Historic Gardens of Virginia 



lish traditions which governed in the more civilized portions of the 

 State, he built a Georgian house and a walled-in terraced garden. 

 The garden recalls the English formal garden, which derived some 

 of its inspiration from Italian models — yet its atmosphere is 

 typically Virginian. 



George Carter started the building of the house in 1800, from 

 bricks made on the place by his slaves, and was, in large measure, 

 his own architect. He ordered the Corinthian columns from New 

 York, however, giving minute directions as to their size and carv- 

 ing; and, old books on architecture, in the possession of his family, 

 and his letters, besides, show that he devoted much time to the 

 planning of the house and the right proportion of doors, windows, 

 cornices, etc. It would be interesting, if one could but look back- 

 ward with clear enough vision, to see the house rising from its 

 foundations, black labour under white overseers, piling brick upon 

 brick, to the accompaniment, doubtless, of old plantation songs. 

 Then the arrival, after long, devious journeys, on boat and over 

 single track, corduroy, or deep mud roads, through the forest 

 wilderness, of those white columns from the North. 



How self-sufficing they were, the country land-owners and 

 planters of those days, turning to account all the resources at hand, 

 living on what the land could furnish, and converting it into bread, 

 meat, clothing, building and hard cash! The Virginians, however, 

 did more than this, they derived an aesthetic enjoyment from the 

 development of things beautiful about them, and so George Carter, 

 when he had finished his house, turned to the building of his enchant- 

 ing garden. 



No papers remain to show where he got his ideas, nor how he 

 put them into execution. Suffice it to say, that this garden was his 

 hobby, that he cut oak trees, on the hillside to the east of the house, 

 to build it; brought the soil from the meadow-lands near the creek, 

 to make easy the growing of the things he wished to plant, and 

 walled it in with home-made brick. No other gardens were being 

 built in Loudoun County at that time, perhaps very little interest 



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