William Thornton Re-examined by Bob Arnebeck

The Doctor Examined, or Why William Thornton Did Not Design the Octagon House or the Capitol by Bob Arnebeck Table of contents Chapter 10: Rivaling Tayloe Mrs. Thornton by Stuart 1804 The General died at Mount Vernon on December 14, 1799. Thornton came with the Laws a day later. Years later, he would write that he offered to restore the frozen corpse to life, but was "not seconded." However, the corpse was not frozen. According to Jefferson's thermometer in the Virginia foothills, afternoon temperatures were around 40F. Tobias Lear reported the events surrounding the death and burial in meticulous detail. He didn't mention a frozen corpse or Thornton's offer. He did note that the attending physician and Dr. Thornton vetoed his suggestion that the burial be delayed so more family could attend the funeral. The doctors said the inflammatory nature of the General's fatal disease made the corpse susceptible to decay and had to be buried as soon as the General...

The Doctor Examined, or Why William Thornton Did Not Design the Octagon House or the Capitol by Bob Arnebeck   Table of contents  Chapter Nine: The Ingenious A 116. Law's 1800 house became the fulcrum of the New Varnum Hotel Thornton never claimed in writing that he designed the houses built by Thomas Law, General Washington and John Tayloe for which ground was broken in 1799. No contemporary credited him for designing those houses. But no one else claimed credit or was credited for designing the houses. His biographers give Thornton a good excuse for not stepping forward. Thornton feared that being a practicing architect would tarnish his reputation as a gentleman. So, while he bragged about many accomplishment, he did not claim credit for designing the houses of his gentlemen friends. His biographers find evidence that he did the designs in his correspondence with the General and a diary his wife kept in 1800, even though they too never explicitly said he designed those ho...