1759 Vought House
The 1759 Vought House was built on 285 acres of Hunterdon County farmland purchased by Christoffel “Christopher” Vought in 1759. Constructed of stone and hand-hewn timbers, the house features rare wattle-and-daub walls and ceilings and ornamental plaster designs, the most extraordinary being a motif of a serpent winding the length of the center hall ceiling with its head turned back to face the main entry.
By the early 1770’s, the Vought farmstead had grown to nearly 500 acres and Christopher and son John had attained positions of prominence in the community. As years of colonial grievances with Great Britain spawned growing calls for rebellion, both father and son were staunch Loyalists. When the rebel New Jersey Provincial Congress ordered local militias to prepare for the defense of New York, John Vought was issued a summons to appear due to his entire company’s refusal to turn out.
Local tensions erupted on the night of June 24, 1776, when John and Christopher Vought led a mob of two dozen Loyalists armed with clubs in a raid on the tavern house of their neighbor, Thomas Jones. Jones was an ardent Patriot rebel, a delegate to the New Jersey Provincial Congress, and a Captain in the Hunterdon militia. Acting on an order from the NJ Provincial Congress to apprehend the Loyalist “insurgents” involved in the attack on Captain Jones, the Patriot militia marched to the Vought House and captured Christopher. Son John had managed to slip away undetected, but soon turned himself in upon hearing of his father’s capture. They were held at the jail in Trenton for approximately five days, then released and fined 100 pounds each by the NJ Provincial Congress on July 31, 1776.
In December of 1776, Christopher and John Vought led a large party of local Loyalists on a daring journey through rebel militia assaults to reach British forces stationed at New Brunswick. John Vought was commissioned as Lieutenant and later Captain in the New Jersey Volunteers, the Provincial regiments that fought alongside British regulars during the War for Independence. John and his father were stationed on Staten Island with British forces throughout the war.
Left behind to manage the farmstead, Cornelia and daughter-in-law Mary Vought, with two enslaved servants, bore the brunt of the hardships of war. In 1778, the family household goods and livestock were confiscated and sold at auction. In April 1779, the real estate was sold at auction. The Voughts would never see their home again.
At the end of the war in 1783, the Vought family set sail for exile in Nova Scotia. In 1792, they finally returned to the new United States and resettled outside Albany, NY.
