This summer I have been looking at the Farm Journal of Cadwallader Colden. He began the journal in 1727, three years after building a house at Coldengham and when Jane herself would have been 3. He continued until 1736 listing trees, vegetables and livestock, making notes on grafting and planting, and supplying weather reports and financial notes. Mixed in with all of this are regular mentions of the farm layout such as in this detailed entry about fencing the garden:
About the time I pail’d in the Garden The Posts& rails of Chesnut made of trees that had been kill’d about 3 or 4 years & the Clapboards or pails of white oak from trees fell’d about ye 20th of this month The rails of ye 5th and 7th panels from ye Garden door next ye brook were of read oak rails that ad been cut 6 or 7 years
The rails between the Kitchen & the Brook were generally of White Oak
While cataloging some of the trees that had been cut since 1720, presumably to clear the land for the house and surrounding fields, this entry also places the garden behind the house between the kitchen and the brook. The garden door, made of red oak, is next to the brook. Using this and the other descriptions scattered throughout the journal, I have begun a drawing that guesses at the overall plan of the house and surrounding farm circa 1727-28.
