The buildings of Peter Harrison: cataloguing the work of the first global architect, 1716-1775

245 Pages·2014·50.76 MB·English

by  Harrison, Peter;Millar, John Fitzhugh

The Buildings of
Peter Harrison
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The Buildings
of Peter Harrison
Cataloguing the Work
of the First Global
Architect, 1716–1775
J F M
OHN ITZHUGH ILLAR
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Jefferson, North Carolina
LIBRARYOFCONGRESSCATALOGUING-IN-PUBLICATIONDATA
Millar, John Fitzhugh.
The buildings of Peter Harrison : cataloguing the work of
the first global architect, 1716–1775 / John Fitzhugh Millar.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
♾
ISBN 978-0-7864-7962-7 (softcover : acid free paper)
ISBN 978-1-4766-1574-5 (ebook)
1. Harrison, Peter, 1716–1775—Criticism and interpretation. I. Title.
NA737.H3M55 2014 720.92—dc23 2014037949
BRITISHLIBRARYCATALOGUINGDATAAREAVAILABLE
© 2014 John Fitzhugh Millar. All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying
or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publisher.
Front cover: Old Dartmouth Hall, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire.
The building, one of few actually affirmed to be by Harrison, was designed in 1769.
Construction began in 1784 and was completed in 1786 (photograph by Anne Wilson)
Printed in the United States of America
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Box 611, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640
www.mcfarlandpub.com
Table of Contents
Preface 1
I.
Carl Bridenbaugh’s Account of Harrison 5
II.
A New Narrative of the Life of Peter Harrison 10
III.
The British Isles and Europe 32
IV.
Canada 57
V.
New England 70
VI.
The Mid- Atlantic 112
VII.
The American South and Atlantic Islands 144
VIII.
The Caribbean 174
IX.
Other Continents—South America, Africa, Asia and Australasia 190
X.
Furniture 202
Appendices
A—Buildings Attributed to Harrison 209
B—Student to Teacher 214
C—Architectural Pattern Books in Harrison’s Library 215
Illustrated Glossary of Architectural Terms 217
Bibliography 227
Index 229
v
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Preface
Although I had spent a total of six years at British schools, I designed by Nicholson (but I still thought it was by Wren). For
was surprised and annoyed to find myself in yet another British the oak plaque that every Middlesex senior is obliged to carve
boarding school at age fourteen in the autumn of 1959, as arranged for paneling on the wall of the school I carved Trinity’s steeple.
by my British father. I regarded Newport, Rhode Island, as my At Harvard, I started work on building further models of
home, and heartily wished to be back there, and not at Charter- Wren churches (one of them actually by Wilbraham). I was
house School, Godalming, Surrey. invited to a sherry reception at the Eliot House Senior Common
After moping for a short time, I came to the conclusion that Room to honor two visiting professors. As I remember, one of
there was nothing I could do to reverse the situation, and that them was the author Tom Wolfe, but the other was a famous
it would be a sin to waste that academic year feeling sorry for scholar in American history, Wendell Garrett. When I talked
myself. One of the iconic symbols of Newport, Rhode Island, with Garrett, I found that my fame had preceded me, because
in my mind was the steeple of Trinity Church, and that inspired he already knew that I built architectural models for fun. He
me on the next leg of my journey. asked me to build some models of buildings by Peter Harrison
That church had been designed (we now know) by Governor for an exhibition he was planning, and he needed the models in
Francis Nicholson, and construction had begun in 1723. Nichol- just a few days.
son’s steeple design was regarded as either too difficult or too I agreed to make as many as could be made in such a limited
expensive to construct, and so the local builder, Richard Munday, time, but he understood that, unlike my large Wren and Nicholson
had designed and constructed two graduated, arched octagonal models, these Harrison buildings would be small, perhaps about
stages under a spire. Munday’s steeple lasted only about two eight centimeters long apiece. Since I considered Newport my
decades until it was felled by a hurricane (it could also easily home, I was of course already familiar with some of Harrison’s
have first been weakened by rotting wood). At that point, Peter buildings there and in Massachusetts—the Redwood Library,
Harrison offered to design an impressive but inexpensive replace- Touro Synagogue, and the Brick Market in Newport, King’s Chapel
ment steeple, but in 1959 I had no idea that Harrison had ever in Boston, and Christ Church in Cambridge. Of those, Garrett
had any connection with the steeple. asked me to build models of the Redwood Library, King’s Chapel,
I believed what I had been told, namely that Sir Christopher and Christ Church. Then he suggested four other houses of which
Wren (1632–1723) had designed both church and steeple shortly I had never heard about any Harrison connection: Shirley Place in
before he died, so I resolved to read everything I could find about Roxbury, Massachusetts, the Vassall- Craigie-Longfellow House
Wren, and to build a model of Trinity Church. In a matter of and the Reverend East Apthorp House in Cambridge (all three
only a few weeks, I found perhaps as many as 150 English build- still standing in altered form), and the Charles Ward Apthorp
ings in books that any normal person would swear had to have House in New York City, known to posterity only through old
been designed by Wren—they were in the correct style, and were photographs. In fact, Garrett had written an excellent essay about
built in the correct time period. I showed my list to some experts, the East Apthorp House, and he gave me a copy.
and they said that I was completely mistaken: Wren had not Knowing my way around Carl Bridenbaugh’s 1949 book, Peter
designed any of those buildings, although they had no idea who Harrison: First American Architect, I pointed out to Garrett that
had designed them. Many years later, I discovered that the mys- none of those houses was represented in that book. At that point,
tery architect had been born the same year as Wren, and had he said something that forced me to raise my sights far higher
served as Wren’s architectural tutor: Elizabeth Lady Thomas than I had ever dreamed possible. He said that even though
Wilbraham (1632–1705), the world’s first woman architect. My Bridenbaugh (a professor of history at Brown University) was a
book on this exciting architect is forthcoming. highly regarded and distinguished scholar of early America, I
Still believing that those buildings were by Wren, I continued should not necessarily believe that he had written the last word
to research the architecture of Wren’s period through two addi- on the subject. Garrett then suggested that I should find out
tional years at Middlesex, a boarding school in Massachusetts, what more was able to be found about Harrison’s career, and
and on into my first year of college at Harvard. While I was at write my own book.
Middlesex, I managed to build further models of Wren churches “No sweat!” I replied airily. “I’ll have that all done by my sen-
in London, plus a church in Boston that we now know was ior year.”
1
2 Preface
At about the same time as my encounter with Garrett, I Over the years, I travelled extensively in eastern Canada and
learned that Harvard was offering a course on the history of the Caribbean, whenever I could find the time and the money
American architecture, taught by Professor William Jordy of to do so, and, as you can imagine, I had my share of exciting,
Brown University. Jordy, who was obviously enamored with Vic- even dangerous, adventures. Some were no more noteworthy
torian and modern architecture, passed over the entire colonial than visiting one island on a rather tippy dugout canoe whose
period in a single lecture, and dismissed the related Beaux Arts sail was made out of flour sacks, or having to spend the night
period (roughly 1890 to 1935) in one paragraph. I was outraged, stretched out with the hens in the hotel’s chicken coop in French
and resolved to investigate the subject as thoroughly as possi- Guiana when I arrived from the airport after the hotel had closed
ble. for the night (the hotel still attempted to charge me the regular
Garrett’s challenge and my dissatisfaction with Jordy’s course room rate!).
resulted in me writing a book that covered high- style pre– Rev- On one occasion, I visited Paramaribo, the capital of Suri-
olutionary American architecture and placed Harrison in con- name. Most Americans today have never heard of Paramaribo,
text: The Architects of the American Colonies, Barre Publishers, but it was a major trading partner for American ships in the
1968. The research and writing of that book, and the drawing eighteenth century. Although technically a Dutch colony, it was
of all the illustrations, took almost all my waking hours not populated largely by British merchants along with the Dutch,
already committed to my Harvard course work; the illustrations, and a surprising number of early buildings may still be seen there
incidentally, were all in pencil, partly because I had never learned today. The combination of white clapboarded houses and brick
to draw in ink, and partly because no one had yet invented any buildings with white cupolas, surrounded by drooping eucalyp-
pens easier to use than the rather dodgy Rapidograph. tus trees, is strongly reminiscent of a rural New England college
I cringe to remember one incident during these years. Bill, my campus, where of course the drooping trees would have been
roommate, had invited his ravishingly beautiful girlfriend to our elms. Harrison designed two buildings at Paramaribo.
suite for the evening. At one point, he offered to fetch the three A single flight per day landed at the airport after dark. The
of us “frappes” (most Americans now use the term “milkshakes”). city was about an hour’s ride by bus down a long straight road
While he was gone, she started running her fingers through my with jungle on both sides. Being tall, I sat in the central seat in
hair, and said, “Writing a book—I am so impressed! How do the back so I could stretch out my legs. In the middle of nowhere,
you do that?” we suddenly screeched to a panic stop, and I was thrown out of
I turned around from the typewriter to face her, and I blurted my seat part way down the aisle. When I protested about the
out, “Because I don’t spend time chatting with people like you!” stop, a voice from the front of the bus replied, “Well, you’d stop,
In a way, I made it up to her later: when Bill’s red Jaguar XK-150 too, if you could see the size of the anaconda that is crossing the
broke down, I drove both of them down to her house in Darien, road.” The snake measured about ten meters in length, and its
Connecticut, but that still does not erase the memory of that girth was as large as a human, so the bus would have been seri-
moment worthy of Dr. Sheldon Cooper in the CBS television ously damaged if it had collided with the snake. We waited as
comedy series, The Big Bang Theory. the snake slithered off into the jungle.
The book was on the verge of publication when I had an On another occasion, I flew to Haiti during the reign of the
epiphany: my book was about formal architecture in the Amer- dictator “Baby Doc” Duvalier. Duvalier was worried about a
ican colonies, but where were the American colonies? I had potential coup, and so he placed the country in a lock- down. I
assumed that they stretched from Maine to Georgia, but it sud- was therefore not permitted to travel outside the capital city,
denly occurred to me that if someone had been leaving England Port- au-Prince. Having a recent college graduate’s disdain for
in, say, 1765 and saying, “Good bye; I’m off to the American island dictators, I decided to travel outside the city anyway, so
colonies,” he could have meant the area from Maine to Georgia, I went to the United States Embassy to see what they could
but he could also have meant Canada, Bermuda, Florida, the arrange. “We have no influence with Haitian officials at all,” was
Gulf Coast almost to New Orleans, a large number of Caribbean the reply. When I pressed further and explained that I spoke
islands, and the Guianas in northern South America. It was too passable French, one kind official relented. The majority of
late to delay the book’s publication, but I resolved to find out Haitians, he said, are unable to read their own language, let alone
whether Harrison or any of the other architects had also English. He took a piece of the finest U.S. Embassy stationery
designed buildings in those other colonies. And what about and typed on it that the Bearer was hereby applying for the posi-
other colonies outside America, such as Gibraltar, or Africa, or tion of assistant janitor to the U.S. Embassy, and signed it with
India, or Sumatra, or Canton? They ought to be investigated as a flourish. Then he applied gold seals, stamps and ribbons, mak-
well. For that matter, if Harrison was so well esteemed for his ing the document look most official. He handed it to me and
architecture in British colonies, was it possible that he could suggested that I try it out on government checkpoints.
have designed buildings in French or Dutch colonies as well? In The document worked like a charm at every checkpoint. I
the end, I found that he did. I felt quite sure, though, that I could drove towards the south until the mud became so deep that only
safely eliminate any possibility of his designing buildings in four- wheel-drive army trucks could pass. Then I turned around
Spanish or Portuguese colonies, and he seems not to have and headed north. Just short of Saint-M arc was a more intelli-
designed anything in Danish colonies, either. gent soldier. He told me that Sergeant Joseph knew how to read,
Preface 3
and he would take my letter and hold it for the sergeant, because an airport. When they all refused, Bishop found that the only
I would no longer need it for the rest of my trip. When I returned leader who would offer to help was Fidel Castro from Cuba.
to my hotel late that evening, I was met by the manager, who When the airport was half built, Castro asked permission to
looked worried. He asked where I had been, so I told him. He install anti- aircraft troops at the airport in case the United States
explained that the much feared Ton- Tons Macoute (secret police should decide to bomb it. Every month, more troops arrived
goons) had been looking for me at the hotel, but he said that while few ever went home. Finally, the airport was completed
once they had searched the hotel they were unlikely to return, and opened, so Bishop asked that the troops be sent home.
so I was quite safe until my flight departed the next morning. Instead, Cuban troops murdered Bishop and his colleagues. At
I returned to Haiti months later when I was assured that I that point, Governor- General Sir Paul Scoon went into action.
would be free to travel anywhere I wanted. I took the local gov- Normally, he was relegated to a ceremonial role, but constitu-
ernment flight to the ancient capital Cap Haitien in the north tionally he was permitted to take over in an emergency. What
aboard an old DC-3. Goats and chickens wandered freely up his team had not wanted me to see on the mansion was elaborate
and down the aisle during the flight. The architecture in the secret communications equipment on the roof, and he used that
north included many eighteenth- century buildings, and one of to talk with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and President
them, a domed church at Milot, appeared to have been designed Reagan without being detected. It was at his request that Pres-
by Harrison. I took the “bus” back to Port-a u-Prince, an open ident Reagan sent the invasion. Why the president felt it neces-
flat- bed truck that took twelve hours overnight to make the jour- sary to justify his move by connecting it to the medical students
ney; I paid a few cents extra and sat up in front with the driver. is anyone’s guess.
I never did manage to reach the south coast of the country, where Regardless of the exciting adventures mentioned above, the
stood an arcaded market building at Les Cayes that I attribute period of almost fifty years devoted to research on Harrison’s
to Harrison. career has been equally exciting for me as each piece of the puzzle
Finally, I should mention Grenada. Saint George’s, the capital has slowly fallen into place. Normally, an architect’s career
city, is another Colonial Williamsburg waiting to be discovered, should not take long to investigate, but in the case of Peter Har-
full of eighteenth-c entury buildings. The Governor’s Mansion, rison nearly all his papers were destroyed at the hands of the
which stands on a high hill overlooking the city, was built in mob led by the thug Isaac “King” Sears at the beginning of the
1764 to designs by Harrison. I had attended a diplomatic recep- Revolutionary War—somewhat analogous to the mob that pil-
tion there on my first visit to the island in 1968, but the reception laged the Iraq Museum in Baghdad in the early 21st century. Of
had been at night when I could not see or photograph the exte- the more than 400 buildings here attributed to Harrison, only
rior of the house. I finally returned in mid– 1983. I telephoned eighteen are documented (considerably more than were known
the Governor- General’s secretary to obtain permission to pho- to Bridenbaugh in 1949). As a comparison just over 400 build-
tograph the front of the house from half- way along the S- shaped ings are generally attributed to Frank Lloyd Wright, so the size
driveway, and was very surprised when I was curtly told that the of Harrison’s output should not be a surprise. A difference
house was top- secret and that photographs were not permitted. between them, however, is that Wright had a large staff to super-
I could not believe that a 1764 house could be that secret, so I vise construction (the time- consuming part of an architect’s job),
wandered up to the mansion’s gateway in the hope that the whereas Harrison served almost exclusively as a mail- order archi-
guards would not be as emphatic as the secretary had been. tect; this meant that local builders were in charge of construc-
But the guards were just as implacable as the secretary, so I tion, with the inevitable result that some of them made
turned around to trudge down the hill again, when I saw a tall unauthorized alterations to the designs.
tree that obviously had the view I sought. My wife handed me Now, most serious historians treat someone whose documen-
her camera, and I climbed up the tree. Just as I took my picture, tation has been destroyed as if he never existed. Fortunately,
I heard the rumble of a Cuban armored personnel carrier climb- artists and architects create their own documentation of a dif-
ing the hill. I froze, and watched the vehicle proceed out of sight ferent sort intrinsically in their designs, if only one can read it.
around the next bend. Evidently, drivers of such vehicles can see Knowledgeable art historians frequently identify an anonymous
only a small amount of the road ahead through a tiny slit, so he painting as being the work of a particular artist, such as Car-
failed to see me. If he had seen me, he might have shot first and avaggio, because of the techniques displayed on the canvas, and
asked questions later. most of the time their attributions are widely accepted.
Only a short time after we had returned home from Grenada, Buildings designed by architects are in a sense one step further
President Ronald Reagan ordered U.S. Marines to invade the removed from that process, because in most cases the evaluation
island, claiming that American medical students there were in has to be made of the building itself, rather than of the original
serious danger. I did not believe a word of that claim, but it was drawing of it. For many architects, I suspect, it would be impos-
many years later before I heard what was really going on—and sible to rely on any such evaluations, but I feel that Harrison was
it had actually involved the Governor’s Mansion. different enough in his designs from the works of most other
Grenada at that time lacked a proper airport. In an effort to architects that it is possible to tease out what makes his designs
increase their tourism, Prime Minister Maurice Bishop asked different.
officials in London, Paris, Ottawa, and Washington to pay for I have striven to make my evaluations using three methods.