1908: Washington Segregated

In researching a coming blog post, Quondam Washington came upon the following article, written in 1908, commenting on the near-complete segregation of blacks and whites in the Capital City (citation below).

The author, incidentally, was an African American. 

A COLOR PHASE IN WASHINGTON

By Osceola Madden

 

In Washington, the great capital city of the greatest country on earth, the separation of the races is more nearly complete than in any other city of the union. This does not even except the South, for here, where there is the largest colored population of any of our cities, the largest point of contact, that of personal service, is growing smaller each year and white help in private homes, boarding houses and hotels is taking the place of colored, while "white barber's" shops, until recently unknown in the South, arc getting very common. 

Shoe-shining parlors in the downtown districts, well appointed, with upholstered seats, electric lights and fans, periodicals and newspapers, have monopolized the trade of the once familiar black bootblack with box and chair.

In Washington the colored infant is introduced to his existence by a colored physician, often in a colored hospital with colored staff and nurses (the Freedmen's is the largest in the District). When old enough he goes to a colored school to study and play with colored children only. He sees white children and grown-ups in the complete than in any other city of the union. This does not even except the South, for here, where there is the largest colored population of any of our cities, the largest point of contact, that of personal service, is growing smaller each year and white help in private homes, boarding houses and hotels is taking the place of colored, while "white barber's" shops, until recently unknown in the South, arc getting very common. Shoe-shining parlors in the downtown districts, well appointed, with upholstered seats, electric lights and fans, periodicals and newspapers, have monopolized the trade of the once familiar black bootblack with box and chair.

In Washington the colored infant is introduced to his existence by a colored physician, often in a colored hospital with colored staff and nurses (the Freedmen's is the largest in the District). When old enough he goes to a colored school to study and play with colored children only. He sees white children and grown-ups in the streets, but nowhere else, and there is never contact unless a children's "race row" should happen. A colored dentist helps him get rid of his "milk teeth," and next day in a happy frame of mind he goes to a colored Sunday-school and a colored church.

After a course in the colored graded schools, should a profession be desired he can make a limited selection and get an excellent training at the one colored university, Howard. With the exception of the Catholic University all the others are closed tight — for him.

Should he not have desired or have been unable to obtain, a professional education, when ready to look for a life vocation or compelled by circumstances to hustle for a living, he is certainly up against a hard proposition if he is intelligent and ambitious. The number of trades offering him opportunity to become a skilled mechanic is small, and industries in which he can secure profitable employment, regardless of his preparation and ability, are few.  Without capital and experience, it is practically impossible for him to make a successful business beginning. What he shall do is not easy to decide.

Later, should he require legal assistance of any sort, excellent lawyers of color are ready to aid him, or if unfortunate enough to run afoul of the law he may be arrested by a policeman of his own race and have his case, if minor, tried before a colored magistrate. When he has lived a long and useful life, and all hope of local suffrage to help lessen the discrimination against him has departed, he gives up the ghost, and after a colored minister of the gospel has eulogized him in a colored church, a colored undertaker buries him in a colored cemetery. From beginning to end he has not crossed the color line.

As a matter of fact, in Washington, as in many other southern cities, the better classes of white and colored people know absolutely nothing of each other. They pass on the streets, sometimes, but that is as near as they ever get. In the schools, in the churches, in the various pursuits of gaining a livelihood, and —speak it gently — socially, the two races are entirely separate and apart.

According to the police census of last year the district has a population of 329,591, of which number 96,188 are colored people. Of approximately 450 clerks in the District (municipal) Building nine are colored men, a majority of the messengers and laborers being of the same race. The police force of 731 has thirty-eight colored officers on its roll, while nine of the 398 members of the fire-fighting force are colored. . The chief of the fire department says that he contemplates establishing a fire company composed entirely of colored men some time in the future.

In the city post office there are 556 white and seventy-nine colored clerks, including substitutes, and 325 white and fifty-five colored mail carriers on the list. Of the six city magistrates one is a colored man drawing a salary of $2,500. The colored Recorder of Deeds gets $4,000 as his annual compensation, and the president recently appointed a young colored lawyer as Assistant United States Attorney at a salary of $2,000.

The local school system is a dual one, the superintendent being white with a white assistant superintendent in charge of the white schools and a colored assistant in charge of the colored schools. For the 111 white and sixty-five colored school buildings there was an enrollment at the close of the last school year of 1,058 white teachers with 35,356 white pupils, and 517 colored teachers who gave instruction to 17,382 colored pupils.

For a great many years the government departments have drawn numbers of capable colored men with their families from all parts of the country, and there are now thousands of cultured, well-educated and refined colored people in the capital, many of them living in handsome and even elegant homes of their own. In this connection it may be worth while to state that of the total value of taxed property in the District of Columbia, $382,987,251 (this does not include government property to the value of hundreds of millions); nearly $23,000,000 worth is owned by colored people. This estimate is based upon the latest report of the Assessor of the District.

In the nine executive departments of the National Government there are approximately 1,450 colored employees, about three hundred of that number being clerks, drawing salaries ranging from $240 for the humble charwoman to $4,000 for the Register of the Treasury. The total amount paid these 1,450 employees is about $817,240 each year. One colored woman clerk enjoys a salary of $1,800. In addition to the Register of the Treasury, the Assistant Register, the Auditor for the Navy Department and, I believe, one or two chiefs of divisions are also colored. 

The corps of instructors in the local schools includes graduates of Harvard, Yale, Amherst, and others of the leading colleges, as well as a few from Oxford and from the leading universities of France and Germany, and some who have studied in Italy and Spain. Howard University, the foremost colored institution of learning in the country, and to which, by the way, Andrew Carnegie has recently donated $50,000 for a library, offers many advantages to the student in the higher branches, and is making an effort to include technical courses for those inclined to take more than the ordinary course in manual training. This institution is supported by Congressional appropriations and by private contributions.

Washington has no large industries or business houses managed by colored men, and there is no colored bank. There are many small stores and enterprises operated successfully, and in a limited number of trades many colored men make a comfortable living.

Of the benevolent and kindred organizations the "True Reformers" are very prominent. The local manager states that the order has a membership of ninety thousand, spread over thirty-seven states, including five thousand in Washington. They have erected in the city at a cost of $100,000 a handsome structure which contains the armory for the colored militia, a commodious entertainment hall, a drug store, and a number of office and lodge rooms. The building has proved a paying investment.

Among the professional men of color are many lawyers, some of whom do well, a goodly number of dentists with all they can do, and physicians with large and in some instances lucrative practices. Of the 1,459 registered physicians in the city seventy-six are colored, about fifty being regular practitioners; a number of the others are government clerks, "Sun Downers," practicing after office hours. Some of these physicians do exceedingly well, one in particular having a sanatorium and dwelling in the residential portion of Pennsylvania Avenue, about six blocks from the White House, and valuable properties located in other parts of the city.

There are a number of colored architects, at least two being very successful with excellent work to their credit, an automobile establishment, ten drug stores, two of which contain sub-post office stations, and two first-class photographic studios. A colored woman conducts an establishment of considerable size with schools of instruction in dressmaking, millinery and cooking, and in addition an employment bureau. There is also a flourishing Conservatory of Music and School of Expression in its fifth year, with an enrollment of 178 pupils and eight instructors.

A Young Men's Christian Association and a like organization for young women are struggling to get well established, and in the southwest portion of the city a colored woman is conducting a social settlement, which is doing most excellent work among the poorer classes of colored people in that section.

There are 114 colored churches in Washington, of all denominations, a majority Baptist with a goodly number of Methodists; also Episcopal, Presbyterian, Seventh Day, Holiness, Catholic and Lutheran, which would seem to assure a happy future for the colored people now here, however the present may seem.

The World To-Day, Vol. XIV, No. 1, January 1908, pp 549-552.

Photos, courtesy Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA

History of a Defunct Church: Central Presbyterian Church of Washington, D.C.

Note:  in the pages of a book the writer recently picked up in a used book shop, she found the following history, typed on three folded, yellowed, nearly-transparent sheets of paper.  The name "Pat Pritchett" is written in blue ink at the top right of the document--in a decidedly feminine hand.  I have duplicated the piece as it was written, commas and all.

Today, the former Central Presbyterian Church building, at 3047 Fifteenth Street, NW, houses the Capital City Public Charter School.

CENTRAL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH 

OF WASHINGTON, D. C.

 ----------------------------------

It was in January, 1868, that a handful of Christians decided to begin public worship in Washington, D.C., and the Rev. A.W. Pitzer was invited to preach.  They had secured a room in the Columbian Law Building on

Fifth Street, N.W.

, between D and E Streets.  The church was organized and this small group, with no money, no officers, no Presbytery, not a foot of ground—nothing to encourage them—planned to build a church.  A Sunday School had already been organized.   As a result of faith and self-denial a lot at the corner of Third and I Streets, N.W., was purchased on December 1, 1871 and ground broken June 24, 1872 for erection of a chapel.  Within five years after organization of the church, the chapel was completed.  The main sanctuary was built alter and was dedicated December 6, 1885.

For thirty years, the Central Presbyterian Church was the only Presbyterian Church in Washington connected with the Southern General Assembly.

After a remarkably long and active pastorate, Dr. Pitzer resigned in April 1906, was made pastor emeritus, and moved to Salem, Virginia, his boyhood home, where he lived until his death.

In September 1906, the Rev. James H. Taylor was called as pastor, and entered upon the work in November 1906. 

Due to changing conditions in the neighborhood the congregation considered securing a new location, and a lot was purchased in August, 1909, at 13^th and Monroe Streets, N.W.  On this lot was erected a portable chapel and a Sunday School started.  Son this piece of property was deemed inadequate for expansion and it was disposed of.  A new site at the corner of Fifteenth and Irving Streets, N.W. was secured and the frame chapel moved to this site in 1912.  During these years, Dr. Taylor was assisted during various periods by the Rev. John W. Walker, the Rev. H. W. Shannon and the Rev. D. W. Gates.

Before the property at Third and I Streets was sold in 1913, Woodrow Wilson came to Washington as President of the Untied States, and on the first Sunday after his inauguration he came to Central Church to worship—on March 9, 1913—and became a regular member of this congregation.

In October 1913, preparations were begun for the new building at 15^th and Irving Streets, N.W.  On December 19, 1913, President Woodrow Wilson laid the cornerstone.  This new building was occupied in February 1914.  Soon after the President came to Washington, word was received that he would supply the flowers each Sunday for the sanctuary.  These flowers were always delivered on Saturday.  During his term of office The President presented two gold plated vases for flowers.

The new sanctuary was dedicated May 31, 1914, with Dr. Pitzer addressing the congregation.  In May 1918, Central Church celebrated its Fiftieth Anniversary, at which Dr. Walter W. Moore of Union Theological Seminary, Richmond, Virginia, preached.

The property on

Irving Street

, adjacent to the church, was purchased, and in 1930 a Sunday School Building erected, with the cornerstone laid by President Herbert Hoover.

On May 28, 1933, the Sixty-fifth Anniversary of the organization of the church was observed.

The Seventieth Anniversary, on May 29, 1938, was another important event, when Dr. Ben R. Lacy, Jr., President of Union Seminary, Richmond, Virginia, Preached.  Other ministers who assisted the pastor during these years included the Rev. Fred V. Poag, the Rev. R. McFerran Crowe, the Rev. William F. Mansell, the Rev. Yandell Page and the Rev. J. Walter Dickson.

A Vacation Bible School had been started and carried on for over twenty years under the supervision of Miss Mary Coit.  Also a Friday night Class, begun in 1924, under the instruction of the pastor.

Many beautiful memorials have been presented to the church over the years.  Only two pastors served the church in seventy-five years. 

In October 1943, Dr. Taylor resigned and became pastor emeritus.  (Dr. Pitzer died in 1927).  The Rev. William F. Mansell became pastor, following Dr. Taylor, but ill health forced his resignation February 26, 1946.

Chaplain Alexander J. McKelway served as preacher for morning services until 1947, when the Rev. Graham Gordon Lacy was called as pastor and installed June 8, 1947.  The honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred on him by Hampden-Sydney College June 1948.

On November 18, 1956, a noteworthy event occurred, when a Centennial Memorial Service for Woodrow Wilson was held at Central.  At the 9:30 A.M. Service of Remembrance a bronze tablet was unveiled by Mrs. Wilson, renaming the educational building the Woodrow Wilson Building.  The Memorial Service was held at 11:00 A.M., with the Rev. Dr. John Alexander Mackay as speaker. 

The question of possible relocation of Central Church was considered, and on June 10, 1958, the congregation voted to remain at the present location.  At the same time the calling of an assistant minister was authorized, together with the purchase of a manse.  As a result of this action, the Rev. Jamie D. Stimson was called as Assistant Minister, and installed June 21, 1959.

Photo, courtesy http://www.streetsofwashington.blogspot.com/

Mothers of Invention

Today, Quondam Washington would like to pay tribute to some Washington inventors--men and women whose creativity, ingenuity and perseverance have somehow been forgotten to history.

Mr. James H. Welch of Georgetown who designed what observers claimed was the most perfect machine yet produced for its purpose—that is, the liquor bottle register. A nickel-plated device, it was attached to the neck of liquor bottles so that it registered every drink a customer took. This way, bartenders had no opportunity to forget how much liquor they dispensed. At the time of this invention (1878), the liquor tax was two and a half cents per drink—that is, if they remembered to register the drinks. Proponents of Welch’s bottle register suggested that if the contraption were used consistently, tax authorities could reduce the liquor tax to a half cent a bottle and still generate more tax revenue.  Dull, yes, but clever.

Mr. John J. Burrows patented in 1872 a form of pavement involving rectangular wooden blocks—it’s a bit difficult for the highly non-technical QW to visualize the system: Block were composed of one vertical and one inclined side, and one concave and the other convex. When the blocks are laid, the projection of one block would fit into the recess of an adjoining block. Oh, yeah, I get it now. Between each row strips would be placed, which would leave grooves—and these would be filled with concrete, gravel or sand.

Good thinking, Mr. Burrows. But even more boring than the liquor bottle register.

19th Century schoolteacher Miriam E. Benjamin conceived of a device she called a “Gong and Signal Chair” for hotels. Hotel and restaurant guests, if they needed the service, would simply press a button located on the chair which would not only send a signal a waiter or other attendant, but cause a small light on the chair to be illuminated. In her patent application, Ms. Benjamin declared that her invention would “reduce the expenses of hotels by decreasing the number of waiters and attendants, to add to the convenience and comfort of guests and to obviate the necessity of hand clapping or calling aloud to obtain the services of pages.”  QW gives her honorable mention, as her chair was an important predecessor to the signals we now use on airlines across the globe.

At least two African American women of Washington obtained patents for their inventions:  In 1884, Judy W. Reed, the first woman of color to ever do so, was awarded a patent for her hand-operated dough kneader and roller. I'd buy one--if they were still offered for sale.  I'll wager Ms. Reed never got rich, and there is scant mention of her in the literature. 

QW’s heart goes out to another African-American inventor in Washington, Ms. Ellen Eglin. She invented the clothes wringer for washing machines which would have been a real money-maker for her. However, she sold the patent rights to her wringer for a mere $18, because, as she explained,

You know I am black and if it was known that a Negro woman patented the invention white ladies would not buy the wringer, I was afraid to be known because of my color, in having it introduced into the market, that is the only reason.

James William Bryan in 1923 announced he had some three dozen or more patents for an automobile with legs. Imagine a five-passenger car with no clutch, no gears, no springs—and weighing half of a Model T or any other wheeled car. Most amazing of all, Mr. Bryan claimed that with two engines developing a combined horsepower of 40, why, his machine was capable of racing as fast as 81 miles per hour. Most amazing of all, he claimed his car could rise up or down one foot—without moving the motorcar from a horizontal plane. You hear that, Smart Cars???

Perhaps the city’s most prolific inventor was Mr. C. Francis Jenkins, a lowly stenographer with an interest in film. Mr. Thomas Edison may have gotten all the credit for inventing the kinetoscope, but it was Jenkins who originated and patented the original Phantascope. After a dispute with Jenkins, his partner Thomas Armat sold the design to Edison—and it was reborn as the Vitascope.

In 1924, Jenkins wowed Washingtonians with a demonstration at the Wardman Park Hotel of the “radio photo letter”—the predecessor of today’s facsimile machine.

By 1913 he was promising Americans that they would be able to enjoy radio vision—that is, moving pictures by wireless. In 1925, he said that he had only a few more details to work out. “To me, it does not seem strange that we shall presently plug into the loudspeaker jack of our radio receiving set a small boxlike device which will project a picture on a small white screen—an action picture of some event then taking place downtown, or in some more distant city, a Presidential ceremonial, a national sport, a spectacular event.” Jenkins built the nation’s first television transmitter, located on the Virginia side of the Anacostia river. On June 13, 1925, he performed his first public wireless transmission from Arlington, Virginia across the river to Washington, D.C.   Besides all this, he was granted more than 400 U.S. patents for inventions ranging from an altimeter, a brake for airplanes, a machine that shelled beans and even the conical paper drinking cup.

QW doesn’t step into an elevator without wanting to go back in time and give Thaddeus Cahill a sharp elbow in the ribs.  The grandfather of Muzak, Cahill was a Washington lawyer and inventor who liked to fool around with sound. He wanted to be able to amplify music through the telephone, but there was really no way to amplify it enough so that anyone but the person holding the receiver could hear. If there were, why music could be played in hotels, restaurants, theaters and even private homes.

Thus was the Teleharmonium born. In the earliest model, sound was audible via acoustic horns built from piano soundboards; later models were linked directly to the telephone network or to a series of telephone receivers fitted with special acoustic horns – not unlike those used in old Victrolas.

Cahill built three Teleharmonims [ae?], each one bigger than the last. The final machine weighed about 200 pounds and took up an entire building on west 56th street in New York City. Sadly, his scheme to pipe music on a grand scale failed because it ended up costing too much—in addition, it was discovered that the Teleharmonium interfered with local telephone calling.


Finally, we go way back in the history of our nation, all the way back to our first Commander in Chief, George Washington, who, according to legend, invented an object without which nary a cocktail or a Starbucks latte could be mixed—the swizzle stick. Or so at least one New York Times journalist would write. It was during a trip to Barbados to visit his ailing brother. One hot day, the two men were out walking, and George’s brother declared to that he was tired and thirsty. “It is against my principle,” said George “to venture in uncertain taverns out of idle curiosity.” Why, he would just as soon cut down a cherry tree than taint himself as a barfly!

However, it being an emergency, and his brother looking so terribly peaked, George led the two into a certain tavern before—clearly, he was no stranger there, for the tavern keeper took one look at him and produced a bottle of schnapps.

But on this day, schnapps alone would not do. Our founding father wanted something a bit cooler. The tavern keeper produced a few local ingredients, and George set about composing a concoction that even Washington’s mixologist celebre Derrick M. Brown would envy:  Four parts schnapps, a teaspoon of South American bitters and a grating of kola nut. George then broke his clay pipe in half and used the stem to stir the mixture until foam appeared at the top.  Thus, the swizzle, both stick and cocktail, was born.

Well, truth or not, this wins QW’s award for one of the most useful inventions ever produced by a Washingtonian. And now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s time to log off, go into the kitchen to mix a Swizzle, which I will stir to a perfect froth with a swizzle stick (lacking a pipe, I'll use my finger), pour it all into a conical paper cup and plop my feet up in front of my portable radio vision machine for some well-deserved leisure time.

Is it me, or did 19th Century DC reporters have far too much time on their hands…

 From the Washington Post, Feb. 24, 1895, p. 17, "He Attracts Attention"

"Like a burst of sunshine in a shadowy place, he comes into the passing crowd and becomes a part of it.  Others skip with rapid feet, bending from heel to toe clad in brown and black and somber grays, but he plods steadily along with stiff ankles, like a boy on stilts.  His feet are covered with queer contraptions.  The soles are thick and unyielding; black velvet binds them at the sides, and buff silk constructs the uppers.  The lower limbs to the knee are swathed about with lightly gathered folds of white cloth that look all the world like bandages, and queerly made trousers of bluish satin continue loosely upward.  A full sleeved, ample-bodied garment of gray silk hangs from his shoulders, and down the back of it floats a long plait of hair as black as ink.  A small silk cap with a blue button on its top rests upon his head, and a pair of glasses with crystals as large as Mexican dollars reposes on his well-shaped nose, and serve as windows for the thoughtful, brown eyes to look through.  He thumps along with head erect on sloping shoulders, leaning forward with no evidence knowledge of the effect he is creating.  Some people turn and regard him with undisguised wonder.  They have bundles in their arms that will cause comment for a week out in the country.  Disrespectful gamins make remarks about rats and Japan.  Every woman wishes she had a gown made of silk like he has in his coat.  But his imperturbability never forsakes him.  He turns into a bookstore and selects the latest work in philosophy and scientific research.  He buys the last French and German periodicals.  Then he strolls out and swings along out the streets and up the Fourteenth street hill to the big stone pile at the top.  The servant salaams to the floor as Mr. Yei Shung Ho enters the Chinese legation."

Apologia

A number of folks have complained, since viewing the photo which accompanied my last entry, Headless Chicken, that they were so disgusted that they've since become ardent vegans. 

With apologies to the poultry industry, Quondam Washington offers a replacement photo which, she hopes, her readership will find a bit more appetizing.

The Case of the Headless Chicken--Cruelty Most Fowl

Dr. M.P. Key of the District’s Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was outraged as he walked into the office of DC District Attorney Moore’s office at Police Court on Christmas morning of 1883. Over one arm hung a basket, from whose depths could be heard a curious fluttering.

The creature inside, he announced, had been on public display for several days at 941 Pennsylvania Avenue. The owners of the creature, Mssrs. Randolph Warrick and Henry Irving, had been placed under arrest for animal cruelty.

In what certainly had to be a memorable moment in DC legal history, Dr. Key opened the basket. Out jumped a headless rooster.

To the amazement of those who gathered to see the spectacle, the chicken had a well-developed body, neck and legs.  However, most of its head appeared to be missing. Those who had the stomach to lean forward and examine the flustered bird more closely noticed that though its eyes and beak were absent, it did retain its ears and what appeared to be the base of the head.

Mssrs. Warrick and Irving appeared before Judge Snell some time later that day, represented by lawyer Campbell Carrington. Warrick explained that he had bought the curious bird from a Richmond man for $25. The former owner explained that the bird had been missing its head for over a year. It happened this way: the former owner from Richmond had chopped off the heads of a number of fowl one day. However, the bird in question refused to die. So the Richmond man had kept it alive by forcing feed down what he believed was its windpipe.

Warrick and Irving argued that they had received a permit to show the bird from Chief of Police Dye.

After lengthy arguments over the nature of animal cruelty, Judge Snell dismissed Irving but fined Warrick a hefty $50—twice what the latter had paid for the bird.

It was Snell’s opinion that exhibiting the bird amounted to animal cruelty—and any creature missing a brain had to be suffering.

He also publicly questioned why in the world Police Chief Dye would have given a permit to exhibit the poor bird.

Dr. Key placed the bird back inside the basket and left the courtroom. Meanwhile, Mr. Warrick told the press he was astonished by the verdict—why, Mr. Barnum of circus fame would likely be willing to pay $1,000 for such an oddity as the headless chicken.

That should have been the end of the matter…it was not. The following day—Boxing Day, when other Washingtonians were home still digesting their Christmas dinners of headless geese and suckling pigs, Warrick and his attorney Carrington were back in Police Court, appealing Judge Snell’s decision. Today, the defense was ready to scientifically prove that the headless rooster was not suffering. Carrington had arranged for an autopsy of the hapless fowl by the esteemed Deputy Coroner, Dr. Hartigan.

It was Hartigan’s observation that though the head had been removed and a greater portion of the bird’s brain was missing, a small portion remained in the base of the missing skull. Furthermore, he opined, since that portion of the brain which feels pain was located in that part of the brain that had been missing, the bird had not, in fact, suffered at all. If the bird were in pain, he pronounced, it would not have thrived as it had.

Furthermore, Dr. Hartigan stated, he had conferred with a number of other physicians, all of whom concurred with his diagnosis.

Judge Snell, however, stuck to his guns—as well as his previous judgment. “I think this is a demoralizing exhibition,” he said. “If this is allowed, we will have all the boys in the city trying to cut the heads off chickens.”

The case was dismissed. Justice was served.

And someone enjoyed a fowl supper that night.

Dolly Barber's Tree

Hard by a poplar shook alway,
All silver-green with gnarled bark:
For leagues no other tree did mark
The level waste, the rounding gray.
She only said, "My life is dreary,
He cometh not," she said;
She said, "I am aweary, aweary,
I would that I were dead!"


                                    -- From “Mariana,” by Alfred Lord Tennyson

Every so often, Quondam Washington comes across a bit of history that she cannot explain.

This time the author is completely stymied and is forced to call upon her readership to see whether her research is faulty—or whether the facts are simply lost to history.

At issue is the legend of the “Dolly Barber Tree”, an ancient popular which once stood along what is now Reservoir Road in the vicinity of Foxhall Village and was once the trysting place of the 18th Century girl after whom it is named.

There is no doubt that the tree existed; from earliest times it was an important reference point for surveyors and is mentioned in old land surveys. It apparently marked the convergence of three important properties west of Georgetown, belonging to William Murdock, Henry Threlkeld and Henry Foxhall, all famous old names in West Georgetown history:

• Henry Threlkeld (1716-1781) was an early settler who bought "Alliance," an estate of 1,000 acres bordering on the Potomac River. This tract, part of which came to be known as Berlieth (the spelling has changed over the years), extended north from the river to include the grounds of what is now Georgetown University, Visitation Convent and farther north to the present-day Duke Ellington School of the Arts and the neighborhood now called Burleith.

• Henry Foxhall was an Englishman, said to be a friend of Thomas Jefferson's. Prior to coming to Washington, he had been a partner in an iron works firm in Philadephia. Arriving in Washington around 1799, he built a foundry at what is now Glover-Archbold Park. He lived at a expansive estate called “Springhill” in the vicinity of what are today 44th and P streets.

• Finally, William Murdock the Older, was a prominent early landowner in lower Frederick County, which in those days encompassed the entire Foxhall area. He was the son of Rev. George Murdock, a Marylander ordained in London's St. Paul's Cathedral in 1724, and the first rector of Rock Creek Parish (from 1726 until his death in 1761).

William’s first wife was the daughter of Col. Thomas Addision, and his father-in-law gave Murdock a portion of land at “Friendship”, a famous old estate which sat about a mile north of Georgetown where American University is now.

His son Col. John Murdock (b. 1734, d. 1791) was a partner in a lucrative tobacco export business with Uriah Forrest and Benjamin Stoddart, formed in 1783. John, in turn, had a son named William whom I believe plays some role in the Dolly Barber mystery.

The “Dolly Barber” tree has had brief mention in old newspapers:

On August 2, 1899, a huge summer storm hit Washington and took down an old local landmark called the “Dolly Barber Tree”, an event which at the time was so newsworthy that it was reported by the New York Times three days later.

Two years later, District surveyor Henry B. Looker submitted his annual report to Commissioners, in which he commented on the significant increase in the number of requests for land surveys—this, as citizens began spreading into the suburbs and formerly large tracts of land were divided and subdivided to accommodate them (Post, Aug. 2, 1901). Incidental to the report, Looker referred to a the “Dolly Barber Tree,” which he acknowledged as the cornerstone of several original Georgetown tracts. In order to preserve its exact site, “south side of the New Cut road west of Foundry Branch,” Looker’s office placed a permanent monument at the exact spot where the tree once stood, which carefully recorded auxiliary points for future land surveys. (Report of the Operations of the Engineer Department of the District of Columbia for the Year Ending June 30, 1900, Washington: GPO, 1900).

Developers of Foxhall Village in the 1930s, in promoting their new development, cited the romance of the site and made reference to the Dolly Barber Tree.

So, the tree existed—but where, exactly--and who, then, was Dolly?

References insist she was the daughter of “William Murdock”—which could be either the father of Col. John Murdock or his son, also named William. Regardless of which Murdock was her father, why did she carry a different surname?

The possibilities are interesting—but before QW and the reader get too carried away with theories, let us examine one or two clues that bear consideration:

• A Dorothy Barber is listed in the 22 August 1776 census of Frederick County’s Lower Potomack Hundred (the same general “neighborhood” as the Murdock family and the tree. She is described as being 11 years old, thus, born in 1765.

• Col. John Murdock, before his death in ca. 1791, writes a will in which he goes to some length to ensure that Dorothy Barber and her three teenaged children are provided for:

-->Fifthly  it is my will and desire not withstanding anything herein before contained and I do expressly desire unto Dorothy Barber one hundred acres of land to be paid off for her by my said trustees immediately after my death to include the plantation where James Collins now lives and the house where the said Dorothy Barber now dwells to be bounded to the eastward by the Mill Branch and the southward by the east line of Whitehaven and to the westward and northward by such lines ... and to hold during her natural life the said premises and after her decease & will and desire the said land to John the son of the said Dorothy and his heirs forever provided nevertheless if the said John shall die before the age of twenty one years a without issue of his body living at the time of his death...His will states that Dorothy has three children: John, under age 21; Elizabeth, under age 18; and Mary, also under age 18.

• Consider another tantalizing clue: John’s son William is clearly a ne’er do well, implied in this segment of John’s will:

In the Name of God Amen. I John Murdock of George Town in Montgomery County and state of Maryland do make and ordain this my last will and testament. Whereas to my great uneasiness I have discovered that my son, William, does not possess care and prudence sufficient to qualify him for the management of our estate…[it is my will and desire to] pay and satisfy all such debts as may be justly due and owing from my son William …

•  Box 40, folder 2 in the Jesuit Archives for Maryland at Georgetown University contains a number of warrants of resurvey and/or indentures between 1791 and 1824.  Among them is an indenture (1822) between John Murdock alias John Barber. Could this be Dorothy’s son John, using both names?

As a final note, A. Boschke’s Topographical map of the District of Columbia, surveyed in the years 1856 '57 '58 and '59, shows an “M. Barber” as the owner of a land just northwest of Georgetown.

What, dear readers, does this all mean?

Can anyone help me identify dear Dolly?

The Assault on Elsie Ough

One chilly December morning in 1893, a Miss Elsie Ough, the daughter of a prominent Canadian architect, was driving her father to work along the New Cut Road, which is today, Reservoir Road, through Georgetown and all the way to 14^th and F Streets in the City, where his practice was located. 

She drove her open buckboard wagon all the back through Georgetown. 

The family home was said to be a pretty little cottage which sat on the left side of Conduit Road, past the water holding tank--at about two miles out the New Cut Road.  Once outside of town, she would have trotted through open farmland where sheep and cows grazed, past the College Woods and the forests and meadows of what we now know as Glover Archibald Park. 

She had just crossed a little stream at Foundry Branch when she felt her buggy jerk.  Before she knew it, a man had leapt onto the back of her vehicle and had his hands about her throat.   Elsie tried to cry out, but he carried a knife and threatened to use it on her if she made another peep.  She would later tell the court that the man made indecent proposals to her.

The brave young woman resisted him and did scream; however, the area was so rural at the time that none could hear her.  As the man and girl continued to struggle, her horse continued his trot toward home—and the feeding trough, no doubt. 

They made it to the site of the Dolly Barber Tree*.  At last, someone heard Elsie’s cries; Lazarus Whetzell was an elderly widower who happened to be working in his garden at the top of a rise above the water. 

Elsie’s assailant, seeing that there was a witness, jumped down from the wagon and began to run down the road.  However, he suddenly changed his mind and ran back toward the wagon.

Elsie lashed her poor horse as hard as she could and managed to race home before the stranger could get to her.   She arrived home in a state of hysteria.  Her shocked family summoned the police, to whom Elsie gave a description:  The man had been wearing a blue coat with brass buttons—suggesting he might have been a naval cadet.  He had run back in the direction of Aqueduct [Key] Bridge.

Once word got out, the rural neighborhood was outraged.  Their excitement had not even begun to die down when another girl was assaulted.  This time it was 13-year-old Annie Drury of Foxhall Road and her 15-year-old girlfriend and neighbor, Kitty Babcock, who were assaulted.  They had been walking together when the man came from nowhere and made some of the same indecent proposals to them.

The description given by all three girls matched a certain young Georgetown resident, Milton Chamberlain.  Police issued a warrant for his arrest, and just a few mornings later, Milton’s father James, a Thirty-Second Street grocer, hearing that one of his sons was suspected, brought both his sons to the Seventh Precinct Station House—Milton and Robert.  When the girls positively identified Milton, Robert was allowed to return to school.

Police charged Milton with four counts of assault, battery and indecent language between the three girls.  He was taken to Police Court, where Milton’s father was able to make the $500 bail Judge Miller ordered. 

At the February 13 trial, Elsie testified as to the alleged attack on her by Milton Chamberlain back on December 18.  Milton’s lawyer, a Mr. Campbell Carrington, argued the charge of criminal assault because no clothes were torn.  However, the prosecution, Mr. Mullowney, countered that there was legal precedence for charging a man with criminal assault solely on the basis of his indecent remarks.

In March, the case went before Judge Cole’s criminal court.   Milton’s mother Louise Chamberlain stated emphatically that he had never owned a blue coat with gold buttons.  Family and several school friends and all came forth to speak for Milton.  His one-time teacher at the Jackson School, Ms. Sarah M. Farr, wrote a letter to the editor of the Washington Post, pleading his case, reminding the public that he was only a few months out of knee pants.  “Think of the innocent, fifteen-year-old boy sent to jail for ninety days, to be a companion of thieves, murderers and assaulters  Mothers, tremble for your boys!  Any one of them may be seized at any time to be a scapegoat of offended public feeling.”  (Post, April 2, 1894, p. 5)

On April 4^th, the jury found Milton guilty of simple assault.  He was sentenced to ninety days in jail—however, his attorney, Mr. Carrington—or so it was initially reported--brought the matter to the attention of the President of the United States, Grover Cleveland.  On or about May 14^th, President Cleveland granted a full pardon and signed for the release of lucky young Milton, stating he believed the entire matter had been a case of mistaken identity.

Several days later, a presumed attorney by the name of Milton Myers wrote a letter to the editor of the Post.  It stated that Carrington had nothing to do with bringing the matter before the President, that it was, in fact, Miss Farr and two other of his teachers who had petitioned the White House. (Post, May 17, 1894, p. 7)

Milton would go on to work as a clerk in his father’s grocery—and later, its butcher.  He would marry a girl named Lucy; they would have a child who they would name Milton, Jr.  He was a fireman at the Bureau of Mines at American University by age 40, when he registered for the World War I draft.  After that, only his son Milton shows up in  the records. 

Elsie Ough never appeared again.  Her family either moved away or she married soon thereafter.

Nothing more is known about Annie Drury.

Kitty Babcock remained living with her parents William and Gertrude in their house on the now obsolete Ridge Road, near Foxhall, for at least another fifteen years.  After that, she too disappears.

A Man's Home: Ryder's Castle and the Removal of Little Abby

No, it was not an elegant mansion on upper Sixteenth Street. The building carrying this soubriquet was a neglected three-story house on 6th Street NW, halfway between D and E Streets, where the Hyatt Regency-Capitol Hill now stands.

The building was nicknamed after its claimed owner, George S. Ryder*, who operated a rooming house whose inmates were well-known to police at the No. 6 Precinct—swindlers, fortune-tellers, loafers and pickpockets.

In January,1897, George was said to be not only old and grey, but recently paralyzed. He hardly sounded like the father of the five-year-old little girl named Abby K. Ryder who had just been removed from the house by Agent Parkman of the Children’s branch of the Washington Humane Society.

In fact, many doubted that old George really was Abby’s father. Including George himself. In a hearing January 2, he told Police Court Judge Miller he couldn’t be sure, though he loved her and wanted to provide for her as if she were his own. He even agreed to place her in the care of his lawyer, General William Birney. However, the court dismissed this possibility after Ryder failed to make arrangements for her move.

DC Police Officer Patrick J. Creagh, along with two other officers, Kelly and Lynch, testified that the residents of Ryder’s Castle were persons of immoral and corrupting character—why, the housekeeper, Mrs. Baxter, was an alcoholic. Worse, eh hmm, well, police had sneaked inside the house once to find Ryder and Mrs. Baxter in bed together—as well as the child!

It had been Creagh who, a few years earlier, passed by the old Castle and overheard a group of three young women were laughing riotously about a scam they had going: On Pension pay days, they would follow old soldiers and pick their pockets. They were so vociferous in planning the next day's outing that Officer Creagh arrested them on the spot and had them sent to the workhouse for sixty days. For at least that month, the neighborhood’s Civil War veterans were safe from assault.

Now, Ryder, in an effort to appease the court and keep little Abby with him, told the judge that he had evicted all the residents of the house—save for Mr. and Mrs. Percy and Maud Brown, who were elderly, and a Mr. Hawkins who was an old gentleman of color.

After investigating the situation, two weeks later, Judge Miller turned poor little Abby over to the Board of Children’s Guardians, a poorly-funded agency which, more often than not, placed children in public institutions rather than private homes.

Sadly—but not surprisingly—Abby never appears in any Washington census. What became of her is not known, unless one among our readers can shed any light. 

As for the "castle": There had been some doubt all along that George Ryder was its legal owner. Sometime that year, the city had ordered Ryder to hook up to the sewer system, however he failed to do so. In September, Ryder was forced to admit that the property did not really belong to him, and pending charges were dropped.

That was the last time George Ryder made the newspapers.

Ryder Castle presumably fell into ruin...but not until far worse goings on were discovered there.

This would not be the last time the names Percy and Maud Brown appeared--in either newspapers, District court dockets or this blog.






*Not to be confused with the George Ryder of equestrian circles and society pages.

© Cecily Hilleary, 2010.

Photos courtesy Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA

Washington Digs Out...For the Umpteenth Time

    

    A reminder to all those Washingtonians who are currently excavating cars and sidewalks that   
    Snowmaggedon has been visited upon Washington many, many times before...

John Brown's Mysterious Origins

Nineteenth and early Twentieth Century journalists loved a good mystery.  Apparently, so do some Twentieth Century bloggers.    

The Washington Post of May 10, 1904, carried the following tale of a mysterious stranger:

On a cold and blustery night in the mid 1860s, a cold and starving stranger knocked on the door of Georgetown’s Franklin Inn at 168 Bridge Street—later, 3249 M Street--asking for food and shelter.   Innkeeper Ann Cleveland was the widow of John Cleveland, who had died in a tragic accident at the Washington Monument construction site.  Sympathetic to the man, she ordered her servants to give him food and a place to lie down for the night.   She told him not to leave in the morning until she had had a chance to speak with him.

The next morning, she offered the man, who called himself John Brown, a job as a general handyman.  He accepted the offer and ended up working there, according to the Post, for two decades until Mrs. Cleveland’s death in 1888.

Mrs. Cleveland, prior to her death, had instructed her daughter Louisa Phipps to provide for Mr. Brown and, on his death, give him a respectable Christian burial.

Mr. Brown died at Providence Hospital in May, 1904, and true to her word, Louisa arranged for Father Smythe from St. Joseph’s Church on Capitol Hill to preside over the funeral.  She buried John Brown in the family plot at Holy Rood Cemetery in Georgetown.

Mr. Brown was as much a mystery to the family and neighbors at his death as he had been in life.  He had appeared to be an educated man from a good family.   He never divulged a single detail about his past, no matter how much pressure he was put under.  He kept to himself, never making friends with either men or women.

The Post fancifully hinted he may have been connected to the infamous abolitionist by the same name—but of course, this would have been impossible, as the famous John Brown had been put to death in December, 1859. 

Census returns show John Cleveland in Georgetown as early as 1840.  The 1870 census shows a widowed Mrs. Cleveland and her children, as well as several servants and staff—among them, three Johns:  Sweeney, Whelan and Haines, but no Brown.   The 1880 census shows a plasterer named John Fowler.

No John Brown is listed in the tombstone transcripts of Holy Rood Cemetery, though further examination of burial records held at Georgetown University may reveal his name. 

The Wild Man of Tennallytown

Some years ago, the author read an account of a wild man who lived in a cluster of rocks on the Virginia side of Long Bridge, and she has been collecting tales of these “half men-half beasts” ever since. Most of these savages have simply turned out to be homeless indigents or aged victims of dementia.

The following is one of her favorites:

In July of 1894, farmers in Tennallytown began reporting having seen a half-naked man roaming the pastures and byways of their village, ranting as if he were wild. A local butcher reported seeing a white man of heavy build running through the woods just south of old River Road. When he called out, the running man simply shook his fist. The same day, a milkman on Conduit Road, about a mile and a half away, caught sight of a half-clad man running on his property. He thought it was a joke.

Streetcar No. 5 Motorman W. M. Vogt reported that while on a run through Tennallytown, he saw the wild man running down the middle of the road, flailing and threatening to tear up the track. Later, on a return trip, Vogt saw him crouching by the track. As the car passed, the wild man scurried away with a speed impossible for a drunk.

When a guest at the Woodley Inn claimed he saw the wild man in a ravine outside his window, authorities began to sit up and take notice.

Citizens began to talk about forming a posse to track down the wild man, but their efforts were hindered by rain over the next few days.

Police had found a pile of clothes in a ravine behind the Woodley Inn—a dark grey serge vest and coat and a brand-new straw hat. They joked that these likely belonged to someone too embarrassed to claim them.

Word of the wild man was beginning to spread. Housewives, who stayed at home alone during the day, became nervous. Though no one had been harmed by the wild man, the newspapers reported that there was no telling what he was capable of. It was supposed he subsisted on nuts and berries he found in the woods.

Concerned citizens checked with the mental asylum to see whether any inmate had escaped. None had.

Tennallytown resident Edward Brooks claimed his black servant had come across the wild man sleeping in the brush on the side of the road: The latter wore only “pantaloons", i.e., boxers, and a pair of worn socks, as well as several days’ growth of whiskers.

Patrolman Lohmann was sent to look for the wild man, who had by that time absconded.

Next, a carpenter who lived near Woodley Inn told mounted officers Heide and Murphy he had sighted the wild man just south of the Inn.

Under pressure from a nervous public, police arrested a black man named George Douglas, a hitherto harmless Tennallytown resident who was said to be nearly insane with grief over the death of his wife two years earlier. It was doubtful he was the “wild man,” in spite of his light complexion, because the clothes found in the woods were far too large for him.

Late on the evening of July 23, the night watchman in the powerhouse of the Tennallytown Electric Railroad Company heard an “unearthly shriek” from the engine room. Workers searched the building twice—and twice more heard the “demonic yell,” but found nothing and no one. They returned to the office, their hair standing on end. Perhaps the sound had come from outside, for there was no sign of forced entry into the powerhouse, and all its doors and windows were locked tight.

Then, just as suddenly as the wild man had appeared, he disappeared—for at least a few days. Locals theorized that the rain had forced him to seek cover in a local barn. Some believed he may have died from exposure or hunger. Search parties were called off. Tennallytown women and children breathed a sigh of relief.

And then on the afternoon of July 25, a man who called himself Mr. Lamb walked into the Seventh Precinct station house and asked for his clothes. Yes, he said, he was the wild man who had been terrorizing the vicinity. He blamed his antics on the kind of insanity that comes in a bottle.

It seems that Mr. Lamb had gone into the country some time in the preceding week, carrying with him “a large load of vinous stimulants.” He didn’t remember anything else, save for waking up to find himself nearly naked. He hitched a ride on the wagon of a butcher who he met on the road.

Officers told him his clothes had been sent to police headquarters and would be sent for immediately. Lamb could claim his clothes the next day. When he did, he announced that the hat they presented him was not his original $3.50 hat, but one of a much more inferior quality. Police believed that the officer who delivered the clothing from downtown headquarters had exchanged his own inferior hat for Mr. Lamb’s hat. They promised to keep their eyes on Officer Hauptman, just in case he should ever show up with a new straw hat.

Dead Man's Beat

If you were a policeman in Georgetown during the latter half of the nineteenth century, there was one assignment that would fill your heart with dread: Patrolling Cherry Hill, a rundown and disreputable neighborhood of alleys along the C&O Canal south of Bridge Street—today’s M Street, NW.

If you believed the papers and tales shared among officers in the Georgetown Precinct House, every policeman who had ever been assigned to patrol “Spooks’ Alley” had either died or suffered disaster and misfortune.

Police Officer [Samuel] Frank Burrows had been on the force for many years and told anyone who would listen that he’d rather resign the force than ever again walk the grim alleys around Cherry Street. It was haunted; plenty of folks had seen the ghost. He would appear every night, whether in summer or winter, just after St. John’s bells finished pealing twelve midnight: A phantom policeman wearing a heavy winter uniform, his collar pulled up to his ears. Whenever one of the officers would approach him—and few dared—he would disappear.

It was Dead Man’s Beat that had turned his hair white overnight.

In the beginning, Burrows didn’t believe in ghosts or spooks and thought less of his colleagues for being so gullible—that is until one evening when he was sent to the haunted beat. He didn’t get further than Thirty-second and M Street before he turned around and beat a hasty retreat to the station house. He begged to his lieutenant to either reassign him or dismiss him, for he was determined not to ever patrol the area again. He had seen the ghost in every conceivable shape, sightings so terrifying that he wished he had never been born.
The next day, Burrows woke up with snow-white hair.

And the officer who had been sent to replace him on the beat was found dead.

©Cecily Hilleary, 2010
Photo, courtesy Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA