by John S. Lancaster.
At the height of his career in Nashville, 1837 to 1861, Adolphus Heiman designed over 30 structures, ranging from churches and public buildings to residences, forts, and even a bridge. By the mid-1850s his architectural skills and achievements had received so much recognition he was referred to as “Nashville’s Architect.”
Until recently, Heiman’s efforts in designing and creating tombstones and vaults had not been investigated, but three newly identified examples of his work show another side to the talents of this Prussian immigrant.
Located within the Old City Cemetery on Fourth Avenue South are two very different markers. The simpler of the two tombstones was made for Benjamin Sharpe in 1848. It has experienced such severe weathering that the acroteria on the four corners and much of the inscription have eroded away. Chancery Court records of a lawsuit between F. Scott, Adm., vs. Heirs of Benjamin Sharpe provide clear documentation that this stone is a Heiman creation.
As part of the docket evidence now preserved at the Nashville Metropolitan Archives, an entry on an itemized ledger page shows that A. Heiman was paid for a tombstone on September 8, 1848. Also included is a note written in Heiman’s own hand confirming payment from Mrs. Ann Sharpe for the “forty-seven dollars on account of a tomb for Benj. Sharpe deceased.” Heiman seems to have been a friend of the family: his name also appears on the Sharpes’ wedding bond and as an executor of Mrs. Sharpe’s will.
As further documentation is discovered, other tombstones in the Old City Cemetery may also be attributable to Heiman . One such record was recently discovered in the Chancery Court case of J. W. Birdwell & wife vs. William H. Harris: a payment receipt for William Harris’s monument lists the payees as Heiman and Stevenson. (Stevenson was a popular stonecutter in Nashville and signed his name to the Mexican War Memorial in Gallatin, Tennessee.) Although we know Mr. Harris was buried in Old City Cemetery, his stone has yet to be located.
The other Heiman tombstone in City Cemetery marks the grave of Nancy Maynor. The wife of Pleasant Maynor, Nancy passed away on the 28th of May in 1836. Pleasant Maynor remarried on February 21, 1837 to Jane M. Iredale. Of interest is the fact that Heiman is believed not to have arrived in Nashville until 1837. While there is sufficient space to carve another name on the opposite side, only Nancy’s information appears on the monument. This stone also bears the signature “A. Heiman” near the base.
Carvers and designers rarely signed tombstones unless the work was unique. The Maynor monument is an above-ground stone box topped with a shaft-like pedestal surmounted by an urn. Two notable details of this piece are the carved butterfly on the pedestal and the anthemion designs on the four corners of the tombstone. In memorial art a butterfly represents the soul and/or resurrection; the anthemion is purely decorative. The use of an above-ground stone vault was common in the Nashville area, but the bodies were buried in the ground beneath rather than inside the vault.
The third and most elaborate example of Heiman’s known stonework was the Franklin Vault in Sumner County, Tennessee. Located on the property of Fairview Farm, the vault was built for the wealthy slave trader Isaac Franklin and his family. Only seven years after marrying the much younger Nashvillian, Adelicia Hayes Acklen, Mr. Franklin died suddenly in Louisiana in 1846 at the age of 57. His wishes were to be returned to Tennessee for burial, and his remains were shipped in a lead-lined casket filled with alcohol. His body was placed in a temporary brick structure until a permanent vault could be constructed. Tragedy struck the Franklin household again only seven weeks after Mr. Franklin’s death when his two oldest daughters, Victoria and Adelicia, succumbed to croup and bronchitis only two days apart.
The loss of her husband and children devastated the young widow, who soon moved back to Nashville. Her father, Oliver Bliss Hayes, was appointed to handle her affairs. It is not clear who hired Heiman to create the Franklin Vault, but he designed it along with an octagonal cast iron fence for $2,500.00. By 1850 the mausoleum still had not been finished. The local builder hired to do the job had subcontracted the work. When the builder died in 1849, the subcontractor, who had not been paid, tried unsuccessfully to sue the trustees of the Franklin estate for monies still owed him.
The Sumner County Chancery Court case of Henley vs. Armfield specifies that the material for the vault was to be solid stone masonry except for the brick interior arches for the ceiling. The dimensions were twenty-eight feet square and fourteen feet high, excluding an obelisk. The walls were to be two feet thick with the outside rubbed and with four interior pillars, two feet square, to assist in the support of the superstructure. Four partition walls would create an eight-foot-wide central passage giving access to six apartments on each side, and two sets of stone shelves that were to be no less than six inches thick. The floor was to be made of “chiseled flagging of stone diamonding with stone of different colors” and the arched brick ceiling was to be “plastered with hydraulic cement.” The outward door was to be made of iron and the inner door of cedar. A window with an iron grate would provide ventilation. The roof was to be made of stone slabs five to six inches thick laid in such a way as to prevent leaks. As cost was not a prohibiting factor, the finest materials available were to be used.
It was specifically noted that Heiman himself was expected to erect the monument on top of the vault and to create the design on the two frontispieces. Some of the details appear never to have been finished, but the design of the frontispiece was completed as an Egyptian motif — an orb flanked by winged serpents. Almost certainly the largest vault Heiman ever designed, it had a style more readily found in the St. Louis Cemetery of New Orleans than on a Sumner County farm in Tennessee. A 1911 picture of the Franklin Vault has been published in Margaret Lindsley Warden’s booklet, The Saga of Fairvue, 1832-1977, p. 10.
In 1912 the vault was struck by a tornado and collapsed. Fortunately, the remains of Franklin and his children had been removed to Mt. Olivet Cemetery in Nashville years earlier. For years the Egyptian-styled lintel remained, lying in the tall grass. Today, with the fence long since removed, the ruins of the vault are threatened by development.
Although not common knowledge, many prominent architects of the early 19th century, including Robert Mills, Gideon Shyrock, and William Strickland, accepted commissions to design tombstones or monuments, in addition to their buildings. Even after the completion of his First Baptist Church project, Heiman continued to rely on stonemasonry as a primary form of income until after his return as a hero from the Mexican War in 1847. Thenceforth, his enhanced status thrust him into the spotlight of Nashville society and he began to be offered commissions for all types of building projects.
It is ironic that the favorite architect of ante-bellum Nashville would fade into obscurity. Most of Heiman’s work has now been destroyed, including the majority of his public buildings and private residences. Even his final resting place is uncertain. Adolphus Heiman lies in an unmarked grave beneath the forty-five-foot granite monument in Mt. Olivet Cemetery’s Confederate Circle. (2000)
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