Melissa Murphy and Kevin Colglazier, the current owners of York's historic Coventry Hall, have uncovered a mystery beneath the bead-board that once covered the walls of the manor's carriage house: inscriptions of biblical verse from the past.
Photo by Jennifer L. Saunders
This hand-painted mural, which adorns the wall of a second-floor bedroom of Coventry Hall, was completely obscured by a past owner but has been returned to its former glory with the help of former Museums of Old York Curator Tom Johnson, who uncovered and restored the artwork for the home's current residents. Local residents are hoping an ordinance to protect historic homes from immediate demolition will work to preserve pieces of history such as this.
Photo by Jennifer L. Saunders
YORK VILLAGE - Recently, while at work renovating the second floor of the carriage house of Coventry Hall at 34 Long Sands Road, owners Melissa Murphy and Kevin Colglazier found what had been hidden for years beneath the bead-board that covered the walls: a religious inscription carefully painted there by an unknown resident from the past.
The phrase, which was black and etched into a beam, started out as, "Thy God hath commanded thy strength."
As the rest of the bead-board was removed more was found, but this time in vivid colors including orange, blue, yellow and red. The phrase continued with, "that which thou hast wrought for us."
"This type of exciting find is what you hope for when restoring historic houses," Murphy said of the writing from the past.
She researched the snippets of the verse she had found in the second-floor room of the carriage house, and located their origins in Psalm 68, Verse 28 of the King James Bible: "Thy God hath commanded thy strength: strengthen, O God, that which thou hast wrought for us."
However, the beam bearing the words "strengthen, O God" is mysteriously missing, perhaps uncovered by one of Coventry Hall's previous owners and used elsewhere.
Murphy said it is fortunate that she and her husband found this, as it could have been covered forever. Her plan is to preserve the writing as the restoration of the carriage house continues, and she is considering having it covered in glass to keep it from deteriorating further.
"It's not going anywhere," she said.
When the beard-board ceiling was removed a beautiful vaulted, hand-hewn post-and-beam 18th-century roof was exposed, with odd pegs that may have been used to dry the original owner's private store of tobacco. There are what appear to be like chalk marks in the beams where someone once counted and recorded a tally of something and in one section there is even a date, 1861.
Such pieces of past history, hidden beneath wallboards and wallpaper or in the form of odd pegs and dates, such as those etched into the carriage house ceiling, are wonderful connections with the owners of the past. The home's first owner was the Hon. David Sewall, a Supreme Court justice for the state of Massachusetts and the first federal court judge in the state of Maine. Those pegs in the carriage house, for example, may well have once been used to dry tobacco for Judge Sewall himself.
Coventry Hall has been a private residence since it was completed in 1793, and there is much that is unknown about its history. As the husband-and-wife team works with preservation experts to restore the house, Murphy is also delving into its history, with the help of local residents like Old York Research Librarian Ginny Spiller and Historic District Commission Chairman Bob Cutts. Murphy said she feels compelled to document what she finds in the house so that there will be a record of its history for years to come. Records indicate, for example, that Presidents James Monroe and John Quincy Adams were among the home's early house guests.
Former Old York Curator Tom Johnson, who is a member of the Maine Historic Preservation Commission and the curator of the Canterbury Shaker Museum in New Hampshire, has worked extensively with Murphy to unlock the house's history, even fully restoring a stunning mural of York Village in that had been obscured by one of Coventry Hall's previous owners.
This 18th-century federal style mansion is believed to be an early design of America's first architect, Charles Bulfinch, and was built on the site of an older tavern that was destroyed in an earthquake in the 1700s.
Both Johnson and Murphy have pointed out some of the elements of the house that appear to have come from that older building, and sources indicate the carriage house itself may predate the grand mansion known as Coventry Hall.
Much of the property's history remains unknown and undocumented, and the story of the "writing on the wall" is just one of those mysteries. As Murphy pointed out, each discovery leads to more questions. Describing her role in Coventry Hall's story not just as that of an owner, but a steward of this special property, Murphy is endeavoring to record the history of her home as she and her husband work to restore it.
But just who took the time to letter this psalm so carefully along the walls? Murphy has been delving into research via local sources and the internet to begin piecing it together. Earlier this month, she invited York First Parish Church Pastor Rev. Rich Knight to see the inscription with an eye toward deciphering its roots.
"The Puritans believed that the Bible was God's greatest gift to them. That's why they were called ‘People of the Book.' They loved the scriptures, as evidenced from the verse on the beam," Knight said after visiting the carriage barn. "Puritan Thomas Goodwin said that our scriptures were ‘taken out of the scriptures in God's heart.' - from God's heart to ours. Puritan Thomas Watson said, ‘Think in every line you read that God is speaking to you, for in truth he is.' So to the Puritan family who lived there, those words on the beams were not sentimental reminders or wishful thinking/positive self talk. They were literally God's words to all who would read them."
Johnson, who viewed the writing with Murphy prior to departing from his post at Old York to become the curator in Canterbury, also found it intriguing.
"The fact that someone took the time to paint the verse in that area indicates that it must have been for a specific reason," Johnson said.
Johnson questioned whether Sunday School classes might have been taught in the room above the carriage house.
"When I first saw the verse painted on the beams, the Gothic style lettering and the colors of the paint used made me think it might have dated to about the period of the Civil War," Johnson explained.
However, he said, a Sewall descendant named Rev. Frank Sewall later resided at Coventry Hall, raising the question of whether the writing dates from his occupancy.
Knight was unable to find any connection between a Rev. Frank Sewall and the nearby First Parish Church, but noted the First Parish Church's pastor in the late 1800s was a Rev. David B. Sewall, who served in that capacity from 1873 to 1888.
Back at the Old York Research Library, Spiller noted in turning page after page in York's histories and genealogies archived there that gaps exist in the recorded history, and whether a Rev. Frank Sewall or the Rev. David B. Sewall who led the First Parish Church in the 1870s and 80s was descended from the Judge David Sewall who built Coventry Hall is unclear in the records. Other Sewalls resided on Sewall's Hill, overlooking the current Sewall's Bridge at the York River, Spiller noted, and genealogies indicate Rev. David B. Sewall's father, the Rev. Jotham Sewall, appears to have connections both to Sewall's Hill and to Massachusetts.
One interesting bit of information archived in the library relates to Johnson's question of whether a Sunday School might have been housed in the carriage barn at Coventry Hall.
The Sewall genealogy lists the reverend's three children, the youngest of whom was born in 1849 and "organized a literary society for York young people" and referenced Jane Sewall's description in a book by Ralph F. Lowe. Spiller shared a copy of a published account of life in York in the 1800s by Lowe, who was born in York in the 1860s and later in life became a Methodist Episcopal Church pastor in Vermont.
In his book, Lowe describes the Rev. David Brainerd Sewall as "a well-poised, all-around man, studious, saintly, universally respected and loved by all who knew him. I think he would be generally regarded as the most representative minister of the entire town at that time."
The passage goes on to describe Sewall's youngest daughter, Jane, as doing "something for the benefit of the young people of the town such as I have never known equalled (sic) anywhere. Beginning about 1884 or '85 she conducted for several years for all young people of high school age who cared to attend a class in English history, or literature, of American history or literature, from October till May. The group met once in two weeks, by turns in the homes of the members. The first hour was taken up with an informal discussion of the lesson, led by Miss Sewall, and the following hour was given over to games and informal social enjoyment."
The club included about 21 boys and girls, Lowe wrote, and he also noted, separately, "Miss Sewall was an excellent teacher of boys in her Sunday School, but ‘The Young People's Literary Club' was not confined to her church."
Spiller said that whether or not these Sewalls resided at Coventry Hall or were connected to it, the room above the carriage barn might even have served as one of the meeting places for the literary group, since the locations of the meetings varied.
For her part, Murphy believes that uncovering such messages from the past as the writing on the carriage house walls are examples of what make historic homes like Coventry Hall so worthy of being protected and preserved.
