William & Mary's 1695 and 1733 colonial cornerstones
200 Richmond Road, College of William & Mary, Williamsburg, VA 23185
Age
All Ages
Cost
Free
Wren Building is generally open to the public during College of William & Mary academic hours; the President's House is the active residence of the college president and is not open to the public.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Historic college campus walking paths
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1700 · Oldest college building in the United States · Revolutionary War hospital (Wren Building) · Battle of Yorktown medical care · Lafayette quarters (President's House)
The Wren Building is the oldest college building in the United States, first constructed between 1695 and 1700 at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg. The building was officially named after the English architect Sir Christopher Wren in 1931. The President's House on the campus was completed in 1733 and James Blair, the college's founder and first president, moved in immediately.
During the Revolutionary War the Wren Building served as a hospital for French soldiers wounded at the Battle of Yorktown in 1781. A bronze plaque inside the building lists the names of more than 120 French soldiers who died inside during that period. The President's House was used as the headquarters of British General Charles Cornwallis in 1781 before British troops were evicted and French and Continental Army wounded received treatment in the house. The Marquis de Lafayette then took the building as temporary quarters.
Both buildings remain in active use by the College of William & Mary. The Wren Building is generally accessible to the public during academic hours; the President's House is the active residence of the college president and is not open for interior tours.
Sources
Wren Building students and staff have long reported the apparition of a French soldier walking the third-floor halls, especially near a room identified in local tradition as where one of the wounded French soldiers died during the building's Revolutionary War hospital period. The accounts also include unexplained footsteps, screams, and objects moving on their own, and are catalogued in Williamsburg ghost-tour writing including Colonial Ghosts, Williamsburg Ghost Tour, and US Ghost Adventures.
The Shadowlands entry adds an account, attributed to an inhabitant of the President's House, of the discovery of skeletal remains within the walls during a renovation. The college and Wikipedia note only that bone fragments were found and that no identification was completed, and the entry's reference to a 'thirteen-year-old girl' is a Shadowlands embellishment rather than a verified historical finding. A separate inscription, 'O Fatal Day,' is reported to be scratched into the glass of a third-floor window with no documented origin.
Notable Entities
Walk through the Wren Building, the oldest college building in the United States, with first construction between 1695 and 1700. View the bronze plaque listing more than 120 French soldiers who died inside during its use as a Revolutionary War hospital after the Battle of Yorktown.
View the 1733 President's House from the public campus walk; the building is the active residence of the William & Mary president and is not open for interior tours. Cornwallis used it as his headquarters in 1781 before British troops were evicted and the French and Continental Army wounded received treatment inside.
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