The site of the Danvers State Hospital, on Hathorne Hill in Danvers, Massachusetts, was once home to the Hathorne Mansion.
The mansion is believed to have been built sometime prior to 1647 by William Hathorne, father of Salem Witch Judge John Hathorne.
When the property was first purchased by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts from farmer John Dodge in 1873, it was reported in the Boston Globe that the governor of Massachusetts and the Executive Council visited the Dodge farm to see the historic mansion and tour the grounds.
After construction on the new asylum started in 1874, it’s not exactly clear what happened to the old mansion due to some conflicting information about it.
According to Arthur Harrington in a 1912 article in the Historical Collections of the Essex Institute, an old mansion that many believed to be built by William Hathorne was the only house on the Dodge farm at the time the property was sold to the state and the house was divided into three sections and auctioned off.
Harrington states that two of the sections were reportedly moved to Maple Street in Danvers, where they stood as two separate houses owned by Daniel Cahill, and the third section was moved to the Newburyport Turnpike, where it also continued to serve as a house.
Harrington found the information about the sale of the mansion from a Salem Gazette news report from August of 1876 that states that the “Old Mansion” on Hathorne Hill, as well as the outbuildings on the property was sold at auction the week before and was going to be moved.
The article states that the house is “one of the oldest in the vicinity,” and its “rooms have fireplaces, are quite low studded, and with their oak timbers exposed to view, present unmistakable evidence. No boards were used outside the studding, but the spaces between these timbers were filled with bricks laid in clay, and the oak clapboards were nailed directly to the studding.”
It also states that since the previous winter the house was being used as office space for the engineers, architects, and inspectors building the new asylum.
Yet, some other news reports from 1876 state instead that the Hathorne Mansion was slated for demolition. One such news report was published in The Daily Evening Traveler on August 19, 1876, which reads:
“The ‘Old Mansion’ on ‘Hathorne Hill,’ in Danvers, is coming down, after having stood for seven generations, as it was built in the reign of Charles the First, which closed at the beginning of 1649…”
The news report states that the house was built by William Hathorne and that John Hathorne also lived there, and it goes on to express dismay over the demolition:
“It is to be regretted that this ‘Old Mansion’ should disappear, but there is no help for it. There is something grim in the thought that it goes down for the accommodation of a mad-house.”
In October of 1876, Harper’s Bazaar also reported that the mansion was about to be demolished:
“The Hathorne house in Danvers, Massachusetts, usually known as the ‘Old Mansion’ on ‘Hathorne Hill,’ is about to be demolished.”
The article reiterates that the house was built by William Hathorne sometime prior to 1650, and it mentions that he is the ancestor of Nathaniel Hawthorne.
A possible explanation can be found on the Massachusetts Cultural Resource Information System’s website, which states that the Uzziel Rea–Francis Dodge House on Maple Street was once located on the Dodge Farm but was sold to Cahill in 1876, divided into two parts, and moved to Maple Street.
It seems that either Harrington was wrong and the Francis Dodge House also existed on the Dodge farm when the state purchased it and the Salem Gazette confused the Francis Dodge House for the Hathorne Mansion, or the Francis Dodge House is actually the old Hathorne Mansion and it was moved to Maple Street.
The MACRIS file for the Francis Dodge House, written by Danvers historian Richard Trask, states that the purported date of the house used to be sometime between the 1660s and the 1690s but that a chimney brick marked with the date 1715 makes it more likely that it was built in 1715. If that is true, it means it is not the Hathorne Mansion and was simply a farmhouse owned by Francis Dodge.
Nonetheless, even if the Hathorne Mansion was demolished, it seems that at least a small piece of it survived. In 1889, a reader sent a letter to the Salem Gazette in which they claimed to have a section of a clapboard taken from the Hathorne Mansion.
“I have a section of a clapboard taken from a house built on Hathorne or Prospect Hill, in Salem Village, (now Danvers), about the year 1647, by or for Judge Hathorne…”
It is not clear how the person obtained the clapboard, but they described the house it came from as a “two storied structure celled inside with wood, while the outside was covered with oak clapboards without boarding, the space between being filled with clay. It was situated a little below the southeast brow of the hill….”
The reader also didn’t indicate what happened to the house that clapboard came from, merely that the state government bought the site and built the hospital on it.
The old door knocker from the Hathorne Mansion also seems to have survived because it was reported that Francis Dodge saved it and presented it to the builders of the hospital when they bought the property.
The door knocker was later added to the front door of the hospital’s Gray Gables nurse’s cottage in 1898 with an inscription that read, “This knocker, age unknown, was taken from the Old Hathorne House, which stood on this hill for 250 years. Presented by Francis Dodge.” (Harrington 102.)
The Gray Gables was later demolished in 2006 after the property was purchased by a real estate developer. It’s not clear what happened to the door knocker or if it was still on the door by 2006.
Sources:
Harrington, Arthur. H. “Hathorne Hill in Danvers, With Some Account of the Major William Hathorne.” Historical Collections of the Essex Institute, Vol. XLVIII, April 1912, No. 2, pp. 97-112
“The New State Hospital.” The Boston Globe, 17 Oct. 1873, p. 8.
“A View from Hathorne Hill.” Salem Gazette, 22 Mar. 1889, p.1.
“Communications.” Salem Gazette, 11 Aug. 1876, p. 1.
“Sayings and Doings.” Harper’s Bazaar, 7 Oct. 1876, p. 7.
“Review of the Week.” Daily Evening Traveller (Boston), 19 Aug. 1876, p.2.
“Historic Building Detail: DAN.266 Rea, Uzziel – Dodge, Francis House.” MACRIS, mhc-macris.net/details?mhcid=dan.266