The Real Property

The story of Elisha Camp and Sackets Harbor began in 1801 with his purchase of portions of the Town of Hounsfield and the Town of Lyme using his brother-in-law, Augustus Sacket, founder of Sackets Harbor, as the intermediary to undertake the transaction since Elisha was still a minor and thus unable to enter into a contract.

 Camp Manor sits on land overlooking the mouth of the harbor. The total acreage is 2.99 acres with separate parcels situated on only the southeast and southwest corners of the village block. A buckthorn hedge runs along the front of the house with lilac bushes and various trees on the borders of the other streets. The house sits in the center of the parcel. At various times, there were out buildings such as a barn, ice house, two boathouses, chicken coop, bungalow, play house, well house, smokehouse, and garage. Along with the house, only the well house, smokehouse, and garage remain. There were also various gardens and a clay tennis court on the property.

The House

The house now known as Camp Manor was the dream of Elisha Camp after he had visited a similar home designed by Barnabus Waterman in Kinderhook, New York. Elisha had Waterman design the house for which he laid the corner stone of the foundation in 1807 when he was 21 years-old.  This act commenced an eight-year journey to construct the home, which encompassed his marriage in 1811 to Sophia Hale and may have included a brief construction stoppage due to the War of 1812.

The limestone foundation was quarried in Chaumont, NY, at quarries owned by Camp. The bricks came as ballast in ships from England. The timber frame construction and finish lumber came from native trees in the area. The limestone foundation was laid upon bedrock that was quarried on-site to allow for a full basement to be constructed in which Camp could stand tall with his six-foot frame. It’s assumed that Camp employed various carpenters and shipwrights in the area to finish the interior of the home after the war of 1812.

In 1821, he purchased French mural wallpaper, designed by Joseph DuFour, to adorn the walls in the North Parlor. Designed by DuFour in 1816, the watercolor wallpaper is known as the “Banks of the Bosphorus,” depicting Byzantine Constantinople. The wall paper adorns each wall of the parlor room without repeat. The wood cuts for prining this paper are believed to be located at the Louvre Museum in Paris. This decoration is unique to North American and may be one of only four such examples in the world still in existence in its original form.

There are intricate carvings and moldings throughout the home. Camp Manor remains much like it was when the Camps began living there around 1815.

Over the years, the house has been updated to include central heat (steam based with radiators from around the 1900s). The house has also had two renditions of electrification; the first being knob and wire and the second being a two wire system brought to the house in the 1950s. Gas lanterns were never used at the house. The original storm windows have been replaced with year round storm windows and screens in aluminum frames.

Water has always been available in the house with a cistern being built into the basement in its original construction. The first and only bathroom was on the first floor in a corner of the building. In the 1890s, two linen closets and a dumbwaiter were converted to bathrooms in the main house with last updates to these facilities in the 1950s. Currently, the home offers seven bedrooms and three full bathrooms.

The interior of the house has several features as follows:

• Delicately scaled Adamesque woodwork and large, well-proportioned rooms.

• Central hall and two rooms on each side - typical features for Federal style homes.

• 1st floor hall is divided into 3 sections by folding doors set in a casing with pilasters with attenuated colonnettes supporting a full entablature surmounted by a leaded elliptical fanlight.

• Woodwork in the house has flat, thin ornament.

• Baseboards have a band of reeding.

• Mantels in the main parlors have paired colonnettes, frieze, bed molding, mantel shelf, paneled end blocks with sunburst motif, and paneled central tablet with sunburst and fan motifs.

• Southwest parlor walls are recessed under elliptical arches with paneled soffits.

At the time of original construction, the property had a barn, smokehouse, ice house, and chicken coup. Only the smokehouse remains. Over the years, a bungalow, playhouse, two boathouses, tennis court, greenhouse, side porch, and two-car garage have come and gone with only the garage remaining.

The Contents

When the Camps moved into the home in 1815, the family lore has Elisha entering the front door with two infantry pikes, one in each hand, which still remain in the front entrance. Elisha and Sophia’s portraits overlook the center hall.

Much of the original contents of the house remain. To decorate the home, Camp brought artisans from Duncan Phyfe to build furniture in the early 1820s. The main pieces built by the Duncan Phyfe artisans were a rosewood veneer sideboard, a walnut secretary, dining table, two settees, two card tables and other cabinets and tables. Two pieces of Camp’s furniture are adorned with a medallion that signifies the twenty-fifth anniversary of George Washington’s death. Significant pieces of furniture, clocks, pictures and portraits, books, letters and other items from other generations also remain at the house.

Examples of antique furniture and china of historical importance are two pieces of furniture that at one time belonged to Ulysses S. Grant as well as china that was received by Dr. Elisha Camp, Elisha’s father, from the Marquis de Lafayette in payment for his medical services. The china came from the French royal family by way of Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orleans. The Duke was guillotined during the Reign of Terror while his son became King of France after the Revolution of 1830.

Camp Manor possesses an extensive library collection of important historical texts and cartography. The library holds fiction and non-fiction texts alike, namely literature on military tactics and history, books relevant to the history of Jefferson County, an entire Encyclopedia Americana, and other first printings of books from the early nineteenth century. The Encyclopedia Americana was purchased by Samson Mason in Washington, DC, in 1825 for $240. The family bible owned by Elisha Camp and various letters exchanged between family members throughout the family’s history are still present in the house. Camp’s professional and commercial documents and letters are housed in Cornell University’s Rare Book Library.

With three relatives graduating from the United States Military Academy at West Point and other relatives serving in the state militias of New York and Ohio, many items of military significance exist in the house, ranging from correspondence, medals, long rifles, swords, flags, pictures and more. In particular, an American flag that flew over Rome, Italy, on June 6, 1944, remains in the house in the collection of Brig. General G. Stanley Smith. Other items in the General’s collection include his West Point Cadet uniform, his field desk as a Captain, WWII medals and citations, among other historical artifacts.