In 1950 there was a scrap metal business where Glasgow Street intersects West High Street, in Stowe. Included in that scrap yard site was a large old house that was demolished about this time. The house was named “Stowe” by its builder, John Potts, Jr., and, despite its inglorious end, in its day it was the most grand and elegant house in the Pottstown area. Today, Stowe takes its name from that house.
In opulence and grandeur, Stowe, built in 1772, was said to exceed Pottsgrove Manor, the house built by John Potts, Sr., which today is an historic site on King Street.
The story of Stowe starts with its builder, John Potts, Jr., one of 13 children. About his father, John Potts, Sr., Potts Family researcher Dan Graham writes: “At his death [in 1768] he was one of the richest men in Pennsylvania owning large tracts of land, forges, furnaces, and an iron production and distribution system second to none in the colonies. Pottsgrove Manor, his residence, was built in 1752 shortly after Potts purchased almost 1000 acres of land from Samuel McCall. The house fronted the Schuylkill River and was impressive for the time and location. He ran his iron empire from it.”
When John Potts, Jr. built the Stowe Mansion in 1772, “Potts Grove” was a small village of about 20 houses, two churches and a tavern. Despite the modest size of his village, Potts decided to make Stowe House his official “seat.” Potts Grove was eventually to become Pottstown.
The iron empire of John Potts, Sr. was bequeathed to his children who, for generations to come, sold and resold parts of it among themselves and the families of Rutter, Nutt, Savage and Bird, families whose sons the daughters and granddaughters married.
John Potts, Jr. received law training at the Temple, London, and he had use for it. Potts and his older brother Thomas purchased the manor property containing the father’s house from the father’s estate and split off about 250 acres of the western side.
Among other things, John Potts, Jr. consolidated family interests in Warwick Furnace and was the sole owner. In 1769 he sold it to Samuel Potts for the enormous sum of 8,500 pounds. John Potts, Jr. then refocused his interest to Philadelphia where he bought a house, was a Justice of the Peace, Judge of the Common Pleas for the city and county (that included all of the present Montgomery County) and by 1774 was on the Philadelphia City Council.
Although his interests were in the city, in 1772 he repurchased the western 250 acres of the manor property, which he had previously sold to a brother a few years before. There he built Stowe mansion and developed a large plantation. In correspondences he would call the house named Stowe his “Seat.” At this time many wealthy Philadelphians fled the city in the summer to escape the heat, foul air and yellow fever.
While he was a law student in London, it is likely that Potts learned about, and perhaps visited, the Stowe Mansion in Buckinghamshire, England. The original Stowe Mansion was built over centuries and was called by the Prince of Wales “the grandest 18th century house in England.”
When Stowe’s fourth owner, Samuel Baird (1758-1820), put the plantation up for sale in 1801, the advertisement gave an excellent description of the house and property: “The buildings are a large Stone House 50 feet front and 30 feet deep, four rooms on a floor, two stories high, and good garrets with handsome dormer windows; to the house is annexed two kitchens, a pantry and stove room, in all [not including the house] sixty et long by twenty-two feet in breadth, two story high in the upper story of this part there are four handsome chambers, two of which are prepared. The whole forming a front on the road of one hundred and ten feet. From the house the prospect is extensive and elegant, the whole of Pottstown, which is distant one mile, is in view, and the river Schuylkill, which bounds the farm for nearly half a mile is seen both above and below for some distance. There is also a good farm house, twenty seven feet by twenty, a large barn, the first story stone and the remainder squared logs, with a cedar roof, a pump in the barnyard, stone smoke house, stone hog house… The orchard contains three hundred and fifty apple trees of the best graded fruit, also pears, peaches, and cherries… Several never failing streams of excellent water rise on and run through the land; for genteel polite society, few villages in Pennsylvania equal Pottstown, and none excel it.”
However, back in the city, one thing that was becoming abundantly clear to City Council members was that John Potts, Jr. was a loyalist. Unlike any of his siblings, in the gathering political storm he remained loyal to the Crown.
Despite their English heritage, all the Potts family, except John, joined the Patriot cause in 1775. With the Declaration of Independence and then the ensuing war, he returned to Stowe and remained there until September of 1777 when he joined the British in Philadelphia.
Continued next week…The Historian is produced by the New Hanover Historical Society. Call Robert Wood at 610-326-4165 with comments.
