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Updated: June 21, 2025
The old hotel now a very unsavory tenement-house was built by John Tavers, innkeeper, in 1770, who planted in front of the door a tall post, from which swung the sign of the Earl of Halifax. Stavers had previously kept an inn of the same name on Queen, now State Street.
MARK NOBLE, A friend to my country. From that period until I know not what year the Stavers House prospered. It was at the sign of the William Pitt that the officers of the French fleet boarded in 1782, and hither came the Marquis Lafayette, all the way from Providence, to visit them. John Hancock, Elbridge Gerry, Rutledge, and other signers of the Declaration sojourned here at various times.
It was only through the intervention of Captain John Langdon, a warm and popular patriot, that the hotel was saved from destruction. In the mean while Master Stavers had escaped through the stables in the rear. He fled to Stratham, where he was given refuge by his friend William Pottle, a most appropriately named gentleman, who had supplied the hotel with ale.
"Yes; Captain Stavers, the new landlord of Graveleigh, seems to be a very bad man; and though he could not turn the Somerses out of the cottage so long as they paid rent, which we took care they did pay, yet out of a very wicked spite he set up a rival shop in one of his other cottages in the village, and it became impossible for these poor young people to get a livelihood at Graveleigh."
I sometimes drop in there to give Stavers a lift with his books, as he is a poor hand at keeping accounts. Glad to hear what you have to say, Dick. No more unexpected fortunes dropping down out of the skies, eh?" for of course Dick had told the others about the good luck that had befallen his mother, and even shown them the lawyer's letter. "Not that I know of; but then I haven't been home yet.
Even in 1798, of the six hundred and twenty-six dwelling houses of which the town boasted, eighty-six were of one story, five hundred and twenty-four were of two stories, and only sixteen of three stories. The Stavers inn has the regulation gambrel roof, but is lacking in those wood ornaments which are usually seen over the doors and windows of the more prominent houses of that epoch.
It is certain she did not encourage Captain Stavers, for I went over to Graveleigh myself on the sly, and lodged concealed with one of the cottagers who owed me a kindness; and one day, as I was at watch, I saw the Captain peering over the stile which divides Holmwood from the glebe, you remember Holmwood?" "I can't say I do."
You see, I sold my little place at Graveleigh to the new Squire, and when Mother removed to Luscombe to be near me, she told me how poor Jessie had been annoyed by Captain Stavers, who seems to think his purchase included the young women on the property along with the standing timber; and I was half afraid that she had given some cause for his persecution, for you know she has a blink of those soft eyes of hers that might charm a wise man out of his skin and put a fool there instead."
"Yes; Captain Stavers, the new landlord of Graveleigh, seems to be a very bad man; and though he could not turn the Somerses out of the cottage so long as they paid rent, which we took care they did pay, yet out of a very wicked spite he set up a rival shop in one of his other cottages in the village, and it became impossible for these poor young people to get a livelihood at Graveleigh."
"What excuse for spite against so harmless a young couple could Captain Stavers find or invent?" Cecilia looked down and coloured. "It was a revengeful feeling against Jessie." "Ah, I comprehend." "But they have now left the village, and are happily settled elsewhere. Will has recovered his health, and they are prospering much more than they could ever have done at Graveleigh."
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