Friendship Hill adds furniture from another historic site
Albert Gallatin’s Friendship Hill is looking more like a home these days. That’s thanks to a loan of enough 19th century furniture to fill nine rooms at Friendship Hill National Historic Site in Springhill Township. This Fayette County national park has become the temporary residence for furnishings from the Arlington House, the Robert E. Lee Memorial in Virginia, another national park that is now void of furniture as it begins a rehabilitation project this summer.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony to unveil the furnishings to the public will take place on Sunday at Friendship Hill following a 2 p.m. concert by the Albert Gallatin South Middle School Band on the lawn.
Earlier this week, Mary Troy, curator, and Laura Anderson, museum technician, traveled from Arlington House to Friendship Hill to help local staff place the furnishings in four bedrooms, three parlors, a dining room and the kitchen. The rooms are located on the first and second floors.
“I think it’s wonderful because the house was so empty,’ said MaryEllen Snyder, chief of interpretation for Friendship Hill and Fort Necessity National Battlefield in Farmington. “It’s such a great relationship between Friendship Hill and Arlington House.’
“We don’t have to pay for art storage,’ said Troy, who explained the Arlington House is installing a climate management system and fire suppression system.
“It’s a win-win situation. We did an estimate that to rent storage space it would have cost $200,000 for 18 months,’ said Snyder. “The government saved that much money by having it here.’
The furnishings are already attracting attention. Snyder noted that park ranger Kitty Seifert has been training 11 new volunteers who want to give tours of the house. The volunteers, many of whom are members of the friends group called the Friendship Hill Association, have to learn not only the Gallatin story but also the Arlington House story for visitors.
A press release from Friendship Hill explained, “Friendship Hill was Albert Gallatin’s home from 1789 until 1824. Gallatin, the secretary of the Treasury, was living in Washington, D.C., when Arlington House was built in 1802 by George Washington Parke Custis. Custis was George Washington’s stepgrandson and became Robert E. Lee’s father-in-law. Arlington House was the scene of R.E. Lee’s fateful resignation from the U.S. Army at the beginning of the Civil War. The house and grounds were seized by the federal government during the war and soon after, Arlington Cemetery was established.’
The loan includes some furniture used by Robert E. Lee when he lived at West Point from 1853-55. Located on the first floor of Friendship Hill, they include two settees that face each other in the large parlor as well as the table in the dining room. There are also two sideboards – twin pieces – with the larger one located in the dining room and the smaller one in the small parlor.
Troy said the furniture includes objects original to the family, period furnishings and modern and period reproductions.
Lawren Dunn, park ranger and cultural resources manager, explained that Friendship Hill also is displaying many of its own objects, including vases, books, glass and dishes.
Clothing from the Friendship Hill Association’s living history collection also is being displayed throughout the house.
“It made it so the house looks lived in,’ said Snyder.
Visitors to Friendship Hill may look but not touch the Arlington House furnishings. The rooms are protected by glass-and-wood barriers.
Yet, walking through the house with these furnishings, one can more likely imagine Gallatin living here with his family.
The National Park Service Web site explains that Gallatin, who was born in 1761 in Geneva, Switzerland, came to America in 1780 and came to Western Pennsylvania when he was surveying and interested in land speculation in the Ohio Valley. He named the home because of his friendship with other school friends and business partners. Gallatin was involved in glass manufacturing, milling and musket production in the nearby town he named New Geneva.
Gallatin married Sophia Allegre of Richmond, Va., in 1789. They met when he stayed at a boarding house run by her mother. They lived at Friendship Hill together five months until Sophia died unexpectedly in October 1789.
Gallatin met his second wife, Hannah Nicholson, through her father, Commodore James Nicholson of New York, during a visit by Gallatin to New York City. The couple married in 1793 and had six children but only three lived to adulthood.
Their eldest son, James, was born in 1796 and son Albert Rolaz in 1800 and both lived at Friendship Hill.
Seifert shared information from a letter that Hannah Gallatin wrote on Feb. 5, 1801, from Friendship Hill to her husband in Washington. Hannah Gallatin wrote news of the boys and asked Gallatin to bring shoes for herself and Little Albert as theirs were almost completely worn out:
“James has learnt all his letters, and I have put him to spelling words of one syllable, and he makes out tolerably well, he is a very good child indeed, it is a great satisfaction to me to see him so sweet in his temper … Albert walks all over, and rides about the room on your cane, and looks as big and proud about it as if he really felt himself a little man.’
The Gallatin’s daughter Frances was born in 1803 in Washington, but she did live at Friendship Hill from 1824 to 1825. Three other daughters, Catherine, Sophia Albertine and Hannah Marie, did not live to reach their first birthday.
The Gallatins departed Friendship Hill in the fall of 1825. Gallatin served as ambassador to Great Britain for a year and then retired to New York City.
In addition to tour guides and park staff, visitors can learn information on Gallatin from display cases in the house as well as three instructional panels created by Matt Flippin, a student in West Virginia University’s parks and recreation program. Information on Gallatin also is available on the Web site at www.nps.gov/frhi.
Friendship Hill is located on Route 166, three miles north of Point Marion. The house is open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. through the end of October. Information on winter hours will be released later. Meanwhile, the park grounds are open daily from sunrise to sunset year-round.