Chapter Seven: Thornton Becomes a Commissioner/Lovering Builds Houses

The Doctor Examined, or Why William Thornton Did Not Design the Octagon House or the Capitol

by Bob Arnebeck

Table of Contents

 

65. The real city in 1794: the abodes of Notley Young and his slaves

At the September 1793 auction of lots held in conjunction with the cornerstone ceremony at the Capitol, George Washington bought six lots on the east shore of the point where a spur of the planned canal would reach the Eastern Branch of the Potomac River. There, deep water ships would harbor and be loaded with produce from the West shipped via the Potomac Company's locks and the City of Washington's canal. James Greenleaf was also at the auction and began negotiations with the commissioners that would lead to his contracting buying 6000 building lots. Most of the city's 1200 squares had been or would be divided 50/50 with the original owners of the land. The easiest way to do that was to give every other lot to the government. To allow as more freedom to develop his lots on the point below the Capitol, Greenleaf bought all the private lots he could, but he didn't buy the six lot the president bought there. They would be far more valuable after Greenleaf developed the point. Politics was a seasonal activity but goods coming down and going up the Potomac would be unceasing, once that infrastructure was built. Greenleaf would build the elegant residential houses to accommodate the merchants who would build the wharves, warehouses and counting houses on the president's and other waterfront lots. In anticipation of future glory, every one began calling that area Greenleaf's Point.(2)

Greenleaf made his contract with the 30 year old coachmaker James Simmons on November 30, 1793. He was to begin working on January 1, 1794, as supervisor of operations for three years at a salary of 1,000 Pennsylvania pounds or $2,600. One of his jobs was to "plan buildings." He was in Georgetown by April and work soon began on the operation's headquarters at 6th and N Streets southwest of the Capitol. The commercial potential for the house was obvious. It faced a wharf on tide water that invited boats coming down a broad reach of the Potomac before it turned south. The whole point of the Greenleaf's Point was that it was to become a Mecca for international commerce. To better prove that point, in 1795 a store-keeper with wet and dry goods moved into the house. Although the house served as Simmons' headquarters, it wasn't intended to be a model for the brick row houses Greenleaf wanted to build. (1)

67. The Simmons House/Honeymoon House/Thomas Law House

On May 20, Tobias Lear's business partner, former senator Tristram Dalton, wrote to Greenleaf: "Mr. Simmons and your people were well, the sloop sent by Dr. Appleton from Boston was unloaded; the Brick machine nearly ready to be worked...." Twenty-eight year old Dr. Apollos Kinsley, who got his M.D. at Columbia, informed Secretary of State Jefferson on November 22, 1793, that "the Machine for Makeing bricks, for which I receivd a patent, has been made, on a large scale and has been tryd and found to answer well;" Greenleaf lived in New York City, bought the machines and shipped them to Greenleaf's Point.(3) 

Dr. Nathaniel Appleton who shipped building materials from Boston had married one of Greenleaf's older sisters in 1780 when Greenleaf was 15 years old. He gave up his Boston practice and moved to the Point to be the development company's clerk. He arrived in June, but did not stay long. He also came down for his health and that didn't work out. Soon, he was rushed to a house in Georgetown high above Little Falls so he could breath better. Once back north, two months before he died in April 1795, he cautioned his replacement that houses on 6th Street flanking the Potomac were "the most ineligible in that climate, as you'll perceive in June, July and August next." He also remembered that the house Simmons and he lived in and two smaller brick houses nearby"were erected before I arrived there."(4) They lived in the house Lovering supposedly designed.

However, Lovering signed a contract with Greenleaf on May 8, 1794, while they were both in Philadelphia, and the architect likely was not asked nor prepared to design the house that Simmons "people" were then building at the Point. In the contract, Lovering was described as "late from London." He likely arrived in the country in late 1793 or early 1794 with his second wife and their baby daughter. He had his left his teenage son in England. He was probably born around 1750 and thus was around ten years older than Simmons. Greenleaf hired him to build town houses. In late 18th century London, speculative developments of town houses were the rage. Lovering probably learned his skills working on them. He was an expert at hanging windows and Georgian architects lined the streets with windows. In 1798, he would school the commissioners and their contractors on proper sashes. Oval rooms made the Octagon unconventional and adventurous, but don't lose sight of another feature of the Octagon: thirty-two windows facing the streets.(5)(6)

68. Portland Place, London 1800

Architects designing and supervising construction of houses commonly signed contracts after the design and all the materials to be used were particularized and the cost determined. Greenleaf broke that mold. He had to build 140 houses in 7 years. He decided to build rows of town houses, and only drew up contracts specifying when houses would be completed. He offered a fee of unprecedented generosity in America: 8% of the cost of the houses. With every move he made, Greenleaf tried to make it clear that he wanted to build a magnificent city. In the contract with Lovering, there was no mention of the three houses Simmons was building. That either Simmons or Greenleaf asked Lovering for a design of the largest house before he signed his contract is not plausible. In the process of convincing Lovering to sign, Greenleaf likely concentrated on proving the extent of his resources and practicality of his long term plans. It would have pointless to challenge Lovering to design one house site unseen when Greenleaf needed to persuade to him to build ten, and in rows.

In the 18th century architects and builders were often itinerant workers committed to a region and traveling from job to job in the largely rural country. It took Lovering four more years to fit that mold. In 1794, not only did he likely have few contacts in any region of the country, but Greenleaf's contracts were life-changing offering a seven year commitment. Apart from making plans for townhouses, once he signed the contract, Lovering had to take care of his family and effects that they brought from London. Not surprisingly, he didn't move to the federal city until July.

At the same Lovering signed his contract, Joseph Clark of Annapolis signed his. He had been in the country for about a decade, had extensive contacts in Maryland, including workers he could call on. He had discussed his grand plan for the nation's capital with George Washington in 1790. Greenleaf probably met Clark at the Capitol cornerstone laying ceremony on September 18, 1793. As a Maryland Grand Master pro tempore, he had officiated the Masonic ceremony. He was familiar with what would become Greenleaf's Point but, after he signed Greenleaf's contract in May, it also took him almost two months to move there.

Clark invested his all in the federal city. His wife, Isabella, put it this way in a letter to Greenleaf:  "In June 1794 we Sold our House, our Store of Merchandize, Three Female Slaves, also about one half of our Household Furniture, not to pay our Debts, for we owed none of consequence, NO, but to carry the money to Greenleafs Point - we had in addition upwards of four thousand dollars in paper Money, and I had sixty one half Joes long hoarded up..."(9)

Appleton came to the city before Clark and Lovering. On June 23, he wrote to Greenleaf that he was chalking out the ground for Clark's men and that Clark was still in Baltimore. He did not chalk ground for Lovering because he had no men on the scene and had not arrived. Appleton was trying to get money from Robert Morris in Philadelphia to pay Lovering's way to the federal city. Greenleaf was then in New York City.(10)

The large house that Appleton would find ready to house him in late June, then called the Simmons House, had obviously been designed by someone other than Lovering or Clark. The type of building materials that arrived from New England in May included "marble slate and chimney pieces, mahogany twist handrails. and stone circular arches." Design ideas able to incorporate such features had to have been decided on by Greenleaf and Simmons well before May 8 when Lovering signed his contract.

However, once on the Point, it made sense for Lovering to take over the work of finishing the Simmons house, who better to oversee placing the stone arches? Unlike Clark who brought workers with him, late from London Lovering had none. Likely, he assumed command of the workers finishing the Simmons house and then used them to build row houses. After Simmons left the project, a 1796 report on the houses built for Greenleaf that Lovering may have written, gave the house at 6th and N Streets SW the highest value, $10,000. The report noted that it was "built by Lovering" with "late Simmons" in parentheses.

Greenleaf also hired a French engineer, only known as "Mr. Henry" who was described as a "kind of Secretaire Economique whose business is solely to study, to economize the business, to suggest hints for improvement and to systematize everything...."  Lovering's houses cost $4.50 a square foot and Clark's cost $5.50. However, the two architects were not following the same designs. Mr. Henry also thought that a house of Lovering's left unpaired at the end of the building season could be modified to make a good hotel. He evidently had the knack of embedding a large room in a town house. The houses Lovering and Clark built were called "Lovering's houses" and "Clark's houses." Clark built two groups of four attached houses. What is known as Wheat Row is still standing. The only house Lovering built on the Point that is still standing is the restored Cranch-Duncanson House. A photo taken in the 20th century suggests his talent for hanging windows, and how the pretensions of the neighborhood diminished when Greenleaf's Point did not become the commercial center of the empire.(12)

69. Cranch-Duncanson House

In the meantime, on September 15, 1794, the new board met in Georgetown. Thornton did not have his official notice of appointment and could only watch the remaining original commissioner Daniel Carroll of Rock Creek and other new member of the board. Gustavus Scott was a lawyer and had previous experience in public office including as a state legislator and member of the Baltimore health committee where there was a yellow fever epidemic in 1794. Despite those credentials, in 1896 Glenn Brown wrote: "After Thornton became a member of the board of commissioners, a decided improvement is evident in their written proceedings and in the business forms and contracts which were introduced in connection with the streets, bridges and buildings that were in their charge. As they appear in the records after his appointment, Thornton should have the credit for the improvement."

While Thornton could not act as a commissioner at the September meeting, he was not idle. He signified to the board that he wanted to buy two lots in Square 33 which were far from the Capitol about a half mile southwest of the President's house. One of Thornton's lots did have "a frame building fifty feet long," but he didn't plan to live there. Thornton would bring his mother-in-law with him, and there was no society to speak of in the federal city. Instead, he bought a house in Georgetown. What attracted him to the lots he bought in the federal city was that they were just around the corner from lots in Square 21 on Peter's Hill along the river a mile southwest of the President's house that the president picked out in 1793. Blodget had helped the president and when back in Philadelphia likely told  Thornton that the president planned to build his city residence there once he sold his Western lands that he thought Greenleaf and Morris were negotiating to buy.(13)

But the private plans of the president were dwarfed by Greenleaf's machinations, and Thornton was soon consumed by them. On September 19, Commissioners Carroll and Scott sent a letter to Secretary of State Randolph discussing their cautious approach to Greenleaf's new proposals for paying what he owed the commissioners. They assured Randolph that once back in Philadelphia, Thornton "will very readily give any further information if wished for." The phrase "very readily" suggests that his colleagues' first impression of Thornton was that he quickly grasped a problem and then couldn't stop talking about it. Yet, two weeks after learning the commissioners' case, it seemed he pleaded Greenleaf's case. 

He went back to Philadelphia to begin packing up his all, as well as prepare his wife's and mother-in-law's for moving to Georgetown. He also briefed the secretary of state. On October 2nd, Randolph wrote to the commissioners that "Dr. Thornton, a member of your board, and Mr. Greenleaf called upon me this morning...." Greenleaf wanted to change his way of paying the commissioners $50,000 on May 1, 1795.(14) It is possible that Thornton looked up Greenleaf in Philadelphia, but it is more likely that the younger and richer man immediately began working to make Thornton as amenable to his ideas as the commissioner he replaced. Back in April 1794, Greenleaf had recommended two former senators for the job. He knew the importance of having friendly commissioners. In April 1795, Thornton would buy lots from Greenleaf in Squares 33 and 21 for $1358.66.(15)

Two commissioners could form a board and make decisions. A commissioner could file a written dissent from the board's decision. Thornton would often exercise that prerogative. He didn't dissent to a decision his colleagues made in his absence on October 1. They formalized Greenleaf's agreement to pay Hallet to support his continued work on the Capitol design. The commissioners also continued renting a house to Hallet and his family next to the Capitol site.(16) That his colleagues made the decision before he returned suggests that they did not think Thornton was appointed by the president to oversee all that pertained to that Capitol. That Thornton did not object to continued support for Hallet suggests that Thornton had no special briefing from the president about the Capitol. 

When he returned from Philadelphia, Thornton found that Scott had taken over leadership of the board. He began reviewing the  contracts the old board made with the speculators. Thornton soon understood that associating himself with Greenleaf's ideas about paying his installment was not appreciated by his colleagues. 

When Greenleaf made a brief visit to the city, he deflected the board's attention from contracts. He asked if there was anything he could do for them when he made a trip to Holland before the end of the year. Carroll had been educated in France many years ago, and Scott got a law degree in Edinburgh. Thornton had last been in the Old Country and thus more current in regards to wages in Scotland.  The board's letter outlining a program of indenturing stone masons to come work in the city was clearly composed by Thornton. He even told Greenleaf, who had just hired many, how to hire workers.(17)

Scott's skepticism about Greenleaf's contracts stoked worries that he would not pay the commissioners on time. Even Carroll who had signed the contracts recognized the need for a fresh look at the board's balance sheet. That, and not Thornton's unease at Hallet still working on designs, likely prompted the board to try to get drawings from Hallet that could make it easier to estimate the cost of continuing work on the Capitol. They used Simmons as a go-between, after all he was paying Hallet with Greenleaf's money. The board thought they got Hallet to agree to give them "the sections and what relates to the first or basement story of the Capitol." What he sent didn't satisfy them, but their November 25 letter to Simmons doesn't particularize their dissatisfaction.(18) 

Even though the prospectus for the design contest required that the winner supply sections and drawings, there is no evidence that Hallet's snub prompted Thornton to come to the rescue. There is also evidence that the new commissioner did not think the Capitol design and construction was one of the board's pressing problems. Within two weeks, the board got a possible solution to their Hallet problem. Commissioner Johnson's brother in London asked John Trumbull, who had just returned to London, to recommend a British architect. The artist knew just the young man for the job. Trumbull sent a letter to his brother Jonathan in Connecticut extolling George Hadfield's bona fides which included eight years studying architecture at the Royal Academy in London and Rome. Trumbull's brother passed the letter on to the president who sent it down to the commissioners without saying the young man had to be hired. 

John Trumbull also wrote to Tobias Lear who pressed the matter with Commissioner Scott, who was not encouraging, and with Thornton who offered some hope. According to Lear, Thornton explained that the board "conceived that the Gentleman whom Mr Trumbull mentions would be a valuable acquisition to the City; but as the great public buildings are now going on upon approved plans, it was a doubt whether there would be immediately such employment for Mr Hatfield’s talents as could justify them in offering what might be considered as an inducement for him to come over: However, as other public buildings, such as an University and its appendages, Churches &c. &c. would presently be wanting, he could, in these, have an opportunity of originating and superintending, which might make it worth his while to come over; and that they should give the matter a further consideration as soon as they could get through some other business which pressed and demanded their immediate attention, and would then decide upon it."

It is likely that Thornton offered his own reaction to hiring an architect, rather than his colleagues' ideas. It is inconceivable that Carroll and Scott would banty about ideas like hiring the English architect to design the National University and a church. In his letter to the president, Lear noted Scott's negative reaction to Hadfield coming.(19) 

Thornton's being so complaisant in regards to the status of the Capitol design suggests that he had finally accepted the changes to his design approved in July 1793. In 1794, there was no doubt that the “approved plans" were Hallet’s corrections of Thornton’s original elevation and floor plan. Judging from their cool reception to hiring Hadfield, the board expected Hoban to superintend work at the Capitol unless Hallet with Greenleaf's help got the job. On December 18, the board wrote a discouraging letter to Trumbull and so informed the president.

Within the next two weeks, the board changed its mind, and sent Hadfield an offer. They again informed the president of their decision: "We view, and review the magnitude of our Undertaking; which, requiring all our Attention, leaves less time to individual Exertion in the Superintendance of the public Buildings, and we are convinced of the necessity of constant attention to adjust the various Members of the Work, to preserve an elegant Correspondence—A Superintendant of great ability, whose time will be wholly engaged is therefore requisite; and when we consider how much is demanded here for very ordinary Talents; when we are also encouraged by the moderation of Mr Hatfields Desires, though we have hitherto declined giving any Expectation, yet on more mature reflection, we think the public may be materially benefitted by the offer we now make him."(19) 

Other than granting that an individual commissioner did not have time to superintend the Capitol, what was meant by adjusting "the various Members of the Work, to preserve an elegant Correspondence?"

Four days later, Thornton sent a personal letter to Trumbull that was sent with an official offer to Hadfield. He boasted to Trumbull that he was "pleased" that his appointment as a commissioner "will afford me an opportunity of correcting some wilful errors which have been fallen into by those jealous men who objected to my plan, because was not regularly brought up an architect.” Then he envisioned Hadfield as just the young man who would help him: “you will be so kind as to represent to Mr. Hadfield that the general plan is adopted, but there may be particular parts that will require minute attention, and I shall be always happy in consulting the taste of Mr. Hadfield. I have much pleasure in expectation, for he will be a pleasing acquisition to me.” In the same letter, Thornton asked Trumbull to send him a copy in miniature of the Farnese "Hercules." In Thornton's mind, between his December discussion with Lear and his January letter to Trumbull, the "approved" plan became the "general plan" that needed correction. Since Hallet had not preserved Thornton's portico in his July 1793 revision of the plan, Hercules no longer mounted the pediment. Thornton planned to restore him.

Trumbull's reaction to Thornton's scheming was to advise Hadfield "to avoid any circumstances that may thwart their [the commissioners'] views or give them offence." He also intimated that except for L'Enfant, no one in America  would "be your equal in knowledge in your profession."(20)

The equivocation over hiring Hadfield proves that Thornton had no instructions from the president to restore his original design. However, apparently in the back and forth over whether to hire Hadfield, Thornton found his mission. It is likely that Thornton coined the curious phrase in the letter that all three commissioners signed. Perhaps, getting them to agree to "to preserve an elegant Correspondence" was all that he could get them to endorse. He would soon distinguish himself from them by urging the importance of "grandeur."

The president did not react to their hiring Hadfield. At the end of a January 7 letter to Carroll, he briefly mentioned the Capitol: "For a variety of reasons, unnecessary to be enumerated, tho’ some of them are very important, I could wish to see the force of your means directed to the Capitol in preference to the other public buildings." Perhaps, he did not necessarily want an elegant correspondence of the various members. He probably addressed his letter to Carroll alone because what vexed the president was largely the fault of the old board. Greenleaf decided not to go to Holland. Instead, he did exactly what the president expected the commissioners to do, and he did it in a spectacular fashion. He persuaded Thomas Law, a Nabob, as men who got rich in India trade were called, to buy 500 of the speculators' federal city lots for $180,000. That is, Law paid $360 a lot that Greenleaf bought for $80. The president was dumbfounded. He wrote to Carroll and asked why the commissioners had sold lots to Greenleaf so cheaply, and why didn't they make the sale that Greenleaf did? In reply, Carroll   pointed out that thanks to the contract the old board made with Greenleaf and a clause precluding him selling lots to speculators, Law would have to build 166 houses in the next four years. Plus, thanks to Carroll's ties to the Catholic church in Baltimore, where Carroll's brother was bishop, the board sold lots at a good price to James Barry, an India trader eager to open the Eastern Branch to the world of commerce. As for the Capitol, Carroll was on the same page and "Your opinion respecting the Capitol, was imparted to the [new] Commissioners by Docr Stuart & myself."(21)

Then in a January 28 letter to the commissioners, the president gave Thornton a chance to shine. He urged that planning begin for a National University in the federal city. Once a plan was adopted, he would donate 50 shares of Potomac Company stock to endow the institution. However, "as the design of this University has assumed no form with which I am acquainted; and as I am equally ignorant who the persons are that have taken, or are disposed to take, the maturation of the plan upon themselves, I have been at a loss to whom I should make this communication of my intentions."  

In a January 8 letter to Lettsom, that mainly complained about his ill health and depression over not being famous, Thornton highlighted one bright prospect, establishing a university "which has long lived in my mind, and which on mentioning my ideas to the President he approved of much. He even desired me to write and digest a plan." In letters to Lettsom, Thornton tended to exaggerate. In his previous letter he had bragged that the commissioners "have the expenditure of all the public monies, for the accommodation of congress, in buildings, etc. We have the disposal of one half the whole city....The trust reposed in us is so great that I do not know a more extensive power in any office of the government, except the President, or perhaps the Secretary of State, Treasury and War." 

Thornton wrote the commissioners' reply to the president and it hailed Thornton for what he had not done: "Many have suggested in part what ought to be done in forming a general plan. None has yet been presented, but the Board was informed, some time ago, that Dr Thornton has long had it in Contemplation to lay such an one before the Executive, and has made some progress in digesting it."

Earlier in the month, Blodget wrote to Thornton from Philadelphia and reported that he had convened a committee of artists who were "busily employed in the affairs of the national university. We are now on the college of painting." The commissioners did not share that news with the president. However, Thornton may not have taken Blodget's taunting letter seriously. It was primarily about problems with the lottery: "No sir, altho you may understand the building of federal cities, capitols, anatomy, painting, botany, belle lettre and such trifles give me leave to assure you that you are not yet sufficiently instructed in the more noble and exalted science of lottery making."(22)

Meanwhile, Scott consolidated his command of the board. He assessed, correctly, that the board could not count on money from Greenleaf. At that moment, the board had only 6856.17.6 Maryland pounds in hand as of October 1, 1794, or around $11,000. In the most comprehensive letter ever written by the board, they lumbered the president with details about their operations. For example, they ordered that quarried stone be delivered by the supplier to the work site so that the commissioners' slave laborers would not have to be called from other work in order to unload scows at the public wharves. They bragged on their piece-work contracts and highlighted one they made "with a Mr Dobson from England; who has given very good Security for his performance & has commenced his Operations."

They attached Papers or reports marked B, C, D, E, F, G, H, and I. At the end of the very long letter, they apologized, at great length for its great length. In their apology, the precise and legalistic language used in the letter lapsed into a roll of rhetoric Thornton likely dictated: "We ought perhaps to apologize for giving you this long Detail, being Sensible how little time you can devote to the Subject. It is however of importance: & we are Confident you will think so, that we should with the utmost truth & candor lay before you the real state of things. Should any unexpected Incidents prevent the public buildings from being prepared in Time for the reception of Congress, how deep would be your, & our regret. Such an Event might ultimately shake the Dignity, Honor & peace of the Union. Thinking as we do, we should be wanting in official Duty if we did not make a just representation of affairs here. With such means as we have eked out by the strictest System of Œconomy, the utmost exertions shall be made; and whenever a Prospect of enlarging them shall offer, we shall with the sincerest pleasure grasp the happy occasion, having most ardently at heart the fullest Success of the City." Then they added a P.S..

For the president, one pleasing feature of the long letter was that it only asked him to make one decision: whether or not to get a loan. The board had some doubts about the height of the Capitol's foundation, but divided on whether to ask the president or just ask the secretary of state to ask the president. They mooted the debate between Hallet's courtyard and Thornton's portico: "... we beg leave to Suggest the Idea whether it would not be prudent in the present State of our funds to forego carrying on more of that building than the immediate accommodation of Congress may require."(24)

The letter also laid the groundwork for a dispute that soon caused the president to lose confidence in Thornton and Scott. They started a row with Thomas Johnson, the man Scott replaced. He had bought lots from Greenleaf along Rock Creek just north of the stone bridge at K Street NW. When Johnson tried to get the deeds for the lots, the two new members of the board told him that the old board had not been authorized to sell water lots to Greenleaf. Johnson promptly complained to the president, and blamed Scott.(25)

A gaping hole in the report sent to the president was an accounting of past and an estimate of future expenditures for the Capitol. The board blamed the conduct "of Mr Hallet whose capricious and obstinate refusal to deliver up such Sections of the Capitol as were Wanting obliged the late Commissioners to discharge him, and occasioned some difficulties in this business." The letter didn't mention that on January 21, Hallet wrote to the board apologizing for his insubordination and asking for his old job back.  

As the short session of congress came to a close, Secretary of State Randolph asked that one of the commissioners come to Philadelphia to arrange for a loan from Philadelphia banks.(27) That was the administrations only written reaction to the board's long letter to the president. The loan was Carroll's idea and he had expected to go, but illness kept him home. Scott decided that the board had mortgaged too many lots, and shouldn't mortgage more to get a loan. That left Thornton to go Philadelphia.

Despite his intention to undo Hallet's "wilful errors," in the long and detailed overview of their affairs that the commissioners sent to the president on February, there was no suggestion of changes to the Capitol's design. Since the president created the problem, there was one issue that the board anticipated might have to be decided by the president. The L'Enfant Plan sited the Capitol on the down slope of a hill. In 1792, the head surveyor Andrew Ellicott suggested it be moved higher back on the hill. The president disagreed. In March 1793, with a Capitol design approved the old board made the same suggestion and told the president that Thornton agreed. The president didn't react. The old board made the best of the situation with a plan to let brick makers level the hill by digging clay for bricks to be used for the building. 

By February 1795, Commissioner Thornton had a better idea, build the foundation higher. With the prospect of seeing the president, Thornton decided to write his own reports on issues the president should decide including a report on the foundation and on the next stage in building the Capitol, the basement. He began collecting data for his foundation report to prove that raising it would be cheaper than leveling the hill. In the process of trying to begin leveling the city as whole, a French engineer, perhaps attracted by other Frenchmen working in the city, measured elevations on Capitol Hill in the summer of 1794. In his report, Thornton explained: "Being cautious of admitting any Information on this important Subject, without investigating the minutiæ myself, I went over the Ground with a very accurate Instrument, and took the different heights, which I found corresponded so nearly to the Elevations given by Monsr Blois, that I may, with great propriety proceed upon his Reports as Data, in calculating the difference of the Expence of raising the foundation and of removing the Ground." 

The old board had also asked both Hallet and Williamson to estimate the cost of raising the foundation one foot. Thornton came up with his own figure, and observed: "Mr Hallet’s I think rather under the Truth, and Mr Williamson’s rather more than what the work can be done for by our present Arrangements. It is thought the work may now be executed for £1.2S.6D. the Perch; I will however allow £1.3.1 i.e. £740 for a whole round of one Foot high, or for the ten feet £7,400."

Hallet's "rather being under truth" was not the type of wilful errors that bothered Thornton. He called attention to one in his report on the basement. "It has been hinted," he wrote, that there would be no basement. Then he fumed "I cannot tell what was contemplated by those who immediately superintended the building." That is Hallet. Between January 21 and February 23 when Thornton went to Philadelphia, Thornton had an opportunity to force Hallet to show drawings that would prove that he planned to thwart the amended plan approved by the president and thwart the "ideas of Doctor Thornton." But the doctor didn't jump at the opportunity to cross-examine Hallet. The board took a month to reply to Hallet's letter. The board's secretary informed him that "the Board have concluded previous to giving an answer to your request you will lay before them any papers you have respecting the Capitol."(26)

As the bird flies, Thornton's Georgetown house was several miles from Hallet's house next to Capitol. But while measuring the elevation of Capitol Hill, Thornton could have conferred with Hallet. Not having data to marshal on the subject, Thornton's report on the basement is short, and as it turned out, he didn't give the president his report on the basement.

However, in the Papers of William Thornton, C. M. Harris gives agency to all of Thornton's reports: "WT raised the second ["the basement"] (and likely others) in meetings with President Washington." But there is no evidence for that, and evidence that he didn't. His third report was on leveling the city in which he wrote that despite the work of Blois, "it appears necessary to lay the plan I propose before the Executive that a certain rule may be adopted by which all future operations shall be regulated." He described and drew his plan using the alphabet from A to O. However, on August 15, 1795, after he retired, Commissioner Carroll sent a long letter to the president addressing problems remaining. He was most concerned with leveling the city. He mentioned Blois several times and Thornton not at all, except by implication. In the spring of 1795, Blois stopped working because of differences with the board, that is, Thornton and Scott. Carroll was then too ill to sit with the board. It was pointless for Thornton to try to change board policy by going over that head without informing his colleagues. If Carroll did not know about Thornton's "certain rule," the president did not know about it either.

As for Capitol design, it seems that Thornton did not want to quiz Hallet for fear that he would find that Hallet had nothing against having a basement.(7) What Thornton wrote in his report were conclusions to be drawn once he had proof of Hallet's perfidy: "I must beg leave to remark that very great liberties have been taken in laying out the foundation of the Capitol, and unnecessary deviations made from the plan you were pleased to approve." He didn't specify the liberties taken. He did not have a copy of his prize winning design. Instead, in the next sentence, he rewrote history by reminding the president that "the impracticability of that plan was urged, to give place to one which is not less so, but more expensive." Of course, the president accepted changes to Thornton's plan because everyone agreed that Hallet's revision made it less expensive. But not actually knowing what Hallet planned, Thornton could only ask: "Why for the mere sake of differing from the original plan should the order of things be inverted?"It was pointless, and foolish, to present conclusions to the president based on a rumor that could easily be dispelled by getting information from Hallet.

Hallet probably had not inverted the order of things. In that era, a basement was above ground and provided a service entrance to the building a story below its principal rooms. In his April 1793 amplification of his design, Thornton described his basement as 20 feet high. He described the floor above it as "The Grand Story." He distinguished his basement by facing it with rusticated stone which exhibited a rough cut that made pleasing contrast with the smooth noble facade above with its Classical columns. Having the rusticated basement was critical for Thornton. Not having one would clearly be a repudiation of his design ideas.

In the designs Hallet drew before he came to the city, he also had a rusticated basement. But in his March 1793 drawing, made after he had been on site for seven month, he realized that the building needed a "sub-basement," which is to say a basement partially underground, that "will raise the first floor to some steps above the highest ground...." That is to say, Hallet knew the site on the side of the hill was not level. The elevation Hallet drew has his sub-basement dignified with rusticated stone and also completely on the level. In reality, he knew that the ground around it was choppy. If he thought that a rusticated sub-basement could pass for a basement, he wasn't inverting anything, only coping with the rough terrain.

Another hazard Thornton faced if he particularized Hallet's wilfull errors, was the possibility that the president would ask Hallet to respond. Thornton finessed that by assuring the president that if the controversy remained solely in the board's hands all would be right. In his report, he made a bold promise: "It shall be my particular study to accommodate the original to the present foundation leaving out all difficulties or parts which the most common artificer cannot execute." That said, his report did not include any drawings.

Hallet's March 1793 deign

North Wing in 1800 showing uneven ground

Go to Chapter Eight

Footnotes to Chapter 7:

1. Harris p 588; Ridout, pp 28-29, 76, 123;

2. GW to Commrs. 14 March 1794; Clark, Greenleaf and Law in the Federal City, p. 120.

3. Dalton to Greenleaf 20 May 1794;  Greenleaf's Account with Commissioners; Stoddert to Greenleaf 12 May 1794  In Greenleaf Papers, Stoddert looks forward to "getting supplied with bricks from your machines...."; Appleton to Greenleaf, June 23, 1794; agreement with Kinsley 16 November 1793, HSP; See Kinsley to Jefferson 22 November 1793.  Excerpts from Through a Fiery Trial on Greenleaf's speculation

4. Appleton to Cranch, 2 February 1795, NALC papers; Ford, Notes on Webster, p. 384; Appleton to Webster 26 July 1794, Ford, Notes on NoahWebster, p. 384; Appleton to Greenleaf, 24 September 1794. He moved in with John Templeman who had moved to city from Boston; Appleton to Cranch 21 February 1795. Judging from a letter sent to another brother-in-law, Noah Webster, Cranch began corresponding to Appleton to keep hope alive that he would mend and return to the city. Ford, Notes on Noah Webster. p. 391.

5. In the contract he made with Greenleaf on 8 May 1794, Lovering is described as "late of London." Thanks to the marriage of Lovering's daughter to Dr. John Brereton, some attempts at describing Lovering's life are found in genealogies of the Brereton Family; Fitzroy Square ; Lovering to Commissioners, January 9, 1798.

6.  contracts with architects in Greenleaf Papers, HSP.

7.  Clark, p. 68

8. Dalton to Greenleaf, July 14, 1794; Contract with William Prentiss, Nicholson Papers.

9. Contract with Clark, 12 May 1794, Greenleaf papers; Isabella Clark to Morris and Nicholson, 28 November 1795. She sent the same letter to Greenleaf.

10. Appleton to Greenleaf, June 23, 1794; 

11. List of Houses and Property on Greenleaf's Point, Book 75 Greenleaf's Papers; Appleton to Henry, 3 & 9 February 1795; Cranch to his father 25 November 1794.

12. Henry to 

13. Arnebeck, "The Bubble and the Nest Egg"; Thornton ad in National Intelligencer 14 May 1813.

14. Commrs to Randolph  19  September 1794;  Randolph to Commrs. 2 October 1794

15. 10 April 1795, 1795 Almanac, Thornton papers, Lib. of Congress Reel 7. 

16. Commrs. Proceedings 1 October 1794.

17.  Greenleaf's secretary to Commrs, 18 September 1794;  Commrs to Greenleaf, 18, 20, 27. 29, 31 October 1794, 3 November1794; Commrs to Randolph, 18 Oct. 1794.

18.  Commrs to Simmonds  25 November 1794;

19.  John Trumbull to Jn. Trumbull, 23 Sept. 1793, as quoted in King, Julia, George Hadfield: Architect of the Federal City; GW to Commrs, 27 November 1794; Lear to GW, 17 December 1794. Commrs. to GW, 18 December 1794 & 2 January 1795.

20. WT to Trumbull, 6 January 1795, Harris, p. 291; Trumbull to Hadfield, 9 March 1795, Trumbull Papers, also Harris, p. 304.

21.  GW to Carroll, 7 January 1795,

22. GW to Commrs, 28 January 1795;  Commrs to GW,  18 February 1795;WT to Lettsom 22 Dec 1794 and 8 Jan 1795, Pettigrew vol 2 546-9. Blodget to WT, 5 January 1796, Harris, p. 288-9;

23. Carroll to GW 13 January 1795; James Barry papers, WHS;  Carroll to GW, 19 February 1795.

24. Commrs to GW  4 February 1795 

25. Johnson to GW, 23 December 1793,  Johnson to GW, 15 June 1795 ; Johnson and Stuart to GW 23 April 1794

26. Hallet to Commrs. 21 January 1795, Richmond to Hallet, 20 February 1795.

27. Randolph to Commrs., 13 February 1795

In a personal letter,  Carroll's only bad news was that his poor health forced him to resign as soon as a replacement could be appointed.(23)