f this beautiful woodwork was removed, and to-day, despoiled
of its former architectural splendor, dingy and dilapidated, the shell
of the building is used as a cigar factory.

The house was built about 1765 by John Stamper, a wealthy English
merchant, who had been successively councilman, alderman and finally
mayor of Philadelphia in 1759. He bought the whole south side of Pine
Street from Second to Third from the Penns in 1761, and for many years
the house was surrounded by a garden containing flowers, shrubs and
fruit trees. Later the house passed into the hands of Stamper's
son-in-law, William Bingham, Senior, and afterwards to Bingham's
son-in-law, the Reverend Doctor Robert Blackwell.

Doctor Blackwell was the son of Colonel Jacob Blackwell, of New York,
who owned extensive estates on Long Island along the East River,
Blackwell's Island being included. After graduating from Princeton,
Robert Blackwell studied first medicine and then theology. After several
years of tutoring at Philipse Manor, he was ordained to the ministry and
served the missions at Gloucester and St. Mary's, Colestown, New
Jersey. When both congregations were scattered by the Revolution, he
joined the Continental Army at Valley Forge as both chaplain and
surgeon. In 1870 he married Hannah Bingham, whose considerable fortune,
added to the estate of his father which he soon after inherited, made
him the richest clergyman in America and one of the richest men in
Philadelphia. The following year he was called to assist Doctor White,
the rector of Christ Church and St. Peter's, and to the latter Doctor
Blackwell chiefly devoted himself until his resignation in 1811 due to
failing health. It was the services of these united parishes which
Washington, his Cabinet and members of Congress attended frequently. On
Doctor Blackwell's death in 1831 the house passed into the Willing
family and has since changed owners many times.

The Wharton house, Number 336 Spruce Street, was built in 1796 by Samuel
Pancoast, a house carpenter, who sold it to Mordecai Lewis, a prominent
merchant in the East India trade, shipowner, importer and one-time
partner of William Bingham, the brother-in-law of Doctor Blackwell, and
whose palatial mansion in Third Street above Spruce was one of the most
exclusive social centers of the city. Mordecai Lewis was a director of
the Bank of North America, the Philadelphia Contributorship for the
Insurance of Houses from Loss by Fire, th