University of Virginia Library

Spring Brings New Life

About a month following the visitors' meeting the construction at the university site was
once again being carried on at a respectable speed. The proctor pressed his architect to send
the hotel plans down from the mountaintop so that the carpenters could ascertain the size
and amount of timber that needed to be cut. He had decided to assign Hotel A to James
Oldham, whom he thought could better manage the large flat roof that was planned for the
building. Spooner and Perry would receive the smaller hotels. The layout of the buildings on
the west range apparently had not been finalized, at least not in Brockenbrough's thinking,
for he informed Jefferson that "Hotel A if placed in a line with the North flank wall of Pav:
No 1. will have no dormitory attached to it as there is only 56 feet from the north flank to
the alley or cross street runing up to the back of the dormitories." To solve this difficulty the
rector was requested to visit the site before Brockenbrough set the laborers to digging the
foundations of the hotels. "I find if we cut in the bank the depth of Hotel A we shall have a
bank 7 feet high & then the cellar to dig out in order to save some labor I propose advancing
the buildings a few feet in the street & then throwing the street more to the East."[392]

Also in May, Brockenbrough attempted to revitalize efforts at the university to push forward
the stonework. He sought to hire a stonecutter, "by the day or piece work," who just finished
carving for General Cocke at Upper Bremo. He could pay for "plain work 25 cents pr
Superficial foot & 50 pr foot straight moulded work, & 75 cents for circular Moulded do pr
foot superficial," or $1.50 a day.[393] Luther M. George sent up "Som cut Stone" from
Milton, apparently shipped from Richmond by Thomas B. Conway, along with the word that
"a very Large one hear" weighing at least 2,800 pounds could be wagoned up when
wanted.[394] A few days later George sent word that his "Boatman Elijah has brough[t] up
an other of them Large Rock and have Sent it on by a waggoner."[395] (Elijah, who
apparently was George's slave, later worked for the university 41 days straight "inclusive
easter Monday & 2 other lost days deducted.")[396] Destined to become an Ionic cap, the
2,149 pound stone at Lewis Ferry cost the university $12 by the time it reached the
construction site. John H. Wood charged the university $13.14 for boating 3 small "ones of
wrought stone" to be used for bases and caps and one 2,389 pound rock from Richmond to
Milton at the end of the month.[397] In early June the proctor tried to talk Jefferson into
buying marble from Pennsylvania after Giacomo Raggi, who "complains much of this
stone," returned from Philadelphia with a sample more to his liking.[398] Jefferson would
hear nothing of the proposal, although in July he finally conceded that something must be
done. He wrote Consul Thomas Appleton in Leghorn to ask how much it would cost,
"considering the low price of labor, and of the material with you," to get the Corinthian
capitals ready made from Carrara.[399] It was February 1821 before Jefferson received
Appleton's reply, and only then did he discover that he had omitted to give Appleton the
number of capitals he wanted carved![400]

Jefferson visited the university on Tuesday, 6 June, but Brockenbrough, unfortunately "out
of place," was not able to get the rector's opinion on several important points immediately at
hand. One of the questions he wanted to ask, whether to place the "ornaments for the metops
layed down by Nicholson" in the "Frize of Pavilion No 2 E. Range," gives some indication
of Richard Ware's progress on that building.[401] The substitution of tin gutters for wooden
ones and the ordering of marble from Philadelphia both have been discussed previously, as
has the progress of the pipe borers in laying down waterpipes. Jefferson's answers to the
proctor's inquiries about substituting 10 x 12 glass for 12 x 12 in the hotel windows in order
to save money and whether the cornice and entablature of the pavilions would look better a
stone color rather than perfectly white have not survived but can be easily surmised. The
question of building a small house for each of the Italian stonecutters' wives worked itself
out when the women decided not to leave their native homes. Finally, the proctor had
concluded brickwork agreements for the new buildings at $10 per thousand for "common &
peace bricks" and $16 for the "front or rubed stretchers." Curtis Carter contracted for
Pavilion VI and Hotel A; John Perry and Abiah Thorn for Pavilion VIII and Hotel B;
William B. Phillips for Pavilion X and Hotel C; and the "dormitories divided amongst
them."[402] By the end of June John Neilson could report that the "brick-layers have begun
their seasons work and all seems getting forward."[403]

Over the course of the late spring and summer the university's suppliers continued to
provide various kinds of materials to the construction site. James Leitch's account for the
period shows that while the merchant continued to sell nails, he also became the institution's
main whiskey and Jamaica rum dealer.[404] The firm of Brockenbrough & Harvie helped out
its Richmond competitor, John Van Lew & Co., by taking over some of its accounts with the
university for the glass, tin, hardware, etc. that the latter had sold to the university between
August 1819 and mid-May 1820.[405] John Van Lew & Co., experiencing difficulties in
procuring boats, began to ship its tin, iron, herring, and assortment of hardware exclusively
by wagons; James Stone, Andrew Jamison, Hembro Pendleton, and Thomas Jackson all
drove wagons to the university during the spring and summer.[406] Thomas Perkins of
Boston, in response to a request from the university, sent Brockenbrough a quote for Boston
Crown Glass from the agents of the Boston Glass Manufactory, Pearson & Cloutman.[407] In
June William Bowen delivered 6,500 wooden shingles to James Oldham, at a cost of
$58.50.[408]