The Old Senate Chamber of the
The Maryland State House
Where Washington Resigned His Commission
When the Continental Congress convened in Annapolis from November 26, 1783 to August 13, 1784, it met in the Old Senate Chamber, a simple but elegant room. It was here that General George Washington, on December 23, 1783, came before Congress to resign his commission as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army in an emotional ceremony. He left immediately after the ceremony to return to Mount Vernon and private life as a farmer. A bronze plaque on the floor marks the exact spot where he stood while delivering his farewell speech. Less than a month later, on January 14, 1784, the Treaty of Paris was ratified in this same room, officially ending the Revolutionary War. On May 7, 1784, the Chamber was the scene of Thomas Jefferson's appointment as the first United States minister plenipotentiary to foreign governments.
Some pieces of the furniture in the room, including the President's desk and chair, were made for it in 1796-7 by noted Annapolis cabinetmaker, John Shaw. The rest of the pieces are reproductions made by Enrico Liberti in 1940. John Shaw (1745-1829) was, more than any one else, responsible for the appearance of the State House from the 1770s through the first two decades of the 1800s. He cared for the grounds, illuminated the State House for festive occasions, supplied furnishings, made repairs, and did normal maintenance.
The head on the mannequin of Washington is a replica of the one sculptured in 1785 by the French artist Jean-Antoine Houdon. The uniform is an exact replica of one worn by Washington which is now in the Smithsonian Institution, in Washington, D.C. Gifts from several organizations made the mannequin and uniform possible: the Colonial Dames of America, Chapter One; the Maryland Society of Sentates Past; and the Maryland Colonial Society.
The painting above the fireplace is Washington, Lafayette and Tilghman at Yorktown, painted in 1784 by Charles Willson Peale. It shows General George Washington with his aide-de-camp and secretary, Colonel Tench Tilghman, and the Marquis de Lafayette. Col. Tilghman, a Marylander, was the courier who carried the news of the British surrender at Yorktown to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. On display to the left of the portrait are two of Tench Tilghman's swords which the state acquired in 1998.
The other four portraits in the room are also by Charles Willson Peale and are of early governors of Maryland: William Paca, John Eager Howard, William Smallwood, and John Hoskins Stone.
At the rear of the room, on either side of the entrance, are two rows of Windsor chairs. It was here that the gentlemen spectators and commissioners sat. Above this area is the Ladies Balcony. The beautifully handcarved tobacco leaf motif, which is featured on the decorative border around the balcony and above the dais at the front of the room, gives a clue to the importance of tobacco in Maryland's history. During the 17th and early 18th centuries, tobacco was the chief cash crop and the currency of the province.