Manship House Is Southern Star of Gothic Revival
In the early 1830s, Charles Henry Manship pulled up stakes in his native Maryland and came to this Deep South city to seek his fortune. A decorative painter, he was to leave his mark on Jackson in a big way.
The town, then a fledgling state capital, was in the midst of a building boom. Manship found work soon after his arrival on the construction of what is now the Old Capitol. But before long the handsome, dark-haired newcomer went into business for himself, opening a shop where he sold paints and fine wallpaper as well as his skills as a decorative artist.
As Jackson continued to grow, Manship’s business flourished and he became one of the town’s leading merchants and artisans. During his long and productive life he also served Jackson in many public offices, including the post of mayor during the Civil War.
Gothic Revival Villa
Perhaps his greatest legacy to his adopted hometown, however, is the olive-colored “cottage villa” with cream Gothic trim that he built in 1857 on what was then a four-acre lot in a sparsely settled neighborhood. A rare Southern example of Gothic Revival style, it served not only as a residence for him and his large family but as a showcase for his decorative talents.
Through techniques of graining and marbling with paints, Manship made ordinary pine doors look like rich mahogany or oak, gave pine mantelpieces the appearance of black-and-gold marble and turned wooden baseboards into elegant slate.
He also added his own distinctive touches to the house’s architectural design, including a raised foundation, central hall and floor-to-ceiling windows to improve the ventilation and keep the house cooler during Mississippi’s sweltering summers.
Refreshing Change
Today, faithfully restored and operated as a house museum by the state, it is a refreshing change from the white-columned, antebellum Greek Revival mansions for which Mississippi is better known. Besides its architectural and decorative novelty, the Manship House offers an close look at a seldom seen side of 19th-Century Southern home life: that of a prosperous but unpretentious merchant-class family.
Gothic Revival, which is characterized by steeply pitched roofs and pointed-arch windows, reached its zenith as an architectural style in the United States between 1840 and 1860. Although it was extremely popular in the Yankee Northeast, it never caught on widely below the Mason-Dixon Line.
Manship apparently took the design of his home from an 1850 architectural pattern book, “The Architecture of Country Houses” by A. J. Downing, a leading exponent of Gothic Revival. A house almost identical to Manship’s is pictured in the book.
Inside the Manship House are three bedrooms, a parlor, sitting room, dining room and--unusual for the time--an indoor bathing room.
Golden Anniversary
The interior has been refurbished to appear as it did around 1888, the year Manship and his wife, Adaline Daley Manship, celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary with their 10 surviving children.
Many of the furnishings are original, including the marble-topped center table in the parlor around which the family often gathered in the evening to read to each other. The sideboard in the dining room and the print of Confederate President Jefferson Davis above it also are original. The print was a gift to Manship from Davis.
Photographs, diaries, letters and contemporary news accounts supplied information about many of the interior details, but family recollecdions were even more helpful. Members of the Manship family lived in the house continuously from the time it was built until it was acquired by the state archives and history department in 1975.
One sees examples of Manship’s wood graining and marbling skills throughout the house, painstakingly restored by Malcolm Robson, a fifth-generation decorative artist from Surrey, England.
His Favorite Room
Manship’s greatest undertaking was the dining room, his favorite spot and the largest room in the house. There the walls were plastered, covered with heavy wallpaper and then painted and grained from floor to ceiling to resemble oak paneling.
To create the effect, a graining color was applied to a golden base coat that covered the wallpaper. While the graining color was still wet, a Chinese hog-hair “flogger” was dragged over it and flogged, leaving behind the flecked appearance of oak.
Next, metal combs of various sizes were pulled over the graining color to complete the raw oak look. Pencil brushes then were used to apply dark and light figuring. Finally, coats of varnish were applied for protection and luster.
The house is more than just a restoration, however. It also is an effort to interpret the everyday life of the Manships.
In June, for example, the house goes into the “summer dress” that was traditional in Dixie in the days before air conditioning. To give the interior a light, airy look, heavy draperies and rugs are replaced by lace curtains and straw matting and the upholstered chairs and sofas are fitted with unbleached muslin slipcovers. Gilt-framed pictures and the gilt dining room chandelier are shrouded in mosquito netting to protect the gold finish from damage by flies and other insects.
Victorian Christmas
In winter the house takes on an old-fashioned Victorian Christmas appearance. Garlands of fragrant pine and ivy wreath doorways and light fixtures. A tall, gaily decorated evergreen tree fills the parlor; candles and kerosene lamps light the rooms.
To make the scene come even more alive, a Victorian-style Christmas Eve celebration is enacted on one night each December at the house by the eighth-grade class of Cleta Ellington, a direct descendant of Manship’s who teaches at St. Richard’s school.
The youngsters, dressed in period costumes, carry on the same types of Christmas Eve activities the Manship children might have. They make toys, wrap gifts, trim the tree, tell Christmas stories and set the dining room table for the holiday meal.
The Christmas season is an exciting time to visit Jackson. Besides the special events at the Manship house there are a wide variety of other yuletide festivities, including bonfires and caroling on the banks of the Old Pearl River, an outdoor “singing Christmas tree” concert at Belhaven University and traditional performances of “Nutcracker,” “Messiah” and “A Christmas Carol.”
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The Manship House is open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday; admission is free. Tours of the home begin at the adjacent visitor’s center, which contains interpretive exhibits on Manship and his family and on 19th-Century decorative arts.
The house is at 420 E. Fortification St., Jackson, Miss. 39202, (601) 961-4724. From downtown Jackson, go north on Interstate 55 to the Fortification Street exit, then turn right and drive about eight blocks to the house. Enter the parking area from North Congress Street, which runs along the east side of the property.
One-day workshops that cover a range of Victorian home life subjects, from setting tables and folding napkins to adorning the home and playing 19th-Century parlor games, are held throughout the year. They also are free. Participation is limited, however, so call ahead for reservations.
For information on other attractions and events in Jackson, contact the Jackson Convention & Visitors Bureau, P.O. Box 1450, Jackson, Miss. 39205, (601) 960-1891.
