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Chapter 11
The Final Years: 1826-1828
Documentary History of the Construction of the Buildings at the University
of Virginia, 1817-1828 |  |
Repairs Necessary
Over the next few months, progress toward the final completion of the construction at the
university nearly halted, owing in part to another Virginia winter and in part to the fact that
maintenance of the finished work competed with the priorities of completing that remaining
to be done. Brockenbrough's letter to Dinsmore & Neilson, written in the spring of 1827, is
a good example of how the workmen were called upon to perform repairs on one building
while still engaged in the unfinished work at another. "I am anxious," wrote the proctor, "to
have the roof of the Gimnasium put on a proper state to carry off the Water—the longer it
remains in its present state the greater the damage and as I look to you to make it good the
sooner you attend to it the better—the crackd gutters too in the roof of the Anatomical Hall
must be attended to & if necessary other gutters put in their places[765]—no payments for
those items can be made untill they are put in the order they should be."[766]
765. Nothing more about this roofwork has been identified although on 4 January 1828 John
Mahanes received $16 for his delivery of 4,000 wooden shingles to the university (loose
receipts for 1828 in ViU:PP).
766. Brockenbrough to Dinsmore & Neilson, 23 April 1827, ViU:PP. On 5 June ASB gave
Dinsmore & Neilson a draft on the Bursar for $1,000 "on acct of the work executed by
Dinsmore & Neilson." Dinsmore previously had received on 13 February a draft for $98
from ASB "on acct. of work by Dinsmore & Neilson," and on 4 September and 1 October
1827, Rice W. Wood received for Thomas Darrett $173.40 and $15 "in part of Dinsmore &
Neilsons Draft on the Proctor for $580.43½ on acct of Lumber for the University of Va." A
draft on the bursar for $2,000 was paid to Dinsmore & Neilson on 13 November, and on 15
December 1827 Nelson Barksdale gave ASB a receipt for $50 "on acct. of Lumber
furnished for the Rotunda, it being in part payment of the Dft of Dinsmore & Neilson." On
15 September 1827 Hugh Chisholm received $20 "on account of the P[l]astering of the
Anat: Hall." These receipts are in the loose receipts for 1827 in ViU:PP. Dinsmore &
Neilson's receipt of 21 February 1828 for a draft on the bursar for $1,000, in the loose
receipts for 1828 in ViU:PP, is specifically for "work on the Rotunda & Anat: Hall." Rice W.
Wood performed legal work against the university for carpenter James Oldham (see
Grizzard, "To Exercise a
Sound Discretion"), and in July 1822, Wood purchased from Archibald Stuart a tract of
unimproved land totaling 880 acres in northern Augusta County on the south branch of
Naked Creek, just west of the Valley Turnpike to the southwest of Burketown. Wood died
young, survived by his wife, Sarah W. Wood, and their four infant daughters, Anne,
Cornelia, Mary, and Antoinette (see C. E. May, My Augusta: A Spot of Earth, Not a Woman,
302-3).
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Chapter 11
The Final Years: 1826-1828
Documentary History of the Construction of the Buildings at the University
of Virginia, 1817-1828 | |