Several examples of historic bricks and bond styles around Virginia, photographed by Kyle Griffith

As a landscape underlain by red clay and once fueled by the manufacture of tobacco factories and cotton mills, Virginia is no stranger to old brick. With more than four centuries worth of masonry surviving across the state, they are etched by certain signs that hint at the stories of who made them. People who live in old houses understand how bricks have changed. Modern bricks are typically machine-made, uniform in size, with sharp corners, and usually core holes drilled through the brick, which also reduces weight. The surface may appear perfectly smooth, or wire-cut with vertical grooves, or have a special finish applied. For pre-1900 bricks, most of the above would be untrue. 

For country homes more than two centuries old, it is likely that the bricks were made on-site. The local red clay, called ultisol, was gathered and mixed with sand and other binding materials. At the Lewis Mansion (Kenmore) in Fredericksburg, Virginia, visitors may spot chunks of oyster shell in the bricks. Brickmakers would dust clay with sand to prevent sticking, then press it into wooden molds, either open “stocks” or closed-bottom boxes. The second option produced “scraped bricks,” which are recognizable by the marks left by the tool used to scrape off the excess clay. Pressing left distinctive folds or wrinkles on the sides. After molding, bricks were tipped out and dried in the open, where they could be altered by fingerprints, paw prints, bird tracks, and other elements of nature before hardening. 

In larger settlements like Danville, commercial brickyards operated at a significant scale to supply bricks for tobacco warehouses throughout the 1800s. Once dried, bricks were fired in kilns. Under the supervision of a skilled burner, the kiln produced durable cured bricks that could withstand time and weather. The bricks closest to the heat source sometimes got so hot that they formed a silver mirror-like glaze on the surface (see photo). A map of Chatham from 1878 shows that there was once a brick kiln located near the end of Kemper Street.

Most modern walls are built in stretcher bond, which are rows of bricks laid with their long side visible. Older walls relied on alternating headers (the short side) and stretchers to create stronger structural bonds. For example, in Chatham’s Competition Alley, one can see five layers of stretchers and a layer of headers known as common bond. For both of the 1767 and 1813 clerk’s offices in the county, the fronts of the building have alternating headers and stretchers in the most expensive arrangement known as Flemish Bond, and the other three walls are in common bond. For additional style, examples like the 1730s Hanover Courthouse utilized overfired glazed headers in Flemish Bond to create an impressive checkered pattern.

After 1900, when cars needed harder surfaces and trains could bring in machine-made bricks, the small kiln technique fell by the wayside. Several years ago, when Danville’s Schoolfield Mill was demolished, many residents salvaged the hardy enameled bricks. Recessed markings detail that they were made in New York by the American Enamel Brick Company in 1912. During the same era, some roads were paved with buff colored vitrified brick like the examples seen along parts of North Floyd Street in Danville.

Whether they’re found on the side of a court house, a chimney stack, or in the road, old bricks hold a lot of secrets about what they’ve been through. So much can be observed within a square foot of a historic brick structure, and the longer one looks the more can be noticed about the interesting decisions taken throughout the many processes that were undertaken long ago.