The Michael Swope House

[210 Prince Street. Owners: Mr. and Mrs. Hugh B. Cox.]

There is an ancient house in Alexandria whose rusty rose brick faÇade and beautifully hand-carved eighteenth century doorway add ornament and distinction to the 200 block of Prince Street.

Not many years ago Mrs. Alexander Murray (the daughter of a former owner) who had spent her girlhood in this old house remarked to the author, "You know, the house has a ghost. There is a story that an American Revolutionary spy who was executed by the British haunts the place." Every proper old mansion should have a ghost—and what could be nicer than an American patriot—blue coat and cocked hat?

Time passed. Mrs. Murray's story remained to be written, when about 1930 General Dalton came into possession of 210 Prince Street. Hearing that his house had been broken into, he requested his friend, Mrs. Sheen, the wife of Colonel Sheen, to examine the house and have the lock repaired. Mrs. Sheen with her son, Gordon, and a Negro went to General Dalton's empty house to repair the door and to lock the mansion. While the Negro was working on the lock, he said, "I certainly does feel funny. There's something strange about this house. Let's hurry and get out o' here." Whereupon Gordon Sheen pooh-poohed the idea, standing by the Negro to reassure him. Suddenly he saw (or said he saw) in the doorway at the end of the hall a soldier in Revolutionary uniform walking toward him. When the apparition reached the music room or library, it turned sharply to the right into the room and disappeared.

doorway

Doorway to Colonel Michael Swope's House

Some time after this Mrs. Sheen was showing General Dalton's house to friends who had been living abroad and wanted a home. The two ladies had been through the lower floors and started to the third story. At the top of the steps the visitor said, "I can't go farther. Something is pushing me back." Mrs. Sheen at once descended the stairs, thinking her friend ill. When they reached the first floor the lady from abroad said, "A force was pushing me backward. I am quite psychic, you know, and the ghost who inhabits this house would make it impossible for me to live here. I love the house and should like to own it, but I should not be permitted to do so."

At the second auction of lots held on July 14, 1749, Augustine Washington, brother of Lawrence Washington and half-brother of George, bought lots Nos. 64 and 65 for fifteen pistoles. At a meeting of the trustees on June 15, 1754, lots Nos. 64 and 65, the property of Augustine Washington, along with other lots were ordered to "be sold to the highest bidder at a Public Vendue, the several Proprietors thereof having failed to build thereon according to the directions of the Act of Assembly in that case made and provided and it is further ordered that the Clerk do give Public Notice that the sale of the said lotts will be at the Town aforesaid on the first day of August next."[112] In the minutes of the trustees for September 9, 1754, lots Nos. 64 and 65 were entered as sold to William Ramsay for 39½ pistoles, or £37 1s. 9d.

The next document in regard to these lots is an indenture made July 21, 1757, between William Ramsay, of the County of Fairfax and the Colony of Virginia, merchant, and Anne, his wife, of the one part, and John Dixon of the County of Cumberland in the Kingdom of England, merchant, of the other part, whereby William Ramsay in consideration of the sum of £810 7s. sterling money of Great Britain to him in hand paid by John Dixon releases, grants, confirms, etc. to John Dixon certain lands described fully (1,261 acres) and "also the following lotts or half acres of land situate lying and being in the town of Alexandria in the County of Fairfax to wit Lott number thirty-four, forty, forty-six, forty-seven, and the lotts number sixty-four, sixty-five [author's emphasis] as the same are numbered in the plan and survey of the said Town originally made by John West Junr., as also the following Negro and mulatto slaves with their increase (to wit) Peter the joyner, Jacob, Sophia, Whitehaven, Moll, Sall, Peter, Imanuel, Winnifrid and her child, Zilla, Phillis, and Clarisa, all which said lands and tenements lotts of land and slaves are now in the actual possession of the said John Dixon by virtue of one indenture bearing date the day before the date of these presents and by force of the statute for transferring uses into possessions to have and to hold the said lands tenements and all and singular other premises with them and every of their appurtenances together with the aforesaid slaves unto the said John Dixon, his heirs and assigns forever,"[113] provided always that if William Ramsay shall pay or cause paid to John Dixon of the town of White Haven, England, the just sum of £810 7s. with interest at five per cent per annum on the first day of July next, he will again come into possession of this vast property.

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The Great Room

In the following August, Dixon appointed Harry Piper of Alexandria his true and lawful attorney to collect and receive for him all sums of money or tobacco which might become due, "and furthermore for as much as I have taken a Deed of Mortgage from Mr. William Ramsay of the town of Alexandria in the Colony of Virginia, Merchant, for sundrie lotts or half acres of land in the town of Alexandria with ye houses, gardens and other improvements thereon, together with sundrie slaves as also one tract or parcel of land...."[114]

In 1757 by a letter of attorney, dated August 8, John Dixon, merchant, of the town of White Haven in the Kingdom of Great Britain, authorized and empowered his attorney, Harry Piper of Alexandria, to take all legal means of foreclosure to receive the sum of £810 from William Ramsay who had mortgaged certain part of lots Nos. 64 and 65 with sundry slaves to secure that amount.

John Dixon in turn sold this property to the Scottish firm of shipping merchants, Robert McCrea, Robert Mease, & John Boyd in 1774, and in 1778 Boyd released his part of the property to McCrea and Mease for the sum of £253, with all houses, alleys, profits, commodities, and so on.

That William Ramsay built at least a part of this house seems almost indisputable. First, Augustine Washington had forfeited the property by not complying with the law to build thereon, and it seems hardly possible that Ramsay should have owned the property from 1754 to 1757 without complying with this act of the assembly. Furthermore, in the appointment of Piper as Dixon's attorney on August 16, 1757, the property is referred to as consisting of houses, gardens, and other improvements thereon. Dixon disposed of the property in 1774 to McCrea, Mease & Boyd, and four years later Boyd released his part for £253, with all houses, alleys, and so on. Little construction was done in Alexandria from 1775 to 1783, for this was the period of the Revolutionary War and no capital was going begging in the colonies at this date. Besides this evidence, the house has every appearance of a colonial building and the woodwork is all mid-eighteenth century in design. William Ramsay was an original trustee, appointed by the assembly for laying out the town. For a time he was successful and prosperous, owning much property, until overtaken by great misfortunes and compound interest!

All of which brings us to Michael Swope of York, Pennsylvania, a worthy gentleman of ancient lineage, patriotic inclinations, and distinguished service. The family Bible attests the fact that he held many offices of trust—judge of the Orphans' Court; justice of the peace; member of the assembly; Colonel, First Battalion, First Brigade, Pennsylvania Flying Camp Regiment, being but some of them. He was captured at Fort Washington and kept a prisoner of war for a number of years, suffering great hardship and privation.

kitchen

Stairway and kitchen at Colonel Michael Swope's

When the Revolutionary War was over, Colonel Swope's health was undermined and he found the severe Pennsylvania winters unbearable. With his wife and family he moved south to Alexandria, where he set up in the ship chandlery business with his sons. He purchased from Robert and Ann McCrea and Robert Mease the property already described as a residence in 1783. In a later deed of June 29, 1809, it is recited that Michael Swope erected a large three-story brick building on these premises in 1784.

This house at 210 Prince Street is a fitting memorial to this officer. The doorway to the dignified old town mansion is one of the best examples of Georgian woodwork in Alexandria, and remains, save for one small patch and a new fanlight, in its original state.

The back drawing room is splendidly proportioned. The paneled mantel flanked by fluted pilasters is in keeping with the other woodwork which is good throughout the house. Some of the best, a cupboard, was found on the third floor and brought down to replace one missing in the great room. Since it fitted perfectly, it is quite possible that it has only been returned to its original place. The rear wing of the house seems older and more worn than the front, giving the feeling of earlier construction.

During Colonel Swope's occupancy fine furniture filled these rooms. In the Alexandria clerk's office an inventory of Colonel Swope's possessions, taken in 1786, fills several pages of legal paper when copied in its entirety. Such things were listed as "one clock and case, one mahogany dining table and eight chairs, one spinnett, one large looking glass, four small ones, one dressing table, one desk and drawers, five beds with all their furniture and linen belonging to them and bedsteads, two Franklin stoves, one riding chair and harness, sundry china and Queensware, eight decanters, 75 pounds of pewter, sundry silver furniture, to wit, two cream pots, five tablespoons, six teaspoons, two soup laddles, one tankard, and also one Negro woman and her child named Jude."[115] These are but a few of the Colonel's possessions, scattered these many years among his descendants.

Michael Swope and his sons were successful in the thriving seaport of Alexandria, and when Adam Walter, the second son, was married he moved to Philadelphia, where he set up in the shipping business as a partner of his father. His father built for him a home at 31 Catherine Street and 'tis said that the architecture very much resembles the Prince Street house.

Michael Swope died in 1809, aged eighty-four years. The body of the old hero was taken by boat from the port of Alexandria to the port of Philadelphia where he was interred in the Swope family vault in Union Cemetery at Sixth and Federal Streets. About 1858, during the yellow fever epidemic, the city board of health issued orders to have this vault cleaned out. It is said that the metal casket containing the earthly remains of Michael Swope was then in good condition. Perhaps, after all, Colonel Swope is the ghost that haunts this old house and chooses its inmates.

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