History Thursday: 1213 Winchester Street
Known as "Gammon Cottage," this house was built for the Presbyterian Church's Assembly Home and School.
By Adele Uphaus
MANAGING EDITOR AND CORRESPONDENT
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This house, like 504 Fauquier Street, was part of the Presbyterian Church’s Assembly Home and School, which was established in the late 1800s to provide education and housing for the widows and orphans of ministers.
The property was originally part of Kenmore Plantation, the home of Fielding Lewis and his wife Betty, George Washington’s sister. When it was transferred to Howard Key in 1881, it was described as “that part of the original Kenmore lot which lies east of Winchester Street since that street was opened through the original Kenmore lot.”
In 1894, the Assembly Home and School bought the 60-foot “orphan property” and constructed a “Folk Victorian” style home there, which still stands as 1213 Winchester Street. According to research conducted by Donna Stanton for the Historic Fredericksburg Foundation’s marker program, the first occupant was Susie Gammon, a minister’s widow, and her five children, aged 16 and younger.
“Susie was the daughter of a minister, married to a minister, one son was a minister, a daughter was married to a minister, a son was the president of Hampton Sydney College, and another daughter was married to a university professor,” Stanton wrote.
At its height, the Assembly Home and School comprised eight total houses in the area of Winchester and Fauquier streets. It had 18 faculty and 195 students, including 40 orphans and children of missionaries. There was not a local high school at the time, so many local students attended, according to Stanton.
The Assembly also established a collegiate department and was chartered as “Fredericksburg College”—a completely separate entity from the State Normal and Industrial School, now University of Mary Washington, which opened later in 1908.
By the early 1900s, however, the Assembly was struggling financially. In 1915, Susie Gammon bought the house she had been living in for 20 years for $2,000.
In 1925, she sold the house for $4,500 to Emma Hogan. According to Emma’s 1943 obituary in the Free Lance-Star, as a young woman she “went west as a teacher on an Indian reservation” and future president Theodore Roosevelt, then working as civil service commissioner, examined her for the appointment.
She worked in Wyoming and Arizona, met characters such as Buffalo Bill, contributed to the stories of folklorist George Bird Grinnell, and operated a large ranch as a single woman after the early death of her husband.
According to the obituary, Emma Hogan was active in church and civic matters after moving to Fredericksburg, where she lived for 20 years until her death in 1944.
Later single female owners of “Gammon Cottage,” still the home’s historic name, included Marjorie Mason, a widow and welfare nurse, from 1961 to 1965, and Charline Ecker, also a widow, from 1999 to 2010.
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