Historic Christ Church

Earliest parish records shed little light upon the spiritual life of the infant settlement of Alexandria. First mention of services held in the town turns up in the old Truro Parish vestry book, under date of June 4, 1753, when it was "ordered that the Rev. Mr. Charles Green do preach every third Sunday."[122] Later entries in 1754 and 1756 respectively for "building the desk at Alexandria"[123] and "to have seats made for the Church at Alexandria"[124] are puzzling since no mention occurs for any levies or appropriations for building or repairing. The inference would seem that some individual had provided a meeting place for services, though local tradition is firmly entrenched that a Chapel of Ease stood on Pitt Street near Princess.

Fairfax Parish emerged in 1765 as a daughter of the mother parish of Truro. Whatever previous arrangements for church attendance were provided for in Alexandria, an increasing population now demanded a more appropriate and commodious place of worship. James Wren, gentleman, designed the church and a contract to build it was originally let to one James Parsons in 1767 for the sum of £600. For some reason, Parsons failed to fulfill his contract and in 1772 the vestry appropriated an additional £220 and gave Colonel John Carlyle the task of finishing the building.

Wren proved himself an able architect and Carlyle a great builder. No cathedral in Europe conveys greater serenity than this little church. Cherished by Alexandrians for one hundred and seventy-seven years, the ancient interior expresses all the spiritual and sacred qualities of man. The reredos is centered upon a Palladian window, included as an element of the design. The window is flanked by the tablets for which James Wren was paid eight pounds "to write" the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, and the Golden Rule. Fluted pilasters frame the windows and the tablets. A hexagonal wine-glass pulpit rising on its slender stem is surmounted by a hexagonal canopy. The pews, originally square, were divided in 1817. The balcony was added much later, but is in perfect harmony with the earlier woodwork. The brick tower and interesting "pepper pot" steeple were built in 1818.

In an old deed at Fairfax Court House, dated 1774, between John Alexander of Stafford County, gentleman, of the one part, and Charles Broadwater and Henry Gunnell, church wardens, of the other part, Alexander, for and in consideration of the sum of one penny, current money, gave to the parish:

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Christ Church where both Washington and Lee worshipped

As early as 1762, General Washington was chosen vestryman for Truro Parish and at the first election held in March 1765, for the newly created Fairfax Parish (including Alexandria) he was elected to that office. This development stemmed from the terms of an act of the Virginia Assembly which set the boundaries in such a way that Mount Vernon lay within the new parish. As repealed and revised four months later, legislation returned Mount Vernon to Truro. Technically, then, Washington was vestryman-elect in the new parish for less than three months, yet his association with the Alexandria church was always close. Even before the new church (later to be known as Christ) was finished and delivered to the vestry, he had purchased pew No. 15, for which he paid £36 10s., thought to be the highest price paid for any pew.

Pohick Church in Truro Parish was completed about the same time as Christ Church in Alexandria. It was Washington's home church until after the Revolution, when it was practically abandoned by the Episcopal congregation. The General's habitual attendance at Christ Church apparently dates from about April 1785, when he bound himself to pay an annual pew rent of "five pounds, Virginia money."[125]

An anecdote told in Alexandria of how a group of girls tried to save the silver marker from the Washington pew during the War Between the States is worth repeating. The town was under Union jurisdiction. A group of half-grown girls of whom the leaders were Molly Gregory (Mrs. Robert Powell) and Connie [Constance] Lee (Mrs. George E. Peterkin, wife of Bishop Peterkin) banded together to help the Confederate cause in any way they could. One of their ideas was to go to Christ Church and remove the silver plate marking Washington's pew and take it home for safekeeping. No one was taken into their confidence. In very short order the Yankee provost marshal arrived at Cassius Lee's house and demanded the return the plate. Of course, Lee knew nothing whatever of the removal, but he summoned his children, lined them up, and demanded if any of them had any knowledge of the plate. There was silence for some time. The provost marshal became threatening before admission was made that the removal of the plate was not a theft, but had been taken for safekeeping. The plate was returned to the church. The next day it disappeared and nothing has ever been known of it since.

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The Holy Interior of the old church

Interesting and distinguished men have occupied the pulpit of Christ Church, beginning with the Reverend Townsend Dade, rector (1765 to 1778); and including such men as David Griffith (1780-1789), Bryan Fairfax (1790-1792), and Thomas Davis (1792-1802). The last named officiated at General Washington's funeral. But in the second year of Davis' ministry, President Washington had received the following solicitation:

The letter was long in passage, but it elicited the desired result the following April. The President entirely approved this measure and affixed his name to the paper, regretful at the same time that public subscriptions of all sorts limited the size of his contribution.

This instrument, now preserved in the Smithsonian Institution, has had an engaging history. Built in England in 1700, it was first used in the colonial church at Port Royal and from thence was acquired for Alexandria. After considerable service at Christ Church, it went to the Episcopal church at Shepherdstown, West Virginia, and about the middle of the nineteenth century passed to St. Thomas Episcopal Church at Hancock, Maryland. It was presented to the Smithsonian by the vestry of the latter church in 1907.

Christ Church is proud of its association with the Reverend William Meade, afterward the Virginia bishop of beloved memory. His pastorate was short, from 1811 to 1813, but his fame as preacher, gentleman, and scholar forecast his later attainments. The Reverend Charles B. Danna was another nineteenth century divine who faithfully served the congregation. Dr. Danna occupied the pulpit from 1834 to 1860, when he left to take a church at Port Gibson in Mississippi. He later removed to Natchez, Mississippi, in 1866 to be rector of Trinity Church. He was a trusted friend of Mrs. George Washington Parke Custis and Mrs. Robert E. Lee, and he baptized the children at Arlington House. It was during his pastorate that Robert E. Lee was confirmed on July 17, 1853, by Bishop Johns. When word was received in Alexandria of Dr. Danna's death, in 1873, Christ Church was draped in mourning.

There is an odd and sad sequel to Dr. Danna's pastorate in Natchez. Some years ago there occurred an astounding and mysterious death in Natchez, Mississippi. A very prominent woman whose father had represented his country at a foreign court was found in her own home brutally murdered. Suspicion at once fell upon her nearest neighbors, a man and a woman, eccentric characters, who shared the same house. They were arrested and tried for murder. Their house immediately attained notoriety as "Goat Castle" and was so known over the United States from the manner in which the inmates lived. The strange fashion in which dogs, goats, chickens, or any animal on the place was made welcome in the drawing room was very queer and gave cause for the name.

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The open door marks Robert E. Lee's pew. Here he came for spiritual guidance

The murdered woman had objected to the presence of her neighbors' pets on her place, especially the goats, which were prying and curious, as well as other tame animals which belonged by right in the barnyard, but preferred the drawing room. Ill feeling sprang up, quarrels, lawsuits, all the dreadful sequel of a neighbors' feud. At the trial circumstantial evidence piled up and up. It was not enough for conviction. The inmates of "Goat Castle" were acquitted. Even so, black distrust was their portion from many of their fellow townsmen.

Some people from Alexandria were making the Natchez pilgrimage and came unwarned upon "Goat Castle." Lovely strains of music could be heard, coming from an old piano, sometimes improvised, sometimes a bit of Bach, Mozart, Chopin, played with much feeling. As the strangers approached the house they were shocked at the dilapidation—sash missing in the windows, doors off hinges, boards decayed and missing from the house and porch. Embarrassed, they hesitated to enter when to the door came a man, the musician. Speaking in a quiet voice, he asked them in. Upon the piano a large hen was standing, perfectly at ease. The deterioration of the interior was more pronounced than that of the outside—springs bursting through upholstery, beds unmade and without linen, neither carpets upon the floors nor curtains at the windows. Animals wandered in and out at will. Yet upon the walls hung some portraits and the furniture had been good. There were many books. The man was obviously cultivated in his speech and manner. The host collected the stipend for entering the place and proceeded to show the tourists the house, which was interesting, and his inventions, which were not; a collection of senseless, pitiful, useless things.

Upstairs, and downstairs, into this room and that they were taken to be shown an "invention." Each room was more squalid than the last. Finally the end in sight, escape near at hand, the gentleman said, "I'll show you something," and took the Alexandrians into a room opening off the hall. There was a large mahogany bookcase, sealed by a court order, which the host opened at will, carefully replacing what he took out after it had been examined. One of the strangers, flipping the pages of an old book, saw the signature of Robert E. Lee, Alexandria, Virginia. Startled, she asked where the book had come from. "It was my father's," was the simple reply. "That is my father," pointing to an old oil portrait of a clergyman. "He lived in Alexandria. He was rector of Christ Church."

Not long after this a Negro, arrested in the West, but formerly employed in Natchez, was purported to have confessed to the murder for which these people had been tried and acquitted.

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