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XX
Summary of Findings
Marlborough’s beginnings as a town in 1691 cast the shape that has endured in a few vestiges even until today. The original survey of Bland and Buckner remains as evidence, and by it we are led to believe that the courthouse was located near the “Gutt” to the west of the town, near a change of course that affected the western boundary and all the north-south streets west of George Andrews’ lots. Archeological excavation in the area disclosed Structure B, which subsequent evidence proved to be the foundation of Mercer’s mansion, built at the pinnacle of his career between 1746 and 1750. No evidence exists that this foundation was associated earlier with the courthouse.
Two years after the second Act for Ports was passed in 1705, the second survey was made and was lost soon thereafter. There is evidence that the house built by William Ballard in 1708, on a lot “ditched in” according to this plat, was also in the vicinity of the courthouse. After Mercer moved into this house in 1726, it became clear that the two surveys were at odds, and a new survey was ordered and made in 1731. The maneuvers which followed make it fairly clear that Mercer’s residence was encroaching upon the two acres that had been set aside for the courthouse, which by Act of Assembly had reverted to the heirs of Giles Brent after the courthouse had burned and been abandoned about 1718. The 1731 plat provided a whole new row of lots along the western boundary of the town, while pushing the original lots slightly to the east. This device would have assured the integrity of the courthouse land, while relieving Mercer of the uncertainty of his title. When Mercer’s petition to acquire Marlborough was submitted in 1747 (the 1731 plat still remained unaccepted), he offered to buy the courthouse land for three times its worth. Since Mercer was guardian of the heir, “Mr. William Brent, the Infant,” he was called upon to testify in this capacity at the hearings on his petition. Thus the courthouse, Ballard’s house, and Mercer’s mansion all appear to have been involved in a boundary difficulty, and we may assume, therefore, that the courthouse during its brief career stood close to the spot where Mercer later built his mansion.
This difficulty, in particular, was influential in determining the shape of the town, the manner in which Mercer developed the property and the peculiarities that made Marlborough unique. It was not until 1755 that he was permitted to acquire all the town and by that time Marlborough’s character had already been fixed. We have seen that its outstanding feature, the mansion, was architecturally sophisticated, that leading craftsmen worked on it, and that it was as highly individualistic as its master. It was lavishly furnished not only with material elegancies but with a library embracing more than a thousand volumes.
Aside from the mansion, the area most actively developed by Mercer lay between it and Potomac Creek, with some construction to the north and the east. In 1731, Mercer built two warehouses which probably stood near the waterside at Potomac Creek where his sloop and schooner and visiting vessels found sheltered anchorage. These burned in 1746, but must subsequently have been rebuilt, since Thomas Oliver in his 1771 report to James Mercer commented that the “tobacco houses” must be repaired as soon as possible. They were probably among the buildings that Mercer had constructed up to 1747, when he reported that he had “saved” 17 of the town’s lots by building on them. These lots comprised 8½ acres in the southwest portion of the town.
The windmill was built on land near the river shore, east of the mansion. It was probably located a considerable distance from the shore, although erosion in recent times has eaten back the cliff. In the fall of 1958, half of the stone foundations collapsed, leaving a well-defined profile of the stone construction. Fragments of mid-century-type wine bottles found in the lower course of the stones support other evidence that the mill was built in 1746.
Mercer mentioned his “office” in 1766. This may have been a detached building used for a law office. Oliver in 1771 listed a barn, a cider mill, two “grainerys,” three cornhouses, five stables, and tobacco houses. He mentioned also that “the East Green House wants repairing, the west do wants buttments as a security to the wall on the south side.”
Besides the malthouse and brewhouse built in 1765 (which may have been situated at Structure H and the 100-foot-long stone-wall enclosure attached to Wall A), John Mercer in his 1768 letter mentioned “Cellars, Cooper’s house and all the buildings, copper & utensil whatever used about the brewery,” as well as the “neat warm” house built for the brewer. When the property was advertised in 1791, “Overseers houses,” “Negroe quarters,” and “Corn houses” also were mentioned.
The development of the area in the southwest portion of the plantation probably sustained—or established for the first time—the character originally intended for Marlborough Town. The situation of the mansion was undoubtedly affected by this, as indeed must have been the whole plantation plan. The archeological evidence alone shows that the plan was abnormal in terms of the typical 18th-century Virginia plantation. The rectangular enclosure formed by the brick walls east of the mansion doubtless framed the formal garden over which the imported English gardener, William Black, presided. It connected at the northwest with the kitchen in such a way that the kitchen formed a corner of the enclosure, becoming in effect a gatehouse, protecting the mansion’s privacy at the northwest from the utilitarian slave quarter and agricultural precincts beyond. Walls A-I and A-II, however, related the mansion directly to this plantation-business area and caused it to serve also as a gate to the enclosure.
The position of the kitchen dependency northwest of the house is the only suggestion of Palladian layout, other than the garden. The southern aspect of the house and the rigid boundary to domestic activity imposed by Walls A-I and A-II probably prevented construction of a balancing unit to the southwest. Slave quarters, stables, and perhaps the barn apparently were located to the north.
Since it was not until 1755 that Mercer came into full title to the town, the town plan and its legal restrictions were influential in determining the way in which the plantation was to grow. The house and the surrounding layout were, therefore, wholly peculiar to the special circumstances of Marlborough and probably also to the individuality of its owner. The approach to the house from the waterside was to the south end of the building, leading up to it by the still-existing road from the creek and along the old “Broad Street across the Town,” which probably bordered Walls A-I and B-I. The mansion thus had a little of the character of a feudal manor house, as well as some of the appearance of an English townhouse that abuts the street, with the seclusion of its yards and gardens defended by walls. In many respects it only slightly resembled, in its relationship to surrounding structures, the more representative plantations of its period.
The house was well oriented to view, ventilation, and dominant location. The veranda, which afforded communication from one part to another out-of-doors, as well as a place to sit, was exposed to the prevailing southwesterly summer winds. In the winter it was equally well placed so as to be in the lee of northeast storms sweeping down the Potomac. The view, hidden today by trees, included Accokeek Creek and a lengthy vista up Potomac Creek. Presumably, a road or driveway skirted the kitchen at the west and perhaps ended in a driveway in front of the house. The gate in Wall E south of the kitchen would have been a normal entrance for horses and vehicles.
Within the garden was the summerhouse built by Mercer in 1765. From the east windows and steps of the house and from the garden could be seen the Potomac, curving towards the bay, and the flailing “drivers” of the windmill near the Potomac shore.
The excavated and written records of Marlborough are a microcosm of Virginia colonial history. They depict the emergence of central authority in the 17th century in the establishment of the port town as a device to diversify the economy and control the collecting of duties. In the failure of the town, they demonstrate also the failure of colonial government to overcome the tyranny of tobacco and the restrictive policies of the mother country. They go on to show in great detail the emergence in the 18th century of a familiar American theme—the self-directed rise of an individual from obscure beginnings to high professional rank, social leadership, personal wealth, and cultural influence. They demonstrate in Mercer’s career the inherent defects of the tobacco economy as indebtedness mounted and economic strains stiffened. In Mercer’s concern with the Ohio Company and westward expansion they reflect a colony-wide trend as population increased and the need grew for more arable land and areas in which to invest and escape from economic limitations. They show that the war with the French inevitably ensued, with its demands on income and manpower, while following this came the enforcement of trade laws and the immediate irritants which led to rebellion. So Marlborough gives a sharp reflection of Virginia’s history prior to the Revolution. It was touched by most of what was typical and significant in the period, yet in its own details it was unique and individual. In this seeming anomaly Marlborough is a true illustration of its age, when men like Mercer were strong individuals but at the same time typifying and expressing the milieu in which they lived.
Mercer’s rise to wealth and leadership occurred at a time when favorable laws held out the promise of prosperity, while boundless lands offered unparalleled opportunities for investment. It remained for those best able to take advantage of the situation; Mercer’s self-training in the law, his driving energy, and his ability to organize placed him among these. The importance of his position is signified by the justice-ship that he held for so many years in Stafford County court; the brick courthouse on the hill overlooking the upper reaches of Potomac Creek was the architectural symbol of this position. Although most of his income was derived from legal practice, it was his plantation that was the principal expression of his interests and his energies. Mercer was in this respect typical of his peers, whose intellectual and professional leadership, on the one hand, and agricultural and business enterprise, on the other, formed a partnership within the individual. The great plantation house with its sophisticated elegancies, its outward formalities, and its rich resort for the intellect in the form of a varied library, was the center and spirit of the society of which men like Mercer were leaders. With the death of the system came the death of the great house, and the rise and fall of Marlborough symbolizes, as well as anything can, the life cycle of Virginia’s colonial plantation order.
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