision.

Unlike the letter the president wrote comparing Hallet's and Turner's plans, this letter said nothing in particular about the plans at hand. He also didn't say anything about Thornton except that he had not actually finished his plan. By the way, if he noticed Turner's influence on the plan, it made no difference. He told Jefferson to inform the attorney general of Turner's refusal to go west.

Jefferson wrote to Commissioner Daniel Carroll the next day and all but declared Thornton the winner: his design "has so captivated the eyes and judgment of all as to leave no doubt you will prefer it when it shall be exhibited to you; as no doubt exists here of it’s preference over all which have been produced, and among it’s admirers no one is more decided than him whose decision is most important. It is simple, noble, beautiful, excellently distributed, and moderate in size." He also didn't say anything in particular about the plan or Thornton. Then Jefferson remembered "Poor Hallet, whose merit and distresses interest every one for his tranquility and pecuniary relief." Jefferson assured Carroll that the commissioners could have their say. Indeed, "the interval of apparent doubt" afforded an opportunity to soothe Hallet's mind. In their reply, the best the board could come up with was: "we feel sensibly for poor Hallet, and shall do every thing in our power to sooth him. We hope he may be usefully employed notwithstanding."(40)

Go to Chapter Four

Footnotes for Chapter Three

1.  GW to WT, 8 December 1799; GW to Humphreys, 20 July 1791,; L'Enfant to GW, 19 August 1791

 2.  "Pierre Lenfant" French Wikipedia; for "Peter" see Bowling, Kenneth, Peter Charles L'Enfant: Vision, Honor and Male Friendship in the Early American Republic...; on French military engineers see Duportail to GW 18 January 1778, and Walker, Paul, Engineers of Independence, pp353ff;

3. Hamilton to James Watson, 9 October 1792.

4. on military career see L'Enfant to GW 18 February 1782; on ball Letters B. Rush, vot 1, 16 July 1782 to Ferguson, p. 277;on Cincinnati Knox to GW, 16 October 1783; on medals L'Enfant to GW, 25 December 1783; GW to Knox, 1 June 1786; GW to L'Enfant, 1 January 1787; L'Enfant to GW, 6 December 1786; his first letter to GW L'Enfant to GW, 4 September 1778;

5. On work in NYC see Driskel, Michael Paul. "By the Light of Providence "JSTOR, p. 720; Bowling, Kenneth L'Enfant..., pp. 8 & 9;  on parade see New York Morning Post 4 August 1788

6. Dunlap, William,  History of the Rise of Arts and Design of the Arts of Design in America, vol. 1, 1834, p. 338; Humphries to L'Enfant 11 June 1789, in Morgan. J. D., "Major Pierre Charles L'Enfant," Journal of Columbia Historical Society, vol 2. p119. 

7. L'Enfant to GW, 11 Sept. 1789.

8. The law authorized the commissioners “to purchase or accept” land needed and “according to such Plans, as the President shall approve the said Commissioners, or any two of them shall prior to the first Monday in December in the year one thousand eight hundred, provide suitable buildings for the accommodation of Congress, and of the President, and for the public Offices of the government of the United States.” The law allowed Washington to accept “Plans,” not just a plan so it was assumed that meant he would decide on the plan for the city and plans for the public buildings.

9. Arnebeck, Fiery Trial, pp. 33ff. Also see Seat of Empire: the General and the Plan. 

10. Jefferson to L'Enfant, 10 April 1791;

11. Carroll to Madison, 23 April, 1791

12. Brodeau to WT 25 Sept 1791; WT to Brodeau, 2 & 3 Nov. 1791, Papers of William Thornton, Harris 165-6; Brodeau to WT 21 December, pp 173-5; WT to Batty p. 218, WT to J. B. Thomason 29 November 1792, p. 226.

13. Jefferson to GW, 8 September 1791; Jefferson Memorandum: Queries for D.C. Commissioners 28 August 1791;  

14. Washington to Stuart, 20 Nov 1791; Stuart to Washington, 26 February 1792: In "To Tease and Torment" Two Presidents Confront Suspicions of Sodomy, I explore sexual dimensions of the troubles with L'Enfant. In Fiery Trial pp 62-110, I narrate L'Enfant's predicament. In "Give L'Enfant a Break", I do just that. I establish that he didn't employ slaves in Slave Labor in  the Capital;  L'Enfant to GW 17 January 1792 ;  

15. L'Enfant to GW 17 January 1792 Enclosure; GW to Jefferson 22 February 1792; Roberdeau to L'Enfant 18 June 1793 L'Enfant Papers LOC.

16.  Jefferson to L'Enfant 22 February 1792; L'Enfant to Jefferson, 26 February 1792 and reply; GW to Stuart, March 8, 1792.

18. Trumbull to Bullfinch, 28 Jan 1818 p 271, Letters of John Trumbull; Trumbull to L'Enfant 9 March 1795. Donald Hawkins, "Origins of the Rotunda" USCHS Capitol Dome, Summer 2013 (pdf). 

19. Wilson, Mabel O., Thomas Jefferson, Architect, "What He Saw..." by Lloyd DeWitt, p. 60 "Thus Jefferson changed the course of American architecture, just as he set out to do."  Churchill, James E., "Thomas Jefferson and Transposition of Ancient Design to the New World" 

20. Butler, Jeanne F., Designing a Nation's Capitol, CHS, 1976 

21. GW to Commrs., 8 June 1792; Commrs. to GW, 19 July 1792; to trace Hoban's career in the city click here for excerpts from Through a Fiery Trial. 

22. For Hallet's background see Pamela Scott "Stephen Hallet's Design for the United States Capitol;" George Turner, (judge)" Wikipedia; Harris, p. 54; GW to Commrs., 23 July 1792 ;

23. WT to Taylor. 19 January 1791, Proceedings of the Free African Union Society, p 37, also WT to Hopkins, 29 September 1790 pp. 32ff; Papers of William Thornton., WT to VI Council 25 February 1791 pp. 129 ff; J. Doty to WT 25 February 1791, in Thornton and Negro Colonization, p. 42 misdated; WT to Sharp 5 May 1792; WT to Rivardi 3 February 1791 Harris p.125; WT to Fitch 21 June 1791, Harris pp. 141ff;  WT to Lettsom 5 May 1792 Harris p. 181  Pettigrew vol 2; 542-3; Mrs. Brodeau to WT 4 May 1791 Harris p. 139;   Papers of William Thornton, Brodeau to WT 25 Sept 1791; Clark's "Dr. and Mrs. Thornton" has several letters from Brodeau beginning on pp. 151-154.

24.WT to Mrs. Brodeau 2 November 1791 Harris p. 165; WT to C. G. Fleischer 24 April 1793 Harris p. 251; WT to Brodeau 2 Nov 1791, Harris 165-6, Papers of William Thornton.

25. Harris, pp. 212-13.

26. Papers of William Thornton, Fellow Citizen to Commrs. 12 July 1792.

27.   Commrs to GW 19 July 1793; GW to Commrs., 23 July 1792 ;

27A. Tobias Lear to GW 14 October 1790 

28.  Hallet to Jefferson, 21 September 1792 ;  Mrs. Hallet to GW, 27 April 1795 

29. Blodget to Jefferson, 10 July 1792 ; also see Stuart to GW, 18 April 1792.

30.  Jefferson to Latrobe 14 April 1811.

31.  GW to Stuart, 30 November 1792 and reply 10 December 1792; more on Blodget as an architect see Hafertepe, Kenneth, "Banking Houses in the United States, 1781-1811, Winterthur Portfolio, vol. 35, no. 1 2000, pp. 9-14, 17-24 and the historic nomination documents for Blodget's Philadelphia house, Keeping Philadelphia Greenville Mansion. 

32. Papers of William Thornton,WT to J.B. Thomason, 29 November 1792.. 

33. Commrs. to WT 4 December 1792, Harris p. 229; Stuart to Washington, 10 December 1792; 

34. Hawkins, "Graphic Origins of the Capitol Rotunda" The Capitol Dome, Vol. 50 Number 3, Summer 2013, p. 11. 

35. Turner to WT 2 June 1799; WT to Rittenhouse, 16 November 1792, Harris p. 216; Papers of William Thornton;

36. WT to Commrs. 14 December 1792;

37. Trumbull to Bullfinch, 28 Jan 1818 p 271, Life of John Trumbull. 

38. Pamela Scott "Stephen Hallet's Design for the United States Capitol;"

39. GW to Commrs, 31 January 1793.

40. Jefferson to Carroll, 1 February 1793; reply 7 February 1793.