The New London Custom House is a historic
custom house
A custom house or customs house was traditionally a building housing the offices for a jurisdictional government whose officials oversaw the functions associated with importing and exporting goods into and out of a country, such as collecting c ...
at 150 Bank Street in
New London, Connecticut
New London is a seaport city and a port of entry on the northeast coast of the United States, located at the mouth of the Thames River in New London County, Connecticut. It was one of the world's three busiest whaling ports for several decades ...
, built in 1833-35. It was designed by
Robert Mills, one of the country's first formally trained architects. From 1839-40, the schooner ''
La Amistad
''La Amistad'' (; Spanish for ''Friendship'') was a 19th-century two- masted schooner, owned by a Spaniard colonizing Cuba. It became renowned in July 1839 for a slave revolt by Mende captives, who had been captured and sold to European slave ...
'', on which captured Africans meant for the slave trade rebelled, was impounded at a wharf behind the customhouse. It was listed on 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 v ...
for its architecture in 1970,
and is now a local museum covering the city's maritime history.
Description and history
The New London Custom House is located on New London's waterfront, facing north onto Bank Street east of its junction with Pearl Street. It is a three-story masonry structure, built out of dressed granite of differing colors. Due to sloping terrain, it presents two stories to Bank Street and three to Water Street, which separates it from the waterfront. It has corner pilasters shaped out of light granite, and its main entrance is sheltered by a porch with round columns and pilasters made of more smoothly finished light granite. A stringcourse of light granite separates the upper floors, and the top-floor windows have projecting cornices over the lintels. The door is fashioned out of wood that was once used in the
USS ''Constitution''.
The custom house was built in 1833 to a design by
Robert Mills, who was then employed by the federal government. The granite for its construction was taken from the Millstone Quarry in
Waterford, Connecticut
Waterford is a town in New London County, Connecticut, United States. It is named after Waterford, Ireland. The population was 19,571 at the 2020 census. The town center is listed as a census-designated place (CDP) and had a population of 3,074 ...
.
The building was still in use as a customs office at the time of its National Register listing in 1970.
[ It now serves as the headquarters of the New London Maritime Society, which operates it as the Custom House Maritime Museum. Exhibits include New London's maritime history, ship models, the Amistad affair, the history of the Robert Mills building, and regional lighthouses. The Frank L. McGuire Maritime Library consists of more than 2,300 books, charts, maps, and prints. The Society also owns the nearby ]New London Harbor Light
New London Harbor Light is a lighthouse in Connecticut on the west side of the New London, Connecticut, New London harbor entrance. It is the nation's fifth oldest light station and the seventh oldest U.S. lighthouse. It is both the oldest and the ...
, the offshore Race Rock Light
Race Rock Light is a lighthouse on Race Rock Reef, a dangerous set of rocks on Long Island Sound southwest of Fishers Island, New York and the site of many shipwrecks. It is currently owned and maintained by the New London Maritime Society as p ...
, and New London Ledge Light }
New London Ledge Lighthouse is a lighthouse on the Thames River in Connecticut at the mouth of New London harbor. It was built in 1909 in the Second Empire style and was automated in 1987. In 1990 it was added to the National Register of Histor ...
, and it operates tours of all three.
See also
*
*List of maritime museums in the United States
List of maritime museums in the United States is a sortable list of American museums which display objects related to ships and water travel. Many of these maritime museums have museum ships in their collections. Member museums of the Council of ...
References
External links
*
Custom House Maritime Museum
- official site
{{authority control
Government buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Connecticut
Government buildings completed in 1835
Buildings and structures in New London, Connecticut
Museums in New London County, Connecticut
Maritime museums in Connecticut
Custom houses in the United States
National Register of Historic Places in New London County, Connecticut
Custom houses on the National Register of Historic Places