USA > Maryland > Washington County > Hagerstown > A history of Washington County, Maryland from the earliest settlements to the present time, including a history of Hagerstown > Part 47
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*Names of the officers and soldiers taken at the meeting:
Philip Mouse,
& Col. John Miller, Capt. James Biays, Daniel Hauer,
Andrew Burns,
Mathias Wegley, Samuel Fiegley,
Frederick Betts,
Capt. Geo. Shryock,
Solomon Stinemetz,
James Dillehunt
Peter Snyder
Spencer Moxley,
Capt. David Artz, John Cramer, Robert Campbell, Abraham Crum,
Charles G. Downs, Richard Davis, Rezin James,
Christian Coy, John Rockwell,
William Biershing,
John Dovenberger,
John Harrigan,
David Tschudy, John Neff,
William McCardel, Jesse Long,
Jacob Burkhart,
John Murry,
William Freaner,
Daniel Oster,
Frederick Kinsel,
Jacob Powles,
Henry Creager,
William Cline, George Hauer,
Daniel Creager, John Kealhoffer,
Fred'k Humrichouse,
John Hull,
Ca't. Gerard Stonebraker Anthony Campbell,
Jacob Boward Samuel Creager.
William Johnston,
Jacob King,
John Brown, James Swales, John Plummer,
Henry Blessing,
George Spangler,
Andrew Double,
Benjamin Simpson,
Joseph Barkdoll
David Newcomer, William Grove
John Anderson,
.Jacob Middlekauff,
John Lushbaugh, David Long,
Jacob Kayler,
John Marteney, Maj. Elias Baker, Valentine Wachtal, David Thum, Henry Sweitzer,
Nathan Davis,
Jacob Hose,
Thomas Combs,
Ezekiel Cheney,
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HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD
snow storm, waist deep in the snow. Mr. Coit had completed his second round and concluding that all had escaped, he was beginning to descend the ladder when he heard the voice of Dr. Kerfoot from the thick smoke. He had rushed up the burning stairway into the dormitory, and would not be satisfied until he had gone around with Mr. Coit and felt in every bed. They then de- scended the ladder together and all' were saved. This was accomplished by such coolness and good management as is seldom witnessed. It was stated in proof of the short notice for escape that seventeen gold watches were destroyed in the fire. The loss to the College, beside a library, was not less than twenty thousand dollars.
The College of St. James had been formally opened with about twenty boys, as the diocesan school of the Episcopal Church in Maryland, on Monday, October 3rd. 1842. The Principal was the Rev. John B. Kerfoot, and his assistants were the Rev. Russell Trevett. D. E. Lyman, Robert S. Howland, J. Kip Anderson and Samuel H. Ker- foot. As the school increased. Reuben Riley George W. Coakley. R. H. Clarkson, afterwards Bishop of Nebraska, and the Rev. Joseph C. Fass- more were added to the faculty. The old Ring- gold mansion house at Fountain Rock, together with a few acres of land including the beautiful grounds and the copious spring which gives its name to the property, had been offered for sale by trustees. The idea of buying it for a church school first suggested itself to Dr. T. B. Lyman, the Rector of St. John's Church, Hagerstown, afterward Bishop of North Carolina. He made the suggestion to Bishop Whittingham, and they two collected the five thousand dollars necessary to purchase the property. The school grew and prospered until broken up by the war as we shall sre later. It was then abandoned until 1870, when it was revived as a grammar school by Mr. Henry Onderdonk and has so continued to the present time. It is now conducted by Mr. Adrian HT. Onderdonk, son of Henry Onderdonk, who died in 1895. After the fire in 1857, a movement was made to remove the school to a more accessible location, Hagerstown at that time being hard to reach, and the college separated from it by six miles of bad road. A site was bought on the Northern Central railroad. twenty-five miles from Baltimore, and extensive buildings were begun, but the war put an end to this project, and the
lower story of the new building lay in ruins for many years.
But while Washington County was in danger of losing this splendid institution for lack of trans- portation facilities, the people were carnestly en- gaged in trying to secure another railroad which should give the County access to the cast and west by way of the Baltimore & Ohio road. The project was to build a railroad from Hagerstown to Weverton. Publie meetings were held at the Lyceum Hall in March, 1857, and resolutions were adopted asking the legislature for authority to issue $250,000 of County bonds to subscribe to the road. It was urged that an advance of ten cents per bushel in the price of wheat, which would surely follow the building of the road, would more than pay the annual interest of $15.000 on the proposed bonds. By Chapter 260 of the Acts of Assembly of 1840, the Baltimore & Ohio road had been directed to build the road from Weverton to Hagerstown and in 1858 a bill was introduced to compel the performance of this obligation. But nothing came of it. The scheme to build the road, like every other enterprise, was interrupted by the war and the road was not completed, as we shall see, until 1867.
In April, 1857. the Washington County jail which had been built in 1826, burnt down. The sheriff's home which was attached to it was saved. In August. 1859, the German Reformed Church in Funkstown was also burnt. This was at the time, one of the oldest buildings in the County and the lot upon which it was built was given by Jacob Funk for the joint use of the German Re- formed and Lutheran congregations, Frederick Geiger and Jacob Sharer being the trustees.
In 1905 when 86 years of age Edwin Bell wrote for the author of this book, his friend of over 30 years, the following reminiscences :
My father, William Duffield Bell, who estab- lished the "Torch Light" newspaper in 1814, oc- eupied as an office aud dwelling the old Jonathan Hager house on the corner of the Public Square and E. Washington St., and there I, his first child, was born. At an early age to me, he removed to a dwelling on S. Potomac St. nearly opposite the Lutheran Church, in the midst of many old fam- ilies of the town. among which were those of "Grandma" Pottinger and "old Doctor" John Young. Mrs. Pottinger was the one sister of the Judges John and Thomas Buchanan who graced
.
Mt. Vernon Reformed Church, Keedysville.
The Manor German Baptist Church, Tilghmanton District.
281
OF WASHINGTON COUNTY, MARYLAND.
the Benches, respectively and simultaneously of the Court of . Appeals and our County Court. She was the accomplished and beloved head of a large family of grandchildren among whom were John Buchanan Hall, son of Thomas B. Hall, whose wife was the daughter of Mrs. Pottinger. Dr. Young's niece was the wife of the Rev. John Lind, pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Hagerstown, who died leaving a son named after his grand uncle by whom he was adopted. My boyhood was passed chiefly with these two boys, known to cach other and their intimates as "Buck," "John," and "Ed." At a later period was added a fourth, Rich- ard P. Hammond, called "Dick," forming a quar- tette of devoted companions to the end of the lives of two, "John" and "Dick." They have been dead several years, the first dying an esteemed member of the medical profession in Philadelphia and the other occupying at the time of his death, somne years ago, in the city of San Francisco, the same relative position which Theodore Roosevelt filled in the city of New York-that of chief commis- sioner of the police department. At his death the profound respect of the metropolis of the State was manifested by the bestowal of almost munic- ipal honors. He was the eldest son of Dr. Wil- liam Hammond, originally a practicing physician of Hagerstown and afterwards surgeon to the time of his death in the U. S. army. His mother was the daughter of Col. Frisby Tilghman, of "Rockland," six miles south of Hagerstown, whose estate joined that of Fountain Rock, owned by his brother-in-law, Gen. Samuel Ringgold, who in early days represented this district in Congress and whose son, Maj. Samuel Ringgold, organizer of the famous battery of artillery which bore his name was the first officer of distinction to fall in the Mexican War ; whilst another son, Con- modore Cadawalder Ringgold, of the Navy, sig- nalized his devotion to that branch of the service as commander of the "Vincennes" in the antarctic expedition under Commodore Wilkes and held a distinct command in the Japan Expedition under Commodore Perry.
Together at the old Academy on Prospect Hill through their preparatory course, a separation came when "Buck" and "John" left for Can- nonsburg College ; "Dick" to commence his course as cadet at the West Point Military Academy; I to take my place in the Torch Light printing of- fice as compositor and assistant of my father. Whilst thus engaged I formed an unbroken inti-
maey through life with two fellow "typos" who matriculated in the composing room of the Ha- gerstown Mail: James L. and John A. Freaner, with one of whom, John, in California days, I was perhaps more closely associated than with any other in that state. James L. Freaner had won renown during the Mexican War as "Mustang," the correspondent of the New Orleans Delta, with which he became connected on starting out in life. His letters which covered the whole Mexican cam- paign under General Scott contained an admir- able record of those events and were copied all over the United States, to some extent adding to, if not forming, the basis of the present system of war correspondence. As such "Mustang" was present at and reported through his letters, the treaty of peace, known as the "Triste Treaty," concluded at Guadalupe de Hidalgo, by that offic- ial, the U. S. minister, with the Mexican govern- ment, and was its bearer to Washington. Upon the acquisition of California he was among the first to reach the new possessions, and from his intimate knowledge of persons and conditions, at once took a leading part in the formation of a temporary government. The seat of this govern- ment, in which all judicial and executive power was centered, was in San Francisco, and the sheriff of that county was the official instrument through whom it was enforced. For this position a man of nerve and of peculiar experience was needed and the choice fell upon John Coffee Hays. He was a native of Tennessee and had been named after Gen. John Coffee of that State, a distin- guished officer of the War of 1812 under Gen. Jackson, particularly in his Indian campaign, and was dubbed "brave Jack Coffee," an appellation which his namesake inherited. The latter was familiarly known as "Jack Hays" the Texas rang- er, the famous Indian fighter and cool and intrepid commander in Mexico under Gen. Scott. With "Mustang" he had been in many a fight and closely associated through the campaign, and was familiar with the stock from which the Freaners sprang. Accordingly his first act was to name as his depty, John A. Freaner, of Hagerstown. This position was filled with signal ability during the provisional term of the office, as well as the full term following the admission of the State into the Union, to which Col. Ilays was elected by an over- whelming vote of the people. at the first election held in California as a State.
At the conclusion of his collegiate course Buch-
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HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD
anan Hall entered the law office of William Price as a student where, before his admission to the Bar, I joined him; John Lind studied medi- cine and became a practicing physician. Richard Hammond left West Point as second lieutenant of artillery, and I assumed the duties devolving upon me. upon the death of my father, as editor of the Torch Light.
At the height of the gold excitement in 1848 the law as well as the newspaper business in Ha- gerstown being somewhat dull, Buchanan Hall pro- posed to me to pull up stakes and that we go to California together. It seemed to me an inspira- tion and was the first step in the movement later carried out. I was the first to start, on the ship "Nylon" from Baltimore, Feb. 3, 1849, and did not reach San Francisco until late in October, in consequence of delays in discharging cargo at Rio de Janeiro and Valpariso and adverse weather off ('ape Horn. At Valparaiso, on one of the public streets, I ran upon John Lind, who had sailed from Baltimore in another ship long after me and reached San Francisco ahead of me. On my arrival in San Francisco the ship had scarcely dropped anchor before I was ashore and making for the Parker House, the only hotel in the city, located on Portsmouth Square. Almost the first person I met was "Jim" Freaner who occupied one of the choice rooms of the house, and that night inflated for me a gum bed which was spread upon the floor of his room, and made me fecl at home. From him I learned that a provisional government had been organized and that his broth- er John was chief deputy of the Sheriff, as well as a member of an industrial company which had been formed in Hagerstown after I left there. "Diek" Hammond, then a major, who had arrived over the Isthmus of Panama, was hard at work as surveyor in laying out the city of Stockton at the mouth of San Jocquin river, in which he was joint- ly interested with the proprietor, Capt. Weber. John Lind was also up in the mines of Calaveras county practicing medicine and of which county he became representative in the State legislature as Senator. "Buck" Hall was delayed in his depar- ture several months and did not arrive until I had been fully established in the practice of the law in San Francisco with Mr. Hyde Ray Bowie, of Anne Arundel Co., Md.
Whilst thus occupied the first steamship. to "double the Horn" with passengers had arrived in harbor, and aboard of it was Buchanan Hall with
his father-in-law, Dr. William Hammond. Mr. Hall's wife the sister of Richard P. Hammond, and his little son, William, remained at their home in Hagerstown and came out later, as did also Dr. William Hammond, Jr., recently deceas- ed, also surgeon in the regular army, who had been married to the daughter of the late Alexander Mitchell. Thus it was that the four Academy boys, all moving by different routes were reunited on the Pacific coast.
This was at the commencement of the most mo- mentous period in the history of California, when that territory was passing through its transition state of Mexican dependence to sisterhood under the Stars and Stripes. Violence and murder drove an infuriated people into disregard of law and the decrees of a self-constituted organization for a while took its place. It was at this period two ques- tions-one national the other State-absorbed the attention of the entire people through successive sessions of the legislature. One was the elction of a United States Senator in place of Dr. Gwin; the other the extension of the water-front of San Francisco. Senator Gwin was a candidate to suc- cecd himself and David C. Broderick was his op- ponent. The other issue covered what was very properly termed an attempt to appropriate the en- tire water-front of San Francisco, for the benefit of the projectors, headed by David C. Broderick and engineered by General James M. Estelle, a state Senator, and which at this day would be denominated "graft." The contest over these issues ran through and monopolized several sessions of the legislature at Vallejo and Benicia, with the aftermath at Sacramento, in turns capitals of the state, resulting in the triumphant defeat of the "Extension Bill" and the election of Senator Brod- erick.
The Democratic party, then in control, was divided into two factions-one, the New York, headed by Broderick; the other by a combination containing the supporters of Senator Gwin, prin- cipally, but not wholly, from the South, of which Major Richard P. Hammond, of Maryland, and Col. John ('. Hays, of Texas, by reason of the commanding positions they held under the Demo- cratic administration of President Pierce, were prominent leaders. On the inauguration of that administration a complete change of all the Fed- eral officers in the State from Whig to Democratie, was rigidly enforced. Upon Major Hammond de- volved the leadership in this work. He had ae-
283
OF WASHINGTON COUNTY, MARYLAND.
companied the crowd to Washington at the inaug- uration of the President and to the surprise of us all on the Pacific coast, as well as to a host of aspirants to the various offices about to be dis- pensed, was appointed collector of the Port of San Francisco with its appendages-the most valuable and in every way the leading position in the gift of the Administration. Major Haminond had served with General Pierce in Mexico and his appointment was made upon the personal appre- ciation in which he was held by him. At the same time Col. John C. Hays whose term as Sher- iff of San Francisco had expired was appointed surveyor general of the State, then in some re- spects more important than that of collector, as the work under his control involved surveys over a territory of vast extent with diversified interests with accompanying patronage.
The return of Major Hammond and Colonel Hays to California with commissions placing them at the head of these two commanding positions on the Pacific coast, was an event which produced some excitement at the time and led to notable results. Among these was the union of the two families by the marriage of Major Hammond to Mrs. Sally E. Lea, the sister of Colonel Hays and widow of a prominent planter in Louisiana, Dr. Lea. She had come out to the Pacific coast with a large number of the wives and families of newly appointed Federal officials, headed by Mrs. Gwin, the astute and accomplished wife of the then Sen- ator. Colonel Hays during his incumbency as Sheriff had revisited Texas and returned with a young wife, a Calvert, descended from the old Maryland family of that name, and known and beloved by all as "Mrs. Susan." Among other families in this immigration were those of Judges Thornton and Thompson, of the Court of Claims, Colonel Inge, U. S. district attorney, ex-Governor Foote, of Mississippi, all of Southern proclivitites, constituting a brilliant society in those early times moving in accord with the political leaders. Thus it was that the Hagerstown boys joined hands with those hailing from the extreme South-West, and in one of the most trying periods of the State, exercised a decided influence. It was during these stormy times that I abandoned the practice of law and accepted the position of assistant editor and reporter in the office of the Daily Herald which had been suddenly vacated by "General" Walker (as he was afterwards known) the commander-in- chief of the filibustering expeditions which ran
their course in Mexico and Central America and ended in the capture, trial and shooting of the "General" in Honduras. The position on the Herald I found to be a very congenial one and it was with reluctance I resigned .it to accept a third interest in the "Daily Times and Transcript," the organ of the Democratic party, tendercd me by my friend, Major Hammond, upon his assump- tion of the office of collector. The conditions in- volved the general management of the paper and it was in the discharge of these that the battle against Senator Broderick and at a later date the Know-Nothing party was waged and lost. This, following upon the advocacy of "Law and Order" against the Vigilance Committee, led to the ex- tinction of the Times and Transcript, which was merged in the "Bulletin" and "Morning Call."
Buchanan Hall upon reaching San Francisco at once commenced the practice of the law in a spacious office on Montgomery street, along with an established attorney Col. Harry Huggins and Henry Clay Mudd, under the firm name of "Hug- gins, Hall & Mudd." Their business was inost promising when the great fire of 1851 swept away, not only their office but its entire contents, in- cluding the valuable library which Mr. Hall had taken with him, and all his wearing apparel not in use. This so thoroughly disgusted him with San Francisco, that he at once accepted the proposition to become the legal advisor of Col. Weber, lhe proprietor a little town on the San Joaquin River, called Tulesburg, upon the area of which the young city of Stockton had been laid out by his brother-in-law, Maj. Hammond as engineer. There exclusively devoted to the practice of his profession, the remainder of his life was passed. In the death of his wife, which occurred some ten years ago, devoted as he was to domestic life, the loss would have been irreparable but for the com- panionship of his son and affectionate care of his daughter, Mary Buchanan, who assumed the re- sponsibilities of the household, in which, to the end, he found an ideal home.
Dr. Lind, as Senator from the important min- ing county in which he had served among that population as a physician, was a valuable auxiliary in the legislature to the opponents of Broderick and the Extension Bill. Upon the expiration of his term as Senator he was called to San Francisco by Major Hammond to take charge, as resident physician, of the new U. S. Marine Hospital then just completed and opened, of which the collector
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HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD
of the port had ex-officio, entire control. This was a large and beautiful structure on Rincon Hill, overlooking. from the south, the city, and a delightful home which was occupied by Dr. Lind till his return to Philadelphia where his days were ended.
The distinction shown the former Ilagers- towner by the President, in appointing him of his own accord to perhaps the most lucrative, and cer- tainly one of the most important, positions in his gift on the Pacific coast, seemed to revive, in the former home of its recipient, the enthusiasın of 1849, and on his return to California the new collector of the port was accompanied by a host of old associates and friends, adding largely to the Washington County contingent which already fill- ed an important place in the newly acquired terri- tory. At a later period and about the close of the Civil War this contingent was enhanced by the addition of an entire family, that of Mr. Peregrine Fitzhugh who, with his wife and five of his daughters and a son removed bodily to San Francisco and entered upon a new life upon the Pacific coast. There, surrounded by their child- ren and their grandchildren, a few years since they closed their lives-Mr. Fitzhugh at the age of eighty-six and his wife, eighty-four. Mr. Fitz- hugh's father was Peregrine Fitzhugh and mother, Sophia Clagett. sister of the late David, Samuel and Hezekiah Clagett and of the wife of Dr. Fred- erick Dorsey, Sr. As nephew and heir of his aunt, the widow of the late Benjamin Galloway, Mr. Fitzhugh inherited a very large estate in this and Frederick counties and Baltimore city, amnong which were C'atoctin Furnace and the home of the Galloways, now one of the land marks of Hagers- town on the lot at the corner of Washington and Jonathan streets, owned by Edward W. Mealey, Esq., upon the rear of which, on Jonathan street, donated by the present proprietor, stands the Washington County Free Library. William, the only son of Mr. Fitzhugh, became a graduate of the University of California. His daughters are, (1). Mary Pottinger Fitzhugh, married Dr. May- nard McPherson, of Maryland, now living in Cal- ifornia with their children: Margaret Touchard, Isabelle Fitzhugh MeCrackin and William Smith MePherson, secretary of the Sierra Mining Co. and the Gold Hill Water Works. (2), Sophia Fitzhugh, wife of Major MePherson, with two children : Mary Buchanan and Fitzhugh MePher-
son, of San Francisco. (3), Isabelle Perryman, dec'd. (4), Meta McP. Fitzhugh, wife of Gen. Howard Thompson, of the Bank of California and their two children: Dr. Thompson and Meta, of California. (5), Catharine Fitzhugh, wife of William Hammond Hall, who with their three daughters, Anna, Catharine and Margaret, reside in the delightful residential section of San Fran- cisco, midway between the ocean and the bay.
William Hammond Hall, born in Hagerstown, was quite a lad, when with his mother he joined his father John Buchanan Hall, in Stockton. Thus at the early age and at the mouth of the San Joaquin River, the entreport of the great southern mining counties of the State, whose waters bore down not only the gold but the wash- ings of the Sierras, he commenced a practical edu- cation in connection with his technical studies of hydrology and mining, which elevated him to the highest rank in his profession. The washpan and the rocker of early days have been superceded by the hydraulic system, whereby the waters of the Sierras are conducted from their heights through canals and flumes across gulches to gold bearing deposits below, which, with mighty force, deftly applied washes away the mountain side. The same system gradually extended to the irrigation of the valleys, renders also the agricultural interest dependant in a great degree, upon the scientific application of the waters of the State, thus exalt- ing the profession of the engineer to the highest rank and most useful vocation within its borders.
It was as such that Mr. Hall entered upon his work not only as a professional but a practical man of business, and as the author of a series of works upon mining engineering in general, but particularly devoted to hydraulic interests. These works are considered of the highest authority both at home and abroad and have been translated into the languages of a number of foreign countries where they are used as text books and have elicited from those countries many medals of value and other distinctions. As an official and professional engineer from his manhood to the present time Mr. Hall's place of residence has been the city of San Francisco. One of his early official positions was that of engineer of the Golden Gate Park which was laid out by him. Later he filled the office of State Engineer with offices at the Capitol. Some years after the collapse of the Jamison episode in the Transvaal, South Africa, in which his cousin,
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