Overview
Fatland, also known as Fatland Farm, Vaux Hall, Fatland Ford, and most recently, Vaux Hill, is a Greek Revival mansion and estate in Audubon, Pennsylvania. Located on the north side of the Schuylkill River, opposite Valley Forge, the property was part of the Continental Army's 1777–78 winter encampment. On consecutive days in September 1777, its stone farmhouse served as headquarters for General George Washington and British General Sir William Howe. The farmhouse was demolished about 1843, and the mansion built on its site was completed about 1845. The Wetherill Family owned the property for 121 years—1825 to 1946. A private cemetery contains the graves of some of Fatland's owners, and of Free Quakers who supported the Revolutionary War.
Fatland Farm
The Perkiomen Creek empties in to the Schuylkill River just north of Valley Forge. The river curves in an oxbow and forms a peninsula with the creek. Early settlers called the area the "Fatlands of Egypt" because of its frequent flooding and rich alluvial soil. James Morgan dammed the creek and built a grist mill and miller's house on the north side of the Perkiomen Peninsula in 1749. This auction took place, but neither property sold. Instead, James Vaux (1748–1842) purchased Fatland Farm by private sale more than a year later, on June 18, 1772.
Vaux Hall
Vaux renamed the property "Vaux Hall." The 300-acre (121.4 hectares) farm spanned the middle of the peninsula. Part of its western boundary, shared with Henry Pawling's farm, was the road south to Fatland Ford, a shallow crossing of the Schuylkill River, opposite Valley Forge. Vaux was an English farmer and Quaker, who emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1771. He expanded the existing stone farmhouse in 1776, The following year he married Susanna Warder (1749–1812) of Philadelphia, also a Quaker. Vaux invited Washington to dine and stay the night—the life guard secured Fatland Ford overnight. As Howe slept, the British Army began a night crossing from Valley Forge.
Montroser: " September 23rd. — Just after 12 o'clock this night the whole army moved to the opposite side, on the north side of the river Schuylkill by the way of Fatland Ford, and by 10 a. m. the whole baggage and all had happily passed it. After the principal body had got on the north side of the Schuylkill about one mile the army halted to dry themselves and rest."
Fatland Ford
By 1803, the farm was owned by James S. Ewing, who advertised it for sale in September. He listed its buildings: "... a dwelling-house 45x35 feet, built of stone, ... Smith's house and Shop, Ice house, spring house, poultry house, smoke house, large stone barn with stables for 40 head of horses and cows ..." Ewing sold the property to Englishman William Woodhouse Bakewell (1759–1821) who, with his wife, 4 daughters and 2 sons, and operated it as a gentleman's farm. Robert Sutcliff, a relative of Bakewell's estate manager, visited in August 1804: This plantation, consists of 300 acres of good land, 200 of which are cleared, and 100 covered with wood. On the estate is a well finished square stone house, about 15 yards 13.7 m in length, with a wide boarded floor piazza, both in back and front. These afford excellent accommodation during the summer season ...
Besides the dwelling house, there is an excellent kitchen, and offices adjoining; with a large barn, and stables sufficient to accommodate 40 horses and cows; all well built of stone. The estate extends the whole breadth betwixt the Schuylkill and Perkiomen. On the former river there is a Shad Fishery which is of considerable value ... This estate, with all its appendages, cost about 3600£ sterling, which is but 12£ per acre, the buildings included. The house is so situated that it commands one of the finest prospects in Pennsylvania, and, being on a rising ground, is dry and healthy. The whole together forms one of the most beautiful spots I have seen in the United States.
Audubon
Sutcliff also visited Mill Grove, then owned by Jean Audubon, a retired French sea captain living in Nantes, France. Lead deposits had been discovered on the farm, and Captain Audubon formed a partnership with French businessman Francis Dacosta to mine the ore. The next morning, the newlyweds departed for Louisville, where Audubon continued his short-lived career as a merchant. The sale was not successful; Bakewell was still the owner of the property when he died there in 1821. Lucy Green Bakewell had been buried at "Fatland Ford" in 1804. Bakewell remarried, and was initially buried in Philadelphia. His descendants later had him reinterred beside his first wife.
Fatland
Dacosta's lead mine initially was unprofitable, with costs too great to compete with imported lead from England. The War of 1812 caused imports to be cut off, and the price of lead in the United States to soar. Samuel Wetherill, Jr., a Philadelphia white lead importer and paint manufacturer, purchased Mill Grove for $7,000 in 1813. "These properties were improved with stately mansions and outbuildings with beautiful lawns and surroundings. (Also erected were summer residences on some of the properties.)" in a 1800 painting Possibly inspired by "Andalusia" (1834–36), Nicholas Biddle's great Greek Revival mansion on the Delaware River, designed by architect Benjamin Latrobe; "Fatland Hall" was designed by architect John Haviland for Dr. Wetherill, overlooking the Schuylkill River.
The size and arrangement of the mansion's center hall and formal rooms were similar to James Vaux's expanded farmhouse, He gave permission for William Bakewell's remains to be reinterred beside the first Mrs. Bakewell's remains at Fatland, He also delivered Mrs. Peary's daughter Marie, whom the popular press dubbed the "Snow Baby." An inveterate tinkerer, his diagnostic medical devices were awarded the 1906 Longstreth Medal by the Franklin Institute. He also invented navigational instruments for ships, and a musical instrument called a trombone flute. Dr. Wetherill never married, and was buried in the private cemetery. He was the last Wetherill to own Fatland.
Free Quaker - Wetherill Cemetery
Samuel Wetherill, Jr. provided supplies to the Continental Army at Valley Forge, and was "read out of meeting" (disowned) by the Society of Friends in 1779, after refusing to renounce those actions. Defying the pacifism of their religion, "Free Quakers" supported or fought in the Revolutionary War. Wetherill became a founder of Philadelphia's Free Quaker Meeting (chartered February 20, 1781), The meeting established its own burying ground, on the east side of 5th Street between Locust and Spruce Streets. Membership dwindled as the Free Quakers died off, and their meeting house was closed in 1836. As the turn of the 20th century approached, the Free Quaker Burying Ground plot became attractive for commercial development. It was in anticipation of the burying ground's sale that Col.
John Macomb Wetherill (Samuel Wetherill, Jr.'s great-grandson) directed in his 1895 will that the private cemetery at Fatland be expanded. In 1905, remains from sixty-one graves were removed from the Free Quaker Burying Ground and reinterred at Fatland. Included were those of Samuel Wetherill, Jr. and his wife and relatives, including Timothy Matlack, scribe of the Second Continental Congress—whose penmanship can be seen in the Declaration of Independence. Many of the tombstones had severely eroded, and were illegible or identifiable only by initials. The remains of Ira Allen, one of Vermont's Green Mountain Boys, had been lost with the closing of another Philadelphia cemetery, and his cenotaph also was moved to Fatland. Numerous Wetherill family members have been and continue to be buried in the private cemetery.
Saint Gabriel's Hall
On November 19, 1895, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia purchased a 185-acre tract of land adjacent to Fatland, to the west. Formerly part of Henry Pawling's farm, there the Archdiocese built the Philadelphia Protectory for Boys, an orphanage staffed by the Christian Brothers. Architects Wilson Brothers & Company designed its Italianate orange-brick-and-red-tile-roofed building, which included a tall campanile, or belltower. Archbishop Patrick John Ryan dedicated the building on May 8, 1898, with more than 3,000 in attendance. Operated by the Catholic Social Services of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, "St. Gabe's" is now a juvenile detention facility. Its border with Fatland follows the old path of Fatland Ford Road.
Camiel
Antiquarian Harold Donaldson Eberlein wrote about Fatland in 1912. He made himself a millionaire as a wholesale beer distributor. He was appointed one of five commissioners to the powerful Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission in 1975, serving on it until his death. State Senator Vince Fumo: "Pete was a pilot. I used to listen for hours in amazement, when he would tell the stories about how he found Fatland Farm, flying over it in a plane, hidden behind so many trees. He bought it and pulled all those trees out and made it into a showcase right next to Valley Forge Park." The Camiels spent several years renovating the mansion, rehabilitating the overgrown estate, and returning it to being a working farm. About 1950, they sold off a section along the south side of Pawlings Road, between the mansion and Saint Gabriel's Hall, for a housing development.
Pottstown Expressway
In 1951, following 138 years of family ownership, Herbert Johnson Wetherill sold Mill Grove to Montgomery County to create a bird sanctuary and house museum honoring John James Audubon. Twenty-five years later, it was announced that the planned route for the Pottstown Expressway was to go through the Audubon property. Camiel was credited with / blamed for applying political pressure to reroute the superhighway around the bird sanctuary: Central to the arguments concerning politicians appears to be the controversial "Camiel Loop." Montgomery County Planning Commission associate director Plutte said that the cost of rerouting the Pottstown Expressway around the home of Peter J. Camiel caused the price of the highway to jump from $5 million to $8 million, and most recently to more than $10 million in the past six months.
As the highway leaves the connection with Betzwood Bridge and aims northwest toward Pottstown, it veers sharply south sic west , down and around Camiel's farm, "Fatland." The parabolic dip in the road mean several miles of additional roadway, roadway that Pottstown was denied. Plutte said the Camiel loop was installed to avert a "potential challenge" arising out of an environmental study. Camiel's farm is near the Audubon Sanctuary, which according to original plans, would have had to surrender land to the highway crews. Federal funds, which pay for 70 percent of the Pottstown Expressway, could be jeopardized by the taking of the park land, Plutte said. Whether Camiel acted from selfish or selfless motives (or a combination of both), the rerouting of the Pottstown Expressway spared Mill Grove – now a National Historic Landmark – and minimized the adverse effect on Fatland.
The Camiels owned the property for 44 years, and were buried together in its private cemetery.
Vaux Hill
Camiel's land sales dramatically reduced Fatland's acreage—his housing development, land for the Pottstown Expressway, and his 1979 sale of 154 acres (62.3 hectare) between the expressway and the Schyulkill River to Valley Forge National Historical Park. On July 16, 1990, Robert Owen Safford (1934–2011) and his wife Barbara Harvey (b. 1947) purchased the mansion on 18 acres from Camiel for $2.1 million. The Saffords expanded the mansion, erecting a west wing and end pavilion that mirrored the east wing and end pavilion—thus creating an overall symmetrical building (for the first time). They remodeled the mansion's interior, and filled it with sumptuous European furniture and decorative arts. In February 2016, the asking price was reduced to $7 million. The current property was sold for $2.74 million on May 28, 2021.
Further reading
*Jennifer Anne Stark, The Pawling Farmhouse at Walnut Hill: Valley Forge National Park, masters thesis, University of Pennsylvania, December 1992. https://archive.org/stream/pawlingfarmhouse00star#page/n3/mode/2up *Rebecca Anne Hunt, Blessed Spot along the Perkiomen: An Historical Analysis of Mill Grove, dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1994.
External links
*Pottstown Expressway Historic Overview