An Old Dayton House Saved From Bulldozer

An East Hampton house dating to 1707 which was home to a local hero of the American Revolution was nearly destroyed last Thursday night during a drill by the East Hampton Fire Department.

The drill, during which the house was filled with smoke while as many as 50 volunteers practiced rescue maneuvers, was authorized by the owner, Ronald O. Perelman. Mr. Perelman, who bought the seven-acre property adjacent to his 58-acre estate, the Creeks, in 1994, expected the Capt. John Dayton house to be demolished this week.

Demolition was halted, however, after a descendant of Captain Dayton, Averill Dayton Geus, launched a vigorous protest over the weekend. Mr. Perelman's lawyers now are trying to work out an agreement with village officials to save the oldest part of the house.

Came As Surprise

"Frankly, we were surprised by the entire matter. We were never told the house had any historical significance until this past weekend. As soon as it was brought to our attention, we halted the demolition so we could gather all the facts," said James Conroy, the senior vice president and special counsel to McAndrews and Forbes, Mr. Perelman's Manhattan-based holding company.

Village Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr. reported yesterday that Mr. Perelman's representatives had been "very gracious and accommodating." He said he expected a solution would be found that was satisfactory to everyone.

Mr. Perelman bought the house and property from the Nature Conservancy for $2 million. Sara Davison, executive director of the local chapter, said the conservancy had done an environmental evaluation of the property before it was sold, but was not aware that the house was "of any value."

Revolutionary War Site

"This is one of the last few Revolutionary War sites that we can still point to here. . . . If I had this house on my property, I wouldn't give it up for anything in the world," Mrs. Geus said this week.

Mrs. Geus manages the village-owned Home, Sweet Home Museum, the first Dayton family residence in East Hampton, and also writes about local history. She is on the executive board of the Town 350th Anniversary Committee.

She learned over the weekend about the damage wrought by the Fire Department and Mr. Perelman's demolition plan, and promptly telephoned Leonard I. Ackerman, Mr. Perelman's local lawyer, and Robert Hefner, the adviser to East Hampton Village on historic buildings.

"Worth Preserving"

Mrs. Geus, Mr. Hefner, Mr. Ackerman, and the village building inspector, Tom Lawrence, looked over the house on Tuesday afternoon. The house's several additions, built over the years, were found to be in poor shape, but they said they found the original structure mostly intact. Mr. Hefner and Mrs. Geus judged it worth preserving.

"It is quite an unusual house, unique for East Hampton as far as I know. . . . The timbers, the exterior framing, the floors, it's all still there. One could get a very good idea of what the original house looked like," Mr. Hefner said.

The house was built in the style of a Cape Cod with some uncommon features, including corner fireplaces. It was enlarged in 1900 as the gate house to the Creeks, then owned by Adele and Albert Herter, and it was moved back from the Montauk Highway in 1950, about the time Ruth Gordon Livingston bought it.

Captain Dayton, who commanded an East Hampton company of revolutionary fighters, is credited with single-handedly putting down a nighttime attack on the then-isolated farm with his own musket and a pitchfork. A Hessian was reportedly killed in the melee. The beams in his house, which are now exposed, show holes where musket balls fired by British troops had lodged.

The history books also say that Captain Dayton prevented, by clever ruse, a British raid by ship on the town's cattle while the herd was grazing on Montauk. With too few troops to put up any real threat, he marched his men along the bluffs above Fort Pond Bay, then ordered them to turn their coats inside out and march past again. By that means, the force appeared twice as large.

That bluff, near Culloden Point, is marked on old maps as Dayton's Ruse. Captain Dayton, who was born in 1727, also served as East Hampton Town Supervisor from 1785 to 1787. He died in 1825.

Dayton Creeks

East Hampton Fire Chief Steve Griffiths said the two-story house had been filled with machine-made smoke last Thursday night, as the volunteers cut holes in the roof, smashed out the lead-paned windows, and hammered through the doors with axes.

"They said we could do all the damage we wanted. They even wanted us to burn it down, but we weren't interested in that," said Chief Griffiths.

He explained that a practice fire-fighting drill was ruled out because he couldn't be sure there would be enough volunteers on hand to control a real fire. The number of volunteers allowed to take part was limited by a member of Mr. Perelman's staff at the Creeks, where there are an elaborate security system and armed guards.

Mr. Perelman's estate sits on a large peninsula formed by two creeks and Georgica Pond. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the property was called Dayton Creeks.

In 1894, Edward Dayton sold 70 acres of the peninsula to Mary Miles Herter. Albert and Adele Herter, who inherited it, were artists and interior decorators who built an Italianate manor house and made it a lavish showplace. Their son, Christian Herter, who became Governor of Massachusetts and later United States Secretary of State, later gave about 10 acres and Captain Dayton's old house to Harry Easer, who was the estate manager for many years and grew up there.

Mr. Easer sold it in 1950 to Ms. Gordon Livingston. She divided off 1.7 acres on the highway that included a cottage for her son, Gregory Gordon (he lives there still) and retired three years ago to Antigua.

At that time, she donated the Captain Dayton house and her remaining property, which included two other cottages, to the conservancy as a "tradeland," meaning it was sold to raise money for her life trust and for the conservancy.

Still Fact-Finding

Mr. Perelman bought the Creeks several years ago for $12 million, from the estate of the late artist Alfonso Ossorio. He recently obtained a demolition permit for the Captain Dayton house, which overlooks the water and was used for guests. A new prefabricated house, reportedly ready to be shipped any day, is to be put in its place.

"We want to show good faith here. We want to cooperate in the public interest but we need to assess where that interest lies and what is the best way to achieve it," said Mr. Conroy. He added that an offer had been made to donate the structure to the village.

"We are still in the fact-finding phase of this thing. Until just a few days ago, no one had ever voiced any concern about this place," said Mr. Conroy.

Photo: Morgan McGivern