Visualising the Virginia 'frontier' and its early colonial settlers, it is easy to imagine only wooden stockades and log cabins. But as early as the mid-18th Century, some very substantial and noteworthy buildings were constructed, some of which still stand today as witness to the ambitions and ingenuity of the first Englishmen in the region. An imposing dwelling-house, Abram's Delight, built in Winchester in 1754 by the son of the area's first white settler, is an interesting example.
The Lower Shenandoah Valley
In the early 18th Century, large portions of the Virginia colony were not yet settled by Europeans. The area between the Potomac and Rappahanock rivers was owned mostly, from the English point of view, by Lord Fairfax; the majority of people living there belonged in fact to the Shawnee tribe, which had been there for over 12,000 years. In 1729 Quakers from Pennsylvania moved down into the region to settle. The town they built, called at first Frederick Town (after the father of George III) and later Winchester, was to become an important trading centre and a strategic site in both the Revolutionary and the Civil War.
The first among these settlers was Abraham Hollingsworth, a Quaker from Cecil County, Maryland, whose grandfather Valentine Hollingsworth had brought the family to Pennsylvania with William Penn in 1682. When Abraham came to a site by the lake where the Shawnee were encamped near a brook, he exclaimed that the place was 'a delight to behold'.
Abraham purchased 582 acres: first from Lord Fairfax and then from the Shawnee, paying them a cow, a calf, and a bolt of red cloth. On the site he erected a log cabin and added a grist mill. The success of the grist mill led to the construction of two other mills, one for flour and one for flax-seed oil. Abraham died in 1748, and the land on which the cabin stood was inherited by his youngest son Isaac, who in 1754 built an imposing house on the site which he called Abram's Delight, in honour of his father.
Abram's Delight
A number of Isaac's neighbours were building too, and Isaac engaged the popular stonemason Simon Taylor, who also built several other houses around Winchester, for Abram's Delight.
The original house was built on a two-over-two floor plan with centre passage; this was a popular style with the early settlers. The walls, two and-a-half feet thick, are of blue-grey native limestone.
As time went on, the house underwent alterations. Around 1800 a two-storey west wing was added by Jonah Hollingsworth, who needed more room to house his fifteen children. In 1830, the facade was modernised, and Greek Revival trim was added.
Haunted? And a Museum Piece
Jonah's daughter Mary, the last Hollingsworth to live in Abram's Delight, claimed that it was haunted. She often heard singing and piano-playing in the empty house. There have been ghost sightings in the house during its period as a museum, as well.
By 1943, when Abram's Delight was acquired by the City of Winchester, the house was in ruins. It has subsequently been restored and now serves as the headquarters of the Winchester-Frederick County Historical Society, and a museum of early life in Winchester.
A model log cabin and mill show the manner in which Abraham Hollingsworth first lived in the place he considered 'a delight to behold'.
Winchester History
Abram's Delight is only one of many buildings in Winchester of historical significance. During the Revolutionary War both George Washington and General Daniel Morgan had their headquarters there. The Civil War General Stonewall Jackson was also headquarted in Winchester. In both wars Winchester was considered to be of strategic importance.
Winchester, in the Lower Shenandoah Valley, is noted for its fine apple orchards and for a landscape that is still remarkably beautiful.
If You Go...
Abram's Delight is located at 1340 South Pleasant Valley Road in Winchester, Virginia. The museum is open 1 April - 31 October: Monday to Saturday 10am - 4pm; Sunday 12pm - 4pm. Tickets are $5 for adults with discounts for students and seniors, and tours are available. For a map and driving directions, consult superpages.
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