Portsmouth Restaurant Guide

The Oar House is located in Portsmouth's Olde Harbour area, which in the late 1700s and early 1800s was a thriving seaport. In December, 1802, 120 buildings burned in Portsmouth's most disastrous fire, including the wooden mercantile structures that occupied the restaurant site. The citizens of Portsmouth rebuilt almost immediately, in the early months of 1803, using brick to eliminate future fire hazards. The buildings on Ceres Street, including the one now occupied by the Oar House, were constructed at this time. Designed as warehouses for grain and molasses, the buildings, which at the time were the tallest buildings in the United States, comprise a row of contiguous brick structures known as "Merchant's Row." In the early 1800s, Market Street, with its elegant homes on one side and Merchant's Row on the other, formed a residential-business complex that was the vital center of this thriving seaport. At the time, the waters edge was directly outside the Ceres Street building wall, and ships unloaded directly into what is now the Oar House dining room and lounge. From there, the goods were raised by elevators to the upper floors. Alexander Ladd's role Alexander Ladd, who headed one of the wealthy mercantile families typical of this period, owned the Oar House building. His home overlooking the river, the Moffatt-Ladd House, is now maintained by the Colonial Dames of America, New Hampshire Division. The mansion is open to the public in summer, and is a fine example of days gone by. We urge you to take time for a visit. Suggested but never proven is a story that Ladd's warehouse on the water and his residence were linked by a tunnel under Market Street, which allegedly caved in many years ago and was sealed. During the initial renovation of the Oar House, a spring-fed well was revealed at the rear of our downstairs dining room.