Colonial Williamsburg Digital Library

CHIMNEY FOUNDATION

The most important single feature of the excavation was a vertically-sided rectangular hole, measuring 7'3" by 4'6" and 1'7" deep, which was cut through by a 3' wide sewer trench (see Figure 4, Plate I). The hole was filled with brickbats and mortar rubble (E.R. 1989E, F, G), throughout which was found strong evidence for the burning of a building, i.e. burnt plaster and mortar, pieces of melted window glass, fire hardened nails, and 5. heat-cracked stone step fragments. A fragment of a floor board showing tongue and groove working was preserved in a charred stat (for details, see Appendix II). Datable artifacts include mid nineteenth-century chimney firebricks, cut nails and a scorched piece of an ironstone plate (E.R.1989G), which should readily date the filling of the hole to 1873 when the Tyler House burned to the ground.

Identification of the hole remained in doubt until nearly all of the rubble fill had been removed. A line of roughly laid bricks then appeared, indicating that the feature was a robbed foundation for what must have been a large chimney. Subsequent careful cleaning of the surfaces revealed the mortar "ghost" images of brick courses up the sides of the hole. Similar stains on the bottom of the hole indicate the edge of brickwork for a base course which seems to have been one brick width's smaller on the north side than the next course above (see Figure 4, Plate II). The footings are estimated to have been 1'3" wide, forming a hollow rectangle, while the rough brickwork was not actually part of the foundation, but simply brickbats, chopped and pressed against the interior face of the foundation. The line of the mortar stains and brickbats with the hole is not quite parallel to the foundation hole itself; the chimney foundation appears to be at a 3° angle to the site grid, while its hole was at a 5° angle. The cellar foundations discovered in 1931 were at a 2° angle to the grid. An iron lightning rod was found protruding a few inches into the bottom of the chimney foundation and leading off in an easterly direction, but it could not be determined if the lightning rod was an original fixture.

The chimney foundation was 8'0" east of the cellar and would be about 6'0" behind the estimated position of the building's north wall. The placement of the chimney and the late date of its destruction makes it certain that it was the northeast chimney in the photograph taken of the building (see Plate III). The photograph suggests that it was an exterior chimney, and nothing was found by excavation to contradict that assumption. The east wall of the 19th-century building lay, therefore, near the western side of the foundation hole. The photograph, however, clearly shows a second chimney rising above the east end of the building. There is no archaeological evidence for another chimney at the east end of the building, although all the area along the presumed wall line was carefully excavated. Either the chimney had extreme shallow foundations, as had the wall footings, or it lay on the south wall more than 4'0" from the southeast corner, or was inset into the house. The drawing of the Tyler House after 1838 (Figure 2) illustrates the two eastern chimneys, but there is also the suggestion that the "missing" chimney was placed decidedly west of the one located by excavation.

OTHER FEATURES

As stated above, no true soil layers had survived the landscaping for the courthouse, and plow scars were found cutting into natural and early features, indicating that the site had been plowed in the period following the burning of the Tyler House and the 1930's when it was simply an empty field. The excavations north of the courthouse revealed a similar loss of stratigraphy, further complicated by a sewer trench extending nearly 6'0" out from the wall line. In the eastern area (E.R.1987-89), digging 7. exposed what appeared to be a series of post holes on a N-S line, 14'0" east of the cellar wall, lying partially under the balk. Some of the holes had molds which may have been sealed before Nicholas bought the property, while others were dug later. The remaining holes at the east end of the building formed no clear pattern, but several contained pink-colored brickbats with shell mortar, suggesting a construction date coinciding with the demolition of early 18th-century masonry.

An east-west series of post holes were discovered 8'0" beyond the north end of the courthouse. These features represented fences indicated on the 19th-century photograph (Plate III) and the slightly earlier print (Fig. 2). Replacement holes for the fence suggest that it stood for a long time, perhaps several generations. Two pairs of large post holes (E.R.1990K, L and E.R.1991C, E) marked the position of a 14'6" wide porch and its 11'6" wide replacement. The line of the porch as revealed by these holes is at a 2° angle to the site grid, the same angle as that of the cellar foundations.

Evidence for fences leading to the flanking buildings was also found. One post hole on a northwest line (E.R.1991M-PI had been replaced at least once and suggests a long use of the fence line to the "laundry." A series of holes were located at the northeast; they also exhibit signs of repair, and perhaps the 3'6" interval between the pairs of holes at the southwest end of the line (E.R.1987G-J, E.R.1992A-D) indicates the insertion (and perhaps replacement) of a gate at the corner of the house.

The east-west fences along the front of the house ran in a fairly straight line off the second porch front, 1'0" further south than the earlier, wider porch. Post hole intervals (7'6"-8'0") are similar, so that the fences presented a mirror image of each other, reflecting a geometry based on a center line at the middle of the porch, obviously the front door of the house. This is the view depicted in the print drawn after the 1838 addition of the kitchen wing (see Figure 2), though it should be noted that the western fence had been removed by the time the later photograph was taken. The photograph does show the remaining front fence and the fences leading to the ancilliary buildings. There is even a suggestion of the gate indicated by the archaeological remains. The 20' wide, brick-based porch of Figure 2 and Plate III had probably been built during the alterations of 1838, and it seems, simply inserted into the east-west fence line. The western fence decayed and was removed, while the eastern fence was repaired or partially rebuilt by the seating of a new post (E.R.1990C,D) at the corner of the porch and the replacement, slightly off its original line, of the next post to the west (E.R.1990E).

Before the construction of the house, and apparently before any colonial occupation of the site, a natural erosion gully had crossed the area of occupation from northwest to southeast. This feature was not fully excavated, but its observable depth, where cut by later features, suggests that it descended toward the north, in the direction of the little dell on the other side of Francis Street.

Print from Lyon G. Tyler
Williamsburg, The Old Colonial Capitol
Richmond, 1907.
See Architectural Research Files
Fig. 2

THE ARCHITECTURAL FINDS

The excavation of the chimney foundation produced several significant artifacts which have been examined by Messrs. Buchanan and Waite of the Department of Architecture. Their comments were extremely helpful and have been incorporated into the text (for a detailed list of architectural samples, see Appendix II).

Plaster: One fragment recovered showed signs of having been whitewashed at least 5 times. In the samples studied no evidence of hair could be seen. It was determined that at least one plaster fragment came from the inside of a fireplace; it was thin and too smooth for a flue lining, but not painted, so unlikely to have been on the fireplace facing. A few mortar fragments were found that had been painted red over earlier layers of whitewash.

Mortar: All the mortar recovered had quantities of shell in it. On a reused brick, a pale cream colored mortar had been covered by a light gray mortar. There was no example, however, of the yellow sandy mortar which becomes common at the end of the first quarter of the 19th century. One mortar fragment was found which had come from the inside of a wall, painted red similar to Wetherburn's basement.

Bricks: Three types of bricks were recovered in the excavations: soft pink 18th-century brick, harder red brick, and off white 19th-century firebrick. The pink brick was similar to that observed in the cellar construction, and was fairly rare. The most common brick was the red, examples of which were in situ in the chimney foundation.

A brick voussoir had come from the left hand side of a jack arch. The narrow "header" end was somewhat blackened by smoke, while the other sides had been covered by a lime putty, except for the exterior "stretcher" face which had a scored line cut 3" from the wider end, a decorative feature used in an alternate sequence.

Two reused bricks were of the same pink color as the bricks of the cellar foundations. Both bricks had been remortared, with 11. light gray shell mortar over a pale cream shell mortar. They had been reused at the corner of a structure, as two sides were unmortared but had been painted red, and in one instance the paint overlay an area of earlier mortar.

Several pieces of molded firebricks were recovered, but not enough to attempt a reconstruction. It is believed that they were ordered in "sets" or "kits" from the manufacturer, and that they were used for stoves as well as for fireplace linings. Their date is thought to be from ca.1850 onward.

Stone: The robbed chimney foundation yielded fragments of a molded base (No. 4,Figure 4), once set into or onto the ground surface, as evidenced by a tar calking along two sides. It is believed that the base was not related to the house, but had supported a piece of garden sculpture or decoration. A sundial was suggested, as statuary or birdbaths were apparently not common until later in the Victorian period. The red, gritty, rather weak granite of the base did not come to Williamsburg until the 19th century.

A harder granite, yellow in color, with red iron spotting was used for two large stones, the larger of which had been roughly chiseled and therefore may have been a support member hidden behind dressed stones. The second piece (No.1,Figure 4), was a large stone step which showed a good deal or wear on the tread, suggesting a long period of use. Similar stone was used in the steps at Mount Airy, near Richmond, so an 18th-century date is not unlikely Although the photograph clearly shows brick steps at the front porch, it is possible that earlier steps were simple covered by the porch, or earlier porches. The original stone steps at Carter Grove were covered by a 19th-century porch.

FIGURE 3. ARCHITECTURAL FINDS.

The post mold carrying the western support to the second porch (E.R.1991B) contained a large number of fragments of the same yellow stone. Several pieces showed signs of tooling, and there was one fragment of a molded base or cornice (No.2, Figure 4) It seems unlikely that this fragment came from steps; it may have belonged to a formal garden architectural piece.

Wood: Large quantities of charred wood fragments were found in the robbed chimney hole. Most appeared to be warped and unidentifiable pieces of pine floorboards, of little further note, but one fragment did preserve carpentry details (No.3, Figure 4). The male member of a tongue-and-groove joint was 3/16" wide and 1/4" long, while the underside of the board exhibited a shallow seat for the floor joist below. The upper surface of the floor board had been heavily charred, and it is possible that the piece came from the ground floor where it was more likely to have been so unevenly burned.