Clermont State Historic Site

As site staff have been swamped with program work of late, we turn once again to our guest correspondent Rex McVitty to update our blog

This article originally appeared in the Sarasota Journal on Thursday, August 22, 1963

Last week, we went traveling south again. This time we headed south to the Eastern Shore of Virginia. There was one Englishman in the party who by virtue of his association with Leprechauns in Ireland had become a big wheel in Chic Clothes designing in Dublin, well he decided that he wished to see Williamsburg.

                After all he was in this country to see the sights and it didn’t look very far away on the map. We had been there once, many years ago and my wife thought that she would also like to see the town again so we started off.

                From where we were staying on the shore, it entailed a ride down to the Ferry across Chesapeake Bay. We knew the captain so he let us ride up with him on the bridge and I got a lovely shoreshine – still, it was nearly a two hour trip. Then we had to go round Norfolk and take the Hampton Tunnel under Hampton Roads and then it was all clear sailing to Williamsburg only it took about four hours.

                The visitor to Williamsburg is supposed to be impressed with the neat weatherbound houses of Colonial Days. I was impressed by the absence of autos which are not allowed either parking or egress at all to the Duke of Gloucester Street which is the main street.

                Instead there was a lubbering old ox-cart drawn by two sturdy oxen and several horse drawn carriages of the Victorian type driven by gentlemen in livery and filled with visitors.  In fact the swarms of visitors strolling around while not in colonial costume gave the place an air of great activity.

                The houses with their broad-based Virginia chimneys, sit in formal gardens. In the many buildings which are open to the public, restoration work has been carried out in detail. Maybe in the English and American furnishings, or even the selection of authentic plants for the near herb gardens.

                These buildings and their landscaped gardens are a mirror in which the life and times of such men as Washington, Jefferson, Mason, Patrick Henry, George Wythe and Peyton Randolph and many other famous residents and visitors of that time are reflected. The site of Williamsburg was once occupied by a stockaded settlement known as The Middle Plantation. It was due to the fact that the State House in Jamestown was levelled by the fire. It was not too healthy a place anyhow there on the marshes.

                And the new College of William and Mary being established at the Middle Plantation caused the legislators to look at it with interest. So they moved over and called the new seat of government Williamsburg after King William III who was the reigning Monarch at the time.

                For nearly 100 years, Williamsburg was the political, social and cultural center of the entire Colony. Here was where the royal governor lived, where the Assembly convened and the Courts sat.

                Twice a year when the general courts were in session, crowds flocked in from all the surrounding countryside for what was called “Publick Times”. Taverns were jammed, shops were well stocked with the latest fashions, imported from London.

                There were horse races, fairs , and formal balls. Auctions were held at various taverns and in the market square and for the time , the city hummed with activity. After three hundred years it is still humming. Tourists from all over the country and taking into account my friend Donald Davies being there.

                I could say from all over the world. Buses come in and discharge their complement of Boy Scouts and Girl Guides and Brownies all come to view with wonder this authentic picturama of Colonial History.

                They have even stands of the “Imperial Weed” on displays it grows in lots on the side streets. Tobacco served in many instances instead of ready cash in the early life of the colony. It was John Rolfe who later married Pocahontas that learned to cure this natural currency in 1612. I think that he was more important to the Colony than Capt. Smith who had better publicity.

                Donald thought that Williamsburg was in better shape now than ever, at least he couldn’t see how it could possibly not be making money. You have to pay to see the places where once you might have been possibly a guest.

                Well, I think that it is well worth seeing, pay or no and they have a good service of free buses.