Historic Structure Report, Historical Data: Hampton Mansion and Garden

Snell, Charles

Hampton National Historic Site preserves the Hampton Mansion, once possibly the largest private home in America and grand example of late-Georgian architecture in America. Hampton is also the story of its people, as the estate evolved through the actions of the Ridgely family, enslaved African Americans, European indentured servants, and paid laborers within a nation struggling to define its own concept of freedom. This report has been prepared to satisfy the historical research needs as outlined in development study package proposal 102, which requested the preparation of a historic structure report, historical data section, for the Hampton mansion at Hampton National Historic Site, Towson, Maryland. The purpose of this study is to provide documentary evidence that may facilitate the accurate restoration and interpretation of the Hampton mansion. In addition, information of the Hampton garden is presented in the hope that it may be of use to the interpreters and planners who will draft plans for the preservation and restoration of the garden. This report is based on four weeks (June 1977) of intensive searching in the eight collections of the Ridgely papers on deposit in the Maryland Historical Society at Baltimore. The extensive collections of Ridgely family papers comprise 138 volumes of account books, ledgers, journals, cash books, and time books, 75 scrapbooks, and 42 boxes of papers. It is believed that all documents in these collections relating to the physical history of the Hampton plantation during the period 1780 to 1948 have been examined. The center unit of the mansion is utilized as a museum, open to the public, generally interpreting architectural values and a broad range of manorial life in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. The basement is utilized a·s administrative space. The west wing is used as a visitor/orientation center and library, and the east wing and hyphen as a restaurant concession. The preservation of the exterior of the structure will require extensive rehabilitation and replacement of woodwork, cornices, trim, window sash and frames, drains, gutters, steps, and porticoes. The exterior of the mansion was restuccoed and painted in fiscal year 1975; however, it will require replacement within the next eight to ten years. Structural stabilization of the interior support framing of the cupola was completed in fiscal year 1978, and reinforcement of the second floor framing in fiscal year 1979.

Historic Structure Report, Historical Data: Hampton Mansion and Garden

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