Chapter 21
[711 Prince Street. Owner: Mrs. Andrew Pickens.]
Alexandria was never a large town. The thrifty merchants of this Scottish trading center built well, and their dwellings abound in architectural interest, but really great houses are rare. On the 700 block of Prince Street, behind a picket fence, guarded by a tall magnolia and several gnarled box trees stands what is called in England a "Georgian cottage," which in Alexandria is an important house.
On November 2, 1797, William Thornton Alexander and Lucy, his wife, sold to James Patron, of Fairfax County, half an acre of land situated in Fairfax County in the state of Virginia, adjacent to the town of Alexandria and bounded as follows:
Vizt: On the South by Prince Street, on the West by Columbus Street. Beginning at the corner formed by the intersection of the East side of Columbus Street and with the North side of Prince Street and running Eastwardly with Prince Street 123 feet 5 inches, thence Northerly and parallel with Columbus Street one hundred and seventy six feet seven inches, thence Westerly and parallel with Prince Street 123 feet 5 inches thence Southerly with Columbus Street to the point of beginning.[179]
This was subject forever to a ground rent of £30 in good and lawful money of Virginia. On this lot James Patton erected a type of house well known locally as a "flounder," because of its narrow width. Such a building was usually set back from the street, anticipating fuller architectural development when the flounder became the ell of the larger house. Patton's home, though diminutive, was comfortable and it had convenient gardens and pleasant surroundings. Here he lived until overtaken by that ogre of all Alexandria shipping merchants—compound interest.
He became indebted to the firm of Marsteller & Young to the amount of ten thousand dollars and sundry notes discounted for his use at the Bank of Alexandria to the amount of nine thousand dollars. To afford full indemnity, he sold in November 1809, to Robert I. Taylor, twenty-five shares of Potomac Bank stock, six shares of Little River Turnpike stock, ten shares of Great Hunting Creek bridge stock, a house and lot on Fairfax Street, and two squares of ground under the charter of Alexandria, adjoining Spring Gardens, bought of Jesse Sims, and the brig John of Alexandria. Also relinquished to Taylor in the settlement of his debts was the half-acre on Prince and Columbus Streets "with the buildings and improvements thereupon erected."[180]
A year later William Fowle with "the consent and concurrance of all parties," purchased the said lot of ground and improvements from James Patton at the price of $6,550.
William Fowle had come to Alexandria in 1800 from Boston to enter, as a partner, the important shipping firm which became Lawrason & Fowle. He married Miss Esther Taylor, daughter of George Taylor of Broomalaw and they are purported to have had eighteen children, eight of whom they reared to maturity. Fowle's father-in-law is remembered as the last gentleman in Alexandria to hold to the fashion of knee breeches and silk stockings. As he lived well into the nineteenth century, his figure clad in "short clothes" and leaning upon a high cane (similar to those associated with the Court of Louis XVI) was a familiar sight upon the streets of Alexandria long after such a costume had become a curiosity. Taylor entertained no idea of giving up the habits of his ancestors, nor of complying with any such folderol as high choker collars and pantaloons so tightly strapped under a gentleman's gaiters that someone had to invent a machine for jumping into them.