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Originally published in 1939
Some of this information may no longer be current and in that case is presented for historical interest only.
Edited by GET NJ, COPYRIGHT 2003
BONAPARTE PARK (private), N. side of Park St., E. Of 3rd St., is a 242-acre remnant of the 1,500-acre tract bought in 1816 by the exiled King Joseph of Spain. The only original building left of the luxurious estate is the GARDENER'S LODGE, near an entrance on Park Street. Vestiges of tunnels and grottoes today offer a contrast to the more modern country residence that has replaced Bonaparte's home.
For 23 years, as the Count de Survilliers, the exile lived here surrounded by a fortune in paintings and sculpture and other treasures, including Napoleon's crown jewels. At Point Breeze, as the estate was called, the ex-King was often host to such American statesmen as Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, and John Quincy Adams, and on Christmas he played Santa Claus for Bordentown's poor children.
Joseph's wife did not follow him to America, but the exile was comforted in his loneliness by the charming Annette Savage, whom he secluded 7 miles away at Bow Hill, Trenton. The household at Point Breeze was for a time managed by Joseph's vivacious younger daughter; and life was so delightful that when a commission from Mexico called to offer the throne, Bonaparte unhesitatingly refused. With the exception of a trip to France, he remained here until his return to Europe in 1839. Nearby lived Charles Lucien Bonaparte, nephew of King Joseph and husband of Joseph's daughter Zenaide. He was the author of the rare American Ornithology (4 vols.) that, together with the work of Alexander Wilson, constituted an important forerunner of Audubon's famous Birds of America.
The exiled monarch had hoped that Point Breeze would remain in the family forever. But when it passed to his grandson, Prince Joseph Lucien Charles Napoleon, the young prince sold the land in parcels and at an auction in 1847 the house and surrounding grounds were bought by Thomas Richards, who sold them to Henry Beckett, onetime British consul at Philadelphia. Beckett was nicknamed "the destroyer" when he tore down the mansion and erected the present nondescript dwelling.
BORDENTOWN MILITARY INSTITUTE, S. side of Park St. between 3rd and 2nd Sts., is an outstanding preparatory school for boys. The oldest part of the main building, a five-story stone structure with a mansard roof and small balconies over the doorway in the French style, was occupied by a French school for girls in 1837. Later a two-story Georgian brick addition and a two-story Colonial frame addition were made. The 15 smaller buildings of the school, of French and Colonial design, cover a campus of 55 acres. In 187o a coeducational school was established which, in 1881, was purchased by President Bowen of the then existent Bordentown Female College and opened as a military institute for boys. The students are drilled according to United States Army regulations and prepared for college, West Point and Annapolis.
MURAT ROW (private), 49-61 E. Park St., is a row of seven attached two-and-one-half-story houses of yellow stucco, with frame additions at the rear and little covered porches abutting on the sidewalk. The row was remodeled from what was once Linden Hall, the home of Prince Napoleon Francois Lucien Charles Murat, nephew of Joseph and Napoleon Bonaparte. The young prince, son of Joachim Murat, King of the Two Sicilies, and Caroline Bonaparte, came to America about seven years after his uncle, Joseph. He was a tall, handsome, dashing chap of 20 years,, whose magnificent disregard for money cut a wide swathe in the social life of the town.
When his uncle heard of Lucien's elopement with Caroline Fraser, belle of Bordentown, he vowed that she should have the pleasure of supporting his nephew. This was, indeed, a prophetic vow; for after a few years of lavish living the young Prince had exhausted his fortune. Faced with the problem of supporting her children and meeting her husband's debts, Madame Murat and her sisters converted her luxurious home into a boarding school for sub-debs of the Bordentown district.
News of the second French Revolution in 1848 sent Murat to Europe. His cousin Louis Napoleon named him envoy to Turin, and he sent for his family. "Friends ... had to pay their traveling expenses, and his two little boys were dressed in garments made from a coachman's livery ..." Napoleon later made Murat a prince, and both his daughters married French noblemen.
HILLTOP PARK, N. end Farnsworth Ave., is a small municipal
park offering a fine view of the broad Delaware, flowing between wooded
banks and disappearing in the green distance. The park is on the bluff,
just above Crosswicks Creek and the tracks of the Trenton division of the
Pennsylvania Railroad. Parallel to the railroad is the old Delaware and
Raritan Canal, sluggish and neglected, its banks overgrown with brush.
At this spot were stables for as many as 200 mule teams, motive power
for traffic that once numbered 225 barges in a single day. Between the canal and the river is Dike Island, formed by the dredging of the main channel to permit the passage of ocean steamers to Trenton.
COLONIAL APARTMENTS (private), 2-3-5 E. Park St., occupy a reconstructed Revolutionary tavern, the American House, which was conducted by Col. Oakly Hoagland of the Continental Army. The original brick has been covered with stucco, but deterioration is evident. Around the second floor runs a decorative iron balcony with a gilded medallion of a woman holding a sheaf of wheat.
BORDEN HOUSE (private), 32 Farnsworth Ave., is a stuccoed brick structure, painted a steel gray, with shutters and window trim in contrasting shades. Three chimneys rise from the slate roof. Tall trees cast their shadows on the red brick sidewalk and the three white marble steps with their graceful iron balustrades. Built flush with the sidewalk, the house is flanked on the north and east with a garden enclosed by an ornate iron railing. This is the only survival of the original building erected on this corner by the first Joseph Borden. The old house was demolished by the British in May 2778, and Borden's son erected the present building. From time to time its design has been modified.
HOPKINSON HOUSE (private), 102 Farnsworth Ave., was the home of the statesman, Francis Hopkinson. The gable is dated 1750, and the old red brick is mellow with two centuries of weather. A dignified white doorway leads directly off the sidewalk; windows are large and white-shuttered.
Hopkinson married Ann Borden, daughter of Col. Joseph Borden, and in 1773 began the practice of law in Bordentown. He was 35 years old and already distinguished in his profession. At this time he began his career as a political satirist and statesman. After predicting the outbreak of the Revolution in A Prophecy, an essay published in 2774, he became a New Jersey representative to the Continental Congress and was one of the State's signers of the Declaration of Independence.
Although Hopkinson served for the first two years of the war as chairman of the Naval Board, he maintained his interest in science and art. Among his varied achievements were a military march in honor of Washington, and the design of the Great Seal of the United States. Recent evidence, consisting of bills approved by the Auditor General, but not passed by Congress, indicates that he was also a designer of the Stars and Stripes.
In one letter Hopkinson asked for a cask of wine for his services; later he raised his request to $7,200. It was rejected because the Treasury insisted that others had shared in the work. In November 1778 he published Seven Songs, his best lyric poetry and said to be the first book of music published by an American composer.
The Hopkinsons were not home during the British reprisal for the mechanical keg plot of 1778, but the invaders dined there. One unverified story is that they set fire to the house after removing Hopkinson's reflecting telescope, watchmaker's tools, and other possessions. But the officer in charge, Capt. James Ewald, impressed by the library, decided to overlook the rebel in honor of the scholar, and ordered the firebrands extinguished. After Hopkinson's death in 1791 the house went to his son, Joseph Hopkinson of Philadelphia, best known as the author of Hail Columbia.
FRIENDS MEETING HOUSE (not open), 302 Farnsworth Ave., is a plain brick structure covered with yellow stucco, hidden behind screening shrubbery and crowded between the Bordentown Banking Company building and a row of business places. It was constructed in 1740 as the first place of worship in Bordentown. The banking company has kept the
property in good repair, but the church is no longer used.
CLARA BARTON SCHOOL (key at nearby house), 142 Crosswicks St., is a tiny brick building utilized by Clara Barton for her school. Before the Revolution it was used as a school supported by fees paid by the parents of the pupils. Clara Barton, later to achieve fame as the founder of the American Red Cross, came to Bordentown in 1851 to teach. Aroused by the lack of schooling for children of the poor, she established in the one-room building a free public school, one of the first in New Jersey and in America. When the townspeople insisted that her work be supervised by a male principal, Miss Barton resigned. In 1921 the building was completely restored with funds given by New Jersey school children. It contains a few pieces of early schoolroom furniture.
The GILDER HOUSE (resident custodian), Crosswicks St. opp. Union St., a two-and-one-half-story, white frame Colonial house, was the home in the 1880's of the Gilders-four brothers and a sister who achieved distinction in literature, the arts, and science: Richard Watson Gilder, author, poet and editor of The Century; Joseph and Jeannette, editors of The Critic; John Francis, composer; and William, geographer and explorer. The house was bequeathed to the city by Rodman Gilder, but a proposed museum has not yet been established.
The OLD BURIAL GROUNDS, W. end Church St., are on a hillside overlooking Black's Creek and Delaware River. One of these old cemeteries contains the bodies of early Quakers. Behind Christ Episcopal Church and circled by the other burial plots is the Borden lot, now known as the Hopkinson lot, surrounded by an ornamental fence. Here lie Joseph Borden, founder of the settlement; Joseph Hopkinson, son of Francis; his mother, Ann Borden Hopkinson ; and Col. Joseph Kirkbride.
POINTS OF INTEREST IN ENVIRONS
John Bull Monument, 1 m., Prince Murat House, 5 m., John Woolston House (c. 1710), 10.5 m. (see Tour 6); Jersey Homesteads, 21.1 m. (see Tour 19).
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