Benjamin H. Latrobe, the architect and engineer, had some taste for landscape drawing. He exhibited, in 1812, a "View of the River Schuylkill" and a "View of the Seat of Miers Fisher."
John Thomas Scharf and Thompson Westcott, History of Philadelphia, 1609-1884 (1884), p. 1052.
The sketch is presently within the Print and Photograph Division of the Library of Congress, where it is [mis]labeled as "Probably Long Branch, the Robert Carter Burnwell house, Clarke County, Va." But when you compare this watercolor to a 1824 sketch of "Miers Fisher's Place" by Charles Wilson Peale (who also painted a portrait of Latrobe) the similarity of the two drawings is virtually exact. Plus, the ground contour of Latrobe's sketch matches Ury's.
"I see sham pane, but no glasses"
2007.05.11 11:48
1812 June 20 Saturday
"This evening M. & Mrs. Das[c]hkoff and M. Cor[r]ea came hither [to Ury]. They had lost their way and got wet in a heavy shower at 6 o'clock. About 8 S[arah] and S[amuel] Longstreth came and brought me the newspaper with an Act of Congress declaring War against Great Britain!!!"
Since there is no further mention of Daschkoff and Correa within the subsequent day's journal entries, I imagine the diplomats immediately hurried back to town upon hearing the news of war.
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Abbe Correa: Jose Correa da Serra, Minister from Portugal, the most famous wit and epigrammatist of his day. He it was who called Washington the "City of magnificent distances."
As with any creator, Jefferson at times doubted that his vision of an academical village would ever materialize. In an 1817 letter to the Abbé Correa de Serra, he writes: "Mine, after all may be an Utopian dream, but being innocent, I have thought I might indulge in it until I go to the land of dreams, and sleep there with the dreamers of all past and future times"
Thomas Jefferson's clock and thermometer, plus a Rembrandt Peale portrait of Jefferson's close friend, the botanist Jose Francisco, Abbe Correa de Serra. All three items have been on loan to Monticello, Jefferson's Virginia estate, for about three years, and the society is negotiating a sale to the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, Monticello's owner and operator. For insurance purposes, the clock and thermometer were appraised in 1992 for $775,000 and $25,000, respectively, and the portrait of the Abbe was valued in 1994 at $20,000.
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1812 June 21 Sunday
"Morning without a cloud. Wind NW/N. Temperature 60°. This is the anniversary of my birth, and I went to Meeting with some desire that the entrance of my 65th year might be favored with some improvement in religious experience."
Looks like Miers had planned to celebrate his birthday with the company of a Russian Prince and Princess and a Portuguese Abbe.
So it turns out that Miers Fisher did know William Penn IV--a great-grandson of Philadelphia founder William Penn. All I know so far though is that Miers shared a coach with Penn and his wife between Doylestown and Abington mid 1812. Perhaps a great-grandson or two of founder William Penn were once at Ury after all.
3 September 1812 Thursday
Morning clear, light air from N westerly drawing round at 10 NE, temperature about 70°. About 1/2 part 9 this morning walking in front of the bees in the garden, one of them attacked me, I ran but he fixed in my hair under my hat, back of my left ear and stung me. With my hat I flapped at him but he pursued me till I entered the piazza. I applied some vinegar to the wound which was not severe, but the effect began to show itself by a burning itch first in the vicinity of the spot and gradually spreading over my whole surface, with greatly increased action of the arteries and a stricture of mu esophagus. In fact, all my sensations recorded under date April 16th last were repeated exactly excepting only the evacuation of my stomach which not being so full as usual after dinner was not necessary. The duration was about the same and now about 12 I am free of all the symptoms, except a quickness of pulse which I hope will soon pass away. Temperature rose to 80°. The papers for two or 3 days past have been filled with accounts from almost every quarter of the capture of fort Detroit wither the whole American army under the command of General Hull, said to be 2500 men, but a few days before he was said to be carrying everything before him was supposed to be in possession of the British Fort Malden sudden reverse? But there is yet no straight account of the causes leading to it. By Relph's[?] Gazette brought me this evening, it appears that on the 19th ....[?] Capt. Hull of the US frigate Constitution had an engagement with the British frigate Guerriere[?] Capt. Davis[?] in which after about one hour the latter lost all his M....[?] and submitted during the following night. The prisoners being first removed to the Constitution, the Guerriere in a sinking state was set fire to and blew up. Thus if the account from Sackets Harbor on St. Lawrence or Lake Ontario be true, the Navy of the US have in the two first collisions with the British, been more than victorious.
4 October 2022 Tuesday
Benjamin Henry Latrobe, Ury (The Library of Congress: watercolor, pre 1812).
The tall, center-right tree was actually twin trees that still existed in the backyard when my parents moved here in 1981. My father soon thereafter had one of the twins cut down, and my mother had the remaining twin cut down circa 1998. The diameter of the oldest twin was at least four feet.
Ury has a very real and colorful history, for example, Ury is where the young John James Audubon spent the first half year, 1803/04, of his United States life, and yes, Benjamin Henry Latrobe designed Miers Fisher's renovation of Ury. Unfortunately, Ury also has a very popular yet fabricated history, such as, the oldest part of Ury was build by settling Swedes in the 1650s and Gustav V, King of Sweden, stayed at Ury in 1926. I suppose there were no depths to which the Crawford sisters would not stoop when endeavoring to increase the value of their property.
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