**[1. NAME OF PROPERTY]{.underline}**

Historic Name: **LEMOYNE, F. JULIUS, HOUSE**

Other Name/Site Number: N/A

**[2. LOCATION]{.underline}**

Street & Number: 49 East Maiden Street Not for publication:
[N/A]{.underline}

City/Town: Washington Vicinity: [N/A]{.underline}

State: PA County: Washington Code: 125 Zip Code: 15301

**[3. CLASSIFICATION]{.underline}**

Ownership of Property Category of Property

Private: [x]{.underline} Building(s): [x]{.underline}

Public-Local: District:

Public-State: Site:

Public-Federal: Structure:

Object:

Number of Resources within Property

Contributing Noncontributing

[1]{.underline} buildings

sites

structures

objects

[1]{.underline} Total

Number of Contributing Resources Previously Listed in the National
Register: [1]{.underline}

Name of Related Multiple Property Listing: N/A

**[4. STATE/FEDERAL AGENCY CERTIFICATION]{.underline}**

As the designated authority under the National Historic Preservation Act
of 1966, as amended, I hereby certify that this \_\_\_\_ nomination
\_\_\_\_ request for determination of eligibility meets the
documentation standards for registering properties in the National
Register of Historic Places and meets the procedural and professional
requirements set forth in 36 CFR Part 60. In my opinion, the property
\_\_\_\_ meets \_\_\_\_ does not meet the National Register Criteria.

Signature of Certifying Official Date

State or Federal Agency and Bureau

In my opinion, the property \_\_\_\_ meets \_\_\_\_ does not meet the
National Register criteria.

Signature of Commenting or Other Official Date

State or Federal Agency and Bureau

**[5. NATIONAL PARK SERVICE CERTIFICATION]{.underline}**

I hereby certify that this property is:

\_\_\_ Entered in the National Register

\_\_\_ Determined eligible for the National Register

\_\_\_ Determined not eligible for the National Register

\_\_\_ Removed from the National Register

\_\_\_ Other (explain):

Signature of Keeper Date of Action

**[6. FUNCTION OR USE]{.underline}**

Historic: domestic Sub: single dwelling

health care medical business/office

Current: recreation & culture Sub: museum

**[7. DESCRIPTION]{.underline}**

ARCHITECTURAL CLASSIFICATION: Georgian

Greek Revival

MATERIALS:

Foundation: stone

Walls: sandstone

Roof: metal

Other: wood

**Describe Present and Historic Physical Appearance.**

Built in 1812, the F. Julius LeMoyne House is a 7-bay, 2 ½ story,
Georgian style double-pile center hall plan house with detailing
reflective of the emerging Greek Revival style. Constructed of
sandstone, the street (south) facade is coursed ashlar and the other
facades are uncoursed masonry. A ca. 1894/1905 frame 2-story service
wing at the rear has narrow weatherboard siding. The house has a
standing seam metal roof with a rear dormer sheathed in the same siding
as the addition. The roof also has a differential pitch, with a longer
slope on the rear than on the front. All but two openings (windows and
doors) have stone lintels and projecting stone sills. The windows are
double-hung 6/6 light sash. The gable end walls have interior chimneys
and attic fan lights. The house has a side yard with modern landscaping
and is situated at the southwest corner of its lot in a mixed-use
neighborhood dominated by commercial and institutional buildings. The
streetscape features consistent setbacks with all buildings abutting the
sidewalk. The house is a well-maintained property with some alterations
and restorations; it retains its overall character, scale, materials,
massing, and style.

The south or Maiden Street elevation is a 7-bay design with frieze
windows in the attic and two recessed entrances. The principal entrance,
in the center bay, has a one story Ionic portico and a secondary
entrance without a portico is centered in the three west bays. The
primary entrance accesses the center hall and residential part of the
house; the secondary entrance accesses the doctor\'s office/apothecary.
Both street entrances are recessed and raised 5 steps above street
level; the primary entrance is deeply recessed and has sidelights, a
transom sash, and a late-19th century mosaic tile floor. The portico has
Ionic Order columns, and the portico and the frontispieces of each
entrance carry full entablatures. The office entrance door has a
nine-light panel in the top half. Both entrances have deep reveals with
flush paneling and reeded molding defining the top panels. Both
frontispieces and the portico are wood. \"LeMoyne\" is inscribed on the
4th step to each entrance. The front basement windows on the street
elevation have cast iron grills.

The east wall has a gable-end fan light and a window on the first and
second stories at the southeast corner. A side porch and door access the
first floor northeast room from the sideyard. A basement door directly
below the porch accessed the original kitchen.

The west elevation has one gable-end fan light and a non-original window
in the first floor northeast room.

The north elevation was designed with five bays and no roof dormer. A
basement window larger than the other basement windows opens into the
original basement kitchen. The north facade has a 2-story frame service
wing with a rear porch and door in its gable end and a door on the west
side. The service wing covers the center and center-west bays of the
rear elevation, leaving two windows on the house east of the wing and
one on the west. The wing has horizontal wood siding, irregular
fenestration with three windows on each story of the west elevation,
variously placed small windows on the north elevation, and on the east
elevation a bank of windows on the first story. The rear slope of the
main roof has a center dormer which appears to have been added when the
service wing was added; it has the same siding as the addition. A new
(1996) flagstone terrace fills the area between the north elevation of
the house and the service wing.

The interior of the house conforms to a center hall plan with the
staircase at the rear of the hall, and the two front rooms are larger
than the companion rear rooms. The turn-of-the-century stair is open to
the third floor; it has straight runs with intermediate leadings, square
newel posts, turned balusters, and applied scroll brackets. The basement
stair is under the main staircase. On the first and second floors, doors
at the rear of the hall connect to the service wing. The wing also
connects to the house through a door converted from a window in the
northwest room on the first floor. All rooms have fireplaces. On the
first floor, each pair of rooms also have connecting doors, but only the
door between the two west rooms is original.

The interior architectural detailing is classically based and generally
of sophisticated design, using reeded architraves, corner blocks with
rondels, paneled reveals and doors, paneled pilasters, and fireplace
mantels with bas-relief scenes from classical mythology. All interior
walls are plain plaster.

Historically, the first floor rooms on the west side of the hall were
the Doctor\'s suite and the rooms on the east were residential. On the
first floor, the hall doors and the doors in the southeast room (drawing
room) have deeply molded reeding and corner blocks with rondels and a
center bead. The drawing room has a molded cornice; the hall and drawing
room have chair rails. The paneled windows reveals have applied molding.
The fireplace in the drawing room is the most ornately treated in the
house, having reeded pilasters, a marble facing and a mantel with
center-panel bas-relief featuring a scene from classical mythology as
well as swags and floral motifs composition ornament. The architrave for
the door connecting to the northeast room is simpler than the other door
and window surrounds. A non-original opening with a door, added by
Julius LeMoyne, connects the drawing room to the northeast room behind
it.

The northeast room on the first floor, identified by the historical
society (current owners) as the original dining room and now used as the
society library, has the least architectural detailing. The fireplace
has no pilasters, only an architrave with a blank frieze. Care was taken
to match the surrounds for the added door connecting to the parlor with
those of the windows, cupboard, and fireplace. The firebox has a cast
iron inset. A cupboard is located to the left of the fireplace. A door
to the right of the fireplace leads to sideporch and yard. The north
wall of this room has two windows. The west window had been converted to
a door connecting to a modern bathroom. In 1996, the historical society
removed the bathroom and restored the window.

The rooms on the west side of the hall are treated similarly with
respect to each other. Originally these rooms were the doctor\'s office
(northwest) and waiting room/pharmacy (southwest, overlooking the
street). The office was converted into a dining room (date unknown), a
window converted to a door connecting with the service wing, and a
window added on the west wall. Except for the molding and surround of
the west window, the door and window surrounds in both rooms have
two-face architraves with backbands. The doors have recessed panels. The
fireplaces in both the office and waiting room have full entablature
carried on paneled or reeded pilasters. The fireboxes have tile insets.

On the second floor a small space at the front of the hall is set off by
flanking cupboards and beaded screen panel. A door on the stair landing
connects to the service wing; a beaded fan screen is over this door
also. The southeast room (the main bedroom) has the most ornate
detailing on the second floor. The door and window surrounds are reeded
with corner blocks. There is a picture molding. Closets with painted
panels are built in to the left of the fireplace. The cupboards are an
undated later addition although the reeded architrave matches that in
the rest of the room.

The northeast room has a closet to the left of the fireplace
corresponding to the one in the room below. The northwest room, now used
as a gift shop, also has a closet to the left of the fireplace. One of
the windows in this room was closed off when the service wing was added.
The southwest room has a molded cornice and the 2-face architrave with a
backband molding imitates the rooms below it. All the fireboxes on the
second floor have cast-iron insets.

The third floor consists of a center hall, three finished rooms, and the
enclosed deck, which runs the length of the house across the front
(south) of the house. Of the three rooms, two small rooms are on the
east side of the center hall and one large room is on the west side. The
east rooms are placed so that one longer room extends the depth of the
house along the east end and a small interior room is located between it
and the center hall. A short passage along the north side gives access
to the outer room. The door to the inner room opens directly onto the
center hall. The outer room has a fan light on the east wall and a 6/6
light sash window opening onto the enclosed deck. The inner room has a
6/6 light sash window opening onto the deck also. The west room has two
south windows to the deck, a fan light on the west wall, and an
open‑tread stair located near the west wall chimney giving access to the
attic area under the roof. The ceilings in the hall and east room are
plaster; the ceiling of the west room is beaded wood.

Originally the house had a roof deck on the third floor street facade
set behind a parapet with a wooden balustrade between stone piers.
Roughly 6 feet deep, the deck featured wood channeled floor boards, five
bays, 6/6 double hung sash windows, wood lintels and sills. The
treatment of openings included beaded architraves and cornices. The roof
deck was still open in the 1840s and featured in an anti-slavery rally.
The deck was altered at some later time, perhaps when other alterations
were made to the house after 1878. The roof was extended to cover the
deck and frieze windows installed. The original features remain under
the extended roof.

The service-wing has a secondary staircase. Each floor is divided into
one large room and two very small rooms now used as offices and storage
space. On the first floor one of the small rooms is a half-bath. Both
large rooms have fireplaces with plain mantels and cast iron insets in
the fireboxes.

The basement consists of four rooms under the original house and one
under the rear wing. The rooms under the original house correspond
generally in plan to the rooms above but without the center hall. Access
to the basement from the first floor is under the principal staircase in
the original house and under the back staircase along the east wall in
the wing. In the original basement, three of the four rooms are
unfinished and have concrete floors. The street level windows in the two
south rooms have been closed while the northwest room has no window. The
northeast room, which was the original kitchen, has a plaster ceiling,
painted walls (stone), a window on the north wall, and a fireplace and
plank door to the outside on the east wall. The fireplace has a large
wooden lintel but no mantle shelf. The basement under the rear wing is
also unfinished and the east wall of this section incorporates the
curved brick wall of the adjacent cistern.

The house has undergone various alterations and restorations of
uncertain date. In 1944 Charles Stotz, a prominent historical architect
of the 1930s, and Edward Stotz, Jr. prepared a condition report and
restoration plan for the Historical Society. These documents included
suggestions about prior alterations, based on interviews with Julius\'
youngest daughter, Madeleine LeMoyne Reed.[^1] Stotz attributes most of
the alterations to Madeleine and dates them between 1894 and 1904. Some
changes also reflect Stotz\'s 1944 recommendations to the Historical
Society.

The service wing began as a one-story brick addition with side porch.
The date of construction is uncertain, but it appears on Doran\'s 1855
city map.[^2] The brick one-story wing was either demolished or expanded
in 1894 by Madeleine. It appears as a 2-story wing on the 1896 Sanborn
map.[^3] When the 2-story addition was built, the original main
staircase was replaced. The window over the stair was converted to a
door connecting the house to the addition on the landing. A rear dormer
was also added to provide light and headroom for the main staircase. At
some point a window was added in the west wall and a window on the north
wall was converted to a door connecting to the service wing in the
northwest room (first floor). The changes are reflected in different
detailing in the window reveals and architraves of both openings. The
west window also lacks the stone lintel and sill of the original
openings in the house.

Stylistic elements of the front entrances suggest early alterations. The
Greek Revival-style portico may have been added or altered in the 1840s.
Stylistically the sidelights suggest a later date than 1812. Stotz notes
that the doorway shows signs of modern (by which he meant 19th century
or early 20th) work. The mosaic floor is late 19th century. Stotz also
notes that a front basement window between the apothecary entrance and
the portico was formerly a basement entrance.

The date when the roof deck was covered is equally unknown. Stotz\'s
plans also indicate that either or both the stairs in the third floor to
the attic and/or the stairs to the third floor were moved and the
opening covered. His plan has separate discussions for restoring each in
their original wells.

At some point in the early 20th century an elevator was added in the
hall between the first and second floors. It appears on Stotz\'s 1944
plan; it was removed by the Historical Society and the ceiling and
floors patched.

It appears that floors have been repaired, replaced and refinished
throughout the house. Modern utilities such as electricity, gas,
plumbing were added to the house over the years but were not intrusive
alterations. Except for the hallway bathroom, which is now gone, the
plumbing was limited to the service wing or shed addition. By 1886 gas
light fixtures were installed and the fireplaces had gas inserts. At
some unknown date the house was wired for electricity. Bathrooms were
added to the house and then removed. Four bathrooms appear on Stotz\'s
1944 architectural plans: one at the front of the second floor hall; one
on the second floor of the addition; a half-bath (toilet & sink) on the
first floor of the addition; and a bathroom in its own shed addition off
the former dining room/current library with a connecting door made from
a window. All the bathrooms except the half-bath have been removed. The
stone terrace was added between the service wing and the northeast
corner of the house as part of the 1996 restoration work. The side door
and porch and the door between the drawing room and former dining room
(current library) may have been added when the shed bathroom was built.

The setting and the lot have been altered since the period of
significance. Originally, the lot consisted of approximately 3/5 of the
city block, from the house on the western boundary to a small property
bounded by Second Street on the east, and all the way back to Strawberry
Alley on the north. The landscaping included gardens and a small
orchard. It now consists of a roughly 120\' x 120\' parcel. Julius\'s
will divided the property into thirds, leaving lots to his daughter Ann
and son Frank, and the house and its lot to his daughters Jane and
Madeleine. Madeleine willed the house and the front half of the lot to
the Washington County Historical Society and the back half of the lot to
the city of Washington for a playground. The playground is now a parking
lot. Two outbuildings appear on the 1886, 1891, 1896, and 1900 Sanborn
maps, and one appears on Stotz\'s 1944 study. The Historical Society
demolished the remaining outbuilding after it acquired the property. The
house is now surrounded by mixed commercial and office properties.

The house has been well-maintained by the Historical Society, which has
restored some of the early features of the house by removing bathroom
additions inside and outside the building and the 20th century elevator.
Although covered, the roof deck, both a unique design feature and an
element in Julius\'s anti-slavery activities, is still intact and in
good condition. Overall, the house with its surrounding gardens retains
its overall character, scale, materials, massing, and style to reflect
the period of significance.

**[8. STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE]{.underline}**

Certifying official has considered the significance of this property in
relation to other properties:

Nationally: [X]{.underline} Statewide: Locally:

Applicable National

Register Criteria: A [x]{.underline} B [x]{.underline} C D

Criteria Considerations

(Exceptions): A B C D E F G

NHL Criteria: 1

NHL Theme(s): II. Creating Social Movements & Institutions

2\. Reform Movements

Areas of Significance: Social History

Period(s) of Significance: 1834 - 1865

Significant Dates: N/A

Significant Person(s): N/A

Cultural Affiliation: N/A

Architect/Builder: Unknown

Comparative Categories: XXXI. Social & Humanitarian Movements

D. Abolitionism

**State Significance of Property, and Justify Criteria, Criteria
Considerations, and Areas and Periods of Significance Noted Above.**

The F. Julius LeMoyne House is significant under NHL Criterion 1 for its
association with the antebellum anti-slavery reform movement as a center
of anti-slavery activity and a safe station on the Underground Railroad.
The period of significance begins with Julius LeMoyne\'s entry into the
Washington Anti-Slavery Society in 1834 and ends with the ratification
of the 13th Amendment in 1865.

Julius LeMoyne was not the first nor the most radical abolitionist in
Washington County. He joined the anti-slavery movement at the point when
it was becoming popularized and politicized among the white middle class
across the country. In his activism and philosophy

Julius LeMoyne represents the conventional mainstream of anti-slavery
activity in the United States before 1850. In his personal circumstances
(middle-class respectability, local social standing, interest in other
local and national humanitarian reforms) and in his moderate public
posture on anti-slavery he is typical of the middle-class Americans of
the antebellum period who became caught up in the anti-slavery debate.
His activities on a local, regional and national level illustrate the
processes by which an anti-slavery network dominated by white
middle-class Americans took root. His philosophy of legitimate activism
contradistinct from his willingness to abet fugitive slaves illuminates
the variation of personal conscience at work on all Americans as they
struggled with the issues of political authority, human rights, and
personal property in the debate over slavery.

Francis Julius LeMoyne (1798-1879) was the son and grandson of Parisian
physicians. His father came to America with French refugees who settled
at Gallipolis, Ohio. His mother was a Scots-Irish immigrant. After their
marriage in 1797 they moved to Washington, Pennsylvania, where LeMoyne
senior practiced medicine, maintained connections with the Gallipolis
settlement, and built the Maiden Street house in 1812.

After graduating from Washington College, Julius worked on his father\'s
farm and apprenticed in the medical practice, then studied medicine at
Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. In 1823 he married Madelaine
Romaine Bureau, the daughter of a French emigre settled at Gallipolis.
They had three sons and five daughters. About the time of his marriage
Julius\'s father suffered bankruptcy. Julius prevented the forfeiture of
his father\'s property by borrowing money and buying the family home and
farms, then over the next several years he worked assiduously to clear
his father\'s debts. His father moved out of the family house in 1827
and Julius lived there until his death.

In the late 1820s Julius became caught up in the various reform
movements beginning to sweep the country and began a personal program of
social responsibility by working for the community for constructive
social good. From the 1830s through 1850s he took an active role in
local public affairs. He was a founding member of the first borough fire
company, helped organize a Lyceum, and served on various committees to
promote local industry and agriculture. While he supported many popular
causes, including temperance and prison reform, he particularly involved
himself in four areas of activity: serving on the Washington College
Board of Trustees and helping the College through a severe fiscal and
administrative crisis; sponsoring the founding the Washington Female
Seminary, which his daughters later attended; joining a group of
investors to charter a local bank; and taking up the cause of
anti-slavery.

In the mid-1850s, when he was about 55, Julius\'s deteriorating health
made the active practice of medicine difficult. Although he continued to
treat patients, he devoted most of his time to scientific farming,
introducing improved strains of cattle, sheep, and horses to the county.
He also began various small real estate ventures, buying and selling
properties at moderate profits and carefully building his financial
resources. Until his death he used his wealth and talent to support
worthy causes. He donated \$10,000 toward founding of the town library
and for many years catalogued the books. After the Civil War he gave the
American Missionary Society \$20,000 toward the endowment of a school
for Freedmen in Memphis, Tennessee. In the 1870s he endowed
professorships at Washington and Jefferson College for agriculture and
applied mathematics. He also turned his attention to the study of
cremation, being concerned about groundwater pollution from cemetery
runoff, and in 1876 built the country\'s first crematory.[^4]

The Washington County population on the whole was not supportive of the
anti-slavery cause. Before independence the county was contested
territory between Virginia and Pennsylvania. The county had
slaveholders, often settlers who had moved from Virginia lands. When the
Pennsylvania Gradual Emancipation Act was passed in 1780, Washington
County was still not a part of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. When
the Pennsylvania/Virginia border was finally certified two years later,
the Assembly passed special legislation extending the emancipation
provisions to the county. Slaveholders complied with the letter but not
always the spirit of the law, and in 1826 a Pennsylvania Supreme Court
ruling was required to deal with county slaveholders who were violating
the 1780 law by holding the grandchildren of slaves in bondage.[^5] The
emergence of a local anti-slavery movement seriously divided local
opinion and often sparked violence.[^6] Before 1834 formal anti-slavery
activity in the county was limited. In 1789 a local branch of the
Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society had formed and managed a brief life
before fading. In the 1820s efforts began to found a new local group,
but they too lapsed after a few years.[^7]

Julius LeMoyne joined the anti-slavery crusade as it was just becoming a
national movement. In 1834, a local group seeking to organize a new
anti-slavery society in the county gave him some of their materials to
read. Persuaded by the literature, Julius joined the new Washington
County Anti-Slavery Society and served as its president from 1835 until
1837 when he was commissioned by the American Anti-Slavery Society to be
its regional agent.[^8]

Through the 1830s and 1840s Julius threw himself into the anti-slavery
cause. His wife, Madelaine Bureau LeMoyne, and his older daughters,
especially his daughter Jane, joined as well. Using his position as a
prominent community figure, he and his wife made their house a center of
anti-slavery activity in southwestern Pennsylvania.

Locally, he worked closely with other abolitionists to sponsor rallies
and to bring visiting black and white speakers to the county. He and his
wife opened their home to visiting speakers, allowed public and private
meetings to be held there, and faced mob hostility on several
occasions.[^9] When he was recruited by the American Anti-Slavery
Society in 1837 to be their agent, he expanded his activities beyond the
county. The Maiden Street house became a depot for anti-slavery
literature, which was distributed throughout the Ohio Valley. He
communicated with anti-slavery groups across the country and included
among his correspondents the leading figures of American anti-slavery
activism, especially Gerrit Smith and Lewis Tappan.[^10] He received
frequent speaking invitations from groups in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and
Illinois.[^11] He co-founded a local abolitionist paper that survived a
few years in the mid-1840s.[^12] He was a Pennsylvania delegate at
national and international anti-slavery conventions.[^13] He was
nominated by the Liberty Party as its first candidate for Vice-President
in 1840, and although he declined the nomination, he actively campaigned
for the party in 1840 and ran as its candidate for Governor in 1841,
1844, and 1847, and as candidate for Congress in 1843.[^14] Julius
continued to support the anti-slavery cause, but was disaffected by the
merger of the Liberty Party with the Free Soil Party in 1848 and
withdrew from political activity. In the 1850s he limited his
extra-local activities largely to correspondence.[^15]

In his abolitionist philosophy, Julius belonged to the more-or-less
conservative group led by Gerrit Smith, James Birney, and Lewis Tappan.
He corresponded with them and shared their opinions that abolition
should be pursued by peaceful legitimate means and an appeal to reason
but with no clear mechanism to achieve it. He rejected the
Colonizationist program of repatriation and fervently debated with local
and national Colonizationists. He equally disfavored the violent methods
of John Brown for abolition by the sword (although his West Middletown
associates, the McKeevers, were friends of John Brown and brought him to
visit the county in the 1850s) and the emotive revivalism of William
Lloyd Garrison for immediate and unrecompensed emancipation.[^16] When,
in 1840, the debate over what constituted peaceful legitimate means
split the American Anti-Slavery Society into religious and political
wings and focused public debate on the Constitutional authority of
Congress to legislate in the matter of slavery, Julius followed the
political faction into the new American and Foreign Anti-Slavery
Society.[^17]

When Julius joined the anti-slavery cause he did not limit his
commitment to politics, organizing rallies, and debating the
constitutional abstractions of states rights, property rights, and human
rights. While he held to a public position of using legitimate peaceful
means to end slavery, like many Americans and some of his neighbors, his
conscience prompted him to bend the law by aiding the escape of fugitive
slaves. He put himself at risk with the same vigor that he pursued his
politics and he offered his house as a safe station on the fugitive
slave escape network.

The Underground Railroad was active in Washington County by the time
Julius LeMoyne joined the anti-slavery cause. By about 1815 a system of
trails for runaway slaves was emerging in southwestern Pennsylvania. By
the 1830s it was an operational network that stayed active through the
Civil War representing a substantial arena of Underground activity
between the better studied areas of eastern Pennsylvania and Ohio. The
strongest centers of Underground activity were in West Middletown, in
the city of Washington, and along the county\'s east border, the
Monongahela River, where substantial tightly-knit free black communities
had evolved during nearly half a century of gradual abolition. These
free black communities supported escaping slaves and developed an
operational network that white anti-slavery activists later joined.[^18]
The African American core of the Underground included Hugh (or Samuel)
Dorsey (Washington), Tar Adams (Washington), \"Old Naylor\" (Wheeling
and Washington), Ermine Cain (Waynesburg/Washington), Lloyd Demas
(Uniontown/Brownsville), Simeon Artis (Brownsville), Thomas Cain
(Brownsville), William Wallace (Centreville). Ermine Cain, who operated
a barber shop in Washington, and \"Old Naylor,\" who based his
operations in Wheeling, were particularly central and long-time figures
in the local Underground. Their white associates across the county
included Kenneth McCoy and John Bell (West Alexander), Judge McFarland
(Washington), Andrew Hopkins and James Moffett (Brownsville), William,
Thomas and Matthew McKeever (West Middletown), Joseph Armstrong
(Monongahela), and Milton Maxwell (Ginger Hill).[^19]

Clearly Julius sympathized with fugitive slaves. He joined the fluid
shifting network of assistance and made his home a safe station for
fugitives. His correspondence for the 1840s includes several letters
from individuals who asked for aid or thanked him for his assistance in
getting out of the South or in getting their friends or relatives out of
the South.

Sometimes the assistance was simply humanitarian. For instance, an 1847
letter to \"Doctors LeMoyne and Templeton\" from Thomas Lee in Cadiz,
Ohio, revealed the story of a Virginia fugitive who wanted to bring his
wife out of slavery. The correspondent had written to the woman\'s
owner, a widow, and persuaded her to free the man\'s wife. However, the
owner feared local public opinion and asked that the woman be removed
clandestinely. Thomas Lee asked for the doctors\' assistance in getting
the woman to Cadiz.[^20]

In another case, Julius received a thank you letter from a Nelson
Talbourt Gant, referring to the \"promise I made your wife while staying
in your house last fall,\" to tell her of his success. Gant was either a
free black or a fugitive who returned through the Underground to
Washington, D.C., where he tried to get his wife away as well. But they
were betrayed and jailed; his wife was threatened with being sold South
if she didn\'t testify against him. After a harrowing trial and
acquittal he eventually was able to buy his wife. His letter finishes
with an expression of hope that they will \"reach a secure place of
freedom\" in Canada.[^21]

There was a rather significant openness to the fugitive slave network
that Julius was involved in during the 1840s. After the passage of the
Fugitive Slave Act in 1850, Underground activities became far riskier,
and the evidence more oblique. However, two undated stories seem to
refer to episodes after 1850.

An undated letter from the editor of a Wheeling newspaper warns Julius
of slave catchers on the way to Washington and indicates that
contemporaries believed him to be an active figure in the Underground:
\"Although unacquainted with your personally, I feel it my duty to
acquaint you (confidentially) of a circumstance which transpired here
this morning, trusting my information may save a brother man from
slavery. Mr McClean, former editor of the Argus, of Wheeling, Va., was
in my office this morning, & in conversation enquired who was U.S.
Commissioner in Washington, Pa. I did not know\-- He said, \'I suppose
if you did know you wouldn\'t tell me, as one of our citizens wants to
seize a slave of his there?\' He wouldn\'t tell me who the master was,
but I feel it my duty to warn you that, if there is no U.S. Com. there
the \"master\" will soon be there himself, in search\-- Please put your
colored folks on their guard, especially fugitives from the neighborhood
of Wheeling, Va. The bloodhounds are on the scent.\"[^22] This letter is
strong evidence that LeMoyne was considered by his contemporaries to be
assisting runaways and would know who they were in Washington County.

Another undated story places Julius with a group of fugitives in a
neighbor\'s barn keeping watch for slave catchers. In the unpublished
research notes of Boyd Crumrine, author of an 1886 county history,
Crumrine records that the fugitives arrived at a Mrs Houston\'s in
Washington, Mrs. Houston being the mother of Crumrine\'s informant. The
fugitives remained in the barn there for two days while Julius LeMoyne
made arrangements for them to continue. Out of concern for the safety of
the women harboring the fugitives, LeMoyne slept in the barn until they
could move on to their next stop.[^23]

In addition to the record of Julius\'s personal involvement, three
postwar stories connect the Maiden Street house to the Underground
Railroad. Second- and third-hand oral accounts about tunnels and hidden
rooms are the local mythology that has grown up around houses where
known antislavery families lived and the LeMoyne House is no different.
Although this evidence is heresay, it contributes to the tradition that
some type of assistance to fugitive slaves was taking place in the
house. In 1941 Julius\'s youngest daughter Madeleine recounted an
undated story of how 25 fugitives were concealed in her mother\'s room
while she feigned illness to prevent slave catchers from searching the
room.[^24] The reminiscences of an 81-year old Washington Countian
include a story passed down from his grandmother, a tale of how her
mother had hidden at the LeMoyne house before being taken to a farm in
Nottingham Township.[^25] Finally, the Director of the Washington County
Historical Society has a story from a visitor to the LeMoyne House. This
visitor related a family tradition that an escaping ancestor hid in a
small moving room in the LeMoyne house. The staff at the Historical
Society connects this moving room with an alleged previous dumbwaiter in
the dining room.[^26]

Julius LeMoyne involved himself with abolitionism and the Underground
Railroad as an expression of personal conscience and social
responsibility, but his story is one of more than personal significance.
The nature of the stories and the quality of the evidence associating
him with the Underground illuminate the complexities of anti-slavery
activity as a nexus for local social, racial, and gender politics in any
community. The Underground required the interdependent cooperation of
supporters whose ordinary interaction would be quite different. Most
obviously it united white and black supporters in ways that subtly
altered the usual relations of authority, although black/white relations
in the local organization of the Underground have not been documented or
studied adequately and Julius\'s relations with black operators have not
been documented at all. It also furnished a common ground among
abolitionists who otherwise contended about the proper mechanism of
abolition\-- in Julius\'s case, the Underground united him with his
political opponents the radical Scots-Irish McKeevers of West
Middletown. Finally, while Julius took personal risks in his actions, he
depended upon the willing collaboration of his family to succeed.
Indeed, the only story from a member of the family associating the house
with the Underground concerns Madelaine Bureau LeMoyne, not Julius.

Julius LeMoyne was clearly a social reformer, caught up in the reforms,
faith in education and science, and utopian ventures being tested in
France, England, and the United States. His broad enthusiasms show him
to be a product of Enlightenment philosophies, a reasonable assumption
given his background. It is certain that he was active in antislavery
causes. Many of his generation evolved over time, beginning as
gradualists and moving toward a more immediate stance. This account
places LeMoyne with the conservative abolitionists, not the
Garrisonians. His position as president of the Washington County
Antislavery Society and then its regional agent means that he would have
been drawn into the national issues and he would have been the person
contacted whenever that part of western Pennsylvania had a
slavery-related issue. Surely there were many discussions held and
actions planned in his home.

It is reasonable to assume that Julius LeMoyne was occasionally called
upon to aid fugitive slaves, among his many other antislavery activities
and his other social concerns. His home at 49 East Maiden Street was
clearly a center of antislavery activity in many forms and it is quite
likely that he and his family gave aid to fugitives in one form or
another.

**[9. MAJOR BIBLIOGRAPHICAL REFERENCES]{.underline}**

**Primary Sources**

*Insurance Maps of Washington, Washington County, Pennsylvania.*
Sanborn-Perris Map Company, 1880, 1891, 1896, 1900.

*Map of Washington, Washington County, Pennsylvania.* T. Doran, 1855.
Washington County Historical Society.

*Map of Washington, Washington County, Pennsylvania.* J.A. Caldwell,
1876. Washington County Historical Society.

Papers of F. J. LeMoyne, 28 Boxes. Washington County Historical Society.

Sergeant, Thomas and William Rawle, Jr., *Reports of Cases Adjudged in
the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.* Vol XIV, 3rd ed. Philadelphia: Kay &
Brother, Publishers, 1874.

Stotz, Charles M. and Edward, Jr. \"A Preliminary Survey of the
Restoration of the LeMoyne House and the Establishment of Headquarters
for the Washington County Historical Society and its Historical
Collections.\" February 12, 1944, typescript, Washington County
Historical Society.

Washington *Reporter* for July 3, 1820, August 7, 1820, October 9, 1820.

**Recollections & Memoirs**

Asbury, John T. \"The Asbury Legend,\" typescript, n.d., Washington
County Historical Society.

Mitchell, Osborne. \"About the Stormy Days Before the War,\" Washington
*Reporter* August 8, 1908.

Recollection of Roy Sarver, July 3, 1996, typescript, Washington County
Historical Society.

Recollection of Judy Black, recorded by Blanch Slates, July 26, 1996,
typescript, Washington County Historical Society.

Ruzika, Joan. Notes on Boyd Crumrine papers, n.d., manuscript,
Washington County Historical Society.

Wallace, Howard. \"Historical Sketch of the Underground Railroad from
Uniontown to Pittsburgh,\" n.d., Washington County Historical Society.

**Secondary Materials**

Bell, Raymond M. \"Washington County, Pennsylvania, in the Eighteenth
Century Anti-Slavery Movement,\" *Western Pennsylvania Historical
Magazine* 25 (September 1942): 125-142.

Blockson, Charles. *The Underground Railroad.* New York: Prentice Hall,
1987.

\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_. \"\'A Missing Link\'; The History of African
Americans in Pennsylvania,\" *Pennsylvania Folklife* 44 (Autumn 1994):
2-16.

Burns, Edward M. \"Slavery in Western Pennsylvania,\" *Western
Pennsylvania Historical Magazine* 8 (1925): 204-214.

Chase, Henry. *In Their Footsteps: The \'American Visions\' Guide to
African-American Heritage Sites.* New York: Henry Holt & Co., 1994.

Crumine, Boyd A. *History of Washington County, Pennsylvania.*
Philadelphia: L. H. Everts & Co., 1882.

Dumond, Dwight Lowell. *Antislavery: The Crusade for Freedom in
America.* Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1961.

Duncan, John S. \"John Brown in Western Pennsylvania,\" *Western
Pennsylvania Historical Magazine* 18 (1935): 278-288.

Forrest, Earle R. *History of Washington County.* Chicago: The S. J.
Clarke Publishing Co., 1926.

Forrest, Earl. *The House of Romance.* Washington, PA: Washington County
Historical Society, 1964.

\"Freedom Seekers: Underground Railroad Travelled through Valley,\"
*Monongahela Valley Review* (February 1993): 8-9.

McCulloch, Margaret C. *Fearless Advocate of the Right: the Life of
Francis Julius LeMoyne, M.D., 1798-1879.* Boston: The Christopher
Publishing House, 1941.

McFarland, Joseph. *20th Century History of the City of Washington and
Washington County, Pennsylvania.* Chicago: Richmond-Arnold Publishing
Co., 1910.

Molter, Dave. \"Area Man Recalls Woman Who Taught Him About Life,\"
Washington *Observer-Reporter* July 29, 1990, pg B3.

Sajna, Michael. \"Underground Railroad Leaves Tracks in Southwestern
Pennsylvania,\" Washington *Tribune-Review* February 25, 1990.

Stotz, Charles Morse. *The Architectural Heritage of Early Western
Pennsylvania: A Record of Building before 1860.* Pittsburgh: University
of Pittsburgh Press, 1966.

Turner, Edward R. \"The Abolition of Slavery in Pennsylvania,\"
*Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography* 36 (1912): 129-142.

Washington *Observer-Reporter* October 15, 1987.

Washington *Tribune-Review* February 25, 1990.

Previous documentation on file (NPS):

Preliminary Determination of Individual Listing (36 CFR 67) has been
requested.

[x]{.underline} Previously Listed in the National Register.

Previously Determined Eligible by the National Register.

Designated a National Historic Landmark.

Recorded by Historic American Buildings Survey: \#

Recorded by Historic American Engineering Record: \#

Primary Location of Additional Data:

[x]{.underline} State Historic Preservation Office

Other State Agency

Federal Agency

Local Government

University

Other (Specify Repository):

**[10. GEOGRAPHICAL DATA]{.underline}**

Acreage of Property: less than one acre

UTM References: Zone Easting Northing

18 564340 4446460

Verbal Boundary Description:

> The boundary conforms to the current city lot parcel \#
> 740-006-00-01-0010-0-0.

Boundary Justification:

> The nominated property consists of the lot now owned by the Washington
> County Historical Society and historically associated with the
> property owned by Dr. F. Julius LeMoyne.

**[11. FORM PREPARED BY]{.underline}**

Name/Title: Carol Lee, Historian and Dan G. Deibler, Chief, Division of
Preservation Services, Bureau for Historic Preservation, Pennsylvania
Historical & Museum Commission

Telephone: 717/783-8947

Date: August 13, 1996

Edited by: Patty Henry and Marie Tyler-McGraw

National Historic Landmarks Survey

National Park Service

P.O. Box 37127, Suite 310

Washington, DC 20013-7127

Telephone: 202/343-8163

\* A photograph of the LeMoyne House is available on the National
Register of Historic Places' Web site at:
www.cr.nps.gov/nr/underground/pa1.htm.

NATIONAL HISTORIC LANDMARKS SURVEY

December 8, 1997

**List of Photographs**

The following information is the same for all photographs:

1\. F. Julius LeMoyne House

2\. Washington County, PA

3\. Dan G. Deibler

5\. PA SHPO office

4\. June 26, 1996

6\. Main facade exterior, facing north

7\. #1

4\. August 1, 1996

6\. Main facade exterior, facing northeast

7\. #2

4\. August 1, 1996

6\. Covered roof deck interior, facing west

7\. #3

4\. June 26, 1996

6\. Front entrance interior, facing south

7\. #4

4\. June 26, 1996

6\. Main bedroom (southeast room, 2d floor) facing northeast

7\. #5

4\. June 26, 1996

6\. Drawing room (southeast room 1st floor) facing northeast

7\. #6

4\. June 26, 1996

6\. Current library (northeast room 1st floor) facing east

7\. #7

**List of Slides**

The following information is the same for all slides:

1\. F. Julius LeMoyne House

2\. Washington County, PA

3\. Dan G. Deibler

4\. June 26, 1996

5\. PA SHPO office

6\. Facade and streetscape, facing northwest

7\. #1

6\. Main faced, facing north

7\. #2

6\. Principal entrance, facing north

7\. #3

6\. Rear elevation with service wing, facing southwest

7\. #4

6\. Rear elevation with service wing, facing southeast

7\. #5

6\. Drawing room (southeast room, 1st floor) facing northeast

7\. #6

6\. Current library (northeast room, 1st floor) facing northeast

7\. #7

6\. Pharmacy/apothecary shop (southwest room, 1st floor)

7\. #8

6\. Current dining room (northwest room, 1st floor)

7\. #9

6\. Hall door to pharmacy, 1st floor, facing west

7\. #10

6\. 1st & 2d floor halls from stair landing, facing south

7\. #11

6\. Main bedroom (southeast room, 2d floor) facing southeast

7\. #12

[^1]: Charles M. and Edward Stotz, Jr., \"A Preliminary Survey of the
    Restoration of the LeMoyne House and the Establishment of
    Headquarters for the Washington County Historical Society and Its
    Historical Collections,\" February 12, 1944, typescript, Washington
    County Historical Society, n.p. Stotz recommended two phases of
    restoration: Program A, refinishing four principal first floor rooms
    and stairhalls; and Program B, complete restoration and overhaul to
    include the construction of museum and library facilities.

[^2]: *Washington, Washington County, Pennsylvania.* T. Doran, 1855.
    Washington County Historical Society.

[^3]: *Insurance Maps of Washington, Washington County, Pennsylvania.*
    Sanborn-Perris Map Company, 1880, 1891, 1896, 1900. *Map of
    Washington, Washington County, Pennsylvania.* J.A. Caldwell, 1876.
    Washington County Historical Society.

[^4]: Margaret C. McCulloch, *Fearless Advocate of the Right: the Life
    of Francis Julius LeMoyne, M.D., 1798-1879.* (Boston: The
    Christopher Publishing House, 1941).

[^5]: *Miller v Dwilling,* September 26, 1826, in Thomas Sergeant &
    William Rawle, Jr., *Reports of Cases Adjudged in the Supreme Court
    of Pennsylvania.* Vol. XIV, 3rd ed. (Philadelphia: Kay & Brother,
    1874): 441-446.

[^6]: Papers of F. J. LeMoyne, Box A 24, Folder 3; McFarland, p 131;
    Forrest, pp. 419-22.

[^7]: Notices announcing meetings appeared in the Washington *Reporter*
    on July 3, 1820, August 7, 1820, October 9, 1820, and December 29,
    1823. Earle R. Forrest, *History of Washington County.* (Chicago:
    The S. J. Clarke Publishing Co., 1926): 415-416. Joseph McFarland,
    *20th Century History of the City of Washington and Washington
    County, Pennsylvania.* (Chicago: Richmond-Arnold Publishing Co.,
    1910): 130; Raymond M. Bell, \"Washington County, Pennsylvania, the
    Eighteenth Century Anti-slavery Movement,\" *Western Pennsylvania
    Historical Magazine,* 25 (September 1942): 125-142.

[^8]: See McCulloch, pp. 112-115, 122; Papers of F. J. LeMoyne, Box A24,
    Folder 3.

[^9]: McCulloch, pp. 116-119. On one occasion, Julius outfaced and
    dispersed a hostile crowd by stationing his son on the roof deck of
    the house with instructions to push one of the beehives onto the
    hecklers if they became too threatening.

[^10]: Papers of F. J. LeMoyne, (1830-1850), Box A24, Folders 1, 3, 4,
    6. Washington County Historical Society.

[^11]: Papers of F. J. LeMoyne, Box A23, Folders 3, 5, 7.

[^12]: McCulloch, p. 145.

[^13]: Papers of F. J. LeMoyne, Box A24, Folders 1-6.

[^14]: Papers of F. J. LeMoyne, Box A24, Folders 4, 5, 8, 11.

[^15]: McCulloch, p. 163.

[^16]: Papers of F. J. LeMoyne, Anti-slavery Papers, Box A23, Folder 7,
    Box A24, Folder 4.

[^17]: McCulloch, p. 137.

[^18]: No analysis exists of the possible configurations the Underground
    network might have taken in Washington County, or their connecting
    links outside the county. The most comprehensive recollection of the
    Underground Railroad in Washington County is by Howard Wallace, an
    African American man born in West Pike Run Twp in 1831 (died 1926).
    Wallace recounts some general routes of the Underground through the
    county and the people publicly associated with it. Major escape
    routes entered Pennsylvania through Fayette and Greene Counties from
    Morgantown, Virginia; through Fayette County from Cumberland,
    Maryland over the National Road; and through Washington County from
    Wheeling, Uniontown, or Waynesburg. Three main routes ran through
    Washington County via West Middletown, Washington, and Brownsville
    to points north and west. Howard Wallace, \"Historical Sketch of the
    Underground railroad from Uniontown to Pittsburgh,\" n.d.,
    photocopy, Washington County Historical Society. Also see: Osborne
    Mitchell, \"About the Stormy Days Before the War,\" Washington
    *Reporter,* August 8, 1908; McFarland, p. 129; Forrest, pp. 424-7;
    Washington *Tribune-Review*, February 25, 1990; \"Freedom Seekers:
    Underground Railroad Travelled through Valley,\" *Monongahela Valley
    Review,* (February 1993): 8-9; John T. Asbury, \"The Asbury
    Legend,\" typescript, n.d., Washington County Historical Society.

[^19]: Forrest, 426; McFarland, p. 129; Crumrine, p. 261; Mitchell, n.p;
    \"Freedom Seekers,\" pp. 8-9. The established free black communities
    in Washington County warrant further investigation for identifying
    possible Underground operations. The Washington County Historical
    Society collected photographs of four possible extant Underground
    sites owned by whites in Washington County: the Beels Farm, across
    from the railroad depot in West Alexander, the McKeever House in
    West Middletown, at 56 East Main Street; the McKeever House outside
    West Middletown at 1824 Seminary Road; and the McKehan House in West
    Alexander.

[^20]: Thomas Lee to LeMoyne & Templeton, May 8, 1847. Papers of F. J.
    LeMoyne, Box A24, Folder 1.

[^21]: Nelson Talbourt Gant to F. Julius LeMoyne, June 6, 1847. Papers
    of F. J. LeMoyne, Box A24, Folder 1, Washington County Historical
    Society.

[^22]: Unattributed manuscript, miscellaneous file, Washington County
    Historical Society.

[^23]: Joan Ruzika, Undated notes on Boyd Crumrine papers, manuscript,
    Washington County Historical Society. In his published history,
    Crumrine explained that \"It is still too soon to make known the
    names of \[white\] persons who assumed the responsibility of caring
    for and aiding these fugitives on their way. \... \[but\] no one
    would impute much wrong to the colored man who became the conductor
    of his brethren from slavery to freedom.\" Boyd A. Crumrine,
    *History of Washington County, Pennsylvania.* (Philadelphia: L. H.
    Everts & Co., 1882): 261.

[^24]: McCulloch, p. 159; McCulloch prefaces this story with the
    unsupported statement that \"for years his house had served as a
    station on the Underground Railroad.\" This story has been
    transformed in retelling into two different stories. One version has
    six fugitives hiding under the bed while Madelaine Bureau LeMoyne
    forbade entry to the slave catchers; the other puts 25 or 26
    fugitives in a secret attic room. See the Washington County
    Historical Society Docent Guide, typescript, n.d.

[^25]: Dave Molter, \"Area Man Recalls Woman Who Taught Him About
    Life,\" Washington *Observer-Reporter,* July 29, 1990, pg B3.
    (memoir of Curtis Henderson)

[^26]: Recollection of Roy Sarver, Washington County Historical Society,
    July 3, 1996. The usual body of Underground Railroad legend
    involving secret rooms and tunnels has grown up around the LeMoyne
    house, in this case specifically focusing on an undocumented
    dumbwaiter. The Historical Society staff consider that a closet near
    the fireplace in the former dining room/current library is the
    location of the dumbwaiter, which would have connected the original
    basement kitchen with the dining room above it. However, in his
    survey and report on the condition of the LeMoyne House prepared for
    the Historical Society in 1944, Charles Stotz made no reference to
    the existence of either a closet or a dumbwaiter. Judy Black, the
    daughter of the woman who cared for Madeleine LeMoyne Reed before
    her death, confirms a dumbwaiter from the basement kitchen did
    exist. But she also claims the existence of a dumbwaiter in the
    basement door area under the existing stairs. According to Judy
    Black\'s narrative the escaping slaves entered the house via the
    well, through a tunnel to the basement, and up the dumbwaiter to the
    third floor. Recollection of Judy Black, recorded by Blanch Slates,
    Washington County Historical Society, July 26, 1996, typescript.