Careswell

In its earliest guise the Winslow House was a two-story dwelling, gabled at the sides with three bays across the front and capped by a massive pilastered chimney in the most elegant seventeenth-century manner. The clapboarding is a Georgian or even Federal "improvement"; the original siding may have been simple butted boards. The sash windows, which came down to the twentieth century, were nine-over-twelve on the rear with later, more stylish nine-over-nine and six-over-nine on the front. The lack of internal shutters suggests that there may have been leaded casement windows before the double-hung windows were installed.

The floor plan has the typical hall-and-parlor arrangement of seventeenth-century New England houses. The stairway in the narrow entryway between the hall and parlor has turned balusters and unique acorn-shaped finials and pendants, some believed to be original, which according to oral tradition relate to the coat of arms adopted by the Winslows. This stairway and much of the rest of the house relates closely to the Bryant-Cushing House, by tradition built in 1698 for Thomas Bryant in nearby South Scituate (now Norwell) by the same master carpenter that Isaac Winslow used.

Onto the original structure were grafted additions and improvements. At some point an ell including a second, "summer," kitchen below and two rooms and storage above was attached to the original kitchen, probably during General John Winslow's ownership. Gunstock posts (see Pl. VII) suggest that this ell may be older than the main house; it may have been part of the house Josiah Winslow built in the mid-seventeenth century--or from some other local building moved onto the site. One can deduce from other physical evidence that General John Winslow probably made major renovations in the mid-Georgian style soon after he took possession of the house in the 1750s, and that his son Doctor Isaac did some remodeling in the Federal style after he moved in in the 1790s.

Space above the present quoins suggests that pilasters had earlier (but not necessarily originally) graced the comers of the structure, and these pilasters may have dressed clapboards (that were also not necessarily original). A deep, fenestrated entryway in the neoclassical style was added at some point in the eighteenth century, and its corners are quoined like the comers of the house (and were presumably added at the same time). The doorway is set off by fluted Doric pilasters; the pediment is decorated with dentil molding appropriate to the order, and on the tympanum is an eight-pointed star similar to inlays found on period furniture.

During the twentieth-century restoration, the original fire-places in the kitchen, hail (now the dining room), and the room above the hall were uncovered. A cup found bricked into the original kitchen hearth is both remnant and confirmation of an early custom (see Pl. VIII). The original fireplace in the hall proved to have an elegant curved back and a decorative fireback of herringbone brick and was surmounted by a massive pine lintel. On the other side of the house, the parlor and the room above it retain later, smaller fireplaces. Although the difference between the north and the south sides of the house is due to choices made in restoration, it is also a reminder of the division of the house when the widow Sarah Wensley Winslow lived there, between 1738 and 1753.