Preventative restoration on the outside

It is obvious that the clapboard siding on the cabin is not original though it probably had some sort of siding originally.

Intact siding from under other building.

The siding is made of American Chestnut and has worm holes in it. If the wood had been cut before the blight it would not have the worm holes so the siding cannot be much more than about 100 year old.

Since the roof is leaking and the water runs right down the side of the building it is necessary to take the siding off to allow the building to dry out. I started with the side covered by the other portion of the old buildings because it is an appropriate wood to use for floor repairs. The hand-hewn logs are in good shape for the most part. Most of the chink and daub has fallen apart leaving only chinking material.

A portion of the front of the cabin after the removal of the siding
Notice the white plaster on the daub

This chink remains leaves some tantalizing clues about life in those days in frontier Virginia. I found bones and a corn cob. The corn cob is very small compared to the modern equivalent so it is almost certainly Indian Maize. I do not know enough about bones to know what they were eating. It seems likely that at least a portion of the time the cabin was without siding because the daub shows white plaster over the mud to protect it from the elements.





After removing as much as I could safely reach of the covered side I removed a portion of the other side and all of the siding from the front of the cabin. It looks a lot better now that it has started drying out. The wood above the top of the door had been taken off when the siding was added so I took a piece of the edge board and made a new top for the door. Since it is nice original board it is hard to tell it has not always been that way.












Here is the portion removed from the chimney side of the house. Notice the nice "V" notch style joints. Hopefully I will have time tomorrow to finish removing the rest of the siding on this side.

Some basic preventative restoration (inside)

In order to repair the roof and make the cabin solid enough to move we need to make some basic restorations in order to protect what is still intact. One of my biggest concerns were the treads of the steps going into the attic.

They are original, over 200 years old, and less than an inch thick with no middle support.

In order to ensure the longevity of the steps and the safety of future visitors I have reinforced the steps. The reinforcement is not readily visible from the front and is repaired in a period correct fashion by putting two end boards to support a new tread immediately under the original.









Another cause for concern is the general wetness of the building. The attic was full of junk (some interesting junk including an original period rope bed-somewhat rotten) so we had to clear all that out as it was soaking up the rain and keeping the attic wet constantly.

With all of the junk out of the attic we can start to see what needs to be done in order to make it safe to work on the roof. There are several boards that will need to be replaced or patched.

A big concern is this rotten beam. It must be repaired before the roof can be fixed. luckily further up the beam from this picture it is still solid. I will be able to take a piece of locust and hew it down to the right size and splice it into the original piece.

Exciting discoveries as General Manager of Alleghany Historical Society (240 year old cabin)

     As general manager of the Alleghany Historical Society people come in and donate artifacts often and each item tells a unique story of the human experience in Alleghany County, Virginia.
     In order to expand public interest in the Historical Society I have been looking into acquiring a 200 year old farm

Merry Plantation House, needing a little work

in the county which is badly in need of restoration or it will fall down in the relatively near future (20 years tops). I have been posting pictures of the old house and I think that that may be the reason that one of the Historical Society members contacted us on facebook about their property. They live on the old William Crow property in Crow, VA.
   







     There used to be a famous tavern there which burned in late 1969 or early 1970. The owners contacted me because one of the original outbuildings is still standing onsite and is in need of attention. They wanted me to come to the property and see what I thought. I had already seen pictures of the outbuilding before this so I thought I knew what I was getting into when I went to the site but I was in for a pleasant surprise.
   

Notice the chimney with the old structure
rebuilt so the chimney was outside

 The outbuilding, going by the pictures, consists of a large outdoor kitchen fireplace attached to a building which was probably used as a barn and attached to another building reportedly used by the innkeeper, Col John Crow.

When I got on site I found much of what I was expecting. The kitchen chimney is very large as it should be since it was made for a sizable inn. It is roughly 200 years old.

I love the corners of this old building.
Whole building is mortise and tenon and pegged together

However, much of what I found was very surprising. Going by the framework around the chimney it is obvious that the structure is old (roughly the same age-200 years old) but has been rebuilt for a different purpose. The building is built solely by mortise and tenon and the mortise holes show that the building has been rebuilt. The four corners of the building are hand-hewn logs which have had the corner cut out of them.

I suspect that this building was the original kitchen and was rebuilt 100 years ago or more to use as a barn.

If we can get the resources together to restore the Merry Plantation than this kitchen would be perfect to disassemble and rebuild on that site as nothing is left of the original kitchen over there.  The chimney has some major structural issues which will need to be addressed so in this situation about the only possible course of action is to rebuild it. As we rebuild the chimney we can also disassemble the barn are reassemble it as a kitchen as it should be.

The truly intriguing part about the outbuilding is the rear portion which has been called an office. It did not take much exploring to see that it is a hand-hewn log cabin with chestnut siding which was added roughly 100 years ago. It is remarkably intact with a few replaced or reinforced boards and old tube wiring added but it is pretty much the same as it was when it was built.

ca 1770s colonial frontier cabin

Now, when was it built? It so happens that the Alleghany Historical Society already had the land deed for the property. William Crow was given a King's land grant for the property in 1770. Not knowing anything about William Crow it is possible that he was a surveyor and had already been living on the property. If that is the case there is no telling how old the cabin could be. Crow's Tavern was well known and had been around for some years before Alleghany County was created in 1821. When it opened is unknown at present. It seems likely that the cabin would have been made shortly after the land grant so it was probably made in the early 1770s in the late colonial era. This truly would have been a frontier cabin at that point as it is only a few miles from West Virginia and far to the west of the French and Indian War era frontier forts.

It needs some help as the roof is going and has been going for some time but it is surprisingly solid with less than expected rot (probably helped by the chestnut boards and logs since chestnut does not like to rot)