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Difference between revisions of "Elizabeth Pitts Lamboll and Thomas Lamboll"

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During the autumn of 1740 the English evangelist George Whitefield (1714-1770) gave several fiery sermons in Boston, commanding children on one occasion, “If your parents will not come to Christ, you [should] come and go to heaven without them.”<ref> Thomas S. Kidd, ''George Whitefield: America’s Spiritual Founding Father'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BGQW367X view on Zotero].</ref> Heeding his call, fifteen-year-old Elizabeth Pitts left Massachusetts, registering at Whitefield’s Bethesda Home for orphans near Savannah, Georgia, on December 13, 1740, where she was among a handful of girls categorized as "poor," with one or more parent still living.<ref>George White, ''Historical Collections of Georgia: Containing the Most Interesting Facts, Traditions, Biographical Sketches, Anecdotes, Etc.'' (New York: Pudney & Russell, 1854), 335 [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/P8GER2ZN view on Zotero].</ref> At Bethesda, she received religious instruction, picked cotton, and practiced skills intended to make her “serviceable," such as sewing, spinning, knitting, washing, house cleaning, and “housewifery.” <ref> George Whitefield, “An Account of the Money Received and Disbursed for the Orphan House in Georgia” (December 23, 1741), quoted in Eric McCoy North, ''Early Methodist Philanthropy'' (New York: The Author, 1914), 157, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/X6DK3MWE view on Zotero].</ref> During her first months at the orphanage, Whitefield erected new accommodations for the children&mdash;  a brick “great house” with “a [[piazza]] of ten feet wide…all around it, which will be wonderfully convenient in the heat of summer.”<ref> George Whitefield, “An Account of the Money Received and Disbursed for the Orphan House in Georgia” (December 23, 1741), quoted in North, 1914, 158, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/X6DK3MWE view on Zotero].</ref> Twenty acres of land was cleared around the house, some of it dedicated to a garden.
 
During the autumn of 1740 the English evangelist George Whitefield (1714-1770) gave several fiery sermons in Boston, commanding children on one occasion, “If your parents will not come to Christ, you [should] come and go to heaven without them.”<ref> Thomas S. Kidd, ''George Whitefield: America’s Spiritual Founding Father'' (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/BGQW367X view on Zotero].</ref> Heeding his call, fifteen-year-old Elizabeth Pitts left Massachusetts, registering at Whitefield’s Bethesda Home for orphans near Savannah, Georgia, on December 13, 1740, where she was among a handful of girls categorized as "poor," with one or more parent still living.<ref>George White, ''Historical Collections of Georgia: Containing the Most Interesting Facts, Traditions, Biographical Sketches, Anecdotes, Etc.'' (New York: Pudney & Russell, 1854), 335 [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/P8GER2ZN view on Zotero].</ref> At Bethesda, she received religious instruction, picked cotton, and practiced skills intended to make her “serviceable," such as sewing, spinning, knitting, washing, house cleaning, and “housewifery.” <ref> George Whitefield, “An Account of the Money Received and Disbursed for the Orphan House in Georgia” (December 23, 1741), quoted in Eric McCoy North, ''Early Methodist Philanthropy'' (New York: The Author, 1914), 157, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/X6DK3MWE view on Zotero].</ref> During her first months at the orphanage, Whitefield erected new accommodations for the children&mdash;  a brick “great house” with “a [[piazza]] of ten feet wide…all around it, which will be wonderfully convenient in the heat of summer.”<ref> George Whitefield, “An Account of the Money Received and Disbursed for the Orphan House in Georgia” (December 23, 1741), quoted in North, 1914, 158, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/X6DK3MWE view on Zotero].</ref> Twenty acres of land was cleared around the house, some of it dedicated to a garden.
 
   
 
   
Elizabeth left Bethesda in June 1742,<ref>Elizabeth Pitts left Bethesda prior to the evacuation of the orphan home on July 10, 1742, when the children took refuge in the Charleston plantations of Jonathan Bryan (1708-1788), his brother Hugh (1699-1753), and their brother-in-law Stephen Bull (d.1770). See George Whitefield, ''The Works of the Reverend George Whitefield, M.A., ... to Which Is Prefixed, an Account of His Life, Compiled from His Original Papers and Letters'', 6 vols. (London: Edward and Charles Dilly, 1771), 3:  455-59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4R3DI39I view on Zotero];  Alan Gallay, ''The Formation of a Planter Elite: Jonathan Bryan and the Southern Colonial Frontier'' (Athens, Ga.: University of Georgia Press, 2007), 41, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/JTTIJZSK view on Zotero].</ref> most likely to go into service in Charleston, where on November 19, 1743 she married Thomas Lamboll, a well-educated merchant whose second wife had died two months earlier. In addition to serving as justice of the peace and clerk of the Congregational Church, Lamboll owned extensive property in and around Charleston, including a rice [[plantation]] on James Island directly across the Ashley River from Charleston that his father had acquired in 1796.<ref>Elise Pinckney, ''Thomas and Elizabeth Lamboll: Early Charleston Gardeners'', Charleston Museum Leaflet, No. 28 (Charleston, S.C.: Charleston Museum, 1969), 4-9, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/DU97BPKV view on Zotero]; Preservation Constultants, Inc., ''James Island and Johns Island Historical Survey'' (Charleston, S.C.: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Summer 1989), 8, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9PKNXN2J view on Zotero].</ref> A French map of 1776 represents a two-story house on his property, framed by two long [[avenues]] of trees. [Fig. 1] Around the time of Lamboll's first marriage in 1737 to Margaret Edgar (1711-1742), he had commissioned the architect Thomas Lee (1710-1769) to build a large house on property Lamboll had purchased in 1722, that extended all the way to White Point, the southernmost tip of the city, where the Cooper and Ashley rivers converged.<ref> Pinckney, 1969, 6-7, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/DU97BPKV view on Zotero].</ref> Elizabeth Pitts Lamboll's interest in horticulture revealed itself soon after her marriage. Among those "persons who cultivated gardens on a large scale both for use and pleasure," the early nineteenth-century Charleston historian David Ramsay recalled Elizabeth Lamboll as "the first that can be recollected...before the middle of the 18th century, [she] improved the south west extremity of King-street, in a garden which was richly stored with flowers and other curiosities of nature in addition to all the common vegetables for family use."  
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Elizabeth left Bethesda in June 1742,<ref>Elizabeth Pitts left Bethesda prior to the evacuation of the orphan home on July 10, 1742, when the children took refuge in the Charleston plantations of Jonathan Bryan (1708-1788), his brother Hugh (1699-1753), and their brother-in-law Stephen Bull (d.1770). See George Whitefield, ''The Works of the Reverend George Whitefield, M.A., ... to Which Is Prefixed, an Account of His Life, Compiled from His Original Papers and Letters'', 6 vols. (London: Edward and Charles Dilly, 1771), 3:  455-59, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/4R3DI39I view on Zotero];  Alan Gallay, ''The Formation of a Planter Elite: Jonathan Bryan and the Southern Colonial Frontier'' (Athens, Ga.: University of Georgia Press, 2007), 41, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/JTTIJZSK view on Zotero].</ref> most likely to go into service in Charleston, where on November 19, 1743 she married Thomas Lamboll, a well-educated merchant whose second wife had died two months earlier. In addition to serving as justice of the peace and clerk of the Congregational Church, Lamboll owned extensive property in and around Charleston, including a rice [[plantation]] on James Island directly across the Ashley River from Charleston that his father had acquired in 1796.<ref>Elise Pinckney, ''Thomas and Elizabeth Lamboll: Early Charleston Gardeners'', Charleston Museum Leaflet, No. 28 (Charleston, S.C.: Charleston Museum, 1969), 4-9, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/DU97BPKV view on Zotero]; Preservation Constultants, Inc., ''James Island and Johns Island Historical Survey'' (Charleston, S.C.: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Summer 1989), 8, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/9PKNXN2J view on Zotero].</ref> A French map of 1776 represents a two-story house on his property, framed by two long [[avenues]] of trees. [Fig. 1] Around the time of Lamboll's first marriage in 1737 to Margaret Edgar (1711-1742), he had commissioned the architect Thomas Lee (1710-1769) to build a house in Charleston on property Lamboll had purchased in 1722, that extended all the way to White Point, the southernmost tip of the city, where the Cooper and Ashley rivers converged.<ref> Pinckney, 1969, 6-7, [https://www.zotero.org/groups/54737/items/itemKey/DU97BPKV view on Zotero].</ref> Elizabeth Pitts Lamboll's interest in horticulture revealed itself soon after her marriage. Among those "persons who cultivated gardens on a large scale both for use and pleasure," the early nineteenth-century Charleston historian David Ramsay recalled Elizabeth Lamboll as "the first that can be recollected...before the middle of the 18th century, [she] improved the south west extremity of King-street, in a garden which was richly stored with flowers and other curiosities of nature in addition to all the common vegetables for family use."  
  
  

Revision as of 16:28, May 19, 2015

Elizabeth Pitt Lamboll (1725-October 11, 1770)[1] and Thomas Lamboll (August 1794-October 29, 1774) developed an important garden in Charleston, South Carolina, and contributed to the expansion of the Bartram Botanic Garden and Nursery through the exchange of seeds and information with the Philadelphia botanist and explorer John Bartram.


History

During the autumn of 1740 the English evangelist George Whitefield (1714-1770) gave several fiery sermons in Boston, commanding children on one occasion, “If your parents will not come to Christ, you [should] come and go to heaven without them.”[2] Heeding his call, fifteen-year-old Elizabeth Pitts left Massachusetts, registering at Whitefield’s Bethesda Home for orphans near Savannah, Georgia, on December 13, 1740, where she was among a handful of girls categorized as "poor," with one or more parent still living.[3] At Bethesda, she received religious instruction, picked cotton, and practiced skills intended to make her “serviceable," such as sewing, spinning, knitting, washing, house cleaning, and “housewifery.” [4] During her first months at the orphanage, Whitefield erected new accommodations for the children— a brick “great house” with “a piazza of ten feet wide…all around it, which will be wonderfully convenient in the heat of summer.”[5] Twenty acres of land was cleared around the house, some of it dedicated to a garden.

Elizabeth left Bethesda in June 1742,[6] most likely to go into service in Charleston, where on November 19, 1743 she married Thomas Lamboll, a well-educated merchant whose second wife had died two months earlier. In addition to serving as justice of the peace and clerk of the Congregational Church, Lamboll owned extensive property in and around Charleston, including a rice plantation on James Island directly across the Ashley River from Charleston that his father had acquired in 1796.[7] A French map of 1776 represents a two-story house on his property, framed by two long avenues of trees. [Fig. 1] Around the time of Lamboll's first marriage in 1737 to Margaret Edgar (1711-1742), he had commissioned the architect Thomas Lee (1710-1769) to build a house in Charleston on property Lamboll had purchased in 1722, that extended all the way to White Point, the southernmost tip of the city, where the Cooper and Ashley rivers converged.[8] Elizabeth Pitts Lamboll's interest in horticulture revealed itself soon after her marriage. Among those "persons who cultivated gardens on a large scale both for use and pleasure," the early nineteenth-century Charleston historian David Ramsay recalled Elizabeth Lamboll as "the first that can be recollected...before the middle of the 18th century, [she] improved the south west extremity of King-street, in a garden which was richly stored with flowers and other curiosities of nature in addition to all the common vegetables for family use."


--Robyn Asleson

Texts

  • Lamboll, Thomas to John Bartram, February 16,1761 (Bartram, 1992: 504-05)[9]
"The manner Mrs. Lamboll managers her Ranunculas & Anemonies every Year, is thus: She prepares Beds of good Rich Mould at least Two Months before she takes up the Flower Roots; that the Earth may be well settled by Rain. Wherever the Ground is low, she raised the Flower Beds, at least a foot in heighth, and where high flattens them. In Summer time, the leaves of the Flower Roots being thoroughly dry, immediately after a Shower of Rain happens, she takes up the said Roots, divides & cleanses them (but not by washing) from Insects, then makes slight holes with the Fingers on the Tops of the prepared Beds, places the Roots about four inches asunder and covers them over with Dirt, Scrap’d from the Paths, about half an Inch deep; strewing it over with the Fingers. And if the Rain fails she afterwards causes the Beds of Flower Roots to be Watered gently, such Water having first stood a Convenient time in the Sun. In Cold Weather she causes the Flower Beds to be Cover’d and Shelter’d; especially when they have begun to Sprout."


  • Bartram, John, July 11, 1765, diary entry while traveling through South Carolina (1942: 14)[10]
"I have Just been on James island with Thomas Lambol & his lady to his countrey seat oposit to Charlstown....This day I spent in writeing letters & observing ye fine improvements of ye town & ye adjacent countrey seats."


  • Bartram, John, August 15, 1765, diary entry while traveling through South Carolina (1942: 19)[11]
"We observed many good farms & gentlemens seats.... Landed at Charlstown...& walked to our friend Lambols where we was accommodated in ye most civil & best manner. in A large chamber. one side fronting ye street with a large window & balcony with A prospect down ye bay [;] ye south side fronting ye garden & orange walks over which A lovely prospect apeared of James island over Ashley river[,] two mile broad[,] from two large windows[.] ye farther end of his garden reaches to within A few yards of ye rivers bank; ye north front hath A fine prospect of ye town through two large windows."


  • Shecut, John Linnaeus Edward Whitridge, 1819, describing the city of Charleston(1819: 42) [12]
"Sometime about the year 1750, Mrs. Lamboll excited great interest in the science of horticulture and gardening, by planting a large and handsome flower and kitchen garden, upon the European plan. It was the first of the kind in Charleston, and occupied the site, corner of King and Lamboll-streets."

Images


References

http://libertyparkusafd.org/lp/Bradford/monographs%5CSalley,%20The%20Introduction%20of%20Rice%20Culture%20into%20South%20Carolina.htm

Notes

  1. For her death date, see "Records Kept by Colonel Isaac Hayne," The South Carolina Historical and Genealogical Magazine, 10 (July 1909): 159, view on Zotero.
  2. Thomas S. Kidd, George Whitefield: America’s Spiritual Founding Father (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2014), view on Zotero.
  3. George White, Historical Collections of Georgia: Containing the Most Interesting Facts, Traditions, Biographical Sketches, Anecdotes, Etc. (New York: Pudney & Russell, 1854), 335 view on Zotero.
  4. George Whitefield, “An Account of the Money Received and Disbursed for the Orphan House in Georgia” (December 23, 1741), quoted in Eric McCoy North, Early Methodist Philanthropy (New York: The Author, 1914), 157, view on Zotero.
  5. George Whitefield, “An Account of the Money Received and Disbursed for the Orphan House in Georgia” (December 23, 1741), quoted in North, 1914, 158, view on Zotero.
  6. Elizabeth Pitts left Bethesda prior to the evacuation of the orphan home on July 10, 1742, when the children took refuge in the Charleston plantations of Jonathan Bryan (1708-1788), his brother Hugh (1699-1753), and their brother-in-law Stephen Bull (d.1770). See George Whitefield, The Works of the Reverend George Whitefield, M.A., ... to Which Is Prefixed, an Account of His Life, Compiled from His Original Papers and Letters, 6 vols. (London: Edward and Charles Dilly, 1771), 3: 455-59, view on Zotero; Alan Gallay, The Formation of a Planter Elite: Jonathan Bryan and the Southern Colonial Frontier (Athens, Ga.: University of Georgia Press, 2007), 41, view on Zotero.
  7. Elise Pinckney, Thomas and Elizabeth Lamboll: Early Charleston Gardeners, Charleston Museum Leaflet, No. 28 (Charleston, S.C.: Charleston Museum, 1969), 4-9, view on Zotero; Preservation Constultants, Inc., James Island and Johns Island Historical Survey (Charleston, S.C.: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Summer 1989), 8, view on Zotero.
  8. Pinckney, 1969, 6-7, view on Zotero.
  9. John Bartram, The Correspondence of John Bartram, 1734-1777, ed. Edmund Berkeley and Dorothy Smith Berkeley (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1992), view on Zotero.
  10. John Bartram and Francis Harper, "Diary of a Journey through the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida from July 1, 1765, to April 10, 1766,' Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, 33 (1942), view on Zotero.
  11. John Bartram and Francis Harper, "Diary of a Journey through the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida from July 1, 1765, to April 10, 1766,' Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, 33 (1942), view on Zotero.
  12. John Linnaeus Edward Whitridge Shecut, Shecut’s Medical and Philosophical Essays...The Whole of Which Are Designed as Illustrative of the Domestic Origin of the Yellow Fever of Charleston; And, as Conducing to the Formation of a Medical History of the State of South-Carolina (Charleston: A. E. Miller, 1819), view on Zotero

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History of Early American Landscape Design contributors, "Elizabeth Pitts Lamboll and Thomas Lamboll," History of Early American Landscape Design, , https://heald.nga.gov/mediawiki/index.php?title=Elizabeth_Pitts_Lamboll_and_Thomas_Lamboll&oldid=10080 (accessed March 28, 2024).

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