Riversdale

Overview

Alternate Names: Baltimore House; Calvert Mansion; Baron de Stier House

Site Dates: 1800–present

Site Owner(s): Henri Joseph Stier 1743–1821; Rosalie Stier Calvert 1778–1821; George Calvert 1768–1838; Charles Benedict Calvert 1808–1864; Riverdale Park Company; Thomas H. Pickford 1862–1939; Thaddeus Caraway 1871–1931; Hattie Wyatt Caraway 1878–1950; Abraham Walter Lafferty 1875–1964; Maryland–National Capital Park and Planning Commission;

Associated People: Benjamin Henry Latrobe; William Lovering 1795–1810; William Russell Birch;

Location: Riverdale, MD · 38° 57' 36.86" N, 76° 55' 54.59" W

Condition: Altered

Keywords: Dovecote/Pigeon house; Fountain; Icehouse; Lawn; Parterre; Piazza; Plot/Plat; Portico; Shrubbery

Riversdale was the plantation of the Belgian émigré Rosalie Stier Calvert (1778–1821) and her husband, George Calvert (1768–1838), a planter and direct descendent of the Proprietary Governors of Maryland. Though estates were usually owned by men in the early Republic, Riversdale is one of the few that passed from father to daughter. Rosalie received the house and land from her father, Henri Joseph Stier (1743–1821), as part of her inheritance, and oversaw the development of its extensive grounds. Much of what is known about the layout of the estate derives from Rosalie’s correspondence with her European relatives. The site was later owned by the Maryland–National Capital Park and Planning Commission.

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History

Fleeing the terror unleashed by the French Revolution, Belgian aristocrat Henri Joseph Stier and his family left their native country for the United States in the autumn of 1794, intending only to remain until they could safely return to Europe. But when the youngest of Henri’s three children, Rosalie, married the Maryland planter George Calvert in 1799, the family decided to make their home in the United States.

As a direct descendant of the Proprietary Governors of Maryland, Rosalie’s husband was an exceptionally wealthy landowner, possessing over 3,300 acres by 1800, which comprised the tobacco farm he inherited on the Patuxent River, called Mount Albion, and additional tracts of land in Prince George’s County, including a small lot in the town of Bladensburg. When Henri began searching for property, his son-in-law suggested 729 ½ acres nearby, which would become the site of Riversdale. Benjamin Henry Latrobe was commissioned to oversee the design and construction of the house, but Henri was vexed by his inefficiency and replaced him with the Washington architect William Lovering.

Despite the Stier family’s plans to remain in the United States, Henri’s son and daughter-in-law returned to Europe in 1802, and they reported that Napoleon was offering safe return to émigrés who had fled the Revolution. Henri and his wife, along with their elder daughter and her family, decided to rejoin them. Rosalie—married to an American husband, with a young daughter and another child on the way—was determined to remain in her adopted country. The news disappointed her father: “Since no hope remains of seeing all my family reunited, I must join the greater number.” He offered her the land and the newly built house, making a point to have the estate placed in Rosalie’s name.

Fig. 1, Anthony St. John Baker (artist), B. King (lithographer), “Riversdale, near Bladensburg,” 1827.

Riversdale would serve as an important point of connection between Rosalie and her European family. She and her father wrote each other regularly, and among their voluminous correspondence are Henri’s suggestions for the landscape’s design: “Note that the water, as a mirror in an apartment, is the principal ornament; the north side of your home is very convenient for this embellishment.” Her letters to her father indicate that she engaged the landscape designer and artist William Russell Birch to draw up plans. However, Birch never visited the estate nor supervised the work and thought “very little” of his design had been implemented.

Relying on both hired and enslaved labor, Rosalie created a pond on the south side of the estate and divided the grounds at Riversdale into flower and kitchen gardens, orchards, and a series of falling terraces. A brick ha-ha separated the terraces from the pond and meadows to the south, and an icehouse, dovecote, slave cabin and other structures surrounded the mansion [fig. 1]. Writing to her brother in 1808, Rosalie described the visual appearance of these structures: “[The icehouse] is covered with straw and . . . looks like a little hut. A little farther on, a negro cabin gives the same effect and another we intend to build supported by columns will look like a little temple.” Within the mansion itself, she transformed her cellar and salon into an orangery, where she nurtured orange trees, geraniums, and heliotropes, all exotic plants.

Rosalie’s love for her family was closely entwined with the Riversdale landscape. In a letter to her father she wrote, “I feel attached to this place you have created . . . and where I have spent so much happy time with you. . . . When I walk in the garden, each tree and rose planted by your own hand is of interest to me, and I take pleasure in watching them grow and caring for them. . . . [E]very object here is dear to me because you used it.” Following her early death in 1821 and the death of her husband seventeen years later, Riversdale descended to their second son, Charles Benedict Calvert, an important innovator in agriculture and husbandry and the founder of the University of Maryland, originally the Maryland Agricultural College. He made several improvements to the estate, especially in terms of farming methods, but he continued to depend heavily on an enslaved labor force. Journalist and landscape designer Frederick Law Olmsted (1822–1903) visited in 1852 and offered a description of the grounds of Riversdale in his Journey in the Seaboard Slave States: With Remarks on their Economy, published in 1856. He commented favorably on the grounds, including the fountains and flower gardens, while at the same time registering his disapproval of slavery.

—Elizabeth Athens

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Texts

• Anonymous, August 1848, describing Riversdale, estate of George and Rosalie Stier Calvert, Prince George’s County, MD (American Farmer 4: 53)

“The main building is 68 by about 50 feet, with an elegant Portico on its northern [front], and a Piaza [sic], running its entire length, on its southern front, each constructed with due regard to classic and architectural propriety. . . .On either front is an ample lawn with shade trees, grass plots, parterres, shrubbery, and flowers, whose effect upon the senses impart an interest to the view, warm the mind into admiration, and give assurance, that a chastened taste and artistic skill had presided while these were being fashioned into form. . . . These improvements were made by the present proprietor’s ancestors, in the beginning of the present century, but are still in a state of the most perfect preservation.”

• Warden, David Bailie, 1816, describing Riversdale, estate of George and Rosalie Stier Calvert, Prince George’s County, MD (1816: 156)

“The establishment of George Calvert, Esq. at Bladensburg, attracts attention. His mansion, consisting of two stories, seventy feet in length, and thirty-six in breadth, is admirably adapted to the American climate. On each side there is a large portico, which shelters from the sun, rain, or snow.”

• Olmsted, Frederick Law, 1856, describing Riversdale, estate of George and Rosalie Stier Calvert, Prince George’s County, MD (1856: 6)

“The kept grounds are very limited, and in simple but quiet taste. . . There is a fountain, an ornamental dove-coat, and ice-house.”

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Images

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  Anthony St. John Baker (artist), B. King (lithographer), Riversdale, near Bladensburg, 1827.

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Other Resources

National Park Service Register of Historic Places Documents

Riversdale Historical Society

Department of Parks and Recreation, Prince George's County

The University of Maryland Riversdale Book Shelf

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