Moray, the Bailey Mansion

These coordinates mark the exact site where the Moray mansion once stood. No visible remains exist.
Shown above is Bailey's "The Elephant Hotel" in Somers, New York.


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Here follows a history of the home as published on the Fairfax County Public Schools website:

What's in a Name?
Have you ever wondered how Glen Forest Elementary School got its name? Find out in this video produced for the Fairfax County Public Schools cable television channel Red Apple 21:

"...During the 19th century, Moray was the home of the Bailey family for whom Bailey’s Crossroads is named. Hachaliah Bailey, of Westchester County, New York, owned a traveling menagerie of elephants and was called “the father of the American circus” by P. T. Barnum. In 1837, he purchased 526 acres of land in Fairfax County near the intersection of Leesburg and Columbia Pikes. Hachaliah conveyed this property to Mariah Bailey, the wife of his son Lewis, in 1843. After acquiring the property, Lewis and Mariah Bailey took up farming. By the late 1870s, the Baileys began operating their mansion as a summer boarding house for travelers seeking to escape the sweltering heat in Washington. After the deaths of Lewis and Mariah, the farm was divided among their surviving heirs. The land where Glen Forest Elementary School stands was inherited by a daughter-in-law, Eliza Dent Bailey, wife of Horace Bailey. The Bailey home, Moray, was destroyed by fire in 1942. The home would have been a short walk from Glen Forest Elementary School because it once stood on what is today Durbin Place."


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Bailey's Crossroads draws its name from the Bailey family of circus fame, which has long been connected with the community. Hachaliah Bailey, one of America's first circus showmen, resided here.

In 1808, while still in New York state, he purchased an Indian elephant which was one of the first such animals to reach the United States. Seeking a place to winter his circus animals, he moved to Virginia, and on December 19, 1837, he bought a tract of land on the outskirts of Falls Church including what is now the intersection of Leesburg Pike and Columbia Pike. On this tract he built a large house known as "Bailey's Mansion" or "Moray". It was reputed to have contained 100 rooms. The mansion sat at a location now known as Durbin Place. It abutted Glenforest Drive, the oldest outlet road to Leesburg Pike.

Circuses were part of the Bailey family business. Hachaliah's son Lewis Bailey (1795–1870) operated a travelling circus and pioneered the use of canvas circus tents before eventually settling in 1840 to farm land in Bailey's Crossroads. Hachaliah's nephew George F. Bailey managed several shows, too, designing a tank in which a hippopotamus could be moved from place to place. Another nephew, Fred Harrison Bailey, recognized a potential circus talent in James Anthony McGuiness, later James Anthony Bailey, who united the Cooper and Bailey operations with Phineas Taylor Barnum's circus to form the Barnum and Bailey Circus, which later joined with the Ringling Brothers Circus to form the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus.

Perhaps the first of the Northerners to settle permanently in Fairfax County to farm was Lewis Bailey, an upstate New Yorker and the son of Hachaliah Bailey, who followed his father south.

In 1837, the elder Bailey bought hundreds of acres of Fairfax land, much of it on the outskirts of present-day Arlington County in the area now known as Bailey's Cross Roads. Shortly afterward, Lewis Bailey bought 150 acres (0.61 km2) of land from his father for ten dollars an acre. Included in the purchase was "a good dwelling-house," but there were "no other buildings of value, and little or no fence." The farm itself, he wrote later, consisted of "cultivated worn-out lands, too poor to produce a crop of grass, or pay for cultivation without manure." Some of Bailey's neighbors considered the farm the poorest in the vicinity. When he built his first small barn, twenty-four by thirty-six feet, they asked him if he "ever expected to fill it." The question was scarcely a jest, for Bailey did not make enough hay the first year "to winter two horses." Nevertheless, the purchase was a wise one. Within a decade Bailey had a fine herd of dairy cattle and had become one of the more prosperous farmers in the area. The Baileys were prominent members of the Dulin Methodist Church, and intermarried with many Falls Church people.

Hachaliah Lyman Bailey (pronounced heck-a-LIE-uh; July 31, 1775 – September 2, 1845) was the founder of one of America's earliest circuses. In 1808, he purchased an Indian elephant which he named "Old Bet" and which was one of the first such animals to reach America. With "Old Bet" as its main attraction, he formed the Bailey Circus, which also included a trained dog, several pigs, a horse and four wagons. This was the impetus for what in time evolved into the Bailey component of what became the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus.

Between 1820 and 1825, Bailey built the Elephant Hotel in Somers, New York. The hotel was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2005. Bailey also served two terms in the New York State legislature.

In 1837, Bailey sold the hotel and moved to Northern Virginia, bought the land surrounding the intersection of Leesburg Pike and Columbia Pike in Fairfax County, Virginia near Falls Church, Virginia, and gave Bailey's Crossroads his name. The Crossroads then became the winter quarters for his circus.

In 1845 Hachaliah returned to Somers for a visit and died from the kick of a horse while there. He is buried in Somers' Ivandell Cemetery.

Several of the next generation of Baileys performed in circuses. Hachaliah Bailey served as a role model to a young P.T. Barnum, who wrote of meeting him when Hachaliah visited Barnum's store in Bethel, Connecticut. In 1888, Barnum lent his name to a partnership with James Anthony Bailey, who had adopted the surname of Frederick Bailey, a nephew of Hachaliah's, to form the Barnum and Bailey Circus.

Early career
Hachaliah Bailey was born in the small village of Somers, New York on July 31, 1775. His parents were James Bailey and Anne Brown Bailey. Hachaliah was one of six children, Mary Bailey, Stephen Bailey, Lewis Bailey, Jane Bailey and Anna Bailey Owens.

Like his father, Hachaliah became a farmer where he farmed land and raised cattle. Hachaliah married Mary Purdy and they had five children. Hachaliah Bailey was also known for finding other ways to make an income. He became one of the directors of the Croton Turnpike Company, this eventually turned into a toll road through the middle of Somers where it became a major route. This route was used to transport cattle to the Hudson. Another way Hachaliah made a profit was by becoming a part-owner of a sloop which was used to transport farm animals.

Hachaliah and many locals frequented a bar called the Bull Head Tavern. This is where Hachaliah bought his elephant Old Bet for only $1,000. Old Bet's name drew from Hachaliah's daughter Elizabeth whose nickname was Young Beth. Old Bet was the second elephant ever to be brought to the United States. Hachaliah brought the elephant to Hudson Valley in 1805 and then New York City in 1806. Old Bet was originally supposed to be used as a draft animal, however, it didn't take long for Hachaliah to realize the rising interest that Americans had for exotic animals. Hachaliah then used this intrigue and began traveling at night so no one could get a glimpse of the animal and he would charge 25 cents per person to see Old Bet.

Hachaliah then decided to showcase Old Bet in a small circus. After Hachaliah's neighbors saw the booming success the exotic creature brought to Hachaliah, most of his neighbors started buying and showcasing exotic animals. Soon after Somers became known for its intriguing animals. By 1808 Hachaliah took on two partners Benjamin Lent and Andrew Brunn each paying $1200 for one/third of the interest on Old Bet. Hachaliah also owned two more elephants after Old Bet was shot on tour by a local farmer who was angry with the amount of money and attention that was being spent on an elephant. Hachaliah then memorialized Old Bet by creating the Elephant Hotel and building a statue in her honor.

Marriages and children
Hachaliah Bailey married his wife Mary Purdy when she was fourteen years old and he was twenty-three years old. Together they had five children:

Calista Bailey (1800–1879)
Lewis Bailey (1803–1870)
Jane Bailey (1808–1882)
Joseph Turk Bailey (1810–1881)
Stephen Bailey (1814–1863)
Hachaliah Bailey then would split with Mary and later marry his wife Ruth Ferris Bailey where they had no children.