History of Baltimore, Maryland, from its founding as a town to the current year, 1729-1898, including its early settlement and development; a description of its historic and interesting localities; political, military, civil, and religious statistcs; biographies of representative citizens, etc., etc, Part 2

Author: Shepherd, Henry Elliott, 1844-1929, ed. 4n
Publication date: 1898
Publisher: [Uniontown? Pa.] S.B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1344

USA > Maryland > Baltimore County > Baltimore City > History of Baltimore, Maryland, from its founding as a town to the current year, 1729-1898, including its early settlement and development; a description of its historic and interesting localities; political, military, civil, and religious statistcs; biographies of representative citizens, etc., etc > Part 2

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"Moale" having six acres and one hundred and ten square perches, and "Stigar" eleven acres and fifty-six square perches; and again in the same year (1781) the same amount of land was added by the act of the General Assembly of Maryland, the lots be- ing the property of John Moale and Andrew Stigar. A large part of the property of Wil- liam Fell was also taken into the town bythe same act. In fact the growth of the town was such that in 1782 "Lun's Lot," "How- ard's Timber Neck," "Parker's Haven," "Kemp's Addition" and "Gist's Inspection" were incorporated with it.

A tax of twelve shillings and six pence was levied this year on every foot front im- proved and unimproved lots in those parts of the streets fixed on to be paved or that may have been already paved by the special commissioners. A four-wheeled riding car- riage was taxed thirty shillings per year; chairs or sulkies, fifteen shillings per year.

The play house was taxed fifty pounds per year. An additional tax of thirty shil- lings was imposed on every chimney catch- ing fire. A householder who neglected to sweep into the cartway, the dirt off of the footway, was to be fined five shillings.

And so from time to time, the laws and ordinances were made which now in a large measure make up the present "city code," a volume which contains upwards of a thousand pages.

The original Baltimore Town and Jones's Town had been joined together in 1743, and thirty years later (1773) "Fell's Point" was added.

Fell's Point was always a nest of sailors, and at the time of which we write and for many years afterwards, was the centre of the shipping industry of the port. Here

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

lived captains, petty officers and thousands of native sailors. Tar and pitch were pre- eminent. Rope walks abounded, joiner worker shops, ship-smiths forges, and were sandwiched between sailors' boarding houses and ship chandlers' stores. Large and growing ship-yards lined the water front, and the stocks were burdened with the vessels of the time, all very much smaller than the leviathans of to-day, but amounting in the year 1790, for the small town of Baltimore, having not more than 13,000 inhabitants, to the following enor- mous total of twenty-seven ships, one snow, thirty-one brigatines, thirty-four schooners and nine sloops, a total of one hundred and two vessels.

To the Point came the rich English and Irish planters, to purchase their trades peo- ple and schoolmasters, for be it remembered that a large plantation had its own black- smiths, shoemakers, weavers, masons, car- penters and schoolmasters, etc., and in the very rich families, hairdressers and teachers of polite deportment, and the use of the small sword and rapier.

The newspapers of the day contained many advertisements that appear to us al- most incredible, our habits, customs and modes of life having undergone more change than ever before in the history of the world in the same period of time. Here is one from a paper of this period:

BALTIMORE, Nov. 8th, 1774.

"Just arriving in the ship Neptune, Capt. Lambert Wilkes, from London, a num- ber of likely, healthy, indented servants, viz: Tailors, butchers, barbers, masons, black- smiths, tanners, carpenters, turners, stay- makers, schoolmasters, brass founders, grooms, brickmakers, clothiers, clerks, saw-

yers, gardeners, scourers and dyers, watch and clock-makers, weavers, printers, silver- smiths, biscuit bakers, several farmers and laborers, several women, viz: spinsters, mantua-makers, etc., whose indentures are to be disposed of on reasonable terms by John Corntwait, James Williamson and the Captain on board."

Soon after this advertisement was printed another appeared, which should also have place.

Nov. 12th, 1774.

"On board the Neptune lying at Balti- more, - I. Williams, late vinturer in London, who has served as valet de cham- ber to several noblemen. His last place was that of Butler to the Duke of Bolton, and for these few years past kept a large tavern, but through honest principals sur- rendered his all and was thereby reduced to bankruptcy. He shaves, dresses hair, is thorough master of the wine trade and tav- ern business, likewise understands brewing and cookery; would willingly engage with any gentleman, hair-dresser or tavern keeper :- Also a young man, who has a col- lege education, would be glad to engage as an usher or private tutor in a gentleman's family-He can teach the minuet, cotillion, etc., etc., and writes all the law hands. Any gentleman wanting such persons by apply- ing to the above ship, within fourteen days from the date thereof, will be treated with on the most reasonable terms."

During the Revolution, Baltimore was a most important factor not only from the circumstance that as part of the State her quota of troops for the patriot armies was always full, but she kept the struggling col- onies supplied with iron, the product of more than fifty furnaces, and with bread and

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

flour, of which enormous quantities were manufactured. The following letters will be interesting in this connection:

PROVIDENCE, Feb. 18, 1777.

Sir: Thevery great scarcity of flour, bread and iron in this State, and the danger of the inhabitants suffering for want of these nec- essary articles, have induced the council of war to fit out the sloop "Diamond," Tim- othy Coffin, Master, to your address to pro- cure them.

We enclose you a draft upon the conti- nantal treasurer for a sufficient sum of money to take her, and desire that you will put on board ten tons of bar iron, if to be procured, otherwise fifteen tons of pig iron, to fill her hold with flour, and her steerage and cabin with as much bread as she can, with any convenience take in.

I am in behalf of the State sir,

Your most obedient servant,

NICHOLAS COOKE, Governor. To

Samuel Purviance, Esq., Baltimore, Maryland.

The inscription on Cooke's monument in Providence says he "merited and won the approbation of his fellow-citizens, and was honored with the friendship and confidence of Washington."

PORTSMOUTH, NEW ENGLAND, Feb. 20, 1777.

Gentlemen :-

I lately received an order from the hon- orable continental marine committee, to send two small vessels to Baltimore for iron and flour on account of the continent, to your address; in consequence of which I have sent the schooner "Dove," Capt. James Miller, by whom this will be handed

you, and by whom you will please ship as much iron and flour as the schooner will carry with safety, on account of the United States of America. As I am in much want of iron, you will please ship as large a pro- portion of that article as the vessel will bear. I shall want, for the use of the con- tinent, at least forty tons of iron this sea- son, the whole of which I hope will be sent or more in the "Friend's Adventure," which will sail in a few days for your place. Pray let about two and a half tons of iron be in very wide bars, suitable for making fire places on board ships; should also be glad of about two tons of nail rods assorted.

Col. Whipple, who is one of the hon- orable committee, has wrote me from Bal- timore, that you would load and dispatch the vessel on account of the continent. I am, with all due respect, gentlemen,

Your most obedient servant,

JOHN LANGDON. To

Messrs. Saml. & Robert,

Purviance, Baltimore.

In view of the fact that the bloodiest bat- tle of the late war was fought at "Antietam," in this State, it is most interesting to know that the guns for the infant navy and army of the Revolution were made at the same place. The writer has seen a letter from Mr. S. Hughes, who operated the "Antie- tam Furnace," in which he says, under date of March 10, 1776: "It gives me great con- cern to hear of your being in so much dan- ger in Baltimore, and my not having it in my power to send so many guns as I ex- pected.

"I have sent one yesterday and three go to-day, which have stood the proof of 74 bbs. powder, two balls and two wads at first

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

and 6 bbs. powder, two balls and two wads the second time.

"I shall continue to send as many as will stand this proof and as fast as we can finish them."

The following extract from a letter writ- ten by Gen. Richard Henry Lee, dated Philadelphia, May 6, 1776, will show the kind of men the English Government sent over to subdue the colonists. He says: "A late arrival from Port L'Orient, with thir- teen tons of powder and thirty tons of salt- petre, brings us a Cork paper near the mid- dle of March, by which we learn that more than 40,000 men would sail from Ports- mouth and Greenock, about the first of April, for North America. They consist of Hessians, Hanoverians, Mecklenburgers, Scotch Hollanders and Scotch Highland- ers, with some British regiments."

In June, 1770, a town meeting was held in Baltimore complaining of the inhab- itants of Newport, in Rhode Island, having violated the "non-importation agreement," which had been entered into by the people of Baltimore, in May, 1769, according to the resolutions of Boston of August, 1768.

Philadelphia had also broken the agree- ment, so that in the year 1770, October 24th, it was resolved that the people of Baltimore were determined to depart from the non- importation agreement, and import every kind of goods from Great Britain, such only excepted on which duties are or hereafter may be imposed by the Parliament of Great Britain.

After the passage of the British Parlia- ment of the bill known as the "Boston Port Bill," which was intended to shut out the people of Boston from all commercial inter- course with every part of the world, a town

meeting was called at "Fanueil Hall," May 13, 1774. It was voted that if the other col- onists would come into a joint resolution to stop all importations from Great Britain, and every part of the West Indies, till the act authorizing the blockade of the harbor be repealed, the same will prove the salva- tion of North America and her liberties.

The resolutions were transmitted to the people of Baltimore, in a letter from Mr. Samuel Adams, to Mr. William Lux, of Baltimore. "From a very early period the various colonies had been trying to form some kind of a confederation, and in the mother country the same idea had taken root, for immediately after the restoration Charles II created a council for Foreign Plantations, which strange to say met on July 4, 1660. The following extract is taken from their report and will show the trend of their thoughts: "We have judged it meete and necessary that so many remote Colonies and Governments, soe many ways considerable to our crowne and dignitie and to wch wee do beare soe good an esteeme and affection, should now longer remain in a loose and scattered but should be col- lected and brought under such an uniform inspeccon and conduct that Wee may the better apply our royale councells to their future regulacon securitie and improve- ment." It was made the duty of this body to correspond with the Governors of the colonies, and to devise means to bring them into "a more certain civil and uniform gov- ernment."

The first invitation came from Maryland in 1677, when an invitation was sent to Vir- ginia and New York, to meet at Albany and conclude a treaty of peace with the Sen- eca Indians. In August of that year a con-

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

ference was held with that tribe; at this meeting the North and the South met for the first time. One after another of the colonies or their foremost statesmen made and published various plans, the last offered before the final adoption of the present Constitution being the one offered by the immortal Benjamin Franklin, July 21, 1775, in which among the many novel propositions was one calling on any and every colony of Great Britain upon the continent of North America, viz: West In- dia Islands, Quebec, St. John's, Nova Scotia, Bermudas and the East and West Floridas, and Ireland.

A meeting was called May 27th of "the freeholders and gentlemen of Baltimore county" by a committee composed of the following named gentlemen: Robert Alex- ander, Robert Christie, Sen. Isaac VanBib- ber, Thomas Harrison, John Boyd, Samuel Purviance, Jr., Andrew Buchanan, William Buchanan, John Moale, William Smith, William Lux and John Smith. After pass- ing a series of patriotic resolutions, which wound up with an order to publish the pro- ceedings "to evince to all the world the sense they entertain of the invasion of their constitutional rights and liberties."

They appointed a committee to a general meeting at Annapolis.

What makes this Baltimore meeting so important in the history of our city and country, is the fact that the first suggestion of a general congress of all the colonies was made by it. The 4th resolution, read- ing, "For the appointment of delegates to attend a general congress of deputies from each county in the State, to be held at An- napolis, and delegates to attend a general congress from the other colonies."

The reply of the Virginia Committee to the letter, enclosing the resolutions of the Baltimore Committee, dated August 4th, is as follows: "The expediency and necessity, however, of a general congress of deputies from different colonies was so obvious, that the meeting have already come to the reso- lutions respecting it," so that we may con- clude that the first immortal congress of these United States was conceived in Balti- more. A body of men, which as Lord Chatham says, "for solidity of reasoning, force of sagacity and wisdom of conclusion under such a complication of difficult cir- cumstances, no nation or body of men can stand in preference to the general congress at Philadelphia."

Before the three settlements of "Jones's Town," Fell's Point" and "Baltimore town," are forever blotted out and incor- porated under the grander and more im- posing title of the "City of Baltimore," let us see what was their general character and appearance.

"Jones's Town" was the oldest; at least one hundred and seven years had passed since David Jones had located on Jones's Falls, somewhere about the neighborhood of Centre street, and sixty-seven years had passed since William Fell had built his first store house on the "Point," and set up in business as a ship carpenter. He was an old-fashioned English carpenter, plodding along, building short stumpy brigs and the curious looking vessels of the period called ketches, rigged with two masts, which were placed in nearly the position of the main and mizzen-masts of a ship, thus leaving a clear deck forward of the main-mast, and bay sloops, which for a long time main- tained themselves as the common carriers

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

of our inland sea. Seventy-five years later, on the very spot, were produced those won- ders of the sea, the "Baltimore clippers," many of them capable of making 14 to 17 knots, and in their construction and rigging so far in advance of any that had existed that they soon revolutionized ship building all over the world. "Jones's Town" at this period, was, so to speak, a very old town for the colonies, and the original log houses must have given way long before the year 1797, the year of the consolidation, to better ones of frame and brick; in fact we know that this did take place, because many brick houses are still standing more than a hun- dred years old in the streets and alleys of what was "Jones's town, now known as Limerick." The occupations followed by the inhabitants differed materially from the maritime callings of "Fell's Point."

Here flour millers, blacksmiths, turners, staymakers, tanners, brass founders, rag car- pet weavers, mantua-makers and sawyers manufactured and lived according to the primitive methods then in vogue. Every- body had some trade or occupation as shown by the old directories. All the "Quality," with one or two exceptions, lived on their estates far from busy towns, with the exception of Annapolis, which from a very early period had been the home of the best people of the province, who pre- ferred a town at all, to the magnificent es- tates and manors of their relations and friends who liked the freedom of the "For- est."

The Hon. John P. Kennedy, late Secre- tary of the Navy, has given a most inter- esting picture of Baltimore town soon after the Revolution. "It was a treat," says he, for our ancestors to look upon this little

Baltimore town, springing forward with such elastic bound to be something of note in the great Republic.

Market street had shot like a snake out of a toy box, up as high as "Congress Hall," with its variegated range of low- browed, hip-roofed wooden houses, stand- ing forward and back out of line like an ill- dressed regiment. Some houses were painted blue, some yellow, some white, and here and there a more pretending mansion of brick, with windows after the pattern of a multiplication table, square and many paned, and great wastes of wall between the stories; some with court-yards in front, and trees in whose shade truant boys and ragged negroes "skyed coppers" and played marbles. This avenue was enlivened with matrons and damsels; some with looped skirts, some in brocade luxuriantly displayed over hoops, with comely bodies supported by stays dis- closing perilous waists, and with sleeves that clung to the arm as far as the elbow, where they were lost in ruffles that stood off like feathers on a bantam.

And then such faces, so rosy, spirited and sharp; with hair drawn over a cushion tight enough to lift the eye-brow into a rounder curve, giving pungent, supercilious expres- sion to the countenance; and curls that fell in cataracts upon the shoulders.

Then they stepped away with such a mincing gait, in shoes of many colors with formidable points at the toes, and high tot- tering heels delicately cut in wood and in towering peaked hats, garnished with feathers that swayed aristocratically back- ward and forward at each step, as if they took pride in the stately pace of the wearer.

"In the train of these goody groups came

21.

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

the gallants, who upheld the chivalry of the age, cavaliers of the old school, full of starch and powder; most of them the iron gentle- men of the Revolution, with leather faces, old campaigners, renowned for long stories -not long enough from the camp to lose their military brusquerie and dare-devil swagger; proper roystering blades, who had not long ago got out of harness and begun to affect the elegancies of civil life; all in three-cornered cocked hats and powdered hair and cues, and light colored coats with narrow capes and long backs and pockets on each hip, small clothes and striped stockings, shoes with great buckles, and long steel watch chains suspended on agate seals, in the likeness of the old sound- ing boards above pulpits.

"It was a sight worth seeing when one of these weather-beaten gallants accosted a lady. There was a bow which required the width of the pavement, a scrape of the foot and the cane thrust with a flourish under the left arm and projecting behind in a par- allel line with the cue. And nothing could be more piquant than the lady's return of the salutation, in a courtesy that brought her with bridled chin and most winning glance half way to the ground."

Having glanced at the homes and indus- tries of the people composing the other towns, which were to be co-partners in the consolidation about to take place, let us see what kind of a place was "Baltimore town." Sixty-seven years had passed since Philip Jones, the surveyor, had driven his first stake; the rough ravine scarred sixty acres had been slowly taking form and shape, streets, lanes, alleys and wharfs gave the town somewhat the appearance of an Eng- lish colonial seaport. Here were combined

many of the characteristics which obtained in the other two, together with the world- encircling business of the merchants. Here then in this new town were founded the. princely merchant houses, which did busi- ness with farthest India, Liverpool, Bristol, London, Cork and Belfast, the Canary Is- lands and every port of the Mediterranean.

In many other ways it partook of the- characteristics of the other towns. Many small factories started, such as cordwaining, rope making and the forging of all kinds. of ships' irons, from the very largest anchor, with its necessary chains, to a dead-eye bolt or a marling spike. From a very early period, the exportation of tobacco had been the principal business of the Province, and much of it had been loaded in the small bay ports or in creeks and rivers in front of the large plantations, but now that the Eng- lish Province had changed its political char- acter and become one of the Free and In- dependent. States, the bulk of the tobacco crop was either hauled in wagons or ship- ped to Baltimore by small bay vessels, and the English "Factors," who had been lo- cated at various accessible points, notably at Elkridge Landing, near Baltimore, An- napolis and in St. Mary's and Calvert coun- ties, had gone home, this profitable busi- ness having passed into the hands of Ger- man and American tobacco merchants. These enterprising men soon built up a. market for the great Maryland staple in France, Germany, Holland and Italy, as well as in England. It is noteworthy that to- day we sell the French Government about twelve thousand hogsheads, or, say, one- third of our crop, and Italy, which also has a Government monopoly of tobacco, takes.

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

a large quantity of our home-grown pro- duct.

Tobacco was to Baltimore what coal is to Newcastle, and to-day the venerable State warehouses built for the accommodation of the planters and for the proper storage and handling of the crop, attest by their enor- mous size its importance, in fact for many years it was the medium of exchange, cur- rency and barter.

To-day, now nearing the twilight of the nineteenth century, and more than two hun- dred and fifty years since it was first planted in the Province, it holds its own and gives employment to thousands of persons in every stage of its cultivation, curing and manufacture. The growing of tobacco, corn and wheat required many slaves and indentured servants, and while the laws for their proper protection were just and wise, they were in fact very severe upon master, mistress or overseer. If a man or woman was "hired for wages," or by indenture, they were liable to be taken up as "run- aways" if caught ten miles from home with- out written permission, and ten days service was added for each day's absence.

Thus in the three small settlements, "Jonestown," "Fell's Point," and "Balti- more Town," were at the time of the final consolidation full of all the essentials that go to make up a great city. Crude and un- couth in many ways, the houses, ships and stores, no doubt very small and primitive judged by our modern standard, but like all the efforts of the race that landed at Ebbsfleet, under Hengest, they came to stay, and of all the races of men the Anglo- Saxon is the best colonist, because he can more easily adapt himself to the climate, conditions, advantages and defects of what-

ever country he makes his home than any other race.

The advantages of this particular locality, however, over-balanced any drawbacks, and the early colonists of Maryland could not find words fine enough to express their affirmation of the place in which their for- tunes were cast.

The Constitution of the United States having gone into effect in 1789, one of the first acts of the Government was to take a census of the inhabitants, which was accom- plished in the following year, 1790. The population of "Baltimore Town,"was found to be 13,503. This was seven years previous to the consolidation of the three towns un- der discussion, an event the most important in their history, as it marked the birth of one of the great cities of the world.

It is to be regretted that we have no pic- ture of the young and growing municipal- ity, but we know this that it was larger then than any other town in the State to-day, its harbor filled with ships of all rigs and car- goes of every kind, and from almost every port in the world; the great merchants be- came noted for the custom of selling only by the cargo.

No event in the history of the city ever gave it such an impetus as the opening of the great National Road, which commenced at Cumberland, the road connecting Balti- more with that place being a much older one, being constructed and owned by as- sociations or individuals, the two together constituting the National Road. This road is the only highway of its kind ever wholly constructed by the Government of the United States, and was to Baltimore what the "Ap- pian Way" was to Rome, and the present city is about twice the size of Rome. The

HISTORY OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

honor of its conception has been given to Henry Clay, but recent research makes it evident that the first suggestion of the wis- dom of building such a road must be ac- corded to Albert Gallatin, the Swiss, who had come to the United States in 1780, against the wishes of his family, his excuse being that he wanted to "drink in a love for independence in the freest country of the universe." He was at the time he made the suggestion Secretary of the Treasury under Jefferson.

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Author: Shepherd, Henry Elliott, 1844-1929, ed. 4n Publication date: 1898 Publisher: [Uniontown? Pa.] S.B. Nelson Number of Pages: 1344

Author: Shepherd, Henry Elliott, 1844-1929, ed. 4n
Publication date: 1898
Publisher: [Uniontown? Pa.] S.B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1344