The Gen. Horatio Gates House and Golden Plough Tavern are two connecting historic buildings located in downtown
York
York is a cathedral city with Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. It is the historic county town of Yorkshire. The city has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a ...
,
York County, Pennsylvania
York County ( Pennsylvania Dutch: Yarrick Kaundi) is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 456,438. Its county seat is York. The county was created on August 19, 1749, from part of Lancaster ...
. The buildings were restored between July 1961 and June 1964,
and operated as a museum by the York County History Center.
Gates house
The General Horatio Gates House was built by Joseph Chambers in 1751, and connected to the Golden Plough Tavern through a shared kitchen. It is a -story, brick and
limestone
Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...
dwelling in the
Georgian
Georgian may refer to:
Common meanings
* Anything related to, or originating from Georgia (country)
** Georgians, an indigenous Caucasian ethnic group
** Georgian language, a Kartvelian language spoken by Georgians
**Georgian scripts, three scrip ...
-style. It was the home of General
Horatio Gates
Horatio Lloyd Gates (July 26, 1727April 10, 1806) was a British-born American army officer who served as a general in the Continental Army during the early years of the Revolutionary War. He took credit for the American victory in the Battl ...
(1727–1806), while the
Second Continental Congress convened in York, September 30, 1777, to June 27, 1778.
Tavern
The Golden Plough Tavern was built by Martin Eichelberger in 1741 and is a two-story, Germanic influenced medieval style building. The tavern is quite significant for its age and social history but is also an exceptional museum of
historic carpentry and
vernacular architecture
Vernacular architecture is building done outside any academic tradition, and without professional guidance. This category encompasses a wide range and variety of building types, with differing methods of construction, from around the world, bo ...
.
The ground floor wall construction is a rare type which blends
timber framing
Timber framing (german: Holzfachwerk) and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and joined timbers with joints secured by large wooden ...
with
log building
Log buildings and structures can be categorized as historic and modern. A diverse selection of their forms and styles with examples of architectural elements is discussed in the following articles:
*Log cabin – a rustic dwelling
*Log house – a ...
. These walls are framed and the spaces between the posts are ''infilled'' with
hewn
In woodworking, hewing is the process of converting a log from its rounded natural form into lumber (timber) with more or less flat surfaces using primarily an axe. It is an ancient method, and before the advent of the industrial-era type of ...
beams, each beam fitted into its own mortise, and the gaps between the beams ''chinked'' with stones and mud like a
log cabin. This construction technique is similar to timber framing infilled with planks known by many names including
post-and-plank
The method of building wooden buildings with a traditional timber frame with horizontal plank or log infill has many names, the most common of which are piece sur piece (French. Also used to describe log building), corner post construction, p ...
.
The upper walls are
''half timbered'' in a Germanic style with
brick nog and
wattle and daub
Wattle and daub is a composite building method used for making walls and buildings, in which a woven lattice of wooden strips called wattle is daubed with a sticky material usually made of some combination of wet soil, clay, sand, animal dung a ...
infill. Half timbered buildings in America are relatively rare, generally found in some areas settled by German immigrants.
The roof structure is framed with a Germanic type of truss called a
liegender stuhl directly translated as a "lying chair" where ''chair'' has the general meaning of ''support''. Liegender stuhl trusses in Europe are found in Switzerland and Germany.
The
wood shingle
Wood shingles are thin, tapered pieces of wood primarily used to cover roofs and walls of buildings to protect them from the weather. Historically shingles, also known as shakes, were split from straight grained, knot free ''bolts'' of wood. T ...
s on the roof are also a rare type for America.
The
Barnett Bobb Log House was moved to this location in 1968.
[ ''Note:'' This includes ]
It was added to the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...
in 1971.
Gallery
File:Photocopy of drawing (from York County Historical Society) William Wagner, artist ca. 1830 SOUTH FRONT AND WEST SIDE (TAVERN ON FAR LEFT; JOSEPH CHAMBERS HOUSE ADJOINING ON RIGHT) HABS PA,67-YORK,12-9.tif, Circa-1830 drawing of the buildings, York County Historical Society.
File:Gen Gates House York PA.JPG, Gen. Gates House, November 2010
File:Golden Plow York PA.JPG, Golden Plough Tavern, November 2010
See also
*
Conway Cabal
The Conway Cabal was a group of senior Continental Army officers in late 1777 and early 1778 who aimed to have George Washington replaced as commander-in-chief of the Army during the American Revolutionary War. It was named after Brigadier Gene ...
*
References
External links
York County History Center website
Continental Congress
Commercial buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania
Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania
Commercial buildings completed in 1741
1741 establishments in Pennsylvania
Georgian architecture in Pennsylvania
Taverns in Pennsylvania
Taverns in the American Revolution
Pennsylvania in the American Revolution
Buildings and structures in York, Pennsylvania
Museums in York County, Pennsylvania
American Revolutionary War museums in Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania state historical marker significations
Houses in York County, Pennsylvania
National Register of Historic Places in York County, Pennsylvania
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