Page 27 - joa-aug-22

By Lina Mann, Historian, The White House Historical Association

“I wake up every morning in a house that was built by slaves.”
– First Lady Michelle Obama, 2016

hen First Lady Michelle Obama delivered this L’Enfant to survey, map, and plan the new city. Together,
powerful statement during a speech before the they selected the site for the White House. The following
WDemocratic National Convention on July 25, year, in March 1792, the commissioners announced
2016, she shed light on a less-discussed element of and advertised a national design competition for the
White House history. Enslaved people were involved President’s House and Capitol Building. In July,
in every aspect of White House construction – from Irish-born architect James Hoban’s design for the
the quarrying of stone to the cutting of timber, to the President’s House was selected by the commissioners
production of bricks, to the physical labor of assem- with Washington’s approval, and preparations on
bling its roof and walls. Enslaved people worked as the building site commenced. On October 13,
axemen, stone cutters, carpenters, brick makers, 1792, White House construction officially began
sawyers, and laborers throughout each stage of con- with the laying of a cornerstone during a Masonic
struction from 1792 through 1800. As Mrs. Obama ceremony.
highlighted, the use of enslaved labor to build one of Over the course of the next eight years, enslaved
the most revered symbols of American democracy, laborers worked alongside white wage workers and
and the home of the President of the United States, craftsmen to produce raw materials and construct the
represents the paradoxical relationship between the President’s House. First, laborers cleared the land,
institution of slavery and the ideals of freedom and built roads, wharves, and bridges, and felled trees to
liberty enshrined in America’s founding documents. make way for construction. In December 1791, the fed-
While many authors and historians have dedicated eral government purchased a stone quarry belonging to the
scholarship and research to the construction of the White prominent Brent family on Wiggington’s Island in Stafford
House, this article builds upon their efforts by County, Virginia. Situated on a small tributary called Aquia Creek,
weaving in the stories of the enslaved people who Waxen bas-relief
on glass of James
often were excluded entirely from this narrative.
Hoban, White
House architect,
H THE BEGINNING H circa 1800

“The building site of the President’s House in the 1790s included a
great house of brick and stone rising in the middle of a hive of free and
enslaved workmen. Quarrymen, sawyers, brick makers, and carpenters
fashioned raw materials into the elements of the vast structure. The
exterior of the residence looked finished by 1800, but it would take two
more years to complete the interior’s monumental architectural details.”
– “Building the President’s House,” The White House Historical
Association

After Congress passed the Residence Act on July 16, 1790, establishing
the location for the new capital city of Washington, D.C. along with
the banks of the “river Patomack,” President George Washington took Hoban’s 1793 north elevation drawing reduced the building from three to two floors
an active role in overseeing the construction in Federal City. He appointed because of a concern that there was not enough stone at the government quarry to
three commissioners for the District of Columbia in January 1791 to complete both the Capitol and the President’s House. – White House Historical
manage federal construction projects: Thomas Johnson, David Stuart, Association, Original Plans Courtesy of the Maryland Historical Society
and Daniel Carroll. Soon after selecting the commissioners, President
Washington appointed French-born engineer Pierre (Peter) Charles Title image: This drawing has also been used in the title image
of this article and has been edited for clarity of viewing
August 2022 25