Dining Room
In the 1790’s, the dining room, an area specifically delegated for daily meals and formal repasts, was a fairly new development in America. Hence, the Hands were up-to-date with new fashions in room usage. The dining table is a Pennsylvania piece in the Hepplewhite style made of mahogany with walnut inlay. It dates to about 1790.
The inventory listed two “stained ends” similar to the two parts of the dining room table. There probably was also a three-leaf center section similar to one of the large drop leaf tables located between the windows. This third piece was used as needed for extending the table to accommodate the thirteen chairs listed for this room.
The painted, yellow-ochre rod-back Pennsylvania Windsor chairs were in vogue in the 1790's and were manufactured for more than 30 years. Yellow was a popular color and was applied to many pieces of furniture in the Federal period. These chairs are commonly called bamboo birdcage Windsors today, and they exemplify the Hands’ desire to keep up with current trends.
The most expensive furnishing in the inventory was a clock similar to the one located in the corner. It is a fine example of an eight-day, quarter-hour, chiming tall case clock. Due to the style of the carving, it is believed that the walnut case was made in Lancaster. The engraved brass dial is signed by Isaac Thomas (1721-1802) of Willistown, Chester County, Pennsylvania.
Three pairs of Sheffield plate (silver over copper or brass) candlesticks were listed for this room. One, a large pair, was probably like the three branch candelabra, and two smaller pairs, like the ones on the side tables.
Over the fireplace hangs a copy of Gilbert Stuart’s famed “Athenaeum Portrait” of George Washington. by Spiridione Gambardella (1815-1886) who worked in both England and America in the early Victorian period and who painted many luminaries, including the Duke of Wellington. This painting is a “stand-in” for Hand’s “Picture of General Washington, Gilt Frame” listed in the estate inventory and believed to have been an original Gilbert Stuart.
Also listed in this room were two gilt “looking glasses.” The pair of Chippendale mirrors with their golden bird (phoenix) carvings that are on the walls now would not have been the most current fashion at that time but were still listed with a high value in the inventory.
A personal sense of the Hand children survives in this room: on a pane of glass in the left hand window, opposite the doorway from the entry, are the scratched names of John Hand and Sarah Hand.