The Flowers (and snakes) of Monticello

 

 

Granny Beth's Visit to Monticello

On Beth's last day here in Virginia we took her to Monticello where we met up with John's brother and family.  When John and I were there before, we didn't go through the passageways under Jefferson's home.  It was a most cleverly built structure - a design I wouldn't mind copying!

This "cellar" was really earth-bermed "dependencies."  They contained laundry facilities, kitchen, household staff quarters, stables, wine cellar, dairy, an ice house...  None of these things were noticeable from the first floor of the house.  Very clever!

During this visit with Beth we did go through these halls and passageways. 

This view is down the side of the north wing.  Notice the very far left of the photo.  That round structure with the wood top is the ice house.  The next photo is of the passageway that literally goes under the house.  Notice on the right side of the photo the top of the ice house.  (John was standing at the corner of the two wings to take these photos.  It certainly lets you see how long they were!)

With nine bedrooms, fourteen family members living here during the time of Jefferson, and numerous visitors, there was a huge amount of clothing and bed linens to be cared for.  Ironing would have been done with "flat irons".

There is definitely a trick to ironing with these as there was no thermostat to control the temperatures.  One is larger than the other, and the small one has a very pointed end.  I'm guessing the larger one was for broad swaths of fabric like the billowing skirts women wore then or the back of men's shirts, probably bed sheets, too.  The smaller iron would have been for ironing smaller areas of cloth, reaching close to seams with the pointed end or pressing lace.  The laundress would have used one iron while others would be re-heating on a rack near the fireplace.

Jefferson learned to love French cuisine while acting as U. S. minister to France.  When he returned to Monticello he brought a French chef with him and built a kitchen similar to those in France.  This is what was known as a stew stove:

Charcoal would sit on the grate up top, ashes would fall through the grate to be shoveled out of the openings in front.  The charcoal allowed for better control of temperatures.  I wish I had an eight-burner stove to work with - especially during holidays!

With good French food one needs good wine.  This is the wine cellar.

It would have been located directly under the dining room where the dumbwaiter would be loaded with preselected bottles of wine and one of four trolleys raised up to deliver fresh wine directly to Jefferson's table.  The trolleys of the dumbwaiter were hidden in locked compartments of the dining room mantlepiece upstairs.  Only Jefferson and Jefferson's butler would have had a key.

This is one of the rooms used by household servants:

We've seen "dependencies" cluttering up the land around plantation homes.  I think Jefferson's solution was a really, really nice one!  I wonder if it's something he saw in Europe during his time there??

Turtles, too!

Geese and mallards weren't the only wildlife in the Dan River.  Granny Beth spotted these guys on the riverbank.  These, I think, are painted turtles.  Paints have red or yellow stripes down the side of their heads and have webbed feet (most turtles don't have webbed feet), so that's why I think these are Paints.

Here's six more sunning on a log.

And four on a rock.

Last but not least, a swimmer.

For my young homeschooling readers (or anyone that's interested), go to http://www.animalspot.net/painted-turtle.html for more information on Painted Turtles.  What do they eat?  Do they hibernate?  How long have they been around?  How many different kinds are there?

Baby and juvenile painted turtles have a hard time surviving.  According to the website, Most frequent predators of juvenile turtles and eggs of these turtles are crows, garter snakes, chipmunks, grey squirrels, groundhogs, badgers, raccoons, catfish, water bugs, bullfrogs, bass, snapping turtles, rice rats, herons, weasels, minks, muskrats, foxes ....

Who knew chipmunks were predators!!!

One of our sons sent us this picture just yesterday of a baby turtle he caught north of Dallas yesterday.  The kids and I have always taken in injured animals of every kind, and he has taken to raising turtles.  Just about every kind of critter you can image has found a home with him and his family.  He's even adopted a rescued Great Dane, and he's the one that found our horse and donkey!  Big or small, we love 'em all!

Don't Be Such a Goose!

We took John's mom down to the Dan River in what had been the Tobacco District.  There is a place on the shore that folks come to feed the ducks and geese, so there is always a flock hanging around to entertain us.

 We know this is a Canadian goose.

Not sure who these guys are...

and these are mallards, a hen and a drake.

Back in Tyler a few years ago, I was hatching all kinds of fowl:  chickens, Bob-white quail, Pearl guineas...  In one guinea nest I found 28 eggs!  Into the incubator they went and thirty days later, ta-ta!, I hear sounds.  I open the lid a tiny bit, peek inside, and, what to my wondering eyes appears but ... but ... but ... a DUCK!  I know it's a duck because of the duck-bill and web feet.  (Duh!)  But we don't have any ducks.  To our knowledge none of our neighbors have ducks.  Apparently some momma duck had been migrating and decided to drop in, find a safe place for her eggs, and laid us a couple.

Oh, well.  God is good.  What do baby ducks eat?  Hmmm.  Might as well try the same chick starter we feed all our fowl with.  Seems to work.  Wonder if baby ducks need to go straight into the water??

I buy a very small plastic swimming pool like our kids used when they were itty-bitty and fill it with a few inches of water.  I put one of the baby ducks in the water, prepared to throw it a life-preserver if necessary.  ZOOM! zoom! zoom!  It was like an underwater silver bullet!  How awesome!  He took to that pool like a duck takes to water.  Wait a minute.  It IS a duck.

And so my life of duck sitting began.  If I was gonna be a good foster parent, I had to figure a way for the little ducks to get in and out of the pool themselves, so I put a giant rock in the middle of the pool and laid a board from it to the edge of the pool.  It didn't take them long to figure out my plan.  In another spot on the outside of the pool I put a ramp up so they could waddle up and take a plunge at will.  

We named them Duck-duck and Quacker-doodle.  Soon their baby down began to be replaced with feathers, and ultimately those feathers were replaced with adult feathers.  That's when we knew for certain that they were mallards - exactly like the ones in the photo above.

This year our neighbors found a baby duck walking down the country road between our homes.  They  scooped it up and brought it to our daughter-in-law.  She and our granddaughter fostered it, and he has grown into a beautiful Crested Mallard.

 I told you God is good!!

The Metal Vault

I wanna take this baby home with me!  It came to America in the 1600's from England.  Weighing in at 250 pounds - empty! - probably means I'm not gonna get it to Texas any time soon...

They know it was used in a tavern in Wynne's Falls, Virginia (the original name for the Danville area) and then as a bank vault until a larger vault could be built, but the town of Danville bought it so that the Secretary of the Treasury could keep part of the government's gold and other valuables in it.  While President Jeff Davis and the government of the CSA was in Danville, the chest was kept at the Benedict home and was well guarded.  However, when Davis and the Cabinet fled Danville, it was left behind.  (One assumes it was left behind empty... Hence the mystery of where that gold went to!!!)

Danville - More to the War Than Just the Last Seat of the CSA

Danville was certainly more to the Civil War than just being the last seat of government for the Confederate States of America.  Danville provided soldiers:  The 18th Virginia Regiment, Cabell Guards of the 38th Virginia Regiment, the Danville Virginia Artillery Company, and the Fifth Virginia Cavalry.  The Fifth Virginia alone took part in nearly 175 skirmishes, engagements, battles, etc. during the Civil War.  The Danville Artillery Company was attached to the Department of North Western Virginia, then to the Army of the Northwest, to the Army of the Valley, and finally to the Army of Northern Virginia.  The 18th Virginia Regiment, made up of everyday people:  clerks, merchants, students, engineers, dentists, tobacconists, etc., served in Manassas, northern Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and in far eastern Virginia.  (That's a lot a' walkin'!!)

One of those soldiers, Harry Wooding, of the 18th Virginia Regiment and later of the 5th Virginia Cavalry, was mayor of Danville after the war from 1892-1938.  That's 46 YEARS!  He is the longest serving mayor in American history!  My momma was 18 years old when he retired from office!  (Read the "Generations" post.)

Danville made sure her boys were well equipped.

Danville's stay-behind residents themselves prepared to give their all for the Confederacy.  By the Spring of 1862, the "Post of Danville" would begin growing into manufacturing ordinance, setting up hospitals, and establishing a prisoner of war camp.  Toward the end, Danville would become the only dependable source of supplies to Richmond and Lee's army.  Frustrated, Lee would say, "...I have been up to see the Congress (of the CSA) and they don't seem able to do anything except eat peanuts and chew tobacco, while my army is starving.  I told them the condition we are in... but I can't get them to do anything... When this war began I was opposed to it, and I told these people that unless every man should do his whole duty, they would repent of it... and now...they will repent."  But Lee knew he could depend on Danville to the very end!

Danville did it's best to provide hospital care for up to 5,000 soldiers.  "Yankee" prisoners didn't come to Danville until November 1863 because the hospitals here were already too crowded with Confederate wounded.  The standard medical "tools of the trade" were present:  Bullet probe, bullet extractor, scalpel set, metacarpal saw, small bone saw, fleams (tools used for bloodletting)...

The hospitals were first set up in tobacco factories and then moved to what had been a hotel that was located closer to the Richmond and Danville Railroad depot.  A third hospital had to be established when the Yankee prisoners came because smallpox apparently came with them, and within a month Danville had a full-blown epidemic on their hands.  Of the 1,323 Union soldiers buried in the Danville National Cemetery, a whole bunch of them died of smallpox because of the lack of medical knowledge regarding smallpox treatment.

I think you can correctly say that Danville and it's area residents saw the worst that the Civil War had to offer... and gave it their best.

Danville's Smoking Parlor (or Man-cave)

We're back downstairs in the Danville Museum and are checking out the men's study.  First a gentleman would don his smoking jacket.  

This particular smoking jacket is made of wool challis with a wool flannel lining quilted with lambswool.    Animal products like wool and hides "breathe."  That's what makes them comfortable in all kinds of weather; they keep you really warm in cold weather, and they don't make you sweat in hot weather.  They "breathe."  Faux leather simply is not a substitute for the real thing - looks the same, but, baby, it ain't!  Ditto for a lot of modern fabrics.

Wool challis was first woven in the mid-1800's in London.  It would have been new, and therefore fashionable, during Civil War times.  One of it's greatest properties is that it could be "printed" on with small, multi-colored patterns.  It also draped well, had a softness of feel, but most importantly, it was easily cared for.  So folks wanting to show their wealth would appreciate being seen by other men in a brightly decorated smoking jacket.  Also, formal dress was common at dinner and, when retiring to the study, smoking jackets prevented ashes and smoking odors from ruining the formal attire.  

Once settled into the 1800's "man-cave," the men could enjoy a game of cards and a cigar.  They might play Faro, Poker, Casino, Euchre, Monte, Seven-Up, or Chuck-a-luck.  Interesting cards with no numbers and square corners.  They're larger than today's playing cards, too.

 Their cigars were kept in small cigar holders/cabinets. 

Humidors decorated with animals of the hunt would hold pipe tobacco.

Then it's down to the basement for some displays of photos, artifacts, and information.

Upstairs at the Danville Museum

At the top of the stairs we have a velocipede.  In the 1880's it was THE thing to ride bicycles - and you did it in your Sunday best.  This, of course, is a tricycle velocipede.  Even the youngsters rode in their best Sunday-go-to-meetin' clothes.

In the bedroom that CSA President Jefferson Davis slept in was a very pretty wash basin, pitcher, shaving cup, etc.

Most quality washstands had marble tops to protect against splashing water.  There was a matching chamber pot.  (As irreverent as it might sound to talk about, I suspect is was even more embarrassing seeing the president slip in and out of an outhouse...??)

Now, this really isn't a good photo, but there's a reason for that!  Beth took a look at it and said, "That's awfully small, isn't it?"  and my response was, "You would think a politician would need a bigger one..."  At that we both started laughing again.  Once we get started, Beth and I can't stop, and I never could get a good photo of this thing! (Though it really wasn't that funny.)

From here the numbers led us back down the stairs.  It was an a-maze-ing visit!  Next we went through the smoking parlor.  Not that the parlor was smoking, but that's where the men retired to after dinner TO smoke. Later it was called a Study, and now it's referred to as "The Man-cave."  (Are we regressing?  A cave!)

Red-headed Woodpeckers? Not.

As travelers, we can't have any pets.  Well, we could if we bought a motor home like John wants.  But until then, nada.  So I've chosen to make lemonade out of my lemons, so to speak.  I've taken up birdwatching. 

I went to my little boutique shop, Wal-Mart, and bought a bird feeder, feed, and a poster of common birds.  Then I found a tree outside the kitchen window and hung it up.  I expected certain birds to flock to it, but was surprised to see a woodpecker on it.  I began to study these critters and discovered one that I thought was a red-headed woodpecker, but it apparently isn't.  She's actually a Yellow-shafted Northern Flicker.  (I know it's a "she" because the males have a black marking under the eye that this one doesn't have.)

From this angle it looks like it has a red head.

From this angle it looks like the red marking is on the neck.  See the long beak?  And it "drills" the ground like a woodpecker drills a tree.

This shows the true positioning of the red marking.

With her head turned away from me the marking looks like a heart.

From this angle it almost looks like a chevron. And look at the different markings on the chest and belly. 

 
 This shot hides the red marking altogether and makes her almost dove-ish.

But this one looks like a hummingbird because of the long beak, albeit a very LARGE hummingbird.

This one shows all of the different markings the best.

This one is just goofy!  I think it's a deer-in-the-headlights look.