There, they quarried and cut the rough stone that was later dressed and laid by Scottish stonemasons to erect the walls of the President’s House. Enslaved people were trained on the spot at the government’s quarry at Aquia in Stafford County, Virginia, forty miles south of Washington. Enslaved African-American quarrymen, sawyers, brick-makers, and carpenters fashioned raw materials into the products used to erect the White House.
A major concern in the construction of the new public buildings in the undeveloped Federal City was the acquisition of building materials, such as stone, lumber, bricks, hardware, and nails.The commissioners typically provided workers with housing, two meals per day, and basic medical care. The owners collected a wage from the commissioners while providing clothing and some medical care to the enslaved laborers. Most of these enslaved laborers were hired out from slave owners from southern Maryland, northern Virginia, and Washington, D.C. However, response to recruitment was dismal and soon they turned to African Americans-enslaved and free, but primarily enslaved-to provide the bulk of labor that built the White House, the United States Capitol, and other early government buildings. The commissioners for the District of Columbia, charged by Congress to build the new city under the direction of President George Washington, initially planned to import workers from Europe to meet their labor needs.
The decision to place the capital on land ceded by two states that permitted slavery-Virginia and Maryland-ultimately influenced the acquisition of laborers to construct its public buildings.
Construction on the President’s House began in 1792.
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