Tests reveal Williams Ordinary in Dumfries not as old as we thought

One of Prince William County’s most historic buildings is not as old as we thought.

Williams Ordinary is one of the oldest structures in the county dating back to when Dumfries was still a bustling port town on the Potomac River. Today, the building on Route 1 south (Main Street in Dumfries)  is owned by the county government and used as offices for its Historic Preservation Division.

Williams Ordinary was thought to have been built as a tavern in 1760. But new tests revealed the building is newer, dating back to just before George Washington took the Office of the Presidency, to 1786 – 87.

Here’s more from an email to Potomac Local from preservationist Sarah Nucci, who works for Prince William County Government.

“… this past year we did dendrochronology to try and get a scientific date on the structure. [The] Common thought was that it was built in 1760, as a tavern. More research turned up that the lots were part of a store that was the Glassford, Gordon, Monteath, and Company Store leading up to the Revolutionary War. The main owner (John Glassford and Company) sells the store off when the colonies declare independence – in order to prevent his property being seized). The property is used as at least one other store, but over time Dumfries declines as a town.

In 1786 there is a newspaper article that William McDaniels’ Tavern burns to the ground, and a few months later there is a mention that he has found a new building and retrofitted it as a tavern and can once again receive customers.

At the same time, William Carr’s estate – buys property and begins to sink money into the property. The records from the estate outline the new kitchen, Esme Smocks’ brick house/tavern, stables, lumber yard and more. This is also the same property that housed the Tebbs-Mundy house (these same 4 lots that the Ordinary now stands on).

It was pretty confusing to try and determine what was happening with the house – but the Dendrochronology came back with the end of 1786/begining of 1787 as the dates for the timbers used in the building. The building is large, though, so it wasn’t likely to be completed in that small time frame of a year – likely about three years or so.

In the end, it looks like this building was constructed as a tavern for Esme Smock (rented by Smock from William Carr’s heirs). There were various other small support buildings on the property; those do not still stand – although archaeology has helped with a better understanding where they were.

The dendrochronology process looks at the wood used in the building to determine the date of the structure. The testing was completed by the Oxford Tree Ring Laboratory in Baltimore

Nucci:

Dendro is pretty cheap (about $2,000 range.) They take core samples of timbers used in the framing of the building (this includes floor supports and rafters in brick buildings like the WO) The use pieces that were hewn from logs and they need about 50-100 years of growth at a minimum and one corner should show where the bark was located on the log.

They take the samples, polish, and then compare them to a master database (climate, rainfall, etc affect each region’s ring growth, as well as the type of tree it is). Our master database lines us up to 1786/7 for the harvesting of those trees. This is pretty hard science – so no guessing, actually provable date.

Michael Worthington, from the Oxford Tree Ring Laboratory in Baltimore did our dendrochronology, paid for by our budget. He had the initial dates back to us within a month or two, but the final report tends to take a bit longer.

So, why did we think so for long that Williams Ordinary dated back to 1760?

Nucci:

So the Tebbs Mundy house had a fireback (cast iron piece in the back of a fireplace) had a 1762 date on it. When it was destroyed, it already had been recorded as having that 1760’s date. The Williams Ordinary is identical to the Tebbs-Mundy House. Very typical construction for the 1760s in terms of form, but the all header bond on the front of both buildings was strange. The few other buildings in the region with all header bond on the front were also 1760’s.

In the end – the important thing to know is that firebacks can be moved (they don’t burn up, so they can go from house to house if needed/wanted). And the Carr Estate (and Tebbs-Mundy) liked older style buildings.

No matter what the age of a house, any home can have problems. On Monday, it was found that a toilet inside the building had been leaking. The leak caused damage to drywall and left an employee’s desk wet.

A repair order was submitted to fix the leak. In the meantime, it prompted some cool photos that give us a good look inside the walls of Williams Ordinary.

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