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

In March 1791, President Washington sent Peter (Pierre) Charles L'Enfant to Georgetown, Maryland to make a plan for the federal capital to be built just across Rock Creek and stretching to the Eastern Branch or Anacostia River to the east. He also expected L'Enfant to design and supervise construction of the Capitol and President's house. 

In April, Secretary of State Jefferson sent him the plans of several European cities and gave his ideas for 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.”(1)

On April 23, Daniel Carroll, one of the three commissioner the president appointed to oversee the project, cheered L'Enfant on and boasted to James Madison that in late June “it is probable some plans of the City and the public buildings may be then exhibited."(2)

But the president was in no hurry. He wrote to Jefferson that he would wait “until an accurate survey and sub-division of the whole ground is made,..."(3) That only allowed the excitement to build. In a July 20 letter to a former military aide, Washington wrote: “ 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."(4)

A word most apropos to discussions of the birthing pains of the capital is "eclat." A search of the on-line archive of the correspondence of the "Founders"reveals that "eclat" entered their vocabulary shortly after the alliance with France in 1776, soon sealed by the arrival in June 1777 of the young Marquis de Lafayette who led the French expeditionary army that helped win the Revolution. For General Washington and the younger generation under him that French word meant more than style and brilliance. It also meant the thunder-striking solution to a festering problem. In 1799, one of his last letters, posted to Thornton, the General ruefully alluded to the city's festering problems and added, "Yet, I trust will, ultimately, escape the Ordeal with eclat."(5)

L'Enfant had the eclat to lead the General to believe that it would come before that. L'Enfant inspired such confidence despite not being a Marquis or lesser aristocracy. He was the son of Pierre Nicholas Lenfant, a government painter specializing in battle scenes and a teacher at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. The son studied at the school and was trained to be a painter. Nonetheless, he let himself be recruited as a military engineer and was accepted as such in America even by his French colleagues who taught him.(6)

He made an impression as an engineer. In 1792, when his knowledge of "water-works" was challenged just after he left the federal capital project, 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."(7)

  

In action in 1779 at the Battle of Savannah, L'Enfant exhibited memorable bravery before being wounded and taken prisoner. When paroled, he was given the rank of major. He captured General Washington's attention when in July 1782, he 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 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 Cincinnati, the fraternal order of American and French officers who served in the war just ending. The General sent him to France and he saw that the King on down rose to the occasion. Benjamin Franklin, then in Paris, thought the eagle depicted in the medal looked like a turkey, but only wrote to his wife about that. L'Enfant returned to America and remained the only French engineer to continue to offer his services.(8)

 

Not until Washington came to New York City to be inaugurated did he see L'Enfant's work as an architect. He had a prospering career there. Members of the Cincinnati became leaders in the city's government and institutions. He altered Trinity Church so it could better coexist with a monument to Richard Montgomery, the first fallen hero of the war.(9) In 1788, he turned a nondescript building into Federal Hall to house the new Federal government. He completed the job in time and to general satisfaction. It has been left to architectural historians to explain its features because it was soon devoured by a massive customs house.

30. Federal Hall

Until 1789, George Washington achieved his world wide fame without the backdrop of any architecture much out of the ordinary. He gave up his command of the army at the small Senate chamber in the Maryland State House in Annapolis. He presided over the Constitutional Convention at the serviceable main room of the Pennsylvania State House.

A man who would turn out to be one of the first arbiters of taste in the new country, 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.(10)

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....” Then 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. Then he pointed out “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.(11)

In July, congress passed the Residence Act of 1790 that empowered the president to put the ten mile square federal district somewhere along a 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.(12) 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. He decided on the site of the federal district before he appointed the commissioners. He decided on the site of the federal city before they had their first meeting.

L'Enfant had nothing to do with site selection, and just waited for orders. But he was not the only man with thoughts about the project. In November 1790, Joseph Clark, an English born builder and architect who designed and was then working on the dome of Maryland State House, went to Mount Vernon and showed Washington plans for a capital city and public buildings.

Clark lived what future Americans would think the American dream was all about. Born in poverty in England, apprenticed to a joiner, he emigrated to Maryland and blossomed into an architect who attracted the attention of the Maryland elite. Clark had designed and began supervising construction of the main building of St. John's College in Annapolis. He was also a leading Freemason in Maryland, rising to “Worshipful Master."(13) He and the president were brother masons. L'Enfant had joined a New York chapter but had no rank. The state's most famous former governor, Thomas Johnson, gave Clark a letter of introduction to the president. Washington soon appointed Johnson to the federal city's board of commissioners.

Clark offered a plan for a city in an unspecified site roughly three-quarters the size of London, but while Clark had references, he had no eclat. Washington took Clark's plan with him to Philadelphia, but had nothing more to do with the man. On January 22, 1791, the president announced the site of the federal district and appointed the three commissioners, Governor Johnson, Congressman Daniel Carroll of Rock Creek, another Marylander, and David Stuart, a Virginia doctor married to Martha Parke Custis, Martha Washington's widowed daughter-in-law. Before the commissioners met, Washington sent Andrew Ellicott to survey and mark the boundaries of the new district, and sent L'Enfant to Georgetown which would be in the federal district and the nearest city to the Metropolis-to-be. That winter, congress had its first short session and in a matter of a few weeks the president went to check on their progress.

Ironically, that convenient pattern of congress's sessions, condemned the city to a century of slower development. The Constitution set a two year term for representatives. It also required that congress convene on the first Monday of December, unless “by Law” congress changed the date. The last Confederation congress set March 4, 1789, as the date when the new congress would convene. So the two year term of office for the first congressmen ended on March 3, 1791. Congress did not pass a law otherwise so the First Congress convened for its last  of three sessions on December 6, 1790. That session lasted not quite three months. Then the Second Congress convened in late October 1791. The new members elected in 1790 finally took office and the re-elected members got back to work after seven and one half months vacation. Thus, for as long as nine months every odd year, the city's main attraction closed down and all congressmen and senators were back in their home states.

The short session allowed Washington to get to the city site before the three commissioners he appointed to oversee the project had their first meeting. Then he took a tour of the Southern states and returned to choose the sites of the Capitol and President's house. L'Enfant responded to such personal attention with a work of genius, "The Plan of the City of Washington."

32. The Plan

Unfortunately for L'Enfant, General Washington wanted a chain of command. Previously, the three commissioners had worked on getting title to the land taken for the city-to-be. Just after L'Enfant came to Philadelphia in August with his plan for the city, the president sent Jefferson and Madison to Georgetown to confer with the commissioners. Ellicott was available but not invited to the meeting. He and L'Enfant were miffed that decisions were made at the meeting without their input.  Jefferson and the commissioners 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 conferring about the future of their city with the president alone at Mount Vernon, L'Enfant bristled at getting an order from the commissioners. The summer of eclat was over. (14)

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.

There were other reasons that L'Enfant was hard to bear. He was not a family man and difficult to track down. He also stole the affections of the men who worked under him even turning them against the commissioners who were legally in charge. For example, Commissioner Stuart hired the son of General Roberdeau. The General was a neighbor in Alexandria, but as second in command under L'Enfant, Isaac Roberdeau countermanded orders from the commissioners.

What frustrated L'Enfant was that the commissioners only met once a month. The commissioner who lived nearby, Daniel Carroll, forwarded the interests of his relatives. L'Enfant complained to the president that the commissioners "oppose me merely to teize and torment." The commissioners and president compensated for their own inadequacies when it came to addressing the business at hand by agreeing that the veil of secrecy, intrigue and expense that L'Enfant cast over everything arose from his "artistic temperament."

In January 1792, L'Enfant went to Philadelphia 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. He estimated the total cost, $4 million dollars, and proposed a plan for a loan of that amount. But he never showed the president or the commissioners his designs for the Capitol and President's house, if he indeed made them. He clearly had some semblance of them. His assistant Roberdeau returned to the city in June 1793. He reported to L'Enfant that the foundation for the plan for the President's house then being built "not being so deep as yours" kept the building out of full view of the Capitol. As for the Congress House "the Bow of the house 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 Hallet and Thornton would plan.(15)

In a long March 1792 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 evidenced no curiosity about any designs submitted, approved or altered. 

 

Washington's fear of criticism helps explain why no design, not even Thornton's winning design, was made public. However, that he expressed such a fear of L'Enfant's criticism suggests that Washington could conceive of a perfect design beyond criticism. His naive view suggests that he had definite expectations of what the buildings should look like. L'Enfant helped inform those expectations. On August 19, 1791, he had written to the president: “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,..." He vividly implied the grandeur of both buildings.(17)

An observer who knew all the principals thought enough was known about L'Enfant's design ideas to give them some agency in the design process. In an 1818 letter to Charles Bulfinch, the architect who took over the project from Benjamin Latrobe, the artist John Trumbull described L'Enfant's role in the design: “Permit me to add, 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. By 1818, the two wing of the Capitol had been built, burned by the British army, and restored. Bulfinch was about to design and oversee building the Rotunda where Trumbull's lifetime project, painting scenes of the Revolution, was to find its home.

Trumbull had toured the site with L'Enfant in May 1791. In 1818, 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 a half inch wide. But Trumbull knew that L'Enfant had more than that in mind. In a 1795 letter to L'Enfant, he rued the differences between L'Enfant and the commissioners that led to L'Enfant leaving the project, 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."(18)

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

 

Given the turmoil that attended L'Enfant's leaving the project, neither Washington nor Jefferson were about to give him any credit for the design of the Capitol. Some historians hail Jefferson, who returned from a diplomatic post in France to be secretary of state, for inspiring the Neo-classical public buildings now celebrated throughout America.(19) He did that in part by offering L'Enfant his vision of the Capitol. However, when he advised the commissioners on the wording of the advertisement announcing the design contests, he didn't mention ancient buildings or the Louvre.

Advertisement for design contests

For the Capitol, the prospectus provided the dimensions of three principal rooms and twelve committee rooms of "a Capitol." The "Senate-Room" and "Room for the Representatives" should have "a Lobby or Antechamber." The winner would get $500 or a medal "of that value" and a lot in the city. There would be a second prize of $250. The award would be "designated by impartial judges" given to "the most approved PLAN." 

The prospectus for the President's house only required that the center part of the building "give the appearance of a complete whole and be capable of admitting the additional parts in future, if they shall be wanting." In both contests, "drawings will be expected of the Ground-plan, Elevations of each Front, and Sections through the Building, in such Directions as may be necessary to explain the Internal Structure; and an Estimate of the cubic Feet of Brick-Work composing the whole Mass of the Walls." 

The contest for the Capitol had clearer requirements, offered a greater challenge and a greater prize. It attracted more entries. Plus, the prospectus for the President's house, seemed to require that the architect come to the city before submitting a design: "The site of the building, if the artist will attend to it, will of course influence the aspect and outline of his plan; and its destination will point out to him the number, size and distribution of the apartments." 

During the president's Southern tour, several of the leading men in Charleston, South Carolina, told the president that James Hoban, a recent emigrant from Ireland, "had made architecture his study, and was well qualified, not only for the planning or designing buildings, but to superintend the execution of them." His response to the design contest announcement was to go to Philadelphia, introduce himself to Washington and carry a letter of introduction from him to the commissioners. He studied the site for the President's house and consulted with the commissioners as he worked on a design. They told the President that they had a good impression of him. Without any ado, the president picked his design. The commissioners hired Hoban to build it. Then in July 1792, Washington walked over the site with Hoban and had him make the building even bigger.(20) 

Of the dozen or so Capitol designs submitted by July 15, the date they were due, only two were taken seriously. Both were drawn by men who likely knew what L'Enfant had in mind for the building. George Turner had been born in England, remained well connected there, but had fought for the winning the side during the revolution making his mark in the Southern theatre just as L'Enfant had done. He had also been secretary of the Society of Cincinnati and had been zealous in defending L'Enfant's honor when questions were raised about his profiting off the medal he designed. The president had also made him a judge in the Northwest Territory but he was slow to move west. Turner was likely in Philadelphia in 1791.(21)

The other favored submission was from a man who not only knew L'Enfant but also knew Jefferson's ideas about what the Capitol should look like. Etienne Hallet had recently arrived from Paris and even though he could hardly speak English, changed his first name to Stephen. He was a trained architect and a good draftsman. L'Enfant used him to copy the plan of the city so that it could be engraved. Jefferson also learned of Hallet's talents and gave him some work to do for the State Department. As L'Enfant's troubles mounted, Jefferson had Hallet draw a design for the Capitol, presumably an attempt to translate "one of the models of antiquity which have had the approbation of thousands of years" into an icon for the new republic. 

A design that scholars assume Hallet drew for Jefferson is extant and it shows some sophistication beyond Jefferson's "models of antiquity." The ancients did not have a bicameral legislature. Hallet gave each legislative body more than just its own chamber. Each had an entrance under classical columns which were under a decorated pediment. The two houses of congress were joined to larger bureaucratic-looking but classical building complete with columns and a high colonnaded baroque dome that hardly compared to London's St. Paul's cathedral.(22)

 

34. Hallet's 1791 design

What Jefferson thought of Hallet's first take is not known, but Hallet waited until the last moment to submit a design for the contest and it seems he struggled to make his submission appear less expensive to build, probably by making the central part of the building smaller. That went against a sudden current of opinion. While Hallet was in Philadelphia paring down his elevation, a very rich New England speculator was in Georgetown promoting a dome.

Samuel Blodget had already purchased lots and land in the city, tried to arrange a $500,000 loan for the commissioners and reminded the president of a discussion they had had during the war about the need for a National University. After he looked at the tree covered Capitol Hill, he convinced everyone he talked to that the Capitol must have a dome. He sent his sketch to Jefferson with a request that he view the drawing "at 3 yards distance in a good light before you determine on the effect it may produce."(23)

41. Samuel Blodget by John Trumbull 1784

The Annapolis architect, Joseph Clark, did not enter the contest because he assumed that amateurs would enter and frustrate the judges who would then commission a professional architect. Instead, thanks to a quirk in the president's way of seeing designs, the obvious winner of the contest, Hallet, was thwarted by an artful amateur. Evidently, Blodget's design was all dome and not considered. However, the president placed Turner's design next to Hallet's and decided that the recently appointed judge's was better. The judge asked that his design be returned as soon as possible. Did he anticipate that it would not stand scrutiny by a professional? His design is not extent but in a letter to the commissioners, the president described why he preferred Turner's by pointing out everything wrong with it:

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. I return it without delay, because (among other reasons for doing it) Mr Turner wishes to receive it, in any event, immediately.

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 elivated 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.(24)

Obviously, what was drawn with an amateur's hand seduced an amateur's eye. The commissioners almost jumped to the conclusion that given his design's striking appearance that Turner had won once he topped it with a dome. Obviously, the solution was not to burden Turner, who had to get to work in the Ohio Territory, but to trust that Hallet could draw the requisite columns and colonnades without ruining the appearance of Turner's design. So, the commissioners summoned Hallet to Georgetown. He left his pregnant wife in Philadelphia and the commissioners put him to work making another design. However, they evidently didn't show him Turner's design. They diagnosed the problem as simply a case of Hallet skimping on the size of the central portion. Here's how Hallet explained that in a letter to Jefferson written in French:

MM. les Commissaires m’ont appelés ici pour faire quelques improvemens a mon plan; et pour n’en point changer la forme il a fallu en augmenter considerablement les proportions. Les colonnes de Fordre extérieure Etoient de cinq pieds de diametre et par consequent de cinquante pieds d’elevation. Cela cut été magnifique mais on a paru craindre que l’execution ne Soit trop Dispendieuse, et il n’a pas été agreé, ni aucun de ceux qui etoient Sous Consideration, mais, 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.

(The Commissioners have called me here to make some improvement in my plan; and not to change the form, it has been necessary to increase the proportions considerably. The outer Fordre columns Etoient five feet of diameter and consequently fifty feet of elevation. It was a magnificent, but it seemed to have been feared that the execution would be too expensive, and it was not awesome, nor any of those who were under Consideration, but, I took orders to work on a new project in the same thing that I had the honour of showing you in Philadelphia last year. ....)

Hallet's solution was to revert to his 1791 design which he had pared down. The problem, which Hallet sensed, was that the president didn't like Hallet. On September 21, the president was on his way to Mount Vernon and stopped in Georgetown to, among other things, look at Hallet's latest design. Hallet shared his trepidation in his letter to Jefferson:

The President asked me a lot of questions about my theoretical and practical studies and seemed to want proof of this he gave me the opportunity to answer him. I had not taken any precautions with regard to this Subject when leaving Paris because I was known to several people interested in the establishment for which I was intended. But I hope Sir that you will have a proof in my favor and which cannot be Suspect, it is the Royal Almanac, edition of 1786 and Following. You will find there the proof that I was received Architect Jure-Expert of the 1st Column in 1785. But the National Assembly having included these offices in the Suppressions I found myself stateless, I came to seek one in America, and If I could find one in this business it would be more beautiful than I dared to promise myself.

During the war, president had parlayed with French engineers. Evidently, he found Hallet's lack of even the pretense of eclat very suspicious. However, Hallet kept his hopes up, telling Jefferson:

This 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.

As it turned out, Hallet's happy expectations did not come to pass despite seeming like a reasonable course of events: amend the plan to accommodate the wishes of the president and commissioners, unveil it to an interested public and build a consensus in its favor. But the powers-that-be who damned L'Enfant for not showing his plan for the city at the October 1791 auction of building lots, refused to show Hallet's plan for the Capitol at the October 1792 auction.(25)

Despite that the commissioners did not lose faith in Hallet. They as well as the president began thinking of Blodget as just the man to be the Superintendent of the City. Washington 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 like L'Enfant: "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."(26)

Meanwhile, on September 4, 1792, the commissioners received a letter from Tortola signed “Fellow Citizen.” In the letter dated July 12, 1792, that worthy reported that as soon as he had heard about the design competition, “I have been constantly engaged since endeavoring to accomplish what you propose.” A phrase that he used might of have struck home. He was keeping “strictly to the rules of architecture.” He said he didn't send the designs because he meant to “depart hence in a few days for America."(27) A fever prevented his immediate departure but by December 10, when Stuart wrote to the president, "Fellow Citizen" had returned to Philadelphia.

 

Go to Chapter Four

Footnotes for Chapter Three

1.  Jefferson to L'Enfant, 10 April 1791; on "Peter" see Bowling, Kenneth, Peter Charles L'Enfant: Vision, Honor and Male Friendship in the Early American Republic...;

2. Carroll to Madison, 23 April, 1791

3. GW to Jefferson, 31 March 1791

4.  GW to Humphreys, 20 July 1791,

5.  GW to WT, 8 December 1799.

6. "Pierre Lenfant" French Wikipedia; for "de L'Enfant" see L'Enfant to GW, 28 January 1783;  in , Grand Avenue: the story of Pierre Charles L’Enfant... pp. 19ff. Scott Berg argues that L'Enfant's artistic training ruined him as an engineer but does not cite any paintings by L'Enfant; on French military engineers see Duportail to GW 18 January 1778, and Walker, Paul, Engineers of Independence, pp353ff;

7.  Hamilton to James Watson, 9 October 1792

8.  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 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;  

9. on work in NYC see Driskel, Michael Paul. "By the Light of Providence "JSTOR, p. 720; Bowling, Kenneth L'Enfant..., pp. 8 & 9;

10. 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.

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

12.  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; for background of the agreement see Arnebeck, Fiery Trial, pp. 33ff. Also see Seat of Empire: the General and the Plan. 

13. Hanson to GW, 2 August 1790; Clark to GW, 5 Dec 1790; drawing of Clark's State House dome.

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

15. 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 Jefferson, 26 February 1792; L'Enfant to GW 17 January 1792 ; L'Enfant to GW 17 January 1792 Enclosure; Roberdeau to L'Enfant 18 June 1793 L'Enfant Papers LOC.

16. GW to Stuart, March 8, 1792.

17. L'Enfant to GW, 19 August 1791,

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. 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.

21. "George Turner, (judge)" Wikipedia

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

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

24. GW to Commrs., 23 July 1792 ;

25. Jefferson to Carroll, 13 October 1792; Hallet to Jefferson, 21 September 1792

26.  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.

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