Sunday, March 1, 2020

Garden Design - Topiary

Much Wenlock Priory, Shropshire, England

Springtime, sunshine, ruins, topiary...who could ask for more.


18th Century depiction of a gardener clipping

We live near the Ladew Topiary Gardens in Monkton, Maryland. They were built on a 250 acre estate by Harvey S. Ladew (1887-1976) after 1920. Ladew, who loved to "ride to the hounds," designed topiaries depicting a fox hunt with horses; riders, dogs, & fox clearing a hedge; elegant swans; an exotic giraffe; & even a landlocked Chinese junk with sails.


Ladew Topiary Gardens

A short ride north is a more traditional topiary garden at Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. In 1700, a Quaker farm family purchased the property from William Penn. Joshua & Samuel Peirce began planting an arboretum on the farm in 1798. By 1850, the site contained one of the finest collections of trees in the nation & one of the first public parks. The farm was purchased in 1906 by Pierre du Pont, so he could preserve the trees; and from 1907 until the 1930s, du Pont created today's gardens, where beauty is as important as scientific botany.


Longwood Gardens

Traveling a few hours further up the Atlantic coast reveals the 100 year old Wellesley, Massachusetts, Hunnewell Arboretum topiary of native American white pine & arborvite.


Green Animals Topiary Gardens

Nearby is the 19th century Green Animals Topiary Gardens in Portsmouth, Rhode Island.


Columbus, Ohio

For years we drove on Interstate 70 from Maryland to Indiana & back again almost monthly. About midway between, an ambitious 1990s topiary garden at Old Deaf School Park right in downtown Columbus, Ohio, replicates Georges Seurat's painting Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, consisting of 54 topiary people, 8 boats, 3 dogs, a monkey, a cat, & a pond.



Even a visit to Epcot in Florida with the grandchildren yeilds a topiary dinasour created, one might imagine, by Edward Scissorhands.


Levens Hall in 1833, Cumbria, England

My favoite topiary garden is Levens Hall (see above 1833, see below recent) in Cumbria, England. It was begun in the 17th century & restored in the 20th century. You can just sit on the benches there surrounded by the towering topiary feeling transported to another time & another world. You might even imagine yourself as a lady-in-waiting at Queen Elizabeth's court. In the photo at the beginning of this posting, the grounds at Much Wenlock Priory, a 12th century church, located in Shropshire, England also boast some mature, but less fanciful, topiary.


Levens Hall, Cumbria, England

Hidcote Manor in Gloucestershire, England, offers intimate topiary in herbaceous borders in the 20th century Arts and Crafts "rooms" of its garden.


Hidcote Manor, Hidcote Bartrim, near Chipping Campden, Gloucestershire, England


Penshurst Palace Kent, England

The more traditional topiary at Cliveden in Buckinghamshire, England, and at Drummond Castle Gardens in Perthshire, Scotland, are a review of Versailles with its balls, globes, cubes, obelisks, pyramids, cones, and spirals. Victorian Knightshayes Court in Devon, England, presents some amusing topiary in its gardens.


Cliveden, Taplow, Buckinghamshire, England


Drummond Castle, Ochtermuthill, Perthshire, Scotland


Knightshayes Garden, Tiverton, Devon, England


Great Dixter Gardens in East Sussex, England

Harry Potter runs through the great yew topiary gardens at Beckley Park in Oxfordshire, England, in the film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Even the rugged clifftop Pormeirion in Gwynedd, Wales, overlooking Cardigan Bay, has topiary tucked into its woodland gardens. Go there only if you are in good shape, which I am not.


Beckley Park, Oxfordshire, England

Topiary is the art of creating sculptures using clipped trees and shrubs. For centuries, gardeners commonly have used evergreen, small leaf or needle, compact plants with dense foliage for topiary, including boxwood, arborvitae, bay laurel, holly, myrtle, common yew, and privet.

The term topiary had appeared in England as early as 1592, when it was referred to as "Topiarie woorke." In 1644, John Evelyn recorded in his diary, "There was much topiary worke, and columns in architecture about the hedges." And in 1680 another English work stated, "No topiary Hedge of Quickset Was e're so neatly cut."

In England, Alexander Pope shot and nearly killed figural topiary in his essay on "Verdant Sculpture" in The Guardian of September 1713, which mockingly described in his imaginary topiary-for-sale catalogue:

Adam and Eve in yew;

Adam a little shattered by the fall of the tree of knowledge in the great storm;

Eve and the serpent very flourishing;

The tower of Babel, not yet finished;

St George in box; his arm scarce long enough, but will be in condition to stick the dragon by next April; and

a quickset hog, shot up into a porcupine, by its being forgot a week in rainy weather.


Some of Pope's contemporaries turned from figural topiary, now held in some distain, to clipped hedges. The clipped hedge is a simple form of topiary used to create boundaries, walls or screens in a garden.



In 1729, Sir Thomas Lee married heiress, Elizabeth Sandys and set about to transform the gardens at Hartwell in Buckinghamshire County, England. Nothing in England's American colonies would match these enormous paths of clipped yew hedges, which served as paths for riding and walking; boundries for playing at bowls, and directing the visitor's line of sight from the formal grounds to the surrounding farmland.



By the middle of the 18th century, Charles Bridgeman and William Kent pretty much pruned the English garden clean of clipped hedges, mazes, and topiary. Fashion banned topiary from England's aristocratic gardens, however, it continued to flourish in cottagers' gardens, where balls, cones, and trees with several cleanly separated tiers were meticulously clipped year after year throughout the 19th century.



The term topiary was seldom, if ever, used in 18th century British America. In the designs of formal gardens around personal dwellings and public buildings especially in the first half of the 18th century, the method of clipping yew or other hedging into realistic or fanciful shapes--columns, balls, or obelisks was simply refered to as clipping.


1766 William Williams (Colonial American artist, 1727–1791) Deborah Richmond

The Sir Christopher Wren Building at the College of William and Mary in Virginia is the oldest college building in the United States. In 1732, Willliam Dawson reported that the garden in front of the Wren Building was, "...planted with evergreens kept in very good order."


Williamsburg, Virginia, Bodleian Plate England 1740

Ten years later, gardener John Custis noted in Williamsburg, "...the balls or standards having heads as big as a peck and the pyramids in full shape...I had very fine yews balls and pyramids which were established for more than 20 years." And in 1777, Ebenezer Hazard reported seeing the College of William and Mary at Williamsburg, "At this Front of the College is a large Court Yard, ornamented with Walks, Trees cut into different Forms, & Grass."

By 1736 in Boston, Thomas Hancock on Beacon Hill was writing, "Let me know also what you'l Take for 100 Small Yew Trees in the Rough, which I'd Frame up here to my own Fancy."

In July of 1734, the first notice of hedges appeared in Philadelphia, although we cannot be sure the gardener was clipping his hedges into unusual shapes, was a sad one, when the newspaper reported that, "Jacob Lee, a Gardiner, being overcome with the Heat as he was at work clipping of a Hedge, fell down and expired."

Garden planners in Pennsylvania added hedges clipped into a variety of forms to their garden alley ways. In 1754, at Springettsbury near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Ezra Stiles reported, "...passing a long spacious walk, set on each side with trees, on the summit of a gradual

In Alexander Graydon's memoirs, he noted the during the 18th century, Israel Pemberton's country seat near Philadelphia, was, "...laid out in the old fashioned style of uniformity, with walks and allies nodding to their brothers, and decorated with a number of evergreens, carefully clipped into pyramidal and conical forms."
d soon after."

John Bartram, son of Pennsylvania botanist William Bartram, wrote to Peter Collinson in 1740, of the garden at William Byrd's estate in Virginia, "Colonel Byrd is very prodigalle...new Gates, gravel Walks, hedges, and cedars finely twined."
ascent...besides the beautiful walk, ornamented with evergreens...Spruce hedges cut into beautiful figures."



Even artisan gardener & silversmith William Faris in 18th century Annapolis, regularly collected holly trees from nearby woods to plant on his city lot and kept them clipped into the form of sugar cones.

In America, topiary re-emerged with a fervor in Colonial Revival gardens 1880–1920. This continued as interest in restoring gardens around historic sites increased. A topiary maze was planted at the Governor's Palace, Colonial Williamsburg, in the 1930s.


The art of Pearl Fryar

The art of topiary, with its living medium, is alive and well in 21st century America. If you have been reading this blog, you already know that I am drawn to self-taught art. One of the most amazing contemporary garden artists is South Carolina's self-taught, outsider topiary artist Pearl Fryar.


Saturday, February 29, 2020

Plants in Early American Gardens - Guinea Hen Flower

Guinea Hen Flower; Checkered Lily (Fritillaria meleagris)

This delightful bulb is native to English meadows and was grown in American gardens before 1700. If well-situated in moist ground, it can persist for many years naturalized in lawns or beds rich in leaf mold. Guinea Hen Flower is known by several names, including Snakes-head Lily, Madam Ugly, and Drooping Tulip. 

The 1597 edition of John Gerard’s Herbal lists it as Checkered Daffodil and Ginnie Hen Flower and describes the flowers as “…checkered most strangely... surpassing…the curiousest painting that Art can set downe.”

For more information & the possible availability for purchase

Wednesday, February 26, 2020

Garden Tools - & a bit about John Evelyn

John Evelyn & Depictions of Early Gardening Tools

During the early 1990s, John E. Ingram, then the research archivist & curator of special collections at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, was working to transcribe diarist John Evelyn's (1620–1706) Elysium Britannicum, or The Royal Gardens in Three Books, which was languishing unpublished as MS 45 at the British Library in London.
Detail John Evelyn (1620-1706) by Hendrick van der Borcht, 1641.

Evelyn was a pivotal figure in 17th century intellectual life in England. He traveled, collected & read books and was intent on introducing a more sophisticated European high culture not only to his friends but to all of England. He had the leisure to do that thanks to a family fortune amassed by manufacturing gunpowder for Elizabeth I.

Evelyn worked for 40 years on his Elysium project, the purpose of which he wrote to a friend, "to refine upon some particulars, especially concerning the ornaments of Gardens, which I shal endeavor so to handle that persons of all conditions and faculties, which delight in Gardens, may therein encounter something for their owne advantage."

The main reason the project took 40 years and ended abruptly before its completion is that Evelyn loved lifting ideas & whole sections from the books he was collecting to incorporate into his Elysium manuscript, which was filled with notes in the margins, wholesale changes, & completely new insertions. He might have had the classics conquered; but science & horticulture were racing ahead of Evelyn, and he was determined to keep up, cribbing as fast as he read.

Evelyn peppered his manuscript with illustrations of garden layouts and embellishments for gardens & grounds. More important to this discussion, he included two pages of sketches of tools & small structures for nurturing new plants to be used in the garden. "Since Gardining...hath as all other Arts and Professions certaine Instuments and tooles properly belonging to it."
Evelyn (1620-1706) by Robert Walker, 1648.

Evelyn's work Elysium does open a world of connections between the changing philosophy of cultural, social & political thought and its reflection in gardens from Greek & Roman times to Evelyn's age.

During the 1980s, an article in the Journal of Garden History suggested that even Evelyn's depictions & discussions of garden tools might have "more subtle meanings" than mere illustrations, that perhaps they might be "charged with symbolic values," emblems for Evelyn's "gardiner" & the world beyond. After all, Evelyn wrote, "What is our Gardiner to be, but an absolute Philosopher!"
Well, back to the tools. (By the way, Dr. Ingram's transcription was published in 2001, go to amazon.com to find it. You won't regret your purchase, if you are at all interested in gardening or in the intellectual life of 17th centrury England.)

One of Evelyn's unfinished chapters was to have been about ‘Watering, Pruning, Plashing, Nailing, Clipping, Mowing and Rolling.’ We could have used that in a discussion of tools, but his advice wasn't always that practical. For garden rollers, he recommends marble columns procured from the classical ruins in Smyrna.

Elysium is not a practical work like his Sylva, or A Discourse of Forest Trees (1664); Kalendarium Hortense: or; The Gard’ners Almanac (1664), a guide to gardener’s task, month by month throughout the year; or Acetaria: a Discourse of Sallets (1699), a proof that vegetarians could eat & live.

Elysium is not entirely void of practicality, but it is unabashedly aristocratic in both aesthetics & philosophy and full of irrelevant digressions, of which I am a huge devotee and part-time practitioner.
Early Garden and Agricultural Equipment.

Evelyn was certainly not the first to illustrate gardening and agricultural tools. Early manuscripts often depcited gardening. Two of my favorites are from 1410 Tres Riches Heures du duc de Berry.
Detail Vincennes Castle in France. 1410 Depiction.
Detail Paris. 1410 Depiction.

A more mundane engraving of instruments for grafting, engraving appeared in Leonard Mascall's, The Art of Planting and Grafting, in 1572. And an engraving of pruning tools appeared in Jean de La Quintinie, The Compleat Gard’ner in 1693.

Page of Garden Tools from John Evelyn's (1620–1706) Elysium Britannicum, or The Royal Gardens in Three Books.


Tools & equipment Evelyn felt were absolutely necessary for a garden depicted on this page include:
iron-clad spades,
rakes,
hoes,
pickaxe and shovel,
sieves and screens,
instruments peculitar to the surveyor
lines,
dibbers,
transplanter,
a planting lattice...for regular planting and setting of rootes and flowers...
ladder,
trowels,
turf lifter,
turf edger,
scyther,
slasher,
trowel,
stone roller,
leveller,
tamper,
funnel,
hoe,
shears,
and long pruners.

Garden Tools from John Evelyn's (1620–1706) Elysium Britannicum, or The Royal Gardens in Three Books.


Evelyn continued with his depiction of mandatory garden tools & equipment on this page including:
slashers,
knives,
hammers,
mattocks,
pliers,
ladder,
3 different designs of watering pots,
water barrel,
water tanks,
fountains,
forcing post,
protection cone,
frame,
bell glasses
hand light bedstead "furnished with tester and Curtaines of treene...to draw over and preserve the Choysest flowers, bing in their beauty, from the parching beames of the Sunn,
knife sharpener,
harrows,
baskets,
bird scarers (bells),
storage chest,
garden diary or register,
and traps.


In the Le Jardinier Solitaire by François Gentil & Louis Liger published in 1706, there is a list of the instruments necessary for a florist. Gentil wrote, As a Soldier can't fight without his Arms, so a Gardner can't work without proper Tools. The one is as necessary as the other.
This engraving from LE JARDINIER FLEURISTE by Le Sieur Liger d'Auxerre printed in 1787. Images taken from earlier publication Necessary Instruments for Gardening from Le Jardinier Solitaire by François Gentil, Louis Liger published in 1706.

1 Spade. The first instument the Gardener takes in his hand to learn a dexterity in turning up the Ground and working it smooth and even and it is chiefly used by Apprentices.

2 Shovel. Used for throwing Earth out of Trenches or Ditches or for throwing rakings into a Wheelbarrow or Dosser.

3 Rakes. This tool is in the Gardener's Trade. a symbol of Neatness. One for smoothing Beds and Plots, the other for cleaning the Walks.

4 Rakers. A necessary tool for keeping the Garden clean of weeds.

5 Displanter. Used for transplanting and for taking up all Flowers, that the Gardener is obliged to transplant from the place where they were sowed to another.

6 Prining knife. So necessary, that a Gardener ought always to have one in his pocket for there's a hundred occasions in the way of Gardening to make use of it.

7 Dibbles. For planting small flowers that have roots and for planting Bulbs.

8 Watering Pot. Nothing is more useful in a Garden than a Watering-Pot, so that a Gardner cannot be without it. It imitates the rain, falling from the Heavens.

9 Beetle. This serves to smooth the Walkes and hinders most effectively the growing of Weeds upon 'em.

10 Flower Basket. A Gardener that cultivates Flowers, ought to have Baskets by him, to gather the Flowrs in upon occasion. This sort of Basket, shew a Gardener's Neatness and the genteel way of his Profession.

11 Sieve. 'Tis by this that the Earth is reduced almost to Dust and is rendered fit for receiving Anemones, Rannunculas, and other fine flowers.

12 Saw. 'Tis used for cutting the Branches which he can't lop with his knife.

13 Transplanter. Used for raising together with the earth, plants for transplanting.

14 Garden Pot. A Gardner ought to have good store of Pots to put some Flowers in, that grow better fo than in full Earth, such as Pinks, Bears-Ears, Tube-roses, &c. These may be either of plain Earth, or of Dutch Ware, the former are much larger, for holding Jessamins, Clove-Gill-flowers, and such other Plants.

15 Plainer, or Rabot. Tho you run the Rake never so often along the Walks and Paths of a Garden, it will leave some Roughness which is easily rectified with an Inftrument call'd a Rabot; and therefore a neat Gardiner ought not to be without it.

16 Paillassons or Panniers of Straw. This is very necessary to keep out the Froft, which would hurt the Flowers that are sowed, especially those who can't bear much cold.

17 Mallet. Used with the Chisel for lopping the Branches, that can't be so neatly taken off with the force of one's hands.

18 Wheelbarrow. To carry the Stones and Rakings of a Garden, to, places appointed to receive 'em ; or, to carry Earth, or Mold, to improve such Grounds as are hungry.

19 Handbarrow. To carry into the Greenhouse, Trees or Shrubs, set in Boxes, which a Man can't carry upon his Arm. Tis likewise of use for carrying Dung upon the Beds.

20 Catterpiller Sheers. For removing Catterpillers, which would otherwise deftroy all- It has a Handle ten foot long fitted to it, that it may reach to the upper Pans of a Tree. They clip, or cut the end of the Branch upon which the tuft of Catterpillers is lodg'd.

21 Garden Sheers. They are of use for trimming the Box, Yews, and other Trees and Shrubs, that serve to embellish a Garden.

22 Double Ladder. For trimming the upper part of the Arbour, or high Bower.

23 Pickaxe. For raising the Plants that adorn the Borders...or for giving some small Culture to Trees and Shrubs.

24 Rolling Stone. For smoothing Walks after they are raked.

25 Hook. A Gardener that has Rows of Greens to dress, can't trim them well without a hook, which is used after a certain way.

26 Glass Bell. A Forist can't be without this unless he has a mind to run the risk of losing his Plants, such as are soon in Beds immediately after the end of Winter.

27 Straw Bell. Proper for covering Plants newly transplanted in order to guard them from the Heat or the Sun, which might annoy them at first.

28 Garden Fork. For spreding and disposing of Dung upon the Beds.

29 Trowel. By the help of which a Flower Gardener takes up Plants with Earth around them.

30 Hurdle. For passing the Earth through. Of great use for separating the good Earth from the Stones.
1761 Frontispiece Le gentilhomme cultivateur ou corps complet d agriculture. Paris.

Richard Bradley, an English garden writer who was appointed the first Professor of Botany, Cambridge University in 1724, and whose books were owned widely throughout the British American colonies, also included a page of garden tools in one of his books published about 20 years after John Evelyn's death.
Garden Tools from Richard Bradley's Survey of Ancient Husbandry and Gardening in 1725.

Garden Tools in Colonial America & The Early Republic
18th-century Depiction

By 1734, garden tools made in the colonies were being advertised for sale in local newspapers.LATELY set up at Trenton in New Jersey, a Plateing and Blade Mill, by Isaac Harrow, an English Smith, who makes ...GARDEN SPADES...COMMON SHOVELS, SCYTHES...BROAD AXES,...CROSS CUT SAWS...BARK SHAVERS, HAND SAWS...HAY KNIVES...TOBACCO KNIVES... GARDEN SHEERS...DITCHING SHOVELS, All Persons that have occasion for any of the above named Goods, may be supplied by George Howell, Lastmaker in Chesnut Street, Philadelphia, or by the Maker at Trenton aforesaid, at reasonable Rates as any that come from England.
Pennsylvania Gazette September 12, 1734.

Garden tools were considered valuable property in colonial British America. According to the Camden County Historical Society in New Jersey, in 1763, Adam Reed of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, accompanied his local constable to a spot where they found Mr. Reed's stolen property "hid in the ground." Among the purloined articles unearthed were four grubbing hoes, four shovels and two spades.
'Recueil des Planches du Dictionnaire Encyclopédique de l'art Aratoire et du Jardinage' (1802)

In another instance cited during the Revolutionary War, John Jones of Southwark left personal tools in the care of Captain Christian Grover "at the time of the approach of the enemy" to Philadelphia. In 1778, Mr. Jones advertised for the return of his property, promising that whoever returned his belongings would be "rewarded in proportion to their trouble or expense." Among his prized possessions were two spades, five garden hoes, one grubbing hoe and two dung forks.
18th-century Depiction

Late in the 18th century, Evan Truman, blacksmith, and Thomas Goucher, a cutler by trade, provided garden tools to the public from their Philadelphia locations at the Sign of the Scythe and Sickle. Goucher advertised his skill in making "all kinds of edge tools and all sorts of hoes," while Truman's wares included ditching shovels, grubbing hoes, weeding hoes, picks and mattocks.
18th-century Depiction

On a much smaller scale, one-man cottage industries also provided garden tools in early America, as a listing from Stafford's 1800 Philadelphia City Directory attests: "Genter, Charlotte; rake maker; above Brown on St. John's Street."
18th-century Depiction

Whether these garden tools belonged to the gentry or to the everyday gardener or farmer, they were essential in the agricultural society that dominated early America. In the early decades of the 19th century, garden writers did not just write of the appropriate tools for the garden, some also sold them.
18th-century Depiction

At the Philadelphia shop of nurseryman Bernard M'Mahon (c. 1775–1816), author of the 1806 The American Gardener's Calendar, one corner was devoted to the various "spades, shovels, rakes, hoes, reels, lines, trowels, edging irons, garden shears, watering pots, pruning, budding and grafting knives so necessary for gardening."
Early 19th-century Depiction

It was not until the growing industrial economy of the mid-19th century, that manufacturers catalogues replaced list of tools in garden books. By then gardening was becoming a back-to-nature preoccupation of the industrial work force as a leisure-time activity.

By the early 19th century, as both disposable income and printing sophistication grew, some catalogues depicted gardening tools in color.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.
Figures Pour L'a Lmanach du Bon Jardinier. Outils de Jardinage. Early 19th-century Depiction.

Tuesday, February 25, 2020

Plants in Early American Gardens - Persian Fritillary

Persian Fritillary (Fritillaria persica)

The Persian Fritillary was introduced into English gardens in the late sixteenth century, but at the time did not capture the same attention as its cousin, the Crown Imperial Lily. This Fritillary’s unusual, deep violet blue flowers are perhaps more appealing to modern tastes. 

Bernard McMahon, Jefferson’s gardening mentor, listed the Fritillaria persica on his 1810 broadsheet.

For more information & the possible availability for purchase

Monday, February 24, 2020

An unusual early American garden + a little gossip in Portsmouth, New Hampshire

In 1740, Nathaniel Merserve (1705-1758) built his dwelling on the tidal North Mill Pond near his shipyard in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He was the owner of the largest shipyard in Portsmouth, by then famous for its shipbuilding facilities. His home was contiguous to his shipyard; where he constructed a 50 gun frigate in 1749, for the Royal Navy called The America.  In the capture of Louisburg from the French in 1745, he was Lieutenant Colonel of the regiment which New Hampshire raised for the expedition; & in 1758, he sailed for the 2nd siege of the place with 168 carpenters. Soon after their arrival at Cape Breton, "his whole party, except sixteen, were seized with smallpox, of which disorder Colonel Meserve & his eldest son died." (1913 Harold Hotchkiss Bennett)
1774 The South West Prospect of the Seat of Colonel George Boyd of Portsmouth, New Hampshire

In 1763, the house was purchased by Peter Livius (1739-1795), son of a Hamburg German employed in an English factory at Lisbon. His British mother sent him to school in England where, in 1758, he married the daughter of wealthy Colonel John Tufton Mason.  In 1763, the newly rich Livius moved from England to New Hampshire, where his wife’s family had large land claims. He immediately established a lavish style in Portsmouth, showing a remarkable ability to generate personal animosities.  He attempted to buy his credentials in New England colonial society by a large gift of books to Harvard College in 1764, from which he did receive an honorary degree 3 years later. In September 1765, his wife's English connections put him on the council of New Hampshire; & in 1768, he became justice of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas. He was accused of partiality as a judge, even of counseling litigants who were to appear before him. Governor Benning Wentworth, with whom he had earlier quarrelled over land grants, even alleged that Livis had been “a principal Abettor in the Disturbances at the Time of the Stamp Act.” In 1772, Wentworth removed Livius from the bench.  The irate Livius returned to London.

Col. George Boyd,  one of Portsmouth’s wealthiest merchants before the Revolution, "purchased ... the mansion & ship-yard, of Peter Livius...He enlarged the house, materially. His garden in front extended to the site of the present depot...& water bounded his premises on the east. It was a magnificent seat, such as a nabob might envy, enclosed within a white open fence, & at regular intervals of some forty or fifty feet, those handsomely carved towering Grenadier's heads were placed on posts, & presented a very unique appearance...His gardener, John Cunningham, (who died a few years since, at the age of ninety-four) he also sent over from England, at an earlier date." (1859 Charles Warren Brewster)
1774 The South West Prospect of the Seat of Colonel George Boyd of Portsmouth, New Hampshire Detail

Boyd's garden is somewhat of a curiousity, even beyond the Grenadier's heads on the fence posts.  Boyd fenced his newly enlarged pleasure grounds with white fences painted red on the side near the road, which was popular in New England a that time.  The garden had a traditional central walkway leading out from the main door of the house, but here the plan diverged from the conventional.  In the middle of the garden, Boyd placed a basin, perhaps to contain fresh water, rather than salt water, for his garden, or perhaps as a home to fish.  He had probably seen such basons on his trips to England to purchase goods.  He built 5 walkways, not the usual 4, radiating from his bason in an irregular pattern, & along only one side he dug a canal, the length of the garden.  From the many buildings of one color which he erected, his estate became known as the "White Village."

Much to the consternation of the local patriotic officials, "during the Revolution, Colonel Boyd found it convenient to live in England, but upon the conclusion of peace, decided to return, bringing a new & handsome coach, an English coachman ... & an elegant monument for his grave at some future time. He found an earlier use for this possession than he anticipated, for two days before the arrival of the ship, on October 8, 1787, he died, and took his place in the North Cemetery instead of in his magnificent mansion with it's spacious garden." (1913 Harold Hotchkiss Bennett)
1774 The Estate of Col. Nathaniel Meserve 1705-1758 Portsmouth, NH 1740 Portsmouth Times, 18 October 1924

In the year 1832, George Raynes (1799-1855) bought the estate, & the family maintained a shipyard there until 1865, building between 60 & 70 vessels.  After George Raynes' death, the family entered a lawsuit contesting the will & the ownership of the business, which lasted for years.  The mansion on the south shore of the North Mill Pond, was demolished in 1938.  Rather amazingly, a depiction of the house & garden remains from a Portsmouth newspaper article published in 1924.

~Charles Warren Brewster, William Henry Young Hackett, Lawerence Shorey.  Rambles about Portsmouth: Sketches of Persons, Localities, & Incidents of Two Centuries: Principally from Tradition & Unpublished Documents, Volume 1.  Published by C.W. Brewster & Son, Portsmouth Journal Office, 1859 - Portsmouth, N.H.
Caleb Stevens Gurney. Portsmouth, historic & picturesque: a volume of information. Self Published by C. S. Gurney, 1902 - Portsmouth, N.H.
~Harold Hotchkiss Bennett  Vignettes of Portsmouth: being representations of divers historic places in old Portsmouth. Published by H. Pearson & H. H. Bennett, 1913
~Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online.  1771-1800 (Volume IV)
The New Hampshire Reports. Volume 54. New Hampshire. Supreme Court, Joel Parker. Capital Offset Company, 1875

Sunday, February 23, 2020

Plants in Early American Gardens - Kwanso Lily

Kwanso Lily (Hemerocallis fulva cv.)

Daylilies are tough, long-lived perennials that have been cultivated for centuries. The Chinese grew them for beauty and also for their edible flowers. The single-flowered species was grown in Europe since at least the 1570s. The double-flowered ‘Kwanso’ type, noted by a European traveler in 1712, was first brought to the West from Japan in 1860. 

It was offered in the London nursery trade by 1861 and soon thereafter arrived in America. Daylilies are more suited to the climate of the United States and their culture here eventually surpassed European efforts. Flowers attract butterflies.

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