Beneath Boards, an
Intriguing Find

The west facet of the north garden house—tucked out of sight behind the garden wall— is the least visible of the building’s eight sides. It turns out that this unobtrusive facet holds some exciting mysteries. When its siding boards were temporarily removed for repair during the recent restoration, the architecture team made an unexpected discovery. On the back side of three boards, someone had scratched a series of letters: “MB,” “GW I,” and “GW II.”

What do they mean? When were they written? The siding likely dates to the 18th century—that is known from the marks of the tools used to make the siding and the surviving fragments of the hand-forged nails that originally attached it. The styling of the inscribed letterforms also suggests an early date. The anonymous hand used serifs—a slight projecting horizontal flourish on the lines—that evoke the handwriting of that period. But the boards were affixed with modern wire nails, testifying that they had been removed and reinstalled during restoration work in 1940. This leaves open the possibility that the letters were scratched by workers at that time.

The documentary record illuminates possibilities for the date and meaning of the letters. Records from 1940 indicate there were no craftsmen working at Mount Vernon with the initials “MB.” However, when the garden house was built in 1785, Matthew Baldridge, an English joiner indentured to Washington, arrived in May and took a leadership role in carpentry projects. And what about the two sets of “GW” initials? Had George Washington put his mark on the boards? Unlikely. The boards were sawn at a local mill, and the “GW I” and “GW II” could have denoted two stacks of boards purchased by Washington and marked for delivery.

The letters are just another example of the exciting process of discovery at Mount Vernon. Every new clue fills out the historical record, yet also raises many new questions to be explored.