John Carlyle's shell and silver snuffbox. Listed and described in the inventory of his estate
Carlyle bought the third lot put up for auction on July 13, 1749, No. 41, paying thirty pistoles. As the auction continued, he purchased another lot adjoining the first for sixteen pistoles. Upon his two lots he erected in 1752 the greatest private house in Alexandria for two or more decades, and furnished it with the best his ships could carry.
The Carlyle house stands high above the river and so strong and thick are the foundations that tradition has it they were early fortifications against the Indians. The house of stone is oblong, being almost as long again as it is wide and is believed originally to have had connecting wings. Two-and-a-half stories high, large twin chimneys rise out of the hipped roof and three dormer windows break the front and back. Double galleries stretch across the river end, and before modern buildings obstructed the view, the river could be viewed for miles in each direction.
Portrait of John Carlyle's mother, Rachel Carlyle, which hung always above her son's bed
Inside, a large hall divides the house. A stairway that has neither the appearance nor character of so old a house, and is doubtless an "improvement," winds up to the second floor. Four rooms open into this hall—fine rooms, too—but the blue or drawing room is the gem, architecturally and historically. This is paneled from floor to ceiling. There are three windows with low window seats and heavy paneled blinds which become a part of the jambs when closed. Over the doorways are elaborate pediments, with broken arches. The chair rail is carved in a fret pattern and the dog-eared fireplace mold in the familiar egg-and-dart design. In the overmantel, double dog-eared molding outlines the center panel and two flat fluted pilasters reach from mantelshelf to the heavy modillioned cornice which is carved in alternating modillions and rosettes. The room is sixteen by eighteen feet, painted a light slate blue with white or cream trim. On the second floor five comfortable bedchambers open upon a narrow hall.
To this home Carlyle brought his first wife, Sarah Fairfax, whom he married in 1748. She was the daughter of Colonel William Fairfax of Belvoir, sister of Ann Fairfax Washington and George William Fairfax. After her death in 1761, when Carlyle married Sybil West, he named their only son for his well loved brother-in-law, George William Fairfax. When his will was opened, it was by the side of Sarah he wished to be buried: "As to my Body, I desire it may be interred under the Tombstone in the enclosed ground in the Presbyterian Yard near where my first wife and children are interred."[76]
This house was the social and political center of Alexandria. Such men as Charles Carroll, Aaron Burr, John Paul Jones, John Marshall, Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, George Washington, and the two Fairfaxes are but a few of those who gathered here for good food, good wine, and better talk. Any visitor of importance was entertained at "coffee"; the house was often filled with music, and "balls" were common.
The "Congress of Alexandria" met here Monday, April 14, 1755, and on the following Tuesday and Wednesday, when with Braddock and the five colonial governors plans were made for concerted action against the French and Indians. Here that famous letter, still in existence, was written, urging upon the British government the necessity of taxing the colonies. This letter set into movement a chain of events disastrous to the mother country. It resulted in the loathed Stamp Act and led ultimately to the Revolution of 1775.