The Lost 1770 Walter Franklin House - 1-3 Cherry Street

from the collection of the New-York Historical Society 

Cherry Street got its name from Cherry Hill, an area near the East River which reportedly once blushed with cherry blossoms every spring.  By the second half of the 18th century it was, according to Gas Logic later, "the home center of New York aristocracy."  

Engulfing two building lots at Nos. 8 and 10 Cherry Street (renumbered 1 and 3 around 1830) was the elegant Georgian style home of Walter Franklin.  Erected around 1770, it sat on the northeast corner of Queen Street (later renamed Pearl Street).  Looking back in 1893, The New York Times wrote "It is said to have been completely filled with simple but elegant furniture, and there was an extensive garden attached."  It was considered to be one of the finest homes in the city.

from the collection of the New York Public Library

Like at least one of his near neighbors, Thomas Leggett, Walter Franklin was a Quaker.  He was the senior partner in the firm of Franklin, Robinson & Co., whose ships brought goods from China and the South Seas.  He was also actively involved in the Revolution and its earliest aftermath.  On May 1, 1775 he was elected a member of the Committee of One Hundred to represent New York "in all affairs growing out of the complications then arising between the colonies and the mother country," according to The New York Times generations later.  "He was also a member of the first Provincial Congress of the Province of New-York, which met in New-York City May 23, 1775."

The New York Times added, "He retired from business comparatively early in life with a very large fortune.  His heart remained free till (so the story is told by Mrs. Hunter...in 1845, his great-granddaughter,) he accidentally met a pretty milkmaid on Long Island."  Taken with the young Quaker girl, he drove his buggy to the home of her father, Daniel Bowne.  "While the two were talking, [Maria] came in to make tea for the city friend, with the romantic result that she 'made tea' for him ever after."

The couple married and had two daughters, Maria and Hannah.  Franklin died on June 8, 1780.  Around 1786 Maria Bowne Franklin married Samuel Osgood, a lawyer, and the family continued living in the Cherry Street house.  The ample size of the home would be necessary--Samuel and Maria would have six more children.

Samuel Osgood, from the collection of the Library of Congress

Osgood had been an active revolutionist.  He led a company of minutemen into the Battle of Lexington and Concord in 1775 and saw action in the Siege of Boston.  By the end of the war he had attained the rank of Colonel.  He served two terms in the Massachusetts State Senate beginning in 1780 and he was as a delegate to the Continental Congress from 1782 until 1784.  He returned to New York City in 1785 to take on the position of a commissioner of the Treasury.

On April 14, 1789 George Washington received word at Mount Vernon that he had been unanimously elected the first President of the United States by the Electoral College.  In preparation for his arrival in New York, Congress looked for a suitable home for the "Presidential Palace."  (The term was still in use decades later when the White House was being erected.)  The Osgood residence was selected and leased for $845 a year (about $22,300 today).  As part of the deal Osgood was told to "put the house and furniture thereof in proper condition for the residence and use of the President of the United States."

Harper's New Monthly Magazine, October 1899 (copyright expired) 

The drawing room was enlarged and Maria set about selecting furnishings.  Many of the existing pieces were simply reupholstered while cabinetmaker Thomas Burling provided some new "Mahogany Furniture."   The inventory of Government-owned furniture included "inlaid" pieces as well as "plain" furniture.  The inlaid furniture included a tea table and a breakfast table which would most likely have been in the neo-classical style, while the "plain" pieces were more common Chippendale or Hepplewhite chairs and tables.  In total Congress spent $8,000 to prepare the mansion (a little more than $200,000 today).

Before the arrival of the President, Maria Osgood's niece, Sarah, visited.  In a letter to her friend Kitty Wistar on April 3o, 1789 she wrote:

Uncle Walter's house in Cherry Street was taken for him [i.e., Washington], and every room furnished in the most elegant manner.  Aunt Osgood and Lady Duer had the whole management of it.  I went the morning before the General's arrival to look at it.  The best of furniture in every room, and the greatest quantity of plate and china I ever saw; the whole of the first and second stories is papered, and the floors covered with the richest kind of Turkey and Wilton carpets.

Sarah noted "There is scarcely anything talked of now but General Washington and the Palace."  

George Washington had left Martha behind at Mount Vernon to supervise the packing of things to be shipped to their new home.  Historian Liela Herbert wrote in the October 1899 issue of Harper's New Monthly Magazine, "the President brought on by sea from Mount Vernon a quantity of pictures, vases, ornaments, Sèvres china, and silver."

Martha eventually made the journey, arriving a month after her husband with two grandchildren, Nelly and George Washington Parke Custis.  She apparently approved of Maria Franklin's efforts, for she called the mansion a "handsomely furnished house."  She gave her first reception on May 29, 1789.  The "systematic entertainments," as described by Liela Herbert, included "levees, dinners, and Drawing Rooms, with pretty ceremony, oiled with wealth and sustained with dignity."

Generations later, on November 19, 1893, The New York Times attempted to recreate in words the atmosphere:

Delicious, festive days [were] those of the Spring and early Summer of inauguration year.  There is an atmosphere about that era impossible to emulate now, or even thoroughly conceive, when fetes and balls and receptions kept the town giddy and what was, after all, a decorous and fastidious gayety.  Imagine, please, the high-caste dames and pretty 'buds' of yore, treading stately minuets, clad in stiff silks and satins and brocades, with swains in uniform, or clad in such garments as light-blue French coats, with high collars, large gilt buttons, double-breasted Marseilles vest, (or waistcoat,) nankin colored cassimere breeches, shining pumps, big ruffles, and ponderous cravats.

Martha had a large staff to assist her.  Seven slaves had been brought from Mount Vernon, and Samuel Fraunces, the steward (who formerly owned Fraunces Tavern), oversaw a staff of about 20 (these included indentured servants, other slaves, and some paid domestics).

This nearly life-sized family portrait was painted by Edward Savage based on sketches he made in the Cherry Street house.  collection of the National Gallery of Art

Every Thursday at 4:00 in the afternoon a state dinner was held.  Liela Herbert wrote "From ten to twenty-two persons were expected besides the 'family.'" (The "family" included Washington's closest associates, who also lived in the Cherry Street house--his private secretary, Nelson; Robert Lewis, his nephew and secretary; and his speechwriter, Colonel David Humphreys.)  Herbert described: 

[Samuel Fraunces's] fine dishes of roast beef, veal, lamb, turkey, duck and varieties of game, and his many other inviting viands, and the jelly, the fruits, the nuts and raisins--the body of the dinner, in short--were placed, before the guests came in, upon the table, with careful respect to appearance.  Upon the central table ornament, sometimes a long mirror made in sections and framed in silver, were 'chaste mythological statuettes.'  A piece of bread was placed below each napkin.  The china and linen were fine...The waiters, five or six or more in number, wore the brilliant Washington livery, and served with quiet and precision.

Martha Washington held a "Drawing Room" every Friday from 7:00 to 9:00.  The stiff formality of society was strictly obeyed.  "At seven o'clock on Friday evenings, carrying neither sword nor hat, as being unofficially present, the President took his stand beside Mrs. Washington.  The ladies, attended always by gentlemen, came in, curtsied low and silently, and sat down."  Once each guest had been received, Washington would walk about and speak to the guests individually.  "No very young girls came--those only that had formally entered the social world."

The decorum was not even broken by a most terrifying accident that befell a Miss McIvers, described by one historian as "a belle."  Liela Herbert recalled the incident:

The chandeliers, their myriad candles burning softly in high transparent globes, hung low.  Miss McIvers's fashionable head-dress, monstrous tall, caught fire one evening as she stood beneath the lights...Major Jackson rushed to the rescue, clapped the burning plumes in his hands, and saved the lady as gallantly as possible.  There was no undue rustling of stiff brocades or ruffling of pretty manners.  It was then, as now, good form for ladies to be perturbed only by mice and cows.

Major Jackson comes to the rescue of the Miss McIvers. Harper's New Monthly Magazine, October 1899 (copyright expired) 

It was from the Cherry Street house that in October 1789 Washington wrote the first Thanksgiving proclamation, setting aside a Thursday each November as a national holiday.

Despite its elegance, the Cherry Street mansion proved too small for the President's household.  The French Minister to the United States, the Comte de Moustier, resided in a larger house owned by Alexander Macomb at Nos. 39-41 Broadway.  When De Moustier returned to France in 1790 Washington seized the opportunity and that February the executive mansion was moved to the Macomb residence.

Harper's New Monthly Magazine, October 1899 (copyright expired) 

Walter and Maria Franklin's eldest daughter, Maria, married DeWitt Clinton in 1796.  Their other daughter, Hannah, married his younger brother, George Clinton, Jr.  For a time Maria and DeWitt resided in the house on Cherry Street.  The mansion remained in the family until 1856 when Hannah Clinton's heirs had it demolished and replaced by stores.

The mansion had been converted for commerce by the time this etching was created in 1853.  D. T. Valentine's Manual, 1853 (copyright expired)

That building and scores of others were demolished for the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge.  Fearing that the importance piece of American history would be forgotten, the Mary Washington Colonial Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution had a bronze tablet cast to commemorate the site.  On May 2, 1899 The New York Times reported that it had been affixed to "one of the big stone arches of the Brooklyn Bridge.  The site is at the junction of Cherry and Pearl Streets, on Franklin Square."  About two feet square, it read:

The First

Presidential Mansion

No. 1 Cherry Street.

Occupied by

GEORGE WASHINGTON

from April 23, 1789

to February 23, 1790.

Erected by the Mary Washington Colonial Chapter,

April 30, 1899

A century later it was endangered.  On November 1, 1998 Bernard Stamler, writing in The New York Times reported "nothing remains of America's first Presidential home except for a brass [sic] plaque on the Manhattan anchorage of the bridge, noting the site's historic significant...Now the plaque--already inaccessible, and tarnished from neglect--is threatened with total obscurity."  The city had begun the process of erecting six new arches under the bridge to shore up the steelwork.  One of them would sit directly in front of the plaque.

The plaque survives, although essentially ignored and unnoticed.  It is the only indication that the first Executive Mansion stood on the spot.

The Lost Henry Remsen Mansion - Cherry & Clinton Streets

Artist Calvin Pollard recalled the Remsen Mansion in this watercolor done around 1843.  from the collection of the New-York Historical Society.

In the first years after the Revolution, Cherry Street rivaled Broadway as the city's most fashionable residential street.  Perhaps none of its stately residences, including that of George Washington, could outdo that of Henry Remsen in terms of lavishness and proportions.

The massive Georgian style mansion which would eventually be given the address 310 Cherry Street sat on the northeast corner of Cherry and Clinton Streets.  Three stories of red brick sat upon a stone base.  The main entrance was flanked by pairs of Corinthian columns and sat directly below an elegant Palladio-style window.  Both it and the service entrance to the side were accessed by split stone staircases.

The high peaked roof, which included a triangular pediment on the Cherry Street elevation was full-height, making the mansion essentially five stories including the deep basement level.  The mansion was surrounded on three sides by gardens and outbuildings.

Hendrick Remsen was born April 5, 1736 and, according to the Year Book of the Holland Society of New-York was "a merchant of eminence in New York and a well-known Whig."  In a letter to George Clinton on February 21, 1780, Remsen explained that he had been an "importer of European Goods from 1759 to 1775 and in the West Indian Trade for 12 or 14 years before our serious troubles commenced."   He had agents in several American cities as well as in France and Holland.

Remsen's wife was the former Cornelia Dickenson.   The article added, "He lived in a large red brick house on the corner of Cherry and Clinton Streets."   The Remsen family traced their American lineage to Rem Jansen Vanderbeeck, who arrived from Westphalia in the first half of the 17th century.

The Revolution caused major upheaval both in Remsen's business and domestic lives.  Like many wealthy patriots, when the British occupied New York, he abandoned his mansion.  He took his family to Morristown, New Jersey where, according to historian Walter Barrett in his 1870 The Old Merchants of New York City, he owned saw mills and 1,500 acres of land.   Remsen's business ground to a near halt as war interrupted his ability to obtain and import goods from abroad.

The family returned to the Cherry Street house following the war, but Remsen's concern over his ability to recover was evidenced in a letter to George Washington dated May 11, 1789.  He said in part "On the return of peace I found my situation so embarrassed by the calamitous events of the War, as rendered me incapable to recommence mercantile pursuits."  But with the intervention of the Government and understanding creditors, he restored his personal wealth and the reputation of his firm.

Remsen's son, Henry, Jr., was perhaps even better known than his wealthy father.  Born in 1762 he was secretary to John Jay during his office as Secretary of Foreign Affairs, and to President Thomas Jefferson.  In 1790 he was taken as a partner in Henry Remsen & Son, and in 1793 became a teller of The United States Bank (a position more like a vice-president today).  In 1799 he entered The Manhattan Company, where he remained until 1840.

He and other wealthy New Yorkers tried to pick up the pieces of their broken institutions.  In 1880 historian Martha J. Lamb in her History of the City of New York, recalled "Business revived slowly.  As spring [1799] advanced the mercantile interests of the city were discussed with vigor, and various were the methods proposed for encouraging trade."  The "old members" of the Chamber of Commerce, "who had been exiles from the city for seven years, as well as many of those who had kept up the meetings during the war," met to reestablish the institution.  Among the wealthy merchants on April 13 to form The Chamber of Commerce of the State of New York was Henry Remsen.

Henry Remsen, Jr. as he appeared around 1795.   from the collection of the New-York Historical Socity

Hendrick Remsen had died on March 13, 1792.  Cherry Street was home to eminent patriots at the time.  At No. 5 was John Hancock, for instance, and at No. 7 lived Edward Fox, of the General Hospital Department during the war.  Cornelia died in the mansion on July 24, 1816 at the age of 72.

In 1808 Henry, Jr. married Eliza, daughter of Abraham R. De Peyster, the same year he became president of The Manhattan Bank.  The newlyweds would need the spacious Cherry Street house--they had nine children.

Walter Barrett described Henry as "as polite as a French dancing master and, with all, most scrupulously honest, in so much that all his private penny-postages he received at the bank he paid himself from his private funds."  Barrett mentioned "All the old folks may remember the immense double house, of brick walls, Remsen...occupied to the last, on the corner of Cherry and (now) Clinton streets, within 100 feet of his relative, Colonel Rutger's, private yard, at that time quite out of town."

Despite his own vast wealth, Remsen was parsimonious, a trait that extended to his banking business.  Bank clerks dealt with numerous bundles of bills, bound by a paper band held by a pin.  Barrett wrote "Remsen, in supervising the business would frequently remark, at the desk where the pins were hurriedly taken out and dropped on the floor, 'that the clerk would lose more pins than his salary would amount to.'"

Early in 1840 Remsen was nudged out of his presidency of the Manhattan Company bank by less conservative members.  On February 21 that year The Morning Herald wrote "This gentleman was highly respected, and universally esteemed;--few men have maintained the high and exalted character of Mr. R.; he is still living; and since the explosion of the company, he has seen in Wall st.--He says, that he does not understand banking as now practised."

from the collection of the New-York Historical Society

Still living with his parents in the Cherry Street house was son William, who by now administered the family's extensive real estate holdings.

On February 18, 1843 Henry Remsen died after a short illness at the age of 81.  The New-York Daily Tribune announced four days later "The relations and friends of the family are respectfully invited to attend his funeral from his late residence, corner of Cherry and Clinton streets, this afternoon."

William was quick to begin selling the valuable property.  Two days after the funeral, on February 24, The Evening Post ran an advertisement for "Two valuable lots of ground on Cherry st., adjoining Henry Remsen, Esq.'s house."

William and his brothers turned their attentions eventually to public transportation.  In 1854 the Third Avenue Railroad was opened and by 1867 was deemed by The New York Herald, "this great railway."  The newspaper noted "William and Henry R. Remsen are the heaviest shareholders and own from 1,000 to 1,500 shares each; a brother of these gentlemen owns about 1,200 shares."

The Cherry Street neighborhood was, by now, engulfed by commercial buildings.  The Remsen families moved to more fashionable surroundings, Henry Rutgers Remsen living in a mansion at No. 40 Fifth Avenue by the early 1870s.   The Cherry Street house was demolished and today its site is part of the 1957 Fiorello La Guardia Houses projects.