THE GRAND EQUESTRIAN monument honoring Civil War commander Major General Fitz John Porter was erected in Haven Park in Portsmouth, NH, in 1906.
A bronze plaque on the monument declares, “On this site was born Fitz John Porter – Aug. 31, 1822.” Porter lived in a rented house located on what is now park property for only a short time, perhaps four or five years, before his family moved to Virginia. The house still exists on the east side of Livermore Street, facing the park.
In 1985 the house was recognized for its historical and architectural importance by being listed as the General Porter House on the National Register of Historic Places. The Register is a federal program, administered by the National Park Service, that recognizes properties and places worthy of historic preservation.
The General Porter House is a 2 and 1/2 story wooden mansion, sided in clapboards that was constructed in 1751, with additions built in later years. It was designed in the Georgian style, which was typical for fine homes in the New England colonies and in the early American republic. The style is named for the four British monarchs, Kings George I, II, III, and IV, who reigned from 1714 to 1830. It was inspired by the classical architecture of ancient Greece and Rome, and is characterized by balance and symmetry.
The exterior of the house (minus later additions) looks essentially as it did when the structure was built. It features a gambrel roof, which has two slopes on each side. There are two chimneys, each situated about the same distance from the side of the house. The façade includes symmetrically placed windows, and a central doorway highlighted with classical ornamentation.
The mansion was built by Matthew Livermore (1703-1776), a native of Watertown, MA. A graduate of Harvard College, he came to Portsmouth, the capital of the Province of New Hampshire, in 1726 to teach school and to study law. He became an attorney and was appointed to positions in the royal government. While representing proprietors of land grants in the province, he gained great wealth by acquiring interests in tracts of land in 27 New Hampshire towns.
In 1779 Matthew Livermore’s widow sold the house to Nathaniel Sparhawk, Jr. of Haverhill, MA, who sold it in 1786 to Joseph Russell, a Boston merchant. The house was purchased in 1803 by Livermore’s nephew, Edward St. Loe Livermore of Newburyport, MA. He had the house moved from Pleasant Street to the west side of the newly laid out Livermore Street. In 1809 the house was bought by Nathaniel Haven, who owned the house next door. Haven was married to Mary Tufton (Polly) Moffatt whose family owned a fine mansion on Market Street.
Haven sold his house to his son-in-law Alexander Ladd in 1813. Ladd and his wife Maria Tufton Haven Ladd became owners of the Moffatt property in 1819. This is now the Moffatt-Ladd House & Garden, owned and operated as a house museum by the National Society of the Colonial Dames of New Hampshire.
The former Livermore house was then rented out, including, around 1820, to Captain John Porter, Commandant of the Portsmouth Navy Yard and future father of Fitz John Porter. In the 1830s it became the home of Samuel Elliott Coues (1797-1867), who, after the War of 1812, helped revive the area’s economy by investing in shipbuilding in Portsmouth, and in Kittery and South Berwick, ME. His wife Charlotte was a journalist who published essays on natural history subjects. Their son Elliott Coues (1842-1899) was an army surgeon and a noted naturalist who wrote an important book on bird identification, “Key to the North American Birds.”
In 1854 the house was purchased by lawyer and state legislator, Albert R. Hatch (1817-1882). In 1899 it was moved a second time to its present location to make way for the creation of Haven Park on land that had been donated to the city through the bequests of two members of the Haven family. The Haven home on the future park grounds was demolished.
The Hatch family sold the house in 1925, and it then passed into different hands until, in 1983, it was rehabilitated and converted into condominiums.
Next week: Fitz John Porter’s naval heritage, and his father’s troubled life.
