Hallsborough Tavern Traditional Cache

This cache has been archived.

offline.cacher: The general rule reviewers use to archive a cache is that the cache owner has been notified (through a log entry) by the reviewer and that no response has been forthcoming. This is the case with this cache. As a result it has been archived.
If the owner would like to discuss this issue, please contact me through my gmail address. Don't forget to include the GC code for the cache.

Thanks
offline.cacher
Virginia geocaching.com reviewer

More
Hidden : 11/30/2011
Difficulty:
1 out of 5
Terrain:
2 out of 5

Size: Size: small (small)

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Geocache Description:

This is another Midlothian/Chesterfield historical cache.

This is placed on the edge of the property, but your best parking
is at the church. The owners would rather not have people coming on
their property after business hours. But if they are open, feel
free to go in and see the interior of such a neat building!

Historic Hallsborough: a 19th-century community

By Diane Dallmeyer

CHESTERFIELD HISTORICAL SOCIETY

A small area just east of the Powhatan line and north of Swift
Creek was known as Hallsboro. A map examiner will note there are
several homesteads marked on the LaPrade map, as well as the
Hallsboro Station and Tannery. Most of Chesterfield today is not
familiar with this area of the county, but the Hallsborough Tavern
stands as a monument to middle and late 19th-century life in this
area.

The original section of the Hallsborough Tavern might have been
constructed as early as the late 18th-century, and subsequent
additions were made around 1832 and 1890. The earliest owner of the
tract was Daniel W. Michaux, a Huguenot descendant. In 1810 James
Howard bought the land and established a tavern and retail
merchandise store. When he died in 1822, his 1,400 acres and
buildings were valued at $2,866. The next owner, Austin Spears,
continued the operation of the tavern and made the enlargements in
1832 that allowed him to house more travelers. The Lynchburg
stagecoach stopped there daily, and the tavern also functioned as a
post office. There were stables for the stagecoach and patrons'
horses, as well as an equipment shop for them on the
property.

The area began to grow and consisted of several dwelling houses, a
large Baptist church, the tavern and store, and a school. Schools
in those days were "old field" schools, or community schools, so
named because they were often built on land that couldn't be
farmed. In Chesterfield only about 20 percent of the non-slave,
school-aged children attended any kind of school, despite the
availability of government subsidies, and the level of education
accessible ranged from secondary to barely rudimentary. Not shown
on the LaPrade map, the schoolhouse at Hallsboro had originally
been built as a cottage for a mill foreman. Thomas E. Marshall was
the teacher - a man with a Phi Beta Kappa key from Hampton Sydney
College. Students sat on benches with no back and used planks
attached to the wall for desks.

Taverns were social centers for a community and served as anything
from a one-room public meeting space to a multi-room hotel. Some
were private homes where families rented out rooms to travelers.
Most taverns, whatever their form, served a vital function as a
communications center for the community. Business deals were forged
there, peddlers found customers, games and sports events took
place, as well as card and dice games. While many taverns served
more as socializing and drinking places, Hallsborough Tavern was
more specialized as it served the stagecoach trade and produced
more rental revenue than liquor revenue. Atypically, Hallsborough
Tavern had no interior staircase, and the upstairs (like that of
the Halfway House) could only be accessed via an outside
stair.

William A. Martin was a prominent businessman in the county and was
probably the first commercial developer of the Hallsboro area. The
great-grandson of a French Huguenot, Martin was postmaster in 1851.
After the Civil War, the Martin family continued to run the post
office and was joined in the 1870s by William W. Baker, who had
married into the family 20 years before. In 1873, Baker and the
Martins were engaged in farming, making wooden barrels for flour
and grinding "shoe make," a colloquial term for the sumac plant.
Shoe make was used as a tanning agent, and the tannery at Hallsboro
contributed needed capital for post-war reconstruction. Baker was
active in politics as well, serving in the Virginia House of
Delegates, and was instrumental in the formation of the Virginia
Department of Health, as well as serving on the Richmond College
(now University of Richmond) Board of Trustees.

Retail stores were of vital importance to the economy of the
county. Storekeepers lent and "banked" cash and sold most of their
goods on credit, with customers paying up their accounts once or
twice a year. The storekeeper would sell crops on commission and
barter with farmers for fresh produce. Merchants were able to sell
liquor; the stores were gathering places in the community, and a
store with a tavern nearby would have been an important social
center, while also serving as a polling place. The Hallsboro store
was about 16-feet x 32-feet and probably was originally constructed
as a commissary to the large tannery nearby. This store featured a
large front room where merchandise was displayed, a back room for
storage, and a second floor for the living quarters of the
shopkeeper. It was most likely built around the turn of the 20th
century. The Martin and Baker families ran the store until around
1928.

The post office and depot was first known as Tomahawk. Later, when
the post office was moved from the Hallsborough Tavern area to the
north, the name was changed to Hallsboro. According to Jeffrey
O'Dell's "Chesterfield County Historic Sites and Architecture,"
Caroline Spears, "possibly disenchanted at the removal of the post
office from her residence, protested against the duplicate use of
the name. Eventually the two parties reached a compromise with the
respelling, Hallsboro." The depot combined a passenger waiting room
and freight storage rooms with an uncovered wooden loading platform
in front. Both freight and passengers used the depot, which was
demolished in the 1950s.

The census of 1850 hints of an interesting human-interest story.
Spears, who had married her husband, Austin, at the age of 13,
survived him and inherited his property. She continued to run the
post office and tavern after his death. She rented out land and
slaves, administered the plantation, and was the legal guardian for
her two young children. These were all unusual jobs for women in
those times. She continued to run the estate during the Civil War
and managed to hide the family silver in a tree stump during a raid
by Union troops at Hallsboro in 1864. Spears died in 1897.

Privately owned today and well-kept, the Hallsborough Tavern house
is a fine remnant of the Chesterfield community. As noted in the
application for the National Register of Historic Places, the
buildings at Hallsboro are significant because they retain a large
amount of their original architectural features and are an
excellent example of a late 19th-century community in central
Virginia.

For a firsthand and wonderfully personal view of the families and
homes of Hallsboro, visit the research library at Castlewood,
located at 10201 Iron Bridge Road, and enjoy Lula Bradshaw Turpin's
memoir, written to her cousin Dick Baker, in 1936, which begins,
"In order that you may have a fuller knowledge of your
neighborhood, I am writing you in the following pages its history
as I remember it…….."

National Register information

Note: The following information comes from the NRHP database and
has not been verified.

Status

Posted to the National Register of Historic Places on March 17,
1980

Reference number

80004181

Areas of significance

Transportation; Architecture

Level of significance

State

Evaluation criteria

A - Event; C - Design/Construction

Property type

Building

Historic function

Hotel

Current function

Single dwelling

Period of significance

1750-1799

Significant year

ca. 1790

Materials

Foundation: Stucco

Walls: Weatherboard

Number of properties

Contributing buildings: 1

Non-contributing buildings: 3

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