Colonial Williamsburg Digital Library

This research was funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, "Planning for the Interpretive Programs for the Courthouse of 1770" (GM-21713-83).

List of Illustrations

Introduction

The southern side of market square in Williamsburg was a far more active and congested place in the eighteenth century than is now apparent from its present interpretation. The vast green space was less of an armed camp centering on the Powder Magazine and Guard House than it was the economic and judicial forum of the city and county. The routine of monthly county and borough courts insured that the space was thronged with crowds of participants and spectators. The weekly or semiweekly markets that finally became established by mid-century, brought yet more townsmen and outsiders to the heart of the borough where they purchased goods, exchanged news and gossip, and helped themselves to the food and beverages dispensed at nearby taverns. In the midst of these activities stood two important structures. On the north side of the public square was the borough and county courthouse, erected in 1770; on the south side was a wooden market house built in the 1750s. Although the brick courthouse has survived many vicissitudes, the market house has disappeared. The purpose of this report is to briefly review the historical, archaeological, and architectural information about this structure so that we can begin to put our thoughts in order about the possibility of its reconstruction.

Markets

Fundamental to the very existence of urban life is the role of the town as a center of exchange. The most basic function and one integral to towns of a certain size and economic diversity is the marketing of goods, particularly foodstuffs such as meat, poultry, cheese, eggs, butter, and vegetables. In eighteenth-century England and America, towns held markets once or twice a week in large open spaces in or near the center of the town. Most larger towns started off with a single open market, but if they prospered almost invariably ended up with several. This main market place sometimes grew smaller because stalls and temporary stands developed into permanent shops and houses or its edges were encroached upon by those who found it advantageous to be near the market. This occurred in Williamsburg where shops and taverns were built on public property. Elsewhere, in places like Norfolk, the market was enlarged to handle increased trade and divided into separate sections for the selling of fish, meat, livestock, and grain.

The local market was not a free-wheeling, open-ended emporium of petty capitalists, although there was a strong push to make it so in many English and American towns in the eighteenth century, rather it was a highly-regulated system watched over by the clerk of the market in concert with other 3 corporate officials. The right to hold a market was a sign of a town's independence and a jealously guarded privilege. Markets also provided an important source of corporate income from the rent of market stalls and an excise on certain sales. The corporation continuously intervened in the economic affairs of its jurisdiction in order to play the role of the honest broker between the merchants and the populous at large. Its chief aim was the maintenance of civic harmony but it had to steer a delicate course between over regulation which might threaten economic prosperity and a laissez-faire approach which might provoke unrest over the high price of basic commodities.

Trade in eighteenth-century market towns in Virginia took a variety of forms. At the heart of any town's prosperity was market day where tradesmen and itinerant higglers retailed their wares in the open market place. The principal goods bought and sold in the semiweekly markets consisted mainly of perishable foodstuffs and a few household items. Carts and wagons filled with provisions crowded into the open spaces in the early dawn hours each market day. Country people coming into town along with local hucksters set up movable wooden stalls and other temporary fixtures which provided a cheap and flexible venue for their produce. In market towns such as Williamsburg, Fredericksburg, Leesburg, and Norfolk, corporate officials, ambitious to attract trade, erected one and two-story market houses where sheltered stalls could be rented to certain vendors. Butchers were among the most common renters of the covered market house stalls since they needed shade to protect their meat from rapid spoilation and required spikes and hooks to support the 4 weight of hanging sides of beef and strands of game.

Where a sizeable portion of the population could not produce its own foodstuffs or have direct access to local farms, meat and vegetable markets tended to flourish. Such was the case of the port town of Norfolk where the market was well-stocked and well-regulated. In contrast, the market in Williamsburg was, at best, indifferently provisioned. Many of the town's residents chose to produce their own food on surrounding farms. In 1764 Robert Carter reluctantly decided to follow the example of his neighbors and bought a farm so that he could have "the articles to be obtained in good markets."¹ In circumventing the public market, Carter well understood that he was contributing to its retardation. A few years later, the pseudonymous Timothy Telltruth bitterly complained to the Virginia Gazette about the quality of the goods sold in the Williamsburg market. His venomous pen excoriated the town's butchers who exacted exorbitant rates for meat "not fit to eat." Left hanging in the market house for long hours by neglectful vendors, sides of beef nearly spoiled. Bakers too, were no friend of the consumer. They used such unwholesome flour when they baked, that the bread they offered for sale was "very prejudicial to the health of those who eat it." It was a sellers market, especially during public times when the population of the capital swelled. If the 5 market was ever to emulate the well provisioned and regulated one in Norfolk, Telltruth believed that the magistrates needed to step in and straighten out the fishy business on market square. If it meant heavy fines for butchers and bakers or even the pillory, then all for the better.²

History of the Williamsburg Market House

Left hanging in the air along with the many sides of spoiled beef are many questions about the market house that was such an integral part of the economic activities on market square. The destruction of the records of the Williamsburg Common Hall has made it impossible to establish any detailed record or description of the market houses which stood on the south side of market square in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. This obliteration of the records may partially explain why so little interest has been expressed in the past by the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation in the reconstruction of the early market house.³ Although there is 6 little documentary material, there still remains the possibility that archaeological investigation of certain sections of Block 12 will reveal evidence for the precise location, configuration, and details of that market house.

What little is known of the history of the market place illustrates the great contrast that can often be found between intentions and reality. Williamsburg's small population and its easy access to surrounding farmland worked against the construction of a market house in the first years of the town's existence. The 1699 act which transferred the capital from Jamestown to Williamsburg empowered the governor to grant to the city the right to hold a market. Implicit in the act was the desire for the new capital to develop into a flourishing center of trade, something that Jamestown had never been able to do. In 7 a sense those who backed the move to Williamsburg hoped that it would take on many of the same characteristics of a provincial English town, among which include a well-stocked market place. With this in mind, the trustees of the town were given leave in 1705 to hold such markets as they thought appropriate and to "enlarge the market-place" if the need arose.⁴ Despite this early attention, it was difficult to get the Williamsburg market going. Governor Spotswood recognized this in 1710 when he observed the problems caused by the absence of a regular market, especially during public gatherings when the population of the town increased sizably. No doubt, like many other inhabitants, the governor favored the creation of weekly markets and worked hard to use his influence to remedy the matter.⁵ The next year he prompted the council to discuss the issue with the town trustees and in 1713 requested the House of Burgesses to help give some assistance towards building a market house but nothing seems to have been done.⁶ In 1720 the inhabitants may have enjoyed more regular markets but still faced great inconveniences 8 for "the want of a Market house."⁷

It's uncertain just how long Williamsburg went without a market house. There may have been one or two wooden structures on market square before the 1750s. Its just as likely that the building erected in 1757 may have been the first and only colonial market house. In April of that year the building committee appointed by the Common Hall met one evening to let the construction of a wooden market house. Although there is no evidence to confirm the actual construction of the market house in 1757, it is certain that some type of structure was standing on the south side of market square by the 1760s. In January 1764 an act of assembly authorized the city to raise what sums of money it needed to repair the market house and other public buildings when it became necessary to do so.⁸ A few years later Timothy Telltruth lodged his complaint about the beef left hanging in the market. In 1770 some inhabitants petitioned the House of Burgesses to convert the abandoned guard house on the square into a market house. Either the old wooden market house had been pulled down or more space was needed for marketing goods and the guard house was seen as a cheap means of meeting that demand.9 Following the Revolution and removal of the state 9 government, the market and presumably the market house were still functioning. An advertisement in the newspaper mentions a store near the market place and a traveler reported that meat and other provisions sold at a very cheap rate.¹⁰ The later fate of the market house, however, is much like its origins, unknown. By the middle of the 1790s, it may have been pulled down since the powder magazine had become the principal and perhaps only market house on the square.¹¹ The magazine may have continued in this capacity until the early 1830s when a new market house was erected on the south side of market square.¹²

Archaeological Evidence of the Williamsburg Market House

A 1781 map of Williamsburg depicts the market house on the south side of the Duke of Gloucester Street, just east of the courthouse (Fig.1). Unfortunately, the scale of the map is teasingly too small to be able to provide the precise location of the building. The Frenchman's Map of the same period confirms Fig. 1. Samuel DeWitt, "From Allen's Ordinary through Williamsburg to York," 1781. Copy of map, CWF Library. 11 the presence of at least three small structures east of the Powder Magazine on market square (Fig. 2) . The Rochambeau Map too, identifies three buildings in approximately the same location. Presumably, one of these three unidentified rectangular structures, which stood in a cluster in the northeast corner of the public square, was the market house. No other cartographic evidence appears until the early twentieth century when insurance maps show much of the area around the magazine cluttered with buildings ranging from a Greek Revival church to a frame garage. Clearance of those buildings in the early 1930s was followed by archaeological investigations.¹³

In 1934 and again in 1948, the area east of the Powder Magazine was excavated in the vigorous manner characteristic of early archaeological endeavors in Williamsburg. Cross-trenching revealed the foundations of a number of unknown eighteenth and early nineteenth-century structures (Fig. 3). The largest remains were those of a 40 by 60 foot building (Structure G), which stood close to the Duke of Gloucester Street, just northeast of the Magazine wall. The cryptic notes of the 1934 archaeological map mentions that the brickwork uncovered there 12 Fig. 2. Detail of market square, Williamsburg, c. 1782. Frenchman's Map. 13 Fig. 3. Archaeological Features, Block 12. From a report by Patricia Samford, "Archaeological Briefing and Testing Plan; Block 12, Powder Magazine," CWF Office of Excavation and Conservation, 1985. 14 appeared to be post-colonial in character.¹⁴ Given the size and prominent location on market square, the building may have been the market house erected shortly before 1835, or possibly, some other unknown civic structure.¹⁵ At the southern edge of the 1934 excavation area, archaeologists discovered the foundations of a building which had a curious cruciform plan (Structure E). Measuring approximately 63 by 23 feet with two truncated and unevenly-sized, central projections, the Flemish bond brickwork had the "general character and appearance…of colonial workmanship."¹⁶ The unusual form of the building have led many to believe that it might have served as the 1715 James City County courthouse or the much later, early nineteenth-century county clerk's office which was demolished by federal troops in 1862.¹⁷ However, if all other evidence is to be believed, then the early county courthouse stood on the south side of Francis Street on the site of the Nicholas-Tyler House. The configuration of the plan may have some similarities to T-shaped courthouses in Virginia but its proportions are unlike any other. It would have been difficult to fit courtroom and jury rooms in the plan without severely altering known dimensional limits. An 15 alternative function suggested for Structure E is that it served as a market house. Markets with cruciform plans existed in England and America in the eighteenth century (Fig. 4). The dimensions of the Williamsburg structure nearly match those of the two-story brick market house built in Fredericksburg in the third quarter of the eighteenth century (Fig. 5) . However, there are two arguments against this interpretation. The 1781 map shows the market house distinctly located next to the Duke of Gloucester Street, nowhere near the lightly outlined Francis Street. The Frenchman's Map depicts no buildings near the position of Structure E which suggests that it was either already gone or yet to be built when the map of the town was made. Its location on the edge of the market square rather than in the center also tends to argue for some other function for the building.

The fragmentary remains of three smaller structures just east of the Magazine wall are the most likely choices for market house. The spatial arrangement of these three buildings to each other and the Magazine is similar to that illustrated in the Frenchman's Map. In 1948 a second archaeological survey of Block 12 revealed for the first time two of the three enigmatic buildings. Too little of the easternmost building (Structure I) was uncovered to determine its size and configuration. Only one wall of brick bats and shell mortar running in an east-west direction was discovered and provided no clues to its original 16 Fig. 4. Market House, High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, 1761. R. Adam, Architect. 17 Fig. 5. c. 1790 plan of the Market House, Fredericksburg, Virginia, Original in Loose Papers, Fredericksburg Courthouse. 18 function or date of construction in the colonial period.¹⁸ The remains of another building were found further south. Structure F, a rectangular building with a gable-end chimney, appeared to archaeologists to have been built in two stages during the colonial period. Not long after the building was excavated, work began on the construction of the present guard house over the first period foundations, although there was very little evidence for its appearance or location.¹⁹

The last substantial structure found on the site was discovered in the 1934 excavations just north of Structure F (the so-called guard house). The fragmentary nature of the foundations made it difficult to determine the precise dimensions of the building (Structure H). It was a little over 19 feet wide and at least 29 feet long and perhaps more. Although much of the brickwork had been robbed, that which had survived was "undoubtedly of colonial origin with oyster shell mortar of eighteenth century coloring & aggregate."²⁰ The configuration and central location of these foundations argue strongly for Structure H as the c. 1757 market house. Its 19 relatively modest dimensions (approximately 19 by 30 feet) are similar in scale to other market houses in Chesapeake towns. According to specifications, the 1736 Norfolk market house was 30 by 15 feet and the 1752 building in Annapolis was slightly larger at 40 by 20 feet.²¹ The proximity of Structure H to the Magazine, the Duke of Gloucester Street, and Structures I and F strongly favors its interpretation as the market house. Only a new archaeological investigation of this building and its neighbors will help resolve questions of their origins and functions.

Market House Architecture

Eighteenth-century market houses followed certain standard design criteria. Foremost, they were to be as open as possible to allow for ventilation. A well-ventilated building helped preserve meat and produce and drew off the malodorous smells of overripe vegetables and decaying flesh. Most people also believed that stagnant or bad air, "malaria," caused a variety of illnesses. Added to this concern for sanitation was the desire to have a structure which would provide as much open space as possible for the exposure of goods to public view. No vendor wanted a stall stuck in a dark corner where few customers 20 would venture. To accommodate these concerns, market houses were built to stand invitingly open on columns, posts, or arcades (Fig. 6). The market houses in Norfolk, Annapolis, and Portsmouth (late eighteenth century) were supported by large wooden posts.²² Some buildings were erected to house a number of civic functions with the market on the open ground floor and courtrooms, meeting halls, or assembly rooms above stairs. Like the two early market houses in Fredericksburg, these two-story market halls were inevitably of masonry construction with the market floor accentuated by a brick or stone arcade (Fig. 7). Walls in the smaller, one-story market houses were either entirely absent or merely served to fill the small space between oversized doors and gates. The gaps between the six-foot wide doors of the Annapolis market house were enclosed with red-painted weatherboards.²³

In order for every vendor to have a favorable venue to sell his goods, market houses were generally long and narrow so that few stalls would be out of public view or inadequately ventilated. Having a stall along the outer edge of the market house also made it easier for vendors to load and unload their goods from carts and wagons. In Norfolk and Annapolis, the early markets were twice as long as they were wide as may be the case 21 Fig. 6. Market House, Charleston, Maryland. Drawing by B.H. Latrobe, 1813. From Edward Carter, John Van Horne, and Charles Brownell, eds., Latrobe's View of America, New Haven, 1985. 22 Fig. 7. Fredericksburg Market House and Town Hall, 1814. 23 in Williamsburg as well. As the success of various markets grew, market houses were either expanded or built anew with lengths sometimes measuring more than three or four times the width of the building. The lower floor of the 1814 Fredericksburg Market House and Town Hall measures 97 feet by 33 feet (Fig. 7) while the Norfolk market house dating from the same period was approximately 120 by 22 feet.²⁴ Such long shed-like structures were commonplace in the larger seaports such as Philadelphia, Boston, and Charleston in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

A conspicuous feature on many market houses was the long overhanging eaves (Fig. 8). Both the Norfolk and Annapolis market houses had six foot "oversets" on each sides while the eaves on the 1797 market in Charleston extended yet another foot.²⁵ These broad eaves provided additional shaded space for vendors and customers and allowed for stalls to be set up in front of the raised platform of the market house. For butchers, meats could be placed on the hooks of market posts behind them as a sort of advertisement while they set up their chopping blocks and trestle tables down on the ground. The large hooks driven into the stone blocks which still survive in the arcade floor of 24 Fig. 8. Market House, Louisville, Georgia. From Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, HABS GA 82-Louvi 1-2. the Fredericksburg market house and the early nineteenth-century illustration of the Newport, Rhode Island market house suggest that such arrangements were commonplace (Figs. 9 & 10).

Typical of market house architecture as well was the paving of the raised market floor with stone, bricks, and tiles. Recent excavations of the eighteenth-century market house in Fredericksburg shows that the building had a brick floor as did its early nineteenth-century replacement.²⁶ Perhaps with an eye towards cleanliness and cleaning, most of these paved floors stood one or two steps above the ground. The Norfolk market was three bricks above the ground, the one in Annapolis one foot, and the 1797 Charleston market 16 inches.²⁷

The Williamsburg Market House: Architecture and Interpretation

Based on historical and archaeological evidence, it appears that the market house erected in Williamsburg in the late 1750s was a relatively simple wooden building raised on brick foundations. In all probability, the building had a shallow hipped roof with overhanging eaves, supported by four or five pairs of sizeable (12" by 12" for example) wooden posts set at 26 Fig. 9. Market House, Newport, Rhode Island, 1762. An 1831 engraving showing meat hanging from a pole in the left front arch. From The West Broadway Neighborhood Newport, Rhode Island, Providence, 1977. 27 Fig. 10. Unidentified English Market House. From Country Life, August 16, 1984. 28 regular intervals (8 to 10 feet). The sides of the building may have been enclosed with weatherboarding, interspersed with a number of oversized doors which would be thrown open during each market day. Alternatively, if there was no desire to shut the building up when it was not in use or to enclose it during the winter months, then the market may have had no walls. Inside, stalls, which consisted of moveable or built-in tables, were set at regular intervals on the brick-covered floor. Overhead were a series of hooks, poles, and spikes for the hanging of goods.

It is highly unlikely that the Williamsburg market house served any other purpose. It is significant to note that in 1757 the building committee of the Common Hall were instructed to let the contract for the market house to a carpenter which implies that the structure was to be built of wood. Since there is little indication that the borough court or Common Hall used the market house for its meetings, it seems likely that there was no room above the ground floor market and that the building was in fact a one-story structure used solely for the vending of goods.

The reconstruction of the market house on the market square would benefit many aspects of the interpretation of the economy and society of eighteenth-century Williamsburg. Whether through a static exhibit or through the performance of character interpreters, the lively routine of market day would present an 29 unparalleled opportunity to discuss many aspects of colonial life, ranging from the processing of food to the role of local government through its literal intervention in the market place. Unlike so many places in the Historic Area, it would be possible as well as sensible to have actors interpret different members of society in a place where they could interact in a variety of situations—as buyers and sellers, country people and townsfolk, slaves and masters, petty capitalists and market regulators. Whereas many crafts are interpreted in isolated or unusual places (the basket weaving exhibition at the George Wythe House for example), the market house would be a natural and correct place to have these presented before the public. It would then be possible for the interpreters to go beyond the business of explaining how such objects were made to more important discussions of how they were marketed and used. Centering around the market house too, could be all those civic activities such as the demonstration of the fire engine which are now performed out of context or in isolation. A reconstructed market house and an imaginative interpretation of the myriad of activities which took place around it on market square would help enliven one of the most important areas of eighteenth-century Williamsburg.